FOREST GOBLIN TACTICS

by Anvar

Most people when it comes to Forest Goblins use 1 mob of spider riders; in this massive unit, they plonk the warlord and battle standard bearer carrying the rather predictable spider banner and go kill any units they can. While this works up to a point I'd like to voice some alternative ideas.

Take Forest Goblin infantry armed with spears, put a warlord and several big bosses in the front rank and give the unit the spider banner. Give the characters wards and/or the sword of swift slaying, then kick anyone who dares charge them. A mob of 40 Forest Goblins with warlord and 2 big bosses doesn't cost that much, and can attack 24 times without counting additional hand weapons for the characters. If you include a boss as well, this is raised to 26 attacks most of which are at S4. Now that's pretty impressive.

Smaller units of Spider riders can be used to combat scouts, skirmishers and Wood Elves who like to hide in difficult terrain. Your spiders have 2 S4 attacks each and so can usually trounce any light troops especially since their spiders ignore difficult terrain. The only difficulty with this is against Elves, as goblins fear Elves they don't outnumber at least 2:1. With a Ld of 5 they will probably refuse to charge any Elf units. To counter give them a boss armed with the shrieking blade. You could also put them near the general but this kind of defeats the purpose of the unit.

This type of unit could alternatively make use of the fast cavalry rule, and move into a position to delay and annoy the enemy, as well as threatening to charge them in the rear. This type of unit should be armed with short bows, and should make use of difficult terrain to sneak up behind the enemy units.

A larger mob of spider riders can be used to flank enemy units when they charge into your inevitable unit with the crown of command. Position the spider riders in the middle of a wood, that way they aren't a tempting target to charge with a few exceptions. When the enemies elite unit gets stuck fighting a mob of goblins, charge them in the flank. They will lose their rank bonus, have to take a panic test, as well as having to take the attacks of the spider riders. This move can easily win you the game.

I would advise against taking a mob of Spider riders as your main mob because they will rarely outclass their enemy. If you must take them, use lots of characters and only charge medium units. Do NOT try and take on the enemy's best unit with just the spider riders, your mob will get trounced. Instead of the spider banner you may wish to consider giving the battle standard the banner of might, as then their 2 S4 attacks may actually hit something. This type of unit should have all the equipment they can if they are actually going to fight (ie spears shield and light armour), if the whole front rank is made up of characters, you can probably get away with a minimum of equipment.


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