Yoooooo, party people! Reecius here to relate my recent ITC Tournament experience with my Orks: “Da Sons of AnOrky,” at the Game Empire Pasadena ITC event.

I love old school, one day RTTs. They’re just a blast. Jump in the ride with some buddies, head out to play some good games with old and new friends, and enjoy a nice day. That is exactly what this was! James, Kiwi Ben, and myself hopped into my truck Saturday morning and hauled up to Game Empire Pasadena which is an awesome game store for anyone in that area. They have a really strong community of gamers there, in a big, clean store with tons of product, and lots of food and drinks to be had in a short radius.

There was a solid turnout for the event, too, 32 players! Not bad at all for a one day event. I brought my Orks which I have really been enjoying playing lately. Below is the list. Please note, this was a Broadside Bash primer event using their format at 2K. I also forgot a unit of Tank Busta Boyz, doh! So, I was forced to write a funky list using the models I had on hand with stuff I may not otherwise have taken. Some of that lead to some pretty surprising results, actually!

Da Sons of AnOrky

HQ

• Zhardsnark da Rippa
• Warboss: Mega Armor, da Lucky Stikk
• Big Mek: KFF

Troops

• Warbikers x 5: Nob, Klaw
• Warbikers x 5: Nob, Klaw
• Warbikers x 5: Nob, Klaw
• Warbikers x 5: Nob, Klaw
• Grots

Elites

• Da Bully Boyz
• Mega Nobz x 5: Saw, Skorcha
• Trukk: Raw, Planks
• Mega Nobz x 5: Saw, Skorcha
• Trukk: Raw, Planks
• Mega Nobz x 5: Saw, Skorcha
• Trukk: Raw, Planks

Heavy

• Lootas x 15
• Mek Guns x 3: Traktor Kannons

Game 1

Opponent: Chris and his Wolfstar! Space Wolves and Grey Knights

Mission: Emperor’s Will + Modified Maelstrom

Chris is a tournament regular and a good player. He also had an army that had some nasty combos and is a pretty rotten match-up for my style of Orks. His army revolved around a vicious Wolfstar packed with characters, Strom Shields and strength 10 attacks. The real trick to it though, is that the unit will often have predominantly a 2++ due to the Storm Shields+Sanctuary from the Grey Knight Librarians. It’s vicious! This is a true Deathstar unit, and it is very fast. I knew I was in for an extremely difficult battle as my army relies on winning melee to win games and his army was straight up better than mine in assault. On top of that, he has 2 Dreadknights which Orks really struggle to deal with.

His list from memory:

Grey Knight CAD with Champions of Fenris Detachment

HQ

Grey Knight Libby

Grey Knight Libby

Wolf Priest on Bike (to give Fearless, Preferred Enemy and FnP 6+)

Wolf Guard Battle Leader: T.Wolf, Fist, Shield

Troops

Strike Squad x 5: Incinerator

Strike Squad x 5: Incinerator

Elites

Ironpriest: T.Wolf

Fast

Stormwolf: M.Meltas

T.Wolves x 6: S.Shields x 6, P.Fists x 6

Heavy

Dreadknight: Teleporter, Sword, Gattling Psi, H.Incinerator

Dreadknight: Teleporter, Sword, Heavy Psycannon, H.Incinerator

This was going to be rough! The issue being that my main hitting unit, the Bully Boyz, get rolled by T.Wolves who kill me in one hit allowing me no save, while I need to do two wounds to them to kill them AND they have a 3++ or 2++. Bad news bears! I wish Orks could get any kind of invul at all, it really, really sucks that they cannot. It makes fights like this so difficult. That unit would be a bear, but combined with two Dreadknights, whom Orks have a serious problem dealing with, was going to make for a tough game to put it mildly.

My opponent won the roll to go first and gave it to me to have last shot at the objectives. He also got to counter deploy me, which he did quite well, lining up my largely immobile shooting units in direct line to his fast assault units.

He comes right at me, I put some meager firepower into him but he makes 3/4, 6+ FnP saves from my Lootas! Doh! I try to fan my forces out in a horseshoe, cupping the area I thought he would be in anticipation of hitting him with as much of what I had at once as possible while simultaneously staying out os his assault range. I sacrificed my Megaboss+Lootas to kill a Dreadknight. I was able to pull this off by grabbing the Big Mek out of the Mek Gunz unit and having him join the Lootas. The reason why, is because (stupidhead!) Dreadknights are Characters, and as such, can challenge. The sword makes them Strength 10, master crafted potentially with Force, too. That, plus a gang of attacks means a Dreadknight can charge a big unit of Orks, challenge the only thing that can reasonably hurt them (Nob with Klaw) and kill them before the swing, leaving the unit helpless and easily destroyed. Orks really HATE challenges, lol! They usually suck at them. So anyway, I brought along the Big Mek to bravely fall on the sword in the challenge and die, allowing the Warboss to kill the Dreadknight with his mighty Klaw+Lucky Stikk (which is an AMAZING piece of kit, btw)! That plus a few wounds from the Lootas shooting and assault netted my one Dreadknight dead. Nice! However, First Blood went to my opponent due to the Big Mek, and my Warboss unit with the Lootas was now hanging out in the breeze (which I knew would happen) and I positioned them to move block the Deathstar, buying me another turn.

His Stormwolf came in, but was promptly immobilized by the Traktor Kannons in my turn (way to go boyz!) who were subsequently smushed by the second Dreadknight (doh!). The Lootas and Warboss were obliterated by the Deathstar and now, most of my opponent’s army was in my deployment zone. I sent a unit of Bikes and Bully Boyz into his deployment zone to try and take his backfield away from him and go for his Emperor’s will objective.

I hit him with almost all of my army now, as I had anticipated the situation unfolding. I didn’t have much hope for actually winning the fight, I was just hoping that with careful model positioning, I’d be able to reduce them and keep them tied up for a few turns. The ensuing melee was brutal, and actually went better than anticipated. Through some favorable model positioning, multiple units being in combat, and multiple initiative steps, I was able to soak a lot of the worst damage on sacrificial Bikers while getting my Bully Boyz into his vulnerable support characters. When the dust settled, he only had a few Thunerwolves left, and all of the rest of the unit was killed! However, my poor Orks were wiped out in the melee. I wish I could say I did it on purpose, but it was a bit of a fortuitous accident! model positioning is critical and I find it is the first skill you lose if you get a bit rusty.

Long story short, while I did kill a lot more of the Deathstar than I thought I would have, he still had more than enough left over to take my backfield with a wounded Dreadknight and couple of Thunderwolves. I took his backfield but wasn’t able to get to his Emperor’s will objective as the Bully Boyz closest to it, had their Trukk blown up just too far away, and they are not fast on foot. I had a surviving Trukk scoot onto an midefield objective to save a point, but that was my last act of defiance!

I ended up losing by 1 point, which all things considered, wasn’t too bad as this was a really tough match. I think with some better tactics I could have made a better showing of it, but it was a fun game and not as bad as it could have been by a mile. Good tips form this game: Boarding Planks ROCK! The extra 2″ of movement the turn you come out is incredibly good. It got me two long charges I would not have otherwise made. And a good way to avoid getting into challenges you don’t want to be in is to hang your Nobs back out of engagement range so you aren’t eligible, then step in at I1 to bop some fools with your Klaw!

Orks lose.

Game 2

Opponent: Keith and his Grey Knights + Blood Angels

Mission: Big Guns + Modified Maelstrom

List from memroy

Grey Knight Strike Force, Blood Angels CAD

HQ

Grey Knight Librarian

Dante

Chappy with Jump Pack

Troops

Scouts x 5

Scouts x 5

Grey Knight Terminators x 5: Hammer, Psycannon

Elites

Sanguinary Guard x 5: Various Kit

Death Company x 5: Jump Packs, Various Kit

Purifiers x 10: Hammer, Incinerator x 2

Fast

Drop Pod

Heavy

Dreadknight: Sword, Teleporter, H.Psycannon, H.Incinerator

Dreadknight: Sword, Teleporter, H.Psycannon, H.Incinerator

 

More Deadknights, gah! Lol, the only two Grey Knights players at the RTT and I drew both, haha. But hey, what’s an Ork gonna do? Punch them in the dingus, that’s what!

Well, once more into the breach, dear friends! Another powerful, fast melee army to contend with. This game was largely going to be similar to the last in terms of the way it played out. However, I had a few Orky tricks up my sleeve! I got first turn, took it, and bum rushed my opponent with most of my army, leaving some mobile units to defend my backfield form the Deep Strikers I knew would be coming down on turn 1.

I positioned all of the Bully Boys and Zhardsnark’s unit into a large ruin on an objective, right in front of my opponent’s melee units hoping to keep his fast units in his backfield and bait him into assaulting me through cover. That way, I’d be able to at least swing simultaneously as the feared Dreadknights. Luckily for me, he took the bait! I was able to kill both Dreadknights within a game turn thanks to the Bully Boyz, but, the jerks took 8 of my heavy hitters with them on the way to the grave. Ouch! I then was able to grind down all of the Sanguinary Guard who with AP3 weapons, can’t funk with MegaNobz. Dante though…wow. Dante gave it to me hard, and didn’t event cuddle after. That dude is a murder machine, now. With I6 and a boatload of Ap2 attacks, he was hacking my poor Orkys apart with gusto! By game’s end he had smoked a truck load of my forces and I was only able to get him down to a single wound, but couldn’t finish him off. Death Company with a Chappy are suitably deadly, too. I was able to get them down to just a single wound on the Chappy, but at a high price. When the dust settled, all of the forces I sent into his backfield were dead apart form a single Trukk, and he just had the two characters with a single wound apiece. Brutal! Luckily for me though, that last Trukk that I had hidden in the corner after delivering the Bully Boyz, was able to flat out onto an objective to deny it to my opponent and give me Line Breaker.

In my backfield, where the other half of the game was happening, Keith had predictably dropped the Termies+Libby and Purifiers into my backfield. I had a bike unit, the Warboss+Lootas and Mek Guns to hold my lines. The Warbikers did a good job of not dying while soaking some firepower, and then killing half of the Purifiers (combat squads) before eating it. The Warboss with Lucky Stikks was a champion, tanking wound after wound and keeping the Lootas alive to paste enemy units with shooting. They also killed half off the Purifiers in assault. At this stage of the game, I felt mega confident. I was winning on Big Guns Points, had more maelstrom points and knew I would be able to win or tie the primary as I’d hold my two objectives, and Keith would have 1, the other contested or held by my Trukk. However, a comical turn of events was about to occur!

His Termies were sitting on one of my objectives, but well within range of my Lootas+Warboss who would walk through them in assault (no AP2 weapons). However, keith had the psychic power Vartex of Doom. As a last ditch shot before getting Klawed by the big guy, he fired it at my Loota unit, got the power off, rolled a hit, and then rolled two 6’s on the D table! The Closest Loota ate the first 6, then my Warboss, next closest, had to only roll a 2+ to LoS! the D slap to the next unlucky Loota in line. I roll the dice and, you know it, up comes that 1! Son of a !#$#@!!! That meant I had no way of getting those termies off of my objective.

I couldn’t believe it, lol, a sure win all of a sudden slips from my hands due to the dirty D! I was able to hold him off of my last objective keeping the game to a tie, but wow, that was amazingly frustrating! I felt that I played such a tactically sound game, only making two minor mistakes, and then a crazy unfortunate (or fortunate, depending on your perspective, haha) series of events lead to the game slipping from between my fingers. Ah well, them there’s the breaks and Keith was a great opponent and played a solid game. I enjoyed the match.

Tie game.

Game 3

Opponent: Adam and his Black Legion CSM

Mission: Modified Relic with Modified Maelstrom

List from memory:

CSM CAD

HQ

Lord: Black Mace, L.Claw (used the awesome FW Horus model!)

Troops

CSM x 8: M.Gun, C.Melta, Fist

Dreadclaw

CSM x 8: M.Gun, C.Melta, Fist

Dreadclaw

CSM x 8: M.Gun, C.Melta, Fist

Dreadclaw

CSM x 5: M.Gun, C.Melta

Dreadclaw

CSM x 5: M.Gun, C.Melta

Dreadclaw

Fast

Hellblade

Dreadclaw

Dreadclaw

Heavy

Fireraptor

 

So this was a super interesting list! A complete Chaos Air force, never seen something like this and was looking forward to playing against it. Dreadklaws, for those unfamiliar with them, are Drop Pods that are also flyers and fast skimmers. So, they can scoot around the battlefield, burning units they move over with special sweep style attacks. It was a bit daunting as the vast majority of his army, the vast majority of my army couldn’t actually hurt! This was going to be interesting and I knew playing to the objectives would be critical.

I won first turn, and gave it to Adam as I wanted last shot at the objectives and to give me the chance to assault his units when they came down from flying mode to go for points.

The game opened up rough! His first Dreadclaw dropped into my lines, danger close, and hit! They have a special attack when they deepstrike that hits units in a radius with an Ignores Cover attack. He hit my best unit for taking down his flying circus with this attack: the Traktor Kannons. He killed 3 of the crew, just enough for a morale check. And, despite having the Big Mek, they failed that check, then promptly ran the 9″ distance they were from the board edge. Mother fuc….

So, there went first blood, my Big Mek, AND my best AA unit, lol. Not a good start!

However, despite that rough start, my numbers, mobility and the mission format forced Adam to come out of the sky, where my speedy Klaws made short work of anything that touched down. I had the Relic from early game to late, and surrounded the unit with it by other, powerful melee units, ensuring I would never drop it.

The Warboss with Lootas again went ham, dropping flyers with weight of dice and the Megaboss tanking wound after wound due to Da Lucky Stikk.

In the end, the Orks won a solid victory as the Chaos Marines just couldn’t get any traction. As soon as they set foot on the ground they got swarmed by Bikers and Bully Boyz. Adam was a great opponent, though, and we had a fun game. I do have to add, that in this mission, if either player held the Relic, each player turn a Strength 8, AP3, large Blast randomly hit the table, blowing stuff up. I really, really don’t like home brew mechanics like this in tournaments as they aren’t fun and can cause one player to win or lose the game which serves only to frustrate people. I know some folks enjoy this kind of thing, but IMO it belongs in a different context than a tournament, such as a narrative campaign where it can be a lot of wacky fun.

Orks win.

Conclusion

So, not my best showing, but had a really good time. 1/1/1, dead even, lol! I highly recomend this event though, to anyone that is thinking about going. You can pick up some ITC points and play in a cool store with a friendly crowd of people. Some of the wonky stuff I used this tournament due to forgetting my Tank Bustas were actually not bad. Boarding Planks, for example, rocked! I had written them off as to expensive, previously, but in practice, the extra 2″ to a charge can be game winning. James went 2-0-1 with his CSM/Daemons and Kiwi Ben went 2-1 with Dark Eldar. I was taking up the rear of the pack, lol!

A Necron Decurion Detachment won the event!

So, now to prepare for the BSB!

Oh, and after the event, James took us to “The Hat,” which is a 60 year old dinner in LA. Seriously, the best Pastrami Sandwhices I’ve ever had! The Chili Cheese Fries were good too, but gave some serious bubble gut!