Come with me as we explore the mushroom-addled mind of a Git! Today’s article continues our Love Letters Series, in which readers of the page submit an ode to their favorite warband. The Love Letter Series was kicked off by this post encouraging people to play the warbands they love and tell others about the experience, inviting readers to contribute their passion to this website – if you have something to say, by all means let me know wherever you found this posted or by emailing me at SpentGlory@Gmail.com. This one started out with the premise he would “write a couple snippets about the perspective of someone who gets to play once or twice a month with the teams. I choose and have to decide between out of my collection knowing I get to play rarely.” The more Tyreal started to open up about his love for goblins in general and Zarbag’s Gitz specifically however, these ‘couple snippets’ turned into a full fledged Love Letter. I hope you enjoy as much as I have!

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Channel your Inner Goblin 

To be a goblin takes craftiness. One does not survive long if they cannot understand the world around them and how it is trying to kill you. Admittedly the reputation that goblins have is founded, but what if.. What if they were just trying to have fun? Sure, the idea that ((stab stab stab again)) may not be fun for the person being stabbed, but what about the one stabbing? 

Goblins hold a special place in my heart. I was 12 when my friend convinced me to go to a game store to play a practice game with him. Goblins against the silly ‘umies who play dress up with their horses. Bah. Naturally the store employee had each of us roll off to see what models we would be piloting for the demo. I had no idea what was going on, but when my dice landed and the employee pointed to the goblin with a ball and chain spinning around, it was love at first sight. Que the “you spin me right round baby” music.

That was 20 years ago and fanatics still hold a dear place in my heart. No need to mention that in that first game,  turn one, three out of my four fanatics ran off the table and one ran into terrain and died…  I spent the rest of the battle sitting there watching my friend run his boar boyz into the ‘umies and eat them for lunch.

But let us come out of the fog of war back into the reality that ZARBAG GITZ JUST GOT A REFRESH!! But before we get to that. Let us talk, well… I’ll talk and you listen and by talk and listen I mean type and read… Ahem. Let us talk about the lesser known, but just as fun warband called the Looncourt. If you haven’t played them, then you are missing out on a great time. The silliness that is inherent in the deck, cards, and mechanics is deliciously satisfying. It’s often just as fun to watch your warband get blown over knowing that you are one squig launch away from a key victory moment, or hoping that when Grib bounds in to skewer someone with his squigs horn it is enough. Then at the end you realize that Grinkrak is one of your best fighters and he sat on an objective all game trying to inspire the weaklings to get something done… Always a tricky balance. If you are interested in the Looncourt @omniops from What the Hex?! did a Fearsome Fortress deck building video on his network’s youtube channel. Thanks Skyler, keep the awesome content coming!

As you can tell, my brain is like a goblin, short sighted and 4 scatter dice away from the possibility of a really good thing… but often falls just too short.

Let us get back to the goblins. Well, the other goblins. Just like my first time playing warhammer was with goblins, my first warband purchased was Zarbag’s Gitz, my first foray into painting miniatures was the gitz, my first losing streak was the gitz. My first win was the Chosen Axes… I bet you didn’t see that one coming… haha! Shout out @Wathlab, for keeping that torch burning bright. 

Playing a 9 Fighter Warband with Fearsome Fortress

Zarbag’s Gitz is a horde warband that has more fighters than starting hexes!! WHAAA? Starting with the 3 archers that can all shoot together to the squig herder that places two squigs adjacent after he is placed, supported by the netter, and wizard leader, and finally the hero and main attraction… the goblin fanatic who inspires to 3 dodge and can only take one action… wreck. If you haven’t experienced wreck, you need to find a gitz player to play against. It is great fun!  

In the great words of the Grand Cherokee ‘24 winner “You have to play 50+ games to start to truly understand a warband, and then you have to learn other warbands too”.

(Editor’s Note: There’s a Love Letter from that winner too!)

I play Zarbag and his gitz with the Fearsome Fortress deck. I’ve played around 20 games with the pairing, and still don’t feel like I have a complete grasp of how to handle each situation.  Holding objectives goes hand in hand with their movement shenanigans, the scurry ability, but trying to hold the middle with your 2 wound fighters is tricky business. I’ve played enough games to realize some things. Boards and objective placement can win or lose games at the start for this pairing and warband. Learning how to best hold or use your objectives is key, obvious but true. Using boards that allow you to have enough supporting fighters within range of the middle while balancing starting hexes that are adjacent is just as tricky as playing the warband. Once you have developed this cunning the rest of the game is just as easy as keeping 2 wound fighters on 1 dodge alive, and not bleeding 7+ glory each game… HAH. Let the fun commence. 

Their objective deck and FF support each other well. Their playstyle has possibilities to counter punch the enemy when they come in or force your opponent to be in locations that you can pile in on them. But there are games when you just need one more objective to score your 6 glory hand and you Just. Cant.. Kill… The…. One….. Fighter…… Sitting……. On…….. That……… Objective………. It happens. But that’s the life of a goblin. Sometimes who you are sneaking up on or laying a trap for just turns around and squashes you like a bug.

Setup is Key to Scoring Objectives

In the FF pairing, it is key to place one or two in your territory and one in no one’s/enemy for pretty much the whole end phase (EP) package. ((conquered domain)) can be quite silly if you get two objectives and the FF feature token placed in the FF zone, then have ((walking wall)), or use ((bold engineer)) to bring another objective into the zone. ((lurk-lair)) and ((gitz everywhere!)) Both can score if you hold two objectives in your own and then one objective in FF zone or enemy. I have scored both of these almost every game, except for the ones where my goblins are dead or I draw them round 3. If you’re positioning to score the ones already mentioned above then ((stockpile)) and ((underground fortress)) are almost an afterthought. The hard EP objective is ((mad scurry)) because you won’t always have 5 fighters. Often if I have this in round 3 it’s not getting scored, or if I draw it in round 2, and I have enough fighters, I try to be more defensive. In the great words of Sir Robin’s patsy from Monty Python, “Bravely ran away, When danger reared it’s ugly head, He bravely turned his tail and fled.”

Game Plan

Something that I am not great at yet, is knowing when to go aggro and try to kill my opponent’s key fighter, or when to make a wall where no matter who they kill, there is always another goblin to hold. In my discussion with @Kyros after a game we played, he mentioned that if you need an objective to be held, like #2 in the picture below, then you have to be the first one on it. If you are not, then you have to use activations to push, or kill an opponent on it. But if you are the first one on the objective, you have the best chance to hold it. It was such simple advice, but that changed how I thought of my activations. For a hold warband, you want your activations to work to the goal of holding, (DUH), but also in a way that could force your opponent into a spot they may not want to be in. Your opponent can come in for an easy charge just to find they are surrounded by red eyed green goblins with pointy sticks. 

If we look at the next board where I have placed the whole warband, you can notice that drizgit and the squigs are in position to be threatening the middle. With Drizgits action he can move himself and the squigs 3 hexes, all with 1 action. Holding space for counter punch is important too, if the opponent takes #5, I have Snirk waiting there to jump in and bonk with 3 damage. This creates the choice for the opponent, either they can move onto 5 and block some scoring and get attacked by Snirk, the best fighter in the game (sorry my bias came out there) or leave 5 alone and let me score some EP. 

Give ‘em a Volley, Ladz

One of the hidden gems that I think people don’t pay attention to or don’t utilize well is the archers action. “Give ‘em a volley ladz” is an action that any archer within 3 hexes of the activated fighter can make an archer attack. This means that you can shoot three times in one activation. WOW! In the picture above, If I activate Redkap, because Dibbz and Stikkit are both within 3 hexes, they too can make their shots. This is great when it works, but it is only a 2 furry 1 damage attack. Many people will look at this attack and scoff and say it is not worth the activation. I would encourage any gitz player to use this at least two times a game. This action is useful for a couple of reasons. In the games where I think about setting up for this action I start to place the objectives closer together, I start to position my archers so they have range on invading fighters. In this initial setup, if a fighter comes in to kill Snirk, I have the option of all 3 archers able to attack back, and they have support doing so. This helps the game plan in a couple of ways, you can use their volley to push the targeted fighter around into a position you want them to be in. Or you could just get luck and crit crit crit your way to killing a fighter. AND because you don’t need to target the same fighter with the action, you could possibly shoot 3 different fighters. This is a sneaky activation that is so thematic of what goblins represent. There have been games (sorry @Kyros) where my goblins critted three times in a row to take one of his fighters down, but also games where I whiff all three attack actions. Either way it’s good fun, and scores you the surge Stayin’ Safe (make three 3+ range attack actions, they don’t need to be successful).

Choice Management, a Walkthrough

One of the strengths that horde warbands has is the ability to have multiple choices to accomplish the same thing. Let’s say that my hand was LurkLair (hold 3, 1 not in your territory), raw materials (place a feature in FF zone), and Scurry (5 fighters have move tokens). This was an actual situation in one of my games.

According to the board state, I wanted to hold 4, 3, and one in the opponent’s territory. Which from first glance looks pretty doable. I can move by backline up and then have a massive move chain to get on the rest. Easy. Done, scoring 5+ glory round 1.

So that’s what I do, I move my backline up to have a huge ball and then want to move the rest on activation 2. I’m in a great spot, almost everyone is connected so I can just conga line my grots around using scurry. 

Then Kyros plays a card… ((Furious Abandon)) push 2. Tazat moves onto 3. Which is fine, I have great damage and supports around him right now.

But in his turn he scythes my two squigs… dead… not great. What proceeds to happen is what I call. The great culling. This is the board state after round 1.

As you can see. He is down 1 person and I am down 3. Not great. Because he captured 3. I felt I needed it to score my objectives. So I just kept charging or attacking into the fighter on 3. Which then was in the perfect spot for him to attack back. By letting him be the first one onto 3, I forced myself to try to move him off of the objective, not hold it and force him to move me. The scurry to set up the larger blob was not worth the slug fest that happened after.

The options I had ahead of me were to use my activations to hold/capture 3. Which I tried and failed at, or I could use them to run around the middle and take objective 2 and 5. This would have been a better idea as it forces your opponent to either chase after you to kill your holding fighter or they can keep holding the middle. Either way you have a better chance then just piling your fighters on the one spot in the middle (which I did, and Kyros happily killed them all). 

Only three fighters left, the archer boys survived this slaughter. I was locked into a single outcome that I didn’t consider that I didn’t need to hold in the middle. All of my other games I could hold the middle and win, this one didn’t work that way. 

Snirk

Snirk gets his own special mention. This is a fighter who comes with a dark history for some. I’ve played games against people and before I set up the board they groan and go, not Snirk. Which is great for me and actually gives me information that they don’t realize they have shared. This tells me they want to target Snirk to take him out because they have been crushed by his whirling ball of death before. I then position Snirk in a spot where he is supported or surrounded by his team and if they want to kill him, they have to come into my territory in a spot I want them to charge to. The second value Snirk has is a deterrent. He can sit in a spot and suddenly there is a 4 hex bubble where if the opponent enters, Snirk is going to charge into them and possibly do some terrible terrible damage. On top of that, because when Snirk charges he can bring friends along with scurry. So usually he is attacking with at least one support. 2 furry with support is the same odds as 2 smash and many people love playing 2 smash 3 damage attacks. He is both a strong bait, and a strong counter punch for this team. Keep him safe. I admittedly need to get better at using him as counter punch. 

Balancing the Team’s Strengths

I usually dangle Snirk as bait, and it works, and he dies. Out of the first 10 games I’ve played with this team, I got to use his wreck ability maybe in 2 of them. I find that balancing Snirk, the squigs, the volley, and not leaving Zarbag behind is hard to manage. In a game you really only can utilize a couple of these abilities before they die or are out of position. So knowing when to use what tool in which part of the game is key. I often lose the squigs early on, and can use Snirk as a punch. Which leaves me with Zarbag and the archers to finish up the game, which isn’t ideal. But that is because I put Drizgit and his squad up front as a shield. I have yet to experiment with keeping the squigs back further for more counter punches. I do this because squigs cannot hold, and I need to hold many things to score my deck. Much more to learn and balance. 

Playing Against Goblins

If you want to win vs the FF gitz, you need to control the center. If you can position your fighters in a way that they can just keep bonking the goblins as they move into the position they want, then you’re in good shape. If you sit back and try to passively score against them, you will allow them the space to move into your territory while also holding everything they need in theirs. Pressure is the best way to take them down. The most struggle I have with them is against elite warbands. I usually can kill 1, but then they kill enough fighters that I cannot score Mad Scurry (5+ fighters have a move/charge token). As most of the 2 glory EPs have to deal with holding at least 3 objectives. A winning strategy can be to move into their territory, and hold one objective inside their territory and then kill any goblin that tries to invade your side of the board. That will prevent almost all of their 2 glory EPs. Then you rack up the glory from killing them, and then boom. You win. 

Goblins Hate the Void

Voidcursed Thralls is a tough opponent. Limiting the range of 5 fighters, and completely nullifying Snirk is not great. If the archers are voided you prevent their action “Give ‘Em a volley ladz”, if you voidcurse Zarbag, he doesn’t have his grievous range 3 spell, if you voidcurse Prog then he can’t use his 2 smash 1 damage attack. Playing against people who know how to use that deck well is a tough go. Other decks aren’t too bad to play against as long as you can keep to your plan. If you are disrupted from that 3rd hold or too many fighters die, it’s going to be a sad day for scoring glory. 

That’s a Wrap

The gitz have so much going for them, minus their health pool, it allows for some super silly pairings. Some that work, others that you wish worked, and some that I have tried and I wouldn’t recommend, but i’ll let you figure those out for yourself.

Here are the decks I have tried in order from successful to not tested, but sounds cool.

Dreadful Defense: Zarbag Gitz’s Fearsome Fortress 

Parasitic Pandemic: Zarbag Gitz Infesting with the Hungering Horde

Icicle Impact: Zarbag Gitz’s Force of Frost-Imbued Weapon

Destiny’s Decree: Zarbag Gitz’s Paths of Prophecy

Hordefrost Heist: Zarbag Gitz’s Rimelocked Relics Raid

If you ever want to play against goblins, find me on the Vassal discord.

@Tyreal

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Thank you so much to Tyreal for this extensive goblin review – hopefully people get some mileage out of the advice and decks linked above. I had thought to pair them with Seismic Shock, but now I have five other flavors to test out! If you are interested in the Gitz from as historical perspective, this now-defunct blog No Gitz, No Glory can tell you how things used to be in the days of Nightvault Yore.

While there are a few Love Letters in the works, there is always room for more. I’d love to hear your thoughts about an older or lesser or weird warband/pairing, what drove you to fall in love with it, and how you’ve piloted it to success – and especially piloting it to fun. If you have a warband you’d love to wax poetic about and serenade the wider community, let me know! I’m always accepting new submissions at SpentGlory@gmail.com. As a testament to the series, Tyreal let me know “This was a great exercise in reflection on my game, strategy and choices Ive made. I’d highly recommend others to do so as a good practice, it forces you to think through the STR/WKN of your warband, your strategy, and you can review a game and get better at it.” Never a bad idea to put your favorite warband under a microscope!

Until next time, grab the warband you love, a couple friends, and Spend some Glory!