OK, I said that I might
write a bit about the newish Ork codex, and here we are. MUCH LATER.
Let's start with one of the big ones, Command Points &
Stratagems. I must confess I'm a late comer to this entire concept,
Orks having extremely limited options until the new book. For the
unfamiliar, Command Points (CP) are a resource generated by building
your army in a specific way, which can be spent on special rules,
Stratagems. Think of them as a hand of cards you can play(1),
interrupting the normal turn sequence to affect the game. Orks can do
rather well out of Stratagems, because our low cost units can enable
a lot of them, granting flexibility to your forces. I'm not going to
do a blow-by-blow of those available to Orks, these are fairly
self-explanatory, but I will talk about a few highlights and how best
to get them.
The Basic Idea
The stratagem holy
trinity is probably Teleportas, Ramming Speed, and Unstoppable
Greentide. Basically everything choppy benefits from being teleported
in, but it's a gorksend for your Deff Dreads and walkers. This has
synergy with Ramming Speed, which can make the teleported vehicle a
nasty surprise for people, as well of being handy for the new Speed
Freek units. These two allow for what every ork force ultimately
wants to do, getting in your opponent's face on your terms. Factor in
Da Jump, and you can get a metric ton of stuff in the enemy
deployment on turn 2, and this is where Unstoppable Greentide comes
in. Not only do you get models back for free, you can redeploy the
unit. While it is extremely predictable, a typical Battle Forged Ork
force will start with these three stratagems in mind. However, you
need CP from somewhere, and a lot of people start with
something like this:
HQ
Weirdboy with Da Jump
Weirdboy with Fists of
Gork
Troops
10 Gretchin
10 more Gretchin
Another 10
Gretchin
This basic battalion is and easy plug in for an existing force with an infantry element, and is a decent example of how to work more Command Points into your force. It only costs 214 points, grants 5 CP, and while grots are famously crap at actual fighting, even they have a use. The Grot Shields Stratagem allows them to protect other infantry like the famously bullet-prone Lootas, and if not, they can do the boring stuff like hold objectives. The Weirdboyz are also inexpensive, and bring two useful powers, and can Smite stuff in the absence of better ideas. This battalion is obviously not self-contained, and would require there to be a big unit of Boyz or similar to work properly, but it really wouldn't be difficult to add one, and then do exactly what you want with the rest of your points. Alternatively, a more self-reliant battalion might look like this:
This basic battalion is and easy plug in for an existing force with an infantry element, and is a decent example of how to work more Command Points into your force. It only costs 214 points, grants 5 CP, and while grots are famously crap at actual fighting, even they have a use. The Grot Shields Stratagem allows them to protect other infantry like the famously bullet-prone Lootas, and if not, they can do the boring stuff like hold objectives. The Weirdboyz are also inexpensive, and bring two useful powers, and can Smite stuff in the absence of better ideas. This battalion is obviously not self-contained, and would require there to be a big unit of Boyz or similar to work properly, but it really wouldn't be difficult to add one, and then do exactly what you want with the rest of your points. Alternatively, a more self-reliant battalion might look like this:
HQ
Weirdboy with Da Jump
Big Mek with Shokk
Attack Gun
Troops
30 Shoota Boyz,
including a Nob with a Big Choppa
10 Shoota Boyz,
including a Nob with a Big Choppa
10 Gretchin
This battalion is about
footslogging and doing unglamorous jobs like supporting fire and
holding objectives. There are two Stratagems you can use here, the
aforementioned Unstoppable Greentide, and Mob Up. These are mutually
exclusive, so don't mix them up, but using Mob Up to nail two units
together and then jumping them somewhere is well-worth
considering. Remember Ork units usually work best as big as
possible. That said, clan kulture starts to make its presence felt
here, requiring some tweaking. Goffs would definitely want to go the
Skarboy route here, for example.
Going Further
OK, so you got a
battalion, do you need more that? Possibly. Going for 2 battalions
gives pretty much all the slots you'd need at under 2000 points and
10 CP, assuming you don't mind taking the mandatory Troop units and
HQ. I come from the school that believes ork armies should have at
least a hundred models in them, so I don't. This may not
however be the case. One thing that tends to turn up a lot in the
discourse is the idea of small formations of differing clans,
maximising their speciality. Badmoons or Freebooters would like the
Spearhead detachment, Evil Sunz would like Outriders, and so on.
These do suffer from fairly minimal CP, so variants of the grot
battalion seem more popular. Alternatively, if you are a clan
purist(2), there's always the brigade. This grants more CP than 2
battalions, and requires one less HQ, but asks that you take a lot of
everything. Fulfilling that requirement is tricky, but there is an
inexpensive unit for each slot. Unfortunately, Orks don't do the
whole “Multiple Small Unit” thing very well(3), so this really
isn't sensible below 2000 points. Here's an example of what people
are trying.
Bad Moons Battalion
HQ
Weirdboy with Da Jump
Weirdboy with Fists of
Gork
Troops
10 Gretchin
10 more Gretchin
Another 10 Gretchin
Heavy Support
15 Lootas
10 Lootas
This is a culmination
of what we've talked about so far. You Mob up the 2 Lootas, have them
shoot, and them use the Bad Moon specific stratagem “Show-Offs”
to make them fire again. Tactical Rerolls and More Dakka also have
applications here, to maximise the Dethguns, and Grotshield will
protect them from the inevitable attempts at revenge. Of course, this
eats CP like me at an all-you-can-eat buffet, which is another reason
why this is a battalion.
Wrapping Things Up
This concludes our
brief look at the matter of Ork Stratagems. TL;DR try to have as many
as possible.
Foot notes
- Literally, in that you can buy them as cards.
- Dodgy wording alert!
- Possibly Deathskulls, but its a push.
