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Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development

 Post subject: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Fri Jan 17, 2014 11:37 pm 
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Hi guys,

I've agreed with E&C to help out on the development of the Ork lists for his Mechanicus supplement to get them into a state whereby they are ready for publication.

For simplicities sake, my aim is to focus on one list at a time. Get it to a state where we are happy that nothing is fundamentally broken and the list plays as it should, then sign it off and move onto the next.

Proposed order to tackle the lists:

Albert Orkstein Gargant Bigmob
Gobgutz Badfang Stompy Onslaught
Kolonel Sandorks Blood Axe Tribe
Sun-Tzorks Grotling Waaargh!
Harley Orkisons Speed Freaks

So, please feel free to post up your playtest reports, notes and thoughts and let's try to get the lists finished...!

Cheers
Reedar


=========================
Playtest Summary
=========================

3k vs Steel Legion
0-1 to SL

3k vs Black Legion CSM
2-0 to Orks

3k vs Steel Legion
0-1 to SL

3k vs Biel Tan
3-0 to Orks

3k vs Biel Tan
1-2 to Eldar

3k vs Black legion CSM
0-3 to Chaos


Last edited by Reedar on Mon Feb 24, 2014 10:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 12:18 am 
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Starting with OGBM I assume?

Can we talk about how we went from this list to this list?

I have two players in my group who enjoyed 2.2 immensely, and haven't played since 3.0. Complaints fall in to two categories: the removal of units that were already converted and built, and what seemed like arbitrary changes to formations/stats.

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 12:45 am 
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I was always dissapointed when Stompa mobs got removed from OGBM list. I would be happy if these got reinstated.

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 10:12 am 
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Dave wrote:
Starting with OGBM I assume?

Can we talk about how we went from this list to this list?

I have two players in my group who enjoyed 2.2 immensely, and haven't played since 3.0. Complaints fall in to two categories: the removal of units that were already converted and built, and what seemed like arbitrary changes to formations/stats.


Removal of units that were already converted and built:

The 2.2 list may have been fun, but like many lists from that era it was also an unbalanced bloated mess. Some hard choices needed to be made to bring the list to a state whereby it could hope to become balanced.

Some of the converted units, for example the "Crawler" War Engines, can be well represented through a Gargant taking the "Transporta" upgrade (adds transport capacity & speed, reduces number of large weapons). Crawlers are not Gargants, and with the theme of the list being "Gargants & Mekboy weapons", they had to go. Same with Landas, they were dropped in order to concentrate on the "Gargants & Mekboy weapons" theme, and to give the list some weaknesses as well as strengths.

Changes to formations/stats:
Feel free to list any changes to formations or stats that you feel were unwarranted or arbitrary in nature and I'll be able to comment on why changes were made.

In general I can say they happened in order to focus on the list's theme, or for balance reasons, or for both.

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Last edited by Evil and Chaos on Sat Jan 18, 2014 10:21 am, edited 2 times in total.

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 10:15 am 
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wargame_insomniac wrote:
I was always dissapointed when Stompa mobs got removed from OGBM list. I would be happy if these got reinstated.

These were removed in order to concentrate on the "Gargants & Mekboy Weapons" theme of the list; Especially since the options for Stompa Mobs got expanded options in the standard Ghazgul's Ork list (extra Supa Stompa options).

They could be put back in, but I would personally caution against it as their presence would start to dilute the list's theme, IMO. A list is of course defined as much by what it lacks, as what it has.

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 11:57 am 
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My thoughts on the OGBM list are as follows:

Firstly, the Mad Mek Bigboss should be able to be placed in a gargant, not just in a great or mega gargant. However, it should also be forced to go into the most expensive gargant on the table. He is, after all, going to go where all the shiniest big guns are. With E&C's blessing, I tested this change in my OGBM pure gargant list, and found it to be most reasonable.

Secondly, I have found that when placed against an equivalent AMTL list, the Gargants are pretty solidly outperformed. They're fun, and cool, but they do not stand up well to the weaponry available to a titan legion.

The exception to this, I feel, is the Supa Stompa, which is overgunned for its points and position in the list. the ability to take 3 such Stompas, in a single formation, results in a quite spectacular MW barrage

While I realise that this might not be possible, given its position in core lists, I think that Supa Stompas should have their weaponry reduced in some manner. As it stands, Stock Standard 2 Supa Stompas vs a Gargant
Gargant gets +1 on its CC and FF, and on average 1 extra power field, and cannot be suppressed without being broken compared to Supa Stompas
Supa Stompas get the ability to spread out more, and twice as much firepower. They also get 50 points to spend. they're standing at basically as survivable, twice as capable at range, marginally less capable in engagements.

They can also, thanks to their weaponry excess and the granularity of the barrage table, at no cost to firepower, trade one such Soopagun for the free powerfield upgrade.
Now, admittedly, they're less able to customise themselves, but when comparing the two, two SS's are way better than a gargant.
use the 50 points price difference to buy a second Big Generators or Weirdboy tower, and for the same price as an 8DC 6BP Mw Single Gaze of Mork Shot, with d3+3 power fields, you're looking at 8DC, 8BP Mw, 2 Gaze shots, with 6d3 power fields, or perhaps a better choice, 8DC, 10BP Mw, 2 Gaze shots, with 4d3 Power Fields, and a 45cm MW AA attack.

Even if they only had 2 guns each, a 2 SS mob would still have 2BP, or one upgrade, and a Gaze shot more than a Gargant, and be 50 points less

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 12:41 pm 
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Copy and paste error spotted, page 7 "Every Gargant Bigmob army must include a Supreme Commander called a Mekboy Big Boss. The Bad Ork Bikerboy is a free unit".

I agree that Supa-Stompas look too good in comparison to Gargants and think their power should be reduced. Ideally make a list specific version that's the same but with different armament - perhaps a mandatory CC arm, gattling style multiple shot AT/AP gun and only a single Soopagun.

The one thing I REALLY want in the list is the ability to customise all Gargant and Great Gargant weapons. Please allow full customisation of these, like titans can in either the Net-EA or Epic-UK Titan lists. Make them free swaps for soopaguns (ideally), charge varying costs or include more gun options in the unit entries, but please make it possible in some fashion. I find so many MW barrage weapons on Gargants incredibly boring, not fitting with the older background and wider variety of weapon types and simply dull to play with and against. I want to be able to field a Great Gargant with a Gatling Cannon, Mega Choppa and Megalobba for example. I'd probably get some playtests of the list if it had full weapon choices (0-1 per gargant at an extra cost is not enough) whereas I have no desire to play the list in it's current form.


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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 1:04 pm 
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Another typo/omission is that the Supa Stompa stats are nowhere to be found, despite being a common unit

my Gargant Mob, which I really should post pictures of one day, have a few variations in the build (infact, it only had a single gargant with triple Soopas, and only one other that actually used his single remaining soopa in a MW capacity.)

my recollection is at 5k I took:
2 Gargants with 2x Power Klaws and Transport, one with 2 killa kans, and one with 4 (making him my BTS and Warboss, not tactically a great choice, but he was damn eager to get into the fight so who was I to argue. He did tend to explode)
2 gargants with 2x Zzap guns and Grot Megamissiles
1 Gargant with 2x Gattling Guns and Soopagun (realistically, it should have used a Power Klaw, but that wouldnt have worked with the modelling I went with)
1 Gargant with 2x Megalobba and Soopagun
1 Gargant with 3x Soopaguns

Overall, I found there was still some pretty diverse weapon sets, since you only needed, in the end, to have 1 weapon of either Soopa, Zzapp, or Power Klaw, from the original build

but they did, for the most part, underperform. I don't think the 2nd basic upgrade was really worth the extra 50 points more than the first upgrade. It was also fairly punishing to have to force the gargants to Sustain, since orky accuracy is nothing to write home about, and a doubled BP gargant generally fails to do much of anything except put a few blast markers on something.

Course, since I was primarily fighting other titan lists and minervans, experience may be atypical, but yeah, I certainly feel that if I'd taken them as soopa stompas where possible (coulda done it as 2 gargants and 10 Soopas in 6 mobs) I would have come out ahead of where I ended up

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 1:32 pm 
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GlynG wrote:
Copy and paste error spotted, page 7 "Every Gargant Bigmob army must include a Supreme Commander called a Mekboy Big Boss. The Bad Ork Bikerboy is a free unit".

Thanks will fix that in the master document.
I will attach a fixed document here for Reedar's convenience.

Quote:
I agree that Supa-Stompas look too good in comparison to Gargants and think their power should be reduced. Ideally make a list specific version that's the same but with different armament - perhaps a mandatory CC arm, gattling style multiple shot AT/AP gun and only a single Soopagun.

Rather than changing stats of existing units, why not just increase the points cost a bit?

Quote:
The one thing I REALLY want in the list is the ability to customise all Gargant and Great Gargant weapons. Please allow full customisation of these, like titans can in either the Net-EA or Epic-UK Titan lists. Make them free swaps for soopaguns (ideally), charge varying costs or include more gun options in the unit entries, but please make it possible in some fashion. I find so many MW barrage weapons on Gargants incredibly boring, not fitting with the older background and wider variety of weapon types and simply dull to play with and against. I want to be able to field a Great Gargant with a Gatling Cannon, Mega Choppa and Megalobba for example..

Whilst a balanced list with those changes might be a possible outcome, it would I think reset the playtesting experience to date on the existing list. My personal preference would be to finish balancing the existing list for the supplement in a reasonably short period of time (let's say a couple of months), and then look to replacing the list with a more "extended options" version of the list at a later date.

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 1:46 pm 
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Without downgunning the SS's, I think the most important change would be to stop them being in mobs anymore. Add in a price increase (atleast 50 points, probably 75) and maybe deny them access to upgrades (of go the opposite route, call them Kustom Stompas, force them to take an upgrade but make them pay for it by increasing the price further) and you're probably a long way towards stopping the trouble

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 1:50 pm 
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Jaggedtoothgrin wrote:
Another typo/omission is that the Supa Stompa stats are nowhere to be found, despite being a common unit

Thanks I'll get that fixed too.
Quote:
Overall, I found there was still some pretty diverse weapon sets, since you only needed, in the end, to have 1 weapon of either Soopa, Zzapp, or Power Klaw, from the original build

I agree there is plenty of variety there.

Quote:
they did, for the most part, underperform. I don't think the 2nd basic upgrade was really worth the extra 50 points more than the first upgrade.

No love for the triple Zzap Gargant? :-p

Quote:
It was also fairly punishing to have to force the gargants to Sustain, since orky accuracy is nothing to write home about, and a doubled BP gargant generally fails to do much of anything except put a few blast markers on something.

Aye, Orks doubling and trying to do anything rarely does much. :-p

Quote:
Course, since I was primarily fighting other titan lists and minervans, experience may be atypical,

I'd definitely be wary of using that experience as a sole metric.

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 1:53 pm 
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Quote:
Without downgunning the SS's, I think the most important change would be to stop them being in mobs anymore. Add in a price increase (atleast 50 points, probably 75) and maybe deny them access to upgrades (of go the opposite route, call them Kustom Stompas, force them to take an upgrade but make them pay for it by increasing the price further) and you're probably a long way towards stopping the trouble

No objection to seeing a price increase on them (I'd start with 50pts) and certainly no objection to either a price increase or an outright removal of the double & triple size Supa Stompa formations.

With those two changes applied, I'm not sure if you'd need to go the third step of changing what upgrades they're allowed to take, but it could be a further change held in reserve if found necessary?


My experience of the list to date from sixish games has been one of mild losses, but then I too did not try maxing out on Supa Stompas (yet).

EDIT: I have updated the supplement (as found here: viewtopic.php?f=4&t=26652 ) to correct for the typos noted above.

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 5:33 pm 
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Hey Reedar, I'll see you across the table!

Would it be more useful for me to start putting together my own ork gargants or a standard ork/ig/eldar force to face off against them?

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 6:15 pm 
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Just for reference, I am keeping an eye on this.

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 Post subject: Re: Epic: Mechanicus Supplment - Ork Development
PostPosted: Sat Jan 18, 2014 6:22 pm 
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Can lose a few games to you if you fancy Tim? :-)

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