Moving Armies pt 4 : Goblins w/ Orc Allies

Ok, so for the last part of this series comes the lists that are most likely the most difficult to convert, simply because what is one army in Warhammer is two in Kings of War - Orcs & Goblins.

I actually have two Orc & Goblin armies.   The second one was Da Beech Boyz - follow the link if you want to see them.  I tried to convert it, and it was really too evenly split.  I thought the same was going to be true for The United Greenskin Postal Service (old pictures on the site) but then I realized I had a lot more goblins than orcs - so actually could do goblins with orc allies.  Or even just goblins.

Goblins with Orc Allies - 2800 pts 

The United Greenskin Postal Service

The older United Goblin Postal Service

A little bit of history of this army.  When I first started playing WFB some 14 years ago, I initially liked Orcs & Goblins.  I found one person who played - and he already had Orcs & Goblins - so my thinking was I had to pick something else.  I went with Vampire Counts simply because I knew how to paint skeletons already, and I was a little intimidated painting an army as opposed to a few roleplaying miniatures.

Well I learned after a while that different people will make totally different armies from the same lists, so when I got a little tired of VC (I played an army with no Vampires - didn't work that well), I thought I would start something new.  I liked goblins, and like all the random stuff that could happen with them, from squigs to fanatics.  So that was my theme - though you can't really paint random.  The ideas I had were a circus (and I'm glad I didn't, because I have seen a fantastic circus goblin army) or the idea of 'going postal'.  Thus was the UGPS born.  No, I have no connection to the postal service or anything like it.  I had lots of squigs, fanatics and wizards.  When someone said it wasn't fun to play against, I added 40 goblins, a big boss and a bsb with the banner that boosted his leadership to 9.

Then a new edition and a new army book came out.  Gone were the free heroes (who were on chariots) and several other items, so I decided to add a few orcs and it became the United Greenskin Postal Service.  I re-based all the units I was using for this - so you will see the original old green bases vs. the newer brown ones.

So how did I turn this into a Kings of War army?  Well we start with goblins.  Lots of goblins.

• Sharpstick Legion (230) + Brew of Strength (30)
• It turns out I have more than 100 goblins with spears - 40 goblins and 60 night goblins.  These are spread over 3 units though.  The biggest unit was the email unit - 40 regular goblins w/ spears.  Since I had replaced the goblin UPS boyz with Orcs, I figure I can add 20 of these in the back.  Give the CS(1) - now 35 attacks, phalanx and NE 25/27 - nice solid block for the core.

Their shields all have an 'e' on them.  The banner is a can of spam with the NO symbol on it.  I have some fighting (for the animosity rule) inside the unit.  Of course they failed their test two or three times a game (more than any other unit)

• Sharpstick Horde (155)
• I had a unit of 30 night goblins w/ spears - this was the Snail Mail unit (all the models had shells as shields).  Yes, i repeated the idea in Da Beech Boyz (I hated doing it, but it fit so well and I couldn't think of anything else) but I didn't want to mix them (worse than I was) so the rest of the goblin UPS boyz filled out the back rank here.

I do like the snail mail image I found for the banner.  Plus the really old night goblin flipping the bird (for quite a while I had to have one of these in every night goblin unit!)

• Rabble Regiment (75 pts)
• I like variety, so when I originally did the army I gave some spears (which was most effective), some bows, and some hand weapon/shields.  This was actually a pain, as the plastic night goblins then did not come with that option - so I was cutting off bows and spears and replacing them with leftover hand weapons from my previous VC army.

These are the philatelists.  All their shields are different stamps.

• Spitter Regiment (85 pts)
• One problem I have found was the spray varnish I was using on my models yellows after a few years.  Thus you can see their white banner is yellowed unfortunately.  Aside from painting them blue, I really couldn't think of a conversion for the OverNight Goblins.

I thought it was one of the better names.

• Goblins.Mawbeast pack Regiment ( 95 )
• So the random theme comes in with a squig herd.  Originally squig hoppers were part of the herd - they then became their own, separate unit with the next book.  One problem is that WFB squigs are on 20mm bases - while Mawbeasts are cav.  A regiment of cav is 125 x 100 - so I just put six across and five deep - almost the right size.  The hoppers were meant to be dogs chewing on the mail.

If I were to rebase this, I'd put a squig and a herder on a cav base

• Fleabag Rider Sniffs Regiment (145)
• When I first started on this, I thought I only had enough for two troops.  However digging them out of storage, I found I still had all 10 of the pony express unit, even though five had never been rebased.  (But it does unlock another hero/monster/war engine slot).  Each of them has a leather pouch with letters sticking out of it.

Wolfie Express?

• Fleabag Rider Sniffs Troop (95)
• With the new book came new spider riders - and these naturally became my web-mail unit.

Spider riders web mail

• Fleabag Chariots Regiment (110)
• In the first incarnation with all goblins, if you only took goblin heroes then you could take an additional goblin big boss per 1000 points - so I took 2 and put them on chariots with extra crew and extra wolves - to give them more attacks.  Two of these is the size of three  normal chariots (i.e. 150mm wide), so there you go. 

I put magnets in the chariots so they could have heroes or just goblins.

• Sharpstick Throws ( 55) x 2
• So two spear chukkas become sharpstick throwers (note the messages tied to the bolt).  I actually have two more of these, but ran out of slots.

I enjoyed making mini diorama's out of each of these - especially when I found the guys on the right - they are from two different 40K war machines, but just go together so well.

•  Big Rocks Thrower (80)
• What else to use the rock thrower as but a rock thrower.  Converted all the crew to be carrying packages - I like to call this one "Special Delivery"

The sculpted mailbox for the counterweight turned just ok

• Big Rocks Thrower (80)
• I like these better than the sharpstick throwers, and I realized that the doom diver actually fit the bill pretty well.   

When posolutely, absotively has to be there. . .

• Mincer ( 80 )
• The snotling pump wagon fits this perfectly. 

A fun, characterful model.  I love the different snotlings (and have added a few).  The one on the front tied to a big stick is my favorite.

• Giant (190) x 2
• I can't say why, bit I've always liked giants.  I only have 5 of them - three in this army.  The first two were from the "Giants of Albion" old regiment of reknown - with a few snotlings thrown in for fun.  I added old metal river troll heads and painted them green - because why would a pink skinned giant join a greenskin force?.  I used a copier to take an image of the old GW mail order box and reduce it down, and pulled the white dwarf covers off the web.  I thought those helped with the theme.

All I did was replace the rock, add the snotlings and stick the "magazines" behind his finger - they were basically already posed effectively.

•  Giant (190)
• When then plastic giant kit came out, I had to have one.  This is a fantastic kit and, I feel, one that is actually reasonably priced.  There are just so many options for it.  Of course I didn't use any of the heads it came with, instead going for the third river troll head, and adding the mailbox to the club (the rope is a pipe cleaner with the fuzz burned off and then painted).  His belly says "Return to Sender"

Such a cool kit.

•  King on Chariot ( 130 ) + Medallion of Life (30)
• Ok, so this was never "officially" in the army, but that was because we I never played where special characters were allowed.  This is the old "Grom the Paunch" model - a huge fat goblin who once ate troll meat - and that gave him regeneration.  So naturally I took the Medallion of Life to give it to him here as well.

I ordered the special chariot crossbar to convert one of the previous chariots - back when you could still order individual bits.

• Wiz (45) + Bane Chant:2 (15) + Fireball:6 (15) + Wind Blast:5 (15) + Boots of Levitation
• A fully equipped wiz - with the ability to march and still cast spells.  Almost as good as mounting him for flexibility.

In the earliest version, he was a lord level shaman with "Ditto's Double Dealin Doodahs" which allowed him to cast the same spell twice.  Can you say double "Path of Gork"

Orcs - for a 2800 pt army, I can spend 700 pts on Orcs.  I wanted to see how much I could get out of my existing one so I put in as many goblins as I could.  However I don't have 700 pts of Orcs in the list

• Orc Ax Regiment (125)
• I mentioned above where I had replaced the goblin UPS Boyz with orcs - well here they are.  All in brown tunics and shorts.  They don't have the UPS shields that the goblins had, but it still gets a smile.

I actually had these with 2 handed weapons but I felt they fitter better as AX

• Orc Morax Regiment (200)
• Black orcs actually fit as either Morax or Greatax, since they have both great weapons and 2 handed weapons.  Personally I feel that morax are more effective, so they get that.

Hard to see from the angle, but they are all painted up as mailboxes - with the UPSP eagle across each of their bellies.  Another unit that was just painted differently and not really converted per se.

•  Orcling Horde* (90)
• I had forgotten that I had actually made 10 bases of snotlings.  I never did get around to add the tiny packages and letters I wanted on these bases.

These were going to be sorting the mail

• Krudger (130) + Stabby Sneak (15) + Zappy Sneak (15)
• So I can fit one Orc hero - so of course a maxed out Krudger.  This was made from the orc character kit - it actually had the stuff to make two characters (and a boar mount).

I really like that Kings of War doesn't care that he is on a mailbox (which is to make him stand out as a character, not get any kind of Line-of-Sight advantage)

 Army points - Goblins : 2225   Orcs : 575

I do still have a few models left yet.

• 2 bolt throwers
• 12 night goblin fanatics
• 4 snotling bases
• Goblin Big Boss
• 4 Night Goblin Shamans
• Goblin Battle Standard Bearer
• Orc Battle Standard Bearer
• about 10-15 more night goblins from various units (including squig herders)

So thanks for reading.  As you should be able to see, you can easily use most (if not all) of your existing Warhammer models in Kings of War.  Some map perfectly, others are close, and others you may need to "count as", but if you are still interested in playing a fantasy mass combat game, there is no reason not to give it a go.