How to deal with Orks?

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

I recently played a game against orks, and got stomped. I know how I went wrong, I took a low model count list with emphasis on mobility and firepower. I had a Helfrost Cannon Dreadnought for my alpha strike, and it did effectively turn my opponent's advance back on itself. I deployed first, and went second, as was the scenario in our narrative campaign. 

 

The points limit was ~1600, and my opponent works on the philosophy of "boyz before toyz".

 

At this point this list had all but tabled a dark angels player by turn 2.

 

I know  that I deployed my forces ineffectively, with my land raider off to one side, and my troops not occupying the emplaced weapons I had at my disposal. I know for the future that I need to pay closer attention to those things.

 

Now, to the guts of this post,

 

I faced 4 squads of truck boyz (one was a group of burna boyz), 1 max squad of stormboyz, and a Nob Squad deathstar in a battlewagon.

 

 

I had 2 min units of wolfguard with stormbolters and wolfclaws/powerfists mounted in AC Razorbacks. 1 5 man wolfguard terminator squad (AC, 2 SB, 1 TH/SS, 2 WC, 1 PF) in a land raider crusader with my wolf lord. I backed this up with a Helfrost cannon dread in a drop pod, and 2 land speeder tempests. 

 

What I think I should have brought, was 2 full squads of grey hunters (bolters and plasma guns, with close combat weapons for the extra attack, and wg pack leaders) 2 helfrost dreads with heavy flamers, 2 vindicators, 2 LS Tempests, 2 rune priests with telekenesis/divination, and a unit of wolf guard with storm bolters. This would have given me a ton of templates, to throw at him, and it would have given me a ton of shots to throw his way. He was going to come my way, and I should have given him a symmetrical force to fight. Divination could have given me re-rolls to hit, and the potential to ignore cover. In addition I would have had cover saves against him, and I would have had pie plates of death to drop on him. As I didn't need to move and Bolters are sufficient against most ork gear, I could have just thrown firepower at him. 

 

I'm curious to see what y'all think.

[GreyCrow]

Going very low model count or toyz before boyz is a great way to make sure to be at a disadvantage with Marines. After all, our basic kit is really really strong (army wide T4, 3+ makes for good survivability, BS4 and WS4 and S4 means we're really good in close combat too compared to most other basic infantry) and it's great to capitalize on it !

 

Even your signature kinds of upholds that philosophy :p

 

I think you just didn't have enough bodies on the table : you basically had 15 infantry models if I got it right ? Your second list should work out great against his army !

[Lord Commander Scrymgeour]

flamers.... lots and lots of flamers.

[Guest Drunk Guardian]

Boltguns have never shined brighter for me than when facing Orks.

[Iron Father Ferrum]

Boltguns have never shined brighter for me than when facing Orks.

 

Neither has a TFC.  Those things are sheer murder against orks, especially if he's "boyz before toyz."

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

Thanks, I'm hoping to get a re-match soon, so that I can return the favour. I have a feel for how he thinks now, so all I nee to do at this point is deploy well, and lay down the hate. 

[MagicMan]

If Whirlwinds have been appropriately priced in the SW codex, consider taking one! They're great once you've gotten the Orks out of their trucks.

 

 

To do that, you're going to want some S6 - S8 fire, preferably in high volume. Long Fangs with Missiles could do the business here? Their frag templates will help against the horde. Also be good for insta-killing Nobz, as well as hitting armour.

 

 

And as a secret from an Ork player to you, our elite units fear yours! Orks are bullies, we'll send our Warboss/Nobs against your troops, because we dont have access to an invulnerable save, and without one our elite units/HQ's can be quite squishy vs an appropriately tooled character/terminator squad. Try and deny your opponent these match ups, if possible.

 

 

Grey Hunters will definitely be your shining star in these games. If you can cover your light vehicle popping elsewhere in your list, ignore plasma/melta, and take flamers. 

[knife&fork]

Force Ld checks whenever you can. It won't send mobs running but it will eat away at their numbers. 

[Tiger9gamer]

as an ork player, I fear high amounts of str 7 and above for popping trukks, and melta guns would be a good idea too. maybe in place of a hellfrost dread take a rifleman dread? that provides nice accurate dakka.

 

 

Whirlwinds and anything barrage is nice too, but don't go overboard on flamers. defiantly have more models too. 

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

The problem with the whirlwind is that the model costs money, something which I have in short supply. I do have access to a second vindicator however. As for the rifleman dread, that's not a bad idea, however, the helfrost dread, packs a two for one, since it's a S6 AP3 blast, or a S8 AP1 shot, so it can pull double duty, killing trucks or boys. And backing it up with a heavy flamer DCCW, makes the whole package pretty versatile. I'd love to have some barrage in my army, but I don't have the money right now. As for it being well priced it comes in at 65 pts. It would be a worthwhile investment for my army, even if it's very situational. I appreciate all of these suggestions, and this is shaping up to be a killer re-match.

[Axagoras]

thunderfire cannons, oh wait, dirty traitors dont get to use them. um, 3 whirlwinds will work, a ton of grey hunters. thunderwolf cav squad. Also you said he was running trucks of boys, so just blow the trucks up and kill most of the squad, (explodes should kill 4 of them) and then 8 boys isnt much of a threat to a squad. Especially if a grey hunter squad softens em up first.

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

Looks like some las-plas and las-launcher long fangs and whirlwinds are in my future. Very situational use unit though, and the long fangs can get expensive, especially if I have to mount them in transports. I've definitely got a lot to think about.

[CrystalSeer]

There are some really good suggestions here for list building, the one thing I would add is looking at how you do your deployment.

 

Orks rely heavily on overwhelming your shooting. They do this by sending more targets at your lines at a time then you can reasonably deal with. To counter this, use refused-flank deployment to make him come to you in more of a line. This will buy you time (a turn or 2) of not having to worry about the units further back, so you can mass your firepower on the closer units and bigger threats. If you can force him to deploy first, this will be all the better, as he will have to deploy to respond to threats from any sector, whereas you can pick which flank will be better for you.

[MagicMan]

Just remember (if possible) to deploy on the flank facing the fast units. This may not seem a good idea (they'll hit you quicker) but it'll strand the slow footsloggers much more effectively than if you did this the other way round, in which the fast units will catch up with the slow and they'll all hit you together anyway. :)

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

One thing I did hit on, was popping his trucks early, maybe killing some of the troops inside, as well as forcing the remainder to foot slog it the rest of the way, maximizing the time I have to shoot at them, and whittle them down. I need to pack weapons that will more reliably kill his trucks, to make this happen. If I can keep his men at range as long as I can, it should make it relatively easy to mop up his remaining troops in close combat. I also need to take out his battlewagon and nobsquad deathstar. Making them foot slog it up the field, and giving me time to kill them at range, before mopping up in close combat. I think that should work well, I need to play a bit more cautiously, and save my hard hitting fast mechanized cavalry tactics for other opponents, like space marines, guard, and chaos. Seeing as those are my primary threats right now, aside from orks.

[Sigil]

^ That's the exact strategy I use. I send a melta, combimelta, MM tac squad combat squaded in a pod down field in a sort of suicide mission. Their objective is to pop as many transports as possible, which when combined with my other long range shooting tends to do the job. The tac squad is usually assaulted the next turn and destroyed, but that just means another mob is stuck midfield for that much longer and not hitting my main battle line.

 

What really throws a wrench in my butt is beefed up mobs of nob bikers, who can soak up tons of firepower that should be wrecking boyz, but can't be ignored because of their disgusting hitting power.

 

My other pods tend to drop on the side lanes of the board and create interlocking firelines. This forces the boyz to either make for the newly arrived units or continue being funneled toward my DZ. The rest of the game is all whittling down the enemy before he can get at me. Sounds boring, I know, but actually is always fun. Something about the stress of being on the backfoot against a raving horde of techno-barbarians is just fun.

[Ulrik_Ironfist]

I have a list that's five drop pods, 3 heavy flamer dreads, 2 grey hunter melta bunkers, a wolf lord with combi-melta, long fangs, and 2 vindicators. the dreads hit the table first turn, in his back line, and flame his trucks and the boys inside. Lascannon long fangs to eat the battlewagon, or trucks, and vindicators to pieplate whatever's left over.