Skrags Damnation - 2400pts

Pandora's box has been opened!

I see your obsession with necromancy continues.  Have you considered getting counseling?

So this army list is based off of my topic in feeding grounds. The idea is to utilize Skrag's ability to take Lore of Undeath without needing Butcher tax. As this is something entirely new to Ogres there is very little to go on so a lot of this is just theory. I have tried taking the best bits of our beloved Ogres and complementing them with the undead

The secret of the army is simple. You spam etherals. Ok. So you use your 1st magic phase to hopefully raise a Casket of Souls with Kandorak, the Harbringer , that adds dice to the pool, all the while marching all the chaff up. Continuely use Ryze to create enough chaff/road blocks until you reach critical mass and unleash multiple terrorgheist screams/vargheist flank charges and alike from the safety of a Standard Irongut unit. All the while the opponent is being whittled down from shooting and is trapped on small units that don't give up many victory points via being played in an MSU style. So in short keep the opponent off me long enough till i have summoned enough free units that don't give up battle points to grind out the victory.

So here is the list, it is still a very rough list but a basis none the less

LORD - Skrag the Slaughterer: 425 Points
Lore of Undeath

HERO - Bruiser: 183 Points
Heavy armour, Ironfist, Dragonhelm, Crown of Command
So these two go inside the Irongut unit
The Bruiser needs to be relatively resilent as he is unable to hide in a rear rank and may possibly be needed to make way to fight on the opposite flank to Skrag

HERO - Firebelly: 170 Points
Dispel Scroll, Ruby Ring of ruin
Goes in a Leadbelcher unit

CORE - 8 Ironguts: 394 Points
Full command; Look-out Gnoblar; Standard of Discipline
Creating a Ld10 bubble for my army

CORE - 3 Ogres: 103 Points
Additional hand weapons, Bellower
CORE - 3 Ogres: 103 Points
Additional hand weapons, Bellower

SPECIAL - 5 Leadbelchers: 225 Points
Bellower
SPECIAL - 5 Leadbelchers: 225 Points
Bellower
SPECIAL - 4 Leadbelchers: 182 Points
Bellower

SPECIAL - Sabretusk: 21 Points
SPECIAL - Sabretusk: 21 Points

RARE - Ironblaster: 170 Points
RARE - Ironblaster: 170 Points

There we have it

Have i truly opened the Pandora's box of the Ogre Kingdoms

Evening Minigiant,

Looks like a great offensive list in terms of magic, close combat and long range.

Great to see a double IB. If you are going to be facing lots of T3 models, you could max out the 25% allowance for rare units and also get double scraplaunchers. I guess it all depends on whether they or LBs give better mileage.

Let us know how you get on!

Badmarsh

Let us know how you get on!

Oh i plan too :-) because right now i feel like this is a truely unique take on Ogres and something no one else is working on, but first i must go dust off some of my old VC army lying around. If i like this a lot i must go get some Samurai undead made....my wallet hurts just thinking about it

Here's what I keep thinking, as I consider this list:

Is Skrag better than a Slaughtermaster & Butcher?

I think maybe the answer is no.  Take this example:

Skrag  -- vs --  Slaughtermaster (Lvl 4 Undeath, GW, AoD, Grut's Sickle) & Butcher (Lvl 1 Maw, Dispel Scroll, GW)

Skrag:  Is 124 pts cheaper than the SM&Butcher.  Has the cauldron.  Has killing blow and terror.  Has better weapon skill, toughness, and leadership.  Also has Frenzy (and all the drawbacks that come with it) and an irregular base size (cannot rank up or make way, makes your unit much wider and more difficult to maneuver).

SM&Butcher:  Has better strength on weapon attacks, 4 more wounds, has a 4++ from the start (on the important guy), has a DISPEL SCROLL (yes, it is that important), casts as a LEVEL 6 (again .. important).  Also can rank up, make way, accept challenges, hide in the 2nd rank, fit in a 3 wide unit of MI, etc.

Even considering an additional 15 pts for Standard of Discipline, I think the SM&Butcher are a much better deal - especially for Lore of Undeath (you need tokens, to get tokens you must cast a lot of spells, to cast a lot of spells you need a +6 to cast).  The additional magic defense of a scroll is great also, although you could instead go all out with a forbidden rod on the butcher and supercharge your first magic phase (earlier tokens means earlier terrorgheists).

I realize part of the appeal of this army list is that it uses Skrag.  That's fine, as long as there is an understanding that Skrag is probably not the most optimized way for ogres to use the lore of undeath.

Thank you for replying, i appreciate your comments but i think you have ignored another component. The Firebelly (Dispel scroll)

And Lore of Undeath & Lore of Fire instead of Lore of Undeath and Lore of the great maw

I feel the power comes from having two complimentary lores and none are LotGM

Now the obvious development is Lore of Undeath, LotGM and Lore of Fire but there is just not enough power dice to make this work

I saw the firebelly (and everyone probably knows that I love seeing lists with firebellies).  I was doing a modular comparison of what you would need to bring to have something comparable to Skrag.  If you incorporate the Firebelly into the comparison:

Skrag & Firebelly (Scroll, RRR)  --vs--  SM (Lvl 4 Undeath, GW, AoD, Gruts) & Butcher (Lv1 Maw, GW, Scroll)

Now the SM&Butcher are 66 pts cheaper, still have higher strength, no frenzy drawbacks, no base size issues, still cast as a Level 6, and still start with a 4++.  If you add the Standard of Discipline, they are still 51 pts cheaper.

Skrag&Firebelly still have some advantages, or course.  The cauldron, killing blow, terror, a breath weapon, and 2x fireballs.  The real issue is that Lore of Undeath has to be the primary focus of the list.  Otherwise that lore won't work.  You need tokens to summon anything of real worth.  That means no dice can be spent on fireballs without slowing your accumulation of tokens towards terrorgheists (and other fun things).  Skrag and the firebelly bring a bunch of combat abilities when your lore is focused on using the summons (which award no vp) for combats.  I would build a Lore of Undeath list very similar to a Heaven's list.  Skrag belongs in a Maw centric list (with a firebelly) where the magic supports his impressive combat ability.

-Snark