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I recently have a problem with my World Eaters against a good Tyranid player.

Man, I hate those genestealers. Even if I charged them with my berzerkers, I still get slaughtered first with their In6 and rending attacks.

I need real serious opinion on how to deal with those nasty bugs.

 

If you have equal numbers of berzerkers versus genestealers, it should all boil down to the charge and cover. Honestly, the squads are pretty even. You have pistols, powerfist, and 3+ armor in your favor. The Nidz have WS:6, In:6 and rending in their favor.

Darrian

Take Predator Destructors (AC, SpHB and PSB) x3 or indirect Defilers x3. Indirect Defilers are better if he hides the stealers behind his MCs, but the AP3 is a problem if it scatters on your Raging 'zerkers.

That will nerf any AntiTank you might have otherwise taken, but your hidden Fists should take care of the MCs as long as they don't get locked down by gaunts.

Exactly what Strangelooper + Darrian said. Never engage stealers in melee unless you have the clear advantage. Heck, I have seen poorly deployed bloodthirsters die to them. Your berserkers probably cost more in the end anyway.

For my proof of concept: Saturday I fought a stealer heavy army against my latd. Escalation. He had a broodlord that was staring down my zombies. The broodlord had a full retinue of stealers. I kept my zombies just out of assault range until turn 4 since 1 of the basilisks came in on turn three. Boom. 7 dead stealers. I then had more zombies than he had attacks. I ended up with 6 zombies and a bunch of dead bugs including a broodlord.

Yeah I am still unsure as to why he wanted my zombies dead so badly.

I say don't bother with shooting. A World Eaters army can't pack in enough shooting to kill tyranids, and you sacrifice some of the HtH power that you need to get shooting.

You have to take on the genestealers as priority targets, bypassing gaunts if you can, with a mix of bloodletters and berzkerkers (I use a 2:3 ratio) and a clear advantage of at least 2-1 or preferably 3-1 in numbers. They stealers will nail a few of your guys in the first round, but especially if you have the charge, you can wipe them out and consolodate into nearby guants or big bugs to save being countercharged. It's an uphill struggle, and I've had some nail-biter games, but it can be done.

Alternately something that theoretically might work, but that I haven't had a chance to try yet, is destroyer rhinos. I've got three waiting to be converted on the workbench. They should work like gaunt lawnmowers, each one slicing down a swath of about 50% of the little guys 12" long and 4+" wide. If the berzerkers that the rhinos carry can disembark in cover at the end of the destroyer shock run, they'll get the drop on genestealers standing at the back.

Don't play WE. They no longer play the way fourth edition 40k works. Its all about mobility and fire power. Nids are a cc army, all competitive Nids lists max out their fire power. Even the bugs are adapting. If you think Nids are giving you trouble what are Eldar going to do to you. There are better armies of chaos to play with.

WE aren't that bad and people dont play cult armies for the easy win. Sure they are limited in fire power but with a khorne dp and bloodthirster it more than makes up for the lack of lascannons for anti tank. I love that destroyer idea.