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Just had a game with my mate who is new to 40k, and crushed him pretty bad with what I thought was a seriously subpar Ork list. Trukk boyz, a few fire support units (lootas, kannons), bikers and nob bikers with warbosses and painboys, and a void shield which was my only real trick. This went up against some tacticals in rhinos, sternguard in a rhino, vindicator and predator, two biker units with one biker captain, two melta speeders, and a storm raven.

But man, despite my boyz best efforts to humiliatingly lose every single close combat they got into, I still smashed everything to pieces and he got really down about it. When he asked what he could have used that would be better, I know jack all about marines so couldn't really tell him much except that grav guns look retardedly good. Can anyone give advice on how to make a space marine army perform solidly so we can have some more enjoyable casual games?

You just listed or best units, other than mek guns, and said you took them against someone new to 40k...

Maybe shorten your list. Give yourself less points than him by 1/4. That might fix the "problem" you're having.

Other things to help? Take nobs as a unit to waste points. Take burnas to waste points. Take bubble chukkas...30 man units of grotts...deff dreads...kommandos...killa kans. Then have fun getting your butt kicked. If you need a bad flyer, burna bommas are worst.

Grav is eh against Orks, when they sport 6+ saves.

Depends on his chapter tactics to optimise his list. But I've been rekt by Plasma Cannons and TFCs.

FratHammer wrote:
You just listed or best units, other than mek guns, and said you took them against someone new to 40k...

I'm not buying this at all man - I took trukk boyz because they're terrible and I like the idea, if you think they're good your either insane or a genius. 500pts of subpar trukkers, one unit of guns, one unit of bikes, and two units of min lootas is more than enough masochism for my taste.

Grav is eh against Orks, when they sport 6+ saves.

Depends on his chapter tactics to optimise his list. But I've been rekt by Plasma Cannons and TFCs.

I reckon marines got more than enough ways to kill boyz, and I usually don't run many boyz because I'm tired of being utterly disappointed with them. However for killing Bikers and vehicles they might not be the best - heavy flamers and autocannons maybe?

Autocannons are pretty good.
Never seen Heavy Flamers used against me so I can't comment.

Take a squadron of 3 whirlwinds, 3 large blasts, shred, pinning, ignore cover for only 195pts, even better if the marine player take the suppression formation, that gives reroll to hit . Just remenber to use backfield lascannon to pop the trukks first.
Take more flamers on the tacticals, which will cause D6 hit of the boyz inside the trukks. And generally it is the standard weapons when fighting orks.
If the marine player bring the Vindicator. Put that pieplate on the nob bikers. Any of their failed jink save could be one less powerklaw (that is four less S10 attack on the charge? I think). Don't waste that on the boyz if those boyz are in terrain.

Gross, that whirlwind formation sounds like just the sort of thing I'm looking for. Any way to give that gak ignores cover? Also am I right in thinking the speeders can shoot all their gak *and* mark a target for maximum bad rules writing?

Got him to change to flamers at the start of the game after he mistakenly took two heavy weapons on each unit. They didn't do anything but I agree they are the go to weapon for boyz clearing

Usually not every Nob Biker has a klaw, but the vindicator can instagib the meatshields so that other stuff can kill the klaws. Again though, they'd benefit a lot from ignores cover shenanigans - solid jink plus good chance of night fight means that my army is usually protected by very good cover saves.

One of it's Weapon types comes with Ignore Cover standard, regardless of the formation.

The Vindicator squadron benefits trade the individual S10 Ap2 blasts for one apocalyptic blast S10 AP2 Ignores Cover

 Dakkamite wrote:
Just had a game with my mate who is new to 40k, and crushed him pretty bad with what I thought was a seriously subpar Ork list. Trukk boyz, a few fire support units (lootas, kannons), bikers and nob bikers with warbosses and painboys, and a void shield which was my only real trick. This went up against some tacticals in rhinos, sternguard in a rhino, vindicator and predator, two biker units with one biker captain, two melta speeders, and a storm raven.

But man, despite my boyz best efforts to humiliatingly lose every single close combat they got into, I still smashed everything to pieces and he got really down about it. When he asked what he could have used that would be better, I know jack all about marines so couldn't really tell him much except that grav guns look retardedly good. Can anyone give advice on how to make a space marine army perform solidly so we can have some more enjoyable casual games?

Yes, against your 6+ saves and mostly AV10-12 vehicles, Grav Guns will be extremely good... (that's sarcasm)

I'm echoing the above that you took basically the best units in the book. Doesn't matter if YOU think they're bad or not... The only subpar units you actually brought were nob bikers and kannons.

Compared to your opponent, whose subpar units include: tacticals, sternguard not in drop pods, vindicator, predator, storm raven.

Ways to improve:

5 Sternguard, 5 Combimelta, in a droppod. Delete your enemies biggest vehicle turn 1. If they don't have a vehicle, mow something down with specialist ammo.

Take scouts instead of tactical marines. Or better yet, bikes, since they're troops in this list. Just don't take tacticals.

I hope that captain was a Chapter Master on a bike with a Thunder Hammer and the Shield Eternal.

Focus on vehicle squadrons. Instead of taking 1 pred, 1 vindicator, and 1 stormraven, take 3 preds or 3 vindicators. 3 vindicators give you a huge blast, S10 AP2 ignores cover.

Take Thunderfire cannons.

Take some or all of the suggestions and your friend will be on his way to having as optimized list as you have.

Orks on bikes are probably the best unit in the game... every time I have faced them they are incredibly good.. I have no idea if this is nobz bikers but they can get a jink save to 2+ on the first turn, have a 4+ invul save, are str 10 in close combat, always get in combat by turn 2, are toughness 5 and have 2+ cover/ 5+ fnp on tirn one...that is the best save in game

I assumed he meant his nob bikers were part of his Warbikers units, but if he didn't, nob bikers are overpriced by a ton. And kannons are cheap and good. S8ap3 bs3 18pts 36"range. And can instead shoot small blast that kill scouts. They aren't terrible.

Yes boys in trukks are amazing. 24" move turn one. You're charging turn 2 regardless of where on the board they are. Yes they are fragile, so make sure you confuse target priority. (which you did with bike units and lootas)

Lootas, if you have the force org to do it, want to be in desperate units... That way if one rolls a 1 shot each, the other night roll a 2 shot each.

Now sure, you didn't take Tankbustas, or MANz, but it was a good list at your point cost.

I agree with the above, sternguard go in drop pods. Heavy bolters should be in every unit along with flamers. Heavy flamers vs our bikes are amazing. Every sgt should have a combiflamer. SM bikes are amazing throw a couple flamers on them too. Or if the command squad can still all take special weapons that's a whole squad of bikes with flamers to run down your biker mob.

And whenever he's forced to fight you, make sure he knows to always charge you. He needs that +1attack and to deprive you of not only the attack, but also of your 1turn of s4 attacks. S3 will severely cut down your numbers of wounds.

Against a new player a void shield isn't very nice.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And regarding the bikes... Only warbosses are s10, the unit you're referring to has 3 ICs in it to function that way, one of which is a force world IC (or it's night fighting) and rerolling 3+ bikers that move 48" and all have heavy weapons are better most of the time.

ConanMan wrote:
Orks on bikes are probably the best unit in the game... every time I have faced them they are incredibly good.. I have no idea if this is nobz bikers but they can get a jink save to 2+ on the first turn, have a 4+ invul save, are str 10 in close combat, always get in combat by turn 2, are toughness 5 and have 2+ cover/ 5+ fnp on tirn one...that is the best save in game

2+ jink? only with night fighting and after turbo boosting (same as white scars or any skilled rider).

4+ invuln? Where is this invuln coming from? A big mek with a Mega Kustom Forcefield (relic) is the only thing that has that. That invuln save is only vs shooting attacks.

Str 10? Nobz are 4 str base so on the charge with PKs they are Str 9.

5+ FNP requires a Painboy (which is another HQ if you have a Big Mek)

This whole setup is an incredibly expensive Nob Star but in CC its just low initative Nobz with T5 and a 4+ armor save and 5+ FNP to keep them alive. Ignore cover shooting will rip them apart and high Intitative CC units can butcher the Nobz before they even swing. Also Nobz on bikers are a bit under 50 points each and that's with just the standard choppa/slugga. Add in Klaws and it jumps up to the 70's per model. Warbikers are very good units (as are many biker units) but they aren't insanely over the top powerful.


-Why take a Void Shield in a beginner game? A. Who even has a real void shield model, B. They aren't exactly a common thing to encounter so it doesn't help the beginner better understand the game when it makes shooting at infantry and it count as being AV12 (oh sorry little timmy, those bolters can't hurt the boyz over there because you can't glance AV 12 ) C. Let the new player blow your stuff up, they have fun and it gets them excited for the game. After they know what they are doing then you can turn up the heat on the power gaming.

-Why suggest the SM player to bring crazy amounts of flamers to list tailor against orks? Anybody can list tailor to smash Orks but those lists are going to suck vs 90% of the other armies out there. Instead its seems better to understand how to use the tools at hand to handle the threat on the table. Grav might stink vs boyz but its good vs the big stuff like Ork walkers, Battlewagons, MANz, etc which they might encounter in other Ork lists. Gonna feel like a fool spamming flamers vs a Dread Mob Ork army. Don't list tailor except if both parties are giving the courtesy of informing about bring D weapons, LoWs, and Flyers (which is something I think everyone should inform others about).

-Trukk boyz is Ork 101 and its decent at best and a rolling death trap at worse. Absolutely nothing wrong with bringing trukk boyz to a beginner game.

I agree with Vankraken. I think the Ork vs Marine matchup shows really how weak most marine units are except for the special chosen few.

Good advice guys, keep it coming. combi-flamers etc is just real basic gak that I can't suggest as I don't understand the marine dex

And less snide comments about powergaming or optimization. This dude is pretty new to the game, but he crushed my ass in our last two games and has faced psychic deathstars and all that gak which I would never consider sharing a table with. He reckoned he had a "solid" list so I brought what I thought was sub-par to make up for a limited experience gap - I don't even know the flyer rules or psyker rules and considered Tactical Spam the best way to run marines, that should tell you how much of a powergamer I am.

-Why take a Void Shield in a beginner game?:
Cuz I want to try one out? Always wanted to try trukks with voids as despite their feebleness Trukk boyz is my favourite concept for Orks

Why suggest the SM player to bring crazy amounts of flamers to list tailor against orks? Instead its seems better to understand how to use the tools at hand to handle the threat on the table.:
Doing that goes above my skill level. Dude had too many heavy weapons, so I suggested flamers. Don't overthink it.

oh sorry little timmy, those bolters can't hurt the boyz over there because you can't glance AV 12:
See above. I save my newbie training with 'little timmy' for better games mate.

And kannons are cheap and good. S8ap3 bs3 18pts 36"range. And can instead shoot small blast that kill scouts. They aren't terrible.:
Hence why I took just one unit. When I'm trying to 'powergame' I max out HS with Lootas and Mek Gunz

Yes boys in trukks are amazing. 24" move turn one. You're charging turn 2 regardless of where on the board they are. Yes they are fragile, so make sure you confuse target priority. (which you did with bike units and lootas) :
No they're not. I've ran them for about two years and they are not good. The trukks are fine (used to be great, F U GW) but the package they deliver is awful, and who cares if you can get into melee if your unit is no good at it. Had two full strength units charge a unit of sternguard, do one casualty and be routed then flamed in this game - exactly as I expected them to and hence why I brought them. They are only good at hitting things that don't fight back / fire overwatch or which strike at INT2 or worse. At best they're mediocre in power and hugely dependent on first turn. I don't even understand what target priority is

I agree with Vankraken. I think the Ork vs Marine matchup shows really how weak most marine units are except for the special chosen few.

Have always done pretty decent vs marines with my boyz tbh.

 Dakkamite wrote:
This dude is pretty new to the game, but he crushed my ass in our last two games and has faced psychic deathstars and all that gak which I would never consider sharing a table with. He reckoned he had a "solid" list so I brought what I thought was sub-par to make up for a limited experience gap - I don't even know the flyer rules or psyker rules and considered Tactical Spam the best way to run marines, that should tell you how much of a powergamer I am.

I think it sends a mixed message that is hard to understand via text about the intent of the post. If he has stomped you before and you crushed him this game the it just comes down to luck and tactics and not so much about crushing some beginner. We have no idea what this person's skill level is so its hard to peg where he is on the "potato to pro" skill scale. I apologize if I made it sound like I was condemning you about power gaming but without a frame of reference it just make it seem like a new player got crushed and I feel like the Void Shield is a little bit difficult of a mechanic for a new player to manage when they are trying to learn the basics (like bolters kill boyz, meltas kill vehicles, etc).

Honestly with Space Marines it comes down to knowing how to deploy, position, and when to use things like chapter tactics. I have played my friend's drop pod Space Wolves army and some games he spreads his army out and they get obliterated while other times he pods in the right spots and can divide and conquer my army. Same lists we have entirely different outcomes (no extreme lucky/unlucky rolls) but purely because of target priority, positioning, and knowing when to charge in vs when to pull back and shoot/castle. Whenever your playing the out numbered army with only moderately good shooting vs a large numbers army like Orks, its about crippling the threats and limiting damage exposure. Ive seen a single killkannon large blast wipe out like 8/10 of a grey hunter squad which is about as much damage as what half my lootas / boyz/ and bikers could do in a turn. Proper positioning would of reduced that down to 4-5 hits in cover instead of 9 out in the open. A single mistake like that cost nearly an entire 200+ point squad instead of something like 45 points of models. Like I said before, list tailoring isn't going to help when you don't properly move and position your units. A good player can win with a well rounded list while a new/bad player will flounder with even the more overpowered gak.

Because we can't see what the other guy did it makes it hard to know how to advise any improvements. Best thing to do is play the exact same setup again and afterwards explain the things you where worried about losing, what moves you think he should of made instead (should of shot this instead of that), and what moves he made that worked out more in your favor. With my friend he learns the most when we talk about the game afterwards and I let him know what I though worked well vs what didn't. Talking game theory without a practical example in front of you can be difficult to grasp and the subtle details are over overlooked which can make a huge difference.

Honestly, Space Marines are always a favorable matchup for my Orks. I always do better in close combat and when they take powerful weapons they tend to not do enough damage to multiple targets, but are instead intended to do some no-save wounds to few units.

I think the best things that a space marine player can take against orks are:
Vindicators, TFCs, Flamers, and either of the Flyers.

Well the flyers depend on if the ork has traktor cannons. But vindi's, especially multiple vindis, will ruin any orks day if it gets a few shots off. It's short range is mitigated by the fact that the Orks want to close in. And flyers are great, especially the cheap stormtalon who can get assault cannons and typhoon missiles for like 140 points or so. A couple of these will come on and just put the hurting on almost any ork unit with a good amount of shots fired.

I find Marines one of the easiest armies to deal with. I find they lack boots on the ground, especially because players often optimise their lists for dealing with other elite MEQ armies rather than hordes and they are sometimes not used to how hordes work (e.g. using cover).

The best chance they have IMO is to take out your transports, forcing you to footslog, and focus fire on one threat at a time. A bit like the 300, but with boltguns.

FWIW your list doesn't seem that subpar to me. Kannons are great for their points. The only sub-optimal unit I can see is the nob biker squad, but to be fair they are quite expensive.

Mathhammer: Firewatch from 10sternguard, hitting on 6s 2 shots each... So 4hits, wounding on 4s, but lets say poison rounds, wounding on 2s, so all 4 wound and die. Charge finishes...16 boys have 4attacks each, 2nobs have 4attacks each. Marines attack with 20 attacks, =10hits, 5wounds, no saves. So 11boys 2nobs. Boys attack with 44 s4 attacks. 22hits, 11wounds, 3-4failed saves. 2nobs have 8attacks, 4hits, 4dead models. You lost 4, he lost 7-8, he has to make heroic leadership. You can't sweep, so he either breaks or you're stuck in...

Poor rolls from your boys? Not taking nobs with bp and pk?

Trukk boys aren't the best, but they are very good when math is on your side and used tactically.

Also, the point of them isn't to kill the unit, just to stop it from shooting while your better units get in position. Also don't forget the trukk has obsec too so you can use it to grab objectives after the drop. (assuming it's still alive)

Four wounds is a morale test - Orks fail morale on 7 and flee.

Luckily I had a mek so the remaining Nob actually gets to swing instead of die to power weapon - but he wiffs and kills 1 instead of 2-3 marines.Orks lose combat (would have lost anyway). No sweep (this time) but bunched for flamers as they flee between trukks.

Trukk Boyz not great. In hindsight I could have taken a Mek with the second detachment. Need to save those Nobz as they are 90% of the units damage output. Still, not great, maybe passable with a void and good night fight chances with thinking kap.

Obsec trukks are pretty slowed, I don't play using slowed rules.

 Dakkamite wrote:
Four wounds is a morale test - Orks fail morale on 7 and flee.

Luckily I had a mek so the remaining Nob actually gets to swing instead of die to power weapon - but he wiffs and kills 1 instead of 2-3 marines.Orks lose combat (would have lost anyway). No sweep (this time) but bunched for flamers as they flee between trukks.

Trukk Boyz not great. In hindsight I could have taken a Mek with the second detachment. Need to save those Nobz as they are 90% of the units damage output. Still, not great, maybe passable with a void and good night fight chances with thinking kap.

Obsec trukks are pretty slowed, I don't play using slowed rules.

they only flee 50%, then they get mob rule, which they still have a 50% chance of saving, with a re-roll. You should make it to combat.
I have to agree that while your list wasn't cookie cutter, it was still reasonably powerful. lootas are good, bikes are good, truck boyz are medicore, but they have other functions other than killing.

I think in general your opponent struggled because he was new, he needed the experience. The times when I started, took a list I thought was 'mint' and got myself smashed, because I didn't have enough AT, or enough threat saturation. He's going to need time to learn how to prioritise. give him another game, but take 1/4 less points, yeh you will probably lose, but the point isn't to lose and to blame it on having 1/4 less points, its to allow him to gain confidence. Afterwards you can discuss what if you had a full army you'd have done, he can work out where he would have struggled and both of you will improve

Orcs pass moral on a 7...

And what does "trukks are slow" mean? They move 12" then in the shooting move 12" because they're fast vehicles... I'm confused.

And yes, I misunderstood that you and your opponent are on the same level and are new and he's beaten you before. You started the post asking how not to trounce a new 40k player. Saying you'd taken really weak units. None of that sounded like your later post, explaining the situation better.

Have fun.

Overall, the best thing I can suggest is, if you felt your list was subpar, then it may be in his list that's the problem.

It'd help better if we had a full, detailed list of what you both brought. Exact numbers, and knowing the point game agreed on, etc.

Edit:

In my experience, as others have said, Marines also feel like they have trouble with hoard armies. They just don't have the dakka output half the time, nor the amount of attacks to take out enough bodies.

Was glancing at the forums and first read this thread as,

'Breeding Orks with Marines?'

I think I need to clean out my mind with soap.

In regard to the usage of "Trukks are slowed"

I just saw someone else in another thread use word Slowed. I think it is some kind of slang that means bad, or not good.

I refuse to update my vocabulary since the late 90s. If it's new slang, I give up.

Slowed? Not attempting to offend anyone but only slang I could imagine would be;
Slowed = slowed = bad? something along those lines?

EDIT: Ah its an autocorrect by dakka. Its the derogatory term for a mentally disabled person (I can't type it because it simply becomes slowed)

Anywho trukk spam with a Objsec CAD could be good against a Decurion SM list. You have too many vehicles for him to deal with quickly, they are also objsec where he is not and as frathammer mentioned, 24" movement when needed. Should be able to play a good mission game with trukk spam.

Tell your buddy to build a list based around flamers and meltas. That would make his marine force more capable to handle your boyz at any angle.Also Flamers + Ork open topped vehicle =

ohhh, autocorrect has changed it. Well the literal definition of that word is slow.

In french it just means late. So if you were saying the train is late, youd say the train is (the word that gets changed to slowed)

Imperial Fists or salamanders vs orks... Bye green friends :(

Grav is seriously bad vs orks. Though 1 squad cant hurt against them meganobzes

Marines are a jack of all trades, not good in anything but certainly not bad at anything. Focus your firepower. Shot down more than 25% of an ork unit? Shoot at another unless its to close. Force leadership test against orks. Works like a charm believe me

Agree with above poster. I have never had issues with Orks when I run my Crimson Fists. Especially when I run Pedro to game PE Orks.