# I won the 1st round of Ard Boyz with my Ogres!



## mynameisgrax (Sep 25, 2009)

The title pretty much says it all. ^_^

After a terrible showing last year (I got Purple Sunned right off the board), I decided to run something slightly different. Here's the list:

LORD

Tyrant w/Thundermace, enchant crown, dragonbane, charm shield, hvy armor 
Slaughtermaster w/dispel scroll, siegebreaker, talisman of preservation


HEROES

Bruiser w/BSB, banner of eternal flame 
Butcher w/hellheart 


CORE

39 Bulls w/full command, lookout gnoblar 
3 Bulls 
26 Gnoblars w/champion 
26 Gnoblars w/champion 
15 Gnoblar trappers 


SPECIAL

Scraplauncher 
Scraplauncher 


All 3 rounds were relatively close, with the battle scores being a little misleadingly in my favor, compared to how close the battle was really going.

The first game was against the player who would ultimately take 2nd with chaos daemons. He played PAINFULLY slowly, taking forever to make any decision, but overall he played well. He did everything he could to slow down my Ogres, and hose them with flamers of tzeentch. My feint to the side worked though, and half of his army was busy killing my expendable units, and I didn't care if they lived or died.

Unfortunately (and predictably) he kept casting Purple Sun, cast by Kairos (the Fateweaver). The first time he cast it, it was with IF, but I rolled lucky and it only killed 8 Ogres out of 14 rolls. The second time he cast it, it was without IF, and I scrolled it. In a poor move, he kept using his re-roll to try and get a double 6 to cast, and the third time he cast it, again with IF, he finally rolled a misfire on the artillery die and it centered on Kairos. He failed his initiative roll, and didn't have the re-roll to save him. The Ogres pushed forward against the side of his army, and won a minor victory.

The second game was against Lizardmen (who went on to take 3rd) with a Lore of Life cheesed out Slaan. The Axes that gave +1 S and A to a core unit made my giant unit of bulls even more impressive, and also helped protect them from dwellers below. Regardless, he used poison, stegadons, and temple guard to whittle my unit down, just not far enough. With about 9 bulls left out of 39, I finished off the temple guard, and killed the Slaan, giving me a major victory (not a massacre, because the rest of my army was dead).

The third game was the closest, and luck played a large part. The random magical weather effects were very random, and result #2 (which came up twice) wiped out every small unit in the game! It was against Chaos Warriors, and he exploited the main weakness of my army: if you kill the characters in the giant unit of bulls, the rest of the unit has a good chance of panicking and running. With all the characters and challenges, my guys kept whittling down to nothing, first losing the champion, then the BSB (the loss of the reroll to break tests could have easily cost me the game), and then the slaughtermaster. The Tyrant held on, however, and I just managed to eek out a win by killing the last of his guys, and since all his units were gone, it was automatically a massacre.

So there you go! Who says the Ogres can't compete any more? ^_^


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## LordWaffles (Jan 15, 2008)

'Ard Boyz was great this year. I placed first at one shop and third at another(Gave away the ticket to semi-finals out of my good nature hahah) running warriors.

I had no idea power scroll was so ridiculous, turn anyone into teclis for a turn? Yes please. And the scroll of feedback, good lord. I learned an incredible amount about competitive play in a very short time at the shop I placed third in.


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## GrizBe (May 12, 2010)

Its just as I keep telling people. If you know what your doing, no army is undefeatable or not competative.


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## Tim/Steve (Jan 25, 2009)

Well other then the slightly weird look that I'm giving to that slaughtermaster (he can't take armour) it looks like a fun list. I definately baulked when I saw the unit of 39 bulls... I thought the time I ran 24 ogres in 1 unit was harsh, but you've just blown that away in a shitstorm of muscle 

There are definately a few things I would have done differently- like dropping the eternal flame (its too risky- lots of things have 2++ or immunity to fire) in favour of defense (eg talisman of preservation and enchanted shield- my favourite combo). If you were staying with magical banners then I'm always tempted by dragonhide. I know its laughably obsolete with its "immunity to ice magic" but the reroll of 1s to hit, wounds and save is immensely useful (just ask anyone who has ever fought against SW in 40k).
I would probably have dropped a few bulls to add the extra scraplauncher- with 3 units of gnoblars already on the field you have the availability to take it without adding units, and ... but you have to have the models (personally I only have 1 scraplauncher, and its still in bits from last time I got annoyed with it- it'll get a conversion rebuild at some point to be less likely to fall apart).

I'm not entirely sure (not having my BRB on me) but does the charm shield allow you to ignore the first wound inflicted on you? If so is it only used in combat? If so then the tyrant can't use it- since he has to use the thundermace he cannot make use of a shield...


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## Farseer Darvaleth (Nov 15, 2009)

*Nods* Good job sir. The list is... intriguing :laugh: but with all the HE cheese out there, it smells relatively refreshing. :grin:

Good job.


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## LordWaffles (Jan 15, 2008)

GrizBe said:


> Its just as I keep telling people. If you know what your doing, no army is undefeatable or not competative.


This is an incorrect statement. If you take a doodoo list in 40k you'll get roflrolled by a competitive wolfbacks or leafblower list. Doesn't matter the tactics, scenario or time perfecting your hobby. Fantasy doesn't have that straight up "I WIN EVERY GAME" scenario in listbuilding.
Grax sounds like he knows what he's doing but when he competes in the semi-finals the point inefficiency of the ogres might start to show through due to how we've cleansed all the easy wins out. From here on it's only more difficult.


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## GrizBe (May 12, 2010)

Reread what you've written there, then tell me your own stupid stupid mistake which has invalidated what you've just said and proved me right


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## Creon (Mar 5, 2009)

I can't find anything that says a Slaughtermaster may wear armor. Does anyone know this answer?


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## mynameisgrax (Sep 25, 2009)

Sorry, got mixed up there. It's not the 2+ armor (that was on the tyrant in an earlier version of the list), but the talisman of preservation, that gives the 4+ ward save.

The charmed shield were for the shooting phase, to protect him if he failed his 'look out sir' save. Mostly for cannons, but it never came up.

Next round, I'm definitely equipping the Tyrant for defense, and moving the thundermace to the slaughtermaster. I almost lost the Tyrant in the 3rd round, and that could have easily cost me the game.

What units are immune to fire, and which get a 2+ save (besides characters wearing the dragonbane charm)?


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## Creon (Mar 5, 2009)

Dragon Princes are 2+ ward versus fire, the DragonHelm is 2+ ward versus fire, there are some others. They removed Immune for fire, and replaced it with 2+ ward from fire.


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## mynameisgrax (Sep 25, 2009)

Hmm....the flaming standard is pretty much a must have because of all the regenerating monsters, and lore of life exploitation around. It's true that dragon princes will be a problem, but I've never seen any played in competitive settings, so I'm not as worried about them.


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## experiment 626 (Apr 26, 2007)

GrizBe said:


> Its just as I keep telling people. If you know what your doing, no army is undefeatable or not competative.


Almost always true perhaps, but I have yet to hear about eve na single VC army making it out of the prelims...

To be honest, every report I've read as of last night from various forums, VC's got absolutely murdered hard-core this year!
TK's also didn't show at all, but I expect that t ochange come the semi's as they have some very scary options now...
Wood Elves also avoid the 'ard boyz for the most part, as do alot of brets.

If you statement was 100% true, then these armies would have stood at least a solid chance instead of just getting horribly butchered silly.
Instead so far I've heard of pretty much just the following armies made it on through;
- lizzies
- high elves
- dark elves
- ogres!!! (nice surprise - congrats on the achivement!)
- warriors of chaos
- daemons
- skaven
- orcs&gobbos

'Ard Boyz at least provides us with a good example of the books that are able to reliably compete, compared to those that could use some solid help...

Cheers!


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## Vaz (Mar 19, 2008)

Tomb Kings can make a decent showing where there magic can happily take effect at 3K +.

With the exception of SCC, previous army strengths are less so - Scorpion and Ushabti for example; yet others are shining - even Horde Spearmen; but being overpriced and weak counter magic is not too fantastic.


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## mynameisgrax (Sep 25, 2009)

I don't know about VC in this past Ard Boyz, but I've seen them to VERY well at competitive tournaments, and did extremely well at the local colonial GT, that had 60+ players. The secret to using them competitively is to exploit either (or both) the lore of death and/or the lore of vampires, and field a TON of ghouls. 

Then you either spam purple sun or danse macabre, and make sure the majority of your opponent's army is either crippled, locked in combat with ghouls, or both.

Brets also often do well at very high point levels, because it allows them to use very large formations of their best knights in lance formation. They did quite well last year, although again, I'm not sure how they did this year.


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