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Alright here's the skinny.

I play Dwarfs. I like my Dwarfs.

But I want a change of pace for Fantasy from time to time. I want to MOVE! I want maneuvers. I want a whole lot of something that the Dwarfs just don't got.

In short I want a second army for Fantasy. And I need help picking it.

I want movement, combat, and magic. In that order. And I don't want it to suck.

There are a few armies that right off the bat appealed to me. Ogres are at the top of that list for a few reasons:

Whole army is M6 except Noblars. All Combat. And the out-of-game factor appealed to me: Small Model Count, dip-able, almost all plastic, and cheap to boot. I've played against them a few times and they seem pretty decent, but I know they can be tough to play against certain match ups.

There are a few other lists that appeal to me somewhat: Lizzies, Wood Elves, and Chaos.

Lizzies I'd probably do a combat army with a few level 2 skink priests, maybe with two small units of Saurus, one Cav unit, two units of Krox, Terradons, Sallies, and maybe a Stegadon for flavor. Problem is that the list isn't quite as fighty as I'd like I think and is based on avoidance somewhat and shooting. The only real heavy hitters would be the two Krox units, saurus cav, and the steg.

Relatively small army list, mostly metal for what I want (major downside for me), but a lot more to paint than Ogres. Still very dip-able though.

Wood Elfs I was tempted to do the Tree army. Ancient, Treeman, Dryads, Branch Wraiths, and Treekin. No elves. Small, a mix of metal and plastic, super simple to paint and dip, but the whole thing of "well everyone plays that" and since there is a person at the shop I go to who does use a similar list, and the fact that people hate the list is a downer for me from starting them.

Chaos appeals to me because I'd be able to do say a Flying Exalted Demon, Mages with decent lores, and then core would be a lot of knights, hounds, maybe a chariot or two, and then I'd add in some Furies and maybe a giant or some Mino's. Heck even a Minotaur army appealed to me till I saw the costs involved with building it. Downers here is that almost the entire list would be Metal. Knights, Hounds, Mino's, Demons, Chariots - All Metal, harder to dip and look good, and more expensive to build. Still I'd rather sink some money into something that I won't want a change from again later isn't something that's going to turn me off from an army.

Problem is I can't decide. I'm leaning towards Ogres because of the fact that with a Tyrant, 2 Gorgers, and then 2 battleforces (plus an iron guts sprue) I can build and convert (Butchers) my entire 2k list. It's almost all plastic and can be built, painted, dipped, and finished in a long weekend. That has appeal, but the list seems to basically be only MSU and at that a lot of people seem to say that I want three butchers, which cuts into my number of squads that I can field.

So um...yeah, that's what I'm thinking about for Fantasy and what I'd like to do. Any thoughts on my ideas, anything I should look out for in Ogres that may make me wish I'd chosen something else down the line? Is there an army that you could recommend that you think would fit the kind of force I'm looking for?

I'm still new to Fantasy and I'm still wet behind the ears in terms of what the armies are like and are capable of - I don't know the game very well yet like I do with 40k. So advice is greatly appreciated.

Why not try Brettonia everything moves 8 (excluding peasants) all knights are goood a CC and the damsels offer decent defensive and offensive magic I give Bretonnia a 5 out of for what youre after

I've played against Bretts a lot, my best friend has them so that kind of puts me off from the army. I could always just borrow his stuff if I really wanted to play with Bretts, but they've become such a "nemesis" for my Dwarfs that I dunno if I'd want them. I appreciate the suggestion though.

Movement, combat, magic? Yup, that's ogres all right. The fatsos are pretty dice-sensitive now and then and do have some annoying matchups, but they aren't pushovers if you wield the more powerful/sensible builds (ie. tyrant & 3 butchers, only small ogre units etc.).

Why not High Elves?

Here's what's got me so down.

After a game of 40k with a really good player (and member here) and talking about Fantasy stuff with him and another very good player who happens to have Ogres, they told me that I really should avoid them if possible because they're pretty bad.

This saddens me, because the army would be almost all plastic, dip-able, and cheap. :( I was almost set to go with them too, but to be honest I think I'd be happier with a Chaos Mino or Knight force. Downsides being cost and metal. :(

High Elves I'm somewhat meh on. I have a dragon just to paint for Mrs. Voodoo, but I'm bummed on the no core calvary thing. Or you know, the no "really good core" period type thing they've got going on. At least with Chaos I can have things like Knights, Chariots, or Minotaurs core, which are fast, small model count, and good.

How about tomb kings? core calvary, the best fast calvary in the game argueably (Chariots) cool magic, and The Ark of the Covenenat, i mean casket of souls.

Tomb kings I was interested in, but overall didn't want an undead army.

I keep flopping back between Ogres and Chaos. Ogres draw me in with plastic models for most of the army. Chaos has better rules but is much more expensive and Metal. That whole "metal" thing really makes me not want to do the thing. Otherwise I'd be doing Minotaurs.

Ogres have come into their own a bit in the last year or so. Several players are making them work at GTs. The three Butcher build is the most common way to make them solid. Rhinox Riders are also quite good if your local tournaments don’t ban them. The butcher list is cheaper, though.

Alex Schmid AKA Sergrum, is a pretty active poster who has done pretty well with them this year and last. Ed knows him too.

http://warhammer.org.uk/PhP/viewtopic.php?t=33977&highlight=

http://warhammer.org.uk/PhP/viewtopic.php?t=28451&highlight=

So I don’t think Ogres are as hopeless as you fear.

Well, funny thing I should come back from a round at the local store and decided to go with them over the Minotaurs.

Thanks for the heads up, I think I met him once actually. BTW, since you know some of these guys, are you in the area around Philly/NJ Mannahnin?

Nope, I'm up in NH. I've known Ed from Dakka since he joined (6-7 years, maybe?), and met him in person for the first time at the Colonial last year. I know him and Alex (a little bit) and some of their respective crowds from a few WH GTs and from the boards.

I'm not sure if cost or time painting is going to come into play, but if you want something amusing, you could go for a greenskin army with wolf, boar, and spider riders combined with some chariots. That'd take care of movement, and combat, and even sometimes magic.

If you are going to do ogres, the 3 butcher MSU list is the way to go.

But minos are much better, either undivided or khornate. A simple head swap and you can still use the ogre plastics. It'll add $50-$100 to the cost of the army, but minos are alot better than ogres.

If you're committed to ogres, I'll help you make them work, but just realize they're at a slight disadvantage most of the time.

I realize that Mino's are better, and I know I can do the head swap, but it probably wouldn't look all that good.

Plus I don't particularly want to be "competitive" with them, I want to be decent enough to have a fun game of Warhammer without getting my ass beat. So it only needs to be somewhat hard army list wise, but yeah I'm definitely going MSU and will have 2-3 Butchers most of the time.

I figure if I want to be "competitive" I can make a hard ass Dwarf army out of what I got (combat Anvil, gunline, Thorek), but to be honest I just want a game where I can experiment a ton more in the movement phase, Dwarfs don't give me that and I want to play it.

Basically I'm not out to win a big GT with these guys, just kind of want an army I can play around with that's radically different than what I've got now, while still liking the army and not feeling silly for dropping $500 (ie. Mino's) on an army. Plus to be honest, I like the Ogre models better than the Minotaur models, and all plastic is such a huge draw.

Once I get it together, I'd gladly take a few lessons from you guys. Heck I still need more practice with Dwarfs, I suck at Fantasy!

I would have to say when I think of armies with Movement, combat, magic in that order, I would have to say a slaneesh army.

Lizardmen and WE are your best bets. They're both tier 1 armies and with the exception of a few Glade Guard and elf heroes you can dip them all. If those two armies don't interest you wait for the new Vampire Counts since you can dip them and they're bound to be a very rewarding (and fast) army as always. If you go for Chaos you should focus on cavalry instead of ogre sized monsters. Mixing Tzeentch and Khorne will give you the best results.