Saurus Blockers are the workhorses (or work-lizards I guess), of the Lizardman team, being fast, strong and tough to boot. At MV6, they used to be the fastest “Blocker” type players in the game until the Amazon Jaguar Blockers arrived and matched their pace, but you can get 6 of them, making for one of the strongest front lines in the game and definitely the fastest ST4 cage. They’re also very good value, at 85k they’re cheaper than an equivalent Chaos Blocker, although they trade mutations access and AG3+ for MV6 and are able to get 6 of them as mentioned before, so they’re able to cover bigger areas of the pitch and you have a bit more flexibility in how they’re developed.

The edition has seen a couple of nerfs and buffs to them. The Claw/PO/MB combo being gone means they’re far more resilient at higher TVs which is where they used to start struggling once that combo became prevalent. You don’t have to wait for doubles either if you want to throw Dodge on them to make them so very, very annoying to put on the ground, although it does require a little SPP investment.

The bad news, however, is the combination of ST4 and AG5+, means Break Tackle is much worse than before on them. In BB2 and older editions, they could dodge on a 2+ with BT, but now it’s been reduced all the way down to 4+, significantly hurting their ability to break away from sacrificial linemen and reducing their mobility overall. It does mean Dodge, although good defensively, has some reduced value on them, as a 2+ with dodge on an MV6, ST4 player used to be very good, but at 4+ it’s far less viable and will be reduced to last-ditch recovery plays. This can be mitigated with a Strength increase, but at that point, you probably want them in a more central, bashy role anyway.

Build List:

• Random Skills
• Standard Saurus
• Blitzer

Saurus Blocker Base Stats:

Randomised Skills:

General and Strength aren’t bad for randoms, but I’d stick with picking them. The last thing you want to do is end up with a Strong Arm or Shadowing Saurus you need to spend 85k to replace! I tried this in the BB3 ladder, it really didn’t work out very well.

Standard Saurus | Saurus Blocker Build

Primaries: Block, Guard, Mighty Blow, Stand Firm, Tackle, Break Tackle/Arm Bar
Secondaries: Dodge
Characteristics: ST, MV

Block is pretty much your #1 pick on every Saurus. Their main job is to hit things, so this will help you get more attempts to break armour, therefore potentially more SPP and will protect them should they be hit back. After that, Guard is going to guarantee those 2 die blocks and will help you against teams like Chosen and Nurgle, as well as anyone taking mass guard and help support your Kroxigor and any nearby Skinks.

After that, personally, I would take Mighty Blow to keep their SPP generation going and having more lethal hits vs those high AV teams and turning AV8+ teams into paste. After that Stand Firm will let you continue to hit things and provide those Guard assists on anything other than a POW. It also means you can safely side-cage down the touchline without fear of Frenzy or a cheeky surf and your cage becomes incredibly tough to break through too.

Tackle is very nice vs Dodge heavy teams, against a screen, it makes moving away much risker and of course, your hits are more likely to put them down for MB to do it’s thing. As mentioned above, Break Tackle is much worse in the new rules but it still has a place. 4+ is not very reliable but if you manage to get enough SPP for dodge, it’s a 75% chance which will help you in tight spots, just make sure to do it as one of your last actions.

You could also have a look at Arm Bar should you not think BT is worth the risk, agility teams will just run away from you most of the time so punishing those 1/6s could be well worth it should you find yourself against lots of running/elf teams.

Dodge is very good on Saurus as it means only POWS are going to knock them down and with BT does give you that manoeuvrability in a pinch. There’s a case for Side Step but personally, I’d stick with Stand Firm.

As for Characteristics, Strength of course rocks and makes them rather scary. MV is pretty decent and AG is probably a waste unless you already have Break Tackle, but Strength 5 is straight-up better in that scenario.

Blitzer |Saurus Blocker Build

Primaries: Block, Mighty Blow, Frenzy, Tackle, Break Tackle/Stand Firm, Juggernaut
Secondaries: Dodge, Side Step.
Characteristics: ST, MV

Lizardmen don’t really have a dedicated “Blitzer” type player, so building a couple of these is well worth it. Simply put, we shift up the more killy skills like Mighty Blow and Tackle and throw Frenzy into the mix as well for additional hits as well as having some surf threat. High-movement teams can snowball pretty quickly should they find themselves players up, so having some hard-hitting players, ideally one for each flank, will provide a nice threat range. Tackle will make sure you can put Dodgers down and Juggernaut will additionally help with some surfing players.

You could of course grab break tackle to at least, attempt blitzes while marked, but you might want to try and get Dodge first before doing so. You could also get Stand Firm, or even Side Step, which will protect you from counter surfs.

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Saurus Blockers are the backbone of the Lizardmen team, so their development is going to be key to winning, perhaps more so than the slightly expendable Skinks. You’re going to be doing a lot of hitting with them and likewise they’re going to take a few punches themselves whilst protecting the ball, so building towards that with the typical bashy skills will hopefully, see you to victory!

That’s it for the Saurus Blocker builds! Check out our guides for Chameleon Skink builds, Skink Runner Linemen build and the Kroxigor.