Oh boy, the Lizardmen…

As a starting team, they can be tough to manage, with their lack of any real blocking skills and reliance on their Skinks to do any actual scoring, they do become arguably one of the better teams in the game once they start getting some skills.

This team is very much one of two tales (or tails?), with one half of the squad being strong, durable and surprisingly fast Saurus who take hits and dish them out, while the other consists of fragile yet stupidly quick Skinks who do your ball handling. They’re also accompanied by a pretty good Big Guy in the Kroxigor who does pretty well in the “getting shit done” department, honestly, he’s definitely one of the better ones alongside the Rotspawn in that they don’t need to move to be useful. Recently they’ve also had the addition of the Chameleon Skink, who until the new edition didn’t seem all that great by only really having Shadowing, but we’ll see how they do in this new Blood Bowl edition.

Overall then you have a team that’s half good at hitting things and the other half good at running around and getting the ball into the endzone… both important things in the world of Blood Bowl! They’re a hard team to shift when managed well, with the Saurus providing a wall of blue scaled muscle, meanwhile, the skinks will be laughing as they hurtle through defences of all kinds!

There are only a few 2020 changes, although the Chameleon Skinks were added during the 2016 edition, they did gain On The Ball as well as a fairly decent PA3+, meanwhile, the Saurus got a tad more expensive, bringing them up to 85k in price. More importantly and perhaps detrimental to the team, their ReRolls have gone up to 70k each (so 140k after the first game), which is going to certainly throw a spanner in the works!

So with that info out of the way, let’s get into the Lizardmen Starting Rosters!

All of the Saurus!, 2 ReRolls | TV1000 Lizardmen Starting Rosters:

In order to start with all of your Saurus, you’ll need to drop down to 2 ReRolls, leaving you 50k spare which is just enough to grab an Apothecary, which is at least a nice little bonus. Ideally, you’ll want to start with all 6 Saurus to maximise their SPP generation but losing that ReRoll does sting quite a bit on a team with no starting Dodge or Sure Hands. The good thing is, Saurus will be hitting on 2 die most of the time and compared to the below build. you’ll have more Strength and more support overall, therefore you should be able to easily Block your way down the field until your Skinks are in scoring range.

Save the ReRolls for Double Skulls, and avoid GFIs for the first few games until you get that third reroll.

The question then, however, is with your well-earned 140k, do you get the ReRoll or the Kroxigor first? It’s a hard choice, but hopefully, by that point, you may have a couple of level-ups to help you out, so personally I’d go for the Kroxigor first, again to start his SPP journey as early as possible, then look to grab that third reroll. Money isn’t too hard to come by in the new ruleset and if your Skinks do their thing and score you lots of touchdowns, hopefully it won’t take more than few games to get what you need.

Just the 5 Saurus Actually, 3 ReRolls | TV1000 Lizardmen Starting Rosters:

Remember how you used to be able to get 6 Saurus and 3 ReRolls on a team? Yeah, you can’t anymore I’m afraid! The 10k increase to the ReRolls and 5k per Saurus means that you’d be left with 280k remaining… not quite enough to purchase the 5 remaining Skinks you’d need for a starting eleven.

So what do we do? Well, in my opinion, I think the ReRolls are far more valuable at this stage in a league, so I’m going to drop a Saurus as I think you’ll be fine with 5 to start with, plus it’ll be cheaper to afford 85k as opposed to 140k after the first few games. This does mean you’ll need to take 6 Skinks which drops your durability a little but does give you some crazy coverage across the map. It certainly feels like a bit of a nerf (which will be pretty contentious amongst coaches whether it was due or not!) but I actually quite like this build overall just due to the sheer pitch presence you still have. There’s not going to be that much tackle or block, to begin with, so overall your Skinks are going to do their jobs fairly uninterrupted until your opponents start getting skills.

In terms of buying your next item well, it’s going to depend on your league. If you’re up against a lot of Block and the odd scattering of Mighty Blow I’d be tempted to grab the Apothecary before the next Saurus. If there aren’t so many bashy teams it might be worth signing up the Saurus as soon as you can just to finish off your wall of S4/AV10. The Kroxigor, of course, comes after these.

Kroxigorgeous, 2 ReRolls | TV1000 Lizardmen Starting Rosters:

Again we’ve had to drop a Saurus from the old version of this Lizardmen starting roster, but at least we can fit in the Krox and still keep 4 of the Saurus. You’ve got a slightly stronger line of scrimmage now and can keep those pesky Elves in check thanks to Prehensile Tail which gives him something to do without him needing to be activated and risking the odd Bone-Head… although for some reason I find Krox’s are a lot better at avoiding those compared to Ogres…

Thankfully along with the Saurus, he’s MV6 and it’s easy enough to get them free in order for them to move about and reposition. Again 6 Skinks gives you access to pretty much the entire pitch and some okay options for backline defence.

You could if you felt like it, upgrade one of the Skinks to a Chameleon. I’d be very tempted to do this if you’re up against passing teams as early on this is really where Lizardmen team struggle due to no reliable way of dragging down catchers. Shadowing is….bad in this edition (not that it was great before!) but On The Ball could give you some intercepting options or at least getting one more body on a Catcher/Thrower for that -1.

2 ReRolls isn’t great and it’s going to be a bit of a push to get that ever so vital 3rd one, but it should be doable, especially if you’re scoring plenty for that extra cash. I’d probably get the Apothecary first if you can seeing as there’s 15k in the pot towards it already and by the time you start buying the 5th and 6th Saurus, you’ll have some skilled up players you’ll want to protect.

Lizardmen Starting Rosters, Conclusion:

The 2020 edition hasn’t been kind to the Lizards, but they still remain a great team and fun challenge. With a few more Skinks in these builds than the older versions, there’s going to be a little more team management needed so that you’re not overrun. Each Saurus is more important than ever and you can’t quite space them out as much as you used to, but you have plenty of skinks to cover and they’re quick enough to provide plenty of assists or tackle zones as needed.

It’s a shame the Chameleon still isn’t great but I can see some fun On The Ball shenanigans that passing teams won’t thank you for. I probably wouldn’t buy one for an optimal team necessarily but if you’re against a bunch of Wood/High/Union Elf teams then it’s not a bad shout. The Kroxigor remains one of the better Big Guys so for me, I’d be starting with one to maximise his SPP gains. We’re still waiting on the plastic Krox but the rest of the team are of course available and look pretty darn good, I especially love the little idols!

Anyway I hope you enjoyed this look at the Lizardmen Starting Rosters, we’re almost finished with our 2020 team builds on the run up the Blood Bowl 3, so check them out, if you haven’t already.