The Unnamed Gorkamorka Site

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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!

Whiskey Delta 4 vs. Da Cuttas Ov Da Jibb
Scenario: We Woz ‘Ere Furst (Da Uvver Book, scenario 2) 

We’ve been working on a new mob for GoMo as part of ‘Ere Be Stuff, as you may have read. The rules aren’t quite finished yet, but they’re together enough to playtest, so here’s a battle report from the first playtest. Sorry about the delay!

On the bottom edge of the board we’ve got the Dust Rats, a mob known as Whiskey Delta 4. On the top edge we’ve got the Freebooter mob, Da Cuttas Ov Da Jibb. The scenario is We Wuz Ere Furst and there’s a full six scrap counters on the board, marked in this image to give an idea where they are (sorry for the blurriness!). The objective is of course to grab as much as possible and try to make sure the other mob bottles out empty-handed.

A new feature we’re trying out for battle reports is “Da Plan” – players give a quick run-down of their plan for the scenario (in secret) so we can see how badly things go wrong:

Da Plan – Whiskey Delta 4

Okay, here’s the plan..
There’s scrap spread about the board so I’m going to try to move as fast as I can and pick them up and then get the hell out of there, because I don’t think my guys are going to be able to stand up to such a pounding. His lads, well, they’re already half bionik, so I’ve got to be careful.

I’ve also split my guys into their two Light Recon Vehicles, or Recce vehicles, so I’ve got one that’s mostly ranged and one that’s mostly hand-to-hand combat. So we’ll see how it goes – hopefully that’ll work best, playing to their strengths rather than trying to get a mixed bag/jack-of-all-trades.

Da Plan – Da Cuttas Ov Da Jibb

Get very careful note of this – in true orky fashion, I have no plan!

I’m going to shoot them, I’m going to fight them, I’m going to bite them..
..and then I’m going to try to get the scrap!

So, let’s get started!

Whiskey Delta 4 get the first turn and send one of their grunts, Howe, to grab some scrap lurking in some difficult terrain. With a man on the ground the two LRVs thrust forward to close the gap between the scrap and themselves. The commanding officer, Togan, takes his hand-to-hand guys up the left side of the board whilst the veteran, Daggat, tries to take the right flank. In doing so he ends up with a clear shot at the Freebooter Kaptin, Grob.

This is the first instance of the increased range of the Dust Rats coming into play, although in this case the bumpiness of the vehicle makes the shot miss by a hefty margin. The orks are up, with Steerrraaagh! at the helm they cruise forward, planning to make a turn and ram the oncoming LRV perhaps, but the vehicle won’t budge from its course, resulting in a stall. Amazingly the nearby rocks were avoided!

Luckily for Da Cuttas Ov Da Jibb, the crazed Dok who hacked off the legs of two of the crew (whether they needed it or not..) saw fit to give them transport in the form of tracks and a gyro-stabilised monowheel. This did have the unfortunate side effect of getting the old Kaptin the nickname “Captain Hula-hoop”, but the less said about our stand-in monowheel the better.

Grob, current freebooter kaptin, fires up his traks’ thrusters and heads over to the scrap hiding behind the rocky outcrop. Meanwhile the old Kaptin, Carrudders, trundles over to the large dune to see if he can find a way up to the juicy scrap.

Contrary to the original rules, we play ammo rolls on 1s, rather than sixes. This does mean that occasionally a weapon jams immediately, but that’s just part of the chaos of GoMo.

Why does this matter? Well, Wabdash, the dead-eye of Da Cuttas Ov Da Jibb, was planning on putting a nice big hole in the engine block of the Dust Rats’ LRV, only to find he’d actually forgotten to reload his weapon!

WHICH WUN OV YOO ZOGGERZ NICKED ME SHELLZ?!
-Wabdash

Back to the Dust Rats, Whiskey Delta 4:

Howe can’t really go anywhere fast carrying the scrap he’s dug up, but he also doesn’t want the orks getting it either. All he’s got his his carbine and some cover, so he gets himself in position and goes on overwatch.

(We’ve not actually had anyone go on overwatch before – the last warrior that tried to get a good shot lined up ended up getting splattered by a speeding trukk before he could declare overwatch!)

Before the brown LRV heads further forward, Daggat jumps off and heads towards the watchtower, hoping to get a good vantage point for his long rifle.

The mob’s CO, Togan, also opts to get his feet dirty and hops off the speeding jeep, easily passing the required initiative test. Once on the ground he runs up the dune, getting close to the scrap.

Time for the freebooters to fight back!

Steerrraaagh! guides Da Jolly Squig around the LRV, dropping off the two of the crew to deal with it. Unfortunately, Da Banga and Wabdash are not having a good day and both end up with a gob full of sand when they try to storm the vehicle.

Steerrraaagh! isn’t actually having much luck either – the Bad Mek jumps off to try to claim the scrap only to have the lurking Dust Rat, Howe, take a potshot at him (he missed) and then have the driver stall the trukk on top of the prize. Well done, that ork..

Lastly, the orks try to take a shot with their harpoon gun only to jam the damn thing, or maybe they’re just out of ammo there too? (I believe they fired it previously but didn’t scratch the LRV, which is surprising given how weak the armour on an LRV is!)

The Dust Rats are on the move again, trying to hold onto their advantage. Howe starts moving towards the edge of the board with his scrap, keeping an eye on the trukk in the distance.

CO Togan grabs the scrap atop the dune whilst the LRV below performs slow speed manoeuvres to turn the vehicle around (represented here by a very distorted arrow). The other LRV starts heading towards the other board edge, getting near Grob, the freebooter kaptin.

Veteran Daggat begins his ascension of the watchtower, getting to the first level where there’s a reasonable amount of cover. Rolko fires his machine pistol at the ork taking cover within the barricades, but doesn’t hit him. He’s also not got any ammo left, ah well!

The orks are up again and this time they’re not messing about – Steerrraaagh! rams the brown LRV, taking out its thrusters, effectively hobbling it.

To follow up, the trukk pulls up alongside the LRV and the crew try to jump aboard, with marginally more success. Wabdash faceplants once again and the kabin boy, the now redundant harpoon gunner, gets minced between the two vehicles, putting himself out of action. Nice one.

Not to be put off by this, Da Banga grabs a firm handhold and prepares to furnish Feddick with a few fresh orifices.

Remarkably, the grunt puts up a good fight, holding the burly freebooter at bay and drawing combat. Impressive, but it’s probably only a matter of time before he takes a beating.

Reacting to the unexpected passenger, the plank driving the brown LRV pushes the vehicle’s gas engines to their limit as he tries to get to the edge of the board, only just falling short.

Meanwhile, Togan scrambles down the dune bank onto the waiting LRV, which starts on its way to the other table edge, planning on picking up the sniper later. He’s a veteran, he knows what he’s doing!

As it happens, he does, and once he’s on the second level of the watchtower with some scrap at his feet, he makes it known. A single shot rings out and the freebooter bad mek’s day is ruined, as he’s out of action. Good night, gracie.

With that, it’s the freebootaz turn, although it doesn’t really begin, as they’ve had enough. Well done, Dust Rats!

Result: Victory to Whiskey Delta 4.

We made a few notes along the way, as this was a playtest, but I think they would be more appropriate in a separate post.

As always, any comments can go in the comments below.