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.

This is an early idea, and something I would like to flesh out more, but one thing that irks me about Orks is they're an army of either extreme MSU (small expendable units of Bikes, Mek Guns, Tankbustas, and solo Deffkoptas), or a single clunky Green Tide with said MSU support. The mob rule is either "all punishment, no point", or doesn't apply.

The initial idea is that rather than purchasing individual Ork units, you purchase a "mob" for a particular FoC slot. A mob is similar to a Guard Platoon with a twist:

An Ork mob uses the highest Leadership available to its mob. An Ork unit adds +1 to its Leadership for each non-vehicle unit from the same mob with at least 5 remaining wounds that is within 6" of it. Should a unit's leadership exceed 10 in this manner, the unit is treated as being Fearless.

The idea being that Orks gain leadership from lots of smaller congregating into a tide that is braver than the sum of its parts, but if you can isolate parts of the mob (be it by shooting a particular section, tank shock, etc), you can defeat the mob in detail. This also could theoretically let you move certain "specialist" Ork types (Stikkbommas, Byrnaboyz, etc) as unit options for a mob, rather than shoehorning them to Elites.

Optionally, certain "specialist" types (Kommandos, etc) can treat each other as part of the same Mob, despite not being taken as part of a Mob.

You could do similar things for Kults of Speed, or other "platoon-like" compositions of Orks.

Thoughts?

I'm not sure. At best I think LD would go up by 4 from doing this prior to hand to hand then at best +2 due to the nature of close combat. Not sure how it would help small units in exploding trukks. they'd all have to be pushed up fairly close to each other and if the bonus applies from transported units them I can't see more than +1 or maybe +2 to LD for those orks falling out of exploding trukks. So to me it's hardly better. I'd rather see items that pip the LD of Nobs. It's easier and you know what your getting into. That doesn't many your idea isn't good. it's not too dissimilar from how the TAU pip their shooting.

I think this rule would simulate what you describe well, but I'm not sure it's practical or helpful from a gamist perspective. I see a lot of extra time being spent pausing to measure exactly how many other ork units are nearby, pausing to double check their number of wounds, etc. I just don't feel it would be very wieldy.

For the sake of discussion, some alternatives to mob rule that I've liked include:

* Orks may choose to use the number of wounds in their unit in place of their actual leadership. Nobs gain +1 Ld, and boss poles add an extra Ld.

* Treat "mob rule" as a sort of leadership "feel no pain." So you'd test on their normal leadership to see if they pass or fail. If they fail, roll a d6. On a 6+, they pass the morale test anyway. Add +1 to this for every 10 models in the mob (rounding down). Add +1 to his if the unit is in combat. Add +1 if the unit contains a boss pole. And then give all "sergeants" +1 Leadership in general. This helps both big squads and small squads, but it gives footsloggers a bigger boost to help them cross the table without running and it helps smaller elite units by letting them get a +1 with a character and by not killing them when they fail a leadership test.

And as a passing thought, what about letting units of the same type "absorb" fleeing friendly models? So when a squad of tank bustas starts running away, maybe they retreat to the nearest squad of buustas that isn't locked in combat or embarked in a transport and then simply becomes part of the unit. The ork player would still be "losing units," but they'd also be keeping their models.

That last could be problematic in the case of absorbing units with odd Specialist USRs. Imagine an entire mob of Stealth Tank Hunter Boyz, with absorbed meganobz

 MagicJuggler wrote:
That last could be problematic in the case of absorbing units with odd Specialist USRs. Imagine an entire mob of Stealth Tank Hunter Boyz, with absorbed meganobz

I was picturing something more like bustas joining bustas, boyz joining boyz, etc.

Why not have the fleeing unit loose it's Special rules and gain what ever rules the unit it joins has.