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Hello all, another newbie question here. Sorry.
I've just been looking at my lovely shiny ork codex book and of course there's a force organisation chart which specifies:

Compulsory - 1 HQ, 2 Troops,
Optional - 1 HQ, 4 Troops, 3 Elites
Optional - 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support

What I wanted to ask is why are there two 'Optional' groups?
Is it that there are certain conditions (Missions, points total, other...?) where you would only be allowed to choose from one of the optional groups?
Is it that in order to choose from the second optional group you must have chosen everything from the first optional group? So you'd need 2 HQ, 6 Troops, 3 Elites before you could take any Fast Attack or Heavy Support?
Is it some other reason that I haven't thought of?

Thank you all in advance, I'm sure there's something simple that I've missed!

The compulsory choices are what your army MUST have for most games of 40k. You don't need to fill both HQ and all 6 troop slots to take the optional ones, but you do need to have that ONE HQ and TWO troops units.

The Optional ones are what you can use to fill out the numbers and up the firepower.

So, for an example, you'd need a Boss and two mobs of boyz (with or without trukks). Once these are chosen, you can use all of your remaining points on any other units from the list. More troops, a nobz mob, kans, dredds, etc.

They two optional groups was just done for visual presentation. No group is "more optional" than the other. You can take an optional Fast Attack without having to first take an optional Elite.

I understood about the compulsory choices - that makes perfect sense to me, and I also understand the point of having other groups as being optional, but I find it hard to believe that all of the optional stuff was split into two groups for visuals! Why wasn't it just stated that as a compulsory you must take 1 HQ and 2 Troops, but that you can take a maximum of 2 HQ, 6 Troops, 3 Elites, 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support? Surely there's a good reason for this??????

Also, as a separate issue, surely this means that it is impossible to wield very large armies of just one detachment, without playing Apocalypse? What I mean is, say you were compiling a theoretical 5000 or so point list of orks and you took your full 6 troop choices, each unit is limited to 30 boyz, so you would be hard pressed to spend all of your points? I know I'm talking about something a little redundant due to the existence of Apocalypse, but I was just thinking.....

There's no hidden, deeper reason. You have grasped how it works exactly.

Well, before Apoc, people would just use multiple FOCs. Pretty simple.

Fair enough. Just seems a bit daft to me not to do it the way I've suggested, but there you go. Guess I'll keep planning armies in the way I was then. Thanks for the help.

InyokaMadoda wrote:I understood about the compulsory choices - that makes perfect sense to me, and I also understand the point of having other groups as being optional, but I find it hard to believe that all of the optional stuff was split into two groups for visuals! Why wasn't it just stated that as a compulsory you must take 1 HQ and 2 Troops, but that you can take a maximum of 2 HQ, 6 Troops, 3 Elites, 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support? Surely there's a good reason for this??????

As the other have already stated, it was for 'visual presentation'. That was good enough reason for them, so it should be good enough for you as well.

InyokaMadoda wrote:Also, as a separate issue, surely this means that it is impossible to wield very large armies of just one detachment, without playing Apocalypse? What I mean is, say you were compiling a theoretical 5000 or so point list of orks and you took your full 6 troop choices, each unit is limited to 30 boyz, so you would be hard pressed to spend all of your points? I know I'm talking about something a little redundant due to the existence of Apocalypse, but I was just thinking.....

It's been this way for almost ten years. You either get your opponent's permission to use multiple Force Organization charts, play an Apocalypse game or you simply don't take the units as they won't fit in your Force Organization chart.

Ghaz wrote:

InyokaMadoda wrote:I understood about the compulsory choices - that makes perfect sense to me, and I also understand the point of having other groups as being optional, but I find it hard to believe that all of the optional stuff was split into two groups for visuals! Why wasn't it just stated that as a compulsory you must take 1 HQ and 2 Troops, but that you can take a maximum of 2 HQ, 6 Troops, 3 Elites, 3 Fast Attack, 3 Heavy Support? Surely there's a good reason for this??????

As the other have already stated, it was for 'visual presentation'. That was good enough reason for them, so it should be good enough for you as well.

That may be the reason, all I was saying was that it was a needless complication as there are better ways to do it.

And apparently they thought otherwise.

Lock please.

tegeus-Cromis wrote:Lock please.

I'm sorry?

Maybe because I'm a newbie, but....