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With the release of the new codex bikers have seen quite a drop in price along with an increased squad cap.

Just wondering what people think would be the optimum size and number for bike squads in a biker heavy force, also taking into account the new mob rule?

Also does anyone feel like with the price drop for the Warikers and the lack of one for Nob bikers along with the Cybork and cover loss makes the Nobz less viable than larger mobs of Warbikers.

whatever you do take an odd number of bikes. and thanks to the not beeing fearless thingy... take as many as you can.

Max sized units would be best, but I dread to think how clunky that would be in the table.

Do they still have auto cannons mounted on each bike?

dakkaguns... but yes same weapon as before, thought lost their cover save...

Bikes became better, bike squads became bigger, bikes are £8 a pop. I see the codex direction now...

Thankfully i already have 66

I will need to hunt down 9 old-school bikers to fill out my regular biker units eventually though, as i hate 'borrowing' from my Nob Biker units.

Haven't tried the new bikers yet. Not happy about the rules change and loss of Wazdakka though :(

since bikes cannot be taken as troops anymore, you can use only 45 bikes max.

Per FOC You'd need a pretty big game to fit 66 + bikes in anyway.

Or run Unbound of course ..

I planned on running them with Zhadsnark from FW.

He is pretty damn awesome and makes bikers troops.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
So, 3 options in my head right now. The warboss would be in the 15 strong squad and there may be painboys spread out elsewhere.

a)1x 15 bikers and 3x 10 bikers.
b)3x 15 bikers.
c)1x 15 bikers and 4x 8 bikers.

They would be backed up by some mek gunz.

The way I see it, you either want as many as you think you can practically use in the typical terrain you play with plus a painboy, or a small unit with a big mek and KFF.

Minimum-sized units with no upgrades are a decent harassment unit, but kind of outclassed in that role by buggies and deffkoptas. The warbikers' main advantage is that they can take characters.

If you take a combat character, like a warboss, you pretty much need a painboy as well to give him a hope in challenges. You could also just take the painboy and let the unit's boss nob do the fighting. Either way, more bikers means more use from the painboy.

If you take your only other biker character option, which is a big mek, you probably want to have him sitting in the middle of a bunch of vehicles, protecting them with a KFF. In this scenario, the bikers are mostly a bodyguard to the mek and too many would get in the way of the vehicles trying to get within 6" of the mek. Four bikers plus the mek is probably ideal for morale purposes.

i've played a couple of games with a bikelist. its not really that competitive but at the same time not completely useless... and a lot of fun to play^^

what you need are some outflanking buggys with scorchas and a blitza bomma

also two extra HQ's with various upgrades are a must have.

 Perfect Organism wrote:

If you take a combat character, like a warboss, you pretty much need a painboy as well to give him a hope in challenges. You could also just take the painboy and let the unit's boss nob do the fighting. Either way, more bikers means more use from the painboy.

i think that you will be pretty save around challenges as long as you take an warboss with the headchoppa, since zhadsnark will attack with his ini as well as the headchoppa warboss...
with T6/W3 you just need to watch out for force weapon users.


btw... does zhadsnark really only have a normal 6+ save?
couldnt find anything that would say otherwise... really bumped me out last game :(

Bikerz are the new NobBikerz as long as you invest a KFF Mek on the new Gifts of Gork Bike along with a PainBoy on bike. Max Size! Run some bikes in front of KFF and run whatever you want along it (I'm thinking a BW with MegaNobz and Grotsnik). Depending on Point size a Stompa on the other side to grant it 5++ and to grant the Bikes Fearless.

Lukky Stikk is also nice, because it gives WS5 to the whole mob.

The new Challenge rules, and the ability to throw lots of characters into one unit, really help Orks. Have a Warboss whom you just know is going to die from challenging that Chapter Master? Make him wail on your Nob instead, and the Warboss with 5 attacks, WS6, and Unlimited rerolls can wail on the squad. Or if the squad is dead, you're hitting the Chapter Master anyways but he's not hitting your boss back.

So what do you all think in a biker heavy army.

A few big squads? lots of smaller squads? or a mix?

I tried a single mob of 15 (plus warboss w/Gazbag's relic bike) yesterday and it was absolutely devastating. As a shooting platform, they have no match.