Ork finalists and Christmas goodies

My Orks made it to the final of our Tale of Gamers, where they were on the back foot from the start against Henry's White Scars list with added FW Sicaran. Once the Centurions had whittled down my Stormboyz, the Battlewagon was immobilised and I lost the Trukk things got even harder.  I almost managed to claim the D3+3 maelstrom VP card for controlling every objective, but those dev cents actually won combat against my depleted burnas and meks and consolidated onto the last objective I needed.  It was game over from then on, with the final score 9-19.

My horde got a good number of reinforcements under the Christmas tree, including 30 Boyz, 5 Warbikers and 5 more Stormboyz - one box from Tim in the store as past of Matt's gift box idea.  The highlight however was a Morkanaut from an anonymous donor!  (I have a good idea who it was though.)  I was very happy with that haul, as I'm normally lucky to get one box.

I started building the Stormboyz from my daughter, so I was able to field 'Da Vulcha Skwad' from the Ghaz supplement in a doubles game yesterday.  We rolled for random pairings and my partner was George with his drop pod marines against Nick's guard and Oli's DE raiders.  My Trukk got immobilised first turn, which meant my Warboss and Nobz had to footslog across the board.  However, all of our reserves came in on time with minimal scatter, so our opponents were pretty much forced back into their corner.  They also had terrible luck with their reserve rolls, with the Valkyrie and Scions not arriving until turn 3, when the Scions mishapped and we got to place them in the corner.  Also, the Raider with 4 flamer weapons (I forget the name of the unit) on board stayed away until turn 4.

Who needs a 6x4 board anyway?

We threw everything into assault with the Talos / Cronos / Haemonculus formation, starting with a Chapter Master and Tac Squad, backed up by the Warboss and Nobz, the last few Stormboyz and Warbikers and killed the engines in combat for the first time ever.

The game ended with us holding all the objectives.  Drop pod marines seem to complement orks very well.  Although they are Come the Apocalypse allies, we ignored the allies matrix for both sides in this game.  I had been considering some Tyranid allies for my ork army, as that was always in their fluff, but I may work out my own list using an allied SM detachment in a drop pod or two to keep the opponent busy while the greenskins move up the board.  I have plenty of Howling Griffons already and wouldn't need to worry about the restrictions on deployment.

I wonder if I would be accused of abusing the allies rules...?

All of the Orks

Waagh Zogsmasha has reached the end of GW Newbury's Tale of Gamers.  There are now just some final games to play to decide the winner.

At over 100 figures at 1500 pts it certainly has the highest model count of any of the armies.  If you have never tried Orks, well you should give them a go.  I just love picking up handfuls of dice when they get into combat. It is a fun army and I find them a competitive force too.

Final Orks for Tale of Gamers

Last month threw up a bit of a surprise for me with the Tale of Gamers painting challenge.  I was aiming to enter my new bubble-chukka on a scenic oval base (from a flyer).  However, the base was stuck in the shop and took a bit longer than expected to finish, so I was behind on painting the artillery piece come judging day.  As a result I decided to put in my Warboss from month one instead, which won by one vote!

For the final instalment of the competition I decided I needed a bit more anti-tank beyond the 2 Meks with killsaws I added last month.  I am now nearly finished with 10 Tankbustas to do this job.  Boss Zagstruk makes up my last 65 points.  He gives me another character in my Stormboyz, and has the potential to remove a character with his hammer of wrath attacks.

The final challenge was to either enter Armies on Parade with the army, or enter it for a separate best painted army competition this weekend.  As I didn't have time to paint any more scenery, I have opted for the latter.  Having seen many of the entries from a number of stores this year, which seemed to be simply an army plonked on a realm of battle board, I might as well have done the same.  The lack of a national competition at Games Day this year seems to have discouraged many people from putting in much effort on terrain pieces.

I played a game with the full 1500 point army yesterday against Taff's Salamanders /  Grey Knight alliance.  This was another fun but very close affair, with the relic changing hands a couple of times, as neither of us could get away with it, although I lost it at the end of the game.  The deciding factor was his seemingly immortal biker captain, which spent most of the game on his last wound, but just would not die.  At one point I  allocated all my attacks from 13 boyz against him, but rolled just one 6 to wound, which of course he saved!  My tankbustas had a good game though, by killing the Dreadknight sat on the relic with their meltabombs.  That also got me first blood, which ended up being my only VP.

After the competition has finished I have a few more Nobz and Gretchin from Stormclaw to make, as well as 6 Killakans.  At some point I shall probably get another unit of Stormboyz, so I can field the formation from the Ghaz supplement with Zagstrukk.  1500 points is as many as I normally play anyway, but out would be good to get to 1850 or 2000, if only to give me more choice of units, instead of every greenskin I have.

Orks have taken over.

This blog may have been quiet lately, but my Ork army has been growing steadily and I played quite a few games with them over the summer holidays, which have all been great entertainment. There have been quite a few welcome convincing wins, which makes a bit of a change for me. With most current armies geared for shooting, my speedy horde has to get across the board quickly and hit hard, which it has done quite well so far.

Since my last update I have finished the Lootas and added a unit of Gretchin along with a couple of Nobs, including a power klaw and Waagh banner.  For my birthday in August I was given a Mek Gun, so next up is a Bubble Chukka and a unit of Burnas with a couple of killsaw-armed Meks.

The Lootas have added some dakka to the army and initially did very well by taking out a Fire Prism on their first ever turn.  They have not done quite so well since then, but opponents always seem to be wary of their potential for carnage.

Getting to shout 'WAAAAGH!' is one of the perks of the army. Unfortunately our GW manager is ex-Army and has politely asked me not to make unexpected loud noises in the shop. Shame!

With my force now reaching 1250 points, there will only be another 250 points until the last part of our Tale of Gamers is declared.  I have enjoyed the competition a lot so far and I am very pleased to have a new army, which is completely different from my Howling Griffons.  I would definitely recommend this type of event to all sorts of gamers, whether in a store or amongst a gaming group.

Orks vs Orks

My summer project for this year is my new Ork army for GW Newbury's Tale of Gamers.  We are now at the end of the third month and our forces have reached 750 pts.  I am just putting the finishing touches to my latest units, adding 10 stormboyz, 15 slugga boyz and a trukk to my force.

This week I have played 2 great games against other Ork players.

For the first one Wiggy wanted to play 1500 points.  Luckily, I found my son's old Black Reach army from when he briefly got into the hobby a few years back. He had more figures than I thought! In fact there was enough for me to field the Warband formation and another Horde detachment. This allowed me to give a weirdboy a try, as I could fit in more HQs.

We rolled Big Guns with 2 objectives each, so my Battlewagon would be worth 1 VP.  Wiggy had a Gorkanaut and a unit of Lootas.

During deployment I put most of my army on the right flank opposite his two Units of Boyz on Trukks, with 3 units of Gretchin as a meatshield across the whole front and the rest of my Boyz and my Wierdboy spread out behind.

Wiggy went first and it was an eventful turn for the psykers.  His weirdboy rolled Perils straight off and his Lootas then shot up my weirdboy's unit and they promptly ran off the board for first blood (note to self- make sure you get bosspoles!)  So much for testing the psyker...  My battlewagon was also immobilised before it could do much.

On my first turn the right flank started a sequence of charge and counter-charge, as Wiggy had put a Trukk in range. My bikes were sent fleeing (again no bosspole..) but the combined charge of Nobz and Boyz was too much for his Boyz.

During Turn 2 he advanced his Gorkanaut and disembarked the Burnas inside to threaten my right flank. Instead of the obvious charge with my Nobz I called what I hoped was my first Waagh of the game then sacrificed a unit of gretchin to soak up the wall of death from the burnas before the stormboyz overwhelmed them with 52 attacks.  I then charged my Warboss and his Nobz into the Gorkanaut with support from another unit of Boyz with my only Power Klaw. This was enough to kill the big walker and score me a VP, however the combat and resultant explosion saw the end of the Warboss too. A VP conceded too and no more Waaghs. However I knew my only way of dealing with armour was in combat I had little choice.

With our most threatening units gone the rest of the game became a war of attrition, although his big unit of shootas with weirdboy and warboss were still a worry.

Moving all the boyz around certainly takes longer than with marines, but I am sure I will speed up. In the end we just had time to get to the end of turn 5. A couple of my units were down to 2 models, but there were too many targets for Wiggy to finish them off. As I had the last turn I was able to use my last biker and my fast trukk to contest both of his objectives whilst I still held mine. The final score was 7-3 to me, but the result may well have been different if the game had continued.

The second game was a quick 800 pts played on the 4'x4' board at GW Newbury. I took my core force and swapped in 2 power klaws in my nobz unit. I played against Nick, who was mainly using shootas as well as more lootas.  With the smaller board, more of my army was in range of his guns, so he won 8-3. The craziest moment came when my 20 boys failed a 5" charge into woods against his lone warboss before killing him with sluggas on the next turn.

So what have been the lessons from these games?

1. Gretchin are great nuisance units for soaking up overwatch, clinging onto objectives, distraction etc.

2. I probably need more power klaws and certainly need more dakka! Ranged anti-armour would also help. Lootas are next on my list.

3. The warband formation is no good if the warboss dies in the first wave. Maybe get another warboss to hang back and call the Waaghs?

4. Orks are fun!

New Orks - Battlewagon and 20 Boyz

Waagh Zogsmasha is growing! Month 2 of our Tale of Gamers is now completed. Although I had the points for tabletop standard painting, I have now finished the Blood Axe camo and details to a standard I am happy with.  The Nobz are already in the window at GW Newbury and I would like these to join them too.

Next up are 10 more Boyz and 10 Stormboyz, which are now assembled.  The Stormboyz are really good fun to build and I will probably expand the unit further. A Trukk is also on my list for month 3.  It may even get the Nobz closer to combat before it gets wrecked!

The Ork codex is here - finally. Back to the drawing board now...

After what seemed like the slowest 40k release ever, the long-awaited Ork book is now out. So what is my initial verdict?

We are now used to the hardback codices with full-colour quality printing. As this is the first  7th edition book, GW has introduced a few changes to the layout.  Each unit is now represented on a single-page datasheet, instead of a unit description on one page then all the points elsewhere in the book. The points for many of the generic upgrades are still only listed on the wargear page, but there is a bit less page-flipping. The datasheet format also means there are now Lords of War (Ghaz and the Stompa), a 40k formation (Ork Warband) and a new detachment type (Ork Horde Detachment) also listed. Both of the latter give units of 10 or more models Hammer of Wrath IF they roll an unmodified 10 or more on their charge distance. Whilst this feels very Orky, I am not sure it compensates for losing Objective Secured. Even with a 30-strong mob, how many of those will get into base contact for an extra S3 hit when charging at extreme range? Perhaps 9 super-scoring troops (plus dedicated transports) would have been too much, but we'll have to see how useful these impact hits are in games.

Mob Rule has also changed and is more random. Instead of simply being Fearless at 11+ models, any units with this rule now roll on the Mob Rule table if they fail a morale or pinning test.  If they are locked in combat, they ignore the failed test on a 1. If there is a character in the unit, a 2 or 3 inflicts D6 S4 hits to ignore the failed test.  A 4-6 gives the same result if there are 10+ models in the unit.

My personal interest with the new book is how it affects my Tale of Gamers army. My first impression was disappointment. Even after only the second month, with the force at 500 pts, I already have to drop models. Both the Painboy and the Battlewagon have gone up in points. Whilst the Painboy is now a separate HQ and so can join any unit, instead of being an upgrade to my Nobz, at 50 pts he is now too much with the Warboss as well at this level.  Nobz are also no longer troops with a Warboss.  As we are now supposed to be playing 500 pt lists, I will either have to drop a couple of boyz and keep the big mob in the Battlewagon in an unbound list or take two units of 10 Boyz and reduce the Nobz unit instead. I also now need to declare month three.

I think I will stick with the normal FOC for the time being and carry on building up my Boyz. I will stick with Slugga boyz for now, as Shootas are also a point more expensive. Trukks are also slightly cheaper, if still only AV10, so I will try one of those too. I am also very tempted by Stormboyz. At only 9 pts each they can now be taken in units of 5-30 and now run up to 2d6", although this triggers a Dangerous Terrain test.  Combined with the new Waagh rule ( run and still assault once per game) this will surprise an unwary opponent.

Whilst Mob Rule is a big change, I think the combos in this book, as with the Astra Militarum book, will change how the army plays in the future.  There are some very nice new models in the Ork range, but many of the options seem designed around taking large numbers of boyz as the core of the army.  Again, this fits the character of the army. And of course GW also wants to increase sales.