Seraphon Lists - Jack's Fire Lance

[Ben]

We talked about this on the podcast @Jack Armstrong

Jack’s Fire Lance Temple Host.

Saurus Oldblood on Carnosaur – 250
Saurus Scar Veteran on Carnosaur – 210
Skink Starseer – 140
Skink Star Priest – 120 
15 Saurus Knights – 300
15 Saurus Knights – 300
10 Saurus Knights – 200
10 Skinks – 60
10 Skinks – 60
3 Salamanders – 240
Fire Lance Battalion – 160

 

Its fast and has huge damage potential in Coalesced but can also play well in Starborn.  

[Jack Armstrong]

Theory of this list is the volume of attacks that Saurus Knights get (7 per model) which aren't particularly good, but when combined with the Starpriest's 6's to wound are a MW means they can put out a good amount of damage.

So you deploy and send in the Cav in waves, also giving them exploding hits on 6's, plus 1 to hit and the natural plus 1 to hit from Koatl Claw mean they are hitting on 2/3's for all their statline.  Then you have spells, either rr hits of 1's, immune to battle shock and +1 armour save and you have a really nasty unit.  With the +1 to run and charge constellation they can move up 8" and then charge up to 18" away and get +4 to the roll of 3D6.

The salamanders give you some shooting threat and also very good combat damage and then the two mounted characters for follow up. 

 

As Ben says it can also play well in Starborne.  The Cav lose two attacks a model but can be deployed and teleported or 'remembered' by the Slann (you would probably go Draco tail sub-faction).  Here they would get the natural 6's are MW from the Firelance formation along with the ability from the Starpriest.  The starseer again is really important to make sure you're getting those 9" charges off.

Have some games and let me know what you think.

Jack

[swarmofseals]

@Jack Armstrong Just listened to the podcast yesterday and enjoyed it a great deal. Thanks for your comments! My initial instincts for a Coalesced list were very close to this, with the most significant difference being that I tried to include a large block of Saurus as well for objectives. I was a bit concerned about the relatively low model count in a fully knights focused list. I imagine you found the bodies in your list to be sufficient?

[Frowny]

I think this theory will make a strong list, but I think you've taken the theory too far.

In real games, I think You will struggle to fit 15 cavalry bases into combat. You may also struggle to fit more than 1 unit wholly within 12 of all your buff pieces.

I would consider dropping the knights to 10-10-5 or even 10-5-5. This gives you 300points to play with. I would consider adding a different dimension of threat. The same buff pieces also affect saurus, so one direction is a block of 40 Saurus with Spears to be the 2nd wave. Another direction would be to increase one of your skink units to 40 for a turn 1 threat with their blowpipes+venom, since even with the buffs you may not be able to do much if given turn 1 and they deploy back a few inches. 8+3+10.5=21.5, not quite getting there on a 24 inch zone.

I also think kroak+astrolith+balewind is 450 or so might be a nice different dimension of attack and you already have 2 wizards to benefit from the +1 to cast.

I also think turning one of the skink units I to either allied tree revenants or chameleon skinks will be strong. Pinning units in the backfield to hold objectives has been great for me in other armies.

Lots of possible directions to go

[swarmofseals]

@Frowny you know who @Jack Armstrong is right? I think he is probably quite aware of the challenges of his unit sizes!

[Jack Armstrong]

I hadn't actually played with the list and when i did I found myself agreeing with quite a few of Frowny's points!

 

I like a unit of Chameleons to sit off the board and threaten for objective play.  I also found the sweet spot for Knights to be 10's for mainline buffable units and 5's for quite good flanking units or objective holders.  Adding in some Saurus also help, specially in the Sunclaw Starhost for 4 r1 attacks a model.

 

The latest version of the list is:

Carno Oldblood

Starpriest x 2

40/20/20 Saurus Warriors 

10/10/5/5 Knights

5 Chameleons

Sunclaw Temple Host

 

[Alan Mandelson]

Sunclaw battalions require an Oldblood on foot (not keyworded in the battalion) or a Sunblood. It would be nice for and Oldblood on Carno to be in that battalion as the benefits would be great for the unit bad sadly not available.

[Fiddybucks]

On 3/17/2020 at 11:41 AM, Alan Mandelson said:

Sunclaw battalions require an Oldblood on foot (not keyworded in the battalion) or a Sunblood. It would be nice for and Oldblood on Carno to be in that battalion as the benefits would be great for the unit bad sadly not available.

You can use either old blood because carnosaur is a subheader. 

[DrDoom]

I've seen a handful of recent Seraphon lists and they are all really heavy on skinks and slann. Does this list have enough teeth to compete without the summoning? I keep hearing how awesome salamanders are, maybe less knights for some salamanders or bastiladon? I can easily see where losing teleporting isn't a big deal with how many units are on the table to begin with.