Nobbled!

So this weekend managed to get a squad of Nobs and a warboss painted. Not got the pics yet as still have to base them, but knowing I was having a game after work on Monday (thus wanting to keep the game small) I figured an expensive unit of hardness was a good way to eat up points and reduce the size of my army. Thus my 1500 point list was

A warboss with Power Klaw
Wadaka Gutsmek
10 Nobs (including 3 P.Klaw, 6 Big Choppas, a Waagh Banner and a painboy. The unit was designed for WYSIWYG, and so a plethora of bosspoles was on display - the nobs normally leading squads. This did give me some flexibility to play around with the wound allocation if needs be, but the squad wasn't designed with that in mind)
dedicated transport - Battlewagon with Deffrolla
11 Warbikers inc Nob with P.Klaw
10 Burna Boyz inc Mek
1 Battlewagon with Killkannon

I was up against...

A Tyranid warrior prime (HQ) attached to a squad of 4 warriors
A zoanthrope
A unit of 2 Zoanthrope
A unit of 3 Shrikes
2 units of 3 Ravenors
2 Hormagaunt Broods
A termagent Brood
A trygon
A trygon Prime

Ouch.

We rolled the Cut and Run Ork mission, and I deployed on one flank. My opponent did the same (as much as he could given the size of the army) with the trygons deep striking.

He got the first turn. The lone Zoanthrope blew up one Battlewagon. The pair of Zoanthropes blew up the other. Bad start. He also got both squads of ravenors and a hormagaunt brood in combat with everything I had.

The nobs squashed the Ravenors and freed up the Burnas and themselves to move on. The bikes took a good tally on the gaunts and ravenors, but not enough to kill them off. With a battlewagon wreck between the bikes and the rest of the orks, and more nids incoming, the nobs and burnas left them to fend for themselves. The burnas toasted a brood of hormagaunts before the Nobs charged the warriors and lone zoanthrope, killing the alpha warrior, zoanthrope, and most of the warriors.

In turn 2 the bikes were under more pressure as the shrikes entered the fray. The two trygons turned up and shot the hell out of the burna boys, though the two survivors passed their morale check (though had gone to ground) Meanwhile the nobs finished off the warriors and moved on. In the Ork turn two, the Nobs waaaghed to get into position to charge the zoanthropes AND the trygon prime. They killed both. By this point the kill points were in my favour - Rich had to table me to win. And technically I could exit from my table edge from turn 3 onwards. The bikes meanwhile fell after failing 7 out of 8 4+ armour saves. The lone Nob being run down without the nids even having to make an initiative roll (his I plus poor dice roll was less than their I!)

Turn 3 Rich decided it was do or die. Sure he could use his better mobility to scoot around taking pot shots... though with feel no pain on the squad this may not be too effective. Besides, if he played that game, I could simply walk off the table for the win. He decided on do or die and charged everything towards me. The hormagaunts left over from the bikes finished off the burna boys, while the ravenors and shrikes charged the nobs. They did some wounds, but were wiped out in return. The Nobs then charged straight for the trygon, killing it in a single round of combat (though losing a couple of their number for their efforts)

The hormagaunts reverted to instinctive behaviour, and assaulted the nobs. They didn't last long. With a single unit of hermagants in cover, the 3 nobs and warboss (all wounded) could have walked home for the win... but that wouldn't be very Orkish, and no way to end such a terrific game. So they advanced on the hermagants. The only tactical thing I did was split the warboss from the Nob squad so that one lucky round of shooting couldn't wipe out my entire army!

Turn 5 the gaunts shot and killed another nob. In the ork turn 5 the boss rejoined the squad, and they wiped the gaunts in combat. Victory!

Overall, the nob squad and boss cost 530 points, so a large chunk of my 1500. But given they took out about 1350 points of my opponents 1500, it was a fair price! This was a terrific game, and I can see how the nob squad is open to abuse. I don't intend to do so. I merely played by the rules after equipping them WYSIWYG (as any regular reader here knows, I'm particularly fond of playing to that standard) After losing both battlewagons on turn 1 I was really up against it, and am very glad I managed to pull off the win (and do so without running off the board like the mission parameters said I should, in a distinctly un-orky fashion!) :oP