Lootas or Burnas?

[KnightShift]

I'm trying to get a 1,000 point army ready for our league day on Tuesday. Am almost there...

And now I'm trying to figure out whether I should take this new box of Ork Lootas & Burnas and make, well, Lootas or Burnas.

The pyromaniac in me wants to go with Burnas. But I'm thinking that Lootas *might* have more tactical advantage.

So... how should I spend my day tomorrow with this box? :)

[entendre_entendre]

what is the rest of your build like? may help in your choice. think about what the rest of your army will be doing. will they need some (somewhat inaccurate) cover fire? or will you need to flush troops out of cover? that brings me to this:
what are your opponents playing? burnas in a trukk or BW are good as you 'can't' miss with a flame template, & the PWs are a bonus as well - downside: you have to get close, but w/ orks that's what you want to do anyways... upside: flame spam = lots of wounds even vs MEQ, can assault afterwards :)

[KnightShift]

That's what I was thinking: that the flame template is apt to do more damage than the guns would. I'm still fairly new at this but this past week I learned (sorta the hard way) that Orks LOVE to be pushed out to the fore as fast as possible :D

Think I'll go with Burnas then. And BTW, love your screenname! ;)

[Mike Dunford]

I think you're making the right choice. Flame templates are fun, but there's also a great deal of fun to be had in watching your opponents discover just how many Str 4 power weapon attacks can come from the 75-point unit that just charged them.

And I love the smell of promethium in the morning.

I usually mount mine in a 45-50 point looted wagon. (Red paint and 1-2 big shootas). Not much more expensive than a truck, slightly more survivable, and, most importantly, the burnas can start the game mounted in the looted wagon; they have to climb into some other squad's truck.

[Exitus Acta Probat]

I get the appeal of Burnas, I really do...and they have a use.
Mostly hand in hand with Snikrot in a unit of Kommandos.

One of the weaknesses of the Ork 'dex is the need to crack units OUT of their 'ports. This is not accomplished with burnas. You can kill a unit of tacs with boyz OR burnas. You CANNOT kill a unit of tacs inside a rhino with either. You MIGHT get em out with the boyz power klaw.

You NEED the lootas/equivalents to bust open as many armour 11/12 'ports as possible, so the boyz CAN swamp them. Won't help you against Land Raiders, but neither will the burnas.

It's not really a question of what'll do you the most good up close, that is not your issue against most armies ('nids and khorne zerkers being the few exceptions), it's getting them OUT so you can really take advantage of that 'up close and personal' kinda feel.

Lootas will do that for you. It's a context thing. Use the Lootas, and you won't need the burnas...your boyz will do the rest. And while they are, your lootas can start shooting down speeders/killing vendettas/krunking war walkers etc etc etc... :)

[KnightShift]

I may just get another box and have both Burnas and Lootas. If nothing else than to break more stuff and kill more 'umies :D

[Vince]

If your running stinkrot then (1) squad burnas have a place. Even saying this though Exitos is right. One of your biggest weakness is poping open transports. Lootas are the best answer. If the choice was 1 burna squad with stinkrot vs 1 unit of lootas (really you should cut something else and take both most likely) then the choice is lootas.

[icecube]

First of all: buy 2 sets of lootas/ burnas and a set of boyz so you can make nice sized units of both. I play orks in our league and i field lootas to crack all those rhinos and chimeras speeding around the place. I could have used burnas in one game though when the opponent had 45 guadsmen in a large ruin. So i say lootas.

[Old_Paladin]

Everyone is saying to get lootas to pop light vehicles.
If that's the case, make your boys into burnas and buy a box (or convert up a squad) of Tank Bustas.
Why Bustas? Three words, rokkits (better strength then deffguns), bombsquigs (Str:8 hit on a 2+), Tankhammer (2-4 Str: 10 melee attaks).
That or rokkit-buggies; either are better at taking down transports then lootas [unless you roll well a lot] (and 3 buggies will live longer then 5-6 lootas) You need large squads of lootas for them to work well.

[Mike Dunford]

Lootas are an outrageously good defensive unit. As such, their role in an ork army is extremely limited.

Lootas lack sufficient range to command the entire board, so they need to be placed carefully at the start. If you place first, your opponent can easily negate them for a turn or two simply through good deployment. You can't shoot with them from moving vehicles, and they can't reposition and shoot in the same turn.

They can threaten enemy front armor 12 light vehicles, but they're not substantially more dangerous than a similarly sized unit of tankbustas. A unit of 6 lootas can't be expected to inflict more than two hits on a vehicle in a turn (12 shots, 4 hits, 1.3 5+s, .6 6+s). A unit of 6 tankbustas will have slightly less chance of scoring a hit overall, but the same chance of scoring a penetrating hit (6 shots, 2 hits, 1 4+s, .6 5+s). And the tankbustas can do that while moving either on foot or in a vehicle of their own.

If I want to dismount enemy units, I use either tankbustas or something with 2L rokkits. If I want an unit that can cut through enemies that are out, I want burnas. I don't see lootas as being better at either option.

[bartschy]

Hi,

do both,

buy another box of boyz and build both lottas and burnas you have enopught parts and than some
to build extra nobz, tankbustas and so on.

I also build my commandoes out of burna bitz and boyz.

Just take a boy and the burna head and backback, together with a pistokl and tankbusta bomb an ther you go.

Nothing is more fund than building and converting Orcs, nothing is more long and tideous than painting them all afterwards.

For my Orc painting its' 15 done 300 to go ....

Thanks

Marko

[Exitus Acta Probat]

Hi,

Nothing is more fund than building and converting Orcs, nothing is more long and tideous than painting them all afterwards.


POINT!
If you have access to alot of buddy's bitz (specially tau gun leftovers) MAKE those lootas, it'll be cheaper and cool if you get a good setup going.


buy a box (or convert up a squad) of Tank Bustas.
Why Bustas? Three words, rokkits (better strength then deffguns), bombsquigs (Str:8 hit on a 2+), Tankhammer (2-4 Str: 10 melee attaks).
That or rokkit-buggies; either are better at taking down transports then lootas [unless you roll well a lot] (and 3 buggies will live longer then 5-6 lootas) You need large squads of lootas for them to work well.

No, bustas have a range of 24"...at that point, you need to start thinking in assault terms. And bomb squigs threaten your own line under the wrong circumstances. If you're all foot, then that's okay...but undermines your next statement which I do agree with to a certain degree, rokkit trakks. Though at that point go Deffkoptas! (they're cheap with black reach too).
Still point for point less versatile than lootas.


Lootas are an outrageously good defensive unit. As such, their role in an ork army is extremely limited.

Lootas lack sufficient range to command the entire board, so they need to be placed carefully at the start. If you place first, your opponent can easily negate them for a turn or two simply through good deployment. You can't shoot with them from moving vehicles, and they can't reposition and shoot in the same turn.

They can threaten enemy front armor 12 light vehicles, but they're not substantially more dangerous than a similarly sized unit of tankbustas. A unit of 6 lootas can't be expected to inflict more than two hits on a vehicle in a turn (12 shots, 4 hits, 1.3 5+s, .6 6+s). A unit of 6 tankbustas will have slightly less chance of scoring a hit overall, but the same chance of scoring a penetrating hit (6 shots, 2 hits, 1 4+s, .6 5+s). And the tankbustas can do that while moving either on foot or in a vehicle of their own.

If I want to dismount enemy units, I use either tankbustas or something with 2L rokkits. If I want an unit that can cut through enemies that are out, I want burnas. I don't see lootas as being better at either option.

They are the second most viable and useful shooting unit in the Ork 'dex. Not command the entire board? WTF? since when did 48" not command the entire board in comparison to a lowly rokkit? 15 Lootas = 30 shots per turn average. No rhino survives 10 strength 7 hits. Squadrons of anything but leman russes start suffering STUPIDLY and speeders/sentinels/yes even dreads start to get attrited down to immobile useless drek.
Oh, and let's talk about the Glory Hogs rule...can we say throw away rhino/speeder what have you to CONTROL where the tankbustas go if they are on foot? It's like rage, only for a crappy assault unit. :(

Good lawd, in a rokkit vs loota world, it's a hands down win for teh lootas...

[Old_Paladin]

24" = assault? maybe in a turn or two, and if you have the tankhammer, you might want that.

You think the bombsquig is too unpredictable? 1 in 6 aren't odds. This is an army that has the option for a SAG; i'll not even touch the weirdboy.

If you like the random factor of lootas, why not suggest Flash Gits? Strength 6 assault 2 isn't bad right? and they can get re-rolls to hit and FNP!

Now I'm just starting to sound snarky.
Every person plays differently, I just find (like others) that lootas are a middle ground unit, and sometimes specialists do better. Some people love lootas, and face opposition where they excel (like against tau, Nids or some forms of guard)

Glory Hogs isn't a bad rule, not as bad as rage. It doesn't control movement, just shooting and assault. A smart opponent can block you for a bit, but they can't lead you around pointlessly all game. If you play smart with them, you can use your own LOS blocking units, so that the Bustas only target what you want.

The main difference between rokkit and Deffgun, moving. Your deffgun might have range, and is randomly putting out lots of shots. But rokkits are more likely to get side shots [with a better strength] (the reduced range of rokkits ironically also increases the rate of side shots too, but without diagrams I don't want to get into the physics of why). Rokkits are really 30" range (they can move and shoot).

The point about no rhino survives 10 Str:7 hits; you spent 225 points to kill a rhino!
Like I said huge Loota units work... but do you want to spend that many points?
30 slugga boys would have killed it in CC for cheaper!

[Nabterayl]

Lootaz are demonstrably better than tankbustaz at stopping transports up through AV12, unless the tankbustaz are using their bomb squigs with wild abandon. Proof:

Define a "favorable result" as immobilizing, wrecking, or exploding a transport. Any of those results is usually good enough to get the passengers out - we'll assume that the transport either has an extra armour equivalent or that the passengers are willing to wait for a Stunned vehicle to get moving again rather than get out. We'll further assume that we require our anti-transport weapons to obtain a favorable result first shot, because (we'll assume) there are lots of transport running around and we can't afford for our anti-transport weapons to spend multiple turns picking a transport to death by destroying weapons and then immobilizing it.

This means that there's a 1/2 chance with any given penetrating hit to obtain a favorable result, and a 1/6 chance with any given glancing hit to obtain a favorable result. With an open-topped vehicle those odds go up to 2/3 and 1/3 respectively. We don't need to worry about AP1 weapons, since neither lootaz nor tankbustaz use them.

Deffgunz fire, on average over time, two shots. We'll therefore assume for purposes of this exercise that deffgunz are heavy 2, which is mathematically equivalent to running the numbers we're about to run three times (once for heavy 1, heavy 2, and heavy 3) and taking the weighted average.

Not sure how to post tables on these boards, so I'll spare you the calculations unless anybody's curious. Short answer:

15 lootaz (weighted average 30 shots) have the following odds of immobilizing, wrecking, or exploding the following armor values:

AV10 open-topped: 98%
AV10 hard-topped: 95%
AV 11 open-topped: 95%
AV11 hard-topped: 87%
AV12 hard-topped: 68%
15 tankbustaz using only their rokkits have the following odds:

AV10 open-topped: 94%
AV10 hard-topped: 85%
AV 11 open-topped: 88%
AV11 hard-topped: 77%
AV12 hard-topped: 64%
The deffgunz, clearly, are superior in all cases. But what if the tankbustaz use 14 rokkits and one bomb squig? Then the odds go up to:

AV10 open-topped: 95%
AV10 hard-topped: 89%
AV 11 open-topped: 90%
AV11 hard-topped: 80%
AV12 hard-topped: 67%
The deffgunz are still superior. In fact, even if the tankbustaz use all three bomb squigs in a single go, the odds are only:


AV10 open-topped: 98%
AV10 hard-topped: 93%
AV 11 open-topped: 94%
AV11 hard-topped: 86%
AV12 hard-topped: 74%


IN OTHER WORDS, 15 tankbustaz essentially need to blow all three bomb squigs in a single round of shooting to have the same odds as 15 lootaz of immobilizing, wrecking, or exploding a transport. And that means they need to be within 18" of the transport, which of course is closer than most of us prefer to get to an enemy's transports.

What then is the point of tankbustaz? They have two applications that lootaz don't.

One, they carry assault weapons. This makes them more mobile, if the layout of the board makes that desirable, but also makes them a safer bet to place in a looted wagon for extra protection (as they effectively can't be silenced through stunned/shaken results).

Two, tankbustaz have pretty damn fabulous odds when assaulting an enemy vehicle. Kitted out with two tankbustaz and a nob with a power klaw, 12 tankbustaz (so you can fit them in a transport) have the following odds against a vehicle they are hitting on 6's:

AV10 open-topped: 88%
AV10 hard-topped: 79%
AV14 hard-topped: 65%
Needless to say, the odds go up from here if the vehicle isn't moving at cruising speed.


So, my rule of thumb is this: if I need my anti-transport to move, or if I don't expect there to be any good cover for them, I take tankbustaz. If my anti-transport can stay put, lootaz it is.

[Chumbalaya]

Tankbustas are hampered by Glory Hogs too much, so much so that they require a transport.

Lootas put out more firepower at medium S to knock out vehicles AV12 and lower or stick wounds on units to force tons of saves.

Flash Gitz are terrible.

I'd just pick up some spare boyz and make Burnas and Lootas.

[Old_Paladin]

I guess part of my point is that taking 15 of either is a waste.
I'd take 6 bustas and 3 squigs with a Hammer-Nob; at that point 10 lootas aren't the be-all and end-all.

The charts are nice, but when lootas are hitting front armour, my rokkits better be going be going after side armour (or i'm doing it wrong).
Which make lootas better against most fast attack and rhinos.
With bustas better against chimeras, fish, preds and vindies.
And both are near identical against dreads, falcons and serpents.


Gits aren't really a good choice; I was making a sarcastic comment about people relying on good rolls making something great (ie. 45 loota shots and hitting with half of them).

[Pariah Stevo]

It's all according to what you army needs. First off, only one box of either is going to do you no good. You needs quads of 10 at least. Please Remember that ork only hit 1/3 of the shots they fire. If you gonna use tank bustas or burnas, they need a battlewagon. Tank busta are best in assault with thier tankbustabombs, but are really overkill on anything less than a land raider. Personal i would go with lootas. THey really help when somethings being annoying.

[Chumbalaya]

I wouldn't take smaller units of Lootas because of BS2 and no bosspole, Tankbustas can be run smaller because they have bosspoles.

I find Bustas better in close with tank hammers, the rokkits aren't that hot with 1 shot and BS2, but hammers and tankbusta bombs work extremely well.

[Mike Dunford]

I think we all agree on the benefits of using bozy to make the full load of special weapons in the kit - and in passing I'd note that the fantasy ork warriors regiment is a bit cheaper per ork, and work well with the 40K arms. They make particularly good Snakebites.

@Nabterayl:
As far as the armor analysis goes, I'll cheerfully admit that the lootas are far better than tankbustas at taking down AV10-11 vehicles. I looked only at AV 12, and noted that the tankbustas are similar to lootas there - which your numbers seem to confirm (unless you want to argue about whether 64% is really similar to 68%). And I think we all know what happens to loota odds when you hit AVs 13-15. I'm just not a fan of buying anti-vehicle units that have low odds of taking out tanks when the same points will buy me a unit that can do both reasonably well.

I've got a feeling that the probability differences will be a little less pronounced with smaller numbers of models in the calculations, but I don't particularly feel like running the numbers on that one.

Logistically, I think it's easier to field 12 tankbustas than 9 lootas. The tankbustas can go in and shoot out of a vehicle. The lootas have to be located somewhere that has both good cover and clear lines of sight throughout the tactically important areas of the board. Finding areas that fit both criteria AND have the capacity to hold the required number of models is not always a trivial accomplishment.

Strategically, there's the 1/3 chance of a Dawn of War setup to keep in mind as well. Both tankbustas and lootas will have to start off by moving. That's one turn of shooting gone for the lootas right there no matter what, and more if an adequate firing position can't be found within 6" of the board edge.

Setting lootas aside for the moment, burnas - even in moderately sized units - have the ability to cut through heavily armored opponents - especially ones that fight at low initiative for whatever reason.

[BuFFo]

I go lootas. 100% of the time. Without question. a chance to reign 45 autocannon shots on a target is just disgusting...

[Nabterayl]

@Nabterayl:
As far as the armor analysis goes, I'll cheerfully admit that the lootas are far better than tankbustas at taking down AV10-11 vehicles. I looked only at AV 12, and noted that the tankbustas are similar to lootas there - which your numbers seem to confirm (unless you want to argue about whether 64% is really similar to 68%). And I think we all know what happens to loota odds when you hit AVs 13-15. I'm just not a fan of buying anti-vehicle units that have low odds of taking out tanks when the same points will buy me a unit that can do both reasonably well.
Damn AV15 vehicles ;)

I don't disagree with any of your conclusions, actually, Mike, since most of the time I do prize mobility. I just wanted to throw some mathematical light on the question of how deffgunz (even single deffgunz) compare against rokkits. Being a Strength snob myself, I was pretty shocked the first time I ran those numbers.

It's precisely because deffgunz are better than rokkits against a given sub-13 armor that the choice between lootaz and tankbustaz comes down to doctrine. I hoped that by pointing out definitively that deffgunz win mathematically, it might help to focus the discussion on the parts of the question that matter.

[terricon4]

You need more than one box each unless you want the mek. I would sum it up as if you have a highly anti infantry army, get lootas, if you can handle tanks but need to kill infantry, or heavy infantry, take burnas. A battlewagon really helps burnas as they can close and all get off an optimum shot.

[mercer]

I've used Burnas before and now using Lootas, I like Lootas the best.

Burnas are good the mass templates, best setup is in a battlewagon or trukk with a Big Mek with a KFF. The transport and force field will keep them going, though once they are out don't expect them to last long. Bonus with them is you don't need to worry about the BS2 shooting, unlike Lootas, but, you need to get into range and you need a mass of them or else they will die once get popped. Any player who knows the mass flamer templates on route will pop the transport and gun them down, or let them foot slog it.

Lootas still need the same protection in the form of a trukk or battlewagon and possibly a Big Mek and KFF. Unlike Burnas they have massive range, stronger weapons and the move there is the more shots they get. They are perhaps one of the Orks best anti vehicle unit (do Orks have those? :p) as they can take out armour mostly on the side. Infantry doesn't pose a problem and advancing Orks either on foot or in transport will get long range fire support.

Lootas are highly annoying, especially in a battlewagon where you cannot get them which has a B.M with KFF. Burnas are not so hot (pun not intended) as you need to get into range, and once done a unit over they are waiting to be shot up next turn. I would go with the Lootas really, their benefits out weigh the Burnas, though either way give the B.M a power klaw, if either unit gets assaulted once out the transport it will help a bit ;)

[Droofus]

As an Ork player, I'm most frightened of seeing burnaz across the table, because they annihilate my regular boyz. However, 2 units of 10 lootaz usually find their way into my lists of 1850+. The reason has already been stated - they're simply too cool for school when it comes to popping transports.

Burnaz have a role, putting large amounts of strength 4 hurting on a unit, that is already filled by our regular boyz. They also require a battlewagon or looted wagon to be effective. The best use of burnaz therefore, at least in my experience, is in the battlewagon rumble/nob heavy list. In such a list you are likely to be spamming battlewagons anyway and you'll lack the regular boyz to be able to put 40 strength four hits on a unit. But in a standard horde? No thanks. I need the anti-tank that the lootaz provide much more than anti-infantry from the burnaz.