Campaige against O&G

How to beat those cowardly High Elves?

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Nick7356
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Campaige against O&G

Post by Nick7356 »

Sorry I don't know if this post ahould be here or the army list or tactics part of the forum. I'm playing Dark Elves in a campaign againat O&G next weekend and I'm more of a Dwarf player then a Dark Elf player. So I don't really know what to put in my army to play against my opponent. So I need some help on what to use.. We're play the might empire campaign and the event I have is scout.
For people who don't know scout lets my opponent set up first and I get the first turn.. So any help would be appreciate.
----------W/L/D
Dwarfs 72/24/29
Skaven(OLD) 19/7/4
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Lethalis
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Post by Lethalis »

Greenskins are in general a combat horde army, which means that they in general will:
  • have many and big (infantry) units
  • have combat support units like chariots, monsters etc.
  • look forward to meeting the enemy in combat asap
  • have a weakness that's inherent to many of their troops


Big infantry blocks have big flanks and without the static combat resolution of their ranks, they will struggle to win combats. Always look for opportunities to attack them at vulnerable spots and try to get behind their lines, either with high movement or breaking through their lines at their weakest spots.

Combat support units for Greenskins means characters on mounts which can equal units (Wyverns, chariots) and things like Chariots, Trolls, Giants etc. Most of them will have some difficulty at least to win combats decisively on their own but teamed up with at least one rank and file unit they can easily dent most battle lines. What's more, they don't suffer from Animosity and therefore can happily keep up the same pace as the other troops (Trolls being the obvious exception). If you can destroy their support units then the blocks will easily fall prey to your higher movement units.

Greenskins will try and advance as quickly as possible to meet your army in hand to hand combat. Generally that means you, having more likely superior missile fire/magic, will want the opposite. Now I'm not saying your army should remain static, to the contrary in fact I'd advise positioning your units in such a way that if they want to move past that wood, their flank will get hit by Witch Elves or get within 6" of the Hydra. Also, harassing units such as Shades, Dark Riders and Harpies will serve well as march blockers. If they have Night Goblins, it's most of the time wise to get a unit of Harpies as close as possible, as fast as possible, so any Fanatics are released when he still has to march forward and may limit the routes of his advance without taking casualties.

Inherent weaknesses of Greenskins of every type against Elves are their lower movement, low leadership and Animosity.

- lower movement means that in roughly 75% of the situations you should be able to get the charge off against them. Sometimes they will have cavalry against your infantry, sometimes they will have Animosity getting them more movement and sometimes you will misjudge the distance between your and their units. However, most of the time you will be able to decide where combat takes place, or whether it should take place at all. This should allow you to hit their vulnerable spots.

- low leadership means that psychology will be most definitely your friend. In fact, if we were to visit each of the psychological effects you will find that most of the time they will be to your advantage by nature, and the rest can be bent in your advantage without too much trouble.

Panic is obvious - 25% casualties will probably be the most common. Focus fire on critical units and don't stop until they are either destroyed (Giants, Chariots [with characters!]) or you have shaved off a quarter of their numbers. The more tests you can cause, the better. If they have a wizard as their general, their leadership will be relatively low even within 12" of the general so let loose the magicks and iron fury of the Druchii.

Fear is more of a double edge as our fear causing units are mostly Cold Ones who suffer from Stupidity. Either keep these combat support units cheap (which admittedly does deny taking advantage of the auto-breaking due to fear) or build them up to the point where they may hold out even when charged - although if you're feeling confident that you can manoeuvre these units out of the enemy's reach then definitely consider these. Remember a character on chariot can negate the enemy's rank bonus.
Note how Goblins fear Elves when they don't outnumber by a margin of two to one at least. If you're feeling evil (duh :P) you may want to direct some missile fire to ensure this is exactly the case.

Both armies have access to flying Terror causing monsters and a Rare Terror causer at movement value 6. The differences being that the Druchii's hit harder, and they resist Terror better. Add to that that an Orc general on Wyvern will either be far away from his troops or not making full use of the monster's capabilities, the Druchii are naturally favoured against these lowly beasts. Moreover, a Giant has no armour save, ward save or regeneration to speak off so it will fall prey quickly to even repeater crossbow fire. If you can drop it while it is in the Greenskins' battle line, it may even kill their own guys.

Stupidity. Pretty much like terror, due to higher leadership the Druchii have the advantage here. Their regeneration makes them dreadfully resistant to most of our missile fire so if you have a magic user, it may prove well worth to choose the Lore of Fire. If they have a magic user as general they will fail their tests about 50% of the time anyway, but it may be nice to suicide-charge some Harpies in them just to try and take them out, rendering the Trolls dangerously vulnerable to all units.

Frenzy is great in such battles. The movement of the Witch Elves is usually sufficient to draw them away from unwanted battles, and there are always Harpies to block line of sight. On the other hands, Harpies and Dark Riders as well as other units you may deem as sacrificial can easily be used to draw Savage Orcs (either mounted or on foot) away and in rather vulnerable spots, allowing you to break through their battle line via the Savage Orcs' flanks, or just drawing the unit so far away it will fail to entirely make an impact on the battle.

Hatred! This gives the Druchii a definite advantage over the Greenskins when combat eventually takes place. If you can make sure the support units are cleared/neutralised, then the downside will have little effect.

Stubborn, the only unit they can have which will be stubborn will be Night Goblins with a magical banner and Snotlings. Their leadership is puny anyway, so not much of a threat anyway. To the contrary, if you need a spot held the Black Guard will answer your call on a rather more reliable leadership value, as will Khainite units when you include a Cauldron.

- Now, Animosity is most typical for the way Greenskin armies work; they either sweep all before them or they will fail epicly. As the rule is pretty straightforward and rather unpredictable, there's little advise to give here. Instead, you should pay heed of the green general calling a Waaagh! which can be a battle breaking move, more so when the majority of the army is made up of Orcs. Your best bet is to march block specific parts of the army so its effect can never be optimised and keep the opponent doubting of when to call it.
Svennh
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Post by Svennh »

I'm not a experieneced DE player but I can share a battlemoment with you.
Last night I played against a O&G army.
I charged with my hydra a unit of nightgoblins (30) , the fanatics had already left the unit ( thanx harpies!!).
The result was a fleeing hydra.
They past the fear/terror test and had netters so the S was reduced by 1.
I did 4 wounds he did 1 : 3ranks +1wound+ banner + outnumbering - 4 wounds = breaktest for Hydra.
The hydra fled and was taken by the little green men.

So, even when you take on goblins, be sure that you negate the ranks.

I thought the fear and the 13 attacks would break them.
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Irtehdar
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Post by Irtehdar »

Svennh wrote:So, even when you take on goblins, be sure that you negate the ranks.

I thought the fear and the 13 attacks would break them.
This is something Ive seen quite often. (and did quite afew times myself)
It is important for us as a ''few in numbers'' army that we think seriously in regards on negating enemy ranks. And doing so is actually quite simple for us with M9 fast cav in core. Ive come to the conclusion that throwing in ANYthing that negates enemy ranks is more powerful than whatever we have in the front.

On a sidenote just having 2 ranks in total and 5 shades in the flank of an opponent is enough to break far bigger and tougher enemies.
And its not like we are an army that can easily afford matching 40 model strong units with ranks. But if we can take out the ranks bonus it goes along way.

Ive actually experienced getting a comeback from a game that was almost lost by doing this.
The game was more or less lost and my BG's was pounded down to near nothing when they took a charge by a huge orc block. Charging the flank of the orcs with RxB's turned the table for me and sent the orcs packing and subsequently run down. (RxB's because I had nothing else that could reach the battle)

Overall Id say that against an army like O&G its important to remove enemy rank bonuses as often as possible.
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Nick7356
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Post by Nick7356 »

Thanks for your advice guys. Here the link for the list I might be using. Any thoughts on the list will help on beatind down those green skins.

http://www.druchii.net/viewtopic.php?p=725877#725877
----------W/L/D
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Skaven(OLD) 19/7/4
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Calisson
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Post by Calisson »

I play only against goblins, never orcs.

They can bring difficult times in the magic phase.
They have a staff that steals one of our powerdice, providing them with one additional dispel dice.
Their magic is primitive, but could be devastating, especially Gork's foot, which can stampede any unit in the game (no LOS nor minimum distance required).

Hand of Gork is tricky as well:
If you positioned yourself close to the enemy but out of his view, he can turn towards you and Gork make him charge.

Their shooting phase can be deadly as well: their warmachine are very, very cheap, and they can have many.

Fanatics can destroy a CoK unit (I've seen that). Fortunately, they are easy to trigger with harpies, and once released, they are a pain for both armies.

Spiders can run through terrain as if itwas a plain. Fortunately, their melee ability is low.
Wolves are very fast.
Together, they have a high speed.

Squiggs have a high strenght but rather lame movement.
Easily teared down by shooting.
When the last squigg shepherd dies, the remaining squiggs litterally explode, 2d6 radius. Beware of not having a unit with few mini in vicinity (=> dead pegasus).

And the goblin army is always impressive in numbers.

Beware of animosity, could be a good or a bad point. Previously out of range units can be suddenly too close.


On the good side, they flee very easily when afraid of anything, such as, let's say, a normal elf warrior...
I destroyed once half of his army by destroying a single unit, which frightened pretty much everyone else (60 gobbos fleeing, including the two shamans...).


Finally:
O&G is the most hilarating army in WHB.
Your opponent accepted an incontrollable army becoause he wanted to have fun (and stampede you as well).
If you play against O&G, be as fair as possible, don't cheese up your army, bring your cold one's so that you have stupidity as well.
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Nick7356
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Post by Nick7356 »

Calisson wrote:If you play against O&G, be as fair as possible, don't cheese up your army, bring your cold one's so that you have stupidity as well.


Thats the whole point of the campaign. You know what army your fighting, so your supposed to be chessy.
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Skaven(OLD) 19/7/4
Skaven(NEW) 3/0/3
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Iyagd
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Post by Iyagd »

Well, Tactics for sure. Moved.
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