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So, you're a happy ork that's got his hands on nobz. And you think: "Hey, the guyz are bigger badder boyz, wut can go wrong, i'm gona put them in any list and they'll rock!". Nope, not really. If you ask any ork player he'll say that they're underwhelming and outshadowed by other more regular choices in our dex. Let's make this comparison with both goods and bads going on for the nobz:

Comparing with other stuff

Nobz vs Boyz:
- Barebones nob costs like 3 choppaboyz being less durable and choppy than 3 of them
- Boyz don't care bout instant death
- No obsec => no obsec truck (not active if you're using horde detachment or other stuff that looses obsec on boyz)

+ They're less likely to loose enough models to force ld check after explosion
+ Hidden klaw!

~ If you factor in 'eavy armor, they're not 3 times more expensive but barely above 2 times. And damage output and durability of a single nob is comparable to 2 boyz.
~ Smaller footprint means more concentration and the guyz are easier to hide. The bottle neck fient is easier to pull off. While at the same time, they can't act as a bauble wrap as effectively. Yep, sometimes even truckboyz have to bauble wrap. Even though, it happens not that often.

Nobz vs Bikerboyz:
- You get 3 bikers for a single nob. Same stuff as Nobz vs Boyz but no more point mitigation for 'eavy armor nob vs 'ard boy. And the firepower loss is significant here.
- Instant death once again.

+ Not Fast Attack
+ Hidden Klaw once again

Nobz vs Meganobz:
They have different roles so is there really any point comparing them? Well, the hidden part is skippable at will.


How to actually use Nobs effectively?

Now as we've covered most notable drawbacks and advantages, let's try to find out the actual ways of using nobz and situations where they'd be worth it.

1. When you're running a list full of bikers, buggies and koptas - all great options - a min-mid-sized squad of bikernobz with a hidden klaw will find their place somewhere on the flank. Not before bikerboyz, though. But when you can take no more of this great guyz due to FOC limitations you can go for the nobz without hesitation!
I'd run with a squad of 3 or 5 with pk/bp nob. A squad of 3 is comparable in cost to a squad of truckboyz or manz but has obvious advantages of being biker-mounted and easier to hide.

2. Ask yourself, what's the best thing a regular nob does fluffwise?.. Mocks the weaker guyz around. What about a min squad of 3 'eavy armored nobz without other gear whatsoever? Having added in a ram truck, they'll cost you 101 pt! 106 with a bosspole.
How are they better than truckboyz, you ask me? Well, a min squad of barebones truckboyz will cost a few pt less but will be super-vulnerable and will need a nob upping it's cost. Than when/if the truck gets wrecked, they're more difficult to hide. And if it gets to explode, they loose almost half the squad forcing a ld check and possibly mob rule which will shrink the numbers even more. While, as listed in the nob'z advantages, unharmed nobz are less likely to get this problems. If you get 'eavy armor and nob for your boyz, they start to cost a third more. And you start to think, why not add a pk in, cause the squad's allready quite expensive. And they fall out of the category 'As cheap as possible'.
Also, target saturation ftw and they're annoying enough to make your opponent bite his elbows deciding what to shoot next.

2*. A squad of 5 with 'eavy armor and a single pk doing the job of 'ard truckboyz for about the same cost. All the advantages and disadvantages included, they're still quite comparable wtih 'ard boyz in this case.
But by the time you're done with filling your troop choices, you might allready get enough of those. And personally, i'd go for manz by that time. However, it's still an option.

3. In hellhuge games with titans, you can take a blob-of-death on bikes kitted with a bunch of power klaws for relatively cheap (for such games). Oh, boy, don't titans like such ammount of fast massed pk-s with 3+ cover save.

4. Combi-scorchas?.. I'm not sure if it's viable or better than burnas. So, will just leave it as an option.

In conclusion

Yep, nobz are mostly underwhelming if you just throw them in your list randomly. However, with a number of factors, they can be used not less effectively than other things.

It's mostly subjective, but I feel that medium-ish squads of nobz, with maybe one klaw max, are pretty good at pretending to be Boyz whilst also being shot at less. The solid amount of strength 5 attacks on the charge will make a bloody mess of anything, and the klaw makes sure it goes down.

Alternatively, a small squad with 'uge choppas would be pretty good at killing light vehicles I guess...

Personally, I think that the best thing about Nobz right now is that they're not high on the target priority unless you start gearing them out. Between huge blobs of Boyz, bikerstars, MANZ missles, and wagon rushes.. a moderately sized squad of Nobz with but a single klaw in a trukk won't get shot before any of those things. Yet, when they hit the line, they'll do a pretty good job of butchering any non-CC unit, or even effectively suiciding into horde oriented melee units (7 nobz would beat the tar out of a mob of boys ). If worst comes to worst they can be a surprisingly dangerous speed-bump, what with the hidden klaw and all.

 koooaei wrote:
+ They can't loose models if a transport explodes. So, no ld check and no mob rule for that matter - only pinning

This isn't correct.

10 models, so 10 hits. Assuming 5 wounds caused, that's 2 dead and one wounded.
Random Allocation doesn't let you spread wounds around. One model is chosen as the "closest" until it's dead, then another is randomly chosen.

 grendel083 wrote:

 koooaei wrote:
+ They can't loose models if a transport explodes. So, no ld check and no mob rule for that matter - only pinning

This isn't correct.

10 models, so 10 hits. Assuming 5 wounds caused, that's 2 dead and one wounded.
Random Allocation doesn't let you spread wounds around. One model is chosen as the "closest" until it's dead, then another is randomly chosen.

Good catch, i'll change it to "less likely to loose enough models to force ld check"


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 morganfreeman wrote:
It's mostly subjective, but I feel that medium-ish squads of nobz, with maybe one klaw max, are pretty good at pretending to be Boyz whilst also being shot at less. The solid amount of strength 5 attacks on the charge will make a bloody mess of anything, and the klaw makes sure it goes down.

Alternatively, a small squad with 'uge choppas would be pretty good at killing light vehicles I guess...

Personally, I think that the best thing about Nobz right now is that they're not high on the target priority unless you start gearing them out. Between huge blobs of Boyz, bikerstars, MANZ missles, and wagon rushes.. a moderately sized squad of Nobz with but a single klaw in a trukk won't get shot before any of those things. Yet, when they hit the line, they'll do a pretty good job of butchering any non-CC unit, or even effectively suiciding into horde oriented melee units (7 nobz would beat the tar out of a mob of boys ). If worst comes to worst they can be a surprisingly dangerous speed-bump, what with the hidden klaw and all.

Yes, s5 is sometimes invaluable. When you meet t6 spawns, for example. Striking simultaniously and wounding on 5-s is not bad. Or to more likely wreck a vehicle before having a chance to explode it with a pk. Besides, the lower ammount of models - the easier it is to get them all striking or hiding.

However, the drawbacks are: no obsec and generally more choppiness and staying power of regular boyz.

I rarely have Objsec on my Orks, find the army is more "Objective Sweepers" than "Objective holders". Works well for my guard though.

You guy did great job! I just was thinking of using my old good Nobz and have never thought of 3-4-strong trukksquads

Good stuff, nice writeup and I agree with most of it.

I've also found they're good run in a good sized squad behind a mob of Boys and with a Warboss in tow, as they can mop up behind the Boys or counter-charge if the Boys don't get through the enemy in one go or are threatened by another enemy unit. With Eavy Armour, they can actually be pretty tough to put down in time, especially if you have enough other 'more dangerous' threats.

 morganfreeman wrote:

Added the 2* option


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Paradigm wrote:
Good stuff, nice writeup and I agree with most of it.

I've also found they're good run in a good sized squad behind a mob of Boys and with a Warboss in tow, as they can mop up behind the Boys or counter-charge if the Boys don't get through the enemy in one go or are threatened by another enemy unit. With Eavy Armour, they can actually be pretty tough to put down in time, especially if you have enough other 'more dangerous' threats.

Unfortunately, i have pretty bad experience with a footslogging squad of 10 nobz. Footsloggas are more prone to being countered. They just never got where needed vs shooty armies no matter what i did. And they were not too great vs mellee-oriented ones. Personally, i prefer my footsloggas to act more of a tarpit over a tarpit. So, the points go to more boyz or stormboyz for an unexpected 24-27' charge
Even though i see some situations where footslogging nobz might actually cut it thanks to leaving a smaller footprint, i just can't recommend footslogging nobz over footslogging boyz If they were a third cheaper than maybe...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Cowboy_Jerry wrote:
You guy did great job! I just was thinking of using my old good Nobz and have never thought of 3-4-strong trukksquads

Thanks a lot, i appreciate it!

Personally I god damn love the combi Skorcha shenanigan unit. They shoot as they roll up and then fry as they roll through.

the_scotsman wrote:
Personally I god damn love the combi Skorcha shenanigan unit. They shoot as they roll up and then fry as they roll through.

How do you use them?

I couldn't help but notice the lack of discussion over the inclusion of a WAAAGH! Banner. While I know its utility has decreased due to the introduction of the almighty DLS MA Warboss, I still think it makes a significant difference in the output of damage from a unit of charging nobs as a good portion of the units you want to bully with these guys (i.e. tactical or devastator squads, necron immortals, dire avengers) have WS4, meaning you'll get that extra mileage from the deluge of attacks from basic choppa+slugga nobz and help out in preventing a certain amount of whiffing from your PK attack rolls. I see it as a little extra insurance that makes the little time they have count. That plus I've loved modelling the actual WAAAGH! Banners themselves on my Nobz.

 Grimskul wrote:
I couldn't help but notice the lack of discussion over the inclusion of a WAAAGH! Banner. While I know its utility has decreased due to the introduction of the almighty DLS MA Warboss, I still think it makes a significant difference in the output of damage from a unit of charging nobs as a good portion of the units you want to bully with these guys (i.e. tactical or devastator squads, necron immortals, dire avengers) have WS4, meaning you'll get that extra mileage from the deluge of attacks from basic choppa+slugga nobz and help out in preventing a certain amount of whiffing from your PK attack rolls. I see it as a little extra insurance that makes the little time they have count. That plus I've loved modelling the actual WAAAGH! Banners themselves on my Nobz.

I mostly suggested msu options and a banner is definitely not worth it on small units. Maybe you could post your view on such stuff?

The best tactic I have found with my Nobz is to line them all up in a nice row in the little spaces in my battle foam tray.

I was thinking of it in the context of using a group of 4-5sh Nobz w/ a WAAAGH! Banner and 1 PK similar to point #2 on your list. Now the trade off could be removing some of their survivability by not taking 'eavy armour, since then they come around to 157-175 points with a trukk+reinforced ram. Less expensive than 'eavy armour trukk boyz but definitely more killy and likely to get the job done with the crucial pip of WS5. The only WS3 or lower units you'll encounter where this won't make a difference are things like IG units, some select troops or MC in Tyranids, and guys like Tau Broadsides who are now hitting you on 5's rather than 4's which helps soften the blow of lacking of a good armour save.

But will it make more difference than an extra nob?

I'm glad this discussion is taking place I haven't touch my nobs since 6 edition.

I can never figure out how to build them. They are a bit too customizable.

I fielded the green tide this weekend against Tau. 2500 points.
10 units of boys. Each unit had one upgraded to a nob.
90 boys, 10 nob and the warboss, and to be a jerk I put a pain boy in the back. It was a rape-fest.

That's not exactly what we're talking about. Your example is about boyz with nob leaders. And we're trying to figure out how to use nob squads.

Altho I love nobs I think it is one of the worst unit's in our dex nou compared to boiz, MANZ and regular biker boyz :( , I mean if they be a troop with boss again then they could compete with boyz , otherwise I don't see them anywhere in my list

I think nobz units are most viable at either the area of smallest size, or all out.

smallest size = 3 give them some minor upgrades, maybe 1 klaw, and put them in a trukk. Hope they are ignored, they probably will be.

I like 3 with eavy armor, 1 powerklaw in trukk for 121 pts
or
4 with eavy armor, 4 big choppas in trukk for 138pts

3 nobz on bikes with powerklaw is not too shabby either, has some minor dakka potential, and the small unit size is pretty good for delivering the klaw, also since the unit is small you can be redundant and take more than 1 of them.


I think the other option is go big. 10 nobz, couple powerklaws, couple choppas, couple kombi skorchas, eavy armor, painboy, waaagh banner and a BW to cart them out there.

They are okay, I think a lot of other stuff does their job better.

What they bring is some killing power, in a small footprint, which is something orks don't always have since a lot of our killing power comes from large units. This makes them often ignored, in favor of things like greentide blobs charging an enemy deployment zone, lots of trukk boyz, even manz missiles. They just don't seem as high a priority to take out, but they can make a good mess of things when they get there. Of course this is not the case for the maxxxed out unit, which is nasty and can mess things up quite readily so will be a priority.

Most of the msu uses of nobz have been covered. Otherwise the single reason I've figured one would want nobz would be if your army was heavy on heavy support, say if you still need to field 30 lootas and then mekgunz because you have those models laying around from old days. Suddenly, you can't get a BW for boyz and need an HQ delivery force. Nobz start looking good, except probably on bikes to attach biker ICS to, short of a points problem then maybe you take the nobz in a wagon.

Other than bringing the DT wagon, they seem to be a source of kombi weapon spam. Though it typically over budgets the unit. Skorcha can guard a unit from assault I guess.

If you want the unit for this, remember only a couple kombi weapons and one powerklaw, else its too expensive.

 Rismonite wrote:
Most of the msu uses of nobz have been covered. Otherwise the single reason I've figured one would want nobz would be if your army was heavy on heavy support, say if you still need to field 30 lootas and then mekgunz because you have those models laying around from old days. Suddenly, you can't get a BW for boyz and need an HQ delivery force. Nobz start looking good, except probably on bikes to attach biker ICS to, short of a points problem then maybe you take the nobz in a wagon.

Other than bringing the DT wagon, they seem to be a source of kombi weapon spam. Though it typically over budgets the unit. Skorcha can guard a unit from assault I guess.

If you want the unit for this, remember only a couple kombi weapons and one powerklaw, else its too expensive.

Good catch about the battlewagon above HS limit.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Before the new codex dropped, i've found out an interesting combination of megaboss + regular nobz with a painboy.

Megaboss with old cybork
3-4 barebones nobz with a bp
1 painboy with grot orderly

The guyz ran in a wagon in case of a wagon rush or in a truck in case it's not. The squad was relatively cheap and effective with 2+ 5++ 5+++ boss tanking wounds losing ap2 stuff to nobz. And they were troops thanks to the old rule.

But now nobz can't get a slotless painboy and DLS megaboss is just really wonderful in a squad of boyz. However, if for some reason you're limited just for one detachment and you're running a wagon rush but don't want to get blitz brigade, for example, if you have points just for fewer of them, you can still run this setup and it's actually cheaper now. Big gunz are so good, they're really competing with wagons, so why not get a battery of gunz, 2 HS wagonz for boyz and a dedicated wagon for nobz with boss?

One thing that is a pet peeve of mine are players who when talking about Nobz bring up Meganobz. They are seperate units. I have two boxes of nobs I have no idea what to do with them.

Strictly for getting an IC plus painboy into CC. Ten Nobz all with eavy armor. Adjust per warlord type. Perhaps given regular shoota to cover a situation that needs shot. You should probably prepare for both with this unit because they can't be disposable and cheap.

Warboss, sure bring the boss with claw or headwhoppa killchoppa or the dead shiny shoota for when the nobz need to shoot. I wouldn't put him in mega armor because you bring nobz to prevent snp. Bring A Couple Skorcha to help deter follow up assaults after you mop up.

Or maybe Badrukk. The IC with an invul and a gun.. soak up a challenge and let two hidden nob klaw win the assault for you.

A weirdboy! Force weapon sure why not!

KFF mek should probably go in a bike unit for vehicle support

Any Supa Cyborked IC from W!G could be tough enough to let klaw in the nob unit do work.

For the most part kombi Rokkit seems unusable. The Big Choppa seems too expensive for what it does for nobz.

I have found that Nobz work really well in a ork foot-hoard. I run 60-90 shoota boyz on foot as the core of most of my ork lists. I almost always run 10 nobz with heavy armor and nothing else in a bare bones battle wagon. I will usually attach a warboss to them and in bigger games I will include 2 powerclaws and a Waagh banner. The nobz are a suicide squad that turbos up to the enemy and engages key units, soaking up shooting that would go to the boyz, allowing them to advance and grab objectives. Usually the nobz will take 2-3 turns of heavy shooting and combat for the opponent to eliminate and by that time the tide has arrived to clean up whatever the nobz didn't kill.

I use a mob of ten nobz in a DT battlewagon, led by a painboy. Three have power klaws, the rest (including the boss nob) have sluggas and choppas. They also have 'eavy armour and a waaagh! banner. The result is 11 guys with two wounds, 4+ armour save, 5+ feel no pain, WS5, 32 s5 attacks on the charge (four of which are poisoned), 12 s9 ap2 attacks on the charge. I know their stats are not as points-efficient as boyz or meganobz, but I feel the combination of bonuses in this unit makes them pretty solid overall.

I think 3 Biker Nobz could be a good place for a hidden klaw... The one downside of Biker Boyz is that there nob can often be challenged out... I think Biker Nobz aren't totally out of the picture... S7 on charge with big choppas and the S9 PK is pretty good...

DontEatRawHagis wrote:
One thing that is a pet peeve of mine are players who when talking about Nobz bring up Meganobz. They are seperate units. I have two boxes of nobs I have no idea what to do with them.

Only slightly relevant to the topic, but you don't necessarily need to build them as Nobz. The last box of Nobz I bought ended up using the combi-skorcha and combi-rokkits from that kit plus some spare shoota barrels to add three boyz to the start of a Flashgitz squad. The other two bodies made a killsaw mek (using the cybork circular-saw arm) and a Painboss (with the other stabby cybork arm).

Honestly, if you have enough Boss Nobs its not worth fielding Nob squads in their current codex role. Especially not if you can't make them Troops anymore. Enough of the other posters to this and similar threads have convinced me that they're not points-efficient enough. I do still like the Nobz box for conversion possibilities, though. There's a lot of fun little bits in there and I like that those models have been out for years but I still find fun ways to model them.

To me, they have decreased in value because of how the other Orks units have altered. They haven't altered and they've been left behind. They need a good FnP, and the only way do give them this is via the Painboy, who works so much better on most other units in our Codex. They have no way of dealing with Fearless (which WOULD have been a really nice extra for them, considering they're meant to be a really hard ass unit) so they now struggle to take out Monsterous Creatures.

I have a unit of Nob Bikers at home. The best way I've found to fun them is not as Nob Bikers but as Mogrok's Bossboyz formaiton: 3 Big Meks + 1 Warboss + a ML2 Weirdboy. Put the weirdboy somewhere else (like a 30 ork unit blob), resulting in something like this:
You get scout from Deffkoptas and the unique units that the Nob Bikers once were. Either Da Lucky Stikk or Da Finkin Kap, which ever way you want to cause havoc. The unit is not designed for CC, but it has no issues going into it. And you'll get that good old invulnerable save Nobs miss. You'll still have a HQ spare from the CAD, although the above Deffstar might be a bit expensive, but most Deffstars are.

So: You CAN run Nob Bikers, but it won't be very effective. You CAN run footnobs, but you'll again be needing the Painboy. So the real question is, which unit would you rather put a Painboy with:
4-7Nobs or 30 Boys or 15 Tankbusters or 12-15 Warbikers or 30 Grots. Having the Painboy move away from the Nobs was a huge loss to Nobs, but a great boost to the rest of the army.

On a side note: The reason why Nobs got nerfed is clear to me. A few years ago there was a White Dwarf where they pitted 500pts of Foot Nobs against 500pts of Space Wolf Terminators. Nobs won 3-0, no contest. Their 2 wounds, FNP and Invulnerable saves were too much. The Nobs were able to overwhelm them with their higher attacks and multiple AP2 PKs. GW didn't like that Orks won, so what did they do? They IMMEDIATELY said that they fielded both 500pt units in a 1500 point game and the Space Wolves won 1-0. They didn't show the army lists (so the Orks could've been easily out-classed) and they didn't have re-tries. GW don't want Orks to win, and it breaks my heart.

What do you think of using nobs in lieu of trukk boys? I personally always find myself wishing i could cram another PK or two into a squad of boys.

9 nobs (and a boss nob), 2 PK nobs, waaagh banner, boss nob w/ power klaw, trukk-reinforced ram.

9 power klaw attacks base at s 8
12 charging at s 9

28 choppa attacks at s 4
35 charging at s5 charging

total of 20 wounds

3 shootas (because PK are specialist, might as well take the free shoota instead of slugga on the PK nobs)

4+ Sv

ws5

Room for MA warboss or mek and painboy. Drop one nob, and you can fit MA warboss and painboy. Really stretch those

-355 points

vs

11 choppa boys, 1 boss nob w/ power klaw, boss pole, trukk-reinforced ram

3 power klaw attacks base at s8
4 charging at s 9

33 choppa attacks at s 3
44 charging at s 4

total of 13 wounds

1 shoota (see above)

4+ sv

ws4

195 pts

so for 160 more points, you get alot of different things. I think I might try this this weekend and see how it turns out.