Today we’re looking at Clan Verminus in our Age of Sigmar Rat Kings review. This Skaven faction is all about martial powers over everything else.
Clan Verminus are the bravest and strongest of the Skaven (compared to other natural Skaven). Unfortunately, there are only 4 troops that fall within this faction, so your options are a little limited as to what you can take.
AoS 2.0 Taking Skaven Clan Verminus To 2000 Points
The faction in a Nutshell:
This is the most numerous of the Skaven clans and is focused on the art of war and martial powers over everything else. They are often found mixed in with a lot of the other Clan armies and can form a bulk of the foot troops with the clanrats. While elite units of Stormvermin are used as bodyguards to the leadership figures. Within Age of Sigmar, they can be found throughout the books but are the main villain in the war against the Fyreslayers in the Realm of Fire, as enemies in the Spear of Shadows, and throughout other skaven heavier Age of Sigmar books.
Taking the Army to 2000
Starting with the battleline this army has a pretty expensive troop for Skaven in the Stormvermin. So, we are going to use 2 full units of Stormvermin and then a full unit of the cheaper Clan Rats to round out our battle lines.
- 40 Clanrats: 200 points (Battleline 1 of 3)
- 40 Stormvermin: 500 points (Battleline 2 of 3)
- 40 Stormvermin: 500 points (Battleline 3 of 3)
Clanrats: Move 6”, 6+ Save, 4 Bravery, 1 Wounds. They have either a Rusty Spear: Range 2”, 1 Attack, Hitting on a 5+, Wounding on a 4+, for 1 Damage. Or they use Rust Blade: Range 1”, 1 Attack, Hitting and Wounding on a 4+, for 1 Damage.
If an attack has a damage characteristic of 1 this unit adds 1 to their save rolls. You can add 1 to wound rolls for this unit if they have 20 or more models, and 1 to hit rolls if there are more than 30 models. Finally, the leader makes an extra attack, the standard allows retreat and charge moves in the same turn, and the drummer adds 2” to retreat and run rolls.
Stormvermin: Move 6”, 5+ Save, 5 Bravery, 1 Wound. They have a rusty halberd attack: Range 2”, 2 Attacks, Hitting on a 4+, Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for 1 Damage. If an attack has a damage characteristic of 1 this unit adds 1 to their save rolls, and you can add 1 to hit rolls for this unit against units with fewer models. Finally, the leader makes an extra attack, the standard allows retreat and charge moves in the same turn, and the drummer adds 2” to retreat and run rolls.
Next, we need some heroes to buff these troops, and what better way to do that than a Verminlord and some warlords!
- Verminlord Warbringer: 280 points (Leader 1 of 6, Behemoth 1 of 4)
- Skaven Warlord on Brood Horror (Forge World Model): 220 Points (Leader 2 of 6, Behemoth 2 of 4)
Verminlord Warbringer: Move damage table (12” down to 4”), 4+ Save, 10 Bravery, 12 Wounds. Has a missile weapon with Prehensile Tails: Range 6”, Attacks damage table (5 down to 1), Hitting on 3+, Wounding on 4+, for 1 Damage. Then has two melee attacks the first is a Doom Glaive: Range 3”, 4 Attacks, Hitting and Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for 3 Damage. The other attack is a Punch Dagger: Range 1”, 4 Attacks, Hitting damage table (2+ up to 4+), Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for 2 Damage.
If he charges you can re roll all failed hit rolls. He is a wizard and can cast / unbind one spell a turn which his unique spell being Death Frenzy: Casting Value of 5, Range 13”, Target friendly Verminus unit, whenever a model from that unit is slain in the combat phase it may make a pile in and move attack before being removed. His command ability lets you re roll all hit and wound rolls of 1 for all Verminus models within 13” of this model during the combat phase.
Skaven Warlord on Brood Horror: Move 8”, 4+ Save, 6 Bravery, 8 Wounds. Has three attacks the first being Prehensile Tail: Range 3”, 3 Attacks, Hitting on a 3+, Wounding on a 4+, for 1 damage. Then Fangs: Range 1”, 6 Attacks, Hitting and Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for 2 Damage. Finally, he has a Warpforged Blade: Range 1”, 3 Attacks, hitting and Wounding on a 3+, with -2 Rend, for D3 damage.
This model heals a D3 wounds in your hero phase, and he adds 1 to the Bravery of all Clan Verminus units while wholly within 13”. His command ability lets you pick a friendly Clan Verminus unit wholly within 13” and add 1 to Attacks characteristics of all melee weapons used by that unit.
This brings you up to 1700 points and you have a ton of bodies on the floor and some heavy hitters with the two powerful heroes. Let’s dip into the Masterclan a little bit and bring in a couple of leaders to help round out this force.
- Screaming Bell: 200 points (Leader 3 of 6, Behemoth 3 of 4), Allied
- Grey Seer: 100 points (Leader 4 of 6) Allied
Screaming Bell: 12 Wounds, Move damage table (4” down to 1”) (add 1” for every 3 skaven within 1”), 4+ Save, and 10 Bravery. It has three different melee weapons, the first being a Staff: Range 2”, 3 Attacks, Hitting and Wounding on a 4+, with -1 Rend, for 1 damage. The second is a Claw attack: Range 1”, 4 Attacks, hitting on a 4+, Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for 2 damage.
The third attack is Wheels and Spikes: Range 1”, D6 Attacks (2D6 if there are 10 or move Skaven within 1”), Hitting is damage table (2+ up to 5+), Wounding on a 3+, for 1 damage.
All non-chaos wizards within 6” must subtract 1 from their casting rolls. In your hero phase, you roll 2D6 and consult a chart where a variety of effects can happen. The best is a 12 and you summon a Verminlord (Once per game), while the worst is a 2 and the bell suffers a mortal wound.
It is a wizard and can cast/unbind one spell a turn with its unique spell being Cracks Call: Casting value 6, range 18”, target enemy unit, you roll 2D6 and for every point that it beats their move characteristic the unit suffers a mortal wound. (does not work against units that fly). Finally, it has a command ability that lets you add 1 to Move and Bravery for all Skaven that can see the Bell.
Grey Seer: Move 6”, Save 5+, Bravery 6, Wounds 5. He has one staff melee attack: Range 2”, 1 Attack, Hitting on a 4+, Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for D3 damage. He can consume a warpstone token when casting magic where you roll a D6, on a 2+ you can re-roll a failed casting attempt or on a 1 he suffers a mortal wound. They can cast/unbind 1 spell with the unique spell being Vermintide: Casting Value 6, Range 26”, Target is enemy unit, you roll a D6 for each model in the unit and on a 6, it suffers a mortal wound. Finally, they have a command ability where whenever a Skaven model flees within 26” of the grey seer you roll a D6 and on a 4+ they do not.
Load Outs: Give your Clan Rats the Rusty Spears and Shields for the longer range, that way back units can get more attacks. The Stormvermin there is no reason not to give a couple shields to get the bonus from that so make sure you have a few in the unit with those equipped.
Tactics: Run the Verminlord surrounded by a unit of Stormvermin and try and get his spell off on them as much as possible. Add in the extra command ability rerolls and they can cause some serious damage to anything they encounter. For the Screaming Bell you can run it with the clan rats to make them a bit more dangerous while your Warlord buffs the other unit of Stormvermin.
The whole point of this army is to keep the Stormvermin as healthy as possible and get them into combat ASAP. After that watch them tear through everything. Finally, the Grey Seer might be able to use his command ability to help negate some models from fleeing during a failed battleshock test…
There you have it a massive furry army of Clan Verminus Skaven ready to stab – stab your and overwhelm them with attacks!
Previous Rat Kings articles can be found by clicking below!
About the Author: Travis Perkins
