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After several games with my Tyrainds here are my results....

Tyrants - Originally seemed a bit crap. They died quickly & didn't do much for their points. I will consider them for my future plans though.

Tervigons - Really disappointed me. They did OK in an Objective game (got me a draw), but when they were forced into combat, they totally fluffed several times & really annoyed me.

Primes (Alpha Warriors) - Seem like a good choice for their points. I was disappointed with the CC results on one, but quite impressed with the shooting results on another... (I took X2, one shooty, one CC).

I haven't even considered using any other HQ choices.

Hive Guard - Died & did nothing - X2 - 100 points wasted.

Lictors - X2 - 130 points, died & did very little. I wasn't impressed AT ALL!

Zoanthropes (in Drop Spores) - Have so far FLUFFED EVERY SHOT THEY HAVE MADE! In 3 games I have immobilized a Vindicator! That's it!

I haven't considered using the other units in the Elite section.

Warriors - Seem AMAZING! They can take bullets like men of steel & seem like a SOLID choice for all round games.

Genestealers - Are better than ever with Toxin Sacs! X13 rends & X14 Armour saves in one assault with X2 groups of 10! Goodbye Marines! Fragile though. A bit of a one hit wonder now unless carefully used!

Drop Spores - Seem really good, but annoying that they are an extra kill point!

Termagants - Just die too easy. They are good for objective games in a Tervigon BUT>>>> drop a Hellhound in there & they are pants. Also, how are they dealing with mech armies.... Not at all is the answer. Overall... Meh.

Hormogaunts - Awesome that they are cheaper, but meh. If Tervigons could spit them out maybe, but I think for the points I'd rather go elsewhere with my units.

Rippers - Not even considered them, although I am glad that they can hold objectives now.

Haven't really tried any of the 'fast attack' section apart from Gargoyles & I must say they seemed pretty good. I have always liked them & now they're cheaper they seem more if a good choice. I must say I was expecting them to become a troop choice if you took a winged tyrant though. Oh well.

Carnifex - Hmmm - Not sure, seemed to die real quick. I guess people know how scary they are. Drop Spores seemed to get him where I wanted him though. If he had survived the round of shooting I'm sure he'd have wrecked some stuff.

Biovores - Seem better than ever before but still quite fragile.

Trygons - Seem pretty cool, but I'm not sure. I want to like them but the S6 puts me off. 6W is cool but they still seem to fall pretty quick. Have yet to try a Mawloc or prime.

Tyrannofex.... Meh. Died. Didn't do much. Guns weren't great. Overall, not a great choice for 250 odd points.

So, from my games I can (in my own experiences) relay that a lot of the new units seem like a bit of a gimmick to me.
I am still quite convinced that (despite popular opinion) MC lists still seem viable. How are we really expected to overrun Mech lists with gaunts?
I have tried a couple of swarm lists & they got BLASTED TO PIECES!!!
I can compare it to running a Guard 'foot' list against a SM Mech list. What can you do...? really....?

I have a new army list that I think will be the way forward. I realize that this is not the thread for it though so I'll post it in the list section if anyone is interested.
My next list will be an entire 'outflanking' & 'deepstriking' army We'll see how it works out.

Hope this helps some Tyranid players....
As I have said. These are only MY experiences. Please feel free to tell me your own. I'm sure everyone will be RAVING about Zoanthropes, but they seemed the biggest let down to me.
Cheers DAKKA.

Klueless.

Things i have seen that you may wish to try out.

Take 3-5 Mycetic spoes with Barbed Stranglers and deploy across the board with a mind to good LOS. 55pts each and chance of scattering (not a bad thing since it shoot the closest enemy) but the point is they can cover most of the board.

Gargoyles ... can't recomend these enough. Roll to hit get a 6 and you wound them. You need some thing like a Trygon prime so they don't try lurking.

Rippers still can't hold objectives. They are swarms and swarms can never hold.

I have to question your ability to play as you seem to have said "everything in the codex dies too fast (save Warriors)." Which is obviously not the case, given my experience against them so far, not to mention Shep and Mahu's.

I played a game against a Trygprime this weekend and it feel real quick to my mob of boyz, the other game I played Tau, it ate 3 crisis suit squads fo dinna! Mixed results. Beautiful model though. Give the Prime a shot, you'll probably like the results. Plus anything with an assault 18 (total) weapon is awesome.

My opinion on the Trygons are they can't come in alone. You need to have more than just that popping up as an immediate thread, or it will be too easy to kill.

Well I'm still getting used to this new army really. I'm sure I'll work out the kinks in it. Overall I'm not disappointed with it. It was just fun having so many different upgrades in the past. Oh well.

Maybe the Zoanthropes will pay for the points a bit more in future games....
We'll see.

Zoanthropes have been amazing for me (1 unit of 3). In only a few games they have killed a Land Raider Redeemer, a Defiler, and numerous MEQs.

Warriors are awesome, it's weird how everyone seemed down on them. I use deathspitters and a Prime with boneswords attached to them. The Prime kicks butt in CC and the shooting is quite effective.

Carnifex with Stranglethorn has been a monumental let down so far, and I'm ready to bench him.

I played my first game yesterday with the new nids. I never played with the last codex, though I had it and I spent a good amount of time meditating over it.

My thoughts in response to what you wrote:

Tyrant - Amazing! I gave him the heavy version of the barbed strangler and bonesword/lash whip. He and his two remaining tyrant guard annihilated a full 10 man squad of CSM without taking a wound from them. Paroxysm is an amazing ability. The tyrant went gone on further to halfway take out a DP before the next squad finally finished him off (he did have two wounds on him already from lascannon fire.)

Zoanthrope - I botched my first three shots with these guys, but then they went on to wipe out a defiler.

Termagaunts - Kept them in cover for the most part. They caused several saves but did not kill anything. Tied up several units in the shooting phase, which made them more than worth the points.

Hormagaunts - 26 of them getting shot constantly walking across the board from the edge (dawn of war) still managed to wipe out 7/10 CSM hiding in cover.

Warriors - I made mine shooty and was somewhat disappointed with them. I may need to rethink that.

Genestealers - Another awesome unit, but if you don't keep them protected, they'll roll over on you.

Something I'd throw out there: Venomthropes. One of the reasons why I kept my hormagaunts alive in-spite of being constantly fired into was that I had a mobile 5+ cover save bubble from that guy. I kept him at the edge of the bolter fire as much as possible and my opponent had to choose between hitting the guy who was making the cover, or hitting the guys who were going to wipe him out.

Some thoughts: I miss flesh hooks. I feel like what gets them doesn't really need them (carifex? REALLY?) but at the same time stuff like Genestealers really need them, especially with how much assaulting into cover it feels like I'm doing. Also, maybe I was just having bad luck, but it seems like the shooty aspect doesn't really work too well. I imagine I'll keep it around just to do additional pain to GEQ armies, but I don't feel like the additional guns brought much to the table against MEQ (and I'm used to that disappointment, I play IG after all).

daedalus wrote:I played my first game yesterday with the new nids. I never played with the last codex, though I had it and I spent a good amount of time meditating over it.

My thoughts in response to what you wrote:

Tyrant - Amazing! I gave him the heavy version of the barbed strangler and bonesword/lash whip. He and his two remaining tyrant guard annihilated a full 10 man squad of CSM without taking a wound from them. Paroxysm is an amazing ability. The tyrant went gone on further to halfway take out a DP before the next squad finally finished him off (he did have two wounds on him already from lascannon fire.)

Zoanthrope - I botched my first three shots with these guys, but then they went on to wipe out a defiler.

Termagaunts - Kept them in cover for the most part. They caused several saves but did not kill anything. Tied up several units in the shooting phase, which made them more than worth the points.

Hormagaunts - 26 of them getting shot constantly walking across the board from the edge (dawn of war) still managed to wipe out 7/10 CSM hiding in cover.

Warriors - I made mine shooty and was somewhat disappointed with them. I may need to rethink that.

Genestealers - Another awesome unit, but if you don't keep them protected, they'll roll over on you.

Something I'd throw out there: Venomthropes. One of the reasons why I kept my hormagaunts alive in-spite of being constantly fired into was that I had a mobile 5+ cover save bubble from that guy. I kept him at the edge of the bolter fire as much as possible and my opponent had to choose between hitting the guy who was making the cover, or hitting the guys who were going to wipe him out.

Some thoughts: I miss flesh hooks. I feel like what gets them doesn't really need them (carifex? REALLY?) but at the same time stuff like Genestealers really need them, especially with how much assaulting into cover it feels like I'm doing. Also, maybe I was just having bad luck, but it seems like the shooty aspect doesn't really work too well. I imagine I'll keep it around just to do additional pain to GEQ armies, but I don't feel like the additional guns brought much to the table against MEQ (and I'm used to that disappointment, I play IG after all).

Now the method to deal with enemy in cover is lashwhip or pinning weapon, not so easy though.

The warriors' shooty weapons are most suck, they are not good shooty unit, better use as a counter charge unit.

ED209 wrote:

Now the method to deal with enemy in cover is lashwhip or pinning weapon, not so easy though.

The warriors' shooty weapons are most suck, they are not good shooty unit, better use as a counter charge unit.

Really? A 3 shot BS3(or 4 with a prime) S5 AP5 gun for 5pts seems quite good to me. You're bascically having a unit full of moving heavy bolters, which isnt anything to sniff at.

Would it be worth taking a venomthrope brood to stick in the middle of a gant/tervion blob? 5+ cover and FNP isnt easy to shift for most armies, especially when 60+ models have it. Defensive grenades and dangerous terrain tests also makes them harder to deal with in combat. Behind a gant wall vthropes would get a 4+ cover and you could also put a tyranid prime with them to absorb S8-9 shots that would otherwise insta-death them.

I havent found that to be the case - I find a nice big unit of Deathspitters shooting with the Prime's BS has been quite good so far. Not "amazing", but not suck either.

Probably just my luck with the shooting then. The melee combat turned out to be clutch though, and that's the important part. I ended up losing my match, KP, 4 to his 5. It was his first victory against me with his CSM, though normally I play IG and I usually kit for MEQ killing, so he's hard put to really do much against them. If I could redo the entire scenario over again, I think I would have started the match with the Hormagaunts on table and walked the shooters on, rather than the other way around.

Regwon wrote:

Really? A 3 shot BS3(or 4 with a prime) S5 AP5 gun for 5pts seems quite good to me. You're bascically having a unit full of moving heavy bolters, which isnt anything to sniff at.

Would it be worth taking a venomthrope brood to stick in the middle of a gant/tervion blob? 5+ cover and FNP isnt easy to shift for most armies, especially when 60+ models have it. Defensive grenades and dangerous terrain tests also makes them harder to deal with in combat. Behind a gant wall vthropes would get a 4+ cover and you could also put a tyranid prime with them to absorb S8-9 shots that would otherwise insta-death them.

What can Heavybolter in a Tyranids army do for you? kill vehicles ? no, Kill infantry? yes, but you wont do much against MEQ or other hard stuff,only some orks or GEQ, the question is that whether you really need spend 35pts a model just for 3 BS3 S5 AP5 at 18" ? what do we have in last edition for Deathspitter on Warrior? a 24" BS3 S6 AP5 blast at 33pts each model, infantry or light vehicle as you call. now it become worse and I dont feel like to say this is good anymore.

Venomthrope could be very good if you got a slow moving formation like Tervigon with tones of gaunts ,but then this is too much for deffensive power, I would put Termagants with devourer in this case to max out the fire base effect, if they dont charge you they got shot to death ,if they charge you then eat some counter attack toxin sacs claws plus all the venomthrope buff , only weakness for this will be facing multiple big blasts ,5+ cover save wont hold off that.

I enjoy dropping Pyrovores in a Spore right on top of units. It is pretty effective, despite what everyone else seems to think.

Warriors are NOT a great unit anymore, especially against the Guard. I had 15 warriors killed in 1 round from 3 Leman Russ pie-plates. 3 Wounds doesn't matter if they are so easily Instant Deathed.

Hive Guard are OK. I wish they could hold objectives, then they would be near-perfect.

Again, the problem with the Tyranids is just a standard rule: You can't assault after a Deep Strike. I will once again probably go back to not Deep Striking anything, simply becuase I don't like landing and getting gunned down. No Assault after Deep Strike makes Tyranids unhappy.

ED209 wrote:
What can Heavybolter in a Tyranids army do for you? kill vehicles ? no, Kill infantry? yes, but you wont do much against MEQ or other hard stuff,only some orks or GEQ, the question is that whether you really need spend 35pts a model just for 3 BS3 S5 AP5 at 18" ? what do we have in last edition for Deathspitter on Warrior? a 24" BS3 S6 AP5 blast at 33pts each model, infantry or light vehicle as you call. now it become worse and I dont feel like to say this is good anymore.

Venomthrope could be very good if you got a slow moving formation like Tervigon with tones of gaunts ,but then this is too much for deffensive power, I would put Termagants with devourer in this case to max out the fire base effect, if they dont charge you they got shot to death ,if they charge you then eat some counter attack toxin sacs claws plus all the venomthrope buff , only weakness for this will be facing multiple big blasts ,5+ cover save wont hold off that.

The law of averages makes deathspitters good against MEQs. With that many S5 shots some will get through. S5 does also mean you can threaten MCs and light vehices, even with low chances of success. The anti-tank in the army comes from other places, like zoanthropes or hive guard. Yes its not as good as a S6 AP5 blast but that doesnt mean it isnt good. Warriors need some sort of shooting, otherwise they risk being outmanuvered and shot to pieces before they can do anything. They just dont have the speed to go pure combat, not against the mobile armies that we are seeing at the moment. So for 5pts, deathspitters are the best option. If you want a fast comabt nasty then get some shrikes with boneswords. Just as good as warriors but a lot faster.

Devourers double the cost of the gants. Even if they would have a huge amount of firepower it wouldnt be worth it at 10ppm. You may as well get twice the number of gants for that. Slightly less firepower but better in every other respect. I think its better to keep them cheap and use all the buffs from all the tervigons/vthropes to make them good.

Blasts will always be a problem for hordes but a 5+ cover and FNP is far better in everyway than no save at all.

Gaunts armed with Devourers are natural lurkers. 16 in cover kick out a horrendous number of shots, and the -1 to Panic really makes them worth it, especially if you can wangle a couple of extra shots from other units (like Hive Guard).

Sure, they are pretty pricey, but 48 S4 shots are simply not to be sniffed at!

Yeah I think that's why I've enjoyed the Warrior/deathspitters so far - my games were only vs MEQ so far.

Im definitely fitting in a big squad of devourer gaunts to lurk cover and mow down infantry.

Im still not sold on the tervigon though, although I may need him to baby sit my gaunts.

Swarmlord is a monster in hand to hand. More so if he cannot be singled out of his guard.

Genestealers are very good if you play carefully with them.

Trygon prime is totally worth its points.

Mawloc is very cool.
Regen isnt worth it on either of them though.

Carnifex in spod kicks ass.

The problem with the Tervigon is if you get a Kill Points game, you really shouldn't spawn units, or you can surrender points like they are going out of style.

Mattlov - Agreed. I used a Tervigon VS a Mech Guard army the other day. It was useless. It was a KP game, so the whole game the big guy just stood about getting shot until it went down in about the 3/4th round.
Bummer.
I grappled the shoggoth - I'm glad that someone thinks Carnifex's in drop spores is a good idea. Everyone seems to think different. I think the idea of them is cool. In practice, my guy actually got shot to pieces before he did anything, but!!!! I didn't support him & he didn't have a gun. I'm thinking that the Dakkafex in a Drop Spore with Adrenal glands & frag spines is an awesome unit. Especially if you can fit in another CC one into your list to make people panic about which one to shoot.

Dakkafex - 12 S6 shots twin linked. 5 Attacks on the charge. Can strike into cover at I4! Awesome! Although, probably best using this upgrade on the CC fex, so he gets re-rolls to hit!

Everyone else - In my games Warriors have been a solid choice. Both the shooty ones & the CC ones. Although, point for point, the shooty ones have made their points back better. Especially with a Alpha in there.
The CC ones have been a bit hit & miss.

Regwon wrote:
The law of averages makes deathspitters good against MEQs. With that many S5 shots some will get through. S5 does also mean you can threaten MCs and light vehices, even with low chances of success. The anti-tank in the army comes from other places, like zoanthropes or hive guard. Yes its not as good as a S6 AP5 blast but that doesnt mean it isnt good. Warriors need some sort of shooting, otherwise they risk being outmanuvered and shot to pieces before they can do anything. They just dont have the speed to go pure combat, not against the mobile armies that we are seeing at the moment. So for 5pts, deathspitters are the best option. If you want a fast comabt nasty then get some shrikes with boneswords. Just as good as warriors but a lot faster.

Devourers double the cost of the gants. Even if they would have a huge amount of firepower it wouldnt be worth it at 10ppm. You may as well get twice the number of gants for that. Slightly less firepower but better in every other respect. I think its better to keep them cheap and use all the buffs from all the tervigons/vthropes to make them good.

Blasts will always be a problem for hordes but a 5+ cover and FNP is far better in everyway than no save at all.

Yes , they need some sort of shooting ,and the deathspitter is by far the best they can get(for normal ones), that's the reason why desthspitter is good ,because others are even worse, that 's sort of price you have to pay ,if you want to be good at everyway, but at the end you are not that good at any of them. You have power weapons but you cant assault enemy at turn two , you have 18"heavy bolters but you cant out shoot enemy with them , however these are not that bad at all , as long as you come cheap , but in fact the warrior's cost goes up pretty fast when you upgrade them to do both, then what's the point to take them for doing only one thing ,when others do it better and cheaper.

I agree the shrikes are lot better than the warriors ,consider they are only 5pts more each than normal warriors ,you can shoot and then charge, means you get both shoot and CC, the only downside is they are not from troop choice.

Klueless wrote:
Everyone else - In my games Warriors have been a solid choice. Both the shooty ones & the CC ones. Although, point for point, the shooty ones have made their points back better. Especially with a Alpha in there.
The CC ones have been a bit hit & miss.

Enjoy watching them die by the brood to a single Battle Cannon shot. That sucks HARD.

What size bases do warriors have? If pie plates are headed my way I'd make the effort to spread warriors out so no more than three can possibly be hit. Add scatter, cover from other units, and the chance to roll a one to wound, and your opponent is lucky to kill two, three at the outside...

Mattlov wrote:

Klueless wrote:
Everyone else - In my games Warriors have been a solid choice. Both the shooty ones & the CC ones. Although, point for point, the shooty ones have made their points back better. Especially with a Alpha in there.
The CC ones have been a bit hit & miss.

Enjoy watching them die by the brood to a single Battle Cannon shot. That sucks HARD.

I start to think that battle cannon is designed for them

Yes, because I make sure I ALWAYS set up my multi-wound, Toughness 4 assets in as tight a ball as possible when I'm facing Imperial Guard.

I have to agree with the funny & somewhat sarcastic remarks from above. My Warriors were in a building, spread out & on two floors. They took several rounds of Battle cannon shots & still stood about until late in the game. As well as several other large template weapons. (Rocket pods, Demolishers etc) Also, if you have several large guys, Zoanthropes & other mash up units closing in, the opponent will be forced to target more serious threats than a group of warriors sitting back having a deathspit cocktail.
But I guess it's whatever works for you best.

I'm a bit amused by your "zoanthropes are suck, because I rolled bad".

My chosen carry 5 meltaguns. Are there many better anti-tank units? Maybe....fire dragons? I don't know. But we've all seen it.

"Ok, 10 meltaguns, all close range from these fire dragons. ......3 hit.... nothing....nothing.........glance.....1.....wtf?"

Doesn't mean fire dragons suck at tank killing. If you're trying to kill armour 14 you need 2+ to do damage with 3 models that pass ld 10 checks, then roll 3+. The odds aren't AMAZING, but they're pretty good.

Gannon wrote:I played a game against a Trygprime this weekend and it feel real quick to my mob of boyz, the other game I played Tau, it ate 3 crisis suit squads fo dinna! Mixed results. Beautiful model though. Give the Prime a shot, you'll probably like the results. Plus anything with an assault 18 (total) weapon is awesome.

IT IS NOT A 18 SHOT GUN! It clearly says that the 12 shot gun REPLACES the 6 shot gun, you dont get both of them.

thekerrick wrote:

Gannon wrote:I played a game against a Trygprime this weekend and it feel real quick to my mob of boyz, the other game I played Tau, it ate 3 crisis suit squads fo dinna! Mixed results. Beautiful model though. Give the Prime a shot, you'll probably like the results. Plus anything with an assault 18 (total) weapon is awesome.

IT IS NOT A 18 SHOT GUN! It clearly says that the 12 shot gun REPLACES the 6 shot gun, you dont get both of them.

Thank you so much for saying that. Seriously.

krakkirby wrote:What size bases do warriors have? If pie plates are headed my way I'd make the effort to spread warriors out so no more than three can possibly be hit. Add scatter, cover from other units, and the chance to roll a one to wound, and your opponent is lucky to kill two, three at the outside...

No, that is not how you play against guard. I recommend putting 10 super expensive warriors in a spore pod, and deep striking them right next to mystics. Be sure to bunch them up in a nice little ball to maximize cover saves too.