WHFB: Ogre Kingdoms Review Conclusion

Hola amigos, ready to put this one to bed?

Now that all the elements of the army book have been looked at individually, let’s take a step back and look at the army as a whole and how it plays from a competitive standpoint.

Their main strength is the toughness and combat ability of the army.  They are high toughness and multi-wound monsters, which makes them difficult to kill from shooting and combat.  And they hit ferociously hard, especially if they get the charge off.  So any list that is looking to maximize Ogres needs to focus on their strengths, as opposed to being too fancy with shooting units. 

I always say that you need to have a plan for how your list will win the game, and the Ogre plan is close combat backed up with defensive magic.  The Lore of Great Maw adds sick defense on top of an already tough army: this is what you need to capitalize on in a straightforward list.  If your “how will I win” plan veers too far from close combat and defensive magic, I think your list will begin to struggle.

The big weakness of the army is Initiative.  Between low Initiative and Great Weapons abounding, the army is slow in combat, and vulnerable to Initiative tests.  Luckily, there are many ways built into the book to work around this.  I would highly suggest you consider at LEAST one Thundertusk and it’s gamebreaking ASL bubble to even the combat odds against high initiative opponents.  Additionally, the ability to inflict impact hits heavily mitigates the low initiative.  The ability to get impact hits off, rather than being the one getting charged has a lot to do with generalship and maneuver, but remember there are items that make your charge further and move faster.  Those things will enable you to be the charger rather than chargee.  Use them. 

Your units are big, even with only 6 models, meaning they are vulnerable to warmachines, magical template attacks, and characteristic tests (like Initiative).  It is crucially important that you bring multiple casters so that you always have a chance to dispel.  One Pit of Shades or Purple Sun could do serious damage and you need to be set to prevent this.

So with that said, here is a sample list I would consider competitive out of the gate.  I certainly wouldn’t want to play against it with Dark Elves.  I’m not saying this is the best list possible, it surely isn’t, but it’s a good starting point.  It does the things that a good Ogre list should do and minimizes the weaknesses as much as possible.

Ogres 2,500

 Slaughtermaster

- L4

-Ironfist

-Ironcurse Icon

=293

 Bruiser

-BSB

-Crown of Command

-Sword of Striking

-Iron Fist

-Heavy Armor

=188

Butcher

-L2

-Iron Fist

-Dispel Scroll

=163

7x Ogres

-Iron Fists

-Musician

-Standard

=244

7x Ogres

-Iron Fists

-Musician

-Standard

=244

 7x Ironguts

-Musician

-Standard

-Standard of Discipline

=336

2x Mournfang Cavalry

-Greatweapons

-Heavy Armor

=146

2x Mournfang Cavalry

-Greatweapons

-Heavy Armor

=146

2x Mournfang Cavalry

-Greatweapons

-Heavy Armor

=146

Gourger

=90

Thundertusk

=250

Thundertusk

=250

Total: 2,496

Basically, the list tries to get key Great Maw spells off, hit insanely hard with combo charges of Ogres and Mournfangs, and keep everything within an ASL bubble so your opponents are brought down to your level.  It has a Gourger to ambush targets of opportunity and to keep your opponent from playing keep away.

Thoughts?

WHFB: Ogre Kingdoms Review Part 7

Lords and Heroes.  Let's do this, shall we?  I'm not going to cover special characters because I don't care for them in my games, they don't interest me.  Either they are strictly better than the normal choices, like Teclis, or they are completely unusably over priced.  So I just ignore them.

-Lords and Heroes-

Tyrant:  The big guy.  His stat line is definitely fighty, he is a match for a Chaos Lord.  And much like a Chaos Lord, he is completely useless in competitive lists.  The reason is you simply cannot spend 275+ points on a character and equipment that won't influence the game until Turn 3.  The only other time to bring a fighty Lord is for leadership qualities, but that only works in armies like Empire and Skaven where your fighty-lords are dirt cheap.  For you fluff balls (I kid, I kid) ignore this and tool him out with ridiculous equipment like the Sword of Swift Slaying and go to town.

Slaughtermaster: 285 points for a naked Level 4 caster is about on par for other army books, except this guy gets a decent combat stat line.  Not bad.  My advice is to not be tempted to tool him for combat to make an "all arounder" Lord choice.  This guy is the Grey Knights Librarian of the Ogre Army.  His Gut Magic buffs are vitally important to the success of your Ogre Force, and you need to gear him as such.  Please see my magic item review and user comments for how best to do that.  It goes without saying that in any army of 2k or higher, this is an obligatory choice.

Bruiser: Much like the Chaos Exalted Champ and Lord, the Bruiser is the cost effective fighty character.  This guy should be carrying a Battle Standard unless you have a fantastic reason for him not to be, and he should have the Crown of Command in every case, unless you're going to put him into a unit that will already have Stubborn.  If you plan on your Slaughtermaster to reliably casting Regeneration on his unit, the Dragonhelm is a nice, cheap magic item to give him.  With Heavy Armor, Iron Fist, and Dragon Helm, he will have a 3+ armor, 4++ regen, and 2++ ward vs Flaming.  Not bad defense for your Stubborn BSB.

Hunter: A couple reasons to bring him: you want to mount a fighty character on a Stonehorn to make a uber tough deathstar point sink; you think a Sabretusk deathstar is a cool idea; you want a cheaper fighty character with cooler equipment options than the Bruiser gets and don't need a BSB in your army. 

Butcher: Look at the stat line your L2 gets for 135 points!  That's a steal.  I would almost always take one in order to ensure my L4 gets the spells her wants.  Easy choice.

Firebellies:  A pretty crap unit.  Seriously, you don't see many people in tournaments with Fire Magic, with good reason.  All the Lores have offensive spells.  The others, though, add some utility.  Fire doesn't.  Unless you are a fluff bunny or really need a breath weapon in your army for some reason, steer clear.

-Summary-

Ogres have some cool choices here.  The Hunter and Firebelly are both OK and garbage respectively from a competitive standpoint, but they have a cool factor that will get them both played.  The Bruiser and Butcher are both strong choices with stat lines that are superior for their points costs, plus they bring value to your force by being BSB and a wizard respectively.  The Slaughtermaster is just hands down great.  I compared him to the GK Librarian in terms of the utility he brings to your army, but he is actually better than that.  The GK Libby is hard to use effectively without a Land Raider or big Termie unit, whereas nearly ever Ogre Army should use a Slaughtermaster.  The Tyrant is a losing proposition.  If you want an insanely expensive bad ass beater, bring a Hunter on Stonehorn.  If you want a value choice, bring a Bruiser or Hunter.  The Tyrant really doesn't have a great purpose.

WHFB: Ogre Kingdom Review Part 6

I must apologize again for the lack of updates.  Work has been insane lately and my biggest two races of the year are coming up so I've been training like a demon at 4am, which means by the time I get home from work at 6pm I'm too exhausted to write anything.

Hopefully I can power through these and move things forward.

-Rares-

Gnoblar Scraplauncher:  The good news is it caught a big points decrease from the last edition.  You can easily fit two into your list and still have enough points for a third Rare, even in a 2k list.  The bad news is, it's a bit crap.  Str3 small blasts are OK, but you can't really expect them to do too much.  Even two of them are not going to scare a big unit of Chaos Marauders.  The Killing Blow is cute, as always, but nothing you can count on to carry you.  Better options are available.

Iron Blaster:  So we have a Scraplauncher with a mega-cannon attached that fires Str10 Grapeshot!  For 170 points it's a steal.  In a vacuum this is a fantastic unit.  But in the larger context of the entire army book, it doesn't work well.  Cannons are great at killing monsters and elite armored units.  Ogres aren't afraid of monsters, trust me.  And elite armored units aren't especially scary.  I consider the Iron Blaster a great answer to a question that nobody asked.

Giant:  Move along, nothing to see here.  

Stonehorn:  On average it will do 9 Str 6 hits when it charges, potentially more, plus the rider's attacks.  That's strong.  Built in defense against cannons and bolt throwers, even stronger.  It's expensive, but it's a frickkin' beat stick.  Two of these in every list and done.  Seriously.

Thundertusk:  Wow, the Always Strikes Last bubble is insane.  These absolutely frighten Dark Elves.  High Elves get to hit at Initiative at least, Dark Elves just get smashed.  Unfortunately, the thing has crap armor save, and doesn't have the built-in defense against warmachines.  Adding to it's list of weaknesses is that it doesn't bring much to the table offensively itself.  Yes, it makes the rest of your army better, but it doesn't kill much itself and is easier to kill.  I don't want to make this sound bad, really the ASL bubble is absolutely nuts, but you have to consider if it's worth it for your army.

-Summary-

My take is that the Stonehorn and Thundertusk are the big winners.  The other three are marginal.  The debate is between Stonehorn and Thundertusk, really.  So which do you pick?  Stonehorns can be redundant since it's a big beatstick in an army of big beat sticks.  Whereas the Thundertusk isn't a beater, but it is a force multiplier.  Tough decisions that will come down entirely to your list.  However, consider that the Thundertusk is a chariot and thus cannot march.  The rest of your army can march 12".  What good is a 6" ASL bubble when the rest of your army is in combat 12" in front of you?  It may turn out to be something that sounds epic on paper, but is rather awkward to use effectively on the table top.  Does that make sense?

WHFB: Ogre Kingdom Review Part 5

Hey gang.  Let's keep the ball rolling with the Specials.  In Fantasy, Specials do for you what Elites and Fast attack do for you in 40k.  Since 50% of your points can go to Specials, the choices you make in Specials can be what define the feel and flavor of your army.  What goodies to Ogres get?

-Specials-

Leadbelchers:  Flavor-wise, these guys rule.  Big nasty Ogres carrying cannons that they shoot like small arms.  Pretty cool.  Unfortunately, they aren't so awesome on the table top.  The problem is you are paying for normal Ogre toughness and close combat ability, and decent shooting.  They are overpriced as a CC unit, and though their shooting is good, it isn't 43 points per model good.

Maneaters:  Pirate Ogres!  Ummm, weird.  They are super bad ass in close combat, since they come stock with an extra attack and Strength 5 over normal Ogres and for a measly two-points you can give the first row (since each model is armed differently) additional hand-weapons.  That's five attacks per model in the first row.  Insane.  And guess what, you can then arm the second row with Great Weapons.  4 attacks base Strength 7.  But let's not stop there.  Each unit gets to pick two USRs.  The best combos I see off the bat are a CC based unit like I've gushed over so far with Stubborn (best USR in the game) and Swiftstride.  That is an uber unit.  The second coolest thing to do with them is to give them shooty weapons and Scouts and Sniper.  Yep, you read that right.  You can deploy them near your opponent's magic bunker, and shoot the hell out of their wizards turn one.  But all of this awesomeness comes with a really staggering points cost.  You have to think long and hard about including one in your list, because they can become a points sink quickly.  But they CAN be absolutely devastating to an unprepared opponent.  If your opponent sees the Scouts and Sniper shooty unit on your list and doesn't deploy accordingly, he is in for a very rude awakening.

Sabretusks:  Eh.  When you bring a hunter the unit gets a massive buff in the form of Swiftstride.  Without a hunter, they are a low leadership, no armor unit that doesn't have Ogre Charge.  They are cheap (for Ogres) but I don't see a need for them outside of a theme list.

Yhetees:  Pros: they are fast, and they hit hard, and have decent leadership.  Cons: they are expensive, nor armor, and flammable.  Many better choices.

Mournfang Cavalry:  The heavy shock cavalry unit for Ogres.  They are insanely expensive, 70 points gives a 2+ save.  Try to kill a unit of multi-wound monstrous cavalry that have 3 wounds each and a 2+ save.  D3 impact hits on the charge.  Here is how we view this unit: chariots.  These are essentially cheaper, but faster (they can march), and harder hitting chariots.  That don't suffer the drawbacks of chariots.  Ummm yes.  You know I'm a sucker for chariots, and these are better.  The minimum unit size is 2, so I can easily see people flooding the field with MSU Mournfang cavalry.   Treat these like chariots and you'll see their value.  But a unit does not exist in isolation, yes they are cheap super chariots: but is that what makes a good Ogre army?  We'll see!

Gorgers:  90 points each.  Whew.  But, guess what: they have two of the best two abilities in the game, Ambushers and Unbreakable.  So they get to come in your opponent's backfield out of nowhere.  And whatever they charge will either kill them, or die, or be tarpitted.  The Unbreakable feature means that they are ideal for charging defensive minded magic bunkers, who will struggle to kill them, and will be tarpitted.  Generally speaking, a magic bunker that is stuck in combat means a wizard isn't being useful.  As you might have noticed so far, a lot of units in this book are good at attacking magic based strategies.  This is a sign that Ogres may be more competitive than previous editions.  I'm not saying Gorgers are a great unit, because in many ways they compete in role with Maneaters.   

-Summary-

Ogres have some cool Specials for sure.  They DO define the army.  You can bring lot's of Mournfang cavalry in a chariot-esque swarm attack.  You can bring an uber unit of Maneaters that are tailored to nearly any role you can imagine (though I think the two builds I identified are the best ones.)  Heck, you could bring like six Gorgers and have your opponent freaking out when he is sandwiched between Ogres in the front and Unbreakable Gorgers attacking from the rear.  I'm not going to lie, there is a lot of creative real estate to explore here in list building, and I envy you Ogre players for getting to do it.

WHFB: Ogre Kingdom Review Part 4

Sorry for the delay with this.  Real life is kicking my ass.  But enough about my herpe... er... personal problems, how about we talk about burly fat half-men?

Core

Ogres - Here we have the meat and potatoes of the army.  Basic Ogres are pretty cheap for what you get.  The best way to look at Ogre units is to view them as chariots that don't really mind being charged as badly as normal chariots do.  So the big question is, do we ever want to take basic Ogres over Iron Guts?  I think the answer is 'quite' often.  The biggest statistical difference between Bulls and Iron Guts is the Leadership.  One point of Leadership is not that valuable when you have characters in each unit, or you should anyway.  How about one point of armor?  What's a point of armor worth?  That depends.  Going from a 6+ to a 5+ doubles your protection. I'd say it's worth having Iron Fist to double your protection, because I don't think the extra attack is as relevant.

My unplaytested instinct is so say that if you're buying a Look Out Gnoblar and have a 9 Bull unit with a character in it, and are buying Iron Fists, you generally save a ton of points not buying Iron Guts.  Bulls should be the core of your army.  So why buy Iron Guts?  Glad you asked...

Iron Guts:  These guys cost a ton more for +1LD and +1AS, and Great Weapons.  But they possess one trait that sets them far apart from Bulls: they can carry a magical standard.  In the magic items review I made mention of how good the Ogre standards are, as well as some of the BRB standards having pretty fantastic synergy with the Ogre concept.  What I would suggest, for competitive purposes, is one unit of IG per army.  Put your L4 Slaughtermaster in it.  Give them the Banner of Discipline (thanks Vilicate) and have a unit of Bulls nearby with a BSB in it.  I would probably buy the champ, because you don't want your SM getting involved in a challenge with characters who are designed to win challenges.  He is tough, for a wizard, but he ain't that tough.  That's a big, nasty magic bunker with 4+ saves and LD9.  Pretty standout for Ogres.

Gnoblars:  Gnoblars lose a lot in this edition.  Their thrown weapons aren't nearly as scary as they were in the old books, but Gnoblars can still serve two purposes in an 8th Edition Ogre force, as I see it.  

One, they can protect your warmachines.  10 Gnoblars are 25 points and they can guard your warmachines, buying them an additional turn.  Since Gnoblars are beneath contempt, if they get eaten, who cares, they bought your warmachine another turn of unmolested shooting.

Two, they can guard your flanks.  I see most Ogre players bringing one or two big units of Bulls and a unit of Iron Guts.  These units are definitely at risk of being outflanked, like most big, unwieldy units.  A large, deep ranked unit of Gnoblars on the flank can tarpit anyone trying to hit your big guys in the flank.  As most Skaven players know, large units of cheap cannon fodder on the flanks will make sure your center gets there.  Plus, they have relatively easy access to Regeneration.  It can be quite demoralizing for your opponent to realize that he simply cannot kill 50 Regenerating Gnoblars in 6 turns, let alone the rest of your force.

Summary:  Iron Guts are useful, but you should probably only ever have one unit of them per army unless you're playing some ungodly large size game when you can afford to take two Slaughtermasters.

Bulls are now cheap enough to take a couple big units of, and they can be quite scary.  They have shitty leadership, but since most Ogre armies aren't going to have many units, you can probably afford to have a character in each Bull unit to shore that up.  Again, I would almost always go with Iron Fists over the AHW.

Gnoblars should either be taken in giant units to set up on the flanks as a regenerating tarpit, or minimum size units to protect your warmachines.  Though be my guest to experiment with a 300+ strong Gnoblar units in the center that gets Regeneration and nearby BSB bubble.  That can definitely be the type of unit that isn't going anywhere unless you want it to.

All in all, Ogres have a good selection of Core units that will allow versitile and competitive lists to be constructed.  Each unit does vastly different things on the battlefield and my gut (no pun intended) says that a combined arms approach of all three will garner the best results.  Ignore one of them to your detriment!

WHFB: Ogre Kingdom Review Part 3

Magic Items

Alright folks, this is the last of the nuts and bolts reviews before I start on unit analysis.  Keeping with the trend of the newer books, there aren't many items in here, and they will probably be overpriced.  Let's see how right I am or not...

Thundermace - 85pts - Great Weapon.  You may trade in all your attacks for a Thundercrush attack.  If you hit, place a small template in front of your dude on the enemy unit.  Everyone takes a Str3 hit and the dude under the hole take a str9 d3 multiple wound hit.

No way.  For 85 points, it should auto-hit.  Part of what you pay for in a Lord level fighty character is higher initiative and attacks.  This gives those away.  Just no.

Siege-breaker- 85 pts - Great Weapon.  You roll to his against your enemy's initiative rather than Weapon Skill, can't be parried.  Can also trade in your attack for a mega attack against a building.

More crap.  I wouldn't spend 85 points for an item that can only be useful in one scenario and only actually helps you hit dudes from 1/3rd of the armies.  Pass.

Gnoblar Thiefstone - 45pts Talisman - MR2.   Roll on a chart and get a random magic item from the BRB.  If another character in the game has it, you steal it.

OMG garbage.  Look at the list of items.  How many of them are worth more than 45pts?  Right.  So why do I want this?  For Magic Resistance?  You mean the special rule that hasn't been useful once in any game of 8th I've played yet?  Sad.

Greedy Fist - 40pts Talisman - +1 Strength, 6+ ward.  Any saves the ward makes against magic weapons turns the weapon mundane.  Any wizard hit by an Ogre wearing it loses a spell and a wizard level.

On the surface, it isn't terrible.  The wizard hitting part is the selling point.  Except, if an Ogre character is hitting a wizard, the wizard should be dying, not losing levels and spells.  Have to pass.

Gutmaw - Magic Heavy Armor 45pts.  Causes Terror.  For each wound you do in a challenge, you heal one.

Forget the healing factor, it will never matter.  Would you pay 45pts for Terror?  When you already cause Fear?  I don't see this as being something I'd pay for unless Terror did something better, or you could lower enemy leadership.

Grut's Sickle - 50pts Arcane Item - You can inflict an unsaveable wound on your unit to get +2 to cast for the remainder of the magic phase.  At the end of the turn, roll 2d6, on a snake eyes, the unit kills the bearer.

Wait a second.  This is a powerful item!  In an 8th Edition book?!  The +2 to cast makes your Level 4 a real beast in the magic phase.  You probably don't want to use it every turn, but on turn when you don't roll many casting dice, you can ensure that key spells still get off.  I'm shocked, I would consider taking this on my Slaughtmaster quite often.  It compares very similarly to the DE Sac Dagger.  This item also allows you to skimp points by not going to L4.  This can be useful since Ogre Characters are expensive and in low point games you can struggle to get all the tools you need.

Hell Heart - 50pts Arcane Item - One use only.  At the start of the magic phase you can make every enemy wizard within d6 x 5" roll a miscast.  Get an extra dispell dice for every wizard affected.

A pretty powerful effect, actually... if everyone played fair army lists.  Unless the wizard has a way to stop miscasts, like Teclics or Cupped Hands, this can be game breaking.  Unfortunately, those are the only two wizards you should be especially afraid of.  I'm not sold on an anti-wizard item that doesn't affect Teclis or Slann, sorry.

Rune Maw - 60pts Magical Standard - On a 2+, any spell targeting the unit is redirected.  If no valid targets are available, the spell fizzles.

Total shit.  Guess what?  This doesn't say enemy spells.  So the great Maw magic that grants Stubborn, +1T, Regen?  Yeah, your best unit can't be affected by them.  What a joke.

Dragonhide Banner - 50pts Magic Standard - On a turn the unit charges, re-roll all to-hits, to-wounds, and saving throws of 1.  Also, the unit gets an Always Strikes Last Str 3 Breath Weapon.

This is actually pretty good.  I'm not sure I could ever see having the extra points lying around to take it, but if you do it's good, as all Space Wolf players can attest to.  But wait.  You have to successfully charge.  If an Ogre unit powerful enough to take a 50pt banners gets the charge off on someone, are you really going to lose?  I sure hope not.  So what category does this go into?  The sad 'win-more' items.  You pay 50 points to win combats you were already going to win by a larger margin.  Pass.

-Summary-

7 shiny craps and one winner.  Par for the 8th Edition course.  The Hellheart will be upgraded to 'good' when High Elves and Lizards get new books that take away their avoid miscast abilities.

-Bonus BRB Item Section-

So I thought I should detail which Basic Rule Book items are worthwhile for an Ogre Army.  Here goes...

Sword of Swift Slaying - Ogre characters have high strength and decent initiative.  So for 25 points you get to strike first and re-roll hits.  Sign me up.

Sword of Striking - For 10 points your characters hit most people on a 2+.  This is good, because you hit hard, and you have lot's of attacks already.

Trickster's Helm - Don't laugh.  When you're T5, sometimes 6, and have regen, making people re-roll their successful wounds is pretty great.  Not to mention, an extra pip of armor save is good.

Dragonhelm - Hell fucking yes.  An extra armor save, plus a 2+ ward against fire (strong when you have regen, don't forget) for 10 points.  All day.

Rampager's Standard - So vital to an Ogre force.  Re-roll charge distances?  In an army whose success is based entirely off getting the charge?  Yes, all day.

Banner of Swiftness - Cheaper cousin of the Rampagers.  I'd probably bring both.  An extra pip of movement is huge for Ogres, and for 15 points?  All day.

Other Trickster's Shard - Very good.  Most people won't get armor against you, so making their ward saves less reliable is useful.

Iron Curse Icon - Also very useful.  Big Ogre units will draw a non-trivial amount of shooting from warmachines.

WHFB: Ogre Kingdoms Review Part 2

-Magic-

Lore of the Great Maw

Inherent Ability: After a successful cast, roll a d6.  On a 2+ the caster heals a wound and gets +1 to his next cast or dispel attempt.  On a 1, he takes a Str 6 hit.

I dunno, I really like it.  It's characterful, and powerful.  The ability to get +1 to your next dispel attempt is pretty great.  From a basic perspective it encourages smart game play, cast your easy stuff first and save the nasty spell for the end.  Very cool, powerful Lore Attribute.

0 - Spinemarrow - 6+ to cast.  12" range buff spell that gives Stubborn to target unit.  Can be pushed to a 9+ for 24" range.

Wow.  Now THAT is a signature spell!  Stubborn is one of the most powerful abilities in the game, especially when combined with tough, hard to kill units.  Ogres are an army of tough, hard to kill units.  Happy marriage.

1 - Bonecrusher - 8+ to cast.  18" magic missile that inflicts 2d6 hits no armor saves allowed.  Can push to 11+ for 36" range.

This is very situational, but very strong.  Chaos Knights and Dark Elf Dreadlords and even Steamtanks fear it.  A lot of times you roll this you will trade it for your signature spell, but the times it is useful you'll be glad to have it.

2 - Bullgorger - 7+ to cast.  12" range buff that grants a unit +1 Strength.  On a 14+ it can affect all units within 12".

It's a powerful effect, yes.  But it strikes me as a "win more" spell.  You use it, and you end up winning combats with it that you were already going to win anyway.  I'm not 100% sold on it being as broken awesome as people seem to think.

3 - Toothcracker - 8+ to cast.  Same as above except for Toughness.  16+ for all units.

Now this is a game changer.  This is just absolutely crushing.  This defends you from small arms fire as you get close so that you don't take too many wounds cross the field.  Plus, in prolonged combats ::cough::Stubborn::cough:: you will win the attrition war by being very high toughness.

4 - Braingobbler - 9+ to cast.  Hex spell that forces a unit to take a panic test.  Can buff the range.

Weak sauce.  In the 8th Edition world of BSB and Inspiring Presence bubbles this is laughable.

5 - Trollguts - 12+ to cast.  Buff spell that grants 4+ regeneration to a friendly unit.  Can buff to 20+ to give it to ALL units within 12".

Kinda redundant with Toothcracker, but still absolutely insane.  A 12+ cast means you will only want a Lord level caster to have it, whereas a Hero can cast Toothcracker.  My advice is to never take both if you can avoid it.  If you roll both on your Lord, swap #3 for the Signature Spell and let the Hero get it.  Obviously regeneration makes a large bull unit nigh unkillable, so this is a must dispel for your opponent.

6 - The Maw - 15+ to cast.  18" range small template.  Scatters an artillery dice.  Misfire let's your opponent place the template anywhere he wants.  Everything under the template takes an initiative test.  Anything that passes takes Str 3 hit.  Models that fail take a Str 7 multiple wound D6 hit.  Can buff to large template for a 21+

Certainly potentially powerful.  Less powerful than Purple Sun or Dwellers Below.  But powerful none-the less.  However, it isn't accurate and carries some serious risk.  I can't imagine opting to use the small template version very often.  Then again, if I had a Lord level Ogre wizard, I would be throwing my dice at a buffed Trollguts rather than this.  The Maw = High Risk, Medium Reward.  Trollguts = Low Risk, High Reward.  

_______________________________________________________________

Summary: Powerful Lore.  The buffs are really strong, and that's the meat of it.  It's not a strong offensive Lore, but Ogres already have offense aplenty.  They need the defensive ability this Lore brings.  I would recommend taking this on your Lord level wizard everytime in the Ogre army.

WHFB: Ogre Kingdoms Review Part 1

Hey all, I haven't seen many people do any indepth reviews yet, and this army seems wildly popular at least in my area, so I figured I'd fill the gaping void on the blogosphere and shoot out a multi-part review of the new book.  Without further adieu...

Army Wide Special Rules

Ogre Charge - Each Ogre in the front rank gets an impact hit.  Add a strength for the unit's current rank bonus.  If you roll 10+ on your charge distance dice, it becomes a d3 impact hit each.

This is a definitely improvement over the previous edition, and encourages you to bring big units of Ogres rather than MSU.  We'll see if the rest of the book supports big units before we can say how good this is.

Iron Fists - Ogres with Iron Fists count as having a shield, and get the parry save even when mounted.  

Not bad, but nothing to write home about.  The extra +1 armor save is more noteworthy than the parry to be honest.

Look Out Gnoblars - Your unit upgrade characters and normal characters get Look Out Sir! saves so long as you have 3+ rank and file left.  

This is a good idea, since normally you need 5+ to get a LoS save, and this ought to be adjusted for Ogre's size and cost.  I feel bad having to pay points for it though...

Special Weapons

Chain Trap - 12" range str 6 missile weapon with Killing Blow.  

Meh.

Harpoon Launcher - Short range bolt thrower.  Can be carried on a mount, which removes the move or fire restriction.

Meh, unless it can be spammed.  We shall see bwahahahaha.

Pistols and Brace of Pistols - Str 4 Armor piercing quick to fire.

Sounds really strong, let's see how much they cost...

Next up in Part Two: Ogre Magic!