Ogre Kingdoms Vs Tomb Kings

Post your tips for facing Tomb Kings here.

Archived advice can be found by clicking here.  Please note, the tips within Archive threads may no longer be relevant due to the existence of newer army rules and/or newer Warhammer editions.

Ogres vs Tomb  Kings can be a very bloody battle if you are not paying close attention. I have played TK's many times and I'll be honest my first match up I underestimated them and almost lost.

Deployment~ on this one is key as to where you set up your ST7 nasty Great weapon hero(s) to face off with his unit(S) of chariots. And any TK player not using chariots is not playing his army correctly. A unit of impact his will ruin your day, keep in mind that they can cause enough wounds to break through the unit, and if you are a player who keeps your Butchers behind your own lines...they will get caught in the overrun....which is not fun...

The pop up scorpion is an annoyance when he comes behind your lines...your going to have to worry about him sooner or later, so keep in mind that if your opponent has one, you are going to have to deal with him. Same with swarms...

Magic~TK's happens to be an army that lives and dies in their magic phase, if you know you are going to play vs a TK army I suggest you read over their magic section in the armies book.

Ushabti are the heavy hitters....dont let them charge you...DONT LET THEM CHARGE YOU...normally you will see a unit of these bada$$'s on the opposite side of the chariots, with your opponent's plan of trying to steam roll your flanks and then have his little stuff tie you up untill he can get his hammers in again...it is important to remember a a deployment of a refused flank in these situations...

Hope this helps...

Take gorgers. A TK player will always have his priests hanging out in the back with some archers/catapult. If your 70 pt model can keep your 200+ pt units from getting shot/spelled he's done his job. You don't need to save the rare slots for S7 maneaters because an irongut with bullgorger will do the same thing.

A great way to take out TK is to send some Gnoblars to keep your enemy busy while you send up some hard hitting Ogres, i.e:Ironguts, Gorgers, Maneaters, Tyrants, to go and attack there  Tomb Prince or any other important characters.

I've been playing TK's longer than any other army I have.  After playing with Tk's against Ogres, and the other way around there are some must pay attention to points in addition to those listed above.

The good stuff:

TK chariots are the most fragile in the game.  Bonecrusher, Leadbelcher and heck, even thrown sharp stuff can weaken them to the point where your bait units can afford to soak a charge by them.

The whole TK (and VC army for that matter) pay the points to cause fear.  Ogres will never have to test for it unless you are trying to charge the casket or a charcter with the Death mask (both terror causers)

We hit their entire army (Tomb Guard/Chariots/Ushabti/king-princes) on 3's.  That's huge. Ironguts charging into a ranked unit of skellies hit on 3's and kill on 2's. 

Thiefstones.  I'd take 2-3 on 1 character just to nullify a casket.  This becomes more important as the game size increases.  I've had a casket do lots and lots of wounds to oges that have strayed away from the tyrant's LD radius.  Result?  Failed panic checks.  What the casket will do to a unit of trappers.... eesh.   Also if a TK player knows he's going up against ogres, a casket is a MUST BRING ITEM.  Argue with me all you want, but just the presence of the casket makes all Gut magic go off on a 4+ instead of a 3+.  I'd reccomend Gorgers against this item.  1 gorger will take care of a casket, noooo problem.  He's immune to psych so he doesnt have to take a fear test to charge it.  direct all his attacks on the Liche Priest that's making the box work, and poof! no more casket. 

The bad stuff: Ushabti.  As  Punk stated above, they are probably the unit that should be avoided as much as any in the TK army.  With higher WS, I, than bulls/guts and str 6, they'll chew thru any non-buffed ogre unit with no problem.  Even maneaters  should be wary. 

Shooting.  Not so much their archers, yes, even though they can shoot 2x a turn w/ incants, they hit on 5's, wound on 5's and we get whatever armor save / regen.  Its the catapult.  Beware this.  You can't regen against it as it's flaming.  1 wound on a unit will cause a ld check at -1.  (assuming it's been upgraded to skulls of the foe, but I've never field, nor seen one fielded without that upgrade)  And, it can shoot 2x a turn w/ incants.

Scorpions.  As a Tk player I wouldnt bury a scorpion against an army that is bum rushing into my deployment zone from turn 1.  They move 7", and can move 7" then be incanted to charge 14".  2 of these will take out a unit of bulls/guts with their poisoned str5 attacks.  They are T5 so bulls are wounding on 5's.  Dont try to bonecrusher them either, they have MR1.  They make great casket protectors, so I would always have 1 hanging around the casket, ready to pounce on any Gorger that shows up. 

Swarms.  Rank/file Ogres hate lots of poisoned attacks.  Against a unit of these I've charged a lone butcher out of a unit into 4 stands  of these buggers.  The butcher will usually last out 3-4 stands of them.

And finally, the magic. As above a TK army without magic is like a VC army without vamps to do the dirty work.  Bad thing, lots of spells that ALWAYS ARE CAST.  Good thing, most are 1d6 or 2d6.  In 3k games is where you usually see the High Liche Priest that's tossing 3d6.  So, whenever I fight against TK's with any army, I always take staff of sorcery for +1 to dispell.  in 2k games, 3 butchers are a must.   One with the 2 or 3 thiefstones, 1 with staff of sorcery and 1 with 2 scrolls probably.  Also, Giants are great against the TK undead.  They manouver easily to get into a flanking position.  No cannons/bolt throwers to worry about.  No 2d6 flaming spells being tossed their way.  And TK archers still need 5's to hit, 6's to wound.


One last word on their fighty characters.  They don't hit as hard as their VC equivalents, but are very, very hard to kill.  i usually kit out a prince with Great Weapon, Vambraces of Defense and Armor of the Ages.  So that's a hero with 4 wounds and you lose 1 attack in btb with him.  The King starts out with 4 wounds, and both are T5.  Against Ogres I start that prince out with the catapult, so he can incant on it, then he moves to a big skelly unit when it gets to crunch time.  The King gets the flail of skulls, it does 2 wounds per wound folks.

My regular opponent plays Tomb Kings. Some of the advice I have learnt has been posted before, but I would like to reinterate, as well as add some advice of my own.

Take Gorger/s. Quite often your opponent will be hanging around his side of the table - especially with the speed of Ogres. You can also use them to crash into a Screaming Skull Catapault. I normally take 2. However, don't rely on them, because if you do, they won't turn up until turn 5.

The key to the Tomb Kings is their magic phase. You need to know their magic phase. Their is a strict order in which they have to do things. If they do it in the wrong order, pick them up on it. Think about what is likely to be coming up and what you MOST need to dispell at the time. For example, on his Turn 1, it will be more important to dispell him shooting his screaming skull catapault then it would be to dispell moving out of turn. This is because it will give him one "practice" guess towards his target before his shooting phase proper. However, as the turns go on and you get closer to his units, it will be more important to dispell his move out of turn, as he can use it to charge you with a unit. From my experience, you won't be able to out-magic the TKs. I tried, even using 3 butchers and 4 dispell scrolls. So the key is to out-think him during his magic phase.

Remember, the TKs love to use their ranks, so if you can flank charge them with a unit of bulls or gnoblars, all the better. (This probably goes for most armies against TKs but).

I use 3 units of Bulls with no armour but additional hand weapons. They go out the front and try to draw the charge from other units, and quite often they will flee, leaving the charging unit open to a counter-charge from one of my two Ironguts units. They can also be put out on the flank to nullify the flanking of chariots.

A tyrant with Tenderizer and a Gut Maw will spank most TK characters in a challenge, especially on the charge. Put him in your warbanner unit, and his overkill and that banner will be pretty good for combat res. The only thing you risk is if his character has the magic item that allows him to redirect all wounds on a 4+. Make sure you give your Tyrant a ward save - maybe the wyrdstone necklace (thats what I use at least).

Be careful of the Screaming Skull catapault, as it causes a terror check when you get hit by it. Make sure you keep your army relatively together, as you will need to use the Tyrants leadership. Also, make sure you have a BSB, so that you can re-roll break checks. I find it more useful for that last character slot then a 3rd butcher.

The Banner of the Undying Legion is a pain in the butt. Either send fodder into that unit, or hit it with everything, because you can spend a lot of the fight trying to kill that unit, only to have him keep healing it. I find hitting it with my Tyrants unit with warbanner can go a long way to sorting out that unit. You can choose to just ignore this unit - but if you are playing against a good player, it will be at your own peril.

They do have bowmen, but I have found they are not that effective against Ogres. Don't worry about those too much.

I hope that I have been some help, this is the first time that I have given advice on playing WFB, as I have only been playing for about 6 months. However, I have played probably 10-12 games against TKs in that time.

Where I play the tomb king player runs alot of bowmen. I mean 3 units of 15 or 2 of 15 and 2 of 10 eithier way it's a lot af shoots. He also run the High Queen Khalida Neferher. Which makes them poision. Then she is  auto casting smiting once per turn. (that you can not dispell) He will take 1 skull chucker or the casket which makes a hard army to face.

Things that i found usefull is the Gnoblar screen of 2 units in 2 ranks helps block los alittle.
But what really worked was two big blocks of orgers bull and iron gut 8 to 10. Then with Tyrant and 3 butcher in the units how ever you want them but the Tyrant must have the Kineater big name and the butchers have the min. of 3 dispell scrolls.
Do not run the 2 units up  the middle take them down the flank keeping the close togetherer to get the re-roll of the panic test. During the set up phase put out any thing you got so show you plan on going up the middle like most orger armies do.
It all pays off when you do get in combat with all the gut magic in play .