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Hey everyone... I've used my gargoyles in approximately 5 games now, and have been very underwhelmed with them. They just don't seem to be good at what I want them to be good at (attacking very tough individuals like daemons, etc.). They get shot up and still end up losing plenty of models to fearless saves even when they do wounds. Has anyone had success with them that would cause you to think, "Yeah, they'll have a place in my list most times"?

I have used them in every game since 5th ed. i think they are best thrown against a group of termies. they get in fast, tie them up while the slower bigger units close in.

I assume you're giving them toxin sacs if you're going after big game.

I see two ways to run gargoyles well.

First: Take a whole bunch, and take a flyrant with Ancient Enemy. Probably some Shrikes, too: they'll hopefully draw fire from your tyrant. Run them up in people's faces, wait for things to fall out of transports, and eat up. They're gonna get shot this way, but a) you should have enough that it doesn't matter, and b) it means other, more important things aren't getting shot.

Second: Only run some (like 20) in a phalanx army. Put them behind your Warrior-sized guys (maybe Warriors, maybe Hive Guard, maybe Zoanthropes), so they get a cover save and provide one to MCs. Use them as a counter-assault unit.

Oh, and you're putting Toxin Sacs on them, right?

I wouldn't expect them to survive most games, but they're still worth taking so long as they can either do enough damage or save damage from the rest of your own army. Some people take them as cheapish 'ablative armour' for their MCs.

Not a nid player but I know from experience that they're asbolutely murderous against orks.

auto wound on the roll to hit and a 6+ save does not a good combination make for the orkses, particularly if you can get preferred enemy on them.

flap-flap-flap-flap sploot-sploot EEEEEEEEEEE rrrrip

That was my gargoyle impression.

I think that having jump infantry for the price of a shoota boy is pretty big. The only problem is that like most of the rest of the cool units in the codex, they are yet another great way for nids to destroy enemy infantry, but don't offer much against vehicles.

You get what you pay for. Gargoyles are a bolt pistol that flies and little else. You use them for cover saves and last-ditch assaults if you really really need the poison attacks and don't have anybody else around to do it.

I like them as flying cover saves. Fly up, take hits for team.

I use them to hold up bigger units. Like to hold up IG combined squads because guard suck at assault so they've held up for about 3 turns before. But only do that if you are against tau or IG or something obviously.

They have a place, that's for sure. However, not every army needs them, and Im not sure yet if the armies that do are good enough as a whole.

I initially (and still do) wanted to play a complete swarm army. I was taking 50+ gargoyles a game. However, they did very very little overall (which is fine because theyre cheap). They provided my Flyrant cover which was nice, but missles were still wounding with only a 4+ save. I lost synapse pretty quickly with them each game when the gargs split up and the flyrant died.

Im also finding a true swarm army doesnt work unless you have over 2000 points, as there is no way to deal with tanks, and the few units that can will either a) get shot up before they reach the tank as target priority (tyrant, trygon, stealers etc.) or b) reach the tank, destroy it, then get killed the following turn by its contents.

I had ~140 models in those games, and Ive cut some out, gargoyles being one of the units cut, and am now down to an 84 model army (this is all at 1850). Gargoyles just dont fit in unfortunately, as Ive also taken the flyrant away (too many points and killed too easily without guard or 2+ save).

Hey Night Lords - whats your list look like?

Gargoyles work well for me. One use i find is for them to provide cover to MCs, bigger flying things or pretty much anything. The best use, IMO, is for them to distract a big shooty unit that can deal out a ot of firepower, especially anti-tank, my most common target is probably long fangs etc. If you give them toxin sacs and adrenal glands (which is still cheap) then they'll get thier stregnth up to the same as a SM's toughness meaning they'll always wound on a 4+ with re-rolls, this, coupled with lots of them and thier blinding venom makes them actually quite effective in CC.

So basically the same purpose as gaunts: A screening unit for flyrants/harpys/winged warriors then? I just really want them to be useful in my list (currently outflanking stealers and deep striking most of the rest of the army). They're so cheap and models look so good. Since I don't run any big flying things, do you think I could still use them as a screen for things that deep strike or outflank in a less than ideal position?

kaiservonhugal wrote:Hey Night Lords - whats your list look like?

Ive been changing it so frequently trying to find a balance.

A brief outline has been:

Tyrant
60 horms
20 stealers
20-60 gargoyles (now dropped)
5 warriors (dropped)
Mawloc
Trygon Prime

Added:

2x2 zoans w/ pod
x2 tyrant guard
no wings on tyrant, 2+ save

How has it fared for you so far?

Not too well. Granted, a friend of mine Ive been playing against (note: who has a bunch of different armies) and I play pretty competitively (ie better than the average person at the store I would say) against one another in order to improve our games, so it might to ok in a casual setting.

A list of problems:

-MCs just get wrecked by Ap3 fire even with a cover save which is why ive given my tyrant 2+ instead of wings (and x2 tyrant guard make him pretty much invincible albeit expensive).
-Because of the above, gargoyles can be left without synapse pretty quickly when the tyrant dies. They then get tank shocked off the board
-Vehicles are a complete pain in the ass. If they move more than 6" most of the army becomes useless, even though everything had rending claws/adrenal glands. Mech Eldar was a joke. AT fire is required, except its extremely expensive which lowers the amount of units in the swarm...by a lot. 2x2 zoans w/ pod is 50 gargoyles w/ upgrades.
-Genestealers can outflank and pop tanks, but if the tanks stay closer to middle/have contents inside, the stealers are dead the next turn


Tyranids are my more "for fun" army, but I still would like to find a list that has a chance. Im toying with more and more AT fire and MCs (initially I had 0). It just wasnt working.

For those having synapse problems, does attaching the Parasite seem like a reasonable solution?

I've been running an average of 2 MC's in my 1500 list (tervigon, tyrant, carnifex brood of 2), and I've been doing very well against tanks. My problem is that either I'm highly mobile and weak or very slow and very powerful... I'd like to find something in between the two that's not such a drastic contrast.

There are other options for tanks, but what I was saying is against a half balanced opponent, the MCs wont last long when theyre the only AT fire and they only have a 3+ save.

AT is still expensive on its own even though theyre not MCs

It's sad to be a gargoyle in my army. They die every game for doing their jobs.

I love them for seize ground and capture & control, and I hate them in annihilation.

So they are useful in your army... Do you basically have them relegated to last turn objective grabs and that sort of thing?

Grunt_For_Christ wrote:So they are useful in your army... Do you basically have them relegated to last turn objective grabs and that sort of thing?

My gargoyles do just about everything people suggested in this topic. I would even use them to surround transporter and hopefully wrecking it from support fire if that opportunity ever arrive. If they ever lived long enough, I would go for the objective grab like you suggested. As long as I don't have to worry about kill point, gargoyles offer a lot of tactical advantages being a fast unit in any tyranid army. In kill point mission, they are another juicy target for my opponent, and many other tyranid units already coughing up easy kill points, so I have mix feelings about gargoyles. Maybe just me, I'm not too impress with gargoyles' killing power. Sure, you can upgrade them, but too often when you get to assault with them, their model count is already reduce to an insignificant number to make a threat.

I take a group of 15. If the group is too big, it's hard to deep strike and it restricts me to start off with them on the board every game. Around 15 allow some flexibility on deployment and some durability.

To round it up, it's hard to summarize everything about gargoyles from my experience in this short post. I like to keep testing each unit until something that fits my list style. Hope that helps.

An excellent list of points... Perhaps I should use them for a trouble-shooting unit and anything they're pressed to do. I've been taking a group of 10--maybe 15 would be more reasonable and give me a bit more 'oomph' when the time comes for them to strike. All you've said actually helps a lot and has given me plenty of food for thought. Thanks!

I've seen people using them and i think the main problem is people are expecting too much from them.

A base Gargoyle has a 6+ save and a statline thats on par with a IG's man. However they do have a gun, are jump infantry and a roll of 6 to hit auto wounds every one. Oh and they're 6pts each.

Use them like a meat shield and you can't go far wrong.

That's kind of what I'm thinking... And using them for objective grabs or denials late game.

Tri wrote:I've seen people using them and i think the main problem is people are expecting too much from them.

A base Gargoyle has a 6+ save and a statline thats on par with a IG's man. However they do have a gun, are jump infantry and a roll of 6 to hit auto wounds every one. Oh and they're 6pts each.

Use them like a meat shield and you can't go far wrong.

Ahh, but the problem is the opportunity cost of them. I find that they just don't really do... anything. Sure theyre cheap, but with anti tank costing so many points, and so many other options, what crucial role to they actually?

I had about 115 points left over with my most recent list, it could have bought 20 gargoyles, but instead bought adrenal glands for hormagaunts instead.

I love gargoyles - I love their models and concept - but Ive found they just dont really do anything. Theyre just there, being disposable. They need to be baby sat with synapse or theyre finished.

I deploy mine in a teardrop shape, first turn they move up, the tail of the teardrop should be barely within synapse, 2nd turn they abandon synapse and assault into some backline support units if they can.

They get mowed down virtually every time, but they attract fire alot more than gaunts, they give everything a coversave, and they are a threat for that vital first-second turn while 1/2 your army is slogging across the map.

Biggest downside i see with them is they are flyers with instinct lurk, I've lost a few to jumping into terrain when i had no control over them before. Like gaunts, they can be very vicious fully upgraded with FNP and preferred enemy.

I can see your point if you're running a pure footslogging list and you keep them held back. Personally I haven't had a problem with I/B, but that's because I always overcompensate with synapse coverage. That also means that I can't really use them to their full potential--until I get some flying HQ in there that is. Like a few people have said, they just don't really do that much... Even though we all really want them to.

And, unless you're talking about tyrant powers/tervigon powers being put on them, they cant get upgraded with FNP or PE. Only Furious charge and toxin sacs (autowound on 4+). Are you using something I don't know about?

I am going to try to use gargoyles to make a vehicle proof barrier around my nids to keep out hellhounds and other flamers.

Hopefully the gargoyles will get flamed and the rest of my force can advance and shoot the hellhounds.

Grunt_For_Christ wrote:I can see your point if you're running a pure footslogging list and you keep them held back. Personally I haven't had a problem with I/B, but that's because I always overcompensate with synapse coverage. That also means that I can't really use them to their full potential--until I get some flying HQ in there that is. Like a few people have said, they just don't really do that much... Even though we all really want them to.

And, unless you're talking about tyrant powers/tervigon powers being put on them, they cant get upgraded with FNP or PE. Only Furious charge and toxin sacs (autowound on 4+). Are you using something I don't know about?

You've got it, i was just making the point that they are a bit more vicious than gaunts if upgraded/supported. They are fairly useful, provide cover for big bugs, are fast, can be a bodyguard for the sometimes insane parasite of mortrex. or fast, cheap, backline disruption.

I don't use a ton of synapse, between 2-3 tervigons, 1-3 squads of zoans, a hive tyrant, clever unit positioning and instinct: feed It's not too big of a deal. If you lose synapse in an area they units will keep advancing and if they aren't going to end up fighting something you want I deepstrike a trygon alpha nearby to redirect them, or if they just arrived from reserves they will charge and probably catch up with your snapse creatures before it really matters.

note: we play casually in these parts, I don't have to deal with nonsense like 7 razorbacks with lazcannons