Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

For the purpose of capping objectives it should be:

Gargoyles >> Rippers > Hormagaunts >>>> Termagants.

This is entirely based off of IB. Gargoyles will - at worst - go to ground. Rippers and Hormies eat each other. Termies run away.

Why the hell would anyone take hormagants rippers or terms if troop choice already filled. You need 2 minimum size squads of our crappy troops, there is so many good units in the dex, the real debate on troops is which is the lesser evil

 Sinful Hero wrote:

 Zande4 wrote:

 SHUPPET wrote:
I have to agree with tag that the word flexibility is being used wrong here. I'm not sure however that I agree that Horms are better than Rippers, I think jy2 is right that both have their merits, I think Horms are SLIGHTLY better overall, but hey they cost SLIGHTLY more so it's dependant on what you can spare. Same with Terms really, rippers are just SLIGHTLY better for 5 more points a squad. I do say I rarely find myself with 20 points to blow on turning terms into Horms but often can spare 10 for rippers. But i dont think any of them are the wrong choice and all suit different players.

Hormagaunts are hands down the most overrated unit from the Tyranid codex in this thread.

Care to elaborate? What makes you think they're overrated?

Keep in mind I'm talking about this thread specifically. 90% (rough estimate) of this thread seems to argue (and aggressively I might add) that Hormagaunts are our best troop choice because they're fast, screening, melee blah blah blah.... Fill your mandatory 2 troops with deepstriking rippers and be done with that slot. If you want fast, melee, screening units just take Gargoyles. I'm not saying Hormagaunts are worthless, superior to Rippers in CC or can't beat a Tac Squad. I'm just saying they're not the best.

I'd assume their popularity is coming from their pretty aesthetics which draws people to buying them which means they have to defend their purchase because if it's bad it's a bad reflection on them, which is of course untrue but people are people.

 SHUPPET wrote:
Why the hell would anyone take hormagants rippers or terms if troop choice already filled. You need 2 minimum size squads of our crappy troops, there is so many good units in the dex, the real debate on troops is which is the lesser evil

This guy gets it.

Unpopular opinion : I love taking 60 termagants, 2 tervigons, and 2x3 StrangleWarriors. THat's my stock troop choices.

I personally find that objectives are never hard to grab, synapse is abundant, I'm hard to kill, and combat is hard to lose.

 ductvader wrote:
Unpopular opinion : I love taking 60 termagants, 2 tervigons, and 2x3 StrangleWarriors. THat's my stock troop choices.

I personally find that objectives are never hard to grab, synapse is abundant, I'm hard to kill, and combat is hard to lose.

To me, that's really more of a playstyle choice than a tactical one. It's basically our version of drop pod marines. Is it good? I think so. Is it fun to play? Not for me. Ironically Verthane also stopped using his drop pod marine army because he wasn't enjoying the playstyle either. And I mean, if you're not having fun, what are you really doing?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Tag, I think also that a large part of your success with Horms is the gentleman's agreement to place objectives outside of your deployment zones. Without that, it becomes much more difficult to favor them over rippers (and to like maelstrom in general I think). That's why my group has shied away from it, but I agree with your assessment of their worth for straight maelstrom

Eldercaveman wrote:
I've got a 1650 Tournament coming up in two weeks time and finally decided I'm going to use my Nids and not Necrons.

This is the list I'm thinking of running,

Hive Tyrant - 240
Hive Tyrant - 240

Malonthrope

DS Rippers x 5
DS Rippers x 5


Skyblight

Edit: Just caught part of the comp that means any compulsary parts of the FOC must be at least 75 points, so I've put the rippers up to 5 base units and I'm left with 90 points?

Solid list. Personally, I'd take a bastion with 90-pts left, but that's just me. Otherwise, consider adding more gargoyles to your skyblight.

tag8833 wrote:

 jy2 wrote:
Right now, the problem with Tyranids is that they can't reach the far objectives or Maelstrom objectives that deal with being in the enemy backfield unless you want to potentially sacrifice your flyer by landing him.

For people who play Maelstrom correctly, this becomes less of a problem because you place the objectives before you decide on deployment. Therefore, there is no way to place a maelstrom objective in you backfield. If you place it near the edge of the board, it might be in your opponents backfield. If you do go around placing objectives in the corners of the board you are insuring that the game will come down to who picks sides first, and what cards you draw, and not to player skill. The more experienced Maelstrom players tend to place the objectives roughly evenly across the board unless they are facing a very, very unfavorable matchup. A good house rule for Maelstrom is that all objectives must be placed in No-Mans-Land. It greatly decreases the randomness while increasing the players skill. About 60% of the people I play regularly have adopted this house rule, and it is a no-brainer if you wanted to run a Maelstrom tournament.

I generally place the objectives further away from the center and other objectives. That is because my armies usually have the mobility to reach these objectives and I want to make it harder for my opponents to jump from objective to objective with his forces. So even if my opponent gets the side with the objective in his backfield, then at least I know 1 unit will potentially be out of the action as he sits on that objective. Now it wouldn't be a problem for my opponent if he was running MSU. However, if he was running an Elitist army or a deathstar one, then that may potentially take a significant portion of his army out of the action as it sits on the objective.

 jy2 wrote:
They DO have a purpose in the army and they DO contribute to it. They just don't have the tools to do some of the things that you need in your army. That's where the rippers come in. They are good in Maelstrom objectives because they can complement the army well.

So, they do exactly one thing and that makes them compliment the army well? Lack of synergy?

They give the army tactical flexibility with how you want to approach the game. You can start them on the ground on objectives. You can teleport them down onto objectives. They allow the rest of your army to focus 100% on offense and not to have to worry about the objectives. They are annoying enough to draw away valuable resources from opponent to try to take out. In 1 game I had, my opponent spent 2 turns firing at 1 of my unit of rippers with his ravager. That's 6 S8 AP2 shots that wasn't going towards the rest of my army in an attempt to get them off of an objective. I've even used my rippers to tie up enemy units, help out in assault and even as screening units (screened out an Imperial Knight ) when I didn't need them to hold down an objective.

 jy2 wrote:
So, in short, I am not saying that rippers are the be-all-end-all of Tyranid troops. I am saying that they have a place in the army because of the flexbility with how you can play them. And it is also because of this flexibility (and mobility) that rippers have a place, both in Eternal War missions as well as Maelstrom ones.

We've gone several rounds on this. A unit that does exactly one thing and doesn't contribute to your army in other ways is not adding flexibility. It is locking you into a specific strategy where specific units have specific tasks. That works very well in Eternal War where the goals are clear from the start. It works a tiny bit less well in BAO mission where there is a small Maelstrom component, but in a mission that is completely Maelstrom, where you don't know what you have to accomplish until the start of your turn, and every unit may be asked to contribute in various ways it is a sub-optimal choice. You can still use only rippers if you want, but it isn't your best choice. In the same way that using Genestealers aren't your best choice even though they can guarantee you a single Maelstrom point.

I generally take rippers as my 3rd troop choice when playing Maelstrom if I am taking 3 troops, because multiple of the same type of troop can become redundant, but I never take more than one group of rippers unless I'm playing eternal war, BAO, or am trying to seriously nerf myself playing Maelstrom.

I got a 2k game in against a good buddy on Wednesday night, he brought his much feared Dark Eldar, who he has been devastating with in my area. This isn't a battle report, just some photos and a general overview of the game. Haven't got his list but mine was a bit a silly experiment...

CAD
Electro Flyrant
Electro Flyrant

Malonthrope
Malonthrope

DS Rippers
DS Rippers

Living Artillery Node
Skyblight
Broodlord hunting pack.

We were playing straight up maelstrom. Both my Tyrants rolled Warp Blast and Paroxysm for their powers which I only got off one Paroxysm all game.

He got first turn so I reserved my Crone and both Harpies, as well as the rippers and the Hunting pack (outflank).

Deployment overview, Lictor infiltrated onto the objective so I could generate an extra card at the beginning of my turn.




I then roll to sieze the initiative and....


Both my Flyrants rush up and take out one of his transports, and bring the second down to 1 hull point. Biovores then pumle the unit into the ground. Gargoyles move up to tarpit his Talos for 3 full game turns!





After that it was just a case of picking off his units one by one. He Webway'd a unit WraithGuard into my backfield which had me worried, but the Exocrine tanked the DScythes and then proceeded to shoot them to pieces.

After 4 game turns all he was left with was 4 warriors locked in combat with a unit of Genestealers, about to be charged by the Broodlord's unit, two wounded Talos, tied down by a Malonthrope and this depleted Grotesque unit, who were about to take the full brunt of my shooting phase in turn 5. So with time running out and me up 14 - 7 on the points already we called it.



MVP's for the game were either the Malonthropes or the Exocrine.

luke1705 wrote:
Tag, I think also that a large part of your success with Horms is the gentleman's agreement to place objectives outside of your deployment zones. Without that, it becomes much more difficult to favor them over rippers (and to like maelstrom in general I think). That's why my group has shied away from it, but I agree with your assessment of their worth for straight maelstrom

It is one of the house rules that makes accepting Maelstrom much easier for most people. One of the biggest, but least stated aspects of Maelstrom that people fear is the rules say that objectives must be placed before deployment zones are chosen. This forces people to make tactical decisions on the fly without having a pre conceived strategy like the one that JY2 is advocating. You can't lock yourself in if you can't count on your opponent cooperating during objective placement.

I think other people's lack of success with Hormagants is due to ignoring this rule or playing custom missions. Notably the BAO mission encourage objective placement in deployment zones. This was one of their key choices in their effort to save the gunline from the changes of 7th that force gunline players to participate in the movement phase.

If I am playing against you, Luke, and You place objectives randomly around the edges of the board, and I place objectives at the middle of the board, we will both be compelled to concentrate our forces toward the middle of the board, because there are move scorable/contestable objectives there than in this corner or that. As a Tyranid player, our Flyrants give us easy ability to purge objective holders in corners or along the edges of the board. I don't need a gentleman's agreement to win. I can win just fine without it. It is my opponents with a limited number of units with staying power enough to control and contest objectives that need this house rule to be successful in Maelstrom games. Especially anyone running any sort of death star, or a pricey unit like a Land Raider, Wraith Knight, or Imperial Knight. It is the deathstar players that beg for this house rule not tyranid players or MSU players.

I think overall the argument comes down to:
"I don't play pure Maelstrom, and Hormagants don't work well for me" vs "Hormagants work well in pure Maelstrom"

I don't think these positions are mutually exclusive.

@SHUPPET
A little while ago you mentioned you were working on a unit analysis- how's that coming along?

Where can i find the malanthrope profile? only in the IA 4 2nd edition book?

badula wrote:
Where can i find the malanthrope profile? only in the IA 4 2nd edition book?

Correct.

 jy2 wrote:

tag8833 wrote:

 jy2 wrote:
Right now, the problem with Tyranids is that they can't reach the far objectives or Maelstrom objectives that deal with being in the enemy backfield unless you want to potentially sacrifice your flyer by landing him.

For people who play Maelstrom correctly, this becomes less of a problem because you place the objectives before you decide on deployment. Therefore, there is no way to place a maelstrom objective in you backfield. If you place it near the edge of the board, it might be in your opponents backfield. If you do go around placing objectives in the corners of the board you are insuring that the game will come down to who picks sides first, and what cards you draw, and not to player skill. The more experienced Maelstrom players tend to place the objectives roughly evenly across the board unless they are facing a very, very unfavorable matchup. A good house rule for Maelstrom is that all objectives must be placed in No-Mans-Land. It greatly decreases the randomness while increasing the players skill. About 60% of the people I play regularly have adopted this house rule, and it is a no-brainer if you wanted to run a Maelstrom tournament.

I generally place the objectives further away from the center and other objectives. That is because my armies usually have the mobility to reach these objectives and I want to make it harder for my opponents to jump from objective to objective with his forces. So even if my opponent gets the side with the objective in his backfield, then at least I know 1 unit will potentially be out of the action as he sits on that objective. Now it wouldn't be a problem for my opponent if he was running MSU. However, if he was running an Elitist army or a deathstar one, then that may potentially take a significant portion of his army out of the action as it sits on the objective.

You would regret this strategy very much if you played pure maelstrom. If your opponent doesn't cooperate, You are essentially giving your opponent 1 or 2 objectives in their deployment zone, and then giving them the ability to control the middle of the board and all of the objectives they place there. Basically you are giving them the chance to easily score 2/3 of all objectives, while you only get to score 1/3 of them, and since the objectives that need to be scored are random, this problem is magnified.

 jy2 wrote:
I generally take rippers and I have never regretted doing so in both Eternal War, Maelstrom and the BAO missions. My gargoyles can do what the hormagants do in pure Maelstrom missions, but then I also have the luxury of grabbing the far-away objectives with my rippers.

1) How many times have you played pure Maelstrom? Have you ever played Maelstrom against a player who has played it more than 20 times?
2) Gargoyles can do much of what hormagants can do. Rippers cannot. I would never advocate taking Hormagants rather than gargoyles. Unfortunately gargoyles aren't troops, and so to run a legal army we need to take a minimum number of troops. Hormagants can contribute in Maelstrom games much, much more than rippers can. Since we are generally taking a minimum number of troops, we might as well take ones that can contribute the maximum.

So I may be able to attend this GT next weekend

http://www.tangtwo.com/11thcompany/tournament.cfm

Its a large, 7 round Nova style tournament. Tyranids can ally with themselves with no FW allowed.

If its one thing I learned from this past weekend at Mechanicon, its that while I love Carnifexes, I dont love slow units. In 5 games they were able to shoot collectively about 3 times. Charge twice when it mattered.

I know it depends on the matchup, but Im thinking about filling the missing 4th Tyrant with Crones.

Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Venomthrope
Venomthrope
Zoanthrope
Ripper w/DS
Ripper w/DS
Ripper w/DS
30 Gargoyles
Crone
Crone
Mawloc

Allied:
Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Ripper w/DS
30 Gargoyles

Thats 60 gargoyles, 3 tyrants to alpha select units, 4 rippers scoring, two crones hitting vector strikes and carrying xenos off the board (with storm talon and night scythe deterrent) and extra venomthropes for Tau SMS to kill. What say you?

 Sinful Hero wrote:
@SHUPPET
A little while ago you mentioned you were working on a unit analysis- how's that coming along?

I haven't had barely any time and the work I did put into it has taken a lot longer than I thought it would. I don't want it to turn into a pipedream, but I may have to rethink what I'm setting out to achieve here.

 SHUPPET wrote:

 Sinful Hero wrote:
@SHUPPET
A little while ago you mentioned you were working on a unit analysis- how's that coming along?

I haven't had barely any time and the work I did put into it has taken a lot longer than I thought it would. I don't want it to turn into a pipedream, but I may have to rethink what I'm setting out to achieve here.

I'm sorry to hear that- I was quite looking forward to it! Perhaps you could scale it back, and just cover the high and low points of each unit I a few sentences?
Honestly I would be interested to see an analysis from everyone in the thread. The one in the OP might also need some slight updating, or at least a review now that some experience with the codex has been had.

Well, that's my issue and the conundrum I currently face. If I cut it back to information that only I deem important, then if may as well just write the guide myself. There's no real way to filter either which is the real issue. No point in compiling community written guide if I'm only building from certain posts made by the community, otherwise it's pointless.

I think I might make a guide and just try to make it as unbiased as possible sharing all the views and counter views to a unit.

 Frozocrone wrote:

 Sinful Hero wrote:
Don't you only need one troop and one hq for an allied detachment? Two for your main, one for your ally makes three.

Correct however you can't take an allied detachment with the same faction as your primary IIRC in a battle forged army. I think BAO ruled against double CAD

That is true. According to RAW, your allied detachment cannot be from the same faction.

However, the BAO, Nova and Adepticon all ruled that you can self-ally but cannot take dual-CAD and most of the smaller tourneys will follow this standard. So make sure to check with the tournament beforehand how they would rule this.

OrdoSean wrote:
What do you guys think of this 1850pt list:


Hive Tyrant – wings, 2x twin linked devourer, electroshox grubs

Hive Tyrant – wings, 2x twin linked devourer, electroshox grubs -

Lictor –

Lictor –

Lictor –

3 Ripper Swarms – deepstrike –

5 Genestealers –

5 Genestealers –

5 Genestealers –

5 Spore mines –

5 Spore Mines –

4 Sporemines –

Mawloc -

Mawloc –

Mawloc -

Death leaper assassin formation
Death Leaper

Lictor

Lictor -

Lictor

Lictor -

Lictor -

Bastion – commms relay -

Whoa....talk about MSU to the extreme.

I think that it is too much potatoes (infiltrating units) and not enough meat (actual, offensive units). Good luck trying to infiltrate all those units in any type of deployment that makes sense.

 Strat_N8 wrote:
The wargear that potentally upgrades power from pain is the Animus Vitia (spelling might be a bit off). It's a relic now if I remember right.

That looks like it is going to be a very one-sided fight depending on the Tyrants. If they get into the air they will probably wreck the Dark Eldar alone (DE don't like mass S6 firepower), but if they die early the Dark Eldar should have no problem cleaning up the rest of the army with superior mobility.

Thanks, Strat.

It actually turned out to be a very close game (or at least much closer than I expected).

 Iechine wrote:
Id take Gargoyles over hormagants any day, if troop choice requirement is already fulfilled.

Hear ye hear ye....

 ductvader wrote:
Unpopular opinion : I love taking 60 termagants, 2 tervigons, and 2x3 StrangleWarriors. THat's my stock troop choices.

I personally find that objectives are never hard to grab, synapse is abundant, I'm hard to kill, and combat is hard to lose.

Nothing wrong with that. It is a different playstyle than the Maximum Threat Overload types of lists that are common nowadays. It's strengths is mainly in its ground presence and the durability of its troops. However, it does suffer from lack of mobility as well as its offensive capabilities (that usually is the case with "tarpit" armies - they are better in locking down the enemy than in actually killing it).

Eldercaveman wrote:
I got a 2k game in against a good buddy on Wednesday night, he brought his much feared Dark Eldar, who he has been devastating with in my area. This isn't a battle report, just some photos and a general overview of the game. Haven't got his list but mine was a bit a silly experiment...

CAD
Electro Flyrant
Electro Flyrant

Malonthrope
Malonthrope

DS Rippers
DS Rippers

Living Artillery Node
Skyblight
Broodlord hunting pack.

We were playing straight up maelstrom. Both my Tyrants rolled Warp Blast and Paroxysm for their powers which I only got off one Paroxysm all game.

He got first turn so I reserved my Crone and both Harpies, as well as the rippers and the Hunting pack (outflank).

Deployment overview, Lictor infiltrated onto the objective so I could generate an extra card at the beginning of my turn.

Eldarcaveman,

Thanks for sharing.

I will post a link to your batrep in the opening thread on p.1.

tag8833 wrote:
You would regret this strategy very much if you played pure maelstrom. If your opponent doesn't cooperate, You are essentially giving your opponent 1 or 2 objectives in their deployment zone, and then giving them the ability to control the middle of the board and all of the objectives they place there. Basically you are giving them the chance to easily score 2/3 of all objectives, while you only get to score 1/3 of them, and since the objectives that need to be scored are random, this problem is magnified.

You do realize that you adjust your objectives depending on what type of army you play against, right? If I go up against a gunline-type army with low mobility, then I place the objectives near the center (or how you would normally do it) and then dare to move towards the objectives where my army will be advancing. If I go up against elitist or deathstar armies, then I spread out the objectives as those types of armies generally have problem moving around due to having fewer units.

Now here's the difference when implementing hormagant troops compared to ripper troops. Place the objectives far and your ground-based troops won't be able to reach them. With ground-based troops, you are forced to centralize the objectives and that becomes problematic when going up against armies who can control the board better than our bugs (imperial knights, daemons, orks, wraithwing necrons, deathstars, etc.). However, ripper troops have no problem. It allows you to adjust your playstyle on the fly against both types of armies because no matter where you place the objectives, you can still reach it and without sacrificing any of your offense. That is what I call tactical flexibility.

1) How many times have you played pure Maelstrom? Have you ever played Maelstrom against a player who has played it more than 20 times?
2) Gargoyles can do much of what hormagants can do. Rippers cannot. I would never advocate taking Hormagants rather than gargoyles. Unfortunately gargoyles aren't troops, and so to run a legal army we need to take a minimum number of troops. Hormagants can contribute in Maelstrom games much, much more than rippers can. Since we are generally taking a minimum number of troops, we might as well take ones that can contribute the maximum.

1. I've only played my bugs in about a handful of times in Maelstrom missions. However, I've played pure Maelstrom about 15-20 times with all my armies combined (including Necrons, Eldar, Daemons and Space Marines). I am very familiar with what it takes to succeed in Maelstrom-style missions - mobility, flexibility and oftentimes, a lot of luck when drawing the cards.

2. If it works for you, then that's fine. I've got nothing against taking hormagants in Maelstrom missions. Still, that doesn't mean that they are better than rippers in pure Maelstrom. Although they share some of the same qualities (scoring, ObSec unit), they actually serve somewhat different roles. Rippers give you the flexbility to adjust your playstyle depending on what type of army you go up against and without sacrificing any of your offense in doing so. They also allow you to reach far-away objectives that you normally couldn't, at least not without losing efficiency in your offensive machine. Hormagants play more of a offensive and defensive (screening, tarpitting) role in the army. It is just like having a malanthrope and a zoanthrope in the army. Sure, they both provide synapse. However, zoanthropes also help to beef up the army on the psychic front. The two units doesn't always compete with each other. Oftentimes, they can be used to complement each other.





Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Iechine wrote:
So I may be able to attend this GT next weekend

http://www.tangtwo.com/11thcompany/tournament.cfm

Its a large, 7 round Nova style tournament. Tyranids can ally with themselves with no FW allowed.

If its one thing I learned from this past weekend at Mechanicon, its that while I love Carnifexes, I dont love slow units. In 5 games they were able to shoot collectively about 3 times. Charge twice when it mattered.

I know it depends on the matchup, but Im thinking about filling the missing 4th Tyrant with Crones.

Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Venomthrope
Venomthrope
Zoanthrope
Ripper w/DS
Ripper w/DS
Ripper w/DS
30 Gargoyles
Crone
Crone
Mawloc

Allied:
Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Ripper w/DS
30 Gargoyles

Thats 60 gargoyles, 3 tyrants to alpha select units, 4 rippers scoring, two crones hitting vector strikes and carrying xenos off the board (with storm talon and night scythe deterrent) and extra venomthropes for Tau SMS to kill. What say you?

You've already got almost all the components for Skyblight so why not just run it? Harpies actually aren't that bad and can be made usable. Besides, what's better than 60 gargoyles? 60 recyclable gargoyles! BTW, if you run skyblight, you can drop 1 unit of rippers (and some gargoyles) plust swap out 1 of your hive crones to get 2 harpies.


Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Venomthrope
Venomthrope
Zoanthrope
Ripper w/DS
Ripper w/DS
Ripper w/DS
Mawloc

Allied:
Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Crone
Harpy w/TL-HVC
Harpy w/TL-HVC
16 Gargoyles
15 Gargoyles
15 Gargoyles

I'm just curious what people think is the best 4 Flyrant list. Like, aside from the Flyrants, what is the best thing you would include with the limited amount of remaining points? I've seen some with Living Artillery, others just pumping the remaining points in Dakkafexes, I've seen something that looked like a mish mash of everything including units from both the above 2 lists, Gargoyles, and Mawlocs, maybe it was for balanced coverage. Just wondering what people think is the best use of the points after the Flyrants and WHY.

 jy2 wrote:

tag8833 wrote:
You would regret this strategy very much if you played pure maelstrom. If your opponent doesn't cooperate, You are essentially giving your opponent 1 or 2 objectives in their deployment zone, and then giving them the ability to control the middle of the board and all of the objectives they place there. Basically you are giving them the chance to easily score 2/3 of all objectives, while you only get to score 1/3 of them, and since the objectives that need to be scored are random, this problem is magnified.

You do realize that you adjust your objectives depending on what type of army you play against, right? If I go up against a gunline-type army with low mobility, then I place the objectives near the center (or how you would normally do it) and then dare to move towards the objectives where my army will be advancing. If I go up against elitist or deathstar armies, then I spread out the objectives as those types of armies generally have problem moving around due to having fewer units.

You spread them out, but not so far that you can't get to them. Against a deathstar you are giving up one objective a turn. You can't stop them, maybe slow them down with a wall of Gants or gargoyles. You've got to outscore them, that means having multiple units capable of scoring multiple objectives every turn in case those cards come up. Hormagants can do that every single turn. Rippers can only do that on the turn they come in. Also Hormagants are great at stealing objectives from deathstars because most deathstars aren't OS.

 jy2 wrote:
Now here's the difference when implementing hormagant troops compared to ripper troops. Place the objectives far and your ground-based troops won't be able to reach them. With ground-based troops, you are forced to centralize the objectives and that becomes problematic when going up against armies who can control the board better than our bugs (imperial knights, daemons, orks, wraithwing necrons, deathstars, etc.). However, ripper troops have no problem. It allows you to adjust your playstyle on the fly against both types of armies because no matter where you place the objectives, you can still reach it and without sacrificing any of your offense. That is what I call tactical flexibility.

Hormagants average a 13.25" move. They have a deployment range that includes 1/4 of the board. They can basically get anywhere on the board in 2 turns except for deep in the opponent's deployment zone. Rippers have a similar range of mobility on turn 2 (if they happen to come in). You can drop them deep in the opponents deployment zone if you want, but generally they aren't going to accomplish much doing that. Once rippers are on the board, they average a 9.5" move (less than the minimum distance between 2 objectives). Significantly less, and they move that far much less reliably because they lack fleet. So by turn 3, Hormagants have been able to cover more ground than rippers, and that is without using any charge shenanigan. So if your goal is to reach distant tactical objectives, Hormagants are better able to accomplish it than rippers.

If you goal is to camp a single objective. Rippers are your better choice because you can keep them out of LOS easier, and they don't need babysitting as bad. That is why Rippers are all stars in Eternal war, and other low scoring formats.

I think of Hormagants as slightly inferior gargoyles. 13.25" move vs 15.5" move. +1 attack, OS, -1 PPM, but no blind, HOW or shooting. If gargoyles could fill your troop requirement it would be all gargoyles all of the time. My question to you is, would you take rippers over gargoyles in Maelstrom?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 SHUPPET wrote:
I'm just curious what people think is the best 4 Flyrant list. Like, aside from the Flyrants, what is the best thing you would include with the limited amount of remaining points? I've seen some with Living Artillery, others just pumping the remaining points in Dakkafexes, I've seen something that looked like a mish mash of everything including units from both the above 2 lists, Gargoyles, and Mawlocs, maybe it was for balanced coverage. Just wondering what people think is the best use of the points after the Flyrants and WHY.

If you are doubling down so much on air power, you probably should look at Crones with extra points of which there won't be many. 4 Flyrants w/ 4 DS Rippers is 1140 points.

tag8833 wrote:

 jy2 wrote:

tag8833 wrote:
You would regret this strategy very much if you played pure maelstrom. If your opponent doesn't cooperate, You are essentially giving your opponent 1 or 2 objectives in their deployment zone, and then giving them the ability to control the middle of the board and all of the objectives they place there. Basically you are giving them the chance to easily score 2/3 of all objectives, while you only get to score 1/3 of them, and since the objectives that need to be scored are random, this problem is magnified.

You do realize that you adjust your objectives depending on what type of army you play against, right? If I go up against a gunline-type army with low mobility, then I place the objectives near the center (or how you would normally do it) and then dare to move towards the objectives where my army will be advancing. If I go up against elitist or deathstar armies, then I spread out the objectives as those types of armies generally have problem moving around due to having fewer units.

You spread them out, but not so far that you can't get to them. Against a deathstar you are giving up one objective a turn. You can't stop them, maybe slow them down with a wall of Gants or gargoyles. You've got to outscore them, that means having multiple units capable of scoring multiple objectives every turn in case those cards come up. Hormagants can do that every single turn. Rippers can only do that on the turn they come in. Also Hormagants are great at stealing objectives from deathstars because most deathstars aren't OS.

 jy2 wrote:
Now here's the difference when implementing hormagant troops compared to ripper troops. Place the objectives far and your ground-based troops won't be able to reach them. With ground-based troops, you are forced to centralize the objectives and that becomes problematic when going up against armies who can control the board better than our bugs (imperial knights, daemons, orks, wraithwing necrons, deathstars, etc.). However, ripper troops have no problem. It allows you to adjust your playstyle on the fly against both types of armies because no matter where you place the objectives, you can still reach it and without sacrificing any of your offense. That is what I call tactical flexibility.

Hormagants average a 13.25" move. They have a deployment range that includes 1/4 of the board. They can basically get anywhere on the board in 2 turns except for deep in the opponent's deployment zone. Rippers have a similar range of mobility on turn 2 (if they happen to come in). You can drop them deep in the opponents deployment zone if you want, but generally they aren't going to accomplish much doing that. Once rippers are on the board, they average a 9.5" move (less than the minimum distance between 2 objectives). Significantly less, and they move that far much less reliably because they lack fleet. So by turn 3, Hormagants have been able to cover more ground than rippers, and that is without using any charge shenanigan. So if your goal is to reach distant tactical objectives, Hormagants are better able to accomplish it than rippers.

If you goal is to camp a single objective. Rippers are your better choice because you can keep them out of LOS easier, and they don't need babysitting as bad. That is why Rippers are all stars in Eternal war, and other low scoring formats.

I think of Hormagants as slightly inferior gargoyles. 13.25" move vs 15.5" move. +1 attack, OS, -1 PPM, but no blind, HOW or shooting. If gargoyles could fill your troop requirement it would be all gargoyles all of the time. My question to you is, would you take rippers over gargoyles in Maelstrom?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 SHUPPET wrote:
I'm just curious what people think is the best 4 Flyrant list. Like, aside from the Flyrants, what is the best thing you would include with the limited amount of remaining points? I've seen some with Living Artillery, others just pumping the remaining points in Dakkafexes, I've seen something that looked like a mish mash of everything including units from both the above 2 lists, Gargoyles, and Mawlocs, maybe it was for balanced coverage. Just wondering what people think is the best use of the points after the Flyrants and WHY.

If you are doubling down so much on air power, you probably should look at Crones with extra points of which there won't be many. 4 Flyrants w/ 4 DS Rippers is 1140 points.

I'd rather take 2 min squads of Rippers with DS over Homagaunts every day of the week. Gargoyles are far superior and the points I saved on not spending it on crappy Hormagaunts can be used for them.

So what does everyone think of the Toxicrene and the Maleceptor? They both seem powersful. I'm leaning toward building the Toxicrene first, it seems like a great unit that may be useful in killing terminators, and riptides/wraithknights.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
What do you guys think of this semi-competitive list? I face mostly Spave Wolves, but others as well.

This is for 1850.

2x Hive Tyrants with 2x Breainleech + Electrogrubs

1x Venomthrope
1x Zoanthrope

2x Gargoyle Brood (10x Gargoyles)
1x Dimachaeron

2x Termagaunt Brood (12x Termagaunts)
2x Ripper Broods

1x Harpy

2x Carnifex with 2x Brainleech
1x Mawloc
1x Toxicrene

Thoughts? It is 4 points over though...

be gentle

jy2 wrote:
You've already got almost all the components for Skyblight so why not just run it? Harpies actually aren't that bad and can be made usable. Besides, what's better than 60 gargoyles? 60 recyclable gargoyles! BTW, if you run skyblight, you can drop 1 unit of rippers (and some gargoyles) plust swap out 1 of your hive crones to get 2 harpies.


Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Venomthrope
Venomthrope
Zoanthrope
Ripper w/DS
Ripper w/DS
Ripper w/DS
Mawloc

Allied:
Flyrant w/Devs and Electro
Crone
Harpy w/TL-HVC
Harpy w/TL-HVC
16 Gargoyles
15 Gargoyles
15 Gargoyles

To be honest, the main reason is I own two crones and 1 harpy, and with less than a week to go I'd have to order a harpy and paint it in addition to already having to buy/paint 20 more gargoyles and do an entirely new display board while going to work full time. So Im
trying to work with what I've got to chose from at home.

SHUPPET wrote:I'm just curious what people think is the best 4 Flyrant list. Like, aside from the Flyrants, what is the best thing you would include with the limited amount of remaining points? I've seen some with Living Artillery, others just pumping the remaining points in Dakkafexes, I've seen something that looked like a mish mash of everything including units from both the above 2 lists, Gargoyles, and Mawlocs, maybe it was for balanced coverage. Just wondering what people think is the best use of the points after the Flyrants and WHY.

I will say from my experience last weekend that I wish I had had Crones on the table, at least one, in place of a Dakkafex. And more Gargoyles. The 30 garg tarpit always had a use, even against the mechanized IG list, and while the 4 flyrants shredded all vehicles from landraiders to leman russes, there were often times when a S8 vector strike would have gone a long long way, in addition to their flamers. I LOVE the Dakkafex, its just slow enough to maybe see use where it matters for turns 3-5. Crones, while somewhat sucky, in my opinion would have augmented the flyrants and made them even more effective.

Can someone explain to me how Harpies aren't bad?

 SHUPPET wrote:
Can someone explain to me how Harpies aren't bad?

I've always found them to be situational rather than sucky.

 Zande4 wrote:
I'd rather take 2 min squads of Rippers with DS over Homagaunts every day of the week. Gargoyles are far superior and the points I saved on not spending it on crappy Hormagaunts can be used for them.

1) You save 5 points per squad taking rippers over Hormagants. That is almost enough to buy 1 more gargoyle.
2) You didn't answer my question. If gargoyles were troops would you take them over rippers in Maelstrom?
3) What do you consider the main difference between Gargoyles and Hormagants that make Gargoyles "far superior" and Hormagants "crappy". The 2.25" per turn difference in movement? That does it for me, even with OS, and fleet, 2.25" per turn is significant.

Noctem wrote:
So what does everyone think of the Toxicrene and the Maleceptor? They both seem powersful. I'm leaning toward building the Toxicrene first, it seems like a great unit that may be useful in killing terminators, and riptides/wraithknights.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
What do you guys think of this semi-competitive list? I face mostly Spave Wolves, but others as well.

This is for 1850.

2x Hive Tyrants with 2x Breainleech + Electrogrubs

1x Venomthrope
1x Zoanthrope

2x Gargoyle Brood (10x Gargoyles)
1x Dimachaeron

2x Termagaunt Brood (12x Termagaunts)
2x Ripper Broods

1x Harpy

2x Carnifex with 2x Brainleech
1x Mawloc
1x Toxicrene

Thoughts? It is 4 points over though...

What models do you have access to? You might replace to Zope/Vope for a Malanthrope to save a few points to bring you back under 1850. If you really like the Toxicrene why not double down on them? Drop the Mawloc and a few termagants and you should have enough for another.

I am sure this has been said but I can not find it... how do you advise to beat spacewolves ? we will be playing maelstrom and I know he has :

Njall
group of wolf guard terminators with Arjac,
several longfangs or grey hunters
Thunderwolf (maybe?)
venerable dreadnought
and a landraider

this is all I can remember from memory

 Zande4 wrote:

Keep in mind I'm talking about this thread specifically. 90% (rough estimate) of this thread seems to argue (and aggressively I might add) that Hormagaunts are our best troop choice because they're fast, screening, melee blah blah blah.... Fill your mandatory 2 troops with deepstriking rippers and be done with that slot. If you want fast, melee, screening units just take Gargoyles. I'm not saying Hormagaunts are worthless, superior to Rippers in CC or can't beat a Tac Squad. I'm just saying they're not the best.

I don't think anyone is trying to say they are the "best" of our fodder creatures, just they are the best available in troops. It ultimately comes down to what you are going to use your troops for. As a pure objective sitter Rippers are better, but Hormagaunts offer more tactical options (screening, tarpitting) and offer better threat saturation with Gargoyles (both units have the same defensive stats, so draw the same sort of fire - Rippers are S6+ bait while S5 or lower goes to Gargoyles).

I'd also add, Hormagaunts do have a few situational advantages over Gargoyles to keep in mind. Move Through Cover and innate Fleet being the main one, but their I5 and extra attack are also helpful in certain match-ups as well.

 SHUPPET wrote:
Can someone explain to me how Harpies aren't bad?

1. They are dirt cheap for a flyer and the outright cheapest flying monstrous creature in the game.
2. Second most points per wound efficient monstrous creature in our codex, after the Mawloc (27 points per wound on the Harpy vs 23 for the Mawloc) and more points per T5 wound efficient than the Malanthrope (28 points per wound).
3. Sonic Screech is probably one of the best tools we have for combating Knights without being forced to play passively. It allows our armor-cracking monsters to actually get their swings in and wreck the things before taking return blows.
4. Source of accurate S9 firepower if desired (say vs necrons for popping quantum shielding).

It really is a matter of playstyle preference though. The Harpy is ultimately a force multiplier for melee-leaning units (either via pinning, free sporemines for overwatch, or sonic screech), so if you don't really have a melee presence it looses half of its functionality.

Noctem wrote:
So what does everyone think of the Toxicrene and the Maleceptor?

Toxicrene should be useable (will need gaunt support to catch things), but the Maleceptor is sadly going to be more of a detriment than a help most of the time (fragile for its cost, very unreliable psychic power, low damage).

 SHUPPET wrote:
Can someone explain to me how Harpies aren't bad?

He's not bad in the sense that if you must take him (a la Skyblight), then you might as well make the best out of it. Though he isn't great in any 1 category (except movement), he can contribute to an army:

1. Anti-tank with reliable S9 shooting.

2. Anti-infantry with spore mines.

3. Supplements assault nids with reducing enemy Initiative and generating spore mines to soak up Overwatch.

4. A 5W T5 4+/4+ cover sacrificial lamb to potentially draw enemy fire. Hey, better him than your flyrant, right?

5. Movement blockers due to his large base, especially when used with another Skyblight harpy in tandem (and/or with hive crone as well). You can form a pretty big wall with 3 large oval bases as long as you position them correctly (i.e. such that the enemy unit will end their move within 1" of their bases).

6. This is probably his biggest asset - his mobility. Despite all of his shortcomings, he is still a highly mobile unit that can be used to grab/contest objectives at the end of the game.