Alot of armies win their games by positioning their powerful lord character in cheap infantry. The infantry provide the static +5 combat resolution and the character provides the kills. If the character is powerful enough, these units can be very hard to beat even by much more elite (buffed up) units.

Thats ofcourse impossible with DoW. The best possible character build to accompany infantry is a mercenary general with sword of might, enchanted shield, heavy armour and talisman of protection. Even a lesser vampire or a decent dwarf or lizardman HERO would laugh at this. Not even talking about other races LORD characters.

Lets face it: Putting a buffed up mercenary general in the front of a unit of pikemen, marauders or dwarfs is going to be the death of him. Hence why most players put him on a barded steed for that 1+/2+ armour save. Still he remains more or less useless compared to other races lords.

But actually you CAN field a pretty powerful lord character leading cheap infantry! *points at the title of the thread* You dont even have to use up your lord slot, which leaves room for a cheap level 4 mage with access to 8 lores! Sure, the mage isnt a great general or the worlds most powerful mage for that sake, but a level 4 mage is always a great addition, unlike a pathetic mercenary general.

Beorg is a very powerful character. He doesnt equal a buffed up vampire count or a chaos lord riding a dragon, but he definatly equals the average lord character of other armies. And he is much cheaper:


Beorg with 9 bearmen (inc. standard and musician) cost 255 points.

9 bearmen with standard and musician cost: 9*8+10+10 = 92 points.

The bear banner is great and would cost around 30 points I guess. The talisman with 4+ ward save would cost 45 points.

So Beorg costs: 255-92-30-45 = 88 points ladies and gentlemen!!!


88 points for a character with s5, t5, 3 wounds and 5 attacks with frenzy. Sure his weapon skill isnt great but thanks to the banner he hits characters on 3+ and troops on 2+ in the first round. Tell me, who wants that pathetic mercenary general for 90 points now?? The best thing about it all is that his bearmen are actually VERY cheap and surviveable troops with ws4 and 4+ as in combat and immune to psycology!

Thats your perfect infantry leader. And while your opponent struggels with the choice of either a powerful meele character or a healthy magical offence, you can have both!

If you miss the extra +1 leadership simply use dwarves instead of pikemen. They are much better anyway! A unit of 20 dwarves with full command, heavy armour and shield costs 210 points. These fellows can take a cavalry charge just as well as the pikemen!

I have also considered Golgfag. He is also a "lord" meele character that doesnt use up a lord slot. But he really lacks that 4+ ward save, and is alot more expensive. It is also way to expensive to get enough ranks with his unit, so you cant really rely on him to win tough combats. If Golgfags ogres had been with heavy armour and shield instead of two hand weapons, I definatly would have considered them.

Anyway, your comments! Just thought I would share my ideas with you! :)

Beorg and the boys are still expensive comparatively (with other DoW units). You'll have to take some cheap lt cav to keep them from being led all over the field due to frenzy. They are a decent buy. The other 2 RoR units that are actually worth getting (because their price is similar to the regular units but much better is Voland's Venators and Ricco's Republican Guard.

I think the regular maneaters and ironguts are decent buys as well. The light cav, heavy cav, duelists, dwarves and even the regular norsemen aren't bad. Rare slots should always be regular cannons unless you want a giant. I've been tempted to try the 2 giants but am afraid of their poor leadership and trying to keep the wizard alive.

level 4 wizard lords should be put on barded horses and given 2 scrolls and 2 power stones.

While we're on the topic - and forgive me if this counts as thread necromancy; I'm curious! - are Beorg's Bearmen really a Special choice when used as mercenaries? That seems almost too good to be true. I've been looking for Specials to use in my Chaos Warrior army, as Daemons don't fit the fluff, and the Bearmen would be completely sweet. Please tell me this is true!

A healthy unit of Bearmen only costs 335 points, and it is likely to be able to beat even more expensive units. It really makes sense to include it in a chaos army since its just beefed up chaos marauders really, led by an underpriced lord-like character... noone would complain about it for sure, and the unit only takes up a special slot.

only if he gets the charge off (only movement 8) He won't stand up to most other lord characters in my opinion. He'd do alright against average number of heroes in the game.

I'm going to start trying him out in some games and I'll let you know how it goes. Like I said, he's a decent buy, but not impervious by any means. To be honest, I think 1 unit of fast cav to the flank and they would run like little girls. THeir leadership is mediocre and once their beat, they lose their frenzy. In the flank, they only have a 5+ save and T3, which will go down fairly easy.

Sweet - well, you have to use them intelligently, just like any other unit, but with beast herds on the flanks and a bit of manoeuvering, they'd be a sweet unit to use.

I did hear a rumour, however, that GW was thinking of totally renovating the Dogs of War range. Does anyone have any information about this? I wouldn't want to invest in a unit that I can't use in a few months' time. And as it stands right now, are the RoR tournament-friendly?

One of my favorite things to do with this unit is to give your scroll caddy some work. Give him the lore of beasts, and Beorg can do a fairly good impresion of a greater daemon. It's base spell puts him at 7 str, 6 toughness, and 8 attacks, all with that delicious +1 modifier to hit. Who says that Dogs of was can't have bad ass lords?