Is Ironjaws beginner friendly for new players ?

[Incineroar87]

Just wondering if IronJaws is easy to get into for new players ?  They seem well supported out of all the destruction forces atm having decent balance on the battlefield.  They don't seem too complicated rules wise as well?

Trying to get a friend interested in AOS

 

 

 

 

[SirPug]

I think they are rather easy to play but have some trouble vs armies that have full armybooks.

Tzeentzh and nurge particulary are pain. Also lack of shooting and mortal wound output is bit of a problem. 

But in core they are simple army wich is both strength and weakness at the same time. 

They look cool and are rather cheap army to collect if you buy both start collecting and the weird mob warband boxes.

[flemingmma]

Low model count is a good thing as well, easy to get your whole army painted

[Incineroar87]

Do they have any power builds at lower point games ? I'm assuming the standard Marcrusher and supporting units is fairly fine in lower point games ?

[Malakree]

Ironjawz are a very good army for learning the combat and movement aspects of the game at an incredibly in depth level, how to move, charge and pile in are all absolutely key to Ironjawz winning any game so for that aspect they are an amazing starter faction. They also have two amazing box sets which between them contain almost everything you could ever want, throw in a Maw-Krusha and it's literally everything you could ever want.

The low model count was a draw for me as it meant I could spend a lot of time on a small amount of models, having done a 6e Tomb Kings army the idea of painting hordes again was just a none starter. The entire Ironjawz range is also very sturdy, with the exception of the weirdnob, which means they can take a beat/be manhandled and not break I've had 1 head and 1 arm falloff in 9 months and both were easily repaired. The weirdnobs hand is, as I said, the one exception to this rule. I cannot get the damn thing to stay on short of building a massive bracer of greenstuff for it.

Rules wise there are some intricacies for Ironjawz, things like the Ardboy shields and banners, hero phase movement and SnB. Compared to some factions however we are very light on cross unit buffs instead having our power focused inside each units warscroll.

On the competitiveness scale we rank Mid/High Tier 2 on a three tier scale, we aren't broken and don't ignore aspects of the rules (cough seraphon teleport cough) but even though we will lose to them more often than not we can take games off them unlike some other factions, RIP Beastclaw Raiders. The weaknesses we have are pretty glaring and we can kind of play around them with our allies choices but are limited in how much we can. 

For smaller scale games Ironjawz suffer a little bit because the Maw-Krusha is such a huge part of our army, we can make a core at 1k but lack the low points level flexibility due to the sheer cost of our entire army.  As a good example the Waaagh! ability requires you to have at least 6 Ironjawz units/heroes to actually reach full power, something which is incredibly hard to get at 1k. On the other hand it means that it's really easy to build a 1k list and very cheap, A start collecting+Mawkrusha is 860 points on it's own and has everything you need!

Quote

Leaders
Megaboss on Maw-Krusha (460)
Orruk Warchanter (80)

Battleline
10 x Orruk Ardboys (180)
- Ironjawz Battleline
3 x Orruk Gore Gruntas (140)
- Ironjawz Battleline

Total: 860 / 2000
Allies: 0 / 400
Wounds: 55

Overall I would say that Ironjawz are probably the best starting army in the game for learning the movement, charge, pile-in and combat portions of the game. Each of them is an incredibly important part of the army that we are quite restricted on and require precision to get the most out of, you will pay for mistakes made in each of those aspects. Our lack of diversity and the expensive nature of the units is both a boon and a curse, I lament it now but when I was starting out and building my army it was so easy to make choices/decisions.

Honestly for a starter faction I would say go for Ironjawz or Stormcast. SC are the better more well rounded faction for later on but are a little more daunting earlier when trying to build your list. When you hit 2k and start looking at your options IJ expands into a GA:Destruction list while GA:Stormcast is a Grand Alliance all of it's own.