By Dave Nicholls
Taken with permission of Skavenblight
Please ignore any instances where I suggest giving spider or wolf riders a magic standard. They can't have one!
ARTILLERY TRICKS
How to get you ranges right: Hold up a key unit with night goblins and fanatics (your oponent will not want to go near them so will hold about 10" out of the way) or use something like trolls or ogres or a large unit of troops that will not break (25 (5 by 5) orcs with banner defiance and hero with crown command and armour of metoric iron and hero with ogre blade) and enagage his main unit such as chaos knights or a chariot, try and charge if ya can to stop that charge bonus use fanatics to stop them charging I.E hang back with in 8 of then so is he charge you fanatics will come out. Then charge him and hold him up. While he is held up, fire all ya artillery at that unit. I would suggest doom divers for if you screw up rolling you can flap away. In ya first time gues and measure and take note of how far you measured and what ya need next time to nail it. Next turn you will have perfect measurements and can really nail his unit.
For example: today I had a 2500 point battle against chaos and was able to win with doom divers. My chaos enemy had actually placed a chaos sorcerer lord in the chariot pulled by beasts of nurgle with sword of destruction and a champion that had breathed fire. I knew that going into combat with this with characters would be pointless as his beasts of nurgle and lord would probably win. So I deployed a made up tactic straight away. I moved up a unit of night goblins with fanataics in so he would not move forward, then charged with three trolls. The fanatics would mean I would not be flank attacked as chaos great fear fanatics. the trolls are resilient with regeneration and 3 wounds so could hold up the chariot for a few turns. I then fired both doom divers taking a guess at the range. then measured it and worked out what range I needed in my second turn. my second turn I had three trolls one on 1 wound and thanx to my lord being in 12" I had not fled when I lost combat by 1. Well now it was my turn for revenge : I knew the exact range for both doom divers and they both hit (good rolling I know but not that good can be done) killing the sorcerer lord (his general), and the champion, and basicly winning the game for me as the chariot went in random direction then my boar boys were able to finish of his army as they were a power unit which brings me to my second point POWER UNITS!
Large units of cavalry that can win on a charge and break a unit and avoid long drawn out battles are ideal power units. A main tactic of people is to use a unit to hold up his troops like I did in the article above, to stop ya core unit from being held up and wasted the battle, make them charge worthy, like being able to break virtually any unit on charge. note we played only 75 points of items for your characters except your general who is allowed 100 points so this is not my best unit but is cheap points wise for a power unit and very deadly
[NOTE that Dave uses the old Chronicles of War items]
My power unit in this battle with restrictions was 15 (3 by 5) savage orc boar boys with spears including std (gorks war banner +1 strenght on charge) Morglum necksnapper blade encorlled iron (+1 to hit) ,armour protection 5+ armour save reroll on 4+, amulet of power (+2 strength roll after every use on a 1 exploded inflicting d3 strength 3 hits no saves even for wards) Savage orc hero with star lance (+3 strength on charge) armour endurance 5+ save 5+ reroll Savage orc lvl 3 shaman ogre blade (+2 strenght) black amulet dispell Champion with battle stone le marquis (unit gets +1 attack for one turn) well on charge with battle stone activated champion had 3 strength 5 attacks the hero had 7 strength 8 attacks morglum had 5 strength 8 attacks shaman had 5 strength 6 attacks in the battle today he tried to hold them up by blocking me of with 21 chaos warriors a fearsome unit yes 4+ saves 3 strength 4 attacks with extra hand weapons so I did not want to get in to drawn combat I charged and killed the front rank without activating battle stone I saved it, he failed break test (had 3 leadership) and could not attack back as i killed front rank of 7. They broke I pursued I caught them and killed them turned to flank attack 8 chaos knights which were avoiding night gobo fanatics and I flank charged them in the same turn with hand of gork spell and broke them as well and they were killed, the chariot was useless after the doom diver rampage and all that was left was a unit of chaos warriors which my lightning unit killed. LIGHTNING UNITS
For Orcs and Gobbos lightning units are 12 wolf riders (i want 20) have wizard killing banner hero with blade leaping copper (+ 2 attacks) and potion strength and champion with black gem nar OR power stone le marquis (unit gets +1 strength for one turn) with this unit you will likely to always charge first as you have an 18 inch charge and it can deal out some death to small units and wizards the battle today I used them to kill 15 chaos warriors. I declared potion of strength and power stone then charged I hit with 3 rows of 4, the 2 normal guys killed a chaos warrior with strength 5 charge I failed to hit with one but killed with the other. [Beardy git! You're just lucky the stones are outta there now....no more Chronicles!--ed.] The champion killed 1 with strength 6 charge and 2 attacks and the hero with 5 attacks and strength 7 I gave 2 attacks to the champion and 3 to the unit. I killed the champion and 2 guys from the unit. That was the front rank gone bar one guy who attacked back and killed one by fluke rolling, he broke and failed which was lucky (they had 5 leadership after result) and I pursued and killed them.
changes I would make to this lightning unit would be either battle banner so they have a chance to win combat, or banner of might so I can kill more enemy and only need 3's to hit not 4's
The battle was one with three charges and my artillery, one was by magic because I could dominate magic phase after I killed his wizard and I was able to use hand of gork and fists of gork in the end with my savage orc shaman in the last turn against Arkhold hellbrass the character and killed him with 8 strength 6 hits from the spell and good rolling :) the battle was a complete slaughter on my behalf, but his poor army selection and helpful dice rolling was good except my fanatics killed 6 of my own goblins and no enemy troops, just held them up and helped my plan.
OK--another plan I have yet to use is to have a tank unit with strike support and combat boosters a tank unit is a unit of power infantry strike support is two fast cavalry units on the flanks combat boosters is a small unit with high combat potential An example of this type of unit would be 30 black orc extra hand weapons with banner defiance champion with battle stone hero with metroic iron and ogre blade attack anyone with this unit really combat boosters can be 3 trolls or 4 ogres or 6-12 squigs with prodders hold this unit back a few inches from the tank unit, wait till the tank unit gets in combat then hit the flanks hard with ya combat boosters to garauntee a win
strike units can be 10 wolf riders with spears banner might, hero with leaping coper and potion strength 10 spider riders with battle banner spears champion with parrying blade hero with armour endurance flail of skulls the strike unit hold of the enemy minor units while your tank unit goes in combat, and then can pursue when your tank unit breaks the enemy Another way to do this is use the strike units and 2 units of 20 night goblins with 3 fanatics, the enemy will do anything to avoid your fanatics and the cover your tank unit and combat boosters and you can take the victory easily. BUT BEWARE FLYERS, if they land down with in 8 of your fanatics they are randomly released and that can mean death to yourself, so I stongly suggest taking the storm banner if ya think he is takin flyers.
TACTICS VS. CHAOS
When fighting chaos you can fight them by taking advantage of mobile units. Take goblin heroes on wolves, and give each of them a cheap magic weapon (blade of ensorcelled iron (+1 to hit), sword of might (+1 S), blade of leaping copper (+1 A). They charge 18 inches and will usually kill flamers or other demons who will be without the benefit of a magic save. The boarboyz can also be good, if you put a savage orc hero with potion of strength and blade of darting steal you end up with 6 strength 7 hits None of these things are what people call 'cheesy', [oh yeah!?!--ed] but they're effective.
Against daemon units or good ground units likc chaos warriors try tooling up the boar boyz with a good banner (ie. dread banner)For your wolf riders, a hero with the sword of swift slating and potion of strength (30 points worth of stuff) does a lot of damage. You always strike first with 4 strength (3 for potion +1 from banner) and you have 8 strength, even if you are charged you still have 2 strength 7 attacks. MAGIC TACTICS VS CHAOS
Magic items are especially vital to an Orc and Goblin army. Since Orcs have notoriously low leadership the Crown of Command is essential. Buy it now and figure out who will wear it later. The Black Amulet is an excellent protective device for your wizard and goes a long way to boosting your combat results. A magic weapon is almost essential as the Warlord will be expected to lend his weight to the combat.
The gaze of mork doesn't work that well against multiwound things. One thing you could try against them is to take the Banner of Wrath and Staff of Flaming Death and maybe Staff of Osiris. The Osiris thing is quite good, because it has S6 and does d3 wounds! If it kill the model it hits, then it continues to the next one. IF you take these three items, then try to use them all at the same target. They won't do so well alone, but if combined, they can be quite devastating. About his magic items: You could take a big unit with about 5-6 ranks (just to make sure you have the max rank bonus when you charge) and give them the banner of defiance. This gives you a +7 combat res when the combat begins. Try including 1-2 heroes with the Giant Blade and Ogre Blade. That'll give them S 7 and S6. With 6 attacks together they should at least wound cheesy characters and if they don't have dozens of saves, then you could kill it/them, or if it's in a unit, then chop down the Rank n File things and you should win the combat easily. You won't be able to pursue, but you can just keep charging him until you drive them off the board. This worked quite well with my night goblins against a big high elf spearman unit. If you put your lord in the unit, then make sure he doesn't die. if I don't want my lord to die, I give him the following items: Armour of protection, Black amulet and morgor the magler. It's costly character, but if it's a black orc, then no one will kill him, as he always strikes first with S6, has 2 special 4+ saves and a 5+ magic save and T6.
Beat that if you can :-)
TACTICS VS HIGH ELVES
When fighting High Elves definately take a unit of 10-20 boar boys and make them a power unit, then even if you charge his beloved white lions with a lord in the unit, you will prolly kill the lord in the charge and they whole unit will break anyway but beware of white lions as if they have a general in the unit they are immune to psychology and cannot break, and they do d3 wounds -1 attack and +2 strength with double handed weapons. So make sure ya kille the general in the unit if ya do charge them but witha hero and a lord on him he will stand no chance. Basicly take a giant and use him to kill monsters ( I head butted a dragon to death but it took me the whole game but hey his 450 point dragon did nothing. umm and if he takes treeman then you can hit them with ya club and unless the roll under the initative (which is 2) they suffer D6 wounds. Even with the storm banner activated your doom divers have unlimited range so you will cut his artillery out of the game for a few turns and you can use your doom divers do deal out some damage to his artillery. I would recommend taking 3 doom diver minimum and 2 rock lobbers. Book of ashur and some dark magic spells can mean you use magic to wipe out artillery or high magic, even read some colour decks before making up your mind on what spells have good range and then choose them. If he has a dragon then use a mount (prolly wyvern as that is pretty much all you can get) with the collar of zorga and armour of protection and giant blade or morgar mangler, his character is the only one who can attack and you can whip his ass with a black orc warlord espechially if you charge then watch his face when his pet dragon cannot attack back, and you kill his lord and then take control of his dragon and kill a bolt thrower with it, then keep on attacking it and taking it over and using it for your own purposes. if you elf nemisis is known for cheesy magic item give a black orc warlord the sword of destruction and let him try and beat when you when you got +1 strength and toughness than him. If you are playing special characters and teclis is a pain and he has not monsters to worry about get a lord on a wyvern with armour protection talisman obsidian and morgar mangler or some good sword if ya have a favourite then while you are immune to magic when you get in base contact with him his powers are nullified and that is handy.
One cheesy tactic against elves which is handy but ya gotta have the models to do it is get two units of 15 savage or boar boys or 15 savage orc boar boys and 15 orcs boar boys If you have the normal orcs give them std of shielding spears one orc hero and one blc orc hero and a champion. Orc hero with shadow armour giant blade Blc orc hero two with helm atrazar and ogre blade champion with battle stone le marquis and ya savage orcs with gorks war banner and have Morglum necksnapper lvl 2 shaman and a hero and a champion Morglum armour protection amulet power blade leaping gold hero with potion strength blade darting steel shaman blck amulet dispell champ with power stone le marquis Although costly both these units have incredible hitting power. What ya do with them is charge down the flanks then just close the fist and wipe him out. Notice that this only really works if he has minimal artillery like 2 bolt throwers, and you can take them out with shamans and doom divers. None of his hand units will really hold up to much is you charge with these units, but he could have a big unit of 40 white lions so stay away from them or try and combine a charge of both units into him one at the front and one at the flank and then he will crumble, I say you would kill a unit of 40 and DEFINATLEY win the combat anyway
Both these unit are very expensive and if you are playing in a large batte as many house armies like to do make up the regement points with artillery and a unit of black orcs with banner defiance and a champ (you have to have them to have blc orc characters. Also to enable you to have rock lobber you have to have a unit of orcs so take a unit of 10-18 arrer boys and place them on a hill in a line near your artillery as cover and to shoot at units which is just an annoyance factor.
CONCLUSION
I've offered some ideas, but if anyone is having problem with tactics or ideas against specific races then feel free to email me and I PROMISE I WILL REPLY!
Email Dave at: pickles1@ihug.co.nz