Don’t miss our 2000 point Rat King series covering all the allegiances of the Skaven with the sneakiest of the sneaky rats: Clan Eshin.
It seems everyone either owns a couple of Skaven, owns an army of them, or wishes they owned a bunch of them. So, it only makes sense to look at the various clans and how you might make an army out of them.
Clan Eshin is all about stabbing people in the back and using tricks to get the upper hand.
The faction in a Nutshell:
Clan Eshin is the sneakiest of the skaven made up of ninjas, spies, and assassins to any of the other Skaven clans for a price. They’re often found as supporting characters in many of the Age of Sigmar books. They can be seen appearing at a critical time to kill a hero or backstab their employer which was their plan all along. A notable appearance (Spoil for Malign Portents) is that it was a group of Gutter Runners that ultimately foiled Nagash’s plans for his spell at the end of the Malign Portents stories (see The Great Black Pyramid).
AoS 2.0 Taking Skaven Clan Eshin To 2000 Points
This is a little difficult because the list of models in the range is very limited right now if you were to go pure Clan Eshin. However, there is enough to do it so let’s start with the battleline troops.
- 20 Gutter Runners: 200 points (Battleine 1 of 3)
- 40 Night Runners: 360 points (Battleline 2 of 3)
- 40 Night Runners: 360 points (Battleine 3 of 3)
Gutter Runners: Move 7, Save 5+, Bravery 5, 1 Wound. They have throwing stars: Range 12”, 2 Attacks, Hitting on a 4+, Wounding on a 5+, for 1 Damage. Then they have a Punch Dagger and Blade: Range 1”, 2 Attacks, Hitting on a 3+, Wounding on a 4+, with -1 Rend, for 1 Damage. They can run and shoot in the same turn, and when are set up your units you can instead wait for your first movement phase and set them up anywhere not within 9” of the enemy and within 6” of a table edge.
Night Runners: Move 7”, Save 6+, 4 Bravery, 1 Wound. They have Throwing Stars: Range 12”, 1 Attack, Hitting on a 4+, Wounding on a 5+, for 1 Damage. Then they have Stabbing Blades: Range 1”, 1 Attack, Hitting and Wounding on a 4+, for 1 Damage. This unit can run and shoot in the same turn, and after setting up is complete before the first turn you can make a move with them. Wound rolls of 6 for the Stabbing Blades have a Rend of -1 (-2 if 20 or more models) and the leader makes an additional Stabbing Blades attack.
This gives you a lot of bodies to control objectives with and potentially swarm over easier units. Along with that, you can get put an Assassin in each unit as well to give them some more punch when they get into hand to hand combat.
- Skaven Assassin: 100 Points (Leader 1 of 6)
- Skaven Assassin: 100 Points (Leader 2 of 6)
- Skaven Assassin: 100 Points (Leader 3 of 6)
- Verminlord Deceiver: 300 Points (Leader 4 of 6, Behemoth 1 of 4)
Skaven Assassin: Move 7”, Save 4+, 5 Bravery, 5 Wounds. Has Poisoned Throwing Stars: Range 12”, 2 Attacks, Hitting and Wounding on a 4+, for 1 Damage. Then has either a Weeping Blades: Range 1”, 3 Attacks, Hitting and Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for D3 Damage or Fighting Claws: Range 1”, 5 Attacks, Hitting (re rolling hit rolls of 1) and Wounding on a 3+, for 1 Damage. You can re-roll all hit rolls if attacking a hero, and he hides inside a Skaven unit and can come out in any combat phase within 1” of the unit and immediately attack.
Verminlord Deceiver: Move damage table (12” down to 4”), 4+ Save, 10 Bravery, 12 Wounds. He has a Doomstar: Range 13”, 1 Attack, Hitting and Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for D3 Damage (D6 if the unit has 10 or more models). A Prehensile Tails: Range 6”, damage table (5 down to 1) Attacks, Hitting on a 3+, Wounding on a 4+, for 1 Damage. Finally, he has a Warpstiletto: Range 1”, 5 Attacks, Hitting on a 3+, Wounding on damage table (2+ up to 4+), with -3 Rend, for D3 Damage.
Shooting attacks against this Verminlord suffer a -2 to hit rolls, and he is a mage and can cast/unbind one spell with Skitterleap as his unique spell. Skitterleap: Casting Value 3, Range 13”, Target friendly Skaven Hero who can then be teleported anywhere on the battlefield more than 6” away from enemy models and they skip their next movement phase. Finally, his command ability lets you re-roll all failed hit and wound rolls for Eshin models within 13” of this model.
This brings you up to 1520 points but still leaves 400 open for allies, and for this army, we are going to take advantage of the Verminlord Deceiver’s spell and put them all into a single model.
- Thanquol and Boneripper: 400 points (Leader 5 of 6, Behemoth 2 of 4)
Thanquol and Boneripper: Move damage table (10” down to 6”), 4+ Save, 7 Bravery, 13 Wounds. He has the option of carrying a Warpfire Projector with Range 8” and causes an enemy unit to suffer 2D6 mortal wounds. If he doesn’t carry the Projector he has Warpfire Braziers: Range 2”, 4 Attacks, Hitting and Wounding on a 3+, with -2 Rend, for 3 Damage each.
Then he has a staff attack: Range 2”, 2 Attacks, Hitting on a 4+, Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for D3 Damage. Finally, he has Crushing Blows: Range 2”, damage table (6 down to 2) Attacks, Hitting on a 4+, Wounding on a 3+, with -1 Rend, for 2 Damage. This model heals a wound in your hero phase and can cast 2 spells with his unique spell being Scorch.
Additionally, when casting magic before casting on a 2+ you can re-roll failed casting rolls. Scorch: Range 26”, Cast Value damage table (6 up to 10), Target enemy unit, that unit suffers D3 mortal wounds (D6 if it targets a Skaven unit). Finally, his command ability lets you select a Skaven unit within 13” of this model suffers a wound or mortal wound roll a D6 (add 1 if the unit has 13 or more models) and on a 6+ they ignore that wound.
Loadouts: I would always give Thanquol and Boneripper the Warpfire Projector are 2D6 Mortal wounds to anything within 8” that auto hits, is crazy dangerous. Then your Assassins I like the Weeping Blades for the rend and just think they look super cool.
Tactics: This army is an army that you are going to be in your opponent’s territory on turn one making charges. With the Verminlord Deceiver, I would cast Skitterleap which is almost always going to be successful on Thanquol and Boneripper and move them into your opponent’s territory so that they can hopefully kill a hero or heavy armored troop with the Warpfire Projector.
They are no slouches in close combat and have 2 spells to inflict mortal wounds as well so they can then hopefully make a 6-inch charge and just cause havoc. You going to want to hide an Assassin in every large block of troops you have and make sure you take advantage of the Gutter Runners special ability to set up anywhere on the table 6” from the table edge and 9” from the enemy.
If you’re lucky, they can get a charge in as well on a warmachine or wizard hero and the assassin pops out to kill them. The main thing to do is that while Thanquol and Boneripper is a massive model he still only has 13 wounds and a 4+ save so you need to give him support. He can quickly be overwhelmed especially if he is not able to kill off his opponents very quickly.
Check out the other Skaven armies that we have covered!
About the Author: Travis Perkins
