Dred Mob
Ork armies come in many forms, none pleasant to take on. They can be endless green hordes that stretch right across the horizon in a sea of bodies. They can be madcap fleets of dangerous ramshackle vehicles careening about and throwing up great clouds of dust in their wake. But one of the most feared of all by the beleaguered defenders of countless worlds across the galaxy, both Imperial and Xenos alike, is the sight of a Dred Mob, for it means they can expect little but an ignoble end, as an ant crushed beneath the iron-shod foot of a metal giant indifferent to their protest.
A Dred Mob starts life as the sparkle of inspiration in the eye of a Big Mek, often after having viewed the walkers of other races, and the various manners in which they introduced his fellow Orks to their innards. Bursting with the spirit of invention, he'll return to his workshop (as soon as battle permits), and begin giving his new vision form in metal and oil. What later emerges after many all-nighters of hammering and cursing is a monster, hydraulic piston-driven limbs holding up an armoured chassis bristling with all manner of weapons, and with a half-mad Ork or Grot wired into the cockpit. When the Big Mek's warband next sally forth to war, they'll be accompanied by the lumbering behemoth, who'll quickly earn their keep through the sheer carnage they can unleash.
With every victory his creations achieve, the Mek Boss'll acquire more and better scrap, with which to build more and bigger Dreds, an itch he can never scratch urging him on to bigger and better things. He'll move on from primitive Killa Kans and Deff Dreds to grander endeavors, such as Morkanauts and Gorkanauts. As his successes gather pace, other Meks're drawn to him out of admiration and envy, and quickly a shanty town springs up around his lot. The workshop of the Mek Boss himself will have grown exponentially, expanding out into a vast Kan Factory covering acres of land, with crude production lines working ceaselessly fabricating new engines of war. Often the funds for such franchising're supplied by Warbosses, customers only too eager to hire the Dred Mob's stomping services.
On the Tabletop[edit | edit source]
5th-7th Edition[edit | edit source]
The Dred Mob are yet another mechanised Ork sub-list, this time from Forgeworld rather than Chapter Approved, with iterations from 5th through 7th edition. Always more of a shopping catalogue than a codex, it was full to the brim with nice, expensive Imperial Armour models, and light on any cheapy infantry you can port over from your main army, not that anyone in their right mind actually bought the models.
A Dred Mob could take Big Meks, Painbosses, and Kustom Meka-Dreads as HQ; Burna Boyz, Cybork Slashas, and Mekboy Junkas as Elites; Spanna Boyz, Gretchin Scavengers, and Deff Dreds as Troops; Dakkajets, Fightas, Deffkoptas, Warbuggies, Wartrakks, Killa Kans, Grot Tanks, and Warkoptas as Fast Attack; and Burna-Bommas, Blitza-Bommas, Lootas, Big Trakks, Looted Wagons, Lifta Wagons, and Mega-Dreads as Heavy Support. They also had access to the Special Character Mek Boss Buzgob, who comes in full Techpriest cosplay with an Orky Servo-Harness that gives +1d3A on the charge, and has a Warlord Trait which makes surrounding Deff Dreds scoring.
8th Edition[edit | edit source]
With Vigilus Defiant, the battlefields of 40k can once again resound to the relentless stomping of metal cans with anger-management issues, as the Dred Mob's now a Specialist Detachment, redubbed as the Dread Waaagh! For 1CP at the beginning of the game, you can give one of your Big Meks Da Souped-Up Shokka Shiny Gubbin, a Supa-Shokk Attack Gun with 2d6 shots rather than 1d6, and then every turn pay another 2CP to fire twice with the Kustom Ammo Stratagem. Oh, and also another Stratagem and a Warlord Trait, but everybody skims over them to get to the good stuff.
If you must indulge them, the Dread Waaagh! also lets you pick from the Stratagem Mek Connections, which lets a Dread Waaagh! unit get a Kustom Job from a Mekboy Workshop on a 4+ instead of a 6+, and the Warlord Trait Dread Mek, which lets a Big Mek restore one extra Wound when repairing a Dread Waaagh! unit. Look, we told you nobody uses them, what did you expect?
9th Edition[edit | edit source]
As of the Grand Tournament 2020 rules, Specialist Detachments are no longer allowed in tournaments, meaning no more Souped-Up Shokkas to delete tanks from across the board. The Dread Waaagh!'s otherwise still totally viable in non-tournament Matched Play though.
| Clans ov da Orks | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Clans: | Bad Moons - Blood Axes - Deathskulls - Goffs - Evil Sunz - Snake Bites | |||||||
| Non-Clan Factions: | Freebooterz - Feral Orks - Speed Freeks - Dred Mob - Gretchin Revolutionary Committee - Beast Snaggas | |||||||