Hordes: Skorne Karax
After a good bit of playtesting, John is ready to share his thoughts on last month’s Praetorian Karax release.
Guest Article by JohneV
The Praetorian Karax never exactly shined vs. other Skorne infantry choices. But with the new plastics reducing the price it seemed like a good time to finally try them out.
Ignoring Initial Impressions
I decided to ignore my instincts, and put a few games under by belt. They were much better than expected but still not better than many other options in Skorne.
They do have Shield wall which is very good especially in a faction like Skorne where you can speed them up. The major downside, they are only speed 5, 7 inch shield wall is not stellar. Their defense is low enough that trivial shooting will take them out very easily fortunately they have girded which helps against template attacks. Add to the fact that they are mat 5 and uggggh what is this unit for? Maybe their CMA will balance this out for them?
On the Field:
So right off the back in my first game I thought I would use my Tyrant Commander to speed them up, have them shield wall, and advance. I made sure to space them out evenly but I found that the rest of my army quickly outpaced them. I was playing Khador Butcher 3 and managed to get jammed very quickly by mini-feated Iron Fang. I thought this could be as good time as any to put my Karax in to the fray. I need 8s to hit, and 9s to kill. I figure 8 is a little high so I do a few 2 man CMAs I miss my first two great. I decide to switch to single attacks at this point and miss 4 of the other 6 and fail to break armor once on one of the rolls killing 1 Iron Fang Pikeman. Yippee! This game went fairly downhill from me there dice gods not allowing average rolls. You know it is bad when your opponent is the one complaining about dice for you.
Not wanting to throw the towel in on the first go I played a few other games with them. I found their shield wall to be a trap for the most part. The most effective use I could find for them was taking full advantage of girded and using them to hold hands with my troops like Nihilators crossing the board. The only combat use I could get out of them was either by increasing their attack power and using CMA or just using one large CMA on hard targets.
Overall while they are a very cheap unit that with reach CMA can put one or two big hits out there and help you cross the board I do not think they do a better job of it than say a Krea. They do look very good on the table, and it’s always interesting to try out different options for awhile even if they aren’t the most competitive. I am looking forward to the day they get a solo or UA to take them over the edge. Until then I think I’ll continue to favor the Praetorian Swordsman and Nihilators when it comes to single wound infantry.
~Has anyone out there had better luck with the Karax?
