Not a Skaven army yet...

What exactly IS a rat dart? A group of giant rats is suppose?

giant rat units are mixed units. You have the rats and the packmasters. even though their stats are almost identical, it's a mixed unit (think like Kroxigor/skinks).

This means that assuming an entire unit is armed identically you only will ever be able to kill the rats and not the packmaster (the unit is run 2 wide, 3 deep as a minimum sized unit). Also the packmaster can still attack through 2 ranks of models so he gets his one whip attack to boot.

While this usually means the packmaster is testing on snakeyes for a break test, it also means that there is potential to tie up a unit for two turns with a chaff unit. For 23 points.

It also forces LD tests for units that don't want to pursue, something which can fail. And it really messes up frenzied units as you have to pursue and if I remember correctly you can't reform if you catch the fleeing unit.

So suitably skaven


I'll echo frozenfood, if you take the cannon you'll want to take 2; they're cheap and at least for me 1 is underwhelming and never does anything. Having to rely on the artillery die for the strength of the shot surprisingly makes an enormous difference in its effectiveness.

You've got a great start to the skaven, you're going to want more clanrats though. In an ideal skaven force you want 1 body for every 10 points you're playing and half those bodies should be slaves (1 slave for every 20 points you're playing). Skaven NEED numbers to win, more than any other army I think as we don't have access to units/characters that buff our troops, or access to things like Wyssans and Mindrazor. Our magic is no less potent, but it's...different.

Welcome to the horde.

Clan Pestilens is awesome, but they're not core. You could justify it by saying something like clan pestilens...and their slaves.

Stormvermin are great troops. I don't consider them mandatory, but they're the strongest infantry unit we have. And that I5 is sweet.

Plague monks with the plague banner are considered a great hammer unit. They're only S3, but with all the rerolls they get for a turn they can dish the hurt on a T3 opponent. Choose your matchups carefully there. Frenzy is a double edged sword; your ability to manage it will decide whether or not they perform for you. Not a fan of censor bearers; they force too many T tests on themselves and the few times I've seen them on the table they cause just as much hurt on themselves as they do the opponent. They're too expensive in my opinion to be killing themselves. And you need far too many to be effective in combat, although I think they'd be good chaff/chaff clearers. The plague furnace and plague priest are just awesome, and I wouldn't even consider plague monks without this guy. He's ridiculously vulnerable though, so I'd again be careful about the matchup.

Also, it is mandatory to say "Oh there goes another 23 points (chuckle)" EACH TIME he destroys one of your rat darts.
It really adds to the game 

I usually take three rat darts.
Tried 5 in my last game because I was expecting frenzied troops. They just took lots of panic tests really. So at least two?

Stormfiends are after the time frame I'm playing so cannot help you there mate.