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Hey guys, been having trouble for a while against a friend's Kan Wall @ 1,500 and 1,850. I'm not sure if it's tactics (possible) or dice, but they're giving me a hell of a time.

His list is roughly...

HQ: Mek w/ KFF. Warboss w/ Mega Armor & Klaw.

Troops: 2 x 30 Boyz (1x shoota, 1x slugga, both w/ pk Nobz), 1x Deff Dread, 6x MaNZ w/ differential wargear. Battle Wagon with Deff Rolla & different bitz...12 Ardboyz in a Trukk

HS: 3x3 Kanz

Fast: 3x TL-Rokkit Deff Koptaz




I was running...

2x Vendettas w/ 4x Melta CCS

3x Hydras

4x Melta/Plasma vets in Chimeras

2x Demolisher w/ Plas sponsons

Marbo




Basically I'm stuck on target prioritization. He runs the MaNZ, Warboss, and Mek in the Wagon. I disable that on T2 no problem. After that, I get shot after shot bouncing off the fething Kans. Literally 6 TL-Lascannons destroying 1 Kan and negligible damage against the others. After dealing with the soft KPs and immediate threats (Wagon, Koptaz, and Trukk w/ 'Ard Boyz) I'm basically stuck either bouncing shots off of Kanz which don't yield a KP until you kill 3, or dumping shots into Boyz mobs with the usual 4+ coversave. Can't really move to Flame the Boyz as they're spread out to maximize coherency and a flamer template will hit 4 max. Game ended 9 KP to 7.

My strategy was to split up the army into two equal groups (2x Vets/Chimeras, 1x Russ, 1x Vendetta ea.) and hug corners to maximize shooting before the Orks make assault range, then to spread out as much as possible before they hit.

How do you deal with a Kan wall like this? Pray for better dice rolls or should I change something tactically speaking?

I would almost suggest for you get some hell hounds. If his dice are hot your heavy weapons will do very little damage, we play a game with dice and thats just how it goes sometimes you don't get a break. The two best ways to get around cover saves are template weapons, or the order from a command squad that makes your oppenent re-roll successful coversaves. Now your army in not set up with long range shooting from infantry, so that order is out because you will simply get mauled in CC if you drop 12 inches away, this leaves us with hell hounds. The templates can hi multiple vehicles and units at once and ignore cover. At armour 11 the str 6 can pop the cans, yes 5 to glance anything they do hit will not get a save. Your army as is should be able to handle the cans, but you are sorta beholden to the dice for good rolls.

Are you not using your 3 Hydras on the Kans? 12 S7 should get through and start doing damage quite quickly, even with a KFF save they are still going to fall (I assume he is grouping around the Mek). I mean once you penetrate you have a 50% chance of destroying one with the squadron rules.

I'm not sure you need both vendettas, since he is hardly packing that much heavy armour. Perhaps swap one out for a another LR hull, depending on whether you value the 3 shots vs a ID pie plate on the Mek?

Does your CCS need to be up in their faces with Meltas when you have Vet with the same job? You could sit them back and arm them with Las/Auto cannon and Plasma to aid the barrage. Possibly even a MoO since there will be allot of targets.

Marbo? Fun sure, but you could use these points to get more shots out there.

The Demolishers - you caould get more points with regular LR's or even the AC armed one, the S10 doesn't seem that beneficial when you can ID most of his forces with a regular Battleconnon. Also not sure they need sponsons if you keep them, you will have to move them up to range so you will not use them allot anyway. Sort of wasted points without a longer ranged gun.

I'm also guessing that since you are sitting back an letting the heavy weapons do the work you are getting all of you KPs quite early on then being swamped in the last couple of turns and bleeding KPs.

Prehaps a sucker punch might help. Replace the Chimera Vets for regular Guardsmen, blob them and screen your heavy units.

Once the Kan wall have endured your fire and got through 40 odd guard (probably more) with attendant PWs, Commissars, Meltaguns and Melta/Krak/Frag bombs will deal with most of what gets through. They will also be worth only one KP for the lot (Hide the PCS) vs the 8 soft KPs that your 4 x Chimera Vets were worth.

Guys, I don't tailor my armies to single opponents and builds. My meta is very Terminator-heavy so the army I'm running is the army I'm going to run. With it I've played BA, GK, SW, DE, CSM, Daemons, C:SM, and Eldar and hadn't lost a game. The only build that gives me trouble is the Kan Wall, and switching up the units to suit one build is kinda ill advised.

Looking for advice on target prioritization here mostly.

Have you tried focussing all your Vendies and Hydras at the Kan Wall, whilst moving the Chimeras into a position to receive the MaNz assault, keeping the Chimeras far enough apart to prevent more than one being charged at a time. Assuming that the MaNz take the bait, they will knock out one Chimera, and do some nasty damage to one Vet squad. At this point, surround the MaNz with Vets and blast them with FRFSRF lasguns, the meltas, and the Chimeras. Odds in your favour, they will lost a significant number of MaNz and be at a severely reduced effectiveness. All the while, keep up the fire on the Kan Wall, hopefully knocking it down.

Just my thoughts on the matter.

htj wrote:Have you tried focussing all your Vendies and Hydras at the Kan Wall, whilst moving the Chimeras into a position to receive the MaNz assault, keeping the Chimeras far enough apart to prevent more than one being charged at a time. Assuming that the MaNz take the bait, they will knock out one Chimera, and do some nasty damage to one Vet squad. At this point, surround the MaNz with Vets and blast them with FRFSRF lasguns, the meltas, and the Chimeras. Odds in your favour, they will lost a significant number of MaNz and be at a severely reduced effectiveness. All the while, keep up the fire on the Kan Wall, hopefully knocking it down.

Just my thoughts on the matter.

This is definitely the way to beat the Kan Wall.

What happened, was T1 was DoW so can't really shoot at much and the Wagon had its side armor blocked off completely.

T2 I focused the Vendettas on the Wagon and it took 6 TL-Lascannons on side armor to destroy it. CCS killed off the Deff Koptaz and the Hydras plugged away, immobilizing a Trukk (softest target and it was set up for a Democharge from Marbo. Demo charge missed entirely and Marbo died to 4 Shoota rounds.

T3 Lascannons focused on the Kanz and did literally nothing...between 6 of them I scored 1 Weapon Destroyed result. Russes went nuts and did a couple of wounds to the MaNZ squad. Multilasers and Vets opened up on the Kanz and did absolutely nothing.

T4 (last turn before assaults begin basically), CCS destroys 2/3 Kanz in one squad, 2 squads of vets, the CCS and a Vendetta manage to kill 1/3 Kan out of another squad, and the other squad eats up a Vendetta, 2 Chimeras and vets squads, and the Hydras' shooting for literally zero result.



Stopping the Wagon with the Mek is priority #1. After that it's Kanz and soft killpoints (ie: destroy the Trukk and demo charge the unit with Marbo, which didn't happen). Is there a problem with this approach?

I think that prioritising the Wagon is good, but it's a damage sink that's going to eat up a lot of your firepower. End result - the rest of the force will come across the board meeting little resistance. It's a good strong Ork list, so it's no suprise you're having difficulty taking it down. By using delaying tactics on the Wagon, blocking it's movement, line of site, denying it targets, whilst smashing apart his Kans, and then focussing on bringing down the Wagon, Mek and MaNz will confound his plans and could work out quite nicely. Oh, and hopefully you won't get DoW next time.

htj wrote:I think that prioritising the Wagon is good, but it's a damage sink that's going to eat up a lot of your firepower. End result - the rest of the force will come across the board meeting little resistance. It's a good strong Ork list, so it's no suprise you're having difficulty taking it down. By using delaying tactics on the Wagon, blocking it's movement, line of site, denying it targets, whilst smashing apart his Kans, and then focussing on bringing down the Wagon, Mek and MaNz will confound his plans and could work out quite nicely. Oh, and hopefully you won't get DoW next time.

The other option I guess is to completely ignore the Battle Wagon for the first turn and lay into the Kanz but it's pretty lackluster even from a ton of Lascannons. Mathhammer wise though, I'm not putting out enough shots. Assume 2 turns of shooting from 2 Vendettas at Kanz...12 TL-Las shots, 9 will hit, 6 will pen, 3 will be unsaved, 1.5 dead Kanz. Very meh.

Not really sure how to deal with Kanz at all.

Hit 'em with everything. The Hydras, the vets, and their Chimeras. I reckon you've enough firepower there to wipe them from the field in two turns, but it is at the expense of not firing on anything else.

A few things for you to try:

Kill the Dread before the Kans. It is a single model (and kill point) so will fall over before 3 Kans will.

Demolishers are great but if you want to get behind the Kan Wall try Griffons. Cheap, effective, overlooked, and undervalued.

Hellhounds can also hit the guys behind the Kans but you might also try loading up a Flamer special squad into the flyers and get behind the Wall.

Wildstorm wrote:A few things for you to try:

Kill the Dread before the Kans. It is a single model (and kill point) so will fall over before 3 Kans will.

Demolishers are great but if you want to get behind the Kan Wall try Griffons. Cheap, effective, overlooked, and undervalued.

Hellhounds can also hit the guys behind the Kans but you might also try loading up a Flamer special squad into the flyers and get behind the Wall.

Interesting point about the Dread. 6 Plasma guns and 3 meltaguns produced only a weapon destroyed result on it, but in theory it's a sound target in KP missions.


As for bypassing the wall I'm considering dropping the 2 Demolishers and Marbo for a pair of Manticores and a Psyker Battle Squad. Against Orks this isn't huge but it'd help a lot against Wolfstar. Again, I'm not into tailoring lists at all. So for a TAC list, Manticores make about as much sense as Demolishers.

You've got Fast vehicles, right? And Tanks with decent front armour? Ram them. Focus completely on one squad of Kanz with your shooting, and use one of your cheaper transport vehicles to try and Tank Shock/ram straight through the Kan lines, either busting open a Kan or at least pushing them out of the way. Then you'll have a gap that you can pour fire through, and some guns facing side/rear armour of the Kanz and the Wagon.

DoW is bad news for shooting armies both due to night fighting and due to the enemy starting units at the middle of the board.

However, in this case, DoW should have worked to your advantage, because the kans are vehicles and so must walk onto the board, which spoils the entire green tide behind kan wall build. Am I missing something? Are kans considered troops? Even so, they cannot fully deploy because you are limited to 2 troops choices and an HQ for deployment.

Another big issue is, did you remember to use your search lights? They come in standard on IG tanks now. The trick is to get closer with the vendettas, use the searchlights one gunship at a time, and light them up. Then everything else in the army can shoot the same unit.

I second some ideas already pointed out by others about concentrating on the dred/kans first. No matter what damage you do to them other than shaken/stunned, it will be very good for you. Immobilization wrecks them due to squad rules. Plain wreck or immobilization wreck means the horde must go around and gets slowed down. Explosion will hit the boyz behind and take many with it due to poor armor. So, why worry about shooting the boyz through cover, if the exploding dred/kan is like a free mortar shell into the boyz with no cover?

I'd ignore the trukk initially. If he speeds up and leaves the boyz behind, you can pop him on the second turn by concentration. Once popped, the nobz will come out, so then you hit them with the demolishers and plasma. That provides easier closer targets for the demolishers. One turn of firing will wipe them out. If needed, you can pour in some special weapon shots from the vets in chimeras as well. On the third turn, resume pounding on the rest of the horde. So, use the speed of the trukk to your advantage in target priority order.

If you allow yourself changes to the army, I second the griffon idea - very cheap, very accurate, and deadly against orks. Manticores will work as well, as already pointed out, and have more versatility within your meta. Also, both are barrage weapons, so their blast originates from the point of impact, which means kans do not provide cover to the boyz. With manticores in particular, I would target the dred/kans because the multiple barrage can scatter onto the boyz behind anyway, but the S10 hit will pen the kan, while a partial hit can still glance on a 5 or 6 depending on direction. So, the same rocket from the manticore can land multiple damage results on the same squad of kans.

I dont know if anyone mentioned this but there has been a FAQ adjusting the rules for the kan wall. The majority of the kanz must be within 6" of the KFF. Hope this helps.