Skaven Balanced Army build for campaign? (Early, mid, late game)

[Karsk]

I'd also be interested in suggestions as to good army builds for the three LL.

I don't do auto resolve spam. Mostly play on hard.

Thanks!

[StarofTanuki]

Early

Mostly Slave rat / slinger
some Clan rat
4 + Artillery

late early

mostly Clan rat / Slinger
some Stromvermin halberds
2 Rat orge
4+ Artillery

Mid

mosly Stromvermin
some Rat orge
some Deathrunner
some Missile unit
4 + Artillery

Late

mostly Stromvermin
1-2 Hellpit abomination
some Death runner
some Missile unit
4+ Arttilleery

need 1 Warlock engineer for buff artillery firepower and OP warp lighting

[DarkFenix]

Skaven aren't really a race for balanced armies. They lack any kind of versatile core to form it around, their infantry is all tarpit fodder, they have no cavalry, no flyers, and no proper archers. What they do have is a large number of ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥-crazy specialised units that excel in one role.

My favourite army so far was my skryre-centric army of ranged annihilation. Tretch leading (because vanguard deployment means you ALWAYS get your full range advantage), a large artillery battery (4 warp lightning cannons and 2 plagueclaws) buffed by a warlock engineer, a small force of stormvermin to tarpit surviving enemies (and believe me not much ever survives past all that artillery), a couple of death globe bombardiers to actually kill anything that reaches the stormvermin, a couple of warp fire throwers (which in hindsight I'd replace with more DGBs). And a couple of doomwheels, to delay and harass the hell out of the approaching army.

Battles all go the same way, I vanguard deploy at absolute maximum cannon range, hotkey each artillery unit individually (no wasted shots if they all target different units), and let rip (usually focusing enemy ranged units and monsters). My doomwheels go and harass any units my artillery isn't firing at. Maybe 5-6 damaged units will reach my lines, all normal infantry, which get tied down by stormvermin and annihilated by death globe bombardiers.

I've tried using monster-centric Skaven armies, but frankly they aren't very good. Rat ogres get slaughtered by even the most basic spearmen, and abominations are anti-monster units that are mediocre in other roles.

[Smash]

Your basic composition should be pretty much the same throughout the game, although very early on you will probably have to have a lot more infantry than you'd otherwise want.

I am for:

~8 Infantry to hold the line
~5 Artillery
~5 Flankers/Skirmishers/damagedealers (Doom wheel, rat ogres, death runners, globadiers)

This leaves a couple of spots free for lord and hero.

The main thing to keep in mind is your foot soldiers range from awful to okay - you'll be disadvantaged in a fair fight if you rtry and match your infantry with other race's of the same level. The Skaven game is holding down the enemy with those infantry while you get your other units to do the real damage, shooting into them with your artillery or hitting them from behind with your chargers and damage dealers.

[*! Akster !*]

Depends on your lord, army composition does not change at all throughout the entire game, except for artillery if you choose to use it/get more than what your lord starts with.

If you are using skrolk, 16 plaguemonks and 4 catapults, Skrolks spells are enough to deal with armored enemies.

Queek - 12 Skaven clan rats (not stormvermin, they are waaay overpriced especially after all the passive buffs given to clan rats that are simply overpowered), 6 rat ogres, plague hero (armor reduction) and replenishment hero. Almost never use slave rats unless forced to, they break too fast.

Normal difficulty or lower just throw whatever you want at the enemy you pretty much cant lose since you will have 20 full armies vs the enemies 2 thanks to no increased upkeep for more armies (not even counting spamming slave rats).


Dont know what DarkFenix is talking about with artillery and Tretch, since the enemy deploys out of range of your weapons anyway and you usually have an infinite amount of time to set up your army positioning however you want, and his artillery must have some magic 100% accuracy and 10x damage to deal with anything other than T1 units =P

[[R] Iglix]

Early:
As many as possible generals should be spellcasters.
Army:
4-6 ranged units, does not matter if slingers or gutter runners
Rest fill with clanrats as much as money allows.
If you run out of money, fill rest with skavslaves.

Point of this army: Your aim is not to kill enemy units in combat but to route them and then rack kills whiley they are running away.

Spellcasters spells give leadership penalty to enemy units affected by them (or damaged by those spells). Ranged units also give "under missile fire" leadership penalty.
With full army of large units you make battleline that is longer then one of enemy and on both ends you wrap enemy units with your own giving them additional "attacked from flank/rear" leadership penatly. If needed , use Menace from below to ensure these leadership penalties where you need them.
With all these leadeship penatlies stacking you should be able to rout those units on edges of battleline which will not only allow you to switch focus on rest of enemy untis but will also make them more likely to rout thanks to another leadership penalty "friendly units routing"


Mid:
Most of your generals should still be those spellcasters you hired in early game but now you can have some warlords with hero spellcasters if you like. Skaven magic is imho too good to ignore. Also it is fun.

Army:
a) 4-7 ranged units. From these at least 2 catapults. Preferably more. Catapults will get you a looong way at this stage.
Concentrate on getting those in every army even if you would have to delay getting other higher tier units.
Rest fill with best defensive units you can get in area where your lord is. Stormvermins are ideal. In pinch clanrats with shields will do if you will have enough catapults.

Point of this: Lock enemy units in combat, be wary of cavalry going for your artilery, use your artilery to dismantle enemy piece by piece. Use those few ranged units to deal with any monster unit or cavalry locked in combat.


b) 4-6 rat ogres, rest army stormvermins with Halberds

Point of this: This is simple smashy army against composition with superior ranged firepower or too much cavalry to handle with catapult heavy army. Rat ogres smash into some nice infantry units with stormvermins rushing in behind them. If possible, after initial charge of rat ogres and after stormvermins lock enemy units in combat, try to move your ogres out of combat through enemy lines to go after enemy archers. Enemy unit with rat ogres within their ranks will ussualy let them move through if you lock another mellee unit to them.


Late:
Any lord you like.
1 Hellpit A-bomb. Two if you like but not more. They are suprisingly less effective then what they look like (altough that is partly because in time when you will have them , you will encounter lot of top tier enemy units) but still great for smashing enemy lines.

3-4 artilery. I personaly prefer warplighting cannons since they are still good against infantry but at the same time can be used well for sniping monster units/enemy generals.

Around 10 Stormvermins of apropriete type (ie. it would be silly to take halberds when you are preparing to invade dwarfs)

Rest you can fill with whatever unit you like to use. For example I do not like globadiers that much since I had too many situations where they killed more of my stormvermins then enemy units. On other side I love good flanking warpfire thrower teams that melt enemy infantry before your eyes.
At this stage is that nice thing about skavens, that they do not have one optimal units that you simply must pick, but lot of cool stuff that all works one way or other depending on your own preferences.

Point of this: It is very similiar to army composition from Mid - version a) . Artilery to pick enemy apart. Solid infantry to lock enemy units in combat. Only difference is that your army will be "specialized" to some things, according to what units you picked to fill your army.

[Karsk]

I find these builds very interesting and I'll give them a shot! Btw is Tretch easier than Queek in vortex campaign?

I thought that the Skaven would have a relatively flexible build.

Or is it now based on your LL and opponents? Like Tretch fighting dark elves whilst the other two fight lizard men?

[bayujaya]

Skrolk, Plague priest, Warlock engineer, 3 plagueclaw catapults and 1 of the other type (cant remember name), the rest doesn't matter it's just for flavour, could be all slaves or all plague monks hardly any of them will need to fight apart from some mopping up. Doomwheel or abomination to send into the blob for fun.

Just herd the approaching army into a blob with menace below and skrolk/pp vermintide summons and nuke with catapults while sniping monsters/lords with the thing I cant remember the name of . Maybe a couple of stormvermin halberdiers or clanrat spears to guard the catapults.
Disgustingly easy to the point at which there is no challenge left.