Monday, September 5, 2011

First Thoughts on Ogres

On Saturday morning, like a good little sheep, I dutifully picked up my copy of the new Ogre Book. The first thing I noticed was that GW had managed to sneak a little price increase in. When the hard covered books were released they were $73, the new book was $80. This 9.5% price rise since February is entirely justified by the rampant inflation gripping the Western world. I must remember to cite this inflationary pressure when I’m renegotiating salary next week. The book is nicely presented; full coloured and I must say I prefer the hard covered books to the 40k soft covers. I just hope that they manage to control their rapidly escalating costs :-)
So what about the army? Well there are a few things that can be ascertained from a cursory read.
o The army has been strengthened relative to its predecessor, and its strength is broadly in line with the two recent 8th Edition books. o This is largely achieved by re-pointing existing items – Core troops are considerably cheaper than they were in the last book. o The existing army has been strengthened by the addition of new character, Monster and cavalry options. o The pressure point in list construction is going to come in the Rare section (compare this to Skaven where pressure point is making Core percentage). o As a result of pressure on Rares you are unlikely to see Gorgers or the Scraplauncher. Points will be spent on the new cheaper Maneaters, the Stonehorn and the Thundertusk. o Cheaper cost means you’ll see bigger Bull and Irongut blocks. o New character option Firebelly looks full of win. Access to lore of Fire, breath weapon and flaming attacks makes him a great choice for your Irongut units. o Hard to see the case for Tyrant over a Level 4 Slaughtermaster – especially with Bruiser BSB and Standard of Discipline. o Wider breadth of magic lore with secondary wizards able to access Heavens and Death, while Firebellies can get Fire. However, Gut Magic looks less effective especially with the loss of Loremaster. o Really unsure where Gnoblers fit – apart as secondary “clippers”. Therefore I suspect the initial army will look something like this: o Slaughtermaster o BSB Bruiser o 1-2x Firebellies o 2 6-8 man blocks of Bulls o 2 6-8 man blocks of Ironguts o Block of Leadbelchers o Mournfang Cavalry o Ironblaster o 1-2 blocks of 3-4 Maneaters or single block of 6 o Either Stonehorn or Thundertusk

5 comments:

  1. Man eaters and gorgers are both now in the special section, not rare, so no rare pressure applied from them ;-) A stonehorn can also be a hunter mount, big beast armies could be a little more possible because of this? (No comment on whether it is a good choice, just an option to take heat off the rare slot competition).

    Secondary wizards also have access to lore of beasts as well as the other two you mentioned.

    Interesting that sabre tusks are now in packs as a special choice and gnoblar trappers are gone as a unit choice, being an upgrade for gnobblars. All the White Dwarf coverage ignored gnobblars entirely.

    The change to the iron fist was also intersting, now a shield, so a +1 armour save and the parry save and also gives the parry save to cav, so mournfangs can be armour 2+ with a 6+ ward (albeit it is a 5 point upgrade per model for them).

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  2. Sorry missed the Sabretusks.....essential cheap redirectors....I'd take singly.

    Are you sure on Gorgers - I don't have book in front of me.

    And yes you are right re Beasts

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  3. Just checked...yep, Gorger is Special...still crap I think

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  4. No view on gorgers as i haven't used them, i'm assuming crap as the ambushers isn't reliable enough to do the job of interfering with war machines?

    Ogres will still hate cannons (although the stonetusk halves mulitple wounds it receives, so that's annoying). What methods to take them out would you use? The new, faster options in the book, or magic?

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  5. With warmachines I think Gorgers would take too long to remedy the problem.....at best Turn 3. When you compare this with Gutter Runners which are generally a Turn 2 solution - I assume redundancy and take two units.

    For Ogres I think Maneaters are a better response. Take them with a mix of Scout, Vanguard, Sniper and Poison in groups of three with BoH.

    I love the new Maneaters and will look to run two units to mess with opponents in deployment.

    All theoryhammer at this point though.

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