The Unnamed Gorkamorka Site

We’ve had a few bioniks come up in our GoMo campaign so far, but most haven’t been painted yet. In a previous game during an intensive day of play (we managed about five games, one of which will have a battle report) one of Grimlug’s Ladz received a claw arm. Now there’s plenty of power klaw models out there, but we wanted to try out one of the new Kromlech claw arms (available from MaxMini), so a hand was dipped into the communal bitz box.

Flamekebab posted some images of his finished yoof with claw arm along with some step-by-step photos over on the MaxMini forum last night, he’s contributed to this site before and was more than happy to let us use his images:

After undercoating the arm in black, it was lightly painted with Tin Bitz (GW) (not fully painted, not quite drybrushed).

Then it was drybrushed with Gunmetal Metal (Vallejo):

The rest of the model was painted and then rust was added to the model’s metal surfaces. This was done using this method.

There you have it. Click on the images for bigger versions.

Minor note – we’ve just discovered that this site may have been serving ads embedded in each post. Damn.

We mention this because they weren’t ads being served from our account (we don’t even have adsense accounts) – they were embedded in the theme the site is based on. Sometimes ads are embedded in sneaky ways, but this one we just overlooked as we filter out most ads, so we don’t usually see them. Anyway, the code has been removed now, so if any of you were seeing ads, hopefully they’re now gone. If they’re not – post a comment.

We don’t know if we’ll one day decide to start serving ads, we doubt there’s much money in it and we’re not running this site for profit. If we could get some sort of referral fee for the few sites we link to in the side bar, we wouldn’t complain, but that’s not why they’re there.

We apologise for any ads you may have seen – in the off chance you clicked on them, the revenue went to account pub-1715633612259706, which we mention because we think it’s a pretty lousy thing to do, along with hiding spam links in encoded bits of the page.

At the end of March we began playtesting of a new mob type for Gorkamorka – the Dust Rats. I’m not going to lay out all the details of the faction for now, mainly as it’s still being tweaked and refined, but work is in progress.

We played We Woz ‘Ere Furst with the Dust Rats facing off against a mob of ork freebootaz (another ork faction, created by Neil Plews) and found a few interesting things out about the rules we’d created. You can read the battle report of the game here.

First off, they weren’t hugely overpowered, or underpowered. This was of course a pleasant revelation as we were concerned that they’d be too good, although this is going to require more testing. Principally this is because the orks did not strike at their weak spots – hand to hand combat and pinning.

Weakness testing

Dust Rats, like Diggas and Rebel Grots, are vulnerable to pinning when shot at. This doesn’t apply when they’re on a vehicle, as far as we understand it, but when they’re on foot, firing a few shots in their direction will make them go to ground. We shall have to test this out a bit more to see how well it works, but at the moment this is one of their major Achilles’ heels.

Secondly, apart from their Comanding Officer and Veteran, they are quite poor at Hand-to-Hand combat, with a starting WS of 2 for Grunts and 1 for Planks (ork boyz start with WS3, yoofs with WS2, if you need an orky comparison). Given how deadly melee can be, this can also be an excellent way to put Dust Rats out of action.

Lastly, their basic vehicles have quite light armour and are therefore vulnerable to even normal shooting weapons, although not enough shots were fired for us to see whether the armour values that have been assigned are low enough.

Strengths

What we did find was that their ranged abilities were quite useful, particularly using overwatch and vantage points. This makes them distinctly different from all but muties, who themselves lack the ability to traverse tight spaces and climb.

We are considering whether the long rifle (the veteran’s sniper rifle) should become move-or-fire, but this will require further games as it may just have been fortune in this case.

Speaking of fortune – the orks were incredibly unlucky during the game, so we may well switch the Dust Rat mob to another player and see how they fare against another mob of orks commanded by someone else.

Where we go from here

We now know that the basics aren’t too broken, but in the next game we need to see how the Dust Rats cope under fire, both against warriors on foot and their vehicles. We also need to know whether their WS is a sufficient disadvantage compared to their raised ballistic skill. In theory it should be, as shooting is not particularly deadly in GoMo (intentionally so, according to the game design notes at the end of Da Uvver Book).

We also need to try out their other, heavier vehicle – the SSV. Its rules are still being discussed – it’s supposed to be significantly slower than most other vehicles, but it also needs to be able to work in Da Chase, so we’re not quite sure as to the specifics just yet.

We also need to come up with a decent Dust Rat skill list, an equivalent to Da Dok’s Serjury, and any new gubbinz or items they will be able to purchase between games.

Today I present to you a particularly obscure bit of GoMo memorabilia. I’m amazed one survived, but apparently it did – it’s a Gorkamorka card hat from Gamesday ‘97. They’re tacky as hell and can be seen on the heads of the kids in this photo. In fact, the hat is now thirteen years old – that’s got to be older than some of those children..  

The hat itself is actually slightly larger than A4, but only just. Either way, would you really want to wear it?

I’d recommend printing it on thin card stock, rather than paper. Once you’ve done that, use a sharp knife to cut along the swirly lines in it. The end result should look like.. well there’s a damn photo right there, look for yourself!

A4 PDF

JPEG version

Back in January we posted an old White Dwarf article about collecting a GoMo mob, since then one of our starting mobs, Nazgrab’s Yella Deff, has grown quite considerably and now has a mob rating of 293. Whilst this is great, it does mean I’ve hit a bit of wall – the mob is significantly ‘arder than all the others in our campaign. To alleviate this I’m temporarily retiring Da Yella Deff and starting another mob. Once the other players’ mobs catch up, Nazgrab and his boys will be back for more.

So, thought I, why not write an article of my own about starting my new ork mob? I’d love to have my own freeboota mob but I think that they shall have to wait until Da Cuttas Ov Da Jibb are more advanced. Without further ado, let’s get started:

1. Gorkers or Morkers?

This one’s easy – Nazgrab and his lads are Morkers and favour lots of vehicles and speed. My new mob is going to be Gorkers. Lots of spikes and weaponry.

2. Da Boss

Grimlug is my Gorker nob. He’s built from parts from several sets, although mostly he’s from a 40K ork nob box set. His kannon is clearly custom built, mainly because I couldn’t find any resin kannons when I came to build him. Conveniently it’s actually exactly right for the left over kannon shells we had from building the belt-fed twin-linked kannons on Da Yella Deff’s bike.

I’ve also given him a choppa, giving him a decent chance both in melee and at range. As he’s got both BS4 and WS4, it’d be silly not to make good use of him.

3. Da Spannerz

Rotgrim and ZodZod are my spanners. I don’t actually need two, but I feel I’m cheating a little with my overly large trak and plan on buying a suitable buggy or trukk after a few games to give the boyz a bit of breathing room. Rotgrim is packing a kannon (custom resin cast) and an original Gorkamorka weapon sprue choppa whilst ZodZod is going to be manning (orking?) the trak’s ‘eavy shoota.

4. Da Vehicles

See what I mean about an oversized trak?

It’s made from an original GoMo trak, a 2nd Edition 40k ork warbike, a headlight from a modern ork warbike, an old GoMo ammo box (which is oddly exactly the right calibre ammo for modern ork big shootas..), oh and a hell of a lot of plasticard.

It’s got Zogdreg as the driver, one of my three yoofs. He’s not carrying anything more than his knife – he’s got the lousy job of getting the mob to its next fight.

I thought that as I was trying to play differently with this mob, I’d give the ‘eavy shoota a try. It costs as much as the trak itself but could be worthwhile – after all, it fires 2-6 shots per turn at S5, some of those are bound to hit, right?

5. Da Slaverz

For now I’m not going to bother with a slaver, but perhaps later some diggas or grots will come in handy. Just to get in the enemy’s way, right?

6. Da Boyz

To start with I’m just going to be fielding two boyz – Gorog and Wazbag. Gorog has a club (courtesy of the biker sprue) and a slugga. Wazbag thinks he’s a deadeye gunslinger and is packing two six shootas to prove it – annoyingly I can’t find any resin six shootas either, thank you, irony..

7. Da Yoofs

I’ve already mentioned Zogdreg, the trak driver, but there’s two others in the mob too; Gutrunt and Dursnaga. They’re each armed with a choppa and a club, Gutrunt’s club from the biker sprue, Dursnaga’s from the remains of Nazgrab’s old harpoon gun.

8. Da Grotz

As I said earlier, no grots for now, maybe later.

9. Rolling for Starting Experience

I’ve sorted out their experience and the total mob rating comes to 116. Not particularly high, particularly compared to the others in the campaign, however, if they win they’ll be looking at a pretty sweet income bonus and a bit of extra experience either way!

By the way, if you’re struggling with naming your orks, try out this orky name generator.

WAAAAGH!