Ork Nob Bikers

[MygL]

Greetings!

I have a dilemma. In our small gaming group we have a ork player who always use a nob bike squad that is a real mean deathstar. I can't seem to find a good way to take them out without loosing too much. Same goes for my other friends. We stand no chance against him. These nobz seem to have no weakness what so ever.

 

He runs them in two different setups. Either three small groups of three each, armed with one powerclaw and two big choppas, bikes and cybork body (Grotzniks army upgrade). Kinda hard to catch them with him turbo-boosting all over the place.

 

The second unit he usually fields is a group of five or six nobz on bikes, with two to three powerclaws accompanied with a painboy for the cybork and feel-no-pain.

 

So with this later combo he get:

4+ Armoursave from bikes.

4+ Coversave from bikes. 3+ if he turboboosts.

5+ Invunerablesave from cybork.

Feel-no-pain.

2 wounds per model with toughness 5.

The ability to strike anywhere in a turn or two.

 

Do they have a weakness? How to deal with them? I can't see it. Any general tips for me and my friends and any good counter choices? I play Blood Angels myself.

 

Thanks in advance, Michael.

[LardO'Blood]

It is toughness 4(5) so anything S8+ should do the job. It negates everything but these:

4+ Coversave from bikes. 3+ if he turboboosts.

5+ Invunerablesave from cybork.

Do they have hit and run? A good way to tie them up might be 5 TH/SS terminators jumping from a storm raven. 425 points though...

[Validar]

O'blood's advice is very much on spot. Try to position yourself so that your own counter unit (the terminators) will be able to assault no matter where the nobs strike. This may mean clumping up a bit, which works well if your opponent deploys first, since you deny orc footsloggers a great deal of combat by positioning yourself far away from them.

 

Don't shoot at them with anything below strength 8 - if he has equiped them right he can just get the wounds on a nob that havn't suffered a wound before, effectively denying you the wound you've dealt.

 

And nob bikers are a real pain, don't worry if you have to dedicate a lot of your army to take them down.

[DarkGuard]

Sounds similar to one down at my LGS. Tried to shoot them with my Vindicators, so if he failed a save the would die. Unfortunately, this didn't happen, as I continually missed them. In the end my Sternguard got tired of the Vindicator's gunner being an idiot, jumped out the Rhino and rapid fired them to death with combi-meltas, heavy flamers and hellfire rounds. After an almost comedic and confusing period of wound allocation thanks to all the different types of saves, models and wounds, two Nobz remained, fled and kept on running because they were below half strength. :tu:

 

But I do recall thinking later than a Hammernator squad would have made things easier. So stuff like meltas, missile launcher, Hammernators and the like would be your best bet, and I suppose lots of rapid firing units. It'll take effort and time, but keep at it and they'll drop.

[Hellios]

Greetings!

I have a dilemma. In our small gaming group we have a ork player who always use a nob bike squad that is a real mean deathstar. I can't seem to find a good way to take them out without loosing too much. Same goes for my other friends. We stand no chance against him. These nobz seem to have no weakness what so ever.

 

He runs them in two different setups. Either three small groups of three each, armed with one powerclaw and two big choppas, bikes and cybork body (Grotzniks army upgrade). Kinda hard to catch them with him turbo-boosting all over the place.

 

The second unit he usually fields is a group of five or six nobz on bikes, with two to three powerclaws accompanied with a painboy for the cybork and feel-no-pain.

 

So with this later combo he get:

4+ Armoursave from bikes.

4+ Coversave from bikes. 3+ if he turboboosts.

5+ Invunerablesave from cybork.

Feel-no-pain.

2 wounds per model with toughness 5.

The ability to strike anywhere in a turn or two.

 

Do they have a weakness? How to deal with them? I can't see it. Any general tips for me and my friends and any good counter choices? I play Blood Angels myself.

 

Thanks in advance, Michael.

 

 

You play blood angels oh sweet god yes... T5... 4+ cover... 4+ armour 5++ 2 wound fast things a problem for you... well just send in some sort of libby...

 

Obviously depending on what kind of squad he is in makes a difference but... libby... + TDA + Stormshield is no pretty hard to kill... but ideally you don't want to expose him until he is in combat... upgrade to super-psyker cast might of heros on yourself (lets assume you role a 2 and get 4 attacks) and sword sanguine... so S10... yeah you will find it pretty easy to wound him he gets a 5++ but he will fail it more times than not and each wound causes instant death... not saying this is the best unit but it works... you may want to try others powers... the main fault with this is they have to attack you unless you use a land raider or other fast vehicle with an assault ramp to get you in...

 

Mephiston also works but he is at risk from PKs if any survive due to no invulnerable save... Blood Talon Dreads can also make a mess but are at risk from claws if you don't kill everything and don't ID... normal dreads do ID...

 

BAs have a few things that scare them in combat... at range the answer is vindicator (ID is your friend S10 also IDs the warboss... S8 will do against nobs)... sure they get a 4+ cover save.... but half of those fail and if you are hitting a few and kill two you have made nearly 100pts from that...

 

Now the cool stufff... tank shock em with rhinos... leadership isn't that hot and if they break chase them off the board... Not easy enough... remember that libby instead of going all macho on those orks maybe be a bit more cunning and use fear of the darknes... again a leadership test at -2 means you have a good chance of breaking them... if you can get a unit near them so you can run them off the board even better.

[templargdt]

Assault Terminators FTW. Mix in libby with null zone for overkill. I regularly win combat and run off large Nob units with the ATs. Usually I still have 1-2 standing at the end of the combat as a bonus. When you kill 500 points of Nobz with 200 points of Termies, you're doing it right.

[MygL]

Lovely, I'll go with a five man squad with terminators and a terminator librarian with SS. All flying in a Storm Raven. Shouldn't I have any Lightningclaws at all?

 

Thank you for the quick response.

[Validar]

heavy debatable if a single claw is okay in the unit to get a few strikes on initiative... Personally, I think the best saves in the game + strength 8 is just too good not to take.

[t0mmi3]

I role with 5 termies (2 LC 3 hammer) + a chaplain. mega awesome reroll to hit AND wound on the carhge with LCs <_<

[spartan249]

You really need to fight fire with fire in this case. 5 TH/SS terminators, 2 DLC terminators, a Sanguinary Priest, and a reclusiarch will most likely do the job. Mount them up in an LRC (covering anti-infantry), and you should be good to go. Even if the Ork player pimps out his biker squad with power klaws to take your terminators with him, you're still ahead, because doing this puts his points investment above yours.

 

Reclusiarch + 7 Termie squad + Sanguinary Priest - 470 points

LRC: 250 points

 

720 points total

 

Nobz: 10 nobs, bikes, Bpole, 5 Pklaws, 5 Bchoppas, Waaagh! Banner, Painboy, 2 Cflamers, 2 Crokkits, 2 TLShootas- 680 points

(this unit is the "standard" version, with all different wargear to take advantage of wound allocation. Expensive, but this unit is designed to chew through anything. It will serve as the example we'll pit against the terminators.)

 

Yes, the nobz are technically cheaper, but the LRC is another bag of trouble all by itself, given that the LRC is effective against everything in the ork army.

 

Combat order: This is assuming you charge (which should be the case, given that you're in an LR and they're not)

 

I5 - This initiative step is here just to put a few wounds on the bikers. It will likely just wound, not kill, the nobz, although you might get lucky and take one out.

Reclusiarch - ~2 wounds

Sanguinary Priest - ~1 wound

Two Lightning Claws - ~3 wounds

 

I3 - The nobz with Big Choppas hit back. Nothing much should happen, although it's not outlandish for some freak accidents to occur here (Sanguinary priest is there to help reduce the impact of poor armor saving).

5 Nobz at the Terminators - 15 attacks -> 50% chance that one terminator will die. Hopefully one of the lightning claws.

 

I1 - All the klaws and hammers swing at each other. I'll resolve the marines first.

TH/SS Terminators - ~6 bikers dead.

Pklaw bikers - ~2 Th/SS Terminators dead.

 

Final Tally:

Marines - 2, maybe 3 wounds.

Orks - 17, maybe 18 wounds.

 

Orks lose by 15~16 wounds.

 

Replace the numbers with your friend's Ork bikers, and you're looking at much more lopsided fights (You might not even lose a single terminator ;)). These guys will also do very well against ork boyz, so they're bringing versatility as well.

 

If you do not charge, this will be much less decisive, so make sure that you preserve the charge.

[greatcrusade08]

thats alot of points going to sink a sinle enemy unit.. what if your oppoent decides to bring a different list on the day..

 

all rounder lists will fare much better IMO

[spartan249]

LRCs threaten and have the capacity to annihilate anything in the ork armory. In fact, I think it's one of the best choices you could make when taking on an Ork opponent. Tacking on a rock hard unit of terminators that are also resilient vs small arms fire and flood of attacks (totally ork style) that can reciprocate and annihilate almost anything on the charge, including nobz, sounds like a good plan to me, and is one that I have used over and over again to good effect.

 

Besides, the LR's one of the most troublesome vehicles for Orks to take care of. I think it should be SOP to take at least one vs Orks.

[Brother Tual]

I am with GC08 on this one. I dont think taking TH/SS + LRC is the answer to every solution. Bring the biggest 'gun' to the table = win. IMHO this is rookie advice. If he is using smallish units, volume fire will break this unit. Every kill is a serious blow to the unit output. I know, they have alot of redundant saves, but at the end of the day, he can only use one, and the best save he will ever get is 3+ (cover). Kill them the same you would kill attack bikes. The FNP might get in the way if you start using 'small arms' fire but anything over str8 or ap2 (hard to volume fire).

 

I dont know your list build or what points limit you play at. I would look at dropping on the bikers (first turn - before they move is best) a command squad with plasmaguns all round in a pod. Easy. Cheap. Multipurpose. (kinda) There are many other ways to break the nob bikers. But for a no frills, straight forward fool proof answer I would run this unit to your specific problem.

[spartan249]

Fair enough. Terminator Hammer units are not the only way to go about this problem. They are, however, my preferred method. Compartmentalize and control damage, or smack back with a bigger hammer. Either way will work.

[LardO'Blood]

I dont know your list build or what points limit you play at. I would look at dropping on the bikers (first turn - before they move is best) a command squad with plasmaguns all round in a pod. Easy. Cheap. Multipurpose. (kinda) There are many other ways to break the nob bikers. But for a no frills, straight forward fool proof answer I would run this unit to your specific problem.

Interesting idea, melta guns would probably work better though. You can pop vehicles in subsequent turns and despite having half the shots you will instant death them, doing the same amount of damage in the end. You can get a same effect from podded sternguard with combi meltas and two heavy flamers. The heavy flamers will wound on a 4+ and ignore all saves but the invulnerable, in addition to being great against hordes if they survive.

[Hellios]

I dont know your list build or what points limit you play at. I would look at dropping on the bikers (first turn - before they move is best) a command squad with plasmaguns all round in a pod. Easy. Cheap. Multipurpose. (kinda) There are many other ways to break the nob bikers. But for a no frills, straight forward fool proof answer I would run this unit to your specific problem.

fool proof... like if the nobs start off the board... or feeding the command squad and the pod to the ork army.... which may or may not give them a speed boost.

 

Oh this can work but a clever ork player won't allow it to work more than a couple of times, which might be fine in a tourny if the player has left himself exposed... on the other hand it might cause you trouble... not so good if you are looking for a solution to use again and again and again against the same person.

[Grey Mage]

Its a 700-850 point squad...

 

You want to take it down quick? Allocate about 1200 points to doing nothing else but firing on it. Youll see results wether its tacticals, tanks, terminators or devastators... etc.

 

Sure, 1 on 1 theyll decimate most units in C:SM etc, but why on earth would you only fight them with one unit?

[Hellios]

Its a 700-850 point squad...

 

You want to take it down quick? Allocate about 1200 points to doing nothing else but firing on it. Youll see results wether its tacticals, tanks, terminators or devastators... etc.

 

Sure, 1 on 1 theyll decimate most units in C:SM etc, but why on earth would you only fight them with one unit?

 

You speak sooth.

[Br0ther Rafen]

second and third GC08 and Grey Mage here, there is no sensible reason as to why you are playing to his strengths. If you really want to take them out, volume of fire/high S weapons wil do the trick.

And a good addition to any army list (imo anyway) is to field Typhoons, with their 2 shot ML's they can slice through most things, especially with multiple Speeders.

[Brother Tual]

hellios - I am suggesting an alternative to TH/SS in a LRC. The pod will increase high strength, low AP shots so you dont have to allocate 1500 points worth of army shooting at the target unit. You can commit the pod and another 300 or 400 points on top to make sure the job gets done.

 

If you are playing a good opponent this 'my unit beats yours' thinking wont work DESPITE what unit you bring. The OP has an issue with nob bikers. I think the TH/SS + LRC is the generic 'solution' advice on these boards (same as 'take more meltaguns') and it doesnt really help anyone IMPROVE their game.

 

If you are a good player yourself you will be able to protect the pod and have other ways of dealing with the threat that include countering protection tactics (reserves).

 

I merely suggest the pod so that in killing the unit once, he no longer 'fears' the unit as a problem but respects it as a challenge. After this he will have the mind set to be able to formulate stategies on his own to kill the beast. I still remember what it is like to be a new player against a hard list. Your mind set is - how do I not loose so bad or how do I stop unit x from killing me to the mind set of - I KNOW the principles behind killing this unit/army, lets go!

[Grey Mage]

The last time I fought Nob Bikerz I took them down in three turns, capture and control. While I played SWs the following is meant as a demonstration and could easily be copied by a C:SM player:

 

Turn 1: Hit them with a volley of missiles and lascannons *4 shots* from my long fangs, and another 4 shots from a pair of typhoons. This resulted in 3 clean kills after his cover saves. I then hit the unit with a Whirlwind, doing 2 wounds after feel no pain *having hit 6 originally*.

 

His turn 1: They turbocharged forward and out of LOS of my LFs towards an isolated GH squad I had on my left flank.

 

Turn 2: Moved my typhoons, shot again- killed 2 more that had already taken wounds. The left flank GHs jumped into their rhino and move back towards the main body of my force. My Dreadnaught and another squad of GHs moved to support. Long fangs redirected, along with the whirlwind, to fragging his long-range firepower that had shaken my dread and killed a long fang and removed a lascannon from my razorback *lootas and a wagon*.

 

His turn 2: They assault my dread. He kills another nob biker, is immobilized and then destroyed. Sad days.

 

Turn 3: I disembark 20 Grey Hunters, hit him with 6 missile shots killing 2 more, and then rapid fired 2 to death with plasma guns and bolters, finished off the TLPG from my razorback. This left only the warboss with 2 wounds remaining.

 

*note: that warboss assaulted and killed five more GHs, before my counter-assault brought him down before his powerclaw could strike. End result: the whirlwind and did enough damage to wipe his lootas and start in on the 60 boyz and burnas holding his objective. My first wave of GHs held out tell reinforcements arrived, losing 7 men in the process- I wont on turn 6 with an annihilation and both objectives.

[Hellios]

I merely suggest the pod so that in killing the unit once, he no longer 'fears' the unit as a problem but respects it as a challenge. After this he will have the mind set to be able to formulate stategies on his own to kill the beast. I still remember what it is like to be a new player against a hard list. Your mind set is - how do I not loose so bad or how do I stop unit x from killing me to the mind set of - I KNOW the principles behind killing this unit/army, lets go!

 

I'm sorry as a new player I played Eldar... so this is not a situation I am familiar with. I just think unless he makes a list around the drop-pod which is as bad as building it around the TH/SS terminators on principle. Assuming his list isn't built around the pod then I think the chances of it working are the same as it failing and if the sage internets advice fails... will that not cast him deeper into the pit of dispair? I also suggest S8+ shots would do the job... and I think Devastator squads or typhoons would be better than a plasma command in a pod.

 

Oh and the my unit will beat your unit can work... It is how the entire eldar army works. My banshees beat your heavy armour my scorpions beats your gribble... my fire dragons kill your tanks... hell they kill everything lets just take them and fire prisms. But on a more serious note no amount of advice will improve someones game. Playing games will improve someones game... playing games and losing helps even more. Advice might help make it obvious what the person is doing wrong but it is up to the individual to apply it for themselves as the 40k battlefield isn't a generic environment that repeats the same situation over and over again. The principle for beating all armies is the same... negate their advantages/maximise your own...

[Brother Tual]

I agree with you. Taking a pod with command squad or similar is the same as the T/H+SS + LRC in principle. The difference is that one is an addition to an existing army whilst the above is the core of an army. A single pod is not a game breaker but helps alot with alpha strike. I suggest it because the nob bikers can quickly close the gap and be a problem from the get go. Removing them early (or reducing them significantly - remembering we are talking about 3 or 5 nobs) will help MYGL. A POD is a vehicle that uses alpha strike principles. For it to work it does not need to be part of a full POD list or even a list build around them to work.

 

I agree that experience is a much better teacher than either you or I. I have always encouraged learning what works for yourself through playing games.

 

Eldar arer a specialised force. No doubt they have specific roles and as such, different units do well against different target units. None the less an eldar force has some sense of balance coming from the army as a whole. An army of fire prisms and fire dragons is hardly a strong list. Trying to mirror something like this with a marine dex would be a mistake.

 

The principle for beating all armies is the same... negate their advantages/maximise your own

The OP wants to know how to do this. How to negate the strength of the nob biker. I suggest dealing with it earlier rather than later and picking the unit I want to attack it with (maximising my own output) rather than relying it to attack first or hope they come in scope (LOS or assault range) of big guns or hard hitting combat units. How MYGL does this is upto HIM.

[greatcrusade08]

use a thunderfire cannons termor shells to prvent them going flat out, this should give you an extra turn to shoot them

[Wildfire]

Turn 1: Hit them with a volley of missiles and lascannons *4 shots* from my long fangs, and another 4 shots from a pair of typhoons. This resulted in 3 clean kills after his cover saves. I then hit the unit with a Whirlwind, doing 2 wounds after feel no pain *having hit 6 originally*.

 

While I don't disagree with your point that taking multiple smaller, more generally effective squads is the way to go, I will note that your opponent should have taken these hits on his Warboss. He would have gotten FNP against the missile hits, and wouldn't have suffered ID even from the LCs.