Orks just got their 40k FAQ, but it like Games Workshop may have confused a lot of folks out there with what was probably meant to be simple rewording.
Games Workshop dropped that latest FAQ and the Orks are under the spotlight for the changes this time. If you didn’t know it, FAQs are meant to “fix” problems with the game and made to make things fairer. However, Games Workshop may have just confused folks a bit more.
Grot Shield- The Game Breaker?
We’ll be going over all of the changes found in the Ork FAQ, but this needs to be addressed first and foremost. Grots may be a tad absurd now.
Stratagems, Grot Shields Change the rules text to read: ‘Use this Stratagem after a Infantry unit from your army (excluding units comprised entirely of Gretchin models) has been hit by a ranged weapon. Until the end of the phase, you can roll a D6 each time an attack made with a ranged weapon wounds that unit if there is a friendly unit comprised entirely of Gretchin Infantry models within 6″ of it, and the Gretchin unit is closer to the attacking model than the target unit. On a 2+ one model of your choice in that Gretchin unit is slain and the attack sequence ends.’
Is This Poor Wording?
Going by the way this is worded, if a player wanted to shoot at some Boyz with 24 Assault Cannon shots and some Gretchen met all the criteria for positioning, a single Grot would be able to tank all of the shots by rolling a 2+ because the attack sequence ends.
If a Knight-Vallant wanted to flame through a squad of thirty Ork Boyz but some Gretchen were closer, a single Gretchen would eat all of the flame auto hits because the attack sequence ends.
A single Gretchen is expected to hold up against insane firepower like that to where the attack sequence ends?
Is this right?
It may be a huge problem for 40k in general. Think about how tiny Gretchen models are. in the ITC format, people will be hiding Gretchen in the first floor of buildings so there’s no LOS.
Then they’ll be popping the stratagem to essentially make whatever Infantry units are behind them unkillable.
The opposing player won’t be able to do anything about it either because the Gretchen are out of LOS in a building.
Maybe a better question is, with the FAQing of the Rotate Ion Shield Strat, what is an attack now sequence anyways?
Here’s the way the shooting sequence is worded in the BRB pg179 for reference.
Hopefully, this is all just bad wording and they will clarify further later on. Do we need to FAQ for the FAQ? What are you thoughts?
Other Ork Changes
Probably most imporant is the nixing of the 1+ Meganobz save with LOOTED, and the clarification that you can not play strats on embarked units as the case with folks wanting to MORE DAKKA their super battlewagon passengers.
Let’s break some of the bigger changes down:
- Nobs with Waaagh! banner: can now take Power Klaws
- Grot Blasta: on the Kuston Boosta Blasta is now S3
- Megatrakk Scrapjet: Add 1 to hit rolls for attacks made with the twin big shoota.
- Lootas: (Kustom mega-blasta)Change damage of weapon to D6.
- Blood Axes Taktik: Can fall back and shoot OR charge (not both). If the unit is embarked, they can only do so if the Transport has the same Kultur.
- Get Stuck in, Ladz!: Changed to “Use this stratagem and the END of the Fight Phase.
Other Orkish Clarifications
- If you use the Mob Up stratagem with two infantry squads and one did not have a clan Kultur, the squad loses all Kulturs.
- You do not count the Power Level of units embarked inside a Transport with the Tellyporta stratagem
- Stratagems used on vehicles do not affect units embarked inside.
- You can pick new targets to shoot at with the Bad Moons Showin’ Off stratagem.
There are some more changes in the Ork FAQ that we would recommend you read. We covered the bigger changes and questions that were updated. What do you think about the Grot Shield stratagem? Did Orks get even more powerful after this FAQ? Let us know in the comments of our Facebook Hobby Group.
About the Author: Wesley Floyd
Wesley Floyd
Job Title: Staff Writer
Joined: 2018
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About Wesley Floyd: Wes has been in the Warhammer hobby since 2015 and joined the Spikey Bits writing team in 2018. He is known for his satirist takes on trending topics and imaginative yet amazingly affordable hobby solutions to painting Warhammer miniatures.
Imperial fanboy, tabletop fanatic, and the self-proclaimed King of Sprues. He knows for a fact that Mephiston red is the best-tasting paint and is the commission painting equivalent of a Wendy’s 4 for $4. If you like what he writes and want to contact him or have your tabletop minatures painted (to a mostly okayish standard), message him on Instagram.
