What would make you want to take a Skinner?

Give him Grevious Wounds and or Precision strike. Give him an additional doe of damage against warjacks too. Then he'll be the light jack/beast hunter he was meant to be.

Perhaps instead of it having an extra die against warbeasts it could get armor piercing against them. That would do it for me.

Its not allowed in themes yet, so it is not really worth playing. If it becomes allowed in for example Nothkin theme it will most likely be free, and then ill play it. Sad but true...

I think it needs to be cheaper such as 1-2 points non theme. Or free in theme. If it had Armour Pierce and Refuge it would be super interesting to take against hordes lists. I would be fine with it losing dismember if it meant it got armour piercing. Then it could be relevant against both warmachine and hordes.

I think we are sort of past the point of no return on how themes work to make the skinner a valid CHOICE. If it is not allowed in a theme list, you are severely crippling yourself by taking it for sure. not only are you losing out on the free points that a theme provides, but you are also playing a sub par model. If a skinner cost 0 points but was not allowed in a theme, i STILL would be very hard pressed to ever consider playing it. We are getting close though perhaps. If it IS allowed in a future theme, basically any other solo we have is more valuable. If i could take a free skinner or a free [insert other solo here] i would basically always pick the other solo. The final option is that a free skinner is the only possible theme benefit. Then i would play him ofc, but then he is not a CHOICE.

So, if the skinner is ever to be a valid CHOICE, then he has to be better than at least some of the other solos. not point-for-point, but model-for-model. Maybe they can give him weapon master? (snicker...)

They could start by looking at his defensive stats. They could say that "ok, lets go crazy" and bump him to DEF 14 base. That leads to incredible levels of DEF against warbeasts while in a forest, but more importantly that means that other things have a hard time killing him too. He could easily get proper stealth too, and 8 boxes could help him against blasts and such. all of a sudden he is a decent contesting piece. He does something that our other solos do not do. He could also get "Luck" or something similar so that he does not miss his one precious attack.

Even with a theme that allows him, he would need some serious attention before i played him for free IF i could choose another solo for free as well.

Trollock pretty much summed it up.

If he were a cheap point filler allowed in Theme, I'd have one in a couple lists. Lots of my theme builds are usually 1 or 2 points down. I couldn't see him going any over 2pts, since I'd almost always rather max my stone at that point.

Armour Piercing sounds a good start - could justify it as, to a Skinner, a jack is just another type of beast to hunt, one where you need to know exactly where to stick the blade - though I think that should be on both beasts and jacks - and then drop the extra dice for beasts.

Maybe increase his attacks to two, and make them a decent P+S too?

Real stealth would certainly help, as would boosting his def - I mean, come on, this dude is fighting beasts with no armour, you'd expect him to be light on his feet!