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.

I know this is going to be a heated argument, that's why I'm excited. I can't wait to hear reasons and hear people put up their own counter reasons. I just ask that everyone be open minded. I won't start the debate, because I personally don't believe Orks are that great. Instead I would rather people who support the Ork Codex list reasons why they believe they are a competitive army to play. That way those who read and myself can attempt our best to counter said arguments. If arguments cannot be countered then so be it.

Because they play Necrons...

The reason people think Orks are good is because of personal experience. There has been several instances of Orks winning in tournaments and games in general, and any time I see this topic pop up, the argument of the people who think Orks are bad always boil down to "Orks suck because they're not Guard/Space Marines"

I actually think that Orks are good because they have powerful HQ choices, powerful Elites choices, powerful Troops choices, powerful Fast Attack choices, and powerful Heavy Support choices, that when used correctly can win many games.

They also benefit from a lot of good narrative, which contributes to no little amount of the fun to be had in wargaming.

Great stats for cheap points. Powerful weapons for cheap. Lots of fast, useful vehicles for cheap. Everything is very cheap, and really good for it's point value. There are a few exceptions like Flash Gits, but by and large the codex is packed with good choices for comparatively few points.

Why are people even bothering to respond to this obvious troll post? This has been discussed a thousand times, if the OP wants to be educated, use the Search function. Otherwise, it's a pretty sad attempt to flame ork players.

yea, obvious troll is obvious. don't feed him!

orks are good because I said so damnit.

I hate orks too, but that doesn't mean I think they're bad.

Orks is gudd cuz Orks iz da biggest and da strongest!

Well, I'm someone who really enjoyed Dawn of War and then met a friend who'd played for years. I'd originally thought of going with Eldar, Space Wolves or Witch Hunters. Then, I got the races explained to me. I was hooked on Orks when they were described to me as being "The psychic hippies of the universe combined with a gleeful love of violence and speed, a genius engineer and a scrap heap."

Even the good unit/bad unit bit aside, Orks tend to be rich in one thing that many armies lack: comic relief. The model range is nice (and basically as goofy as you want it to be) and the rules fit pretty well. If you want to play a dead serious Goff game with Warbosses, Nobz and big Mobz of Boyz, you can. If you want a goofier bent, you can break out the Wierdboyz, Bomb Squigs, Shokk Attack Gunz and Grotz.

Interestingly enough, the only games I've not enjoyed were the ones where I got really competitive. It eventually became clear that I just wanted to put my models on the table and play around and see what happens. Maybe that just means that I'm matched well to my army. If so, I'm fine with that. At any rate, I tend to see Orks as the lighter side of 40K and I'm still enjoying my horde of psychotic psychic hippies scavenging the universal scrap yard.

Interesting...I didn't think we had a problem with trolls on Dakka, at least not the obvious kind. I say ban him.

If there were never orks I would have never played this game, and if they were taken away I probably stop playing, or just find people that would allow me to use old codexes. As far as them being good they have a lot of variety in good builds which really is what makes an army good I think, i mean the codex only gets you so far then it relies on your generalship from there. Other than that the allure of orks to a lot of players is fluff and lesser restrictions on modeling and customization, example: strapping some gauss cannons to some marines and calling them lascannons would be normally frowned apon but my ork boys with lascannons from a tank no less strapped to there arms is not only never questioned but occasionally complemented. There rules and wargear also add some more fun to the game, though they are a bit more streamlined then earlier editions.

Nob Bikers decked out in wargear The pain this unit has brought to my army almost gives me night terrors.

"Good" needs further definition. For some people, predominantly on the internet, it means being able to produce one of a few cookie cutter lists currently identified as the strongest tournament builds. Sometimes the Ork codex has a list or two ranked up there.

But in actual play, given that most games are friendly games outside of tournaments, those powerful cookie cutter lists are just not what makes a codex decent or not. In those situations, a strong codex is one where a player can build a wide range of lists, using all or almost all the units in his codex, and the Orks do this wonderfully.

There’s about a dozen really different types of lists that are cool to play and easily competitive enough for a game against a mate. There’s few codices with that level of variety.

In 5th, Orks won all 3 of the GW GTs they had in the states before they stopped them. In fact Neil who won the circuit that year did so with a perfect score and all with Orks.

Cause Green iz best

The standard ork boy is points for points, the best rank and file trooper in the game, with a no points swap from slugga to shoota you can take a great low points assault trooper and make it a good shooting trooper that still maintains a reasonable capability in close combat.

Lootas and burnaz are amazing elite choices, also individualised nobs.

The kustom force field and it's effects on vehicles, eg the av14 fronted battlewagon with it's large troop carrying capability.

Deffkoptaz getting the first turn, turbo boosting in their scouting move, moving, pissing rokkits at enemy armour and then charging it with a powerklaw potentially destroying it.

Point being though that none of this is a 'for sure', orks do fail at all of the above on occasion, my deffkoptaz have failed to shoot a single thing ever, even with twinlinked due to one massive and significant handicap, BS2.

Given some of the uberpower stuff we've seen in the Space Wolves and Blood Angels books, orks are middle of the road atm I think in terms of power builds/competitiveness as a codex, but I still argue that the codex it's self is one of the best ever written.

When my buddies and I decided to start playing 40K, and they described Orks to me, I knew it was my army. I have a seriously twisted, sick, and cheezy sense of humor. The comic relief, the fact that "red ones go fasta", it works because they think it works, the Shokk Attack Gun, and the looting of Wagons made me fall in love with them.
After reading through the codex, and seeing more of the fluff, and some of the units, made me love them anymore. I then started thinking of some conversions, and humor factors I can toss in and loved the army even more.
I can't argue about which codex is better in terms of army lists, as I'm still a noob, only started playing this year. I havn't played against every army, so I don't know how they all work. I havn't read all of the codices, so I can't say which one has the 'best' fluff. But I can tell you no two Ork armies will be the same, there seems to be much more versitility in terms of conversions compared to other armies(An Ork wont kill you for the heresy of "refurbishing" Xeno-tech).

Good choices in every slot and some of the best troops in the game. They also have a decent selection of viable builds.

On the other hand, they struggle against heavy armour which means that some builds can hurt them quite badly.

Honersstodnt wrote:yea, obvious troll is obvious.

*checks poster history*

..ahh..

good advice.