Orkz - gib uz a brik

[Plaxor]

Ok so out of the 126 fleets that I looked over... (note most of these are from first time players, who wanted suggestions on what they had, and seemed to take a 'some of everything' approach) I threw out space hulk lists, as these skewed results. They're taken from every forum I could think of with a significant bfg following.


TS: 92% of fleets  (78% had at least 2)
KK: 64%   (23% had at least 2)
Slamblasta: 5%
Kroolboy: 0%
Gorbags revenge: 7%
Hammer: 35%
Ramship: 54%
Onslaught: 7%
Ravager: 62%
Savage: 34% (this is surprising)
Deathdeala: 31%
Roks: 24%

I also did warlord upgrades,
Powerfields: 42%
Mad Meks: 0%
Looted Torpedos; 28%
Maniak gunners: 0%
Mega-armor: 14%

As you can see the favored BB/BC is the hammer, followed closely by the deathdeala, gorbags revenge and the slamblasta follow far behind. Kroolboy no one took. Also note that 75% of fleets had a BB/BC

The Kill-Kroozer is actually taken rather often, but not in multiples like the TS, which almost triples it in that respect. As far as escorts go, people love the ravager, followed by the brute (as suspected). These two show values that look like what you would expect compared to the cruisers, and the bb/bc (if they are lumped together, as people can only take one). However the savage gunships are fairly far behind, and onslaughts even further than that.

As far as the warlord upgrades... well no one likes two of the options, and about 40% of fleets elected to take no upgrade at all in their lists (even though every one observed was at least 1000 points).

[Plaxor]

Also some more interesting facts about this study:

Common Fleet Cores (i.e. cruisers/bb,bc)

4KK,2xHammer (or 1hammer and deathdeala)
4-5TS
1KK 2TS Deathdeala or Hammer
3-4TS Deathdeala or Hammer

Average number of lb per fleet: 9.4
Ratio of escorts to capital ships: 1.15:1 (very low considering. People seemed to mostly use them as a points fill or because they felt that they should)

[lastspartacus]

Thats some pretty cool foot work

[Plaxor]

Hey thanks. Anyways for comparison I did Imperial bastion/gothic fleets as well:

Apocalypse: 4%
Emperor: 27%
Retribution: 23%
Vengeance: 11%
Avenger: 3%
Excorcist: 1%
Overlord: 20% (5% contained two or more)
Armageddon: 8%
Mars: 44% (21% contained two or more)
Gothic: 49% (28% contained two or more)
Tyrant: 16%
Dictator: 11%
Dominator: 40% (19% contained 2 or more)
Lunar: 44% (35% contained 2 or more)
Cobra: 30%
Firestorm: 28%
Sword: 35%
Dauntless: 48%

Endeavor (including variants): 1%

Anyways, this doesn't really provide any new insight in the way of Orks, although you can see that in this scenario, with the wide selection of vessels, ships considered 'good' are taken at least 30% of the time. Battleships... well as the limiting factor precludes, this is more like 20. I understand people not taking the dictator in favor of the mars (and all it's beauty) but what is with the hatred for the tyrant? is it the fact that it has no nova cannon and less weapon batteries compared to the dominator? Note that 3 of the five cruiser variants had similar values, as well as the dauntless. The emperor and retribution pretty much split the battleship market. And the Mars dominated the BC/GC section, followed slightly by the overlord. The escorts were about equal. 72% of fleets contained escorts.

Also note the low grand cruiser amounts, I think this is largely due to the money cost of the vessel, and how weird it feels in a IN fleet. Similarly with endeavors and variants, these aren't readily available anymore, and are generally considered worse than the dauntless.

Overall it's interesting, people favor lances a lot when it comes to basic cruisers. Also I kept track of the number of fleets with nova cannons: 65%, and 54% of those that did, had at least two.

Other interesting facts: Average LB per fleet: 5.6, average number of capital ships per fleet: 6.7, escort to capital ship ratio: 1.2:1 (slightly higher than orks)

I might do chaos later.

[fracas]

Ork escorts clearly are not appealing enough as is
But from a fluff standpoint it really should be an escort based fleet much like corsair eldars

[lastspartacus]

Unless its a WAAAGH! list, right?

[horizon]

Still not. Perhaps less escorts then the normal list but still high amount of escorts.

[horizon]

Hi,

the following is from the (good) Ork player in our group:

---------------

Orks are sub-par in BFG, some reasons lie in the game-mechanics, some in the lack of restrictions and mandatory aspects in army-composition in BFG, some in the design of the Orks themselves.
In general Orks ships are fine the way they are, the rules reflect the ork background (and believe me, i know orks, play them in all GW games since Rogue Trader ;-) and typical ork strenghts and weaknesses.

There is but one real, mediocre, problem: the combined weaknesses lack of speed, lack of manouverability and few shields lead to 2 things:
- in battles orks are sub-par in, at least, the first 2 turns against any fleet that is faster and/or with better weapon-range. Especially a problem with some scenario's an set-ups where manouverability is of the essence and against really fast fleets with a lot of long-range (60cm) firepower
- in army-composition ordnance as theme is almost mandatory as the only working alternative

In game-mechanics this can be solved with a quite simple change though.1) All Ork ships get +1 shield2) Shields that are down come back on:

*** 5+ for escort (begins with 2, after that between 0 and 1 returns per turn)
*** 4+ for cruiser (begins with 2, after that on average 1 returns per turn)
*** 3+ for cruiser (begins with 3, after that on average 2 return per turn)

That solves the relatively big vulnerability in first turns for Orks (extra shield) and on average they they have the same number of shields IF the enemy keeps on the pressure.But if an enemy only sticks to shooting from afar (run and hit), the full +1 shield will return so that tactic (that is in my opinion less fun and hardly real gaming) does not work as well anymore.

With this change Orks get a little bit more survivability on just those parts where the game mechanics have made them sub-par.This also makes it possible to play with less ordance, a different army-composition becomes a valid option.Finally rolling for return of shields is VERY Orky, also exists in WH40K and Epic.

Furthermore i would change little, the rest of the Ork rules and fleet are quite allright except one thing: the heavy guns off course.

Heavy guns left/right are orky and fine, also in combination with point-cost of ships, but heavy guns in front are useless.That also, again, leads to the standard change to torpedoes in the front and, therefore, ordnance theme.Change the range in the front to 30cm on cruisers and that makes them usefull enough.

--------

[fracas]

The shield recovery is too much like necrons so I am not a fan

Shooty and tough are orky traits (fast as well when u factor in AAF)
Give them all +1 turrets or ork turrets hit on 3+ if you want to keep the stats
Ork cruisers are cheap and great value buys; ork escorts should all be cheaper by 5-10pts to keep this theme

[flybywire-E2C]

Also some more interesting facts about this study:

Common Fleet Cores (i.e. cruisers/bb,bc)

4KK,2xHammer (or 1hammer and deathdeala)
4-5TS
1KK 2TS Deathdeala or Hammer
3-4TS Deathdeala or Hammer

Average number of lb per fleet: 9.4
Ratio of escorts to capital ships: 1.15:1 (very low considering. People seemed to mostly use them as a points fill or because they felt that they should)

This is excellent work, and its really sad that Ork escorts aren't used more. I wonder how much of this is the general malaise concerning escorts in general due to a-boat poison. BTW- the FAQ a-boat nerfing really works; escorts manage to spend a great deal of time on the table now. My son reverted to killing them with bombers because he said he had a better chance with them, which tells me this is fixed.

I'm really surprised Savages are taken more often than Brutes; I figured Brutes to be the most popular escort for price and utility, which explains why they command a high price on eBay (yes, I keep tabs in this as well to see what kinds of ships people buy more than others). I figured the new Onslaught with its +1 turret would be in higher demand, as it's the only Ork escort with two turrets now.

I know 40 points a pop is steep for what are supposed to be cheap ships, and this is still a discussion point.

- Nate

[horizon]

Orks do not fear assault boats as they have the Terror Kroozers. I think.

Very good to hear positive about the assault boat idea. We already used a healthy amount of escorts, I am glad such a change will see more escorts around all places.

Ebay stinks, ships tend to go by higher prizes then what GW asks. doh

As said an Orky problem was the change of costs/stats in the 1.5 rulebook update. A big suprise to everyone.

[Plaxor]

This is excellent work, and its really sad that Ork escorts aren't used more. I wonder how much of this is the general malaise concerning escorts in general due to a-boat poison. BTW- the FAQ a-boat nerfing really works; escorts manage to spend a great deal of time on the table now. My son reverted to killing them with bombers because he said he had a better chance with them, which tells me this is fixed.

I'm really surprised Savages are taken more often than Brutes; I figured Brutes to be the most popular escort for price and utility, which explains why they command a high price on eBay (yes, I keep tabs in this as well to see what kinds of ships people buy more than others). I figured the new Onslaught with its +1 turret would be in higher demand, as it's the only Ork escort with two turrets now.

I know 40 points a pop is steep for what are supposed to be cheap ships, and this is still a discussion point.

- Nate

Nate, you're reading it wrong... Brutes are more popular than savages (I listed brutes as 'ramship') brutes are used in 54% of lists, savages in 34%. I think I might go back and write average number of each ship per list. Because it seems people run brutes in larger numbers (5-11 each time they take them, as opposed to usually 3-5 for savages)

Onslaughts don't have 2 turrets, you're thinking of the ravager, which is quite popular at 62% of lists. Onslaughts are the least taken of all at just 7%

Ork escorts shouldn't fear ABs, because even with the old rules, bombers were almost as good at killing them with their 4+ armor, now ABs have a harder time than bombers to kill them (ha!) which to me feels more orky. I mean a hit and run team is going to probably have little idea what to blow up on an ork ship. Not to mention they will be getting more resistance from the crew.

[Plaxor]

Average number of each escort taken per fleet. (actually this time only over 50 fleets, it's a bit hard finding all of them, but this time they are all 1500)

.42 Savage Gunships per fleet. (saw one squadron that wasn't 2 or 3 ships, very rarely mixed)
2.85 Brute Ramships per fleet.
1.15 Ravagers per fleet
.76 Onslaughts per fleet


So even though the ravagers are taken in more lists than any other ork escort, they aren't taken in large numbers, and even though the onslaughts are by far represented in the fewest lists, of these they are taken in large numbers. Brutes... we'll they are as expected.


What this means... well the savage is taken somewhat often... but in very few numbers... which leads to the idea that it's job as a flanker, or the fact that it may be taken as a 'just because I have the models' type deal. Although it is odd that this wouldn't happen for the onslaught.

I don't know what to make of this, but this is a bit more evidence for the Onslaught/Savage weakness. Although it is weird....

[lastspartacus]

Nothing to add atm, just wondering:

What are the current proposed rules for the Grunt and Assault kroozer?  I cant seem to find them.

[flybywire-E2C]

Orks do not fear assault boats as they have the Terror Kroozers. I think.

Very good to hear positive about the assault boat idea. We already used a healthy amount of escorts, I am glad such a change will see more escorts around all places.

Ebay stinks, ships tend to go by higher prizes then what GW asks. doh

As said an Orky problem was the change of costs/stats in the 1.5 rulebook update. A big suprise to everyone.

Okay, here's what we are looking at.

All Ork escorts keep their profiles from BFG 1.5 except for price changes:

Ravager: 40 pts (unchanged)
Onslaught: 35 pts
Grunt: 35 pts (new ship, profile to follow)
Savage: 30 pts
Brute: 25 pts (unchanged)

Thoughts?

- Nate