Hobgoblin 'army list'

I know army lists are not the best loved thing in Oldhammer land but they do give a useful guide to organising your little horde of figures and making battles a little more 'fair' if that there is such a concept during battles of fantastic creatures.
Long term readers will know that I've been threatening to put a Hobgoblin army together for some time but keep getting distracted. I've decided that this Autumn I am actually going to try and get my shit together and start painting up this army. Snicket posted on his blog about putting a campaign together and mentioned about sticking to Warhammer Armies and I though it was about time I actually worked out what was going to be in my army.



The original idea for the army came from the wonderfully silly Chaos Marauders game,

and the brilliant little illustrations that come on the unit cards, both the original Blanche ones


and the ones from the current edition by Christophe Madura


the game portrays a squabbling horde of greenies tramping to battle and the attempt to get them to form a battle line in order to face your opponent.

I liked the idea of mixed army of greenies and I decided to use the Hobgoblin list in Warhammer armies as my starting point.

The hobgoblin list is not a full list and only covers a mercenary contingent. As such it Contains a Leader (with the option to mount him on a temple dog), A shaman, An army standard and bearer, Hobyars (Elite troops), Mourngul renegades (Basic troops) and Hobhounds and handlers. So far so good. Now I need to turn this into a proper army list. The first thing I need is Cavalry. First stop is Hobgoblin wolfriders. I've got two units so these will be really useful. There was a suggestion on the forum of upgrading a unit to be riding honhounds. Seems fairly fitting.

 In order to turn my Hobgoblins into a mixed greeny force I need more goblinoids. The easiest thing to do is rip entries out of the orcs and goblins army list and drop them into my new list. The first one to suffer from this are scabbies, otherwise known as half-orcs. Yay!

The next unit is a little controversial but I see them fitting in perfectly to my vision of the army, Black orcs!

Someone suggested having an assassin as a character as well which seems to fit theme wise. Not sure how it work rules wise but we can worry about that later :)

Every army needs some warmachines. So for our bunch I am going to pluck for a bolt thrower straight from the O&G list with some hobgobs for crew as there is a model that needs to be used!

I'll go for rocket launchers as, again, there is a model available so we should include them.
Next I need to give a bit if thought about the allies and mercenaries that are available for me to use. In order to stick with my chaos marauders theme we will have allies from both the Orcs and goblins allies list and also the Chaos allies list.

 I did consider undead as well but decided they didn't fit my theme (I could always have a shaman raising skeletons with Necromantic spells)
Mercenaries choices would be Ogres, Half-orcs, Orcs and possibly Giants. 
So there we have it. No points, as that's boring, but a general idea of how I could organise an army for Hobgoblins. I'm not going to suggest that this is the definitive army list but I like to think of it as an example of an Oldhammer approach to putting an army together. By being imaginative and sensible and presenting your ideas to your fellow gamers you can build an army that suits your ideas, that comes form your imagination, rather than trying to stick slavishly to army lists. A gentlemans approach to wargaming.

Comments

  1. I just posted this on your forum thread, but I'll put it here for relevance :)

    I'd imagine that if you nipped over to page 98 of the WFB3 rule book, you might find something meaningful and useful for your proposed army that you don't see anywhere these days - something I can only think fits the hobgoblins very, very well...

    Also, I don't see why you couldn't take Nippon mercenaries or Dark Elf allies - they strike me as having an oriental chord.

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    1. I had a look and that is possibly the most un-pc option I could imagine but might be fun to give it a go :)
      Nippon mercenaries might be interesting and something to explore in the future but i see dark elves a coming from the wrong side of the world! When i get everything painted i could think about expanding into those areas but lets not tempt me into buying more figures!

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  2. Sounds like a really good army plan. I quite like army lists as a starting point. Hope you're going nice and old school with your choice of models. The 90's hobgobs just don't do it for me. Someone on Frothers rceently pointed out the Alternative Armies have just put some old gobbo types back into production and they're a great match style wise for the old Citadel stuff.

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    1. A couple of links in the text take you back to my posts about which figures I've got but at the moment I have a regiment of classic half-orcs, 2 regiments of mourngul renegades made up of classic morrison hobgobs plus some tsr ones and even some jes goodwin uruk hai plus a smattering of nick lund figs as well as the monster starter set figure and the talsiman figure. I've got a full regiment of Mighty Throgs despoilers and a pitiful single hobhound. The cavalry is made up of a unit of 10 of Oglah Khans boys and a unit of the 90's hobgob wolf boys as well as a 90's spear chukka. I got my self a classic marsh troll for some back-up as well as the above unit of Olley Black orcs. I've just bought some the alternative armies hobgoblins and put a size comparison shot on the facebook group, I'm still picking up figures so i might end up with a fourth regiment.

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  3. The list is shaping up nicely matey.

    My only reasons for using Warhamner Armies really are that a) a lot of the work for the structure of the campaign is done for me (I'm a lazy sod at heart) b) means everyone has access to the same info and, most important of all c) i adore the art work of the book, the entries make me smile as I remember thumbing through the book as a kid and being spellbound by them.

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    1. I ain't blaming you dude, i'm just being awkward :)

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  4. Another abandoned race. Good to see you bringing them back. I needed three hobgoblins for a Chaos warband and so (instead of dropping $36 on three minis) I had a pitiful (or comical) go at modifying some Night Goblins into Hobgoblins. I'll be following this closely, good luck!

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    1. You must be able to get them cheaper than that!

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  5. Replies
    1. Conversion! http://www.blackhat.co.uk/online_shop/product_info.php?cPath=121_147_148&products_id=1515&osCsid=91a3efb6dcf61b9da3a3330c9cb2c974

      Black hat has some cool oriental adventures mini. The minotaur is quite cool as well....

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  6. Have you had a look at the unofficial hobgoblin army list on this website?

    http://warhammerarmiesproject.blogspot.com/

    Might be something useful in it for your project?

    Cheers.

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    1. Thanks for the link, some interesting stuff on there.

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  7. Looking good fella - personally I'm hoping to include some Hobbo's mounted on horseback as well as mercenary Goblin Wolf riders. I like the idea of wagons and baggage to represent them being nomads.

    Might have to dig out my Hobgoblins and start thinking about my army too now that you've inspired me. In fact that was my favourite thing to do with Warhammer Armies back in the day - work out lists for armies I didn't have and that I thought would never have. Who'd have thought I'd be scouring ebay and the like to make those old lists come true!

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    1. I often think about that when I'm looking at my piles of figures, the 12 year old me would be in fits of delight, no way could I have ever conned this much money out of my parents!
      As for gobbo wolf riders, I do like the look of the new crooked claw wolfboyz so I will have to squeeze them in some how.

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    2. I have just come across 3 figures from the Hobgoblin Rocket crew you can have. I would of offered them sooner but did not want to look like I was offering some sort of bride for your prize draw (i.e. pick me, pick me!).

      Send me a message with some where to send them and they are yours. They need a good home and I won't do any thing with them.

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    3. Oh bless you man, are you on the forum? I'll message you through that. Cheers.

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  8. I am going to answer your question by asking what forum?

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    1. Yeah I went looking and couldn't find you, I was thinking if the oldhammer forum. Are you on lead adventure or Frothers?

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    2. sorry for the delay. I have finally joined oldhammer so feel free to PM me.

      Regards
      Riot

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  9. I'd leave out Black Orcs and put in Bugbears.
    Warlord with Hobhound chariot.
    Standard bearer wagon from main rule book.
    Oriental Ogres.
    Themed Giant.
    Wolf Chariots.
    Summoned Oni (ogre profile but immune to normal weapons and subject to instability).

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