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I've gotta say, while some of these build ideas may have a decent advantage over orks, they're useless if they end up gimping the army against everyone else. Two full units of Warp Spiders and 10 Fire Dragons + Fuegan? Are you kidding me? Even if they do tear through the green tide (and I have my doubts), it's too large an investment and not effective enough against other armys.

I believe many people misunderstand the trouble with orks right now. Virtually every codex has a reliable counter to today's competetive ork builds; the trouble is that the most obvious counters are not effective against MEQs or big shooters. What would be more helpful would be suggestions on tweaking tournament viable builds to be effective against orks as well, or strategies for using existing builds more effectively against orks.

*Double post

Gitzbitah wrote:Somewhere between 100 and 200, depending on how many specialist are involved. A full 6 troop slots, or 180 boyz with nobs and powerklaws, comes in for under 1350 points.

It isn't quite as bad as all that. Your average group of orks is going to be 30 strong, have a nob, a powerklaw, and a bosspole. 3 of the troops will be equipped with either rokkits or big shootas, making the grand total for every group somewhere between 235 and 250 depending on which weapon they load out their three special weapons with.

They are going to have a warboss out there soaking up 150 points typically. Expect at least a group of 15 lootas (possibly 2 groups) for a typical horde of shootas. Probably a KFF floating around as well. So:

15 Lootas = 225 points
Boss = 150 points
KFF = 100 points

You are looking at probably 120 boyz on the field with the above typical build. Even less wounds on the board if the ork player uses killa kan screens or some other mechanized approach to protecting his tender little boyz.

Lochias has nailed the problem. You can stop an Ork horde, but when you build to do so you can't stop the other nasty builds out there in most cases.

@Carnuss... So, 120 would be between 100 and 200, right?
And why would anyone bring a Warboss with a horde? Competitive players only use the Warboss for his Nob troops, and I don't know of anyone that tries to footslog those.

A growing number of players are leaving the rokkits and big shootas at home, particularly with slugga mobs. If you plan on running every turn (a reasonable assumption if you are running a horde Ork army) then there isn't much point to buying a set of assault weapons.

I absolutely agree that KFF Meks will be involved in a Green tide, and that Lootas are likely. I'd expect to see more of Snikrot and his boyz than I would the Warboss. He just doesn't add much more than a 100 point powerklaw to a mob of 30 shootas or sluggas.

Gitzbitah wrote:Lochias has nailed the problem. You can stop an Ork horde, but when you build to do so you can't stop the other nasty builds out there in most cases.

@Carnuss... So, 120 would be between 100 and 200, right?
And why would anyone bring a Warboss with a horde? Competitive players only use the Warboss for his Nob troops, and I don't know of anyone that tries to footslog those.

A growing number of players are leaving the rokkits and big shootas at home, particularly with slugga mobs. If you plan on running every turn (a reasonable assumption if you are running a horde Ork army) then there isn't much point to buying a set of assault weapons.

I absolutely agree that KFF Meks will be involved in a Green tide, and that Lootas are likely. I'd expect to see more of Snikrot and his boyz than I would the Warboss. He just doesn't add much more than a 100 point powerklaw to a mob of 30 shootas or sluggas.

Running when pound for pound you can outshoot any tactical squad? That's something I haven't seen a lot of unless you are out of your 18" range.

I wasn't saying that the number I posted wasn't between 100 and 200. What I was saying is that it is highly unlikely that in a 1500 point army you will see 1350 points in basic boyz. Lootaz are an almost guaranteed addition, and cost 2 1/2 boyz for every one of them that you take. KFFs are fairly common, though honestly I am a bit curious why. With 90 - 100 points spent on more boyz instead, you would probably be better off not taking it, depending on the availability of cover and how much fire you take.

I'm honestly surprised to hear you say that people aren't taking bosses though. A warboss on a bike with a squig, cybork, and PK is about like an orky version of a fast moving monstrous creature. They are surprisingly effective at laying down anything they come into contact with, and typically don't take wounds from mobs of troops, making them very effective for combat resolution when they are locked in with the boyz. I mean they aren't quite like a Nightbringer, but orkz have to work with what they have.

If you are seeing hordes of sluggas opting to run across the board instead of hordes of shootas pacing across the board destroying your line as they approach you, then you are fighting different people than I am.

Sternguard_rock wrote:ummmm...... I don't play them but aren't they army with the most flamers.

Not that many Flamers. If you have not taken out at least half the unit before you get there, you will not do enough damage for it to matter. If Sisters are in Flamer range of a decent-strength unit of Boyz (or worse), then you have already lost. Against hoard, Flamers are a mop-up weapon, not the start of your offensive (unless you kick major butt in assault, which Sisters do not).

I think you should join them. Play a battle or two controlling orks, you'll get to see how the game is played from the green side of the table. Orks are great!

I run a mix of Sluggas and shootas. I do not use special weapons in my slugga squads. They just running their a$$es off. I can field a Warboss @ 120 pts. My 1500pts list looks like this...

Warboss
mega-armor, combi-rokkit, squig

29 sluggas/w Nob PK, Bosspole
29 sluggas/w Nob PK, Bosspole
29 sluggas/w Nob PK, Bosspole

26 shootas/w Nob PK, Bosspole, 3 big shootas
26 shootas/w Nob PK, Bosspole, 3 big shootas
26 shootas/w Nob PK, Bosspole, 3 big shootas
--------------------------------------------------------
If my math is correct that should be 1470pts

That is 174 boys with 6 nobs and 1 warboss= 181 models coming at you.

The only thing I fear running into is a bloodletter army, higher init and power weapons ruin my day.

UsdiThunder wrote:I run a mix of Sluggas and shootas. I do not use special weapons in my slugga squads.

...

The only thing I fear running into is a bloodletter army, higher init and power weapons ruin my day.

Since this is an anti-ork discussion, it may not be the place for it, but I'll ask anyway. What on earth do you do about vehicles? Hope isn't a strategy, so I find it surprising that you would have nothing but PKs to deal anything better than a glance against any vehicle in the game, especially given that you will frequently have to roll 6s to even land those PKs.

While 181 wounds is a nice thing to have on the table, it seems that the makeup of your army leaves you pretty defenseless against a lot of units. I would hate to be in a position where the only thing I can do against a rhino is beg my opponent to slow down so I can hit it.

Meh, maybe it's just me.

So while we've identified that nearly 200 boyz in 1500pts is possible Carnuss is correct. Your average ork player running a "boyz before toyz" list will still have a few toyz to deal with tanks, etc.

From my experience a typical 1500pt "horde" army has around about 100 boyz minimum and up to about 150 maximum. A true horde will run more than 150 but these are fairly rare.

I already mentioned a few general tactics for dealing with orks that can apply to nearly any race/build (stay away from them as long as possible, take out fast assault units first then work on whittling down the big mobs rather than outright destruction, finally counter-charge with a strong assault unit to break the big mobs and then go move onto objectives) but lets see if I can help with sisters. One of my best friends uses them and he is one of the only people to ever beat my orks (along with a blood angel player and a standard marine player) so here's some tips and recollections from my experiences fighting him.

1. serpahim should not a be a speedbump. with their shooting/handflamers to cut down on numbers followed by a charge with some faith assistance they CAN and SHOULD break ork units that they charge. The issue becomes one of avoiding the counter-charge (which will likely wipe out the girls if the mob is big enough). If you have 2 units, hold them back and use them to charge the orks before they charge you odds are in your favour that you'll remove 2 big mobs.

2. Use vehicles to MOVE! shoot and scoot (I know, not the best sisters strategy due to range issues) in order to try and draw a mob away to isolate it. Isolated mobs are easily dealt with without the counter-charge.

3. Immolators make nice speedbumps and kill lots of orks too. He will want rid of them so he will assault them and this will slow him down.

4. Retributors have always worked for me when I run sisters and they've always been nasty aginst me when I fight them. You won't be taking out a squad a turn but use them to drop scary things like lootaz or fast assault units then help whittle away his mobs. If heavy is full then an inquisitor with some heavy bolter servitors can be useful too.

5. The book is great for making rocks that blunt his charge. Move up in a rhino, drop heavy flamers, flamers and dakka on a mob. That (hopefully heavily depleted) mob will then charge you and cause you some pain, but if you don't break because you're effectively stubborn then things start to swing in your favour. After that first charge a lot of the assault powers of orks is lost. Then you can swing in with seraphim to free your girls and break him.

6. Weaponry that ignores cover is worth its weight in gold vs the KFF

7. Penitent engines are typically crappy units but they are nothing short of amazing against orks. Twin heavy flamers and a ton of attacks on an armour chassis that is hard for them to deal with in cc spells a unit you can simply have run at orks and wade through his entire army. Try them out, they are simply brutal against orks.

Lochias wrote:I've gotta say, while some of these build ideas may have a decent advantage over orks, they're useless if they end up gimping the army against everyone else. Two full units of Warp Spiders and 10 Fire Dragons + Fuegan? Are you kidding me? Even if they do tear through the green tide (and I have my doubts), it's too large an investment and not effective enough against other armys.

I believe many people misunderstand the trouble with orks right now. Virtually every codex has a reliable counter to today's competetive ork builds; the trouble is that the most obvious counters are not effective against MEQs or big shooters. What would be more helpful would be suggestions on tweaking tournament viable builds to be effective against orks as well, or strategies for using existing builds more effectively against orks.

Well, this is the army I ran this weekend (vs Dread heavy Marines) , been wanting to try it for a while:

2x Autarch with warppack, mandiblasters, powerweapon, fusion gun

2x8 Warpspiders w/ exarch powerblades dual spinners, withdraw

9x fire dragons w/ exarch, firepike in Wave Serpent dual SL

3x 12 defender guardians with BL, warlock w/embolden and singing spear

3x Warwlkers with dual SL.

1747 points

I don't think this list is uber. It's built as a take all comers with land raiders, mech, and biker nobs in mind. I'm sure the TMC pie factory would destroy it.

Against the marines we called it game at the middle of turn four as he had no scoring units left to my three. I want to try it against Tau, next weekend. I think this list would be alright against orks. I play them as well and know how much firepower T4, 4+Sv, FNP can soak. I don't think I'd table them but, you don't need to.

Ork mobs are *slow* and get in each others way, maybe it doesn't feel that way on the other side of the table but they are.

The horde needs a lot of room to deploy. If you're mobile/mech go after one side and forget the ones in the back. Make them feel useless.

The horde needs to charge. One of the best feelings you get as an Ork player is getting to charge into combat with a nearly full unit of boys. Honestly. Take that away by charging. Rolling one box of dice when you're used to two, sucks. Trust me, your toy soldiers will thank you for it.

There are some other excellent tips here, by much faster typers. Maybe you should ask on of your firneds if you can play a couple of games with their orks, I think that might be your best teacher.

cheers!

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:1. serpahim should not a be a speedbump. with their shooting/handflamers to cut down on numbers followed by a charge with some faith assistance they CAN and SHOULD break ork units that they charge.

On average, a standard Seraphim squad will kill 7 Boyz with shooting, charge, then another three with the assault, but lose four of their number to the Orks. The Seraphim lose the combat, but will likely pass their leadership test then Hit and Run. He lost 1/3 of a cheap squad; you lost 1/2 of your most expensive unit. Pure averages, but my experience has been a little worse than this, as they tend to shoot the Seraphim in the turn or two before, reducing their effectiveness further. Obviously, you will be using your squads in tandem, but it would take two Battle Sister Squads and a Seraphim Squad (650 points) to take out a single mob of Boyz (250 points?), and all three units will be assaulted after this.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:3. Immolators make nice speedbumps and kill lots of orks too. He will want rid of them so he will assault them and this will slow him down.

Yeah, I have used that one to good effect. The empty Immolator will draw all the anti-tank allowing the Sisters to get in. It will not do any damage, unless you spam more of them than he can handle, but it does pretty well guarantee that every Sister will arrive at the same time.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:4. Retributors have always worked for me when I run sisters and they've always been nasty aginst me when I fight them. You won't be taking out a squad a turn but use them to drop scary things like lootaz or fast assault units then help whittle away his mobs.

Perhaps it is a difference of experience, but I have found them useless. Not taking out a squad is an understatement: on average, a unit of Retributors will take out two Boyz a turn; less from Biker units. If they have Lootas, Bikers, Deffkoptas, etc then the Retributors will not live long enough to kill more than that. In their most successful game, my Retributors successfully took out a whole one Deffkopta and five Boyz over six turns, and they only lasted that long because my opponent plain ignored the unit all game (he had learned from experience that their bark is worse than their bite). That eventually became the standard with all my opponents. They would leave the Retributors until there was nothing else to attack, as they were the least threatening unit on the table. I tried them for several months, but they just do not have the volume to make a significant contribution.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:5. The book is great for making rocks that blunt his charge.

Yeah, I have tied up and slowly whittled away at a Boyz squad with some Battle Sisters and a Canoness. Unfortunately, that was still ultimately his win, as he tied down a quarter of my army with a fifth of his. Without the Canoness, his walkers alone crushed the rest of my army, and a squad of Boyz just sat around on an objective picking their noses. Sisters are the best tarpit in the game, no question, but that does not win you games.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:7. Penitent engines are typically crappy units but they are nothing short of amazing against orks. Twin heavy flamers and a ton of attacks on an armour chassis that is hard for them to deal with in cc spells a unit you can simply have run at orks and wade through his entire army. Try them out, they are simply brutal against orks.

I had not even thought of Penitent Engines. They do not have two Heavy Flamers, unfortunately, but I can definitely see them being useful against Orks. The biggest problem with this, however, is the Priest. He is far too much of a liability to take against an opponent you are already struggling against. When you play mech, your best option would be a minimum squad of Celestians in an Immolator, with no options. They will never be able to fire their guns (thanks to his Righteous Fury Special Rule), and will be completely ineffective in combat, due to not having enough attacks to matter. The Penitent Engines seem interesting, but the Priest seems far too high a cost to justify. If you have seen this used, what did they do with the Priest?

Try running Space wolves. I run an all-comers DP list, and the combination of lethal short range fire, being able to cherry-pick the weakest part of the Ork line, and Counter-Assault with wolf pelts is just murder on da boyz.

Elric of Grans wrote:

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:1. serpahim should not a be a speedbump. with their shooting/handflamers to cut down on numbers followed by a charge with some faith assistance they CAN and SHOULD break ork units that they charge.

On average, a standard Seraphim squad will kill 7 Boyz with shooting, charge, then another three with the assault, but lose four of their number to the Orks. The Seraphim lose the combat, but will likely pass their leadership test then Hit and Run. He lost 1/3 of a cheap squad; you lost 1/2 of your most expensive unit. Pure averages, but my experience has been a little worse than this, as they tend to shoot the Seraphim in the turn or two before, reducing their effectiveness further. Obviously, you will be using your squads in tandem, but it would take two Battle Sister Squads and a Seraphim Squad (650 points) to take out a single mob of Boyz (250 points?), and all three units will be assaulted after this.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:3. Immolators make nice speedbumps and kill lots of orks too. He will want rid of them so he will assault them and this will slow him down.

Yeah, I have used that one to good effect. The empty Immolator will draw all the anti-tank allowing the Sisters to get in. It will not do any damage, unless you spam more of them than he can handle, but it does pretty well guarantee that every Sister will arrive at the same time.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:4. Retributors have always worked for me when I run sisters and they've always been nasty aginst me when I fight them. You won't be taking out a squad a turn but use them to drop scary things like lootaz or fast assault units then help whittle away his mobs.

Perhaps it is a difference of experience, but I have found them useless. Not taking out a squad is an understatement: on average, a unit of Retributors will take out two Boyz a turn; less from Biker units. If they have Lootas, Bikers, Deffkoptas, etc then the Retributors will not live long enough to kill more than that. In their most successful game, my Retributors successfully took out a whole one Deffkopta and five Boyz over six turns, and they only lasted that long because my opponent plain ignored the unit all game (he had learned from experience that their bark is worse than their bite). That eventually became the standard with all my opponents. They would leave the Retributors until there was nothing else to attack, as they were the least threatening unit on the table. I tried them for several months, but they just do not have the volume to make a significant contribution.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:5. The book is great for making rocks that blunt his charge.

Yeah, I have tied up and slowly whittled away at a Boyz squad with some Battle Sisters and a Canoness. Unfortunately, that was still ultimately his win, as he tied down a quarter of my army with a fifth of his. Without the Canoness, his walkers alone crushed the rest of my army, and a squad of Boyz just sat around on an objective picking their noses. Sisters are the best tarpit in the game, no question, but that does not win you games.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:7. Penitent engines are typically crappy units but they are nothing short of amazing against orks. Twin heavy flamers and a ton of attacks on an armour chassis that is hard for them to deal with in cc spells a unit you can simply have run at orks and wade through his entire army. Try them out, they are simply brutal against orks.

I had not even thought of Penitent Engines. They do not have two Heavy Flamers, unfortunately, but I can definitely see them being useful against Orks. The biggest problem with this, however, is the Priest. He is far too much of a liability to take against an opponent you are already struggling against. When you play mech, your best option would be a minimum squad of Celestians in an Immolator, with no options. They will never be able to fire their guns (thanks to his Righteous Fury Special Rule), and will be completely ineffective in combat, due to not having enough attacks to matter. The Penitent Engines seem interesting, but the Priest seems far too high a cost to justify. If you have seen this used, what did they do with the Priest?

Sorry I can't do the whole separating quotes thing. So using numbers.

1. I haven't math-hammered this match up yet but from subjective experience my sisters playing opponent can usually break my orks on the charge.

I run 25 orks, nob, p-klaw he runs 8 seraphs, eviscerator, twin hand flamers

so assuming perfect numbers he probably gets pistols, 2 dead orks, flamers 5 - 6 more dead orks before charging. Then 21 basic attacks, 10.5 hit, 3 wound likely 3 dead orks.

Orks hit back and if they can all get in that's 28 attacks, 14 hit, 7 wound about 2 - 3 dead sisters in return.
Then the p-klaw swings, 3 attacks, 1.5 hit. 1 more dead sister unless you have invulnerable saves. The eviscerator gets 3 swings and probably also adds 1 more ork.

So in general you're looking at about equal amount of models killed and a drawn combat with the odds just slightly in the seraphs favour. Clearly I'm not remembering something my opponent does but if 8 vs 25 works out at about equal then it shouldn't be too hard to swing cc into your favour massively. Shooting up the unit with another 1 prior to the charge, adding a cannoness to the unit or upping the squad size should swing the cc into your favour enough to break the orks.

2. Well at least you know it works. I disagree that it does no damage, heavy flamers are one of the best ways to deal with hordes of boys and they are simply THE best way to deal with bikes. Ignoring the cover and the armour save is a huge deal and that applies to KFF's too. their particularly good if you can remove his anti-tank capabilities early so that they get more chances to shoot. Not that this is likely but bear it in mind.

3. They represent pretty much the only serious long range firepower short of inducted guard you have. They're not ideal but I still find them to be pretty good. As I say, target his specialists with them and they will usually make their pts back. Removing lootaz/stormboyz/trukks can be a very big deal for the ork player. To be honest it just sounds like you're having bad luck with them. They aren't necessary for beating orks but I urge you to give them another chance.

4. Yeah attrition is the orks game sadly but this doesn't mean the holding power of sisters is useless. If you can get onto an objective before him and use the book/faith to hold then that helps you tactically. Get several ork squads pinned in place then use seraphs/cannoness to come in, charge the cc and force the orks away. You shouldn't be tarpitting with the cannoness she should be teaming with seraphs. But you probably knew that.

5. He normally uses the priest with the celestians and they have been an average unit at best. Generally he drives them around in an immolator and they only ever get out in order to drop their flame templates (they can't charge when they deploy which over rules holy rage no?) followed by being charged by me and then saved by seraphim. He has used, on occasion, a squad of dominions with 4 flamers in an immolator with the priest. When this was a surprise it absolutely devastated me. The 5 flame templates pretty much wiped out an entire mob in one round of shooting and made a beach head he could defend from. Since I started expecting it it swiftly became a very expensive target for my rokkit buggies.

I'm sorry I can't help more. I've only used sisters once or twice and I don't have the best handle on the army but based on experience I do think the necessary tools are there. You have lots of flamers and heavy flamers, troops that won't break in combat, a decent and mobile assault unit that can't get bogged down in a protracted combat, the dirt cheap hitting power of the cannoness, very powerful cc walkers (orks hate walkers) and mobility. I think it is possible to put those together in such a manner that you can beat orks.

It might help if you tell me what kind of army he usually plays and what you usually field.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:So in general you're looking at about equal amount of models killed and a drawn combat with the odds just slightly in the seraphs favour.

I am not sure how that works. 8 vs 25, down to 4 vs 14 and it is in the favour of the 4?? This is clearly a battle of attrition that is very much in favour of the Orks, not least considering in that combat, you lost four 22 point models, whereas he lost four 6 point ones. Adding a Canoness would add more hitting power, for sure, but then you lose hit and run, which will see the unit (including the Canoness) get slaughtered in his assault phase.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:2. Well at least you know it works. I disagree that it does no damage

You misunderstand me. I suggested it does no damage because, having received all the anti-tank, it will be destroyed. Taking more Immolators than he can hope to take down changes that, of cause.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:5. He normally uses the priest with the celestians and they have been an average unit at best. Generally he drives them around in an immolator and they only ever get out in order to drop their flame templates (they can't charge when they deploy which over rules holy rage no?)

Interesting one that. You normally cannot do anything that would prevent the unit from assaulting (eg running, shooting, etc), but you are allowed to use a transport. That is a rather good idea! I may have to proxy some Penitent Engines and a Priest in my next game to give this a try.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:It might help if you tell me what kind of army he usually plays and what you usually field.

I most commonly face a Dreadbash, though Biker or Speedfreek lists are also a possibility. Locally, the KFF and Deffdread/Killa Kanz are hated by every player, as not one person has yet managed to take out more than one or two walkers in a game. The shooty elements behind them are just an additional kick in the pants. Bikers are also hated for the way they turn it into a one-sided battle. I got the idea when the Codex was still new and I faced a single Biker Boss at 500 points: these guys chew up Sisters lists.

How does Chaos SM fare against orks if I'm running 14 plague marines and 2 defilers at 1000 points?

Elric of Grans wrote:

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:So in general you're looking at about equal amount of models killed and a drawn combat with the odds just slightly in the seraphs favour.

I am not sure how that works. 8 vs 25, down to 4 vs 14 and it is in the favour of the 4?? This is clearly a battle of attrition that is very much in favour of the Orks, not least considering in that combat, you lost four 22 point models, whereas he lost four 6 point ones. Adding a Canoness would add more hitting power, for sure, but then you lose hit and run, which will see the unit (including the Canoness) get slaughtered in his assault phase.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:2. Well at least you know it works. I disagree that it does no damage

You misunderstand me. I suggested it does no damage because, having received all the anti-tank, it will be destroyed. Taking more Immolators than he can hope to take down changes that, of cause.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:5. He normally uses the priest with the celestians and they have been an average unit at best. Generally he drives them around in an immolator and they only ever get out in order to drop their flame templates (they can't charge when they deploy which over rules holy rage no?)

Interesting one that. You normally cannot do anything that would prevent the unit from assaulting (eg running, shooting, etc), but you are allowed to use a transport. That is a rather good idea! I may have to proxy some Penitent Engines and a Priest in my next game to give this a try.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:It might help if you tell me what kind of army he usually plays and what you usually field.

I most commonly face a Dreadbash, though Biker or Speedfreek lists are also a possibility. Locally, the KFF and Deffdread/Killa Kanz are hated by every player, as not one person has yet managed to take out more than one or two walkers in a game. The shooty elements behind them are just an additional kick in the pants. Bikers are also hated for the way they turn it into a one-sided battle. I got the idea when the Codex was still new and I faced a single Biker Boss at 500 points: these guys chew up Sisters lists.

1. 8 v 25 down to 4 v 14 isn't in favour of the four over a long battle of attrition. You are correct there but I didn't mean that. I didn't express myself too clearly so I'll try again.

In shooting the seraphs should kill 6-8 orks before they charge.
in cc the orks will kill 4 seraphs (possibly less with invulnerable faith) and the seraphs will kill 4.5 orks (I think, my math sucks). This will result in a battle of attrition that the orks will win.

Bu most of time you won't be using 8 seraphs against 25 boyz and anything you can to reduce the number of boyz or increase the hitting power of the serpahs will turn 4 vs 4.5 into a bigger difference in favour of the serpahs, particularly because the seraphs hit first and so the more you kill the less of your girls will die. Get this difference high enough to a) reduce their numbers below 11 and b) get a difference of about 4 (say 8 dead orks to 4 dead seraphs) and you should break an average ork squad.

For example lets add a cannoness with blessed weapon and braizer of holy fire to to the squad.
first this adds another flame template and another 3-4 dead orks from shooting.
secondly this adds an extra 4 str 5 p-weapon attacks re-rolling 1 miss. so 2.5 attacks will hit resulting in 1 - 2 more dead orks.

this means this time around only 10 orks are left to strike back, 18 attacks, 9 hits, 4.5 wounds, only 2 dead seraphs and 1.5 more from the klaw, less if using faith.

so now you're looking at 3 dead seraphs vs 6 dead orks, a -3 giving them an ld check of 7. Not guaranteed to break them but it might.

Basically what I'm trying to say is that 8 seraphs vs 25 is not a match up that will result in instantly breaking the orks but anything you to do to put the odds in your favour (killing a few more boys through shooting, adding more seraphs or a cannoness) dramatically increase the odds that you will break them.

Another way of increasing the odds is to use the seraphs to charge into a sisters unit that has tarpitted the orks.

Breaking them in cc is the easiest way to deal with big mobs of orks. Shooting them just takes too much time. But sisters, sadly, lack a unit that can break them on it's own (actually penitent engines can but that's a tailoring your list thing) so you have to try and use 2 units together in some fashion.

Obviously the problem is that he has more units than you and the only advice I can offer there is to use movement based tactics to try and reduce that advantage for him and give you a numerical advanatge of units (obviously not of models). Refused flank might work since the horde needs room to spread out.


regarding taking on specific ork builds.

dreadbash - I haven't run it myself but clearly the trick is to get rid of the KFF which makes the kanz and dreads much, much easier to kill. Exorcists will have a field day with kanz, auto glance with every hit (and a +1 too) and they run in squads so 1 exorcist can potentially drop an entire mob on it's own. Having them all means less boyz which makes the job of your battle sisters and seraphs is much easier re: killing infantry. Any of the assassins but particularly the vindicaire, callidus and culexus would be great for removing the big mek and the KFF. Death cult assassins can do it too with a bit of luck. The vindicaire would be best except he likely hides the mek directly behind a kan so I'd vote the callidus. Plus she can do fun things like re-arrange his kanz so first turn their av facing is to the back of you or they suddenly are behind the mek giving the rest of the army a clear shot at him. General tips for this army is that it is slower and a little bit less numerous than normal orks which surely both help you gain that unit advantage I talked about. Kanz aren't too hot vs sisters too as you can use faith to blunt the power of the dccw's and then tear them up in cc with eviscerators.

Or you could get really wild and fight back with your own dreadbash. 9 penitent engines vs a dreadbash would be huge fun to watch. My money is on the engines.

bikers - I assume you mean nob bikers? Spam squads with melta weapons, heavy flamers and exorcists. Divine guide the heavy flamers so they eat through his cover, armour and FNP save although to be honest melta weps are probably better as they knock off 2 wounds, wound easier and still knock out fnp and armour. First turn he turbo-boosts, you deploy in a ring around him so he can only get a charge off at max 2 squads, unleash hell and then possibly charge him or eat the charge, books mean you probably hold and faith blunts his p-klaws. Hopefully he'll spend much, much longer grinding away than he thought he would.

sppedfreakz - stay in your rhinos, use exorcists, retributors and inquisitors to drop trukks whilst moving back from him and to the sides in rhinos. Then sweep in and dakka the remains. Immolators for hunting his bike squads, whatever you can spare to down deffkoptaz.

Zoot wrote:How does Chaos SM fare against orks if I'm running 14 plague marines and 2 defilers at 1000 points?

average.

add some kind of decent cc unit (zerkers) and you're golden though.

(my opinions probably fail, but this is my take on the view for SM.)

horde- ASSAULT MARINES. Take them. a whirlwind with a dakka pred back to back for massive damage. Add a H. bolter and a flamer for free on your tac squads, and you mop up nicely.

nob biker(z)- Ironclads and Redeemers are quite tasty, in addition to your usual Thunder Spammer Termies.

Dreadbash: Take flamers and missile launchers on your tac squads. An ordinary Dread will help here, as will any sort of PF or TH.

"The Bandwagon": Meltas & Thunder Hammers. ML are OK, but ping off the front armour. Concentrate them on Trukkz and frag any unlucky footsloggers.

ungulateman

With the Seraphim, the nigh-inability to hide them makes them massive targets. I do not think I have ever got 8 to a squad as, with a wall of Rhinos across the field, the Seraphim are the only target the entire Ork army has. 120 Shoota shots alone(!), even with BS2 vs Sv3+, will take out just short of 9 Seraphim. Since they cannot hide behind Rhinos, their utility is largely dependant on the terrain of where you play. If there is a lot of LOS-blocking terrain all the way along they can hide behind, then they are likely to get there. At the end of the day, a unit of Battle Sisters will kill one less Ork for 30 less points (or one more for 20 less points if you add a combi-flamer), and are far more likely to get there unscathed in the first place. I have also found Seraphim useless against other armies in fifth edition, which is why I recently stopped using them altogether. This could be that I am using them wrong, or it could just be that fifth edition killed the Seraphim.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:Exorcists will have a field day with kanz, auto glance with every hit (and a +1 too)

Er, unless I am missing a rule, they do not autoglance. On average, a single Exorcist will destroy 1/2 a Kan per turn. When facing as many as nine of them (and potentially two Deff Dreads), even three Exorcists will have their work cut out for them.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:Any of the assassins but particularly the vindicaire, callidus and culexus would be great for removing the big mek and the KFF.

With a bit of luck, a Vidicare could possibly ping him out, but the odds are very much against you (it is a `you win the game on a 4+' situation). The Callidus could, but again relies on a lot of luck, and on your opponent playing in a certain way. The Culexus, as far as I can tell, cannot so anything about the Big Mek, and has always been a poor choice against most armies.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:Plus she can do fun things like re-arrange his kanz so first turn their av facing is to the back of you or they suddenly are behind the mek giving the rest of the army a clear shot at him.

Actually, that is an Apocalypse Datasheet. You cannot choose the facing, and you can only move one unit 6'', with a few additional restrictions. With a big unit of boys, there is a good chance you will not be able to get them in front on the Kanz, or the Kanz behind them. You also rely entirely on getting the first turn and having something with long enough range and enough firepower to take out an entire unit of Boyz and the Big Mek with them. The Sisters do not have anything that can do this, so you are firmly back at square one.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:General tips for this army is that it is slower and a little bit less numerous than normal orks which surely both help you gain that unit advantage I talked about. Kanz aren't too hot vs sisters too as you can use faith to blunt the power of the dccw's and then tear them up in cc with eviscerators.

Most units are useless in close combat, even with Evicerators, though there are some that can hold their own against walkers (eg Flying Nun). They can take a unit without any real headaches. Unfortunately, it becomes a trade-off. You kill one or two Kanz, but in the following turn the Boyz behind them counter-assault and annihilate your unit. You thin the Kan-Wall slightly, and have drawn the Boyz forward, but lost all your expensive assault elements. There is then not enough fire power to take out that many Boyz, and there are still most of the Kanz/Dreads stomping about. I have found trying to ping them off at long range with Exorcists and Meltaguns inside Rhinos (at 12'') is the most success I have had against this list, but still not scored a win.

Elric of Grans wrote:With the Seraphim, the nigh-inability to hide them makes them massive targets. I do not think I have ever got 8 to a squad as, with a wall of Rhinos across the field, the Seraphim are the only target the entire Ork army has. 120 Shoota shots alone(!), even with BS2 vs Sv3+, will take out just short of 9 Seraphim. Since they cannot hide behind Rhinos, their utility is largely dependant on the terrain of where you play. If there is a lot of LOS-blocking terrain all the way along they can hide behind, then they are likely to get there. At the end of the day, a unit of Battle Sisters will kill one less Ork for 30 less points (or one more for 20 less points if you add a combi-flamer), and are far more likely to get there unscathed in the first place. I have also found Seraphim useless against other armies in fifth edition, which is why I recently stopped using them altogether. This could be that I am using them wrong, or it could just be that fifth edition killed the Seraphim.

Why can't you hide them behind rhinos anymore? And does your club have no LOS blocking terrain? My friend has no problem hiding his seraphs.

Elric of Grans wrote:

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:Exorcists will have a field day with kanz, auto glance with every hit (and a +1 too)

Er, unless I am missing a rule, they do not autoglance. On average, a single Exorcist will destroy 1/2 a Kan per turn. When facing as many as nine of them (and potentially two Deff Dreads), even three Exorcists will have their work cut out for them.

exorcists are str 10 right? vs av 11 on the kanz = autoglance on every hit. It's unreliable due to the D6 but if you roll 4 shots, 3 hits, 2 should penetrate 1 should glance that's potentially all 3 dead with good rolls and a likelihood of 2 dead per exorcist. With the range on those things you should be eating kanz for lunch. That is provided you can get rid of the KFF.

Elric of Grans wrote:

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:Any of the assassins but particularly the vindicaire, callidus and culexus would be great for removing the big mek and the KFF.

With a bit of luck, a Vidicare could possibly ping him out, but the odds are very much against you (it is a `you win the game on a 4+' situation). The Callidus could, but again relies on a lot of luck, and on your opponent playing in a certain way. The Culexus, as far as I can tell, cannot so anything about the Big Mek, and has always been a poor choice against most armies.

culexus can Infiltrate within charge range means if you get the first turn he can potentially charge the meks squad turn 1, possibly get to the mek and take him out. Unlikely I know hence why I think the callidus is the best bet.

Elric of Grans wrote:

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:Plus she can do fun things like re-arrange his kanz so first turn their av facing is to the back of you or they suddenly are behind the mek giving the rest of the army a clear shot at him.

Actually, that is an Apocalypse Datasheet. You cannot choose the facing, and you can only move one unit 6'', with a few additional restrictions. With a big unit of boys, there is a good chance you will not be able to get them in front on the Kanz, or the Kanz behind them. You also rely entirely on getting the first turn and having something with long enough range and enough firepower to take out an entire unit of Boyz and the Big Mek with them. The Sisters do not have anything that can do this, so you are firmly back at square one.

AFAIK "a word in your ear" is still a rule in normal 40k. The datasheet just improves it.

Elric of Grans wrote:

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:General tips for this army is that it is slower and a little bit less numerous than normal orks which surely both help you gain that unit advantage I talked about. Kanz aren't too hot vs sisters too as you can use faith to blunt the power of the dccw's and then tear them up in cc with eviscerators.

Most units are useless in close combat, even with Evicerators, though there are some that can hold their own against walkers (eg Flying Nun). They can take a unit without any real headaches. Unfortunately, it becomes a trade-off. You kill one or two Kanz, but in the following turn the Boyz behind them counter-assault and annihilate your unit. You thin the Kan-Wall slightly, and have drawn the Boyz forward, but lost all your expensive assault elements. There is then not enough fire power to take out that many Boyz, and there are still most of the Kanz/Dreads stomping about. I have found trying to ping them off at long range with Exorcists and Meltaguns inside Rhinos (at 12'') is the most success I have had against this list, but still not scored a win.

Keeping range and pinging until you remove some of the kanz is what I'd do to. I'd be very aggressive about removing the KFF, possibly sacrificing a unit or using something like an assassin so that I can then deal with the kanz quicker with my exorcists. Shoot the dreads, charge (after shooting) the boyz.

I know I'm not really offering that great "epiphany"* that will suddenly open up the golden path to victory but I think it should be possible to win with the tactics we're discussing. Remove the KFF quickly at any cost. Shoot the kanz, burn and charge the remaining boyz. Masses of vehicles aren't easy for sisters to fight and backed up by lots of infantry that means you can't spam the weapons you need to win and have to take a balance but with a bit of finessese it shouldn't be impossible.

The hard part really is avoiding the counter-charge which means either using a refused flank or some kind of scoot and shoot tactic. At least until the kanz/KFF is dealt with.


* although I do think just running 9 penitents at him will beat him and basically play your army for you.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:Why can't you hide them behind rhinos anymore? And does your club have no LOS blocking terrain? My friend has no problem hiding his seraphs.

Seraphim stand taller than Rhinos, so everyone can see them even if they stand behind the Rhino wall. There is very little terrain here that Seraphim can hide behind. Either they are too tall, or it is not large enough for the whole unit.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:exorcists are str 10 right?

S8. If they were S10, my opponents would ban them out-right, rather than merely complaining about how cheesy they are as they do now. They make 3.5 shots, 2.33 hits, 1.5 results, half are saved, resulting in 0.48 dead Kanz (or, just short of one if there is no KFF).

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:culexus can Infiltrate within charge range means if you get the first turn he can potentially charge the meks squad turn 1, possibly get to the mek and take him out. Unlikely I know hence why I think the callidus is the best bet.

All Assassins can infiltrate, but the Culexus is an anti-psyker Assassin, so none of his weapons or abilities have any useful effect on the Big Mek. I suspect you are thinking of the Eversor Assassin, who is basically a living bomb. Charges in, does a little damage, gets killed and explodes.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:AFAIK "a word in your ear" is still a rule in normal 40k. The datasheet just improves it.

A Word in your Ear is in 40K, but you described the Apocalypse version. The 40K version would not be likely to make a difference here, as you cannot move the unit far enough, cannot choose the facing, and the Big Mek is still in a unit, so your shooting, even if you were close enough, is still not going to effect him.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:Shoot the dreads, charge (after shooting) the boyz.

Minor nit-pick, Seraphim are the only unit that can charge after shooting. Everything else has Rapid Fire weapons. I really wish our assault units (Repentia, etc) actually worked, as they would make a huge difference against Orks.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:I know I'm not really offering that great "epiphany"* that will suddenly open up the golden path to victory but I think it should be possible to win with the tactics we're discussing.

I know. I am just trying to incite some good discussion on the topic. I want to see people throwing their ideas in so we can bash out how every army can handle Orks, eliminating the current theme of `Da Orkses is da best!' and levelling the playing field somewhat.

bravelybravesirrobin wrote:* although I do think just running 9 penitents at him will beat him and basically play your army for you.

I think that would mess up almost anyone, and is a very tempting list, but buying, building and painting nine of those things is far less tempting. $500 on models that are universally agreed to be nigh-useless and are supposed to be horrid to build is not especially appealing to me. Three, maybe, but nine is out of the question.

9 Penitents is not a horrid build. With the way their Holy Rage thing is written, they can move d6", run d6", and Holy Rage another d6". It almost guarantees a second turn assault from *9 walkers*.

The reason we never see it, however, is because as you noted, buying, building, and painting expensive and poorly fitted models in one of the oldest and most expensive metal armies is not tempting for many people.

well for Space Marines i would tug out some Sternguard, all those rounds let them really become your everything killer, some rounds get to ingnore cover, while others are poisonous, another gets 30" range while keeping the Boltgun kick, and for those pesky HQs you got a Gets Hot Boltgun shot that has AP3 it can only reach 18" but it still dangerous, i have killed a Daemon Prince with a full ten man squad, mind you the sad thing was the Prince died in CC(it had one wound left and charged, only to be beat down with boltgun pistol grips) so they are a bit pricey but for what they can do, i think its worth it, you can hurt orks at all ranges and you get 2 attacks to start off with so enjoy the goodness of the new Elite Marines