Take the Pain out of Painting - Orks

Painting. It's a Love/Hate thing. Some of us love it some hate it but if you live in the UK and want to play the tournament scene then chances are that you'll need to have a painted army. So what if you've decided on playing a Horde Ork Army then!? Damn, that's a lot of models you've got to get to a table-top standard. Well, I'm here to tell you that it may not be as bad as you first thought.

First of all Orks are fun to paint, not so much fun that if you hate painting you're going to change you mind on these guys though. However if you like to paint it's quick and easy to add your own touch to Ork models. Want to do some free-hand, tatoos, face paint etc, but nervous because you've never done it before? Go nuts, if it's messy it's more Orky. Want to do Death Skulls? Just paint something blue on each model (or every other model) and it looks good and cohesive! Likewise for Goffs (BLack), Snakebites (Brown) Blood Axes (khaki), Bad Moons (Yellow) or Evil Sunz (Red). Want to do you own tribe? Once again go nuts! It's hard to go wrong - have you seen Dash of Pepper's pink Orks ;) ?

Another little bit of personalisation can be achieved by doing some conversions and guess what, it's easy to make these look good on Orks even if you've never tried a simple kit-bash before. It just always seems to turn out looking good because the Orks look inherently chaotic anyway! Just give it a try and you might surprise yourself!

Back to painting now. So you've assembled 90-ish Boys and gone through 2 or 3 cans of primer getting them ready for your painting table. Even the most cheerful of painters is going to be somewhat daunted by this challenge but fear not there are ways to ease the burden. First lets start with Primer, I recommend that you use white but this will depend on the way you want to paint the skin (and whether or not you're doing Goffs!). I think you can get excellent results for skin tone over white primer with washes alone. The method I use is an initial wash of Thrakka Green, let it dry completely, then a wash of Badab Black, let it dry completely, then another weash of Thrakka Green.

That will do you but you can do another wash of either Thrakka Green to make them ... even greener, or you can use Gryphone Sepia to give them an earth tinge or even Ogryn Flesh which gives them a ruddy fleshy hue. This stage is up to you but if you use a mix of the optional stage on a variety of your models you can get some variety in skin tone throughout your force which can look very effective for only a little extra effort. This stage is very quick as you can just slop the wash on, the only time constraint is in the drying time but if you are painting 90 boys in one go the fist model will be well on the way to being fry by the time you've done the 90th!

Once the skin is done pick 2 base colours for the cloth items and Boltgun Metal for the weapons and do 10 Orks at a time. Once the base-coat is dry give them a final light wash of Badab Black and you're basically done. They will look great on the table top and if you spend a little extra time on painting the teeth, claws, eyes and tounge they'll look fantastic with what amounts to very little work for the volume of models you're putting out. Give it a try.

Get ur (Speed) Freak On

As I've mentioned before, our club is hosting a 750 Club Challenge, starting in the next couple of weeks. There are some pretty stringent rules. Since it's Ork Week, I was thinking about what kind of Ork army you could put together at 750. Obviously, there's the horde route, where you take 3 30 Slugga Boyz mobz with Nob, Power Klaw and Bosspole backed up with a Big Mek with a Kustom Force Field. At 750, with a minimum spread of vehicles, it's going to be tough for anyone to kill 90 Orks, especially with at least two squads getting a permanent 5+ cover save. However, it feels like a bit of a boring list, you'd be spending most of the evening pushing green plastic around.

Instead, I got to thinking about a small unit of Nob bikers. With a Warboos, they'd be scoring and they're always good to put the hurt on.

Warboss, Warbike, Big Choppa, Bosspole

4 Nob Bikers, Painboy, Power Klaw, Waaagh Banner

So, you've got 5 very killy bikers, all differently armed for wound allocation shenanigans. The Warboss has a Choppa over the ubiquitous Klaw in order to try and take advantage of the fact he's I5 on the charge.

Now, we need some Boyz to back up this initial charge and some way for them to get around. Since we can't spam Trukks in this competition, let's go with a Battlewagon.

20 Slugga Boyz, Nob, Power Klaw, Bosspole

Battlewagon, Deffrolla, Red Paint Job, Grot Riggers, Armour Plates, Boarding Plank, Big Shoota

The Boyz have a pretty standard load out but the 'wagon has been properly pimped in order to keep it on the move. I'm hoping that since there won't be any Land Raiders or Monoliths, not many people will take Lascannons.

All of that leaves me with just 90 points to play with. I am slightly tempted to take some Lootas but I want this army to be an all or nothing charge and I want the last 90 Points to fit in with a Speed Freaks theme:

Deffkopta, Twin-Linked Rokkit Launcher

Deffkopta, Twin-Linked Rokkit Launcher

Since they're Jetbikes, I think that Deffkoptas should be exempt from the 'only one vehicle' rule. However, if they're not then I would replace one with a Warbuggy with Twin-Linked Rokkit Launcher instead.

Waaagh!!!

One of the fundamental things that makes the Ork, er, Orky is the Waaagh special rule. Nothing says I'm here to kick your ass like charging towards your enemy windmilling your arms and dribbling incoherent expletives! The Waaagh is key to making Orks work.

The number one thing that is on your side as an Ork is weight of numbers, the number one thing that is against you as an Ork player is your opponent's shooting whitteling down your numerical advantage. You might say “But I can take fast transports! He's not going to be able to shoot me up too much”. Well you're on the right lines but you can only cram 12 Boyz into a Trukk so you get to the enemy lines fast but you've lost your weight of numbers, 12 Orks just aren't that effective, the same is true of Biker Boyz. Nob Bikers are an exception because they don't really need the same weight of numbers as Boyz do but if you play Nob Bikers no-one will like you and deep down you'll feel bad and a little less happy with you life in general.

The solution to the problem is Battle Wagons and a good old Waaagh. 20 Boys crammed into a Battle Wagon allows you to bring weight of numbers to bare and, with a little luck (or Ghazkull), nowhere on the board is safe from a turn two charge from your mean greenies. What this means in real terms is that, at worst your opponent is only going to get two turns of shooting off at you, one turn if you went first! And this means you are going to be able to bring significant numbers of Boyz to mess up his lines.

The way I run this is to have 2 mobs of Boyz in Battle Wagons to act as a first strike, a way of tying up shooting units as soon as possible to allow my main block of 30 Slugga Boyz to reach my opponent's lines relatively unscathed. 20 Boyz in a Battle Wagon are going to do some damage but are unlikely to win out easily in most combats. However, 20 Boys followed closely by 30 Boyz is seriously going to mess up anyone's day and I find it an effective way to play Orks.

The last thing to say on the Waaagh is to mention the Prophet of the Waaagh himself; Ghazkull Thrakka. Ghaz is a total monster on his own but his ability to guarantee you a 6” fleet move on the turn you Waaagh is just golden. When you really need to roll well to ensure you make it into the crucial turn 2 combat, having an assured 6” move in your pocket is just too good to underestimate. There are many other reasons to take Ghaz in your army but this one is critical to many a game plan and no opponent of Orks should forget that!

Killin' Teem

This is my first army list for Ork Week. Now, writing a list for Orks for Kill Team should be pretty easy, just take loads of Boyz. For 200 points you can get two squads of 15 Slugga Boyz both with a Nob. Since you're supposed to play on a board with lots of cover these guys would be pretty hard to beat. You've got to kill 15 Orks before you start taking any leadership tests. However, it's a bit dull, I want to take more than just some regular Boyz. One of my favourite units in the Codex are Burna Boyz. These take away the Ork's main problem - low BS. You're also negating those cover saves we just talked about plus they can also have Power Weapons once they get into combat. Let's take five of them and see what else we can take:

5 Burna Boyz

10 Slugga Boyz, Nob, Power Klaw

That only leaves 30 points and I really wanted to take a Deffkopta. If we drop the Klaw down to a Big Choppa we can fit in our Deffkopta and add another Burna Boy leaving us with:

6 Burna Boyz

10 Slugga Boyz, Nob, Big Choppa

Deffkopta

for our 200 points.

As always with Orks, timing your Waaagh is key but on a 4x4 board you should be able to pull off a Turn 2 or 3 charge. In fact the 'kopta should be able to get stuck in on Turn 1.

Guest Post: Da Bestest Orkz

As part of Ork Week, we asked our good friend The Antipope from 122nd Cadian to write us an article. Now, not only is he one of House of Paincake's picks for New Member Monday today but he's also a very keen Ork player. So here's what he had to say about his favourite units in the Ork Codex:

Lootas

I've been running different set-ups with Orky Elite units for a while now - Kommandos with Snikrot, Burnas, Tankbustas, multiple Nob units. You name it, I've tried it. My favourite option by far is the Lootas. Let me explain why. This unit brings an invaluable element to the army - long range anti-tank firepower. In fact they are the only unit that can do something like that reliably.

Their Deffgus have an awesome range of 48" which means they can reach those pesky vehicles that usually hang out in the back ready to zoom in the last few turns to either claim or contest Objectives. Their rate of fire ranges from good to awesome depending on how you roll. Even with just 5 shots they've got enough chance to hit a couple of times which is enough for an AV10 or AV11 vehicle.

I like to keep the units slim so that opponents would think twice before committing a unit to shoot or assault them. Having a long enough range means that you can deploy them quite deep in your deployment zone away from the reach or rapid-firing Bolters. With careful positioning they can be out of range of Heavy Bolters and other 36" range weapons too. Worst case scenario you can always go to ground. Missing a round of shooting is always better than running off the table. Also, they will be relatively safe from assault since your opponent is unlikely to commit a close combat unit for just five guys hanging out in the back.

Boyz

The humble Boyz are the backbone of any Ork army. They are some of the best close combat units in the game with 6 points getting you 4 S4 WS4 attacks on the charge. Cheap as chips and very killy. The big question is how many? For me the ideal number is 20 so that you can fit them in a Battlewagon. Yes, I think that Boyz need a ride in order for them to function properly. Trukks are too weedy and 12 Boyz aren't really enough anyway. So give them a taxi and let them loose on the battlefield. Nob with a Power Klaw and Bosspole mandatory.

Grotz

These little guys can win games if played correctly. Get 10 with a Runtherd for just 40 points and you've got an extra scoring unit. Put them in Reserve regardless of the mission and pray to the Dice Gods that they arrive late enough to stay alive. In Objective missions make sure that you place an Objective near to your table edge so that your little dudes can reach it in one turn of movement. In Kill Point games just hide them behind some LoS blocking terrain so that no-one shoots them.



So they're the thoughts of The Antipope, what does everyone else think? I, for one know how dangerous Lootas can be - I've lost many a Land Speeder to a Deffgun volley. And don't dismiss Grotz, they're cheap and if you can find them some cover to hide in, going to ground gives them a 3++ save, that's better than a Space Marine.

Claws and Fists 'n' Teef

It's Ork week here at Claws and Fists. I really enjoyed playing Orks the other week and I borrowed the Codex from Andy so this week I'm going to talk a bit about what I like the look of in the Codex and then I'll put together some sample army lists. My intention is to have a Kill Team list, a 750 point list for the club competition and a couple of 1750 point lists so stay tuned...

Million Dollar Army?

Dave Taylor's Legio Custodes Army has just sold for $3800 on eBay which was a little too rich for my blood. I just had to stop bidding once it was past the $3000 mark or my wife would actually have killed me (j/k)!

It was all for a good cause which you can read about here. Congrats to the buyer who is getting a beautiful and unique army and contributing to a very worthwhile cause; and a big thumbs up to Dave Taylor for being an all-round decent human being and a pretty spectacular hobbyist!