Ogre Maneaters warband

Hey guys,

my buddy plays ogres in warhammer fantasy and was very excited about the BTB maneasters warband to use in mordheim. only the problem was we found that he was severely underpowered for the first maybe 3 scenarios and then basically became unbeatable once he got about 6 ogres.

What is your thoughts on the maneaters? I'm personally of the opinion that maybe we were running them wrong or perhaps witch hunters and lizardmen just have a hard time fighting such heavy bruisers, but i wanted some respected opinions on the warbands playability and balance.

I played against ogres several times... I think it's important to play against them in a scenario involving lots of different objectives to claim so the ogres have to split up, so yo can take on one with two or three of your fighters... if they get the chance to stay as a group, you're screwed Also, crossbows and other S4 ranged attack is very useful to lower their wounds before they get on close.

Yeah you have to split them up or just pick them off.

They all have toughness 4 and 2 or 3 wounds, so you want to use Strength 4 weapons like Crossbows, Crossbow Pitols, and black powder weapons. If they do get into Melee with you then you are going to want some melee guys with Double Handed Weapons with Strongman. The other thing you want to do concentrate your attacks on the same guys.

And some luck is always useful, too! I once held two big and nasty ogres at bay for several turns with only a couple of acolytes

I plan on defeating them by feeding them snotlings until they fall asleep from being too full and then we win! Wait... Ogres don't get full...

LOL. nice feedback guys. i seriously appreciate your input. I am one fo those guys that if somehting seems impossible im likely not opening my eyes to other options. The maneaters are a tough nut to crack, even with a hail of crossbow bolts and charges with my flagellants. reason i asked is my buddy really loves his ogres and I hate watching him switch to his alts just because he feels like he is bringing the fun of the game down. and im sure theyre more suited to BTB instead of mordheim (since you know....they were written for that setting and all ) but in any case, i began to worry about balance when i kept seeing the ogres in the "experimental" section of classification.

in any case, ive descided that if im facing ogres in the up coming campaign, then ill just have to really crank out some smart tactics....and buy more warhounds

Thnx Guys!

As far as I know, all the BTB warbands were balanced against regular warbands, too. And if you're playing in the City of the Damned, there's another advantage you could use - terrain! With the ogres having such large bases, small alleys etc. where they can't move through at all or only in single file can be a great strategic advantage

Lydor wrote:

but in any case, i began to worry about balance when i kept seeing the ogres in the "experimental" section of classification.!

No need to worry; the attribute "Experimental" itself does only mean that the specific rule(s) were not published by Games Workshop / the Mordheim Powers themselves (and so would not be legitimate in any official Mordheim tournament - not that there are many nowadays, GW not supporting Mordheim officially anymore, and all that ), not more; the classification of a warband as "experimental" is no direct indicator of the warband's having any balancing, fairness or (un-)testedness issues.

Mephysto's right... there are more Experimental warbands these days than official. While "Experimental" warbands are more LIKELY to have some balance issues, that is not a guarentee... some players argue that some of the core starting bands (like Skaven or Possessed) are "broken."

Sadly, as I have never played the Ogres, all I can offer you is some general advice when it comes to playing against experimental warbands:

1. Read ALL of the rules. Sometimes something seems super strong... until you realize that they are nerfed because of a tiny rule you overlooked!

2. Separate the player from the warband: We've had some experimental warbands played by a very aggressive, competitive player. Did he pick them because they win, or do they win because he picked them? Sometimes it's hard to tell, but if the same player wins every campaign (including when he plays with weaker, more balanced warbands), it's possible that the player is just good... OOOOOR he cheats on his Advancement rolls. *shrug*

3. Sympathy for the Devil - Put yourself in the player's shoes... sure, you feel YOUR losses, but is he fairing much better? Does he have bad luck too, or just riding high on a few 6s? If he lost his leader, would he still dominate, or be forced to retire?

4. Smash Him - If a winning player is above sympathy, start up some multiplayer games. Gang up and squash him like a bug.

5. Try Try Again - To Perfectly playtest something takes lots of attempts, from many different people. Try it different times... if any player objects, suggest nerfs and tweaks. When in doubt, side on UNDERpowered, because the alternative doesn't make you many allies.

I should think it would be hard to create an ogre warband that wasn't over-powered to at least some extent . Mind you, I have never played with or against this particular warband, and I have heard nothing but positive things about the BTB campaign in general. But just as elf warbands are hard to balance because of the superior stats of the individual elves, the ogres just have too many stat advantages to balance out easily (without nerfing the stats). Even ignoring the strength/toughness/wounds advantages, the Movement 6 alone is a huge advantage.

With any warband that is dominating a campaign too completely for whatever reason, the simplest solution is to gang up on them and overwhelm them, and then sort out your differences with the other warbands.

Screw dogs, buy flagellants! Or your own ogre. Witch Hunters are a good band to fight ogres with because they have some good weapons and some hard warriors who will fight anything, but I think numbers might be good to have as well.

The only time I faced ogres I played orcs. Sorted.


(At least as long as Mr. Troll stayed on his feet.)

Really strong comments already made by everyone here.

It's important to me that Maneaters can be treated as balanced in an urban set-up. I'm looking forward to them visiting Marienburg.

Achieving a balance is always a struggle. The Maneaters do have some weak Hero choices and the way that BTB campaigns work the Ogres cannot recruit an unlimited following of Gnoblars. While these are features that players may not enjoy, they do contribute to keeping a lid of the warband becoming unfair.

Finding ways to exploit the weakness of your enemies is what winning is all about! I liked the comments made about double-teaming an enemy who has become a greater threat by playing additional multi-player scenarios. That's rough justice.

I would comment that anyone playing Witch Hunters in a campaign is going to get a raw deal. There aren't any decent campaign perks for them. Tuomas Pirinen himself commented on the matter in an interview on the 'Strike to Stun' web site. It seemed like a bug bear for him, he spoke as if there was unfinished business. I'd like to set this to right in the new campaign we're working on because law & order is a big issue in the City of Islands and Bridges.

Regards,

Werekin.

In our campaign the Maneater warband is crippled. When most people are nearly at their Max limit he only has 4 or 5 Ogres. This may be becuase his two youngbloods died in the first scenario.

The same situation also occurred during our playtesting. The warband can suffer irreparable casualties in the first few games if the player has poor luck or makes decisions with reckless abandon.

Maneaters is a tacticians choice, in terms of how successful they can be in a campaign.

There is always strong temptation to get the Bulls and the Mountain Guide on the pitch. This is highly risky! All your eggs in one basket is just asking for trouble. The safe option is to maximise on Youngbloods in the hope they develop, hire Half-growns instead of bully boys and consider the limited options available for Hired Swords.

Hmm...thanks guys! these comments were extremely helpful, and the eye opener on the "experimental tag" was well placed, as was the comment about the BTB warbands being roughly balanced to the core. I appreciate your help!

Just fyi, you DO know that there are TWO Ogre Warbands, right? The Mordheimer one, and the Border Town Burning one. The Mordheimer one is the older "prototype" that was used by the second one. (Never played either, so I can't tell if one is more "fair" than the other, but the latter definitely has a fuller warband with more options.)

Old topic, new question:

So I played my first game with Ogres, and possibly a few upgrades and equipment to buy.

Are Ogres prohibited from using regular shields or are they limited to Ironfists. In our campaign ranged mayhem galore so a normal shield would be better.

The Ogres in the Ogre Maneater warband from BTB cannot use regular shields because shields are not mentioned in their equipment list. In a similar vein, the Mountain Guide hero type cannot ever use heavy armour because it is not in the equipment list for the Mountain Guide.

Hand-to-hand combat weapons and ranged weapons have skills that allow warriors to use weapons outside of their equipment list. There is no similar skill for armour though. This is why Gromril, Ithilmar and Lamellar (from BTB) armour types are all defined as heavy armour. They can be worn by any warrior that has heavy armour in their equipment list (some people do house rule that Ithilmar counts as light armour instead). Otherwise only elf and dwarf warbands would ever be able to use those specialised armour types.

Note... I don't know what this does to the Pavise from the 2002 Annual which is a type of shield but I've never seen it listed in *any* warband list so in theory no warriors would ever be able to use them. (The rules for Pavises are stupid though IMO so I doubt anyone actually cares!)

I would count the Pavish as a shield for "who can use it" but as you said it sucks... I have been trying to figure out a use for it for some time but can't.

R.Lemming is right above on the shield rules.