Skorne – Praetorians
Today’s martial house study will focus around the Praetorians of Skorne, which consist of the Swordsmen, Karax, and Ferox.
Praetorian Swordsmen
This is Skorne’s mainline unit. With decent SPD, the choice between a pair of P+S 9 attacks or a single POW 12 Combo Strike, and the low cost of 4/6, they are something you’ll likely play with or against quite often. The aforementioned ability to choose between attack modes gives them a bit of flexibility between attacking low-ARM, high-DEF targets, and vice-versa. They also have the Penetrating Strike ability that allows the Swordsmen to do a single point of damage per attack against even the highest-ARM warjack or warbeast. This can be a great tool for finishing off an Arcane-Shielded heavy that your Combo Strikes can’t quite breach. While their MAT value is fairly average at 6, the ability to make two attacks helps to mitigate this quite a bit. For example: normal odds of hitting a DEF 15 Gun Mage are fairly low, coming in at about 28%. The double swing, however, closes that gap a good deal to about a 48% chance to hit with at least one of their two attacks.
That said, Skorne is not without ways of increasing accuracy in melee – like via Carnage, Instruments of War, Death March, etc. If you’re looking to give the Swordsmen a higher damage profile as well, you have a few options, like Last Stand and Fury. In terms of unit survival, Swordsmen aren’t the toughest of things. At DEF 13, ARM 14, they’ll die easily enough to direct hits (which won’t be hard to come by) or some lucky blast damage rolls. To give them some staying power, Skorne has a few options as well via direct stat increases with Inviolable Resolve or Defenders Ward or with denial abilities like Inhospitable Ground. The Tyrant Commander and Standard Unit is another great thing to have nearby your Praetorians, giving them them access to Pathfinder and Reveille for shaking off Knock Down.
Praetorian Swordsmen Officer and Standard Bearer
The Swordsmen unit attachment is a great addition to your Swordsmen units. It’s inexpensive and gives the the unit two great abilities: Side Step and Perfect Strike. Side Step makes the unit ideally suited for carving through hordes of enemy infantry by allowing them to move 2″ every time they destroy a model. Perfect Strike is a once-per-game extension of Penetrating Strike to apply against infantry as well, making the Swordsmen even more adept at killing single-wound models. The other two abilities granted by the unit attachment are the Unit Standard for command check re-rolls and Ranked Attack. While Ranked Attack doesn’t really do much for the Swordsmen themselves due to lack of Reach weapons, it does benefit the rest of your army when using your Swordsmen as the vanguard of your forces.
Praetorian Karax
Where the Swordsmen are a more offensively-minded unit, Karax err on the side of defensive. What they give up in one point of SPD and DEF they make for with an extra point of ARM, Shield Wall, and an immunity to blast damage that can be shared with non-Karax models in base-to-base contact with the unit. While these qualities do make them well-suited at soaking up mass POW 10 attacks, most charging infantry will be able to cut through that ARM 18 without much problem, so be wary of closing melee forces. Their P+S 10 pikes may not pack a punch, but access to Combined Melee Attack with Reach and Ranked Attacks gives them the flexibility of being of help against high-ARM or high-DEF targets. It’s also worth noting the Karax’s low MAT of 5, which means that they’ll often have a hard time against infantry with even average DEF values unless they are using CMA or are receiving help. Like their Swordsmen brethren, Karax synergize well with many of the same spells, particularly Defender’s Ward, which can crank their effective DEF/ARM to 14/20; or Fury, which can have each man hitting at an effective P+S 13 or paired CMA attacks at P+S 15. At 4/6, they do compete for list space with Swordsmen, which are often preferred thanks to their multiple attacks, higher SPD, and access to a great unit attachment.
Praetorian Ferox
The Praetorian Ferox are Skorne’s cavalry unit. The have rather unexciting defensive stats, but with buffs like the aforementioned Defender’s Ward, they can become fairly frightening. Steady also helps them work well with Mordikaar’s Hollow spell. SPD 8, Pathfinder, and Jump make this unit among the most highly mobile in the game, allowing the Ferox incredible access to many parts of the battlefield that others just won’t be able to reach. Throw Makeda’s Savagery on this unit, and watch them advance 13″ and jump an additional 5″ so they can strike your enemy’s back lines with little warning.
Concerning damage output, the unit comes in on the low side with a pair of P+S 12 attacks (one from their cavalry spear, one from the mount via Combat Rider or Impact Attacks). When charging, the unit gets to make impact attacks at P+S 12 and their spear attack jumps up to P+S 14 from Brutal Charge. While Brutal Charge is a nice addition to any unit, you lose out on that benefit if using Jump, so be mindful of what’s most important when activation it: damage or mobility.
Again, many of the already-mentioned buffs do great things for this unit. If you’re looking at making impact attacks, anything that can buff their rather low MAT of 6 will help them to get the most out of their turns. If you need to increase their damage output, Fury or Last Stand are your only real options, so pay strong attention to your overall army damage capability if you’re investing the 7/11 points it takes to field this unit.
Tyrant Rhadeim
Rhadeim is a Ferox dragoon solo that sports the same abilities as the Ferox unit in addition to a few other fantastic additions. Stat-wise, his MAT value comes in at 8, making him markedly more accurate than his rank-and-file brothers. He can share this higher MAT value with other Ferox models as well via Veteran Leader provided that they have line of sight to him, helping to increase their effectiveness with impact attacks and against those ultra-high-DEF models like many warcasters, warlocks and solos.
Rhadeim also comes with (at the cost of Brutal Charge) the extremely powerful Armor Piercing special attack, allowing him to deal a single P+S 12 melee attack against a target at half-ARM. This gives Rhadeim incredible damage output, allowing him to hit your standard Khadoran Juggernaut for an average 12.5 damage on the charge. His spear even has the Magical Weapon rule, giving the Skorne commander yet another tool against troublesome Incorporeal solos.
So that’s your quick overview of the Skorne Praetorians. Stay tuned for the next martial house overview on the Protectorate Flameguard.
