8th Ed. Ogre Death Stars; aka how I learned to hate my friends.

So, yeah.. Ogre death star toting a Rune Maw.. how do YOU deal with the bull shittery?

For those of you not in the know, an ogre death star is a horde of ogres or iron guts (6 x 3) containing a slaughter master (level 4 wizard) and a BSB. The BSB is given the Rune Maw banner which on a d6 roll of 2+ will deflect any spell targeting the unit, this INCLUDES templates according to errata and FAQ. The good news is that if there is a different valid target for the spell to target it bounces to them.. the bad news is this still makes the death star almost invulnerable to magic.

Thus far, the only way I've been able to deal with this is to go lore of life and turn it into a battle of attrition. With a greedy fist and the lore of death, however, he has the ability to completely wipe all wizard levels off my slann in ONE spell. Greedy fist makes any hits caused against characters to make them lose a wizard level, and lore of death has sniper special rule and causes d6 automatic hits. Once again, according to errata and FAQ this is a valid usage.

How the hell do we fight something like this? Even if charging on the flank the sheer number of attacks this unit throws out is ungodly. At the same time it takes forever to beat your way through the sheer number of wounds. If they get within 24 inches they can start sniping our slann and once he goes down the fight is lost.

I did have a few interesting ideas on how to battle this but it would take a lot of planning and sheer luck. The idea is to go with lore of shadows and to field a level 1 skink priest with a dispell scroll and to keep him up front and to keep the slann well back from the fighting. Take the signature spell in lore of shadows which has a huge range. Start by throwing that spell at the death star full empowered. If successful this will reduce their movement, intiative, ballistics skill, and weapon skill by d3. Not a game winner, but it helps. Once that is done the lore of shadows allows you to swap places with a friendly character within 18 inches. This is where the skink comes in. You swap places with him to bring yourself within range to drop some bigger spells before popping back over to a bunker unit a safe distance away. If you are INCREDIBLY lucky you MIGHT land pit of shades on the death star.

The other idea, sacrificial chamo skinks. you deploy them right in front of the death star and if you go first just rain poison shots at them. Either way when it comes to the ogre kingdom players turn they have two choices.. walk forward or declare a charge. We WANT that charge so we can declare a flee and slow their progress. If they simply walk forward then we are facing some trouble. Even if they stop right in front of the skinks hold your spot and march your saurus forward as fast as you can. The goal is to keep your slann more than 24 inches away from the fight while also remaining close enough to dole out the helpful spells. In order to accomplish this the ogres MUST be slowed or redirected. The trick is that almost all lore of life spells have a 24 inch range, so you have to stay within 24 inches of your main anvil unit while staying 24 inches away from their slaughter master.. not easy nor a pleasant prospect. Lore of light also has a 24 inch range on most spells so that does bring the saurus into position much faster you still have to do the delicate balancing act of maintaining the 24 inch buffer.

Either way, I suggest you have a scar-vet with armor of destiny, piranha blade, and BSB in your main saurus unit to help bring the pain/issue challenges.

Thoughts?

 

So, it is your philosophy to get within 24 inches in order to use becalming and just do your best to shut down the auto hit spells? I've done this, with great success actually.. it is just always nerve wracking to know that if ONE spell hits it could mean having a very expensive, very fat, very useless frog.

Though, having that many skink priests would mean a good chance at getting harmonic convergence.. which synergizes almost too well with lore of light. This also makes me wonder if comet of casandora would hit the rune maw unit.. it isn't targeting said unit so logic would dictate that the rune maw couldn't deflect it.

 

Although not very helpful to you shun the ass might be a good answer.

I played vs a guy who only brought two hell cannons and a 1600 point unit of chaos warriors. I considered just forfeiting the game and walking away

 

Naw, there are few things in this world more satisfying than picking apart someone's "flawless" offense/defense. I have always been a huge supporter of "there is a counter to every move and a move to every counter."

I have actually even been considering flipping the script on him and taking lore of death myself. The rune maw can't stop purple sun since it isn't targeting. Hazardous and foolish.. yes. But I'll use a power scroll throw seven dice at it first magic phase of every game and see how long it takes for him to stop fielding his cheesetastic unit.

 

Helllo,
You know that the Runemaw passes a Spell that has been cast On the unit, but If you use a Pit of Shades that targets an Area terrain, not a specific unit, than its another story As for Sniping the Slann, Please never heard of an item called Divine Plaque of protection? ]:-> As for the Massive unit, Just use Skinks, skins, and some skinks. You can redirect his charges with trash 70 units, and still poison him, A Skros unit in the Flank is also a good idea, Iron guts (Nobody uses Bulls) hit and wound Saurus and Skinks on the same level, and both have a 6+ parry save. Here in Europe we have a restriction of 450 points max per one unit so we won't face 18 Bulls, but its harder to turn it and easier to hit with salamanders. But the Key is a lot of Skinks 3 Skirmishers 3 Chamelon and some kohorts, should do the Trick

 

... I can't tell you how to deal with Deathstars... but I can tell you how I deal with them ^^

first up; Skinks... lots and lots of skink skirmishers. they poison is lethal. I have had an entire army of nimble skinks up against an ogre deathstar and I whiddled it down to only his tyrant by turn 3.
Salamanders & Razordons; Ogres need to charge, but don't want to charge Razordons. It hurts them.. badly.
Salamanders; keep firing your sallies at them; they can't get armoursaves against salamander-flames. ^^
third; scare them; having 4 skink priests wobbling around the place gives you lots of potential magic; getting a Comet would be a real boon too; when I get comet, I sacrefice a small group of skinks, to keep his deathstar in place untill the comet arives. (tetto is a real boon for this tactic)

when fighting ogres, Saurus are a drag; they may be strong and tough against other opponents, but Ogres hurt like crap since we have 1 less I...Lore of Light however, turns the tables; at WS10 I10 A3 ASF, that basically makes REALLY tough High Elves, this is lethal, even to ogres, since you're ramming an armoursave off, and hitting on 3+ with rerolls...
Mostly I stick to skinks though; basically for the purposes of irony; little Skinks VS big ogres, and we're winning >W<
I don't like using magic to attack the opponent, as I much more prefer to cast magic to make my saurus Warriors and Temple Guards nigh indestructible. so there it is. my jumbled explanation of several tricks I use to defeat Ogre Deathstars. have a go at it; see what it brings ^^

 

Actually Ejpok, straight from the BSB FAQ..

Q: Do ranged direct damage spells that use a template have to
target an enemy unit? (p31)
A: Yes, the template must be placed over the target enemy
unit.

Pit of Shades is a direct damage spell and thus must target the unit. If it targets the unit then it can be deflected. However, a well place Vortex spell is another story entirely. Vortex spells are the ones that you just aim at terrain then let fly. Also, the tricky thing about Comet of Casandora is that it isn't classified as any of the normal spell types, thus isn't restricted to the FAQ ruling.

In addition, the divine plaque of protection only increases the slann's ward save from 4+ to 2+ against ranged attacks. The greedy fist works on HITS not wounds. Every hit caused by the bearer makes the target lose a wizard level, Lore of death causes d6 automatic hits and has the sniper special ability. There is no defense against it other than shutting down the magic phase.

On the topic of skinks allow me to do the math for you. 18 ogres = 54 wounds with a 5+ save. Skinks only have a BS of 3, this means a 4+ base. If they move that becomes a 5+ and if they fire over half range with blowpipes that is a 6+, if they multishoot that takes it to 7+ which means they lose the poison special rule. So even at a 6+ if a unit of 10 skinks fires 20 shots. 20 * (1/6) = 3.3333 this means for all 20 attacks you are looking at, on average, three 6's. with a 5+ armor save you are looking at an average of one save against those three potential wounds. Meaning an entire unit of skink skirmishers aren't even going to kill ONE ogre of the 18 in a round of shooting.

On a lucky day of rolling you can have amazing results, but using math to support your choices this is a bad choice.

 

Hello,
The Plaque of Protection is from Spriti Leehs and Bunjas.... a Normal Player won't let his Slann be charged.
If your opponent Uses 18 ogres that means that you are playing on a larger point game, So take 70+ skinks, Porn Shooting is the way to go, Skinks moving around the unit, redirecting charge and other stuff, and firering over 100 poison shots per round (you always have to have poison, I don;t even want to know who wants to hit on 7+ while you have poison?!!??) This is the best way to deal with this kind of problem (In fact its the best way to deal with most of the problems Just Mass of Skink shooting.
Cheers

 

Skink shooting would be a waste and would be better targetted at all the other ogre toys that hate poison- ironblasters, monsters, sabretusks etc

I would probably try and get into combat with it as soon as possible, light of life buffs to a horde of saurus/temple guard will destroy even ironguts.

That or avoid the unit and speedbump it with razordons.

 

Ok, Ejpok, let me see if I can explain this once more.

The lore of death has spell that cause automatic hits (usually d6 or 2d6 minus S or T)
The lore of death has the sniper special rule and a range of 24 inches. This means it can target your slann while he is in a unit and cause automatic hits against him.
The greedy fist is an ogre magical item that when the character carrying it causes HITS the target loses a wizard level for each hit.
An ogre slaughter master (level 4 wizard) can take BOTH the greedy fist AND the lore of death. This means his sniper special rule automatic hit spells make your wizard that is within 24 inches lose wizard levels (up to taking away all 4) with one spell.

Skinks are nice but I was showing you the math to explain why they aren't as good as you seem to believe. I never once suggested shooting at a 7+ to hit was only showing that you could easily find yourself either shooting far less shots than you'd think or forcing yourself to get WAY too close to the enemy. In order to NOT suffer from long range penalty you have to be within 6 inches and ogres have a 6 inch move. That means if you are that close and they charge you can either stand and shoot or have a raw roll off to see which of you rolls highest. That unit locks into you and you're dead. Not to mention, that many skinks on the field could create a redirect flee reaction panic test domino if you run through your own units of notoriously low leadership skinks.

Normal ogres are 35 points, 18 ogres then only cost 630 points before upgrades.. so it is perfectly feasible to see this unit in +/-2000 point games.

 

Also, yes, Momus is correct. If you throw all your skinks at the death star then expect to get clobbered by a rampaging thundertusk or shot to bits by an ironblaster... or possibly both.

 

Ahh yes, though that is typical of any time a wizard loses a level that is definitely an important distinction to make. Thank you Arli.

 

Well,
Skinks Can Move 12" and Shoot, Can stand 3" from the Ogre death star in the Flank and Shoot at it. And If he whishes to charge a 70 point unit, go ahead, It will depend on the Distance that is between us, either you Flee(most of the time) or you Stand and Shoot (rare). Well, This is a Skink vietkong type of list that is one of the most powerfull here in Poland, It lacks a bit Hth Power but that can be overwritten with a Skrox Unit, or Solo krox unit. but thats another story. Don't tell me that the 6x3 Ogres will be reguall Ogres not IG. Than You shouldn't have big problems even in HTH... The only time i saw Ogre Bulls were 2x3Ogre bulls as redirectors..

 

You have to remember, that even if that death star is full up iron guts that is only 800-1000 of their points. That means in a standard 1750 RTT or 2000 point games you are only talking about half of their points. The rest could be filled with mournfang cavalry, thundertusks, ironblasters, or even gorgers that can come up behind your slann and his bunker unit.

So, here is the devils deal.. 2 mournfang cavalry charge a unit of skinks.. they have 2+ AS so the stand and shoot won't bother them. The have swift stride and a base move of 7 so they have full advantage of landing that charge. You flee, they can make a leadership test to redirect.. lather/rinse/repeat until half of your skinks are now fleeing. They cannot shoot on the turn that they rally. Two units of mournfang could clear the field and have most of your units fleeing.. if you stand and take it they don't have enough attacks to wipe all ten skinks.. which is bad news for us. Because if they break the skinks they then get overrun which puts them DEEPER into our side of the field.

It is vastly important to be able to face down the death star and it's friends. i don't know about you but the concept of 7 units of 10 skinks all fleeing all over the board is 490 points of useless and grants a huge benefit.. or they become mournfang lunchables.

I am now a strong supporter of fielding a massive saurus block supported by a lore of light/life slann and a few skink priests to caddy a dispell scroll and cube of darkness.

 

There are only 2 lore of death spells that cause hits. Caress of Laniph and Fate of Bjuna. Only caress can have a 24" range. Becalming the SM is a good start. Keeping your eye on these 2 spells will help. Fate of Bjuna works against toughness, so a T8 Slann is somewhat of a defense...

Rune Maw = no other items = one very squishy BSB.... similarly a SM is either going to have an arcane item or magic armor with a decent ward save (boo! Hiss!), so he's fairly squishy himself. A cowboy Saurus or two, or maybe a nicely placed steg charge might help neutralize one or the other. TG with sufficient buffs could focus on them and take one or both down.

No doubt this is a nasty mix, but it has it's weaknesses.

Oh, and both hits type spells require that the target be in the front arc. Buff spells don't. A buffed up unit of Saurus can let you sail on past and out of reach...


Just my $0.02.

 

Actually, Magician.. you've just brought up an excellent idea. Having the slann and his TG walking right up along side the saurus block then doing a flank charge would not only help hammer the ogres but would also take the slann off the front arc.

Truly awesome insight that is a real game changer, thank you.

 

Purple Sun is the best thing I can think of. FAQ about magical vortexes and the rules for Rune Maw make it clear that the banner can't stop it. Get Slann in the flank, 6 dice+rumination...

The only other option is to assassinate the BSB. If he's running a full 6-wide hoard, the BSB will be in the front rank, and carrying the Rune Maw, he'll only have mundane gear.. Take a unit of Cold Ones with a champion, and a couple tooled up Scar veterans (or Oldblood, points allowing). Get the Crown item in there somewhere. Charge 'em, make sure the BSB is in contact with your characters, and use the champion to absorb any challenge that hinders your attack. He's T5 with 4 wounds and, at best, a 4+ armor with parry. You "should" be able to take him down, one way or another.

A variant of this would invest even more heavily into the assassin's party, and have the Slann buff the unit continuously while staying out of range of the Slaughtermaster's snipe spells. 3-4 mounted and magically buffed saurus characters could do some horrific damage, as long as the rest of your army can keep his other units off of them.

 

Flank charge with the TG gives the SM a chance to bchange facing and come into btb with your TG using a combat reform.

One other thought...any spell you want to cast on the enemy could go to the deathstar as the first preferential target. Want to slap a magic missile in some mournfangs? Try the deathstar first. Maybe some of your stuff will get past the rune maw and help with attrition. If now, you get the mournfangs...