I suppose you do not want to spend a fortune on a unit that barely ever makes it onto the table, and you probably do not want to build a list that “sounds good” in theory but then feels slow, clumsy, or unable to score once you actually play it.
In this post, you are going to learn all of this without sitting through YouTube videos and searching for updated info for hours.
In this post, I am going to rank Dwarf units with exactly that in mind: which ones can genuinely work for you, which ones usually make their points back, which ones have a clear role within the army, and which ones, no matter how much you may like them, are just not that worth it right now if your idea is to play Warhammer The Old World with a solid list without wasting money.
Let’s get into it!
By the way, if this content helps you, please share it.
Dwarf Runelord in Warhammer The Old World: from the mud to the top
The Runelord is the go-to magic defence unit in Dwarfs as of version 1.5.2. He has a longer dispel range than his smaller version, the Runesmith, and he is worth the points he costs. He is genuinely a very good option.
He has more access to certain items that give him magical protection. He is the interesting combination between the runes of balance and several others that I explained in this post.
Dwarf Thane in Warhammer The Old World: always near the top
The Thane is very good. He has the usual shooting build that puts out a lot of shots and hits, and another one that is a bit more situational, not useful into everything, but still a good idea as well, which is the one that causes stupidity when he shoots at the enemy. This is used more in team events where we know we can pair Dwarfs into low-Ld enemies.
In any case, the Thane is a very good option. He does a huge amount of damage for the points he costs and he usually pays for himself. I made another post talking about these rune combinations in detail, here.
Rangers in Warhammer The Old World: never leave home without them
Although they are one of the troops we see the most in competitive lists, especially in Expeditionary Force lists, they are also really good in normal Dwarf lists. They can take crossbows. They can also take throwing axes, shields, and great weapons. All of this means they have an answer for pretty much any troop that wants to charge them.
They shoot from range with the crossbow, they can stand and shoot with no minimum distance using the throwing axe, and they are very solid defensively in combat with shield and hand weapon. Right now, I would say you can save yourself the great weapon and just use the shield all the time thanks to “parry” to make them a bit cheaper.
Their big advantage is that they are a Core unit. It is basically about deploying onto objectives straight away from a strong position, since Dwarfs are not exactly known for their mobility, and that is very good.
Dwarf Organ Gun in Warhammer The Old World: always reliable
The Organ Gun deals a huge amount of damage to pretty much anything that is not a monster with a ward save, regeneration, and high Toughness. Even though it may look expensive, it has the option to reroll one of the artillery dice, and that makes it fairly reliable for a war machine. It is Strength 5, punches through armour nicely, and is very interesting even though it still has to roll to hit.
I talked about all the war machines here, in case you want to know more.
Dwarf Warriors in Warhammer The Old World: the cheap option within an expensive army
Dwarf Warriors have the job of scoring objectives. That is one of their functions, in units of around 12 Dwarfs, from 12 to 14, and the other option is to run them in a more standard bigger unit of 20-something Dwarfs.
The shield is mandatory for them, and I consider the great weapon optional.
If you want to use them in a small unit, or if you do not have the points to upgrade them into Longbeards, or you do not want to include the Dwarf King, this is a very good option.
Longbeards have higher Weapon Skill and more Strength than Dwarf Warriors. Their equipment is pretty similar, but they are basically the upgraded version, with some extra special rules on top. I talked at length about all Dwarf infantry in another post.
Dwarf Cannon in Warhammer The Old World: expensive but necessary
While it is true that there are much better cannons out there (Empire Great Cannon is better, Cathayan Grand Cannon is better, the bombard is better), the Dwarf Cannon, while expensive, is still quite good. It has Strength 8, it has Strength 10, and all the other complaints the average Dwarf player repeats over and over. But in any case, they are fairly reliable and help a lot when dealing with big targets, which usually give Dwarfs some trouble.
Gyrocopter in Warhammer The Old World: Dwarf engineering fully optimised
It is the redirector par excellence of Dwarfs. Very good. It can fill several roles, such as redirecting charges, sacrificing itself to redirect, hunting wizards, hunting support pieces, hunting war machines, and even, in units of various sizes, burning supply wagons.
Depending on the role you want to give it, you can run them in bigger or smaller units.
Its high Leadership makes it very good, very reliable, for rallying once it flees and then going back into an annoying position and shooting again.
On the charge they are flying chariots, so they get impact hits on the charge. A really interesting unit. Not only is the standard setup good, the machine gun one, but I have also seen it work very well with the steam weapon.
And now we move on to the ones that are playable, but not top tier in the list and not always seen, starting with the King.
Dwarf King in Warhammer The Old World: strong but expensive
The King, whenever you see him, will be on Shieldbearers. Why? Because for very few points, he gets a bit of extra hitting power, but above all he gets 3 extra Wounds that do not count towards the rune points limit.
Since he has so many magical item options, he has every possible build: more defensive, more aggressive, more focused on monsters, enemy characters… In short, there are many different options for him. Build him however you like and that is it.
In any case, there is a post where I talk about the most interesting rune combinations for Dwarfs, which may give you some ideas. I will leave it here.
Runesmith in Warhammer The Old World: completely replaced
The Runesmith used to be mandatory. Now the Runelord works very well and the Runesmith has dropped into the background. You can still use him, of course. But the reduced dispel range, that access to fewer points and fewer magical items to enjoy, makes it worth upgrading to a Runelord.
Dwarf Quarrellers and Thunderers in Warhammer The Old World: shooting and resilience
Quarrellers and Thunderers. They are cheap and they are Core. They can also take shields, which gives them durability in combat. Both units are good, so pick whichever one fits your playstyle better, or combine them.
Dwarf Engineer in Warhammer The Old World: low-cost support abilities
The Dwarf Engineer is good and cheap, but he has limited access to runes and he does not hit very hard. He also does not shoot enough. He cannot use the rune combination with the handgun that the Thane can, so he loses that role, which is a very useful one.
That setup that entrenches your troops and helps them shoot better is fine, though.
Dwarf Grudge Thrower in Warhammer The Old World: the “cheap” brother of the cannon
The Grudge Thrower is a bit pricey. It costs about the same as a Goblin Rock Lobber, basically, but without rerolling the shot.
Personally, I like the cannon more. I find it more reliable for the current meta, where the bases of the targets you are usually going to shoot at are more often long than wide. If we were always shooting at very large square bases, then the Grudge Thrower would make more sense. But normally we are shooting at chariots and monsters on long bases, which are more likely to be hit by estimating the cannon shot 10 inches behind them than by firing a Grudge Thrower.
The good part is that against characters on foot it can sometimes give us a nice surprise, because characters outside units, for example loners, can get hit by a Multiple Wounds (D3+1) hit from the Grudge Thrower, and that is very interesting against Undead necromancers.
Irondrakes in Warhammer The Old World: shooting from not quite such short range
A durable and solid unit that can defend itself in combat and shoots with very good power. They can be taken in small units, and that opens up several different strategies, such as making a first shooting line that flees when the enemy gets close and stays safe behind the combat unit, which will then charge the enemy that has been left exposed.
In any case, their shooting is Strength 5, with Armour Penetration, and they have a 4+ save. Even though they may look expensive, they are a unit that usually makes its points back.
This unit got hit by the nerf to the Strength 8 torpedo that the unit champion can take, and they have been pushed aside, to some extent, by the Expeditionary Force list, where they are not played.
Dwarf Daemon Slayer in Warhammer The Old World: I love this guy
The Daemon Slayer is a loner, so he cannot join units, but thanks to the target selection rule, even though he does not have Look Out, Sir!, he is usually fairly safe from enemy shooting.
In any case, you can give him the rule so that if he dies the enemy does not get his points. That is very interesting if you want him to die killing. I talked about the Daemon Slayer setup in the post I made about Slayers quite a long time ago, which I will leave here, and honestly, even though he is expensive, if he kills enemy stuff and then dies, the value he brings in end-of-game points is very, very high.
Maybe now that missions revolve more around objective scoring, he is a bit less viable, but in any case he is playable.
Dwarf Anvil of Doom in Warhammer The Old World: does it actually work?
If you like it, yes, you can play it, but it creates a bubble around itself that enemy wizards usually do not want to enter, although against certain current meta lists I think that if you deploy it well, the enemy really cannot avoid entering it.
For example, against the Viletide list from Beastmen, if you place the anvil well it is very difficult for the enemy to cast their magic missiles without stepping into your dispel bubble.
You also have to remember that now there is the Runelord option, which we already talked about before. He was not that good before, but now that little bit of mobility together with the increased range makes him very interesting.
And the Anvil maybe drops a bit into the background.
It is more expensive and, to some extent, forces you to build the list around it. I made a post about it, I will leave it here.
Dwarf Gyrobomber in Warhammer The Old World: points you can save yourself
It is a bit overshadowed by the Gyrocopter, which is cheaper and basically fills the same roles, except for the mechanic of dropping the bomb while flying over the enemy unit. That said, I have to say that I often see Dwarf players place the Gyrobomber in a strategically bad spot just because they want to drop the bomb, and they end up losing it.
Be careful with that.
Dwarf Ironbreakers in Warhammer The Old World: too expensive?
Ironbreakers. Probably the toughest infantry unit in the game, but their problem is that they do not hold objectives, they do not score, and so they are completely overshadowed by other units, especially considering that no Dwarf unit is cheap.
It is quite expensive to field Ironbreakers and then put a Core unit behind them, the one that actually holds the objective, so that the Ironbreakers do the fighting while the Core unit does the scoring. It is very difficult to pull that off so that the Core unit never ends up in combat, but it can be played that way.
Dwarf Miners in Warhammer The Old World: what could have been and was not
I already talked about them in the infantry post, so I will not go into them again.
Even though they could have been given an interesting rule, for some reason they were simply made into Ambushers with a slightly absurd cost, basically just heavy armour and a great weapon. There is very little reason to take the unit.
Dragon Slayer in Warhammer The Old World: complete trash
Dragon Slayer. He brings absolutely nothing compared to the Daemon Slayer. He is the weaker version, with worse stats, fewer magical item options, and no special feature at all. Please do not play this.
Dwarf Bolt Thrower: even more trash
Bolt Thrower. Bolt throwers are useless in Old World, but the Dwarf one is not only useless, it is also expensive. It is a war machine that, for the cost, usually does nowhere near the damage it should.
Flame Cannon and Goblin Hewer: bottom-of-the-barrel trash
These machines basically have the same problem as the Bolt Thrower. While the Flame Cannon has the special trait that flame templates cause partial hits, the very short range it has, together with the inability to place the template at any angle once the distance has been rolled, makes it a very uninteresting machine.
And you always have to remember that whenever you choose to include a Flame Cannon, you are saying no to another unit of Irondrakes, for example. The Goblin Hewer is already a machine that makes no sense at all. And the latest FAQs made it even worse.
It was already bad before. Now it is horrible.
Please do not play this.
Maybe Games Workshop, with a bit of luck, will change the rules when they see that nobody is using it.
Dwarf Slayers in Warhammer The Old World: no comment
And finally, the Slayers. There is a Slayer Army of Infamy that Games Workshop seems to have released just to stop hearing people complain.
They do not have any interesting special rules that really change the combat they get stuck in. Because, basically, these attacks after dying tend to be pretty anecdotal against the kind of units that are actually played in the current meta.
At the end of the day, the only really relevant thing they have is immunity to psychology, but since there is no way to make them Core in the Grand Army, they are very bad.
That is why I wanted to give them this special and final place in the tier. If you want to play Slayers and send them in to die, just like they do, then play the Army of Infamy directly, where at least the Slayer unit can score secondary objectives.
That is it for this post. I hope it gives an overall view that helps identify which units may actually work for you and save you money or, for those of you who play against Dwarfs, helps identify which units you really need to be careful with.
Below I leave the related posts I mentioned throughout the article.
I really appreciate those of you who share the content, it genuinely makes a difference.
Battle March Rules | Warhammer: The Old World | New Skirmish Mode Explained
🍺 Dwarfs in Warhammer: The Old World – Guides & Links
🍺Dwarf Slayers in The Old World Breakdown
How to Shoot Characters in Warhammer The Old World (Complete No-Mistakes Guide)
Chaos Magic in Warhammer The Old World: Make it work
Win your games by failing Leadership tests | Flee, fall back in good order or give ground
Any error in the post, feel free to reach out at theoldwarrior@theoldwarrior.com.