Monday, May 31, 2010

'Ard boyz Woes.

 By Archfiend of Dezdemon


Well it looks like the biggest problem I am going to have at the Semi-finals is the one thing ork armies have always had. Anything that is armor 14 all around. Hopefully I can hope for my opponents not having that kind of vehicle layout. Playing against a fellow semi-finalist today in a practice game made me realize how vulnerable my army is to this kind of vehicle spam.


Lootas cannot deal with armor 14. Rokkits can only glance. Power klaws are woefully unreliable if the vehicle moves more than 6". Even then I cannot guarantee any kind of damageing hit except from a warboss or in this case Ghazghull Thraka.

Any kind of on the table advice would be excellent. Or list advice that doesn't include vehicles, as I feel vehicles would simply be giving in on points, as the only vehicles I can take will most likely explode from any damageing hits and the current meta makes me feel that vehicles will die much more often than people think they will.

Here is my list:

Ghazghull Thraka
Big mek w/ shokk attack gun and cybork bodies

30 boyz w/ nob w/ power klaw and 3 rokkits
30 boyz w/ nob w/ power klaw and 3 rokkits
30 boyz w/ nob w/ power klaw and 3 rokkits
30 boyz w/ nob w/ power klaw and 3 rokkits
30 boyz w/ nob w/ power klaw and 3 rokkits
30 boyz w/ shootas and nob w/ power klaw and 3 rokkits

15 lootas
15 lootas
15 lootas
Total points 2500

15 comments:

  1. Don't know what to tell you man, the orky methods for dealing with fast-moving landraiders besides rocketspam tend to involve other vehicles. And not just deffrolla rush, though it IS the simplest. Parking a couple trukks to block landraider movement will work, as will the sacrificial grabbin claw, and the strength 9 wrecking ball hits on a 4+ no matter how fast they move.

    But really, if you are deadset against vehicles, you should try dropping a loota squad for some tankbustas. They take some practice to use effectively, but if you are taking the tankbustas to kill tanks, their special rules shouldn't hurt you too much. People get into trouble with them because they are trying to kill the guys inside the tanks with the same unit, but I don't think your list will have that temptation to worry about. Plenty of boys to mop up the gooey insides. In addition to more rockets than any other squad you have, the tankbustas can bring six strength 10 and 4 strength 9 attacks to the assault, and the whole squad comes with 2d6+6 penetration grenades to throw at things by default. That should be enough to kill a landraider a turn if you can get the squad to their target intact. There are a lot of eggs in that basket, but it's probably better than having no eggs.

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  2. Do orks have access to combi/kombi meltas? I would think it would be a little bit better of a chance than a powerclaw if possible.

    other than that, I got nothing, but I do feel your pain. I had once upon a time had to rely on CC fex to take out AV14. Nice targets, atleast Powerklaws are hidden.

    I'm sure you'll do fine. If you death or glory you auto hit, if that helps.

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  3. PS: added labels and By NAME, for ya ;P
    What, no cool pictures?

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  4. As a Ork-nut, I have few pieces of advice for you :)

    1. Playing an Ork Horde requires one very important thing: The Kustom Force Field.
    Really, it's one of the msot important bitz of kit out there. It is what will keep you alive. Kit your Mek with Burna, 'Eavy Armour and the KFF and park him in a unit of Boyz, he'll keep them and at least two other units with a 5+ cover save against thoose nasty Manticores and such.

    2. I've always prefered Shootas over Sluggas. The shootas have some very distinct advantages over the Sluggas, mainly the fact that you're now more tactically flexible. You only lose one attack on the charge, but gain the ability to rain S4 dakka at a 18" range, which is a big bonus, even thoguh you're just Bs2! This allowas you to sit on objectives and still pose a threat, without having to move of it to engage the enemy. Of course, I prefer a mix. If I were you, i'd take 2 units of Sluggas and the rest as Shootas.

    3. Grotz, oh, glorious Grotz. I lvoe them at least, and always endevour to bring a unit of them. But, seeing as you are going all out on Mobz, they might nto be to your fancy. I'd suggest getting a small unit though, 19 Grotz and a Runtherd, stretch them out infront of your line and bask in the glory of a 4+ Cover save (and a 5+ to fall back on ;) ). Pts that are freed can eb spent on my following sugestions:

    4. You're going foot, no? We'll, that won't restrict you from all vehicles. How about grabbing some of my personal favourites? Killa Kans and Deff Dreads, oh glorious machines of destruction. In your case running the Killa Kans with Rokkits and the Deff Dreads with either dual Skorchas or extra DCCWs. Theese guys will bring some S10 goodness at least, and will hit vehicles jsut as godo as anyone else. And, as a bonus, keep them close to the Mek and they'll have a nice 4+ Cover save, that's constant smoke launchers!

    5. Deff Koptas. Theese migth rbeak what you're going for by going all foot, but, for me they're excellent. They're esxcellent distractions if nothing else, and their cheap cost makes them quite expandable. Kit them with TL-Rokkitz and send them flying!

    This is evrythign I can come upw ith right now... Let me know a bit more of what you are after with your lsit and I migth eb able to help you some more :)

    OH! Forgot one important thing!

    6. Bosspoles. You need them. Get them. One for every Nob, they'll make sure to keep you in line once things start getting dirty, and if you're playing Orks, things will get dirty ^^

    Cheers ^^

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  5. Like Hussar said, KFF is indispensable.

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  6. Well, foot Orks are pretty crappy for a reason, you have no answer to armor spam.

    Combat isn't going to happen with any degree of regularity except on your opponent's terms, and the best way to drop AV14 is a Deff Rolla.

    More range is always a good method. Kannonz, Zzaps, Kanz, and the like will help a bit. Disposable units of Grots out front to provide cover and bubblewrap are important. Hell, even a Wyrdboy could give you a melta shot some times.

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  7. i think you care too much about killing the AV14 units.

    if the opponent has monoliths, you shouldn't even both shooting them as your army as listed should be able to phase them off in around 4 turns. even then, the klaws should do it as it can't move past 6" anyway.

    but lets face it; you're talking about land raiders. the good news about land raiders is that they can't kill you fast enough. the bad news you already know about. my best advice is to not worry about them. take shots/assaults when possible, but anyone fielding land raiders in numbers enough to be scary won't have anything substantial inside. if they do have some badass cargo, it isn't anything you can't kill or overwhelm in a turn or so.

    mech guard might be a bigger problem for you. sure you can hurt the transports better, but you still won't get to choose where the fight will be. and a russ of any flavour is going to be one of those AV14 problems for a while. the best anti-russ weapon the orks have is snikrot - especially against squadrons.

    and i have to go with everyone else so far about the KFF. the shokky has a special place in my heart, but you don't have any real use for it. sure it has the chance to hurt those AV14 threats, but every other good target for it can be handled by the lootas and the boyz.

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  8. I found a moderately fitting picture.

    couldn't find the one I was wanting, with some WW2 Brits (or maybe Aussies) charging German trenches with Kukri's in the Africa campaigns.

    Big Armor's always a headache for Orks. I think the others have given decant advice. More klaws, more rokkits.
    I'd almost bet not a lot of people will take over 3 LR's.
    You start really cutting into your offensive power at that point, plus, lists like Mine and SandWyrm's really cut those Raider heavy lists down to size pretty easy.

    for every guy to show up with raiders, there's two-three with anti-mech

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  9. Riders for the sake of Raider is not very effective, generally because it uses the standard Raider and there's nothing inside that is really scary.

    A Codex Marine/Space Wolves/Blood Angels army that's built around 3-4 raiders is another matter altogether. They'll be using Crusaders or Redeemers, and those do put out a lot of killing power at close range. They'll also be unloading units like fully kitted out Blood Claws with a Wolf Priest and Ragnar.

    These lists are more flexible too, with utility units like speeders and dreadnoughts.

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  10. Edit:

    Opening Pic replaced with one I took from the actual battle in question, which was against Bluemoon's Land Raider Spam that I beat (without killing anything) last week. Also added an overview pic from mid-game.

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  11. Don't Grot cannons have some kind of anti-armor round? The ork player I play routinely around here goes with a brace of them and a bunch of lootas, and sprinkles those damn rokkit launchas all over the place. I'm ready to drop the IG and play some AV14 spam lists myself (damn Grots).

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  12. I think what we have here is a classic rock-paper-scissors spam situation. Both of you need to diversify and balance your lists to break out of this cycle and have decent all-comers forces.

    Here's how to make a balanced all-comers force:
    http://theback40k.blogspot.com/2010/01/you-brought-what.html

    It's true that Orks have more problems than most with AV14. But as I showed last week in the exact same mission, movement and blocking ability can shut BlueMoon's Land Raiders down, even when you can't kill the Raiders themselves.

    So try taking a list with a mix of Trukks, Deathrolla-equipped Battlewagons, Nob Bikers, and Deathkoptas. Orks excel in speed and close-combat, so you want to maximize your strengths by getting in his face and making him react to you.

    When I talked to you last night, you said that you were trying to avoid taking vehicles because you thought everyone would bring too much anti-tank to 'Ard Boyz. That may be true, but it doesn't mean that Mech is bad.

    Consider the third battle in this tourney report from last summer:

    http://theback40k.blogspot.com/search/label/Tourney%20Report?updated-max=2009-08-10T01%3A55%3A00-04%3A00&max-results=20

    I lost every single tank to the other guy's lascannon spam, yet I won the game! I could have won an even wider victory had I not gotten down on myself for losing those tanks and paid attention to the goals of the mission!

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  13. I appreciate the advice and I will take it into massive consideration.

    My biggest problem with this particular issue is the fact that the game left a horrible taste in my mouth by the sheer fact that, in the last stretch of the game, he simply tank shocked his way onto objectives so I could not hold the ones i had been sitting on all game to come to a 3 objectives to none victory.

    I had all the potential in my list to glance the vehicles into at least immobilize but I couldn't do it.

    The biggest reason I took the shokk attack gun mek over a kustom force field mek is that I wanted to switch it up and maybe have more infantry killing power as I almost always ran the kustom force field mek before.

    As for shoota boyz, well I'm fielding what shoota boyz I own right now. I honestly do not have many shoota boyz as most of my collection was bought and assembled before the new book and a I traded off a great deal of my shoota bitz or turned them into big shootas. I know that shootas are more flexible than slugga and choppa, just don't have the models and I've got a big place in my heart for slugga/choppa boyz.

    I do kind of wish orks had at least one AP 1 weapon that wasn't a variable AP gun with max strength of 6.

    Again all, thanks for the great advice and criticism. Just glad it wasn't mostly hateful words like some of the forums I've seen such advice on.

    And last but not least, I wanna point out daemonhunters can run crusaders that use the old crusader rules where they can move 12" and still shoot their hurricane bolters. So with power of the machine spirit, they get hurricane bolters and an assault cannon.

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  14. The best thing in the Daemonhunter army is the cruader! Well and the nemisis force weapon.

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  15. Try reading this article:

    http://fightingtigersofveda.com/top10orktank.html

    Just copy the url into the url box and you should be good to go.

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