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1 / 4 · Click to enlargeLore & origins
Fire appeals to every Ork, but in some the fascination becomes an all-consuming mania. Those Orks end up with a burna in their hands and join the Burna Boyz. They are dedicated arsonists who love nothing more than burning other people's stuff, and the people too if they can catch them. To a Burna Boy, the twin spectacle of leaping flame and a screaming victim is a thing of real beauty, and they will always find some excuse to set light to something, purely for the joy of watching it "do the burny dance".
They are a danger to everyone around them, and it takes a strong Warboss, or the blackmailing power of the Meks, to keep them in line. The rest of the warband puts up with them because they are useful. A burna doubles as a cutting torch, so Burna Boyz help build Ork war machines under the eyes of the Mekboyz and are invaluable in salvage work, slicing up wrecks and armour plate. In return for fungus beer and plenty of things to cut, they will work for a Mek for as long as he likes. They rely on the Meks to keep them supplied with promethium fuel and with the burnas themselves, so many end up attached to a Mek's warband, and they form a core part of the scavenger crews and "Dread Mobs" that serve a Mek Boss.
In battle Burna Boyz are often led by a Mekboy, partly so he can use them for field repairs and partly to make sure they set the enemy on fire rather than other Orks. Their mass incendiary fire is lethal against tightly packed or lightly armoured infantry, and several Burna Boyz combining their fire into one all-engulfing inferno can flush foes out of ruins and woods. Against heavy infantry and vehicles they twist the spigot over to cutting-torch mode, which has earned them the nickname "kan openers".
Appearance & wargear
A Burna Boy is a heavily laden Ork with a big burna linked by hoses to as large a tank of "burnin' brew" as he can carry, to keep flaming for as long as possible. A heavy hide war-harness and webbing takes some of the weapon's weight, and most Burna Boyz hang armour plates and glyphs from it, the glyphs invariably bragging about kills and past campaigns. A drop-down blast mask stops the Ork from blinding himself or burning his own face off in the backwash. Burnas are robust enough to survive being used as clubs, which happens to more than one Burna Boy who has been too enthusiastic with his fuel. Many also carry stikkbombz, a slugga, a choppa or a decent-sized spanner.
Weapons & Vehicles
A volatile liquid-promethium projector that floods bunkers, trenches and xenos swarms in clinging, self-oxidising gouts of cleansing ch…
The brutal, heavy-cleaving blades and ear-splittingly loud pistols of the Ork Boyz—crude slabs of scrap iron made lethal by greenskin m…
The outrageously loud, multi-barrelled dakka-contraptions of Ork Flash Gitz, Lootas and Mekboyz—combining rotary barrels, plasma coils …
The ramshackle, turbo-charged open-topped assault trucks and spiked Battlewagons of the Ork Speed Freeks, hurtling Boyz into melee at b…
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Battlefield role & tactics
Burna Boyz are close-range assault and clearing troops. They advance behind billowing gouts of flame to burn enemy infantry out of cover. Then they switch to cutting torches to break open bunkers, heavy armour and vehicles, or to help a Mek patch up damaged machines mid-battle. They work in small teams or large mobs. Their weakness is range: they must get close, and they burn through fuel fast.
Munitorum & Ordo Xenos Technical Dossier
Classified under Ordo and Departmento Munitorum threat-index protocols as a primary Burna Boyz are close-range assault and clearing troops. They advance behind billowing gouts of flame to burn enemy infantry out of cover. Then they switch to cutting torches to break open bunkers, heavy armour and vehicles, or to help a Mek patch up damaged machines mid-battle. They work in small teams or large mobs. Their weakness is range: they must get close, and they burn through fuel fast. asset of Orks, Burna Boyz relies on a tightly coupled symbiosis between operator conditioning and primary armament. Field maintenance and biological recovery logs indicate that extended deployment without liturgical recalibration or bio-stasis rest degrades targeting and metabolic stability by less than 4% per solar week—far outperforming standard sector baselines—while post-engagement recovery teams prioritize the immediate extraction of their core wargear, neural/gene-seed components, or machine-spirit memory cores before enemy scavengers can exploit them.
Notable battles & users
- Mek warbands: Burna Boyz form a core contingent of the Dread Mobs and scavenger crews that serve Mek Bosses, cutting up wrecks for their masters.
- The Raid on Kastorel-Novem: Forge World's Imperial Armour Volume Eight details their harness, mask, fuel tanks and role alongside Meks.
- Dawn of War: Burna Boyz appear among the Ork forces in the Dawn of War PC game.
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