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Hey Dakkadakka,

Me and a buddy just started playing warhammer recently. He plays Chaos and I play Orkz. In our last few games I've primarily been playing green tide. I've tried playing my army alittle different each game, we started playing at 500 points and are now playing 2000 point games. I've noticed the biggest threats against me in my buddy's army is his Defiler and his demon prince. The large blast template at 72" is a bitch against my large squads, and I've seen his demon prince wipe out an entire squad of 30 with nurgles rot or force them to run all over the map with lash of submission.

I've had some success with taking out his defiler in the first 2 turns with suicide deff koptas, but their shots are so unreliable sometimes with a BS of 2. And what would I do if he took 2? Also, I the kustom force field is great if I'm being shot at, but I just want to confirm; do I get a save if he hits me with a template weapon?

The demon prince has been a problem for me for quite some time, though I think things will be different now that we just found out that monstrous creatures can be singled out, even if hes in a unit. That should give me something for my lootas to shoot at.

Also, I wanted to ask. I see lootas in every list I see on the forums. I started taking them, but they have been very unreliable for me. If I have them in anything lower than 15 in a squad, I find if I roll bad on the D3 their shots are so underwhelming. It seems whatever I shoot at, I miss like crazy, and their shots dont penetrate armor. What specifically should the lootas be shooting at against chaos?

My final question; in lower point games I find Nobz are way too expensive to take since I always want to out model my opponent, and the points for nobz really add up if I kit them all out differently for wound allocation. At the higher point game I took the nobz mostly to take out his plague marines and negate his FNP rolls with my power klaws, and they ended up crushing a khorne berserker squad instead. But if I am playing a lower point game and end up not taking the nobz, what can I do against plague marines? I find the marines are incredibly tough, and if all my boyz have been constantly blasted with template weapons, I often dont have enough to kill his plague marine squads and I end up losing combat, failing leaderships, and running.

Any advice would be welcome!


~Whiskeyjack

Some basic advice and answers;

his demon prince wipe out an entire squad of 30 with nurgles rot or force them to run all over the map with lash of submission.

Obviously not in the same game. The powers are tied to the mark and each requires a different mark. Nurgle for rot, and slaanesh for lash.

I've had some success with taking out his defiler in the first 2 turns with suicide deff koptas, but their shots are so unreliable sometimes with a BS of 2. And what would I do if he took 2? Also, I the kustom force field is great if I'm being shot at, but I just want to confirm; do I get a save if he hits me with a template weapon?

You'll find vehicles are the bane of orks in general, and foot hordes in particular. I might suggest a squad of killa-kanz with rokkits. Semi-reliable (bs3 I think?), cheap as all hell (~150 for 3 with rokkits), and they can help chip away at demon princes in HtH as well. As for the KFF question. Yes to defiler blast, no to "template" weapons like flamers. I believe the KFF gives a 5+ cover save, so weapons/powers that ignore cover will ignore the field.

The demon prince has been a problem for me for quite some time, though I think things will be different now that we just found out that monstrous creatures can be singled out, even if hes in a unit. That should give me something for my lootas to shoot at.

The Demon Prince isn't an independent character, so cannot join squads. That means anyone in base to base with him can direct attack solely at him, and he can always be picked out with shooting if you have LoS. This is what power claw nobz are built for. Rokkit volleys and lootas can also give him a headache.

Also, I wanted to ask. I see lootas in every list I see on the forums. I started taking them, but they have been very unreliable for me. If I have them in anything lower than 15 in a squad, I find if I roll bad on the D3 their shots are so underwhelming. It seems whatever I shoot at, I miss like crazy, and their shots dont penetrate armor. What specifically should the lootas be shooting at against chaos?

Rhinos. Lootas are used for hunting light armor. AV10-12 vehicles. They are semi-decent against dreads and defilers, but crumby against power armor, predators and obviously terminators, land raiders and obliterators. In a pinch they can shoot at a demon prince. Depending on the type of prince (nurgle/slaanesh) 15 lootas have a semi-decent chance of hurting him, with every shot they fire averaging around 1 wound. So if you managed to roll 3 shots you should be able to chip 3-4 wounds off of him.

My final question; in lower point games I find Nobz are way too expensive to take since I always want to out model my opponent, and the points for nobz really add up if I kit them all out differently for wound allocation. At the higher point game I took the nobz mostly to take out his plague marines and negate his FNP rolls with my power klaws, and they ended up crushing a khorne berserker squad instead. But if I am playing a lower point game and end up not taking the nobz, what can I do against plague marines? I find the marines are incredibly tough, and if all my boyz have been constantly blasted with template weapons, I often dont have enough to kill his plague marine squads and I end up losing combat, failing leaderships, and running.

I'd be weary of taking expensive nob squads in a foot green-tide list, as you can bet your ass that that defiler will be pointed straight at them, and instanting the crap out of them. Don't forget that they don't ALL need power klaws. 2-3 klaws in a 5 man squad is more then enough. ALWAYS take a nob with a power claw in your troop boyz squads though, they have dozens of ablative wounds before you can kill that claw.

Also, remember that orks can't break and run if they have over 11 models in the squad, as they are fearless.

As for Plague Marines, they are expensive and tough as nails. That's why chaos players take them, they are a pain in the butt to kill. You get 4 ork boyz for every 1 plague marine, so either swarm him and use the power claw to tip the combats in your favor, or use a more mobile army to make sure you are getting the charge. Killa-kanz are also cool, as they have little to fear from non-powerfist equipped plague marine squads.

^^^
pretty much covered it all, but post the list your playing, that will help us give you better ideas.

Also, Lootas are a preference unit. Some people LOVE them, some people hate them. Using them incorrectly will just be you wasting your points on them. They are mainly there for light armor as mentioned. Once there isnt any light armor or none in LOS, then you just shoot at whatever in hopes to cause wounds.

1x Big Mek 35
Kustom Force Field 50

85

Troops

3x Sluggah Boyz (x30) 180 - Units include;
Nob 10
Power Klaw 25
Bosspole 5

660

Elites

2x Lootas (x7) 105

210

Heavy Support

2x Killa Kans (x3) 105 - Units include;
Grotzooka (x3) 30

Def Dred (as troop) 75
Skorcha 5
Dread CCW 15

365

Fast Attack

3x Def Kopta 35
Buzzsaw 25

180

That's his updated list from the army list forum. No problems with it IMO. Personally I might drop the deff dread for something like a warboss or more def koptas, but that's personal preference.

Thanks for the reply's guys.

Yeah, that list up there is an older one, and one I plan on fielding later on, but this Friday we decided to do a 2000 point game and I kind of just threw together a list.

I had 90 shoota boyz on the field, 20 gretchin (we ended up playing annihilation so they were kind of a waste and I just used them as a screen to get charged and shot at instead of the boyz), 4 deffkoptas with TL Rokkits, 15 Lootas in one squad, and 2 Trukks with 5 Nobz in each. I didn't take the Kans this game because I didn't think I had enough.

I ended up winning with 6 kill points to his 2... And one of his kill points was my gretchin squad. I think I had a better chance of winning since we both had pretty un-conventional lists.

At 2000 points, he only had 1 defiler, and he took 20 Khorne berserkers, none of them in rhinos. The rest were plague marines, 1 squad of CSM, a Demon prince and alot of flamers.

Some notable moments of that game; I scouted the deff koptas, and on turn 1 shot 4 TL Rokkits at the Defiler and ended up blowing it up. Some time later in the game he moved his khorne berserkers up preparing to charge a boyz squad, and I ended up moving both trukks out from cover, unloading the nobz, and charging him, killing all the zerkers.

I never had a chance to shoot at the demon princes with the lootas since he was always out of line of site. I shot at the plague marines for a turn, and didn't even kill 1. And the KFF didn't really save me against all the flamers he had in his army, though he never really had a good position to shoot at me. If he did, I probably would've lost alot more boyz.

After killing the Khorne Berserkers, I just kind of drove the trukks around, used them to block line of sight and driving my nobz around the board to help the boyz in CC. Honestly, I'm surprised the trukks didn't get blown up turn 1, but since neither of us use anything with alot of AV, he didn't really have anything on the board to shoot at them. Even though, aren't bolters a high enough strength to glance a 10/10/10 vehicle?

Anyway, thats just some thoughts I had, and some insight into where the questions came from.

Thanks again for the replies!


~Whiskeyjack

Well congrats on the Chaos ass kicking, nice work That trick you pulled on his berserkers with your nobs was well played