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I am new to orks and about to build something like 80 boyz.

My army has no transports... Yet. Go with shoota boyz only and skip slugga or mix em up?

Depends what your tactic is:
Shooter boyz increases your ability to drown your opponent in weight of fire, but you're an Ork: everything shooty in your army has a bucket full of shots due to the low BS.
Slugga boyz gives you an extra attack on the charge plus you still have the weight of pistol shots from a 20 man unit of boyz. But that would be making a cc army in a shooting meta.

It is up to you.
Personally I would go full on cc boyz with a power klaw nob since ork boyz are some of the few worthwhile troop choices, especially for a cc army: 4 attacks on the charge for a 6 point model? Stick them in trukks with boarding planks and your looking at a nasty turn 2 assault phase for your opponent.

I've always gone half and half, out of the 80 regular boyz I own 40 have slugga and 40 have Shoota.

Yea I'd go half and half too. Shootas obviously offer decent firepower but they're still alright in combat so you don't lose much, slugga/choppa plays to your strength and provides a bit more focus to a unit

Plus it's boring modelling them all the same way

Id go half and half too.

If youre footslogging, shootas give you more options tactically. Its easier to bunker down and play a tactic beyond bum rushing the enemy.

Slugga boyz will suffer more from stayin put on an objective because theyre wasting their potential while shoota boyz can still blast something.

In a trukk or battlewagon, I go slugga/choppa. When footslogging, though, I prefer Shootas. It's pretty simple why; You get more damage per-point from Slugga/Choppas, but only if you can hit first with them. It's that simple.
(Note: I use 'half wounds' below to denote when it's about a 50/50 shot of causing a wound, for the sake of math and averaging out results.)

Let's say you have 10 Ork boys versus Space Marines. When you charge, you can either have 20 shots that amount to around 6 hits, 3 wounds, and one dead Marine. Then you charge, lose around 2 Ork Boys, and hit back with 24 attacks. 12 hits, 6 wounds, two more dead marines. A total of three dead guys.
Now, let's try it again with Choppas. You get only 10 shots, amounting to half a dead marine in shooting, but in close combat you get three dead marines, amounting to three and a half dead marines. Is it a huge difference? No, not really, but keep in mind that the Slugga boys are also going to be ten points cheaper for the unit.


However, let's rewind, and assume that instead of being in a trukk, your Ork boys are sitting 18" away from a unit of Assault Marines. Suddenly, Slugga/Choppas don't get any shooting because they're too far away, take 3 wounds from pistols when the Marines shoot, don't do anything with Overwatch, and then lose 6 more Ork Boys in close combat before they can even hit. The last ork boy is only S3, not S4, so he can't really do anything.
Swap in shootas, though, and you DO get to shoot, causing the same wound you did before. Then you cause half a wound with overwatch, and since you killed a couple marines, cause another half a wound before dying. That's still not a GOOD result (Ork boys suck at being attacked one way or the other,) but rather than being wiped out entirely, you caused a little damage. (Also keep in mind that 10 Assault Marines costs over twice as much as the Orks in question.)


So, yeah. Shootas do better if you have no way of reliably getting the charge. If you can, though, go Slugga/Choppa.

I prefer shootas personally because most things that actually get into combat with them will kill them in droves either which way. At least with shootas I can shoot stuff with them before they go.

That and I am Dakkaboss.

I've noticed that boy'z offence doesn't tend to matter, so i go with choppas cause they're cheaper. But keep in mind that i'm running meganobz from bully boyz formation, so i don't rely entirely on boyz. They are often used as just bullet catchers for the boss and they usually run instead of shooting anywayz cause positioning is more valuable than a few enemy casualties.
If you want to run a greentide formation (10 squads of boyz combined) go with choppas. If you want to run an oldschool greentide (a bunch of regular squads here and there) i'd suggest to make a centerpiece squad of 30 choppas - put boss and dok in there and the rest could be 20 strong shoota squads with special weapons.
If you're going to run boyz with a megaboss than probably shootas as they can't run anywayz.

thanks for the replies guys! For now cuz we play small games im going to do 40 with dakka and when I expand I'll get some chappas.

If you're not running a bazillion boyz, and especially if you're not dropping lots of points on other choices, choppa boyz do best for me in Trukks with 'eavy armour. I often also put a Mek with kombi-skorcha in the mob. You should be hitting the enemy turn two and the armour can help keep them alive in case of a destroyed vehicle. The extra Mek doubles down on the required character for Mob Rule results and can fix the ride.