Children of the Horned Rat - Rise of the Skaven

[Zoie Shales]

So, Playing through the grand campaign as the Empire, I saw a event where the population of a town was lowering, as if people just vanished overnight, and strange triangular symbols where made on walls, this sounds awfuly like the Skaven. Whats more, I looked at the Blighted Marsh , the location where Skavenblight is by Estalia and Tilea, Theres no dark spires of doom or anything but Im thinking that may change in the future.

Im aware the Russian leaks said Skaven where comeing out as DLC10, so it will be a while probabbly, but I would love to the rats being in total war no matter how long the wait.

What do you all think of about the verminous rat-people that everyone else trys so despretely to pretend don't exist? Do you think Thanquol or Ikit Claw may be legendary lords? What units like the Doomwheel, Screaming Bell, or Hell-Pit Abomination would you like to see?

[err151]

The Skaven were my main army for most of my tabletop Warhammer Fantasy career, so I have a particular soft spot for the jumped up, paranoid, back stabbing little bastards.

I'd honestly almost like to see CA bring back the Realm Break or Civil War mechanics from Shogun and Rome with them somehow. Half of the dark humor of the Skaven came from the sheer number of times their ultimate triumph as a race was undone by their own propensity towards near compulsive levels of backstabbing and betrayal. Though, I suspect we might just get something similar to the fightyness meter that the Greenskins and Beastmen have. We'll have to wait and see though.

For Legendary Lords, Grey Seer Thanqual seems like the logical choice for a "caster" LL. Dude is, probably without question, the most famous Skaven character, since he's been in multiple novels and has pretty much been in every army book since 4th Edition.

For a combaty one...I want to say Queek Head-Taker. He got the canonical kill on King Belgar of Karak Eight Peaks during the End Times, and is unique amongst Skaven leaders for leading from the front, getting stuck right in combat, and not running away from challenges of combat. With Thanqual's more cowardly nature on the other end, the pair would make for a nice study in contrasts.

I would also like to see the Under Empire shown off "right", maybe as some kind of secondary map, running under the main. Though, again, I suspect they'll just have more of an access to the Underway stance like Dwarfs and Greenskins. CA are foolish man-things after all. They definatly shouldn't be a horde army though. Amongst all the Chaos factions, one could argue they're the most 'civilized' as they build cities in kind of a warped parody and exageration of human squallor.

I will be *very* displeased if they're missing Doomwheels from their war machines though. Doomwheels are pure, distilled, awesome.

[Zoie Shales]

Publicado originalmente por err151:

The Skaven were my main army for most of my tabletop Warhammer Fantasy career, so I have a particular soft spot for the jumped up, paranoid, back stabbing little bastards.

I'd honestly almost like to see CA bring back the Realm Break or Civil War mechanics from Shogun and Rome with them somehow. Half of the dark humor of the Skaven came from the sheer number of times their ultimate triumph as a race was undone by their own propensity towards near compulsive levels of backstabbing and betrayal. Though, I suspect we might just get something similar to the fightyness meter that the Greenskins and Beastmen have. We'll have to wait and see though.

For Legendary Lords, Grey Seer Thanqual seems like the logical choice for a "caster" LL. Dude is, probably without question, the most famous Skaven character, since he's been in multiple novels and has pretty much been in every army book since 4th Edition.

For a combaty one...I want to say Queek Head-Taker. He got the canonical kill on King Belgar of Karak Eight Peaks during the End Times, and is unique amongst Skaven leaders for leading from the front, getting stuck right in combat, and not running away from challenges of combat. With Thanqual's more cowardly nature on the other end, the pair would make for a nice study in contrasts.

I would also like to see the Under Empire shown off "right", maybe as some kind of secondary map, running under the main. Though, again, I suspect they'll just have more of an access to the Underway stance like Dwarfs and Greenskins. CA are foolish man-things after all. They definatly shouldn't be a horde army though. Amongst all the Chaos factions, one could argue they're the most 'civilized' as they build cities in kind of a warped parody and exageration of human squallor.

I will be *very* displeased if they're missing Doomwheels from their war machines though. Doomwheels are pure, distilled, awesome.

Tottally agree with you, maybe make Queek Head-Taker immune to psycology by the sound of it. doomwheels are a must, Im also hopeing the Screaming bell and Hell Pit Abomination too just cause I actally want to see how they look and sound, Ive only seen pictures and models. And give Thanqual Boneripper as a unique mount.

[Jack Deth]

Units I don't expect to see would be the Verminlord, rat swarms and 1 or two of the weapon crews. Outside of that I see the biggies being the bell and HPA. I see packmasters being things you can put on a hero or general for a buff to giant rats and/or rat ogres.

I'd guess they would go with Queek for one and either Thanquol or Ikit. Most likely Thanquol as they could relese Ikit in a clan pack. I also forsee Plague monks and their magic being released in a FLC/DLC format. Heroes would probably be something like a chieftan, engineer and assassin.

Queek should have hates dwarves/gobbos from the start for that bonus.

I agree they'd probably do something like the fightyness meter but I was thinking. What if they based it on the black hunger...and took it in a different direction. So it works the same, the more time you go without fighting the more the meter drops. The lower it drops the more damage your army suffers but the lower it drops the stronger your army gets.

The black hunger is said to make skaven very violent, more brave or less cowardly out of a necessity to survive . Essentially they have to eat due to a high metabolism, if they go too long without it survival mode kicks in and they tend to become rabid like. Anyways, the mechanic would be similar but different as it actually offers a balancing aspect to it where if you play your cards and units right then your force can be rather powerful.

Just a thought though, at the very least I hope it isn't just a copy past of the beastmen/orc mechanic.

[Zoie Shales]

Publicado originalmente por WHATAHORRIBLENIGHTTOHAVEACURSE.:

Units I don't expect to see would be the Verminlord, rat swarms and 1 or two of the weapon crews. Outside of that I see the biggies being the bell and HPA. I see packmasters being things you can put on a hero or general for a buff to giant rats and/or rat ogres.

I'd guess they would go with Queek for one and either Thanquol or Ikit. Most likely Thanquol as they could relese Ikit in a clan pack. I also forsee Plague monks and their magic being released in a FLC/DLC format. Heroes would probably be something like a chieftan, engineer and assassin.

Queek should have hates dwarves/gobbos from the start for that bonus.

I agree they'd probably do something like the fightyness meter but I was thinking. What if they based it on the black hunger...and took it in a different direction. So it works the same, the more time you go without fighting the more the meter drops. The lower it drops the more damage your army suffers but the lower it drops the stronger your army gets.

The black hunger is said to make skaven very violent, more brave or less cowardly out of a necessity to survive . Essentially they have to eat due to a high metabolism, if they go too long without it survival mode kicks in and they tend to become rabid like. Anyways, the mechanic would be similar but different as it actually offers a balancing aspect to it where if you play your cards and units right then your force can be rather powerful.

Just a thought though, at the very least I hope it isn't just a copy past of the beastmen/orc mechanic.

The black hunger, yes, think that would be like the fightiness but maybe they can do something with that. Queek can have immunity to psycology and be strong vs dwarves and gobblins, and maybe the Verminlord, rat swarms and 1 or two of the weapon crews can be added in at a later time, who knows. I hope they can colinise everywhere, and yea, not be a copy/paste of other factions, they have too much potentual to be.

[Jack Deth]

Though I haven't played a Skaven army since around 2000 I think the biggest problem they have is they are filled with so many unique, fun and funny units.

That's really why I was thinking we wouldn't see the vermindlord or rat swarms as well as maybe the grinder and plague mortar at first as those roles would be filled by other things. Love to see the verminlord and all weapon crews implemented eventually though!

And I hope the dreaded 13th does something really cool. maybe not turning an entire unit into clanrats or something but I can see them just making it a variation of the traitor-kin spell where it's just a light effect and some damage.

[Zoie Shales]

Publicado originalmente por WHATAHORRIBLENIGHTTOHAVEACURSE.:

And I hope the dreaded 13th does something really cool. maybe not turning an entire unit into clanrats or something but I can see them just making it a variation of the traitor-kin spell where it's just a light effect and some damage.

The Dreaded 13th is suppose to make people eaither mutate horribly and die, or turn them into Skaven Clanrats as far as I know, hope it does something epic and not just pfffffffffz!

[err151]

Publicado originalmente por WHATAHORRIBLENIGHTTOHAVEACURSE.:

And I hope the dreaded 13th does something really cool. maybe not turning an entire unit into clanrats or something but I can see them just making it a variation of the traitor-kin spell where it's just a light effect and some damage.

That is probably my one huge quibble with this game. Magic feels very lackluster, both in terms of its effects and how it looks visually. At least in terms of the buff and debuff spells on people. The vortex and damaging ones are a little better.

But those buff spells are decidedly meh. Meh, I say!