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Basic Orc Boyz

The bog standard, basic orc trooper is perhaps the best infantryman in the entire game. While they might not have the skill or discipline of Dwarfs, or the fancy gear of those Chaos gits, one look at the points cost should erase any doubt. For a measly 5 points you get a trooper who is as cheap as a human, has at least average leadership, is as tough as a dwarf or a chaos warrior, and can charge with a Choppa for Strength 4! There are two major tradeoffs:

First of all is the bit no one really thinks about, and that is the fact that you are on the larger 25mm base. This means that against a good number of opponents, you will not be able to get as many lads into combat as the enemy. Lapping-round will help to mitigate this, so be sure to take advantage of it whenever you can. It also means that large units will take up a lot of real estate and make deployments difficult, especially on smaller tables. Look on the bright side, though - your enemy will have that much harder a time flanking you!

The other problem of course is Animosity. Your boyz are a touch excitable, and the longer it takes you to get them stuck-in the greater the possibility that they'll find other ways to amuse themselves. My own personal solution to the problem of animosity is to have a lot of units on the table, so that if one mob of lads gets held up sqabbling, then another mob can step in to pick up the slack. Of course, the more units that you have on the table the greater the chance that one of them will suffer animosity, so you really can't win. Black orcs are helpful, but they can't be everywhere and they aren't always appropriate. Having flexible plans and being good at improvising strategy will come in handy when animosity happens, but it will lose you games from time to time and unfortunately that is just part of the life of an Orcy general. I find that the best remedy is to hop up and down and shout threats at the models - your milage may vary!

Orcy equipment is pretty limited, but this is actually a blessing in disguise. First let me say something on the subject of shields: forget em! Point for point, you will almost always be better off spending the points on more lads. Toughness 4 and superior numbers will keep your units in fighting trim better than the 5+ save that shields and lt armor will afford you. Also, because orcs use Choppas, they can never get the extra Save bonus for using a Hand-weapon & shield in close combat, which again limits the usefulness of shields.

Giving your basic troopers an off-hand choppa or spear can be useful occasionally, but in my experience the best equipment for a basic orc is more basic orcs. Taking an extra choppa works well against low-save, low toughness troops and can bolster the hitting power of an undersized unit. Spears are good if you are building a unit which you plan on using to soak up a charge. However, in either case you lose one of your orcy advantages, which is the ability to charge with that Strength 4 choppa. I will grant you that GETTING the charge with your very average movement of 4 can be a tricky proposition, but if it was too easy it wouldn't be fun, would it? :) I have on occaision had my lads toss aside their spears or extra hand weapons and charge with just their choppas if I felt the situation demanded it. My advice is to only tool up one or two units if you have specific plans for them, otherwise just buy your lads as-is.

The biggest and perhaps the most important question then becomes that of how large to make your units. The answer is to "Stack 'em deep and sell 'em cheep!" While the legal minimum is 10, the PRACTICAL minimum is likely to be 16 lads deployed 4x4. Even then, in a battle of larger than 1000 pts, a unit of 16 will be ducking missile fire and hunting for flank-charges rather than taking the enemy head-on. The largest unit of orcs I ever fielded was 40, and that was against a shooty dwarf army where I was fairly certain that by the time I got to the other side of the table I'd only have 20 lads left. 20 is a good number for a basic unit of orcs: robust enough to soak up some missile fire and still able to deliver a punch on arrival. 25-30 will be very resilient and assure you of getting outnumbering bonuses on more expensive troops. Arriving into combat with some kind of rank bonus intact is also important because (let's face it) with WS of 3 your boys aren't exactly going to put on a display worthy of a swordmaster. In a 2000 pts army I always have at least one unit in the 25-30 range supported by 2 units of 20. Full command groups are essential, if for no other reason than the fact that your enemy will almost certainly bring the same.

Orcs have 3 core troop variations: Big-Uns, Savage Orcs, and the much maligned Arrer-Boys.

Arrer-Boys

Hoo-boy! What good things can we say about these fellahs? Often referred to as "Error Boys", this is what happens when you give an Orc a missile weapon. The truth is that your average orc will get more mileage out of that bow by beating his opponent over the head with it than by trying to shoot it. Why is this? Humans also have a Ballistics Skill of 3, but this is mitigated by their superior weapons (longbows, crossbows, and handguns) as well has the fact that they are on the smaller base size, which allows a greater volume of fire. Your orcs are limited to a 24" range, hitting at Strength 3, and to top it off you can only get a handful of these lads into position without taking up your whole deployment zone. Finally, as with all missile troops they forego the basic light armor of the HTH infantry. And for all this we pay two extra points!! I believe Bart Simpson put it best when he said "That's pretty craptastic." The truly sad bit is that every Orcy general I know has a ton of these models lying around due to the fact that GW included them in the 4th/5th ed. Orc warriors box in equal amounts with their hand-to-hand brothers and then gave us another 16 in the 6th edition Basic Box. So what can I DO with the buggers!?!

Well, they still get their choppas, so they can still kick arse in HTH against the enemy's weaker units. They are also generally cheaper than the basic missile troops of other races, which makes fielding them as a combat block that has the added ability to shoot (or more likely stand-and-shoot) a possibility, although not a highly reccomended one. In 5th edition I used 2 cheap units of 6 to do things like guard the Rock-lobba or occupy a building. They are still useful in this type of role, but their new minimum unit size has made them a lot less nimble. They are perhaps best used in specialized situations - defensive scenarios or sieges(when defending).

Unfortunately, more often than not, I simply stick them in with the regular lads to bulk out the ranks if I find myself short of basic orcs.

Savage Orcs

Although I have never used savage orcs myself (not a huge fan of the old models), I can easily envisage a unit of them in my army. You pay an extra point for these gonzo orcs and you get frenzy - and for a further point you can buy a 6+ ward save for all of them! The frenzy is a good news/bad news kind of thing. Frenzied troops can rock in HTH, but they are easily diverted or avoided by wily generals. As a result the best place for these lads is probably somewhere in the center of your battle line where they can't get led off into a corner and where they will get maximum support from the units around them. I hear that people field entire armies of these lads, but I would have a hard time keeping all those frenzied orcs going in the direction I wanted.

Savage Orcs can take Shields, but there's no real reason to, considering that you don't get any other kind of armor. Remember, Orcs are T4 - shields are for T3 gits! DO go for the 6+ warpaint save, though. Although a 6+ ward save on a character might seem less than useful, give it to an entire unit and you will see some results.

You may only pay the +3 points per model to equip savage orcs with bows if you can look me in the eye and tell me that frenzied missile troops are a good idea. Savage Orcs can also take spears, but such a defensive weapon seems out of character for them. Extra hand weapons will turn this unit into a real meat-grinder, though- especially if you upgrade them to Big-Uns.

Big-Uns

You can upgrade one unit of Orcs or Savage Orcs to "Big-Uns" for +2 points per model - and why wouldn't you? For that extra two points you get +1 to Weapon skill AND Strength!! These guys are almost-if-not-as good as most armies' elites and at a bargain price. Let me just remind you that these bad lads can charge with a choppa at strength 5!?! Extra hand weapons or spears at Strength 4 are also a beautiful thing. Truly there is no greater proof that Gork loves us and wants us to crush our enemies into juicy little bits. And it's not just lads on foot either - you can upgrade Boar Boys as well, which is almost too good to be true.

There is no reason NOT to take a unit of Big-Uns, but mind the restrictions: You need to have at least as many "basic" orcs or savage orcs as you have Big-Uns. Additionally, unless you want people to call you a cheezy git, you should ideally have at least 50% more regular orcs than Big-Uns.

Goblins

When I first started collecting Orcs, I was interested in my army having a very gritty, tough, "Tolkeinesque" kind of look. At the time, that meant that my army would have no gobbos apart from a few wolfboyz. I thought that goblins were weedy, generally useless, and that the models were rather unimpressive. What a difference a year makes! I have since learned to love the little buggers. Goblins - especially common goblins - are an infantry commander's dream: extremely cheap, almost competent, and 100% expendible. And they've even got nice new models to boot.

Goblins are 2 points apiece. Ahem - let me repeat that: GOBLINS ARE 2 POINTS APIECE!!! Do the math: for 100 points you get 50 models that you can practically throw away on the battlefield and not even feel bad about it! In a 2000 pts game that's 5% of your total points and probably half as many figures as your enemy has in his whole army. The trick is not to think of goblins as actual troops - they are more like an "extra wounds" upgrade. Everytime a goblin is shot or chopped up in combat that's a free ride for one of your REAL troopers - the orcs! And as long as your enemy has goblins in front of him that he has to deal with, it will buy your orcs the time they need to get into position or even just to get across the the battlefield.

The icing on the cake is that goblins can flee and panic all over the place and your orcs won't bat an eye. They are especially useful for fleeing from enemy chargers to draw them into the charge range of your Orcs. Feed them to hellblasters... throw them in front of Chaos Knights... or just line them up in front of your Orcs as you march towards that VERY shooty Dwarf battleline. In the words of Jay Leno: "Cruch all you want - we'll make more!"

Of course, there are drawbacks. At 2 points apiece, how could there not be? First off are the abysmal stats, of which the biggest liability is their apalling Leadership score. Musicians are a must because you WILL be taking rally tests. If you don't keep these gits within 12" of your general, there had better be a large enough number of them to survive a round or two of shooting without panicking. Then there's the fact that they have a real problem with elves. They also have a pretty poor selection of equipment. And let's not forget that gobbos suffer from animosity as well. Like I said, it helps if you think of them less as troopers and more like human shields - trust me!

It's not all grim, though. Despite their low weapon skill, Goblins have strength and toughness 3, which gives them almost even chances against a lot of basic infantry out there. And here's a neat trick: Common Goblins come with light armor. If you're willing to go an extra point, give them shields. Unlike orcs, they benefit from the Hand weapon & shield armor bonus. Suddenly you've got a 3 point grunt with toughness 3 and a 4+ save in combat! I call them 'Ardgrots. Believe it or not, I once saw a unit of 'Ardgrots receive a charge from a unit of Chaos Warriors, and not only did they win the combat, but they sent the pervs packing and ran them down to boot! I'm not saying it wasn't a fluke, but these things do happen! 'Ardgrots work especially well against the more expensive core human infantry.

While we're on the subject of equipment, let me note that you may be tempted to give your grots bows. Don't do it. In addition to their hopelessly average BS of 3, goblins can only use short bows, which have a pathetic range of 16". This means that either you have to go to the enemy or else he has to come to you. By the time you get in range it's too late to inflict anything more than token casualties through shooting, and if the enemy is ever in short range you should probably be charging him instead of shooting at him. If you're still not dissuaded, let me just point out that goblins with bows + animosity usually equals more shooting casualties to your own side than the enemy's.

Finally, how big should you make your units? If you go for the "Human shield" option, you probably want to keep them close to the 20-man minimum, although units of 25-30 will stick around longer under heavy missile fire. Units of bigger than 30 look really nice, but you probably want to reserve the huge mobs for those moments of insanity when you decide to leave the orcs at home and just bring all goblins. And if you're crazy enough to do that, then you're soft enough in the head to want to field Night Goblins...

Night Goblins

If you are one of those depreaved and masochistic individuals that thinks that an all-goblin army would be fun, have I got some troops for you! Night goblins are the common goblins' slightly wackier, less steadfast cousins - and that's saying something, isn't it? I have sometimes used Night Goblins in my army, but I have always felt that these weirdoes belong in an asylum all their own. Night goblins are the masters of random destruction and mass confusion, with an emphasis placed on the words "random" and "confusion". As such, the best reason to take Night Goblins in your army has less to do with their capacity to do damage to your enemy and more to do with their ability to annoy the hell out of him.

It is fitting, then, that we begin with the troop type that has the reputation for being the most annoying of any in the game of Warhammer: the humble Night Goblin fanatic. Everybody hates fanatics. Everybody. Even Night Goblin commanders hate their own fanatics most of the time. Launch 5 or 6 at once and the battle is effectively out of all rational control for a couple of turns. A single one of these little anarchists has the potential to decimate an average unit of heavy cavalry, slay large monsters, and punch large holes in infantry units. The only question is whether it will be you or your enemy who gets krumped. The secret that you need to be aware of, though, is that it is far more likely that they will do very little actual damage. Usually they will just get in everybody's way and eventually meet some ignominious if not highly amusing death. You see, the THREAT of fanatics is always more effective than the fanatics themselves. Sometimes this means having a single night goblin unit on the table, and chuckling in amusement as the enemy heavy cavalry flees before your non-existant fanantics. Sometimes this means releasing a large number of fanatics just to stop your enemy from charging or to make him waste time reorganizing his battle line. Sometimes, you just do it to annoy your enemy. This is a totally valid tactic because AN ANNOYED ENEMY MAKES MISTAKES. It's true. The more random weirdness you have going on in your compulsory movement phase, the more likely your foe will become exasperated and do something stupid. It helps if you cackle maniacally while you roll that scatter die. However, even though fanatics have the REPUTATION for most annoying troop type, they are not the ACTUAL most annoying troop type. That dubious honor goes to the squigs.

Squig herds and Squig Hoppers are "special" troop choices, but I am going to talk briefly about them here because they and the Night Goblins absolutely deserve each other. I have yet to use a squig herd myself, but I have seen them in action and you can be sure that it's only a metter of time before I succumb. A squig herd is a ticking time bomb, and the fuse is measued in the number of herders you use. The best way to use a squig herd is to get the squigs as close to the enemy as possible, release all your sguig hoppers, and then do whatever you can to get the Herders killed or fleeing. The herd will literally explode as squigs go flying all over the place, wreaking havoc and causing mass confusion in the compulsory movement phase. Trust me - I've had this happen to me, and whether or not the loose squigs actually inflict a lot of casualties, it will annoy your opponent to no end. This is always good, because AN ANNOYED ENEMY MAKES MISTAKES.

Night Goblins can also use netters, which are yet another annoying troop type which have the potential to rob your enemy of some of his attacks in that crucial first round of combat. Like most things night-goblinish, it is their potential which will vex your enemy more than their actual performance. Although everyone knows exactly how fanatics work, netters are less common and thus less known outside of the O&G community, so don't be surprised if your opponent seems unduly worried - just keep talking them up and let him sweat. What makes the netters tricky to use is that they need to be in the front rank, and they have to fit in around your characters and command group, so in your average unit of 30 goblins deployed 6x5, you can only get 3 into the front rank. This will not yield spectacular results. In their favor, the new models are very nice, they don't cost a lot of points, you will occaisionally get lucky with them, and they will annoy your opponent. After the first combat, the nets are gone, so some people put extra netters into the second rank as a "reload" for the next combat. I personally think this is a mistake, because honestly the average Night Goblin unit will be lucky to survive it's first combat, let alone have time to get into a second combat in a 6-turn game.

One thing to bear in mind about Night Goblins is that they are generally even more poorly equipped than common goblins, if you can believe that. You cannot give them Light Armor, so the best save they will ever get is 5+ in HTH, which is just not going to cut it. Paying the extra point for a spear is not a terrible thing to do, because spears will likely provide you the only chance you ever get to strike back in many combats. This assumes, of course, that you are interested in seeing your Night Goblins do anything other than die in place of your orcs, which is probably their best trick.

As with common goblins, you may be tempted to give these fellows short-bows. As with common goblins, it is probably a mistake. The only goblins you should really consider trusting with missile weapons are the wolfboyz. Most of the time, they're too far away to shoot at your own troops.

Goblin Wolf Riders

I love Wolfboyz. When I was planning my first army, I had visions dancing in my head from The Hobbit of these huge mobs of howling mad lads chasing down dwarfs. Although they are probably not QUITE that fearsome, mine have never disappointed me.

Some wise soul on the Warhammer Players Society Forum once pointed out that wolfboys are the BEST fast cavalry in the Warhammer world for the following reason: The true talent of fast cavalry resides in their basic ability to be where the enemy does not want them to be, thus causing him to focus his attention away from his battle plans to deal with a thorn in his side. Given their speed and complete cheapness, goblin wolfboyz can "be there" more effectively than any other fast cavalry. There are two schools of thought on how to field them:

The more popular opinion is that you should field them in 2-3 small units of 5 each. Keep them cheap, and don't give them command groups (with the possible exception of a musician). Give them bows, and have them hunt war machine crews and look for opportunistic flank charges. You need to field at least 2 of these units because an opponent with any kind of sense will attempt to panic them through missile fire or magic. They have Leadership 6, so if ever these fragile units are forced to take that test, they are more than likely to hoof it (or paw it, as the case may be). Since they have a movement of 9, you'll be very lucky if they don't panic right off the board and you'll probably never see them again. By keeping the units cheap you will avoid seeing a lot of points spend most of the battle running away from things.

While this is a valid tactic, I prefer the opposite approach. I field my wolfboys in a single unit of 16, with full command and spears. This is a gamble, but not as much of one as you might think, and there is a significant payoff. The large number of lads means that it will be harder for the enemy to panic them, and the spears and command group actually make this unit a credible threat on its own if it can get a flank charge. If you can get this unit into the enemy backfield it can absolutely wreak havoc. Even if you use it to go after enemy war machines, the larger numbers give you enough punch to plow through several crews without losing momentum.

Personal anecdote time: I have had this unit rampage through an elven backfield, destroying archers and bolt-throwers in rapid succession and getting 3 times their points back. I've seen them pounce on the flank of an Elven Prince on a Griffon and run him down. I've had them hitting my opponent's uber-unit in the REAR while my own Warboss' unit strikes from the front. The most impressive thing I think they ever did was a follow up charge into the flank of Golfag's Ogres, killing the standard bearer and running the unit down! Sure there have been times when a bad animosity roll has left them exposed or a panic or terror test has gotten them running away, but on the whole I am very happy with this unit's performance.

Regardless of how you field them, the trick to these boys is that no matter how much you are tempted, you NEVER engage a ranked enemy unit from the front. These are sneaky gits and you need to get them in on a flank or rear for them to do their job. Don't get greedy with them and they'll do you proud!

Snotling Swarms

Finally we come to the last of the core troops and what must be the absolute bottom of the barrel for the Orc and Goblin army. What can you say? It's a generic swarm. It's unbreakable, so you can get enemy units stuck in it. Your enemy will most likely just find a way to ignore it and go around it.

These were more fun in 5th edition when they mimiced the behavior of the nearest orc or goblin troops, but the rules were confusing and hard to use. The rules are simple now, but at the same time I find them less appealing. They are good for annoying your opponent, so I'd really only take them in when I'm in a night-goblin kind of mood. The ladz in my more serious Orcy waaghh would probably just eat them before the battle, anyway.