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Greg Lane and the EpicenterUS group organized a tourney in Memphis over the weekend. I built an Ork army to try to abuse the OW Garrison rule and succeeded remarkably.
We used the experimental rules as in the vault, which is the auto-OW, with no restrictions on activation. I will say unreservedly that it is broken.
Here's the list:
6xBig Guns w/ Zzap upgrade (6x175 = 1050)
Stompa, Kan, Warboss (250)
4xBlitz w/Zzap upgrade (4x200 = 800)
9 FB (450)
3 FB (150)
_12_ activations. 7 Garrisons. 10 TKd3 Weapons.
Anything that even thought about sticking its nose out got hammered. If there weren't enough Bug Gunz formations to hurt it enough for my taste, the Blitz brigades moved in and finished it off. I swept 3 games. The only one that was close was v. IG, but the reason it was close was that I made a couple of major tactical errors that cost me 450 points of units, including my BTS formation, and an objective which would have been a third goal for me. I won 3-0, 2-1 (would have been 3-0) and had a resignation after the first activation in turn 3.
[Incidentally, it was lopsided enough that I actually apologized to the other players (except Greg Lane) for making them playtesters without their prior consent]
Limiting factors that have been discussed:
1) OW formations cannot activate turn 1
This wouldn't have slowed me down appreciably.
In 3 games, I had 17 garrisons (terrain restrictions, so I didn't garrison them all) and activated 6 OW formations in Turn 1. However, I didn't need those activations.
First, if I had to make the choice, a couple of those that activated wouldn't have been on overwatch. In particular, I had the Stompas behind a hill in one deployment and only had them on OW because I could. The other was a second-row gun formation that I knew would probably move up to plug a hole in the line.
Second, at least 2, possibly 3 formations chose not to fire at formations when they had the opportunity. Knowing that I had to "use it or lose it" would have been, at best, a tactical inconvenience in that case. At least one of those formations activated to fire at the exact formation it had foregone fire at earlier, at a to-hit penalty because of double-moving.
The total difference would have been no more than 2 activations by formations that were 175 points - hardly a restriction. Heck, some of my formations stayed on OW until turn 2 anyway due to lack of targets or need to move.
2) Roll initiative for the formation to go on OW
This would have been a significant crimp in my plans, but it still would have been nasty.
Odds are that ~1/3 of the formations would have failed. Once you take out the 6 that did activate and the ones that chose not to fire, the chances are that there would have been enough on OW to do something very similar.
IMHO, the major difference in this would have been that it would have dictated specific tactical choices based on which formations failed - failing formations would be the first to activate, etc..
A significant dent for Orks, but much less so for better initiative ratings.
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I agree that garrisons need a bit of help. Despite having practiced with them so that I now feel I get value out of it, garrisoning is a dangerous business that often does not pay off.
I'm not convinced at this point that OW is a viable option without something even more restrictive than the above options.
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Neal
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