Today I played against Big Green's orks. He brought a hybrid mech/foot ork list. I've played against Big Green's Loganwing before, with each of us getting 1 win apiece. Now my opponent didn't bring an ultra-competitive ork list - he only had 1 battlewagon and no nob units - but he had a lot of guns that would make me hurt. I also didn't bring a very competitive
GK list. It's strong, but it's only got 2 dreadnoughts and 1 razorback. So here we have 2 average builds going against each other. I would say it is a fair fight.
Grey Knights 2K (My list)
Castellan Crowe
Vindicare
10x Purifier Grey Knights - 4x Psycannons, Psybolt Ammo, 5x Halberds, 1x Warding Stave
10x Purifier Grey Knights - 3x Psycannons, Psybolt Ammo, 5x Halberds, 1x Warding Stave
10x Purifier Grey Knights - 3x Psycannons, Psybolt Ammo, 5x Halberds, 1x Warding Stave
10x Interceptors - 2x Psycannons, Psybolt Ammo
Dreadnought - 2x
TL-Autocannons, Psybolt Ammo
Dreadnought - 2x
TL-Autocannons, Psybolt Ammo
5x Purgation Grey Knights - 4x Incinerators, Razorback w/Psybolt Ammo
Orks 2K
Big Mek - Kustom Force Field, Power Klaw (in Battlewagon)
Big Mek - Ammo Runt, Boss Pole, 'Eavy Armor, Shock Attack Gun
11x Burna Boyz (in Battlewagon)
15x Lootas
30x Shoota Boyz - 3x Big Shootas, Nob w/Boss Pole, 'Eavy Armor & Power Klaw
30x Choppa Boyz - Nob w/Boss Pole, 'Eavy Armor & Power Klaw
12x Choppa Boyz - Nob w/Boss Pole, 'Eavy Armor & Power Klaw, Trukk w/Red Paint
12x Choppa Boyz - Nob w/Boss Pole, 'Eavy Armor & Power Klaw, Trukk w/Red Paint
12x Choppa Boyz - Nob w/Boss Pole, 'Eavy Armor & Power Klaw, Trukk w/Red Paint
Battle Wagon - Armor Plates, Deff'rolla, Grot Riggas, Kilkannon
Looted Wagon - 'Ard Case, Boom Gun
Looted Wagon - 'Ard Case, Boom Gun
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PRE-GAME ANALYSIS:
Grey Knights:
Big Green's ork army is actually a very dangerous army to a foot-list such as mine. He's got 3 S7/8 AP3 large pie plates and 1 variable strength AP2 large blast (the Shock Attack Gun, or
SAG). I cannot stay out in the open and must try to hug cover as much as possible. That will limit my mobility, depending on the amount of terrain there is. His lootas can potentially put out 45 S7 shots, enough to wipe out just about any unit they shoot at. And they should be in cover so they won't be easy to take out. I just don't have much shooting that can match their 48" range, and I won't be able to get close to them because all his orks will be advancing. Then he's got hist burna boys in battlewagon. Any unit they flame will be dead. Period. Finally, those 2 30-boy units sure are scary. I'm not sure how well I will do against them. My purifiers have a chance....if Cleansing Flame goes off. Otherwise, I need to double-team them in assault, but with those pie plates flying around, I will be severely limited in where I can go.
As for resilience, Kustom Force Field (
KFF) should give all his vehicles cover. But the biggest challenge to me will probably be his high mobility. I just do not have the speed to match his, and that will pose a problem in objectives-based missions. The ork army poses a lot of problems to mine.
For my tactics, my primary targets would be his ordnance weapons. With them out of the way, my knights will have more freedom to move. If I can't move freely, I won't win. Then I will try to take away his mobility. That should even up the matchups. What remains to be seen is how much punishment from ork shooting can I endure before I accomplish my goals.
In Seize Ground and Capture and Control, I feel he has the advantage with more troops and better mobility. But in annihilation, I may have the advantage due to his easy-to-pop transports, though his
KFF Big Mek will make me work for it. As for deployment, to me, it doesn't really matter. He needs to come to me no matter the deployment and I should get 1, maybe 2 turns of shooting before he does.
Orks:
What should orks watch out for? Can we say, Purifiers? Yes, my purifiers will make a mess of his orks in assault, assuming I get Cleansing Flame off. Even Crowe should be pretty dangerous to his boys if I get the charge. Dreads should punch through his vehicles easily enough, even with cover. Purgations will be dangerous to him if and only if they can get into flamer range. My purgation unit has wiped out a 26-termagant unit before when I played against tyranids. I'm not sure how the vindicare will do this game. His shot will probably do something....if it can get pass the
KFF's bubble of protection (cover). I don't see my interceptors doing too well here. Yeah, their stormbolters will probably hurt, but if his ork boyz are in cover, I'll probably kill only about 6-8 of them, after which he could retaliate with his lootas.
One thing that will be to his advantage is that we played it that Cleansing Flame could only be used in the very first turn of assault. Thus, no Cleansing Flame each and every phase of combat for my purifiers. That would actually make a huge difference in assault.
He would want to go first. If I went first, my shooting, though not very strong compared to my mech-
GK list, could potentially cripple him. S7 psycannons and even my S5 stormbolters will make a mess out of all his vehicles besides the battlewagon. Then, I have my vindicare to take care of that. I will also try to setup my dreads for side shots into his BW. However, I may not want to go first. Depending on deployment, I may choose to go second and instead react to his deployment, especially if there is ample cover against his pie plates.
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Mission: Capture and Control
Deployment: Spearhead
Initiative: Grey Knights, but I opted to go second so I could see how he deployed.
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Deployment:
Ork deployment. His objective is in the ruins where his lootas are.
Grey Knights deployment. I try to give cover to my dreads from his lootas. My objective is behind my razorback.
Notice how clumped up my guys were. I was paying too much attention to his lootas and tried to deploy my knights out of their
LOS. Thus I had to pack my guys in tight. I was hoping that no
LOS and cover will minimize any damage caused by his large blasts.
See, game hasn't even started yet and ork shooting has already made an impact against my army.
Vindicare infiltrates into another ruins to get better
LOS.
I try to seize the initiative but fail.
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Orks 1
Orks advance.
More ork movement from another perspective.
One of his looted wagon, after moving, gets a good angle on my clumped up purifiers....there is no cover for them. Luckily for my knights, that shot scatters and only kills 4. He then fires his Big Mek's
SAG (shock attack gun) at the same unit. It is a direct hit, but thanks to cover, I only lose 2 from that unit (4 left) and another 3 from my other purifier unit in the ruins (7 left).
His lootas fire at my 3rd purifiers (near my objective) and kill 3.
Pretty effective ork shooting. Already, he's killed about 310pts+ worth of purifiers.
Grey Knights 1
Grey Knights reposition themselves. His lootas are really screwing me up so I take a gamble. I shunt my interceptors 30" to try to take out his lootas (or weaken them severely at least). Next turn, his 30-boy shoota mob should be able to charge my 300pt interceptor squad. If I don't do enough damage, I'm going to lose that squad next turn.
Crowe comes out of hiding and moves towards his 30 choppa boys. I have a big surprise awaiting them.
My vindicare pens his battlewagon, but he makes his cover. What my vindicare fails to do, however, my left dreadnought successfully accomplishes, blowing up his battlewagon (from the side arc) and killing a couple of burnas in the process. I believe some of the surrounding ork boys die to the explosion as well.
My other dread then fires at one of his looted wagons and blows it up as well.
Psycannon fire blows up one of the trukks, but not before it careems towards my knights. The explosion kill 2 ork boys...and also kill 2 of my purifiers as well!
Other shooting immobilises and stuns his other trukk. Finally, my interceptors fire at his lootas but due to cover, I only manage to kill 4. Not good at all.
In assault, Crowe charges his 30-boy choppa mob. I cast Cleansing Flame and it causes 14 wounds!
Crowe then decides to parry instead of attack. He fails to get any wounds pass my re-rollable saves....and then loses another 14 boys to No Retreat!!! Wow, I just killed 28 ork boys with Crowe.
In the other assault, my 2-man purifier unit assault his 9 orks. Cleansing Flame and normal attacks kill off 5 boys. I then fail my 2++ warding save and lose my 2 purifiers.
Orks 2
Orks disembark from their immobilised trukk and move towards my purifiers. Shoota boys (that other big squad) move towards my interceptors.
His 4-boy unit heads towards my dreadnought. For some reason, he can still see my knights behind the building and focuses on them, killing another 4 knights.
30-boy shoota squad shoots down 3 interceptors.
One unit of boys disembark from his last untouched trukk and assault my dread. They both don't do much in combat (he might have shaken my dread).
Big Mek and burnas assault into Crowe with power weapons (and a power klaw). It might have made a difference here if I was able to use Cleansing Flame.
Instead, I attack everyone in base contact. I kill maybe 3 orks and then he pummels me to death with his power weapons. But before Crowe dies, he makes a heroic sacrifice and take the Big Mek with him.
He assaults my other dread......
.....and kills it.
12 ork boys assault my purifiers. I roll badly and only kill 5 with Cleansing Flamer and assault. He then wipes out my purifiers despite my 2++ invuln.
His shootas then assault my interceptors. I cast hammerhand, but my justicar rolls snake-eyes (1,1) for my psychic test and dies.
Only 2 interceptors survive. Unfortunately, my guys don't break.
Grey Knights 2
Wow...all that carnage....and it's only turn 2! I don't have much gas left in the tank.
This turn, I forget to fire my vindicare.
My last troop choice gets out of his
LOS of his lootas,
SAG and looted wagon.
Razorback drops off purgation squad.
No way they're surviving 4 incinerators.
I shoot at his 3-man ork unit and kill off 2 orks as well as put 1W on his nob. I make a mistake here. My razorback moved 12" and shouldn't have been able to shoot. We both miss it.
In assault, his orks blow up my other dread. He maybe lost 1 or 2 orks only in the explosion.
His shoota boys also wipe out my interceptors.
Orks 3
From here on out, the game went pretty quickly. I didn't have much left.
Ork movement. Burnas go after my vindicare.
Shoota boys go after my purgation. No need for assault. Shootas wipe them out with shooting.
His lone nob then assaults my 3-man purifier unit, but I kill him before he can even strike.
Grey Knights 3
My
GK's get out of his
LOS again. I'm trying to stay alive to defend my objective til the bitter end. Rhino zooms 12" towards his objective.
I didn't bother shooting.
Orks 4
The end is near. Orks move towards my purifiers and objective.
Burnas climb up the ruins towards my vindicare.
His shoot boys, after moving, manages to see my purifiers and open fire. After the dust settles, there
is nothing but dust.
Lootas shake my razorback.
As his orks can reach both objectives and my razorback can only contest one (if it even survive the lootas), I concede the game.
Victory to Orks!!!
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Post-game Anaylsis:
Wow, this was not what I was expecting. I know orks can easily out-assault my army, but
to out-shoot me as well?!? How ironic. I was expecting my shooting, combined with Cleansing Flame, would lead me to victory. What I didn't expect was to get routed like that. But honestly, I shouldn't be too surprised. Big Green's army is well suited to take on an army like mine. His army is a terror against foot-
MEQ lists. He's got large
AP 2/3 blasts galore (4 of them). He's got speed. He outranges me with his lootas. There's almost no way I could get to them. My interceptors were the only ones who can, but he's protected them with 30-ork boys. He can out-assault normal
MEQ's. To him, a power weapon is not much better than a non-power weapon, considering his armor save of 6+. And he's got resilience with a bunch of boys, 5+ cover for them and 4+ cover for his vehicles.
I didn't shoot at his boys because my priority was to take away his speed. That meant psycannons were firing at transports instead of ork boys. I think that is the right strategy, but it's a waste of my S5 stormbolters. So in a way, my shooting was curbed. This just shows one of the inherent weaknesses of foot lists. I need to waste my firepower trying to open up his transports, whereas my opponent can already start shooting at my infantry on turn 1. That's why I think mechanized lists will always be more competitive than foot lists - you've got more mobility and you've also got another layer of protection for your precious infantry.
This game also confirms my suspicions that
GK's are not really an assault army. While their nemesis force weapons are good against other
MEQ's and elite armies, they still cannot take on
cc-specialist armies, at least not head on. They need shooting and powers such as Cleansing Flame to help them even the odds against these armies. That's twice now that my
GK's have lost to assault armies - daemons and orks.
My opponent played a great game. He identified which he felt were my more dangerous units, and set his target priority accordingly. He ignored "support units" such as my dreads and the vindicare and went directly after my purifiers because they were the most dangerous threats to his army (and they were scoring troops also!). He then locked up my dreads with his smaller units. Luckily for him, he wrecked both dreads with some really good rolling.
I think I made 2 major mistakes. Firstly, I should have gone first. My shooting may have been enough to stall his advance on his own deployment zone. This is not my most shooty army (not by a long shot), and yet I was able to disable his battlewagon, 1 looted wagon and 2 trukks on my first turn of shooting, all with cover! My other mistake was that I was just playing too cautiously and probably gave his lootas too much respect. Instead of trying to hide from them, I should just have deployed in cover and shot. Instead, some of my guys were out of
LOS and couldn't shoot. Also because of his lootas, I deployed my interceptors all the way in the back. Finally, I was trying to "hide under a rock". This caused my squad to be tightly bunched up when I should have spread out due to his blasts.
Now the Grey Knight units.....
Crowe: A. This guys is a very under-rated
HQ. He almost single-handedly wiped out an entire 30-boy unit and took out the Big Mek. Not too shabby for what some consider a "liability" and "waste of an
HQ slot". Yes, you'll find that a lot of times, the "Crowe tax" will be giving refunds instead of making you pay more.
Dreadnought: B+. Again, they pulled through for me. Talk about efficient shooting. They were responsible for taking out a battlewagon and a looted wagon, both with cover! My only complaint is their resilience....or lack of. My recommendation? If you can afford it, get the vendreads.
Vindicare: D. Didn't do anything here. Partially my fault for forgetting to fire him for 2 rounds. He was just so well hidden.
Lol.
Purifiers: B-. Normally a good unit, they were severely hampered in this game by ork shooting. They did manage to take out 2 trukks and some lot of boys, but if not for Cleansing Flame, their assault was under-whelming.
Interceptor Squad: D. Finally, a game where they were not the MVP's. To be fair, I sacrificed them to try to weaken the lootas, but that gamble failed.
DO NOT assault with them against a
cc-specialist unit. They, along with strike squads, just will not survive.
Purgation Squad: B. They did what they were supposed to....burn down a unit....and then they died. Too bad the unit they killed probably cost less than them. They are quite serviceable in a niche role.
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MVP's:
Grey Knights:
Crowe: This guy is getting more and more impressive every time I use him. I need to let this guy steal a transport so that he can make it to enemy lines unscathed to inflict some real damage. In 3 games with him, he took down the Nightbringer, broke a farseer, howling banshees, seer council and swept a unit of dire avengers on an objective against eldar....and now this. People will find out soon enough that this guy is a stud and one of the best-kept secrets in the codex....if used correctly.
Orks:
Lootas: This is a close one between his lootas and his shoota boys. His shoota boys took out my interceptors, my purgation squad and finally they finished off my last purifier squad (though there was only 3-models left). While his lootas didn't finish off any one unit, they did take out a lot of grey knights. However, more importantly, they affected the way I played and threw me off my game. Basically, if not for them, I would probably have played more aggressively. In short, they did for their army in this game what my Swarmlord usually does for my tyranids, and that is to change the way my opponent plays.
.....Bay Area Open GT 2013 - Best Tyranids 
.....LVO GT 2014 Team Tournament - Best Generals
Your end has come. The sight of us will be your last. We are Wrath. We are Vengeance. We are the Rainbow Warrioirs."
Waaagh! Skarshak - Back after being lost in the Warp, an' ready to Krump sum 'eads! 
DA KRIMSON KLAWZ 
Saves it from turning into an argument.
2000 pts 
