Eldar: strengths and weaknesses

So, today I am going to talk about the strengths and weaknesses of Eldar, from my experience.

The Eldar can be a very effective army, if played well. One of their guns (nightspinner, I believe,) can pin an enemy unit, and then cause even more damage in the next turn. (First, it causes damage, and then the next time that unit moves, it is going through difficult and dangerous terrain.) They have a high number of barrage weapons, great firepower, and still have some units that are good in close combat. (Avatar, anyone?) However, they do have a couple of weaknesses which are easy to exploit:

First off, they tend to lack high strength/armor piercing weapons. Like all armies they can take some, but they cannot take a lot. That means well armored units, such as Nobz or Meganobz, are very difficult to kill, because small arms fire is rarely effective against them, due to good armor and large amounts of wounds. And it also means that tanks with good armor, such as Battlewagons, (Or, in other armies, land raiders, monoliths, and other super-tanks,) will be difficult to kill. Rear armor will help, but the tanks will have several turns more than an army such as Dark Eldar with a dozen brightlances. (On a side-note, every time I have used Nobz, Meganobz, or both against Eldar, I have won spectacularly.)

Nearly all of their units have either/both WS4 or BS4, so they are pretty elite in what they do, but they only have S3 T3, so they are not exactly marines. (Armor isn’t great most of the time either.) Anti-infantry weapons work very well against the. (Big shootas wound on 2’s and penetrate, bigbomms wound on 3’s and penetrate, even grot blastas wound on 4’s, so one unit of grots will kill 6-7 of them in a single shooting phase.)

The elite units that they have are either expensive or low in numbers. Not unlike most other elite units, but in this case they also have bad armor most of the time. There are exceptions, but for the most part a gun will kill the elites just as easily as the troops. So, killing them first, before they can cause much damage, is always smart.

One of my friends, (Hey, Patrick!) Always takes the Avatar, so I am going to put a word on him here:

The hardest part about killing the Avatar is that ork boyz hit on 5’s and wound on 6’s. And, not many weapons are good against him because they either don’t wound easily, don’t penetrate, or have a low number of shots. The one unit I have found effective is one you have heard of from me many times before. It isn’t deffkoptas, it isn’t ork hordes, and it certainly isn’t Mad Dok Grotsnik. I even mentioned them earlier in this very post! It is decked out Nobz. With a Waaagh! banner, they hit on 4’s instead of 5’s. With big choppas, they wound on 3’s or 4’s, depending on the charge. (Even regular choppas can wound on 5’s, if they charge.) With power fists, they wound on 2’s and remove the armor save, (so it is a 4+ invuln instead of 3+ armor.) And they are still effective against other units. Also, this unit is really really fun to play. And, since the Avatar is only S6, he doesn’t cause instant death, so he will have to cause 10 wounds to remove a model, if you assorted your wargear well enough.

Warhammer 40K: The Psychological Aspect

Note: Before you start reading, I want you to understand a couple of things. First off, these tactics are not intended for friendly games. That is because friendly games are not all about annihilating your opponent. These are only for serious tournament players. Secondly, this is not foolproof. It will not work as well against some players in comparison to others. (More precisely, players who act instinctively will be more effected, players who follow a detailed plan/think their moves out very well, will not be as influenced.) Lastly, this is not the easiest strategy to use. It will take a little time before you can master it. With that in mind…

A lot of players in Warhammer 40k ignore the psychological aspect of the game. However, the ability to ‘psych out’ your opponent can be very helpful. If you make him think that he cannot win, he won’t try as hard. This works on both single combat scales, as well as the entire game in general. This has been done in real wars, as well as occasionally in nature. For instance, if you make your army look HUGE then your opponent will get nervous easily. Now, with orks a large army will be expected, but make it look even bigger by spreading out your boyz. This is smart anyways, to help keep blast templates from hurting you as much. However, if you spread out your boyz the maximum distance, then your unit will look 3 times as large. In the same aspect, your entire army will appear 3 times as large. This can also be used to make a powerful unit look weaker, if you keep them packed tight so they look smaller. If your enemy thinks that your horde of boyz is so massive that killing them is futile, he will not try as hard to shoot them, and will never even think about assaulting them. So, make your hordes look huge, and they will flee.

Another idea is to bring up games that you got lucky playing in the past. For instance, once my warboss killed 4 space marines on his own in CC. He had a power klaw, but still. Or if I was playing against nidz, I could bring up the time I nearly annihilated a unit of 3 tyranid warriors with 4 meganobz, in the shooting phase! If you bring up things like that, they will avoid the mentioned units like plague. Even better, if you could bring up one of the more ‘random’ units in the ork army, they will be even more fearful, because it might not be just luck. You could bring up the time your SAG destroyed an entire unit of terminators when you rolled double 6’s. If your opponent thinks that a unit is more powerful than it is, he will either avoid it, or attack it with way more force than necessary, wasting some of their firepower.

One last idea, you could have different dice for different tests. For instance, you have two dice that you always use for leadership tests, and you always use the same dice for armor saves, and you use a different set of dice for hits/wounds. That may not actually do anything, but your opponent will remember your exceptional rolls. Lets say that you keep rolling average for the first 3 turns, then your ‘attack dice’ get 15 hits and only 1 miss. Your opponent might attribute it to the dice, and he will then think that your dice are actually doing something. And then, when your ‘armor’ dice get 4 of the 5 cover saves, he will be sure of that. It might not be true, but it works sometimes.

And, on a different note, I have been working on the ‘Ultimate Painting Challenge.’ For those of you who don’t remember, the ‘Ultimate Painting Challenge‘ means that I have to paint my entire army, (or at least, what it was when I started the ‘Ultimate Painting Challenge‘) by this date:

10/15/10

If I do not paint all of the models for the ‘Ultimate Painting Challenge‘ by that date, then I will give away one item from my store, to one of my readers, for FREE! yes, for FREE! you heard me right, I said for FREE! even the shipping is FREE! and the handling is FREE! that means that the item, the shipping (within the continental United States,) and the handling will be FREE! I need to stop typing FREE!

Here is what is finished:

41 boyz

Warboss w/PK attack squig

4 deffkoptas

4 nobz

And here is what is not finished:

19 ork boys

10 grots

1 slaver

1 trukk

1 battlewagon (for an added challenge, it is not fully assembled

8 deffkoptas

10 lootas (one fell apart)

6 meganobs

3 burnas

1 mek

8 nobz

1 painboy

1 big mek with SAG

1 megaboss

1 wierdboy

Ghazkull Thraka

Mad Dok Grotsnik

So, I better get painting.

Apocalypse Strategy: Tyranids, Tau, and Space Marines

Today I will do three short strategies on fighting apocalypse battles with three different armies:

Tyranids: These guys first. They will usually be taking giant swarms of gaunts, (probably using the ‘endless swarm’ configuration, to gain the special rules.) The other thing they will be taking is super-monsters. No panzy warriors for them. They will go straight for the source, taking heirophants and heirodules, (if they own them,) and if that fails, all manner of regular MC’s. So pretty much you need two things: anti troop weapons and anti-super weapons. You know what you need? Stompas. Lots of stompas. Normally I would suggest big mek stompas for guns, but they have no tanks so your lifta-droppa would be useless. now, you could just take it for the gaze of mork and the gigashoot replacement weapon, but I personally would rather just keep the chainsaw arm, so you can kill 3-4 carnifaxes at once if you needed to. (Muah-hah-hah!) Another nifty trick, if you are near the board edge, you can assault a unit of 30 gaunts with a stompa and, well, ‘stomp’ on them using the stomp special attack. Then, when they get the -15 or so leadership, they will run off the board edge, or at least run a long ways away. However, this works both ways. While you should take lots of ork boyz to hold the many many objectives, and kill all the gaunts, but you should avoid the gargantuan creatures, as they can stomp too. Unfortunately, they move 12″ instead of 6″, so one thing to try is taking a bunch of stompas and and equal number of ork hordes, and putting all the hordes in the stompas. However, you will have trouble killing heirophants because they have T9 and 10 wounds. So what do you do? you can’t assault with initiative one, that is for sure. but you also shouldn’t assault with low strength, either. The nice thing about heirophants is that you can only take two, maybe three, in even a HUGE battle, but you can take four or five stompas. Now, the heirodule, while you can take several more, also has lower toughness, and only 6 wounds. not only that, but he only has a 3+ save, surprisingly. So what do you do against all of these threats?

First off, if your enemy agrees to using the ‘custom stompa’ rules that I posted about a while ago, take a ‘missile platform’ because 3D6 S9 shots the penetrate heirodule armor, plus D3 supa-rokkits, will kill most any threat, though it can only get one per turn. Let’s see, you would get an average of 3 wounds per turn, per stompa. so, with one stompa you could kill a heirodule every other turn. Also consider taking the gaze of mork if you use this special set of rules. Also, if he has several MC’s clumped together, take advantage of that with your 7″ blast S10 AP1 weapon. Awesome. Now, heirophants will require a little more work. There will only be a couple of them, but you will still have to shoot them a TON to kill them. focus ALL of your AP2 weaponry on one at a time until it is dead. Except maybe the stompa’s main gun, because you may want to shoot a gaunt unit that is getting to close to an objective. But otherwise, focus as much firepower as you can on them, and assuming you have gaze of mork and three stompas, (three stompas shouldn’t be a problem if they are taking two heirophants, because that must be a huge game,) it will still take you eight turns of concentrated fire to kill both. That is around four turns per heirophant, on average. (and use your missile platforms to kill everyone else, like the heirodules and the other MC’s.) Now, that is assuming your life is average, it make take less if you are lucky, or more if you are not, but on average it will take you about 8 turns to kill 2 heirophants with 3 stompas, assuming nobody gets in combat. so once the biggest nasties are out of the way, you have very little to fear from you enemy. I suggest that after you play that, you just mop up everyone else, very few of whom can take down stompas and the like. So: Focus all of your firepower on the most dangerous enemies first, keeping your ork boyz hidden inside the stompas, then simply release the boyz, hold the objectives, and use the stompas to mop up the rest of the gaunts and weaker MC’s.

Tau: These guys I find a lot easier. They have no super-heavy vehicles, one flyer, and only a couple formations. They pretty much have no new tricks. Simply unload with stompas,  because your Deth Kannon matches range with their railgun. Also, I suggest you take big mek stompas on this one, because that way you can use your lifta droppa on close tanks, and you get the power fields if they shoot with their railgun before you get the chance to blow them up. Now, the Deth Kannon, while it could blow them up, won’t do as good unless you move close enough to also use your lifta droppa and your gaze of mork. But all of those combined, as well as a few units of deffkoptas, and you should have no problem taking out the threats in just a few turns, especially if he only mounts his railguns onto broadside suits. And since he will try to avoid your guns, simply send out hordes of boyz to get the objectives and use your stompas as a reverse-lighting rod, keeping them hidden from your awesome power.If they can’t show them self without dying, but they also can’t win without seizing objectives, there is very little they can do. And yes, they will have more guys then a normal battle, but once the tanks are gone there is very little threat from their troops, so you should have no problem finishing them, unless you get terrible luck.

Space Marines: These guys, while they pose a larger threat then tau, are also not overly dangerous. Because while they got some new formations, and the thunderhawk, their main force is still not overly threatening. Once again, take big mek stompas to prevent them dying from shooting, (power fields will help a little,) and take a lot of them. However, if they take a battle titan, or even a mini-titan, you will have issues. The smaller titans, the scout walkers, you can just use a large amount of deffkoptas, and maybe a battlewagon with a deff rolla. And for the warlord battle titan? Well, you can’t shoot at him. you will have trouble even taking down the power fields in a turn, and it will repair all of them in a single turn. What do I suggest? Ghazkull Thraka inside of Snikrot’s kommandos. Snikrot allows anyone in his unit to come in from any board edge. That includes independent characters who join the unit. But, if he stays near the middle, you will have trouble. However, your best shot is getting Ghazkull into close combat alone, so take as many kommandos as you can, to make a retinue to protect him from shooting. The ‘slow and purposeful’ will really hurt here, but try and stay in cover because that will no longer effect you any worse than it already is. Then, when you are within 11-12″ call your WAAAGH!, break ghazkull off from the unit and get into assault range with the waaagh!, get into combat, and kill him. Now, I know what you are thinking, how can ghazkull kill the titan? Well, he is immune to instant death, on the turn you charged in he has an invulnerable 2+ save, and the battle titan can only stomp on him. And, one he is ‘stunned,’ (which should only take one turn,) he can only stomp on you. Not only that, but he cannot shoot, and he can’t do anything to harm you. Also, if you get ghazkull to the rear, you will cause a little more damage. So, given a few turns, ghazkull should be able to kill the beast. every turn you should get .5 glancing hits and 1.4 penetrating hits, so causing a ‘stunned’ result should not be difficult. In addition, within 15 turns or so, the monster should be dead. yeah, now that I think about it, 15 turns will be to many. By that time, though ghazkull may still be fine, the enemy will have assaulted him and probably killed him with a different unit. So, what you need to do is also take 3-4 battlewagons, all armed with deff rollas, grot riggas, ‘ard case, and armor plates. Also, if you have 100 extra point, throw a big mek with an Kustom Force Field in, to keep them safe. Charge them all against the Battle Titan, and with around 28 hits on average per turn, you should have no problem getting the titan to die. That will cause 4.5 glancing hits and 9.3 penetrating hits, causing an average of 4 structure points lost, plus weapons damage and stuff. So, maybe I should have re-labled this ‘how to kill a Battle Titan without really trying.’ What do you do if he takes two battle titans? you run and cry in a corner. (or you take around ten more deff rolla battlewagons and another KFF mek or two. Anyhow, once you have the Titans dead, (or titan, if he takes a warlord in a non-huge battle,) simply use a few stompas to mop up the mess, because space marines one advantage, (High armor,) is not as advantageous during apocalypse. (Also, orks got a real boost in apocalypse.)

Anti-Tau

It has been a while since I did a post on killing Tau, so here goes:

In general, Tau models are relatively fragile and weak. There are many easy ways to kill them. However, they also pump out large amounts of long range firepower, meaning that you will have to survive if you want to kill them. There are several units I have used to combat this:

Deffkoptas: I LOVE Deffkoptas. They won me several games in a tournament at Tabletop Game and Hobby, and made several others very close. One army I played happened to be tau, and these guys were my shining stars. They blew up his HQ (instant death and penetration of armor,) and caused huge amounts of damage on his tanks, saving me from those deadly railgun submunitions. Of course, four deffkoptas cost me a pretty penny, (210 pretty pennies, actually,) but they saved me the game, because before they were blown up, I killed a tank, made another tank completely worthless, (all it had was it’s burst cannons,) and blew up his HQ. But against troops, these guys are a little overkill. (And bigbomms/big shootas don’t penetrate armor,)

Lootas: These guys are a nice choice, they penetrate armor, and can in a pinch take down the tanks. Plant them in cover, keep them away from the enemies railguns, and you will be just fine. They have low BS though, and it will take 1.5 kills each to pay for them self, so you need a cheaper alternative.

Stormboyz: These guys make excellent warriors for taking down Tau Fire Warriors. Get them a looted wagon or hi-jack a trukk, and you can assault anywhere from 28″ (Minimum, only if you take looted wagon,) to 45″ (maximum, only if you take a trukk and call a waaagh! and get double sixes.) On average, you will be getting 36″, though that will fluctuate depending on whether or not you call a waaagh!, (assuming turn 2,) what kind of vehicle you take, ETC. You will obviously assault them, and here is what the average result will be:

(assuming both units have 12 men, orks have PK nob, Tau have Sha’sui)

Orks cause 9.8 wounds

Tau cause .6 wounds

Nob causes 2.2 wounds

So, the entire unit should be precisely annihilated at this point, (exactly 12 wounds on average) and you take MAYBE 1 casualty. Another nice thing about the PK nob configuration is that it can take down takes or HQ units relatively easily, meaning these guys can do everything to damage Tau except maybe hold objectives.

There you have it! Three more ways to kill Tau. (Note: I only have tested Deffkoptas in battle. Lootas I have used in other similar cases, and they performed admirably. Stormboyz, on the other hand, I only just bought, so it is completely math hammer on their respect.)

HQ’s: Warboss Wargear

Warbosses are the most common ork HQ. They are T5, which is practically immune to instant death, (except S10 or force weapons,) WS 5, and they can take almost every ork weapon in the game as wargear. (The only ones he can’t take? Shokk Attack Gun, Kustom Force Field, Waaagh! banner, big shoota, rokkit launcha, burna, kustom mega blasta, and weapons unique to specific units, [lootas, flash gitz, ETC.]) Okay, maybe there are a few weapons he can’t take. Anyways:

(The following items are listed on a scale of ‘never take (NT),’ ‘sometimes take (ST),’ and ‘always take (AT).’) (They are listed in the order found in the codex.)

First off, CC weapons:

Big Choppa: +2 strength and no disadvantages. You don’t get the extra attack, but S7 can kill most tanks, and wounds almost everything with ease. I would normally give this a ST, but I will have to abstain on that because of the next option. NT

Power Klaw: S10 hits that ignore armor! Sign me up! the only disadvantage is, you lose the initiative advantage. You could always chose to forgo using the power klaw and fight without wargear for a turn, but you would not get the extra attack normally allotted at normal strength and initiative. However, I can’t see the reason not to use this. And at I4, most units who threaten the Warboss are going to either beat that hugely or have I1 anyways (which ties the power klaw), so there is really no problem. AT

Now onto the guns:

Shoota/Rokkit: I consider this like I consider the nob version of it. With BS 2, you won’t be hitting much. And even if you do, what on earth would you be shooting at?!?! If it is a MC that you are going to assault soon, a single shot won’t hurt him very much at all. If it is a vehicle, who do you think your warboss is, Luke Skywalker? There is no way he will blow up a decently armed vehicle in one shot. And if you are aiming at a squad unit, (say, space marines,) there is a much more practical way to waste your points than trying to destroy a full squad of marines in one shot. NT

Shoota/Skorcha: This one is a little better, but if your warboss is within burning range, he is probably still will be out of assaulting range. Now, sometimes you will have already used your waaagh! and you want to just weaken the unit, other times you will still be within both assaulting and burning range, but other times you will not. A decent upgrade, worth the points but not necessarily a game saver. ST

Twin-linked shoota: Another mediocre gun upgrade, while it could cause a little more damage, chances are that if you are within gun range, you will have about one turn to shoot. And while in that one turn you can cause damage, you are still looking at a maximum of two kills, and that is assuming both shots hit, wound, and penetrate armor. against most units you won’t get any wounds. Also, if your opponent has fleet then you will be in assault range, losing those precious extra attacks. Not bad, though, if your opponent has a lot of slow and purposeful units that you can shoot at a lot before you assault. ST

Now on to the Mega Armor section: (does anyone else wonder why the mega armor is in a section of it’s own, but the warbike isn’t?)

Mega armor: This is an upgrade that I would only take if he was leading a unit of Meganobs. Of course, I am personally partial to meganobs, so I take mine all the time, but if you intend to have him leading a unit of boys, or flying solo, you will want to avoid this. ST

Miscellaneous:

Warbike: Just like mega armor, only take this to have him lead bikers/biker nobs. Otherwise he becomes a juicy 100 pt. target that can be killed in one turn of shooting easily. ST

Ammo runt: The only reason I can think of taking this is to turn an awful upgrade (Rokkit) into a more expensive awful upgrade. (rokkit with ammo runt.) NT

Attack Squig: Giving your PK warboss an extra attack is rather handy, and can get you those extra kills. Or, if you have the points, three or four of them! You could have around 600 attacks, if you spent the points. However, most games only call for 1, occasionally 2. Handy, but not always necessary. ST

Cybork Body: A 5+ invulnerable save may not be much, but will on average allow you 1 extra wound, assuming all of the enemies attacks penetrate armor but don’t cause instant death. Because if you have three wounds, and 1/3 of the time you save one of them, that averages to 4 1/3 wounds. However, 10 points is a bit much, and if you intend  on throwing him in a horde to act as a body shield, this may not work so well. That is, until you get into close combat. ST-AT

Bosspole: If you are taking meganobs, this is a MUST! doubling the odds of passing a leadership test when your unit costs 400 points can be very important.  However, with a unit of ork boyz, you will want one on your nob because he can’t be singled out in close combat. So it really depends on who you are facing, and who you are putting in the unit. ST

‘Eavy armor: if you are having your warboss lead smaller units, such as nobs (or possibly hiding him in a unit of kommandos with Snikrot!) you will want this. However, if you are already including body shields and/or a cybork body, this can get a little redundant. It is all up to taste. ST

So there you have it! A complete review on all warboss upgrades! If anyone has any other comments or ideas about the weapons, feel free to comment! Kill you later!

Custom Unit: Mek Army

So the way this list works is that you only can play with the units that I wrote down. A lot of them are from the codex, and only 4 are custom designed. It is more of a way to alter your list so that it fits in perfectly with the mek idea. Not that I left the customs out, of course…

HQ:

Big Mek

Wazdakka

Bigga Mek——85 pts can make one unit of meks or mega armored meks into a troops choice

WS 5 BS 2 S 5 T 5 W 3 I 4 A 4 LD 9 SV 6+

The Bigga Mek may take any wargear normally available to a Mek, but he may take two of the following instead of one:

Shokk Attack Gun

Kustom Force Field

Mega Armor

Warbike

Note that they still cost the same, and that Mega Armor and a Warbike may not be taken by the same Bigga Mek

Elites:

Mega armored Meks: 3-10 same rules as mega armored nobs, but with meks tools, can take a kombi-blasta (kustom mega blasta and shoota) for +5 points, and cost 43 points each. Otherwise, same rules as regular meganobs.

Meks: 5-20 per unit, 12 points per model, can take all upgrades normally available to meks.

Tankbustas

lootas

burnas

Troops:

Ork Boys (just like before.)

Mek’s special-unique unit, infantry,

WS 4 BS 2 S 3 T 4 W 1 I 2 A 2 LD 7 Sv 5+

Wargear: Kustom shootas: The meks special shootas count as normal shootas, but may take upgrades normally available only to flash gitz:

More dakka-+1 shot-2 points per model

Blasta- negative 1 AP-2 points per model

Shootier- plus 1 strength-2 points per model

gitfindas- 2 points per model

They are also equipped with a 5+ armor save, which can be upgraded to ‘eavy armor for 2 points per model. Other than that, they function exactly like normal boyz, including the upgrades that they take. (note that all weapons gain advantages, so a big shoota could become S6 AP 4 Assault 4 and a rokkit could become S9 AP 2 Assault 2.)

Fast attack:

Stormboyz

Warbikers

Deffkoptas

Warbuggies

Heavy support:

Dreadnaughts

Killa kanz

Battlewagon

Big Gunz

Looted Vehicles

Flash Gitz

Mek’s Kustom Kannon: 10 points 1-3

This is one of the most flexible weapon in Ork Mek history. It can be designed however the Bigga Mek or Warboss in question needs it. It is armed by a grot crew, and it’s stat-line is:

Range: 12″, Strength: -, Armor Pierce: – Special: Heavy 1

However, you can take the following upgrades for the guns, though none of them can take the same combination:

Immunity to glancing hits +30 points

Upgrade to Blast Weapon +5 points

Upgrade to Large Blast Weapon + 20 points

All shots ignore cover +25 points

4+ force field cover save +30 points

Up to three of the following:

+1 shot, +20 points per upgrade

1 to 10 of the following:

+ 1 strength, +6 points per upgrade

Up to 12 of the following:

+6″ range, 10 points per upgrade

Up to four of the following:

+1 armor on all sides, 10 points per upgrade

Up to five of the following:

-1 armor pierce, 6 points per upgrade

Designers notes: I wanted a gun that could do practically anything. You got a gun that could do practically anything, for a fee, of course.

Anti-ork tactics

Gee, it has been a while since my last post. Anyways, I decided to do a post on countering the models we all know and love, Orks. Yep, fighting fire with fire.

First off, lets get something straight. Just because some ‘getting started’ articles on games workshop say that there are two basic types of ork army, (Footsloggers and Mechanized,) does NOT mean it is true and does NOT mean you should always do one of them and does NOT mean that every other ork player you fight will be either hordes and hordes of orks or orks in vehicles charging forward. Orks are NOT that single minded. (Okay, they are, but there are still more options then that.) However, I can boil down the most common and most basic army types into three groups. (Note that this does NOT mean that they are the only three groups, they are just three more common groups that you will be facing.)

Also, remember that these may not work against somebody with similar ideas, (for instance, if they also read this blog.)

First off, the footsloggers: Yep, it is still a viable option. You will face it more commonly then most of the other ork armies, though you should still be prepared for other types. The obvious choice for countering this configuration is blast templates and guns. Use looted wagons with boomguns, deffguns, deffkoptas with biggboms, and SAG meks. You can also take shoota boys as troops, but still try and get the assault in to close combat, because then you will get the initiative bonus and strength, and kill quite a large amount of enemy orks. However, you will need something to kill this option.

The BIG GUNS: this is the option for killing footsloggers. It is quite a good option, I like it a lot,  but you can not use footslogging against it. So how do you kill it? Speed freaks. Put them in cheap vehicles, (or stronger battlewagons,) take a few bikers, use stormboys, and kommandos. Assault on turn two and cause mayhem. This will work even better if you are playing on corners. However, how do you best kill this option?

Speed freeks: this is the gun killing option. Another good choice, there is really only one sure-fire way to kill it. And that is: (drum roll please,) foot-sloggers. While the speed freaks will always get the assault, they are ussually pretty low in numbers, and cannot stand up to hordes. Against vehicle-based speed freaks, you might want to take a few tank-killing units as well, perhaps a few deffkoptas with rokkits, to take out the trukks and weaken them all the further.

There you have it. This will not cover all options for ork armies, and are in no way fool-proof, but should help for the start of an army. Watch out if your enemy does a hybrid choice, say, guns AND hordes, or speed freaks and guns, because mixing two smaller armie types will make both options stronger, and you will have to do the same to kill them. And watch out for the units that didn’t fit in the cattegories, you will want to take options for that. (for instance, you are facing a mob, so you chose guns, but they throw in just one unit of kommandos. You will have to take a whole nother unit of ork boys to protect against that, so it works in a similar way to a hybrid army.)

Unique units: Gargant!

Today I will only have one unique unit for warhammer 40k. It, however, will be AWESOME! It can only be used in apocalypse games, but is super incredible. The Gargant!

Gargant:                3000 points plus upgrades

WS 4 BS 2 S D Front: 14 Side: 14 Rear:13 I 1 A 2

Unit type: Super heavy vehicle, Walker,

Structure points: 12

Power fields: 6

Transport: 60 + three deffkoptas + 30. (The gargant counts as having three separate transport areas. Only the one with transport capacity of sixty may hold walkers. The one that holds deffkoptas counts as being open topped, and the one that holds thirty has no special rules. Note that the deffkoptas must be bought separately, and that all three transport areas evacuate separately. Also, the deffkoptas are only optional, and must be bought separately. However, if they are taken on the turn they disembark they may make a strategic re-deployment move.)

Access points: 3 on the back, deffkoptas irrelevant (open topped,) 1 on the back (attached to a ramp.)

Fire points: None, Irrelevant (open topped,) None

Weapons and equipment:

8 Supa rokkits, (see apocalypse rulebook)

3 supa dupa rokkits (S10 AP 2, grot guided weapon, (hits on a 2+))

Megadeff cannon (S10 AP 1 range: 240″ Primary weapon, heavy 3, 10″ blast)

Mega-supa-killa gatla (S7 AP3 range 90″ Heavy 2D6, Co-axial, Psycho-dakka-blasta,*)

Tankhunta blasta (SD AP 1 Range: 180 Heavy 8,)

Titan close combat weapon or twin linked Deth Kannon (see apocalypse rulebook)

3 twin linked big shootas

8 big shootas

2 supa-gatlas, mounted on the shoulders. (may be upgraded to Gigashoots, +10 points each.) (for both weapons, see apocalypse rulebook.)

1 belly gun (Strength 9 AP 2, Heavy 1, 4D6 blast**)

*Psycho-dakka-blasta: when the Mega-supa-killa-gatla is fired, it must fire all of its ammunition. Roll 2D6 for the number of shots, and once they are resolved, select a unit within 24″ of the previous unit and resolve 2D6 shots on them, then repeat. (you may select the first previous again.) When firing the Mega-supa-killa-gatla, if on the second round of shooting, or any subsequent rounds, you roll a double for the number of shots, the gun runs out of ammo and no more shots can be fired. Once the psycho-dakka-blasta fires its gun, it may not fire any more.

**When the belly gun is fired, roll 3D6 for scatter instead of 2D6. Instead of using a normal template, roll 4D6, and anyone within that radius around the center of the blast template is hit. There is no ‘center of blast.’ Cover saves may be taken.

In addition, the Gargant may take:

Up to 6 additional power fields, +80 points each.

Force field, (Counts as big meks custom force field, but only effects gargant and is mounted on the gargant,) +140 points

Deff arsenal, +120 points, (Range, 120″, S9 AP 3 Heavy 3D6, +D3 supa rokkits per turn)

Red Paint Job, +40 points

up to two lifta droppas, +40 points each

Gaze of mork, +30 points

Special rules

Effigy of Gork, (or Mork,) All units within 48″ become fearless, including those who are falling back and are below half strength. In this way, a unit that is falling back and below half strength may still re-group.

Inspiring Monstrosity, The Gargant is such a huge, almost Sacred, figure to the orks that all friendly units within 24″ gain +1 weapon skill, as they will fight all the harder in his presence. However, this works both ways. If the gargant is destroyed, place the model on its side or back, and all ork units within 24″ of the wreckage get -3 leadership, frightened at the enemy that could take down their god.

Super monstrosity: The gargant is such a huge monster that none can stop it. If he suffers a Drive Damaged! result, instead of cutting his move in half, or immobilizing him, simply remove D3 from his maximum movement. If this is reduced to 0″ or lower, then all the hits the Gargant has been taking finally sink in, and he is immobilized.

Krew remains: if the Gargant suffers a destroyed result, (not an explodes! result,) place it on its side. For the next turn and all turns after unless the gargant is properly destroyed and is blown up, (counting as AV 10 on the bottom of the model,) roll 3D6 at the beginning of the movement phase. That many grots swarm from the wreckage, with no runt herd to speak of. Because of this, they all count as an independent figure, may deploy anywhere within 6″ of the gargant, counting as 1 man troop choices. This means that if an enemy re-directs anti troop fire against them, the wounds will all be allocated on the one grot they were firing against. In addition, you may roll a D6 every turn, and gain that many ork boys, placed in the same way as the grots, counting as their own unit. Also, roll a D3. Place that many meks around the gargant in the same way around the Gargant. On the result of a natural 6, instead of independent meks, you may chose to place a Big Mek with either a Kustom Force Field or a Shokk Attack gun.

Designers notes: The gargant, whether or not it has a transport in it, is an army in itself. Even without men inside it can cost up to 3890 points. Add a couple of guys inside and you have one of the hardest units in the game, powerful enough to rival the reaver titans of the imperium. I tried to make it seem like a Stompa, but even more powerful and effective, and I liked the idea of the wrecked vehicle having swarms of units going out of it, being almost impossible to contain simply because they all have to be targeted separately. I thought it would be funny if one grot could contest an objective, or even seize one. If you have any questions, comments, or other ideas, feel free to post them.

Imperial Guard: A complete Tactica

HQ:

Commisar Yarrik: This is the only Unique unit I am doing today. I personally think that the Commmisar is not worth his points. With only T4, SV 4+, he is incredibly fragile. A couple of rokkit shots could kill him with the blink of an eye. In fact, most warbosses have better stats then he does. So what advantages does he have?

Eternal warrior: this means that he doesn’t fall over when a high strength weapon hits him.

Inspirational hero: on the assault, everyone in his unit may re-roll failed ‘to hit’ rolls.

Iron will: 2/3 of the time after he dies, he can get back up.

Bale eye: an extra attack, (making it three,) in close combat, and an extra shot.

Force field: re-roll all ‘to wound’ rolls inflicted on the commisar.

All of these make a very sturdy unit. But is it worth 185 points! no! Now, back to killing him. All it takes is a simple combination of nobs and a warboss. Give the warboss a power klaw, bosspole, and some attack squigs. Give the nobs a painboy with a PK, a waaagh! banner, maybe another regular PK, and a couple of big choppas. (arrange to your taste, just make sure there is at least one power klaw and that there is a waaagh! banner.) Now stick the entire unit in a transport, preferably a battlewagon, and then give the battlewagon a killkannon. Now, all of this will cost around 500 points, which is well over the cost of the commisar, but it makes a powerful punch anywhere against imperial guard. The killkannon can shoot most any unit to death, and the nob group is exceptionally sturdy. Now watch out, they are going to try and shoot you, so you may want to take a mek with a KFF. If you do that, you will want to take a bunch of other vehicles. But back to the commisar. Assault him with your nobs ASAP, and rip him to shreds in close combat. It doesn’t matter if he has a retinue, or eternal warrior, with this unit you can rip them to shreds. Once you have that done, (dont forget to cause plenty of mayhem with the killkannon,) continue to assault the other units and kill everything in sight. The nob unit described above makes a very sturdy hitting unit. And even if the commissar survives for turn after turn, you will be locked in combat, meaning they cant shoot at you.

Now, for the rest of imperial guard, I find them rather easy to kill. You will want to use a horde army, as their gun are powerful. But other then hordes and hordes of ork boys, (and possible a couple of nob units,) there is one other crucial element to take: Deffkoptas. Give them big shootas and bigbomms. Strafe the imperial guard cowards. Nearly all have T3 and a 5+ save. That means that big shootas and bigbomms, which pump out lots of mild shots, will be able to shred them. The bigbomms especially, as you can turbo-boost on the same turn that you use them. As for defense, you will want to take lots of boys. They penetrate armor like it isn’t even there most of the time. Now, they have lots of guys, but a unit of five deffkoptas that makes use of cover will be able to drop five biggboms, which can kill several units of IG squads, and the shootas will be able to kill around 6-7 guys every turn! you probably wont even need to take many power klaws, as a big choppa on a nob will cause instant death. Now watch out for ogryns, they have three wounds and toughness five. For this you will want to break out the warboss w/ power klaw and several attack squigs. Put him in a unit of boys and assault the ogryns. Their three attacks will go to waste on the ork boys, and a warboss with one attack squig will cause 2-3 dead ogryns per turn, without the charge, thanks to instant death. So, you assault them, the boys hit first. We will say that 15 ork boys are in CC. So, 60 attacks, thirty hit, ten wound, that is two dead ogryns. We will assume a squad of ten. So, eight hit back, that is 25 attacks, 13 hit, 8 wounds, that is seven dead boys. Now, the warboss attacks on the charge, with 6 attacks because of the squig. Causes 4 hits, (thanks to WS 5,) at worst three wounds, that is three dead ogryns. So, in one turn of combat, they lost five ogryns, (200 points,) and you lost 7 boys. (42 points.) another option would be to take meganobs, as their armor would survive shooting and they can rip anything apart, but that can get costly and the hidden power klaw works fine. Also, the nob attacks wouldn’t cause instant death against T5.

So, in summary, take mobs and mobs of ork boys, take deffkoptas with biggboms, and take the occasional hidden PK for the tough units. But what about the vehicles?

If there is one thing IG knows how to do, it is make powerful vehicles. Your mobs will not work if they have vehicles with a dozen large blast templates waiting to take them out. So  how do you take them out? there are three ways. 1. Deffkoptas with rokkits. bring them around to the rear armor and blast it to kingdom come. Give them bigbomms to, they might pass over some troops. 2. Tankbustas and a Warphead. Now, this is a bit costly, but my least favorite part is that it takes up a precious HQ position. You deep strike behind rear armor and blast it, but you cant assault and use your melta bombs or tankhammers. So, that brings me to option number three, my favorite. Stormboys. Give them zagstruk and a nob with a PK, then assault the rear armor of the vehicles. If you survive with only two guys left, (your nob and zagstruk,) you can assault the next vehicle. And the next. you wont have to worry about leadership, and this way you can take out two or three vehicles via fast assaulting and deep striking.

So, what have we learned from this post? Against troops use mobs and mobs, with deffkoptas and biggboms. Against vehicles, you will have to employ more deffkoptas and stormboys. You will probably end up using all of your fast attack choices, but this tends to work.

Deamons: Wut comes frum da warp

Deamons are murder against orks. They are a close combat based army, and have very few guns. (with very small range.) Obviously, a normal tactic will not work here. What we need is DAKKA!

Deamons have incredibly high weapon skill, and are very difficult to take out in close combat, simply because you can’t land a hit. They also are pretty much immune to power weapons and such, because all of there saves are invulnerable. They are not usually that high, (4+ or 5+ on average,) but they get them no matter what. Since we must forgo the usual methods for orky fighting, what we need is guns. Lots and lots of big guns. Don’t worry about armor, they will kill it in close combat most any time anyways, what you need is DAKKA!

The basic units for fighting deamons are:

HQ:

Big mek with SAG. The pie plates are good, and if you get those double sixes you could take out a greater deamon.

Elites:

Lootas. This unit is an obvious choice, as they can pump out tons of high strength shots, and they can shoot them far away. The AP is only four, but when fighting invulnerable saves, that doesn’t matter.

Burnas. These guys are less obvious, but the multiple overlapping templates means they can take out plethoras of squads.

Troops:

Shoota boys. These guys are another unit designed for guns. they don’t have great range, but are cheap, and can kill most any opponent by burying it in a flurry of shooting. Take big shootas.

Fast attack:

Warbuggies. These guys I will get to later in the post, they are not for their twin linked big shootas as a tar pit.

Deffkoptas. Yes! twin linked big shootas planted on top of a building causes massive damage, and there is nothing they can do about it, since they have no guns. they will have to specifically take a unit just to take these guys out!

Heavy support:

Gunwagon: this is a battlewagon with all the guns possible. I might even take a zzap gun instead of a kannon simply because on a roll of 4 or less, you can fire it as a defensive weapon! (nah, use a lobba.) Give this vehicle a big gun, four big shootas, and possibly a kill-kannon. I am not so sure about the kill-kannon, because it costs a lot and you can’t fire the other weapons when you use them. Also consider giving it the ‘ard case upgrade, because you aren’t taking this for a transport. you will probably not have to move it very much at all! just sit and fire away.

Lobbas: This is the only big gun I suggest you take. It has super range, it has good strength, it drops a ‘little’ pie plate, and it doesn’t require line of sight. Don’t worry about upgrades, by the time your enemy is within killing distance of them, it is to late, so no need for runt herds or extra grots. Maybe a few ammo runts, but that is it!

As for the warbuggies, here is what i suggest you do: (note, only do this in high point games when you don’t need the fast attack choices for other things)

Take two-three units of three guys, and make a wall with them. Simply line them up surrounding the stuff you need protected. Make a little circle. That is all you need to do, and your enemy will have to waste time attacking your buggies until he gets a ‘vehicle: explodes result.’ and then he will have to bottleneck through the gap he made. And all the time he spends killing them (you will get one turn, at least,) you can shoot with twenty seven (twenty four, once he kills something,) S5 twin-linked shots. I don’t care what he brought, he will not last that. A greater deamon would have to take six armor saves! (he would take around three wounds!.) This strategy works even better if you place them between a few buildings, so you need less guys to cover a greater area. (If he gets too many vehicle: destroyed results, he wont be able to get in CC at all! he will have to fly over or shoot you, two things deamons are NOT known for.)

(twin linked BS 5, so out of twenty seven shots, two thirds hit, (18 hits,) and against toughness six, which is the greater deamon toughness, 1/3 will wound, (six wounds.) greater deamons usually have a 4+ invulnerable save, so that means three wound him, he is stuck sitting outside of your ring, and you have a squad of lootas and stuff sitting inside! YEAH!)