PlasticCraic

Some very good points here @Enoby and I think this one is worth emphasising. It was an eye-opener for me the first time I went to a store tournament at an FLGS and there was a Yu Gi Oh event happening at the same team. Our players were all male but around 50% of the TCG players were women, and that would not be unusual from what I've seen since. It seems to be the same with RPGs...the same kind of "guys online" might try to explain that away as being more cooperative and more about story-telling, but I think the fact that card games (which are just as adversarial as wargaming) have so many more women playing really highlights that miniature wargaming is the odd one out, and could be so much better. This is also a really important point I think, and has got me wondering why that would be the case. To give one example, the short story in the Fyreslayers White Dwarf issue was explicitly about female leadership and female empowerment. And yet there are zero female Fyreslayers on the tabletop. So the recognition of the issue, and the will to improve positive female representation, does seem to be there. But if it's not making its way through to the tabletop in the same way that it does in the lore, why would that be the case? I guess there's a few reasons: time delays being a big one (GW can turn out fiction, especially short stories, more regularly than they can update every model range). Even then, while the newer ranges do tend to have more women than the older model ranges, it's nowhere near parity. One possible factor is that the creative team (perhaps subconsciously) are cautious about how they model females without being reductive. DOK for example are basically a teenage boy's fantasy and not something that I believe would represent the hobby well to a woman who was new to the game (happy to be told I'm wrong if women reading this disagree). The classic boobplate is less egregious but still (rightly) draws criticism, and maybe it's just easier in that context to stick to what they know? I'd be interested to know how many women are involved at GW in conceptualizing and designing the miniatures. Hopefully someone can turn around and tell me that there are loads of women already employed in that area, but if not, it's something that could probably be looked at in the future as vacancies are created.

Couldn't agree more! I'm genuinely tempted to buy a heap more Hoppers now.

Hey @Gutlord what are your goals? Is this meant to be a tournament army, or something for casual games with mates? Just want to understand your expectations before I chime in!

Yes I'd say it's still worth playing pure IJ under Big Waaagh. Their own allegiance is good too, but you could totally take a pure IJ army and enjoy the benefits of that. Truth is, both IJ (particularly Ironsunz) and BW are fun to play. So is Bonesplitterz. If you're drawn to IJ, you can buy the models and use them in either or both allegiances and they'll operate perfectly well.

Depending on what you mean by viable, I could see myself taking this to an event. It's not the best or most efficient Warclans army (imo) but I think you could reliably go 3-2 with something like this: You're generating loads of Waaagh every turn with that little Heroes and the high body count (so you can buff your casting and unbinding even further). You can stack +2 to save on your Savage Orruks or Arrow Boys, with enough casts to give them a Mystic Shield too, so they're a real pita (60 wounds on 3+ RR1s, 6++). Warchanter generates loads of Waaagh and can buff your Gruntas, then Pebbles. We have the BWV as described above so between Green Puke, Fists of Gork and the Dakka, you have scope to do damage across multiple phases. It's a pretty balanced army so you should be in most games, but it does lack a couple of things: you will really miss a Megaboss for access to Mighty D, and you might be better off with a CP for Turn 0 Battleshock protection rather than the BWV for the magic high jinks. Not cutting edge competitive, but I would call it viable.

One thing I'd really like in here is the Balewind Vortex: Early game it gives you a Turn 0 threat with the Prophet's warscroll spell If we're investing in +s to cast he has a great chance of cracking that 10+, and it gives him approx 36" range (24" + 1" BWV placement + 5" BWV diameter + 6" BWV extension) If you are careful with deployment you might even get to cast it from out of unbind range and still hit a big unit Then if the situation dictates, you can dispel it and cast again with the Weirdnob Shaman He can start banging out double Green Puke with extended range, teleporting himself around if needs be A pretty good tool for 40 points I think, especially with the dual use. So if one wizard goes down, or you've zapped their only big unit, you have a secondary purpose for it.

I agree in general @Nezzhil, playing Grots will be a pretty bleak experience most of the time, because they do have lots of bad matchups and most of them are on-meta power armies. Most trending armies will shoot off your Heroes, switch off your magic or probably both. And then you're left with a rabble that will Battleshock off the table in two turns. Seraphon for example have better movement, better magic, better combat and better shooting. Good luck. I do think mixed / Grot heavy lists still have a few good matchups (although they're definitely behind the curve overall). Negs to hit are still great against Stonehorns for example, and you should be able to get Blightking spam hitting on 5s or 6s, then outscore them on the scenario while you slowly get tabled. Even Fyreslayers might have trouble getting around your Endless Spells and working through your bodies in time. They also have a couple of good Battleplans: the pie-plate A-Rok can get the gold on Focal Points (being within 6" of multiple objectives simultaneously), and even Scorched Earth for that matter. It also helps that Grot Battleline is decent for missions like Better Part of Valour and Shifting Objectives. I guess I'm just being devil's advocate really, because I do believe they are struggling and already need a new book (the current one was really a failed experiment), but I wouldn't completely rule out taking them to a 2-dayer until I'd seen the pack. Next question: What do you think are the best matchups for Squigs? And are you thinking full alpha-strike big Batallion here?

Might be worth checking out Adam Slovak's Squig list, he's been doing quite well with it. He posted the link on Twitter below: Adam went 4-1 at this event, and did a write-up on the list: https://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1srcf1i He's also gone 3-0 at a one-dayer since, so it's worth a second look!

You are correct @EMMachine, sorry for misunderstanding your point @Spiky Norman!

I agree with @Spiky Norman although I should point out that you can't ally the Rogue Idol into a Grots army at 2000 points any more, after he got a points hike to 420. What I'd add is that Wardokks are often worth it for their prayers alone. What I like about that is you can get juice out of them even if you're facing a dominant magic army that shuts you down. A Wurggog Prophet can reliably cast at +6: +1 from Command Trait (or +2 if there are 2+ enemy Monsters within 24") +1 from Artefact +1 from Rogue Idol +1 from Wardokk Dance (works on a 3+ and you can attempt multiple times) +2 from Big Waaagh (spending Waaagh points) And that's just the stuff you can bank on, without your opponent being able to do anything to stop it. That goes up to +7 if you have 2+ enemy monsters nearby, and +8 with Arcane. He casts 2 spells (3 on a Balewind Vortex), has a great Warscroll spell and generates CPs. What limits his effectiveness is that he is relatively easy to kill. Also the Maniak Weirdnob is good with his inherent rerolls, although he got a points hike to 140 because Destruction, and that's too much for what he is really. Gits were meant to be an army with strong magic, but they've been power crept out of that. Their strongest casters are Skragrott and the Arachnarok, both with inherent +1 and access to the Arachnacauldron for a further +1. The Bad Moon will sometimes help a little too. They can muck around with your opponent's casting using the Malevolent Moon (in addition to the Bad Moon Battletrait on occasion), but against a truly dominant magic army you'll never get to cast it. It can give you the edge over mid-tier magic though, and it's a bargain given that it does MWs as well as the anti-magic. Generally Destruction has good magic in an era of great magic, which isn't a great spot to be in unfortunately. But if you did want to do a magic army, I'd suggest Big Waaagh as the most able to mix it with the big boys. Roll your crazy-gravy Bonesplitterz spells first and if you hit a lucky double, you could force out the buffed / auto unbinds early then have some fun with your own buffed casts.

You need Squigs, my friend. Boingrot Bounders are veteran cavalry, elevated to elite status by surviving one single battle; armoured Grots bouncing in and doing Mortal Wounds on the charge, plus bonuses to their wound rolls and damage. They want to charge, keep charging then charge again. A proper cavalry army. This list gets you plenty little guys, where every model is a threat (and all your cav can come back when it dies):

@Gutlord just to expand on that, Fyreslayers are game-breaking in melee. You need to set a trap to be able to fight them at all. If you let them charge you, they will kill your Frostlord. If you charge them, they will spend a CP, fight first and kill your Frostlord. There are a couple of ways around this, but it all involves throwing something under the bus, so you'll need some expendable units, such as Gnoblars or minimum Mournfang. A classic set up would be to put some Gnoblars in front of you and set up 2.5" back. He charges you and can only reach the screen, murders them, and now it's your turn to swing. Your problem will be that FS get to swing again, and a single pile in from a Stonehorn is unlikely to do enough after their 4++ shrug to prevent them wiping you with their second swing (especially since you haven't charged). Last time I played against FS, I was running a Bloodgullets list with 3 Stonehorns (various types), 12 Gluttons, a Butcher and some minimum Mournfang. I slammed the Mournfang into his Hearthguard sideways on, then charged in the buffed Gluttons around the edge and only put one of them within 1/2" of the HGB. He activated first because FS, but almost all of his attacks had to go into the Mournfang. He massacred them and killed maybe one Glutton. The other 11 Gluttons piled in 6" (thanks to Bloodgullets) and wiped the unit in return 😃 After that he charged in with his second unit of HGB and wiped the Gluttons, and I spent the rest of the game running away from his only scary unit, fighting his Heroes / Aurics / Vulkites, and scoring objectives. I won the game, and I'd be pretty confident in the matchup going forward, but I wouldn't have been able to compete without that setup to lift one of his two big threats early on. Key when setting this up is remembering the HGB have 2" melee range, so you have to keep most of your guys well back, but with a 6" pile in you should be able to make it work. Another thing to remember is that your Blood Vultures can be key. Depending on how many Aurics he can fit into his list (which aren't cheap), and the Battleplan, they'll often have one unit of HGB that only has a lone Hero supporting them. If you can Vulture off that Hero before you engage, they become much easier to deal with. Let us know how you get on!

They would come on here and have a moan about it, and get told it's time to move on. Then they'd have a moan in a Facebook group instead, and end up moving on anyway. In a world where GW have thrown entire armies into to the sea, they're not going to let some invalidated Allies purchases stop them doing what they want to do.

My wishlist: 1) Roll off for first turn (win the drops and get +1 to this roll) 2) Define a "big thing" quantitatively (wound count) in all cases, and without any reference to the qualitative Monster keyword (no more Lookout Sir for Plague Furnaces) 3) A list of valid publications for Matched Play to be created and updated online, including the likes of White Dwarf issues, current Battletomes, Wrath of the Everchosen (but not Firestorm), and so on 4) Keep the priority roll 5) Drop the Pitched Battle Profiles booklet from the GH, and make points updates via pdf, rendering them timely and relevant

Good article Aaron, keep 'em coming! My $0.02 is that I largely agree with your core point, with the asterisk that it shouldn't be used as a free pass for the egregious BS we do sometimes see.

Yep, even better! Two nice looking armies there too, good photos 👍

Yep, even better! Two nice looking armies there too, good photos 👍

It does include Mounts. The only things that don't include Mounts by default are Command Traits and Artefacts.

RI works well in Boneys I think the points hike was harsh, but he will pull his weight

I know what you mean, but I'm not adverse to having a wizard or two in there still. It's only Seraphon who has board wide unbinds, so with a 24" range on their buffing spells, Bonesplitterz wizards can generally do their thing from way back. And the Wardokks are worth 80 points for their Dance alone, and casts are almost a bonus. The Maniak Weirdnob and Weirdnob Shaman getting points hikes in the current meta was an insult, but I don't mind a Wardokk or three in my lists. Maybe even a Prophet too.

Eh I know what you mean, but for sneaky Gits it can definitely be a thing. Most successful Gloomspite lists are based around debuffing Grots so it can be reflected on the tabletop too.

In answer to the original question, I feel like it's the best thing since sliced bread. The game has its ups and downs, and over the 5 years I've occasionally walked away for a breather (either through frustration or just burnout), but I'll always keep coming back. Over time the game just keeps getting better, and I enjoyed the 12 months up to Lockdown probably the most since I've played the game. The social aspect is the best part of it, but the game itself in a great place now that every army has a book. I'll be honest, I'm still reeling from Kroak staying at 320 points, but if I could get through Vanguard Wing days, I can get through this.

AKA "Inferial Amulet" 😃

Good write-up @HostilSpike, good to know you can have a bad matchup against Coalesced and still compete!

Yep, I got my hopes up there, but looks like 420.