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 Kap'n Krump wrote:

The garg squiggoth isn't surprising, though, that thing is seriously undercosted. It's basically as tough as a stompa for less than half the points, plus it's open-topped, so it's arguably more shooty than a stompa to boot.

Aren't people also pulling some sort of shenanigans with the gargantuan squiggoth? I thought I read about some exploit involving it's huge size and lack of base. I might be remembering that wrong though.

SemperMortis wrote:
While there are 18 factions, a fair amount of them are sub factions that weren't originally intended to be played independently of another host army. Inquisition, Knights, Tempestus, GSC, cult/skit and harlequins were originally meant to add flavor to other factions. Some didn't even have legal standalone lists for a long time.

So let's put that down right away. Secondly, generally speaking Orkz aren't finishing top in major tournaments. So far we have 1 example of an Ork list doing well in a major tournament. The last time I checked, the highest Ranked ITC Ork player was at something like 103rd place.

Next, we have 1 build that is competitive. I haven't had a chance to look over the Atlanta Ork list yet but it apparently featured another Squiggoth, so add that to the list of good units.

In SoCal, NOVA, and Atlanta there were 22 to 26 different types of army categories represented according to their way of categorising. "So let's put that down right away" is ridiculous, there is a much higher representation than 8 armies in the tournament scene right now. You are trying to say everything in the game is garbage except the top 7 armies.

Secondly, Orkz ARE performing, just not as well as you would hope I imagine? We don't have a codex, but there are regular major events where Orkz are getting top 10.

And finally, its quite clear that there is not just one build that is competitive. 200+ boyz lists are not performing right now, which is what everyone in this forum thinks is the current best list. The last two successful lists had a variety of different boyz/stormboyz/kommandos, smite spam, mek gun linez, and forgeworld vehicles.

 Kap'n Krump wrote:
I was a bit surprised by that warzone Atlanta list, honestly. Had only 60 boyz.

The garg squiggoth isn't surprising, though, that thing is seriously undercosted. It's basically as tough as a stompa for less than half the points, plus it's open-topped, so it's arguably more shooty than a stompa to boot.

Still dies in like 2 turns to a handful of lascannons though. Least it has in my experience.

I aught to try more wierdboyz, I suppose. Though you can't buy them pretty much anywhere.

Here's the deal - in 8th edition, if someone wants to kill something, they can do it. Unless it's a character protected by a ton of chaff, if your opponent really wants something dead, they can make it happen. If it lives through 2 turns of lascannon shooting, that's *really good*, and you should consider yourself lucky. More expensive things die in 1 turn to focused anti-tank, from any faction. Even Dark Eldar could shoot this off the table with their lances.

I don't think is a problem, in a game that last normally 3-4 turns, for a 300-600pointt heavy tank or equivalent to die in 2 turns of anti-tank heavy fire.

 Dakka Flakka Flame wrote:

 Kap'n Krump wrote:

The garg squiggoth isn't surprising, though, that thing is seriously undercosted. It's basically as tough as a stompa for less than half the points, plus it's open-topped, so it's arguably more shooty than a stompa to boot.

Aren't people also pulling some sort of shenanigans with the gargantuan squiggoth? I thought I read about some exploit involving it's huge size and lack of base. I might be remembering that wrong though.

It is super big, so it is quite easy to charge into a lot of units, each of which gets D6 mortal wounds. Another fun thing is to charge a drop-pod or fortification. They cannot fall back, and meanwhile the occupants in the howder can shoot without being shot at.

hollow one wrote:

SemperMortis wrote:
While there are 18 factions, a fair amount of them are sub factions that weren't originally intended to be played independently of another host army. Inquisition, Knights, Tempestus, GSC, cult/skit and harlequins were originally meant to add flavor to other factions. Some didn't even have legal standalone lists for a long time.

So let's put that down right away. Secondly, generally speaking Orkz aren't finishing top in major tournaments. So far we have 1 example of an Ork list doing well in a major tournament. The last time I checked, the highest Ranked ITC Ork player was at something like 103rd place.

Next, we have 1 build that is competitive. I haven't had a chance to look over the Atlanta Ork list yet but it apparently featured another Squiggoth, so add that to the list of good units.

In SoCal, NOVA, and Atlanta there were 22 to 26 different types of army categories represented according to their way of categorising. "So let's put that down right away" is ridiculous, there is a much higher representation than 8 armies in the tournament scene right now. You are trying to say everything in the game is garbage except the top 7 armies.

Secondly, Orkz ARE performing, just not as well as you would hope I imagine? We don't have a codex, but there are regular major events where Orkz are getting top 10.

And finally, its quite clear that there is not just one build that is competitive. 200+ boyz lists are not performing right now, which is what everyone in this forum thinks is the current best list. The last two successful lists had a variety of different boyz/stormboyz/kommandos, smite spam, mek gun linez, and forgeworld vehicles.

Atlanta was boyz, weirdboyz and Kommandos making up the bulk of the list. Then you had the extra stuff like the Squiggoth and the Mek guns. Literally what I said was either competitive or almost there. There is still only one main type of list it's just modified slightly. 60boyz and 20 Kommandos. The reason that the 200+ boyz list isn't working anymore is because the META adapted to dealing with hordes and conscript spam. Again, where did the Orks do well in other tournaments, I'll gladly look over the lists when I get a chance but last time I checked the highest ranked Ork player wasn't even in the top 100

Hmmmmmmmm, the Atlanta list had 340 points of boyz, 200 points of kommandos, three weirdboyz (180). 1/3 of his list is not the "bulk". Certainly its an important part, as every army leans on efficient units, but damn man big trakks, a warbanner, KMKs, and a giant squiggoth is a unique take on the HQ supplement of the traditional core (which would normally consist of Ghaz and weirdboy spam, as you well know). I'm getting tired shooting down the same arguments, scroll through the tactics thread when I dismantled your "only one list" point with multiple well performing Ork army links and tournament evidence. It obviously bothers me that this is just a complaint thread, but please at least pretend you are trying to be accurate? Playing a middle of the road codex army that has a variety of units performing is allowed. that is OKAY. It doesn't have to be coming first all the time for it to be good enough.

Not every army gets to win.

"Not every army gets to win."

Yep, that's orks, the eternal NPC race

hollow one wrote:
Hmmmmmmmm, the Atlanta list had 340 points of boyz, 200 points of kommandos, three weirdboyz (180). 1/3 of his list is not the "bulk". Certainly its an important part, as every army leans on efficient units, but damn man big trakks, a warbanner, KMKs, and a giant squiggoth is a unique take on the HQ supplement of the traditional core (which would normally consist of Ghaz and weirdboy spam, as you well know). I'm getting tired shooting down the same arguments, scroll through the tactics thread when I dismantled your "only one list" point with multiple well performing Ork army links and tournament evidence. It obviously bothers me that this is just a complaint thread, but please at least pretend you are trying to be accurate? Playing a middle of the road codex army that has a variety of units performing is allowed. that is OKAY. It doesn't have to be coming first all the time for it to be good enough.

Not every army gets to win.

348pts of boyz, 216pts of Kommandos, 4 Weirdboyz (not 3) 248pts. That adds up to over 800pts in a 2,000pt list. So the "Bulk" would be accurate for a statement. Add to that my earlier admission that since its success this edition, the gargantuan squiggoth (FW) is a competitive choice, that puts it closer to 1250pts. The rest of the list is 3 Characters, about 200pts of KMKs, and 2 Supa Skorchas.

So what you have is 800pts of Boyz, Kommandos and weirdboyz. 750pts of Forgeworld some Mek Gunz and characters. I think my statement stands accurate. Also, I can't confirm this yet because I haven't seen it personally, but apparently at least two of his match ups were against Fluffy Chaos Armies. But even if it wasn't, this list is kustomized to deal with Elite Primarch Armies.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And to add to it even further. 8% think Orkz are top 3 armies, 30% Think its top 5 armies. 28% think its between 5-7 (My fault I should have made that 6-8th) and a whopping 42% think its a garbage army with 1 Competitive build with slight variations.

I'd like to meet that 8% and shake their hands

tneva82 wrote:

leopard wrote:
Give them clan traits that make sense and they become allies with themselves which makes a lot of sense, also means say allowing Blood Axes to work with others (but making it a lot harder for the other clans) works nicely

Green Tide should work, but it needs to be just one of many options, when you see you are playing orks and you know the bulk of the list before you see it there is a problem.

They should be ohh so much more

And space marines can ally with themselves thanks to chapter traits. But can still soup it up with others that give them access to stuff they don't have naturally.

As long as alliances exists soup will trump monobuilds unless mono faction becomes varied enough they have naturally every option soup has! See orks having equally wide toolbox naturally as imperium soup?

I agree that Orks and other mono-factions don't have as wide of a toolbox as Imperium and Chaos as things are now. If they gave Orks back units they've cut over the years, and made rules for Ork units that existed in other games but not standard 40k, and maybe threw some things that appear in the fluff but have never had models AFAIK then the Orks could have as big of a toolbox as Imperial and Chaos players. It's a good thing I'm not in charge of the Ork codex, as there would be so many different units and stratagems that the codex would be bigger than the BRB.

I think that GW could make soup-ish armies for most factions, and they've taken some steps that seem to be moving in that direction. I might not be understanding the rules right, but Eldar soup is a possibility now, right? I imagine as the non-Craftworld Eldar get their books we might see more Eldar soup. Tyranids are moving in that direction with GSC and the ability to bring in IG. I could see them down the road making Genestealer upgrade kits for other factions so that 'Nids can pull in even more. Tau have a mulit-species empire. If they fleshed out the Kroot and Vespid a little more, brought back the Gue'vesa and maybe threw in some Demiurg then Tau would have their own soup. I'm not sure about Necrons, as I don't know that much about them.

I recognize that sculpting new models and creating enw molds takes time and money, so I'm not saying all this could be easily done right away. I just think that is probably the way GW is headed and it could help fix the problem of some factions having way more options than others through allies.

I am very excited for the Ork codex, but I must admit I'm also terrified. I'm optimistic that they'll give us good rules for what we have. What I'm scared of is them being strict with us about getting rid of units that have no model and reducing options for units to what is in the box as currently sold. A huge amount of our units rely on kitbashing and conversions.It could be pretty devastating for us, more in terms of fun and variety than gameplay probably.

On the flip side, if GW recognized the Orks as being the modeler's army that it is then many of the units I mentioned being cut or never having rules could easily be made by us through kitbashing and very minor conversion work. I don't expect GW to actually do this, but it's a nice dream.

I also highly anticipated and fear the coming of the codex. We're going to lose access for a lot of HQs unless new kits get released, which seems unlikely considering the poor support for the faction in my few years of playing. I think it's unlikely they'll make any concessions to Orks because of their historical place as a kitbashers playground.

Every game I’ve seen with Orks ends the same... they get shot down to the last boy. They will get some good charges then then get shot up some more.

Locally, none of the players who have Orks even bring them to the table any more, they're all waiting hopefully for the codex to give them some buffs so they can stand up to guard, eldar, and various flavors of marines (especially ultras, ravens, sallies, and chaos).

I'd rate them very highly based solely on cheap ability to take tons of bodies with a crap ton of attacks. Cheap bodies is a very good way (if boring) to beat people.

As far as how good they are, I'm repeating what pretty much everyone else has said- there's one good list but it's not fun to play, and in every other way they are terrible.

What I will say is that they're definitely less fun to play this edition. At least in 7th I could go with different options. Battlewagon rushes, trukk spam, manz missiles, etc. But in this edition battlewagons are a massive waste of points, trukkboyz are awful, meganobz are too expensive for manz missles (not to mention how meganobz barely kill anything nowadays) and ork shooting in general is abysmal. We desperately need our codex to give us our options back. I'm tired of having to bring 90 boyz to casual games just to have some chance of not getting stomped.

 Elbows wrote:
I'd rate them very highly based solely on cheap ability to take tons of bodies with a crap ton of attacks. Cheap bodies is a very good way (if boring) to beat people.

. Wouldn't that make nids, Chaos, IG and a few others even better then? I mean you can take 2 conscripts for the price of one boy. And he gets a tamed weapon and a plethora of rules to really buff it. Or what about nids who can take units of 30 for cheaper then boyz and whose movement is almost double? Throw in a venomthrope and now they are harder to hit as well.

It seems like Hormagaunts and Genestealers, while good, get butchered by Slugga Boyz in close combat. That's been my experience playing against Hormagaunts, and that's what I've seen happen in battle reports where Boyz go up against Genestealers. The Tyranids have a significant speed advantage over the Boyz, but that speed just serves to get them into melee faster where the Boyz squish them. (I'm guessing that a good player would be better able to use the speed to try to ensure the bugs get to charge and therefore strike first, and maybe ignore the boyz in favor of going for objectives.)

I've seen Tyranids beat Ork players who are running a Green Tide, but it's usually due to Tyranid shooting. Devourers are pretty good against Orks.

SemperMortis wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
I'd rate them very highly based solely on cheap ability to take tons of bodies with a crap ton of attacks. Cheap bodies is a very good way (if boring) to beat people.

. Wouldn't that make nids, Chaos, IG and a few others even better then? I mean you can take 2 conscripts for the price of one boy. And he gets a tamed weapon and a plethora of rules to really buff it. Or what about nids who can take units of 30 for cheaper then boyz and whose movement is almost double? Throw in a venomthrope and now they are harder to hit as well.

Hormagaunts are 1 point less than a Boy, have less attacks, less strength, less toughness.

Gaunts: 2 attacks. Hitting on 4s wounding on 5s.
Boyz: 3 attacks. Hitting on 3s, wounding on 3s.
Shooting: Boyz have pistols
Guants: Have no shooting.

Point difference: 1.

When you make claims like i quoted you're proving that you're here to whine. Boyz are a fantastic unit, and far better than hormagaunts.

Didn’t you post a similar thread not to long ago?

Genestealers murder boyz if they get the chare or counter-attack and vice versa.

20 genestealers will kill an average of 27 boyz on the charge, if they are not buffed in any way.

Genestealer are, or should be, like Khorne Berzerkers, the ultimate "cheap" meele unit.

Genestealers cost twice as much as Boyz. If they weren't better than Boyz wouldn't that be a serious problem? As it stands there's not a huge difference between the two, functionally, when they fight each other.

 Marmatag wrote:

SemperMortis wrote:

 Elbows wrote:
I'd rate them very highly based solely on cheap ability to take tons of bodies with a crap ton of attacks. Cheap bodies is a very good way (if boring) to beat people.

. Wouldn't that make nids, Chaos, IG and a few others even better then? I mean you can take 2 conscripts for the price of one boy. And he gets a tamed weapon and a plethora of rules to really buff it. Or what about nids who can take units of 30 for cheaper then boyz and whose movement is almost double? Throw in a venomthrope and now they are harder to hit as well.

Hormagaunts are 1 point less than a Boy, have less attacks, less strength, less toughness.

Gaunts: 2 attacks. Hitting on 4s wounding on 5s.
Boyz: 3 attacks. Hitting on 3s, wounding on 3s.
Shooting: Boyz have pistols
Guants: Have no shooting.

Point difference: 1.

When you make claims like i quoted you're proving that you're here to whine. Boyz are a fantastic unit, and far better than hormagaunts.

Did you forget boyz have 2 attacks base as well? Or how about gaunts getting 3 more inches of movement (5if you pay an extra point. Or how about turning there attacks into 2 damage each with another buff

Boyz are hands down better than Hormagaunts or even Genestealers, and both of those are solid. Ork boyz is certainly one of the five best troop choices in the entire game, and a candidate for being the best troop choice of all.

The problem with the Ork index is that boyz only has synergy with characters and more boyz, which sucks. But boyz are still awesome. Let us not pretend that they are not.

SemperMortis wrote:
Did you forget boyz have 2 attacks base as well? Or how about gaunts getting 3 more inches of movement (5if you pay an extra point. Or how about turning there attacks into 2 damage each with another buff

They both have two attacks base. Choppas give +1 attack, while Scything Talons re-roll hit rolls of 1.
Adrenal Glands don't give extra movement, they give +1" to charge rolls. For 1 point a model it seems worth it for deep striking Hormagaunts but maybe not for footslogging Hormagaunts. (Maybe you were referring to some other upgrade that I'm not aware of?)

Toxin Sacs make them do 2 damage, but only on to-wound rolls of 6. It costs 2 points per model. This is a little bit better than it sounds as Hormagaunts can re-roll to-wound rolls when they have 20+ models in a unit. I haven't thought about it too much, but at first blush it doesn't seem worth it to me for the cost. Maybe it stacks well with certain stratagems. I'm still reading through my Tyranids codex and I haven't really figured things out yet.

If both upgrades are purchased that makes Hormagaunts 8 points per model. I think 30 model squad of Hormagaunts would still lose to a 30 model squad of Slugga Boyz, not counting Stratagems and Warlord traits and other things that make comparing Codex armies to Index armies difficult.

(There are several other differences between Hormagaunts and Boyz that haven't been talked about yet, but I don't know how deep we really want to get into it.)

I think that Hormagaunts are good at getting to enemy gunlines fast and with their 6" pile-ins they are great at tying enemy shooting units up, and I think they can probably do okay against more elite CC armies due to numbers, but when they run into a horde unit like Boyz that is better model-to-model at CC then most of their speed and pile-in advantages are wasted. This doesn't mean that Hormagaunts are bad, just that it is a bad matchup for them. I also think that while Hormagaunts are good, Boyz are GREAT. I don't think Boyz are necessarily broken, but I also wouldn't be surprised if they got a 1 point increase in the codex or some other minor adjustment.


This part is somewhat off-topic, but one thing I slightly dislike about Index version of Orks is that their bonuses tend to be +1 Attack. Ork Boyz have an extra attack built into their profile compared to most armies. Then the Boyz special rule is +1 Attack when you have 20+ models. The one of our three psychic powers is +1 Attack. Then the big bad Ork special Character Ghazghkull gives Orks in his bubble +1 Attack. None of this is bad, I'm just hoping for a little more variety with the codex.

One step I think they could take is separating Boyz back into several different units like they used to be. I think that consolidating many different types of Boyz into one unit made sense at the time, but in 8th it might make more sense to split them up again. Slugga Boyz get the +1 Attack with 20+ models like current Boyz do. Shoota Boyz get a bonus to shooting at 20+ models instead of the +1 attack. Trukk Boyz have a bonus that is not dependent upon unit size. (Trukk Boyz were a Fast Attack choice way back when Troops units generally didn't have access to dedicated transports and had to ride in transports that were purchased as Fast Attack choices. Trukk Boyz had the bonus of only being wounded on a 6+, not a 4+ if their Trukk was destroyed.)

Of course bringing back 'Ard Boyz is something I really want to see, even if they go back to being an Elite choice. They could even bring back Stikk Bommas, although that would be pretty far down my list.

No please, boyz are not fantastic. To make them good or decent at least you need 120+ of them, and in competitive games even 180+. Genestealers are a solid option even in lower numbers, like 40-60.

Boyz are not awesome, they're the only unit that works in the ork codex. And of course the two other versions of boyz, kommandos and stormboyz which are basically the same unit. A list with only t-shirt save guyz may be competitive not because of the boyz profile and their synergies but because of the rock-paper-scissor concept: many lists can't deal with that many cheap wounds, this is the reason why boyz can be effective. Drukhari don't have decent anti infantry, they just have lots of effective anti tank, which means that a green tide will always be an hard counter for them. Not because boyz are good, but because they don't have a real answer to deal with massive infantry models.

If they really were one of the best troop choices in the entire game they should have been solid even in lower numbers. Like hormagaunts and genestealers. Or even TAC marines, which are quite hated but still better than ork boyz IMHO.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Dakka Flakka Flame wrote:


Of course bringing back 'Ard Boyz is something I really want to see, even if they go back to being an Elite choice. They could even bring back Stikk Bommas, although that would be pretty far down my list.

I'd like to see burnaboyz, meganobz, bikes, flash gitz, etc back in the game... not other boyz.

Ehm. No. One unit can be great and not be viable in lower numbers, specially if it is a horde unit.

Conscripts aren't a problem if you only bring 10 or 20. Is when you have 60-80 or more that they matter.

And those numbers of Boyz are insane. In a future Codex- situation where Ork units are cheaper and more balanced and usefull, 50-60 Boyz could be a strong core for an army, even 40, because theres other units that can do work and damage that the enemy needs to focus, so that way Boyz aren't the first priority target, and if they focus your boyz and not the rest of the army, good for you.

Right now you need 90-120 Boyz because thats the only thing in the Codex that does damage (And kommandos and Stormboyz). Just like Taus need 9-12 Tau's Commanders and a gak-ton of Drones.

Conscripts are screeners, ork boyz have a different role. IMHO conscripts are far from being a problem. The majority of the damage in any AM list is caused by other units. Conscripts are good because they can screen something valuable, but boyz are the most valuable thing in an ork army.

As you said they're the only thing in the index that does damage. They're nothing exceptional, really. They only shine compared to other ork units because everything else needs some help and they may shine against some opponent because he doesn't have an answer to deal with many infantries, that's all.

 Blackie wrote:

 Dakka Flakka Flame wrote:


Of course bringing back 'Ard Boyz is something I really want to see, even if they go back to being an Elite choice. They could even bring back Stikk Bommas, although that would be pretty far down my list.

I'd like to see burnaboyz, meganobz, bikes, flash gitz, etc back in the game... not other boyz.

I would also like to see those units become good again, but those are units that currently exist and suck rather than units that have been cut and no longer exist at all even though models arguably exist for them.

I'm pretty optimistic that GW will fix Meganobz, Warbikes, etc. when the Codex comes out. (Maybe not Flash Gitz as they seem to have a hard time getting Flash Gitz right. I think making them Nobz might have been a mistake but I do dearly love the models.)

I don't think it has to be an either/or though, they could split up Boyz again and still make Meganobz and Burna Boyz good.