Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Hey guys, I have a local player that fields about 200-300 grots (with invulns) and at least 100 boyz with jet packs. I've tried everything, I can't figure out how to defeat him. Any ideas?

5 girly man razorbacks couldn't even make a dent before getting swarmed.

That's quite the horde. I'd say your best bet is to force him to make morale checks by beating him to a pulp in melee. Some Assault Terminators coupled with a few characters should do the trick. As soon as he has to make those morale checks for losing a bunch of models in melee, that'll be the entire squad.

Screen with something like Scouts, Tacs, or Reivers and then have your heavy-hitting Terminators and Characters charge without worrying about Overwatch damage.

Problem is the shared morale and models counting as leadership. 40 in a squad, and they can count models in other squads for their morale as well!

I could have the cheese wrong. But essentially morale is moot. IF he can't cheese he will auto pass morale with command points.

use 3 units of 3 flamer Aggressors as screen, should be enough to bubble wrapped your 5 castled up Razorbacks. Dare the orks charges you

Flamers, Stormravens with twin assault cannons and hurricane bolters, razorbacks with twin assault cannons.

Gretchin Don't share morale. They need Runtherders to give them leadership help. So bring some scout snipers and kill the handful of Runt Herders, then kill a bunch of grots with regular bolters and the grots run away. The stormboyz are harder to kill but get 1-2 Stormravens and they die easy enough.

Bunkers?

What you want are Taratula Turrets. 27 points gives you a TL BS4+ Heavy Bolter. Doesn't need babysitting and super effective.

IMO, more marines. Razorbacks and other vehicles are cool, but being able to also fight in the Assault phase is pretty key for keeping your kill rate high. Vehicles mostly only do damage in their own shooting phase. A marine shoots in your shooting phase, fights in the fight phase, and can also fight in the opponents fight phase. Vehicles technically have attacks, but not many and they don't hit much. Spending the points on basic troopers gets you more attacks overall, and Guilliman keeps them hitting a lot, and hitting hard.

Don't play this guy. 300 grots is excessive in a game. I can't imagine it took less than a day to play. Ask him to play a real army. It can even still be an ork horde.

Flyers, lots of flyers. Orks suck at shooting. They suck even more against more flyers.

++ Air Wing Detachment +1CP (Imperium - Space Marines) [27 PL, 495pts] ++

+ Flyer +

Stormtalon Gunship [9 PL, 165pts]: Twin assault cannon, Two Heavy Bolters

Stormtalon Gunship [9 PL, 165pts]: Twin assault cannon, Two Heavy Bolters

Stormtalon Gunship [9 PL, 165pts]: Twin assault cannon, Two Heavy Bolters

++ Total: [27 PL, 495pts] ++

Created with BattleScribe

Leviathan Relic Dreadnaught with Grav Bombards? A grav bombard does 1d3 shots + 1d3 for every 5 models in a unit. So against a 40 man mob that is 9d3 shots per bombard. S9, AP -5. With 2 Grav bombards, a single leviathan is expected to do 18d3 = average 36 shots. Each is about 300 points I think. And they hit on a 2+, so 36 shots = 30 hits = 25 kills. More if you manage to get some rerolls of 1 from captain or lieutenant.

Screen them with agressors.

SM can clear hordes of boyz and grots quite easily, SM should table an ork army like that one. 5 twin asscan razorbacks, guilliman and a stormraven are a good start. Just kill the stormboyz fist and the grots after doing that. You will certainly go first which is a big deal as you can evaporate 2 mobs of stormboyz turn 1.

Forget anything ground based. The storm boyz will deepstrike and charge. You would need lots of units spreading them out to prevent them from landing 9" away. If you manage to meat shield your heavy shooting units the orks will charge the meat shield and probably kill it in the same turn. And if they manage to consolidate to 1" to your heavy shooting units they will drag them in CC, and cannot shoot on your turn.
Stormboyz could also simply fly towards your units. They have 12" movement, can advance up to 6" and charge up to 12". That 30" max attack distance. Or 22,5" on average. If your meat shield isnt close to the heavy shooting units they would fly over it, they can charge over enemy models, because they fly. If your meat shield is close to the heavy shooting unit, and they kill the meat shield, they will drag the heavy shooting unit into CC, disabling its ranged attacks.

The razorback fortress several TLAC RBs with chapter master and lieutenant and scouts with sniper rifle for killing chars, should do great.
Scouts are also great for screening thanks to their deployment rule.

How do you get Stormboyz to deepstrike? They don´t have a special deployment rule.

 papaseven wrote:
Hey guys, I have a local player that fields about 200-300 grots (with invulns) and at least 100 boyz with jet packs. I've tried everything, I can't figure out how to defeat him. Any ideas?

5 girly man razorbacks couldn't even make a dent before getting swarmed.

1) Could you post his list here?

2) As an ork player I will say this: Grots are one of the most useless units in all of W40k. They can do very little damage, and you can tie them up with anything as they are just WS5+ with a single S2 attack. So kill his stormboyz and ignore the grots, until there are only grots left. If half his list is grots, then winning should be easy.

3) Grots do not get the benefit of the mob rule, and even if they did, the mob rule does not nullify morale. To really nullify morale as an ork, you need a combination of large units with correct positioning, backed up by warbosses and runtherdz. It is doable, but it is far from automatic, and you really need to have at least a superficial knowledge of those rules to play efficiently against orks. The only real morale nulllifier in the Ork codex is zagstrukk. Is he running zagstrukk?

4) If he has 100 jumptroops then you better prepare to meet him in close combat, if he ends up going first, which he will at least 30% af the time.

5) Assault cannon razorbacks and guilliman are good against orks, but they will die easily from close combat. A single full-size squad of stormboyz can tie all of them up on the charge and do 8-9 wounds of damage to Guilliman.

6) Bring som intercessors





Automatically Appended Next Post:

Firefox1 wrote:
The razorback fortress several TLAC RBs with chapter master and lieutenant and scouts with sniper rifle for killing chars, should do great.
Scouts are also great for screening thanks to their deployment rule.

How do you get Stormboyz to deepstrike? They don´t have a special deployment rule.

Stormboyz cannot deepstrike. And you really cannot screen against them either. They will just move over the screen.

pismakron wrote:

 papaseven wrote:
Hey guys, I have a local player that fields about 200-300 grots (with invulns) and at least 100 boyz with jet packs. I've tried everything, I can't figure out how to defeat him. Any ideas?

5 girly man razorbacks couldn't even make a dent before getting swarmed.

2) As an ork player I will say this: Grots are one of the most useless units in all of W40k. They can do very little damage, and you can tie them up with anything as they are just WS5+ with a single S2 attack. So kill his stormboyz and ignore the grots, until there are only grots left. If half his list is grots, then winning should be easy.

They get +1 to hit for having more than 20 models, and can shoot their pistols in CC so not 'just' a single WS5+ S2 attack... but yes not devastating. I imagine OP's real problem is the way they let his opponent swamp units with Grotz to sideline and isolate them while his Stormboyz pick apart other units.

Stormboyz can't deep-strike; they can advance and charge.

Grotz don't get mob-rule; the runtherd can pick the squid hound option to let Grotz ignore failed morale at the cost of d3 Grotz. Kill the Runtherds to make Grotz evaporate (and as pismakron mentioned Scouts can try to screen your units too).

I don't know what you run as far as Chapter, but I run either Raptors or Crimson Fists. Against this list I would run the latter. Try not to laugh till I am done, but something worth considering is Centurion Devs with Heavy Bolters and Hurricane Bolters. 6 of them with a +1 from a Rhino Primaris, and then using Bolter Drill will throw out a ton of shots. Realistic numbers if you're in RF range are 48 Heavy Bolter shots hitting on 2's and 96 Hurricane Bolter shots hitting on 2's. Add in rerolls, and give your Warlord Storm of Fire and things will melt. The list that I run this I also have 2 Assbacks with 2 Flamer/Combi-flamer Tacs , 10 Sternguard in a Rhino, some Scouts, and some Devastators. Characters are the normal Captain, Lieutenant, Ancient, and Apothecary all riding in the Rhino Primaris. This is the only way I run Centurion Devastators anymore, and I think they are worth running this way. Otherwise Scout Bikes could work well also. As fast as the Stormboyz and if you go Ultras they will perform well in a hit and run fight with them. Plus that just sounds like fun to watch.

Melee and Flamers. Bring some assault squads with 2 flamers. Aggressors with flamers. The assault squads can fall back and shoot if you give them jump packs too. Move in, flamer, charge, next turn fall back and flamer again.

Don't bring any heavy stuff he can tie up in melee like LRC. Stuff that either throws out lots of melee attacks or can fall back and shoot will help. UM tactics will let everything fall back and shoot.

Vanguard veterans can take 2 chainswords and have I think 2 attacks base. 2 chainswords are free, so throw them into melee to pile on the attacks. You're wounding grots on 2's. Bring in a Jump Pack Chaplain to get some rerolls.

Snipers to kill his Meks. He has to get the entire unit within the Mek's range so make sure he's doing that. Let scout snipers blast the meks and then waste the nearby units with shooting and melee.

Really ? Melee against orkz ?

I can see using melee units like Assault Centurions and Aggressors as a screen against orks if you are running Ultras. Get good overwatch, then probably survive, fall back and shoot again. Not sure but I would be willing to try it.

p5freak wrote:
Really ? Melee against orkz ?

The OP was talking about a list with 200-300 gretchin. They're certainly not boyz and go down like flies against good CC units, without doing damage in return.

you can melee orks. It's not a bad idea. You just have to know the odds and when to pick a target.

Don't bring flamers, numbers are too big and after killing like maybe 2 depending on rolls they'll swarm you. Heavy Flamers are an exception because they'll reliabily kill more (but even then use Flamers as a finisher, not as a thinner).

Assault Cannons and Heavy Bolters are way better, they'll wound more often (on account of higher strength and weight of fire) and can be shot from afar (don't chop the melee army, shoot it).

Also bear in mind that the KFF changed, it only works if all the models in a unit are under it's range (10" I believe). So CHECK THE RANGE. If one model is out, tough bananas, unload a hail of AP-1 shots and watch them drop.

As for Gretchin, Bolters should work fine.

In regards to Morale, assuming full blobs of 30 (because that's the maximum size), you need to kill 19 in order for the rest to run away (barring use of command points or low roll of 1). So kill 19 and then move onto the next unit within 6". Pretty soon you'll force the Green Tide to run away and they'll only be able to save one unit with CP.

Also Gretchin don't get Mob Rule. Don't let your opponent roll them for Ld 30.

In regards to Morale, assuming full blobs of 30 (because that's the maximum size), you need to kill 19 in order for the rest to run away (barring use of command points or low roll of 1). So kill 19 and then move onto the next unit within 6". Pretty soon you'll force the Green Tide to run away and they'll only be able to save one unit with CP.

I'm not sure this is true, if you kill 19 boyz in one mob and they are next to another mob of 30 they will still auto pass a morale test.

The mob that just got a pasting can replace it's bravery with the bravery of a nearby mob and any Ork mob can use its model count interchangeably with its bravery stat.

Finally Warbose provide morale bonuses (Slavers for the Grots) as well so a mob has to be quite isolated before it is reliant on passing a morale test honestly!

The amount of bad advice and misinformation in this thread is unbelievable - outside from actual ork players, that is.

Gretchin have T2 so even bolters wound them on 2+. You don't need any special weapons to deal with them, just get as many shots on the table as possible.
Anything with a hurricane bolter will kill them in droves, so will storm bolters, heavy bolters and assault cannons. Also, don't forget to throw your grenades.
All those guns are also pretty good at killing storm boyz.

Flamers aren't that good at all, you're looking at about two dead gretchin at 8" range, a regular bolter has a decent chance to do the same but more often due to range.

Scout snipers are pretty much wasted against orks. All characters have at least 4 wounds, T4 and 4+ armor, unless you get lucky you will have two squads shooting two turns before one goes down. After two turns the KFF mek is no longer needed anyways. You might as well just shoot a bunch of storm boyz dead instead.

What you might need is a road block for those gretchin. From experience I know that a unit of 30 takes some turns to even kill a tactical squad (they wound them on 6+), so feed them some marines or scouts that fall back during your turn to shoot them some more.
I'm not sure how point efficient land speeders are, but I know that even gretchin are pretty much unable to kill one.

 Kroem wrote:

In regards to Morale, assuming full blobs of 30 (because that's the maximum size), you need to kill 19 in order for the rest to run away (barring use of command points or low roll of 1). So kill 19 and then move onto the next unit within 6". Pretty soon you'll force the Green Tide to run away and they'll only be able to save one unit with CP.

I'm not sure this is true, if you kill 19 boyz in one mob and they are next to another mob of 30 they will still auto pass a morale test.

The mob that just got a pasting can replace it's bravery with the bravery of a nearby mob and any Ork mob can use its model count interchangeably with its bravery stat.

Finally Warbose provide morale bonuses (Slavers for the Grots) as well so a mob has to be quite isolated before it is reliant on passing a morale test honestly!

By that I meant kill 19 and then kill another 19 from another unit so you can bring morale down as an army and not unit at a time. You could also charge at an angle to get Boyz to pile in and then be out of range of the LD buff as a last resort (because your unit will probably take some hefty casualties).

Yeah the Warboss mitigates it but Stormboyz are too fast unless it has a Bike and Gretchin don't benefit so I didn't take it into account.

Snipers to remove characters (invulnerable is from a character and whole unit needs to be within 9" to get it), and he will crumble to morale.

Also of note the invulnerable is only for shooting, so if you assault the gretchin they are back to a 6+ save.

Gretchin need Runtherds or warbosses to help them with morale otherwise they are LD 4. A single 10 man Assault marine squad kills 17-18 Gretchin in a single assault once you include morale, not including any shooting damage.

But killing the characters is key, as if they have Force field and maybe a painboy they can be rather durable. But take those out and their runt herds, and they will crumble. As for the storm boyz, they die like any other ork.

Didn't read every line, so apoligies if it was mentioned above, but how do gretchin get invulns outside of every model within 9" of a KFF? Or is the enemy player just taking models from within the 9" and the OP runs out of fire power? Also - Vindicare Assassins fix this problem if that is the case.

This is anecdotal, but I find it still valuable. I had 20 Intercessors, 2 devastator squads that were not optimized for killing infantry, and a Contemptor Dread that were able to hold a flank against 60 ork boys. Roughly. It was two trukks full and a 30 man blob. Devastators a took out the trukks, everything else unleashed hell on the boyz. He kept them close enough to use each other's morale, so I also used the Orbital Bombardment stratagem. After 2 turns, which my opponent couldn't close fast enough to make it faster, any boyz left wouldn't have been able to dent my wall of Intercessors. This was only part of the battle, but I think it emphasizes the points made here about how to beat ork hordes. Morale can be leveraged, it is just harder. Thank God it isn't as hard as using it against Conscripts! Of note my opponent had a Big Mek KFF and Ghazgul Thrakka supporting his guys. He also had 2 units of grots, Flash Gitz with Badrukk in a Trukk, Lootas, and a second 30 boy blob he Da Jumped behind me. Those melted in a single turn because they didn't have more boyz around for Mob Rule.