Thanks for joining me as we continue our series of articles on the new Orruk Warclans Battletome. Today’s focus is the mighty Megaboss on Maw Krusha: I will be joined by an expert in the field, Thomas Bell, as he runs us through some fundamentals. In the second part, I will be exploring the options and considerations when buliding your own Maw Krusha loadout.

Thomas Bell: Me and My Cabbages

Tom is a competitive Ironjawz player based in the UK, and known for his double Maw Krusha lists. Tom’s recent exploits include an exciting Double Maw Krusha + Weirdfist combo, which he ran under GH18 rules, and more recently a Gordrakk + Cabbage list that he took to a 4-1 result at Blackout 2019.

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As someone who has mainly played Ironjawz since getting back into the hobby nearly 3 years ago, when I was asked to do a post on the new Orruk Warclans, it was obvious to me which aspect I would talk about: I decided to take a lead from one of my club leaders.

Anyone who watched The Honest Wargamer’s coverage of BOBO 2019 will remember Lee “Tuggy” Kay. Maybe you don’t remember the name, but you will definitely remember his carrot measuring sticks. In honour of Tuggy, I’m going to list the reasons why everyone needs more Cabbages in their lives!

My Cabbages

First things first, what is a “Cabbage”?  A Cabbage is the colloquial term for a Megaboss on Maw-Krusha, the massive angry flying death-monster of both Ironjawz and the Orruk Warclans book. It’s also the only monster in the entire book, which when combined with its points cost of 460 means you will never run out of Behemoth Slots, because you just don’t have the points to fill them up! 4 Cabbages would leave just 160 points at 2k, not enough to fill your Battleline requirements. With that sorted, let’s get into why you need more Cabbages.

Mobility

As every Ironjawz player knows, it doesn’t matter how big your stick is if you can’t apply it to your opponent’s face, or their units. This is one area where a Cabbage doesn’t suffer: having a starting movement of 12” means it’s the same speed as any of the boar riding Bonesplitterz, and even after suffering 10 wounds it’s still movement 8”. Considering the standard speed of an Ironjawz unit is 4” it’s basically got a jetpack on. Conveniently for my jetpack analogy it’s also the only unit in the entire book which has Fly as an innate part of its warscroll. So it’s fast and can fly, two things which are incredibly useful and sorely lacking anywhere else in the Orruk Warclans book.

Command Abilities

Anyone who has ever talked to me or seen my army lists will know that I ***LOVE*** the Aetherquartz Broach, because I spam Command Abilities and can never get enough Command Points. The problem is that all the Command Points in the world don’t matter if you can’t spend them when and where you need them. Fortunately, being so mobile and having such a large base means that a Cabbage is a highly effective Command Ability delivery mechanism. Unlike the other slow and plodding Ironjawz Heroes, if you need to throw out an Inspiring Presence, use Mighty Destroyers to fight in the Hero Phase, or even just reroll a charge your cabbage can get there to provide it.

Mighty Destroyers

Speaking of Mighty Destroyers, a Cabbage isn’t just one of the best delivery methods, it’s also one of the best recipients. This is because it can really utilise all aspects of the Command Ability: I’ll first go over what Mighty Destroyers does, then show why it really helps make your Cabbages the best around. I’ve cleaned it up a little bit for clarity.

Mighty Destroyers

You can use this Command Ability in your Hero Phase. If you do so, pick 1 friendly Ironjawz unit wholly within 12” of a friendly Ironjawz hero or wholly within 18” of a friendly Ironjawz General. That unit must:

• Make a Normal Move if it is more than 12” from an Enemy unit
• Fight if it is within 3” of an enemy unit
• Make a charge move in any other situation

You cannot pick the same unit to benefit from this Command Ability more than once per Hero Phase.

This is obviously a fantastic Command Ability which offers a massive amount of utility and power, but why is it so much better on a Cabbage?

Firstly, we have the Normal Move portion. As noted above the Cabbage has a 12” move with fly. As the Command Ability doesn’t prevent you from moving in the following Movement Phase, that means it’s rocketing 24” across the board. This makes it one of the fastest and most mobile units in the entire game!

Secondly, we have the pile in and attack: as possibly the biggest hitter in your army, getting bogged down in combat with chaff is your worst nightmare. Mighty Destroyers offers a solution for this situation by giving your Cabbage the opportunity to fight its way out of combat. This frees it up to move on to the much more important targets later in the same turn.

Finally we have the charge, nothing special about that.  Except for the Destructive Bulk impact hits that is!

Destructive Bulk

Most of you will be aware of impact hits: when a unit completes a charge, it inflicts mortal wounds, often based on some sort of dice roll. A Cabbage has one of the best forms of impact hits: you pick an enemy unit within 1”, then refer to the damage chart and roll a number of dice equal to the Destructive Bulk value. This starts at 8 and decreases by 1 per profile down to a minimum of 4.  For any 5+ dice rolls you inflict 1 mortal wound on the target; you can increase this to a 4+ with a Mount Trait, more on those later.

While that’s reasonably strong it’s not what really makes the ability terrifying. Unlike every other ability which does impact hits, Destructive Bulk has a unique second part to the ability. If the mortal wounds inflicted by this ability mean there are no enemy models left within 3” of the Cabbage, it can then attempt to make a second charge. This charge also benefits from the Destructive Bulk ability, so inflicts the mortal wounds and can trigger a Third charge. So far my personal best is 4 consecutive charges, wiping out two units and a Hero in the charge phase.

Combine this with the Mighty Destroyers Command Ability. Suddenly you can potentially charge in the Hero Phase, bounce through several weakened or low-wound units, then move in your Movement Phase, and charge again in the Charge Phase!

Shooting

Disaster strikes, despite your best efforts you’re locked in combat with some pathetic irrelevant creature, like Archaon or Nagash, who should be nothing but a stain under your Iron boot. How can you finish them off, so you can get on to find some more targets to smash? Well the Cabbage has the only shooting attack in the entire army. Normally this would be a downside; what self-respecting Orruk would want to get caught with a missile weapon?! Well don’t worry, this isn’t actually a missile weapon, it’s just your Cabbage shouting so loud it messes the opponents insides up. Inflicting death by shouting at your target, how to kill in style!

Damage

Finally we’re onto the bit that really matters: just how mighty is the Cabbage?  Turns out it’s pretty mighty, with its Mighty Fists and Tail being the only -2 rend Irojawz have. Throwing out 8 attacks at full wounds with 2 damage each is pretty nice but not amazing…if only we had some way to increase the damage.  Well we do!  Another one of those tasty Mount Traits just gives a flat +1 damage on its Mighty Fists and Tail.  Throw in a Violent Fury from one of your Warchanters and it’s now 4 damage each!

This is before we even get to the Megaboss himself, who forced the Cabbage to submit and then chained themselves to its back for maximum style. Starting at a reasonable 6-8 attacks (depending on which weapon option you choose), again it’s solid but not amazing.

Don’t worry though, this gets better as well.

Orruks get bigger and stronger with every enemy they duff up. This means that at the end of every Combat Phase in which they killed at least 1 enemy model, your Megaboss gets +1 attack on their Choppa and the Cabbage gets +1 wound. So as your opponent fights and pummels your Cabbage down its profiles, making the Fists weaker, your Megaboss is continually growing stronger. 

In the last game I played, my General was up to 11 attacks and 20 wounds by the end of turn 3!

‘Ard as Iron

That’s right, Twenty wounds.  Starting at 15 and getting +1 from killing stuff in every Combat Phase means you can get up to a potential 25 wounds by the end of the game.  That’s just 5 shy of that pathetic Khorne Dragon!  Throw in a 3+ save and that’s one tanky Cabbage. Oh and that Warchanter we mentioned earlier, they can take a Warchant called Fixin’ Beat.  This lets you attempt to heal a model for D3 wounds in each of your Hero Phases, keeping that Cabbage in top fightin’ form.

Da Biggest An Da Ardest

All of this is great you say, but what if I want more Cabbage?  Even Da Best Cabbage there is?  Well then it sounds like you need The Fist of Gork himself, Gordrakk. With +1 Mighty Fists attack, +1 Destructive Bulk dice, +1 wounds and a stronger Command Ability, we’re already off to a Mighty start.

Big G has way more than just this though. His Massively Destructive Bulk doesn’t just kill enemies, if you end a charge with 1” of terrain you can roll a number of dice equal to the value in his Damage Table. If any of those dice come up a 6 that terrain piece no longer gives +1 to save for cover, preventing your cowardly foes hiding from the Krumpin’ they’ve got coming.

But wait, there’s more. Not only is Big G’s Cabbage, Big Teef, the mightiest of Cabbages. Big G himself is the Mightiest of Megabosses. Instead of the usual choppa, Big G wields Smasha and Kunnin’ each with their own attack profile, and BOTH of which gain +1 attack for every stack of Strength from Victory he has.

Each of these weapons also has its own special rule: every unmodified Wound roll of 4+ inflicts D3 mortal wounds against Wizards, or Heroes who are not Wizards, depending on the weapon!

Cabbages!

Personally I’m running 2 at the moment, Big G and a normal Cabbage (the third isn’t painted yet, sadface).

This comes to exactly 1k points so they’ve even gotten together to make my list building easier.

Hopefully it should be clear by now why everyone needs more Cabbages!

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