Best Anti-Horde Army?

[White_13oy]

I'd like to know what people's opinions are on for the army that can handle/kill hoards the best without hoarding themselves or taking mass artillery. They can use artillery just not have that be all that can handle it. I for one can't think of any except maybe Beastmen Mino with AHW and a Doombull with Frenzy sword and just go to town with all those attacks. I'd like to know because I generally don't like the hoard aspect (personal opinion only, not hating) so would like to know how to handle it with resorting to it. I'd like to hear your opinions.

[Gary wyper]

Ogre kingdoms
kots of attacks,impact hits, stomp etc etc

[ftayl5]

Dark Elves have very deadly infantry without going horde. Black Guard are restricted to units of 20, and most often only get fielded in about 14 and I fear them more than most hordes of 30+ guys. Witch Elves have 3 attacks each, meaning horde is only a minor advantage for them in offence(2nd and 3rd ranks only get 1 attack per model). Meanwhile they suffer greatly from allowing enemies to direct more attacks at them (T3, no saves) so I think they're better when not in hordes.
Also repeater crossbowmen can do a lot of damage to many hordes. The most popularly horded units are ones that are fairly cheap but have good offence - which often means they have little protection (T3 or maybe 4, a 5+ armour at best). Repeater crossbowmen love these units.

Also dark magic (the dark elf lore) has a very easy to cast spell (10+) that does a S2 hit on every model in a unit with no armour save. That's killing a 6th of the unit if you don't get lucky or unlucky. Also the caster gets healed for every wound done.

[Morkash]

Against hoarding, your best bet may be a Sigmarite themed army. I'm not into Imperial background, but at least the Sigmar Priests and the Flagellants should have vowed to live without real property, as well as some of the more pious Knightly Orders. But avoid taking Karl Franz on the Imperial Dragon, because as everybody knows, Dragons love hoarding...

Against armies with hordes without you using hordes, Dark Elves, High Elves, Ogre Kingdoms or Warriors of Chaos are fine.
- WoC have deadly and very resilient infantry which can soak up and deal vast amounts of damage.
- HE can choose from all magic lores and have a item with which they can pick their spells for good use against pretty much everything. Their elite infantry is also very effective and often used in units of 21.
- DE have, as ftayl5 said, very good infantry, good shooting, great magic (Dark Magic is fine, Death & Shadow even better) and generally work great against units/hordes with little armour.
- Lastly, Ogres are fantastic even without using them in hordes. A unit of 10 Ironguts (or Bulls augmented with magic) with characters can break the neck of most hordes, while Leadbelchers can blast entire ranks away and a unit of Maneaters can deal more damage than most other units I know of. Mournfang Cavalry can usually directly charge S/T 3-4 hordes in the front, just because they will cause 20-35 casualties in the round they charge without taking relevant damage in return. Last but not least Gnoblar Trappers can force units charging them to pass Dangerous Terrain tests. Annoying for any unit, very effective against hordes.

[Sexiest_hero]

Anything that can trash rank and file kills hordes, most people get upset you can't kill them in one turn. Armies that assassinate BsB and Generals beat hordes as well.

[Aluinn]

Against hoarding, your best bet may be a Sigmarite themed army. I'm not into Imperial background, but at least the Sigmar Priests and the Flagellants should have vowed to live without real property, as well as some of the more pious Knightly Orders. But avoid taking Karl Franz on the Imperial Dragon, because as everybody knows, Dragons love hoarding...

I firmly disagree. Surely Wood Elves, what with the entire army being composed of penniless hippies and ... trees, are better at anti-hoarding. The closest they'll ever get to money are multicolored glass beads (or perhaps some sort of "forest herbs") and berries, respectively. (Well, I guess a squirrel could hoard nuts in a tree, but you can't blame the tree for that, really.)

I'm sure we can agree, though, that Dwarves are the worst, hands down.

[Skopey]

I find mY bret Knights in Lance's of 12-15 models are quite handy at breaking hordes of 30-50 Small frontage and a good number of attacks. Mostly on the charge admittedly but ive had 12 knights break a unit of 70 Nightgoblins in one round of combat. As well as breaking my regular opponents 40 Mara horde on most occasions. The small frontage is a bonus against hordes.

[Kallstrom]

Against hoarding, your best bet may be a Sigmarite themed army. I'm not into Imperial background, but at least the Sigmar Priests and the Flagellants should have vowed to live without real property, as well as some of the more pious Knightly Orders. But avoid taking Karl Franz on the Imperial Dragon, because as everybody knows, Dragons love hoarding...

Haha, it was not until the last part that I got it. (:

[theunwantedbeing]

High elves?
White lions, Swordmasters and Mindrazored Spearmen in horde formations will all decimate huge numbers of enemy models in combat before the enemy can even blink.

You can easily kill 25+ models per combat round with such units.

[brother_maynard]

LD bomb daemons deserve a mention i think.

[Djekar]

Really anything that starts messing with Leadership (I'm looking at you, Doom and Darkness) is very effective against hordes. Slaanesh Daemons, character assassination even some milder leadership tricks can get them into trouble - Skaven and Vamps have some of those.

[Gaargod]

Tomb King with Deathmask probably deserves a mention. In a decent unit (read: chariots/tomb guard), they can win combat and then the enemy is suddenly testing on their own LD, with no BSB, even if they have steadfast. It's surprisingly effective against most hordes. Similarly the LD bomb daemons (icon of despair, masque) can reduce an enemy to testing on like Ld4-6 instead of Ld9. You don't necessarily have to kill the entire unit to win, just deprive them of their ability to steadfastly sit there.

[GodlessM]

Doombull with Frenzy sword

Isn't a Doombull frenzied already?

[brother_maynard]

Isn't a Doombull frenzied already?

its a trick to get him to retain all of his bloodgreed attacks even if he's beaten in combat.

[GodlessM]

its a trick to get him to retain all of his bloodgreed attacks even if he's beaten in combat.

Seems kinda pointless; if a Doombull of all things is losing combat then it is probably getting killed or run down anyway.

[tmarichards]

I'd say Dark Elves, as they have access to criminally cheap multi-attack infantry with hatred, which when combined with Mindrazor will take off pretty much anything in a round.

[BigbyWolf]

Greenskins- Plenty of cheapish artillery (particularly Stone Throwers) that love hordes. Fanatics love big units as it's a bigger surface area to hit. The same goes for any of the random movement units.

Really, I think most armies can handle hordes.

[Phazael]

Dark Elves with all the major toys in play are probably the best anti horde army around. Unkillable Lord can lock down a horde and the witches, backed by Cauldron and a Shadow Wizard can wreck most opposition.

Daemons are probably pretty close behind against hordes, with the LD Bomb and Siren taking away most of the advantages that Hordes provide, especially when backed by a Death or Shadow wizard, combined with chaffe that is almost as good as the Dark Elves have access to.

Out of the new books, Ogres are probably the best Horde breakers around, especially a nice sized maneater unit backed by Heavens or Fire magic, and using solo Sabers to control the movement phase.

[Awilla the Hun]

It is self-evidently the Red Guards who are the best anti-hoard army!

As for hordes, I'd say that mass gunlines/artillery aren't the way to go. Warhammer Fantasy isn't Zulu. What happens when hordes meet expensive war machines and missile troops is that they drown them in bodies before ploughing into the static, fragile target and ripping it to pieces. I'd say that Chaos Warriors and Ogres are pretty good against hordes, because conducting flank/rear attacks on them tends to do nothing but give their regiments more kills, and they're tough enough to simply absorb quite a lot of the Horde's "killy bonus" units. Hellcannons in close combat are also surprisingly effective.

[tw1386]

Surprised Nobody has mention it yet, but I find the Warshpinx to be amazing at dealing with Cheap Hordes and units like Goblins, Skeletons, Zombies, Skaven of all variety, Empire state troops, spear elves, the basic core troops of most armies etc... It's thundercrush attack (if it hits) just demolishes these kind of units, then add on the crews attacks, the breath attack, and its thunderstomp... it can seriously put a dent in these formations.