Victory Pointless

To close off phase 1 of the crusade, the three Ork players involved decided to have a 3-way free-for-all battle to see who’s boss was Da Biggest And Da Best.

The wind was howling.  Thunder rolled.  Had any of the Imperial Meteorologists stationed at this outpost still been alive they might have recognized the warning signs of one of the cyclonic firestorms that frequently plagued the oxygen-rich atmosphere of this world and raised the alarm, calling their fellow colonists back to the safety of their armourcrete shelters until the danger has passed.

But they were dead, the shelters that had protected them shattered ruins that now played host to a strange conference of Orks.  The wailing of the growing storm outside was as nothing to the noise of three Ork Warbosses having an argument.  What had started as a parlay to discuss a potential alliance had rapidly devolved into an almighty row over the distribution of loot.

“Lissen ‘ere, you grot-toothed pair of squig zoggas!  My ladz iz twice as gud as your ladz, so’s we shud get double da loot!” Uzblitz Gogbusta of Da Mushrum Kloudz was yelling.  “Dat’s just maffs!”

Kaptin ‘Showtime’ Dimz of the Shiny Klawz flashed his golden Power Klaw menacingly. “Hope ya brought ya best gear, lads—yer about ta donate it ta da flashiest git in da void!

“Awight listen up you zoggin’ gits,” Kaptin Krakkjaw of the Rokk ‘n’ Rollas broke in. “Dis loot right here is our booty. You want it, you won’t go through us… We’ll go through you.”

The three warbosses eyed each other sullenly for a moment, then almost simultaneously broke into the same warcry.

“WAAAAAAAGH!”

This was a 1v1v1 Combat Patrol game using the (incredibly janky) multiplayer rules from White Dwarf and playing the Cyclonic Firestorm mission.

The Rokk ‘n’ Rollas chose a crusade blessing that gave 3 units a scout move (which, conveniently, was all of their units).  So, I deployed my infiltrating gretchin 9″ away from his deployment zone to try to prevent him from using it to get closer to me and instead funnel him towards Dima’s Shiny Klawz.  The Kommandos infiltrated the other big ruin.

The Rokk ‘n’ Rollas got first turn.  Their Warboss, Meganobz and Nobz charged into the Shiny Klawz while their Big Mek and other squad of MegaNobz skirted my defensive screen of gretchin and charged into my Nobz, wiping them out and injuring Uzblitz.

My Gretchin and Kommandos consolidated their positions in the ruins, filling them with a 1″ gap to make charges more difficult.  Everything else rushed in to try to take down the Meganobz, but only managed to kill two of them, one of which was shortly resurrected by the Big Mek.  This reanimated Meganob struck down Uzblitz but he Fought on Death and wiped the remaining Meganobz.  The Flash Gitz and Boyz then swarmed and took out the Big Mek.

Meanwhile, the other two Warbosses had been engaged in a duel which Dimz of the Shiny Klawz won, killing both Kaptin Krakkjaw and his bodyguard, while his Boyz and Flash Gitz finished off the last of the Rokk ‘n’ Rollas.

Dimz stood over Krakkjaw, klaw raised. “Only one boss gets da spotlight ‘ere, an’ dat’s me – it’s Show Time!

“Aaarrghhh you zoggin’ git, you’ve krumped me!”

As this meant that we were down to two players and the multiplayer rules are a bit… not good, we decided to switch to normal rules from here on out.

A mob of Shoota boyz scaled the wall of the ruins to get at the Kommandos inside.  This led to a protracted battle which the Kommandos eventually won after a bad start.

The firestorm claimed the sole surviving Shiny Klaws Flash Git and several boyz.  Dimz and his retinue moved into the mid-board and wiped out my Boyz, but were themselves taken down by my Flash Gitz.  More shoota boyz followed but met the same fate, being sandwiched between my Gitz and Kommandos.

This left me as the lone Ork standing.

Result: Orks victory!

Mushrum Kloudz: 50

Shiny Klawz: 45

Rokk ‘n’ Rollas: 10

Uzblitz glared out from under the ice pack affixed to his sloped forehead and watched with some satisfaction as the survivors of the other two warbands dragged themselves from the battlefield.

“We’z won!” He crowed, and punched the air in triumph, popping several stitches that a painboy had only just finished putting in.  “Tok, send out da word – I want every ork in dis sector to know dat Uzblitz Gogbusta is da biggest and da best warboss around!  Tell dem ta come join Da Mushrum Kloudz if dey wanna scrap dey’s gonna win!  Tell dem…”

He swayed slightly.  “Tell dem… You tell ’em all dat.  I’z gonna have a nap…”

There was a loud crash.

The only unit from my army to fail its out-of-action test was – for the third game in a row – Warboss Uzblitz.  Gork and Mork clearly want him to grow through suffering.

Post-Mortem

• The multiplayer combat patrol rules are kinda bad and we mutually agreed to drop them as soon as they were no longer relevant.
• This was a really interesting game to see how other Ork detachments work.  I was running War Horde, the Rokk ‘n’ Rollas were Bully Boyz and the Shiny Klawz were More Dakka.  I think the strength of War Horde vs these others is the Stratagems and the slight edge in melee.  The weakness is that the others have ways of getting multiple Waaagh turns on certain units.  If Turn 1 hadn’t had such a high casualty rate for my opponents I would’ve been in trouble as the only Waaagh-less army.
• My tactic of using infiltrators to block scouts/movement was good but could have been executed better – if I’d spread them out a bit more I wouldn’t have left the opening on my right flank that allowed my Nobs to get charged.