Ogres are not strong in long range missile troops and they have no fast cavalry or flying units...
- You need some of the above to, respectively, whittle down the enemy from range, disperse pesky skirmishers and take out long range artillery before it does some major damage.
- Because the movement rate of your ogres is 6 inches you can probably live without cavalry unless you're facing a very fast moving enemy like Elves, Bretonnians or Skaven. With a move of 6 inches you should be able to force the enemy into combat quite quickly against other armies.
- Missile troops you might also feel you can live without. Even if you chose to take some missile carrying Dogs of War they probably will not be enough to allow you to fight any kind of missile battle with your enemy. Nope, instead of these you should concentrate on your strengths and make sure you get into combat early, this will negate the enemy's missile effectiveness by default because they will not be able to fire into combat (unless they're Skaven).
An Ogre army you will usually be looking at the kind of flying Dogs of War that are available. Here are the Dogs of War flyers that are available:-
1) Asarnil the DragonLord
A very hard hitting character riding a dragon. He costs 450 pts though, shich uses up a large part of a 2000 pts army allocation. He is a risky option because he has no ward save, the dragon might be rock hard (T6, W6) but Asarnil has a toughness of 3 and only 2 wounds. Use only if the enemy has few missile troops.
2) Birdmen of Catrazza
These are NOT a combat unit. They are flying crossbowmen (note, their crossbows only count as normal bows, not crossbows)
Because you can only have a unit strength of 10 I wouldn't bother with this unit unless you expect to be facing a lot of enemy magic users (not joined to units) or weak long range artillery that you think you can destroy with a couple of volleys.
The birdmen do give you two more tactical options:-
- you can use them to march block the enemy by landing within 8 inches and...
- if you're careful and land within charge distance you can 'force' frenzied troops to charge you and then fly off as a charge reaction. If you have supporting units within range these can then charge the frenzied troops.
Summary
All in all, unless you have a specific tactical plan, I would recommend sticking to the Ogre Rare Units rather than going for a Dogs of War unit.
Note: If you're interested in the other Dogs of War units check out the '- Dogs of War' thread under the contents page.
If you're playing a 3000pt + game or you have the points to spare then definitely go for a Maneater unit (as many as you can afford), otherwise choose a Slave Giant if you're facing a lot of rank and file or a Gorger if you're attempting to kill enemy characters or units near the enemy's rear lines.
