Malakree

Big Waaagh! is better than pure Ironjawz. The 6++ save alone is worth so much in the modern mortal heavy era, the fact you can also get +1 to hit/wound makes Ironjawz just disgraceful, more than one opponent has questioned the fact all my stuff is on 2+/2+. I've been playing some TTS with a new list recently and it's been doing really well, I'm currently 4-0 with an extra undecided game (was probably slightly in his favour) and I've used big waaagh! at tournaments earlier in the year. This is my current list. If I was going to replace the 30 Arrowboys it would be with another 20 Ardboys, the bodies/wounds are just so crucial at the moment, I'd also probably swap the weirdnob artefact for Ignix scales on the Ardfist warchanter since Kroak is so prolific at the moment. The key thing is you want AT LEAST 1 source of Mighty Destroyers in your army, either Brutish Cunning or an Ironfist. If you go the Ironfist route it should be a unit of 6 GG's.

This is basically the list you just said right?

Big waaagh! Mixed rogue idol lists are really solid. It's a great warscroll at a solid points cost which can be buffed by IJ and BS buffs. Honestly it's just solid.

If you add 6 gg's it reduces it down to 60 Ardboys

Yes you can combine with bonesplitterz in big waaagh. To be honest BW is probably the best way to run pure IJ. Ironjawz lists are built in the subtleties rather than the overarching unit choices. You're battalions, whether you take specific heroes and what weighting you give to each of the units will change how the list plays. GG's make your list faster but harder to keep in range of buffs. Ardboys make the list tankier at the cost of speed. Brutes do add more damage but without the speed or sustainability. Cabbage adds a massive CA user that can hit hard but costs you on wounds/bodies elsewhere. So this is ~what @Skeekrit ran at slaughter. vs what I ran vs another list I ran previously Those are 3 lists made up of the same broad components but each of them plays very differently. One is built around the grind, one is magic MW output and the last is blitz/hammer and anvil.

It's ****** awkward to explain but the short version is no, the reason is you can't actually go far enough not that you're not allowed. I'll go into a more detailed explanation below. Terminology Within α" means under OR EXACTLY so a unit which can be placed "Within 6" of a board edge" can be placed EXACTLY 6" from a board edge. This also means that if an objective is 12" away from a board edge then there is a single point on the board that is Exactly 6" of the board edge AND exactly 6" from the objective. So a model can be placed so that the very edge of it's base is on that point and it is within 6" of both the board edge and objective. Conversely the term more than α" is equivalent to not within α" DOES NOT include EXACTLY α" Hence In order to use Mad as Hell you must be more than 9" from an enemy unit. Hence you are (9+β)" where β > 0 You trigger Mad as Hell and move 6" (9+β)" - 6" = (9-6)"+β" = 3"+β" Since β > 0 ==> (3+β)" > 3" Thus you are more than 3" from an enemy unit Hence you are not within 3" of an enemy unit. You are not in combat.

No you couldn't charge, you could however still run in your movement phase.

There are a few other reasons I do it but they are much more complicated to explain. Realistically though I would go banner, banner, icon, icon, banner, icon. For increasing unit sizes. It means at 10 I go double banner and at 15 I go double banner single icon.

Screen it. Protect it until you can unleash it on a meaningful target. At the moment Ardboys will mince through any other screens without requiring a hammer to do it. So you screen out deepstrikes etc. while your Ardboys slowly meatgrinder their way through the opponents screens. At some point they will have to commit something meaningful to deal with the Ardboys which you then want to pounce on with the MK, preferably in such a way that it's protected from retaliation. In other words, practice practice practice. I've been playing my IJ for 3 years now with maybe 200 tournament games. I cannot tell you how many times my MK died for absolutely nothing, there was a rather embarrassing game on THW stream for chrimbobo game 1, chucked one into 6 kurnoths and lost it to kill 2 which were instantly regrowthed back....So yeah, practice.

@Kasper @brattenbergus On the banner glyph point. Personally I would recommend just building double banner for your unit. The glyph is really situational and very meh, you won't notice it not being there. On the otherhand a unit without a banner is significantly worse, to the point if I have to choose between the boss and banner as the last model ~70% of the time I choose the banner. Since you may choose to split your units into 5s and there are several different abilities which allow people to target/remove specific models that Redundency is crucial.

@VonSmall That's actually a really nice variation on the list I've been building/working around. Dropping the wurrgog for to have 15+15+15 rather than 15+15+5 is something I hadn't thought of. I'm not sure how you deal with fyreslayers or petrifex would be my issues. I'm definately leaning into massive mw output to get round the problem...

I recognise those realmgates haha

Because I need to do it for most of the game against a whole bunch of different armies? KO/Changehost get teleports everyturn that I'm screening out. Also IJ based big waaagh! isn't going below 4/5 drops which means you're not getting to choose a large portion of the time anyway.

@tripchimeras You're actually slightly misunderstanding why I have them. In every list I build I always consider how I'm going to screen any teleporting etc. into my backline and how I'm going to protect isolated objectives. The Arrowboys aren't there for their shots or damage, that's just a nice bonus. They are there because it's a massive amount of wounds, bodies and more importantly coverage. Take a scenario like escalation. A single Arrowboys unit of 20 is covering my entire board edge and a large amount of my territory just by existing. I'm paying 30 points more than a unit of 5 Ardboys to get double the number of bodies AND they are also a reasonably strong ranged threat which is important in the current meta. I don't actually want a unit of 30 buffed up arrowboys. In the first list it's the Savage Orruks I would be buffing to act as a massive and very dangerous anvil in the middle of the board, the hammer is two highly mobile units of 6 GG's which are going to be supported by a warchanter each. For the second list I have an Ironjawz core which is terrifying to deal with, they can easily push forward and threaten anything I want. The arrowboys are there to sit behind the hammer and take potshots while stopping any/all shenanigans. If you look at basically every list I build they all run at least 2 min sized units to provide screening/space control for deepstriking and to provide presence on outlying objectives. This is a trend which goes back to my 2017 lists which ran a unit of 20 Gitmob with bows for exactly that purpose. My gitz lists still run 2 units of 3 fellwaters for outlying objective holding AND at least 1 unit of 20 shootas for backline screening. My preference is always for 3 backline screening but 20 arrowboys is way better than 10 and doesn't negatively impact their potential. EDIT: I got some example pictures previously of me doing it in game. They show how I'm using cheap min str units quite well I think. 120 points to stop the eels coming on in my deployment zone. The black dice in the middle represent the only area he can get his tunneling hero and 30 Irondrakes in the picture outside of his deployment zone. Even then Mollog and the giant are zoing his deployment zone hard as well. This particular one won me the game by putting them so far out of position that they never became relevant.

Maybe something like this As a starting point. Using the savage orruks for bodies etc. rather than Ardboys and the GG's for the hammer. Arrowboys for even more reach. I'd play around form there but I don't have the experience with savage orruk units to properly judge. Maybe this instead. EDIT: The arrowboys providing a massive amount of bodies/wounds along with their ranged potential so they can sit on objectives and still contribute.

Don't have the models but yeah I'd run a proper mixed if I could.

Wouldn't drop him at all. The +1 to cast/heal/save for the Wurrgog is so good and he's also carrying the mortal wound mask. The least negotioable part of the list is the Wurrgog+Wardokk combo 😆

So I don't actually have a spell portal painted 😅 it's kinda hard to fit into my list the way I'm running it. The balewind I can fit in with only a little bit of tweaking.

I keep telling people he's the best warscroll in the book and half of then don't even realise he's in there. I used him at slaughter with +1 trait and +1/2 artefact. Throw in arcane and the wardokk dance I got him up to +7 to cast in one game 🤯 7 wounds, solid in combat, 4+ CP, unbelievably good warscroll spell and has access to Gorkamorkas warcry. Oh and he's a 2 cast wizard. So so good. So at slaughter this weekend Gabe Huddleston went 4 wins and a draw with Big waaagh. Was an MK, 10 Brutes ironfist, bunch of ardboys. Not 100% on the full list but it had no GGs I believe. There was also @Skeekrit on 3/2 with 75 ardboys in an ardfist 😮 one of his losses was to my jammy rolls in our game 1 grude. I also went 3-2 with a combo ardfist+gg/brutes ironfist and a bunch of magic. My big three big takeaways were 1) I still hate brutes, big waaagh has way more cps to IP them at least which alleviates the bravery issue. I can see why a unit of 10 could work. To be honest though I've been the ardboy boss for 2 and a half years now so it's definately a ton of personal bias. 2) The combo of a Wurrgog general with morks boney bits, master of the weird and a wardokk with the waaagh mask is just as good as I hoped it would be. Fisted a ton of people and Gorkamorkas warcry On +3 base is sweet. I'd probably take a different spell on the wardokk though, he never cast the warcry just because it wasn't worth the risk. 3) Wrath of Gork is a good spell which is hampered by it's range and radius. I'd either take it with a balewind or just go hand of gork. There were a couple of times wrath was out of range and I would have killed for a HoG. The 4" budge from a balewind and extra 6" range giving it a threat of 26" would make a massive difference. I need to check but I don't think balewind increases the radius, only the range. That would still be a much needed boost though.

Some variation on this with either an Ironfist, Megaboss with brutish cunning or both. Allegiance: Big Waaagh!LeadersWurrgog Prophet (160)Orruk Warchanter (110)Orruk Warchanter (110)Battleline15 x Orruk Ardboys (270)15 x Orruk Ardboys (270)6 x Orruk Gore-gruntas (320)- Pig-iron ChoppasUnits5 x Orruk Ardboys (90)5 x Orruk Ardboys (90)Total: 1420 / 2000Extra Command Points: 0Allies: 0 / 400Wounds: 129 Basically a ton of wounds, one unit of 6ggs for the hammer an Ardfist or Ironfist. Maybe a weirdnob with HoG. Just so hard to kill and will grind out anything on the 2+/2+/-1/2. This was my preferred slaughter list but I didn't finish the extra 15 ardboys. Allegiance: Big Waaagh!LeadersOrruk Weirdnob Shaman (110)- Artefact: Shamanic Skullcape- Lore of the Weird: Wrath of GorkWurrgog Prophet (160)- General- Command Trait: Master of the Weird- Artefact: Mork's Boney Bitz- Lore of the Savage Beast: Gorkamorka's War CryOrruk Warchanter (110)- Warbeat: Fixin' BeatOrruk Warchanter (110)- Warbeat: Get 'Em BeatWardokk (80)- Artefact: Big Wurrgog Mask- Lore of the Savage Beast: Gorkamorka's War CryBattleline15 x Orruk Ardboys (270)15 x Orruk Ardboys (270)6 x Orruk Gore-gruntas (320)- Pig-iron ChoppasUnits5 x Orruk Ardboys (90)5 x Orruk Ardboys (90)5 x Orruk Ardboys (90)BattalionsIronfist (160)Ardfist (120)Total: 1980 / 2000Extra Command Points: 2Allies: 0 / 400Wounds: 150

With a shield he's refilling saves isn't he? So 4+ RR which is solid. Chance to fail is 1/2*1/2=1/4 or 25% while a 3+ save is 1/3 to fail or 33%. Means statistically a wyvern with boss shield has a better save than an MK at 0 rend (ethereal amulet anyone?)

I can't disagree that I'm biased. I suspect I have a very warped view of who's good and who isn't...I mean I consider my clubmate Alex Bruce to be slightly above average which apparently is not the case? (I consider myself average...)

ugh I confused it with the other one for 1-5 brutes. I guess that just leaves you with 2 cabbages, 2 footbosses, 10+5+5 brutes Honestly it's just bad for it's cost.

@PlasticCraic I think in the UK we are pretty much settled on Ardboy based Big Waaagh! without an MK. being the best IJ based list in the book, There is definitely legs on other lists but as a second tier list in the book. Not sure on the Bonesplitterz because we only really have Ben Savva who plays it properly and he's such a legend that it's meaningless to judge off him 😁

On the footbosses it's best viewed as a free half-stack (no wound) on strength from victory. They still have all the traditional problems faced by Footbosses, slow as sin, massive bases, unreliable and no support abilities. Say we lean into maximising the gain from it. The units we are talking about are all multi-damage units anyway. Brutes have the boss/special weapon while MK/footboss have no single damage unit, so lets just drop the WC altogether and go full ham. This is a 1 drop list which maximises the +1 attack, the MSU Brutes is a classic for the +1 attack and the smaller units means that you are getting an extra attack on both the boss and the choppa. More over the fact you're running 10 units in a 1drop means that you need to roll a 2+ for the 2 extra attacks giving you 11 attacks base from both the Krusha weapons, 9 attacks from each of the footbosses while the brutes are doing 13 attacks on 4+/3+/-1/2 and 21 attacks at 3+/3+/-1/1. That's a ton of attacks and half of your army is gaining wounds/attacks whenever it kills something in a combat phase which combined with the Ironsunz CA is actually something which should happen a fair bit, not to mention that you have a massive amount of CA coverage and the -1 to hit to soak that first round. It's more than a bit mad but could be a laugh. Plus it's a 1 drop which are basically unheard of atm.