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i was wondering what you guys think is the best way to play a tyranid army be specific
my bro likes heavy i like all gaunt type of thing although my bro doesn't play nids

I find a happy medium works best, 3 fex, 3 zoan, 2 tyrants, and the rest WoN gaunts and maybe stealers.

I personally love a swarm with 2-3 heavy hitters.

My nid army consists of a brood of 10 rippers, a brood of 32 hormagaunts, some termagaunts and 2 hive tyrants and a brood of warriors, the rest of my points are spent on things like more rippers, raveners and gargoyles

It depends who I'm facing. If it's a tough match up between one of our veterans nidzilla. If it's a pick up game I still never leave home without a couple of fexes and a tyrant with guard (but I do go very warrior heavy). I actually have a load of lists (fluffy and fast, 27 warriors, genestealer spam, nidzilla) though I see the swarm type army as very unstable. Synapse gets targeted too quickly and then everything falls to pieces. I guess I just like to play it safe.

My nids are 2 fexes both maxed out on points (bout 300 each) and one ranged one cc. then i have a hive tyrant, but apart from that its just another 1,000+ points of lil' guys. i have loads of gaunts, but i don't really like them. on the other hand, i don't think that canifexes are particularly good for their points cost either. to be honest, my favoutrite tyranids are my many genestealers, which never fail me when it comes to kicking butt. they can swarm, but are also as effective as carnifexes in combat. rending claws is better than scythes on them though, because although i have a mix of both, the rending ones usually do better. but you can't just use them because they do suffer when it comes to ranged weapons...

so to answer your question, you need a mix of everything, i would say 1/4 points on monstrous creatures, 1/3 on gaunts, 1/3 on genstealers, and then a final 1/12 on a lictor, biovore or zoanthrope. In effect, play tyranids just like you would play any other army; tactically. get a range of different units for different roles, as you can't rely on gaunts to take out tanks, just as you can't really on fexes to take out hundreds of guardsmen.

...but if you have to choose go for an army of fexes and HTs because 1, it would look so cool, and 2, the look on the opposing players face when you deployed your army of big 'unz would be priceless. (BTW if you do all fexes and HTs then just take rippers for troops in order to fit in with force organisation).


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My nids are 2 fexes both maxed out on points (bout 300 each) and one ranged one cc. then i have a hive tyrant, but apart from that its just another 1,000+ points of lil' guys. i have loads of gaunts, but i don't really like them. on the other hand, i don't think that canifexes are particularly good for their points cost either. to be honest, my favoutrite tyranids are my many genestealers, which never fail me when it comes to kicking butt. they can swarm, but are also as effective as carnifexes in combat. rending claws is better than scythes on them though, because although i have a mix of both, the rending ones usually do better. but you can't just use them because they do suffer when it comes to ranged weapons...

so to answer your question, you need a mix of everything, i would say 1/4 points on monstrous creatures, 1/3 on gaunts, 1/3 on genstealers, and then a final 1/12 on a lictor, biovore or zoanthrope. In effect, play tyranids just like you would play any other army; tactically. get a range of different units for different roles, as you can't rely on gaunts to take out tanks, just as you can't really on fexes to take out hundreds of guardsmen.

...but if you have to choose go for an army of fexes and HTs because 1, it would look so cool, and 2, the look on the opposing players face when you deployed your army of big 'unz would be priceless. (BTW if you do all fexes and HTs then just take rippers for troops in order to fit in with force organisation).

I'm the idiot you'll love to hate fielding 8 MC's in a friendly game mainly because everything else besides stealers is fail deathspitter warriors can work but for the price of a good brood theres 2 dakka fex's.

Even though i only have 2 tyrants and 2 fex's at the moment i have another 4 comnig soon I hope to finish my Nidzilla play afew games then have some decent cash built up for the new nid codex.

My goal every game is to fill up all of my slots in the force organization chart. I try to fit over 100 models in at 1500 points with only a handful of MC's. This usually works pretty well for me because, unlike the other armies in 40k, they can't really pick out your best unit to take out with a drop podded Dreadnought or a charge with the seer council.

Plus, the enemy can't run if your troops line the board from end to end and simply 'windshield wipe" across the board.

Of course, horde lists tend to do poorly vs Mech. lists. There is always the chance that you run into a list that has troops too powerful to swarm over (nobz or their equivalents).

Plus, swarms are fun to play against! What opponent wouldn't love mowing down handfuls of models every turn?

Sebulba wrote:Plus, swarms are fun to play against! What opponent wouldn't love mowing down handfuls of models every turn?

The ones that wouldn't love games where they can physically construct a life-sized land raider, with their bare hands, in the time it takes you to complete your movement phase.

I played a game of planetstrike on Friday night against my buddy's CSMs for 1500 pts. As the attacker I took:
2x24 guants
11 genestealers w. broodlord
12 genestealers
2 zoas
2 'fexs with barbed strangler (under 115 pts each)
1 HT with barbed strangler
2 lictors

Worked really well... for those that say 'stealers aren't very good, i find the tend to eat up enemy HQ units with their sheer number of attacks on that initial round of CC...especially when they have implant attacks.

My option wasn't up there. Warriors! These guys are my mainstay, along with shooty gaunts and Melee fexes. May sound bad, but it does about 50/50 for win/loss in my local area. I'd never take it to a torny, but pull it out for fun all the time.

In the current mech heavy environment, the best Tyranid tactic is: wait until January.

Iboshi2 wrote:My option wasn't up there. Warriors! These guys are my mainstay, along with shooty gaunts and Melee fexes. May sound bad, but it does about 50/50 for win/loss in my local area. I'd never take it to a torny, but pull it out for fun all the time.

Well, I finally pulled out 1 of the battleforces I had laying about and had a great idea for some warriors... templates, templates templates. I'm going with deathspitters and 1 with a barbed strangler. Is this largely what you go with on yours?

It's a very popular build. Hurts hordes and has the capability to take out transports (with a bit of luck).

I've always been hurt by carnifexes/tyrants with devourers, warriors with loads of templates, and genestealers with extended carapace.

On the other hand, and I hate to be a spoilsport, weapons costs and statistics are likely to change with the new codex in January - tyrant, carnifex, warrior, gaunt and genestealer models will probably stay the same - but its hard to tell what upgrades will stay good and which will become useless, what new abilities will be introduced. I would not even glue together any plastic carnis or warriors at the moment. Stick to gaunts, which should retain the same basic armament.

Unfortunately I've already got most of it all together and unless they nerf the barbed strangler/115 pts Carnifex and/or really improve upon the venom cannon's ability to kill tanks the army is pretty much what it'll be.

Although I'm almost afraid to see what they'll come up with to nerf my main army.

BTW, you find the devourers on the MCs to be deadly? With a max strength of 6, they're really only good for troop killing though.

Devourers are only for killing troops, but a carnifex has 8 shots, rerolls to hit and to wound mean just under 6 wounds on all but the toughest troops. (before saves) That's good, reliable damage. A tyrant has 12 shots, and will put 10 wounds on troops, despite the lower strength (It's assumed you give a tyrant +1 Str.) If the MC gets in charge range of a slow-moving tank, he can still mess it up.

I wouldn't worry too much about the main guns, I'd be shocked if stranglers and venom cannons were nerfed - just don't glue anything on with loads of plastic glue, it can get impossible to break them apart without permament damage.

I don't even expect anything to become invalidated (honestly, how many things in a new codex actually get WORSE?) but you'll be a bit dissapointed if deathspitters become S10 AP1 blasts for 5 points (joking, but usually some previously neglected guns become cheaper and/or better) and you've irreversibly melted scything talons onto all your bugs!

Hmm... I was thinking about tweaking my army to be templates everywhere. I'm finding that more and more in larger games, people are packing their units close together so scatter is almost welcomed... you know?

But I have to admit, I'm tempted to make some dakka-fexes and dakka-HT's now.

I'm making an all rounder army.I just need to paint it...

GauntsGauntsGaunts all you really need are gaunts

What do you think about flying rippers and ravenors?

Airmaniac wrote:In the current mech heavy environment, the best Tyranid tactic is: wait until January.

QFT here hopefully after new dex i want have to field 8 MC's to win a game. Thank god i love swarm but i also love winning sothe two never combine well for me.

I like my 'fexes, but outfitting them is always kinda difficult. I suggest that you use magnets so that you can swap.

Use a broodlord and genestealer bodyguard. Use lots more genestealer units. Swarm the enemy with genestealers all with scuttelers so they all scout move before the game.

Genestealers are very hard assault units, its true. Their initiative is high, and they get a lot of attacks on the charge if you pay the points for scything talons, and their attacks are rending. Add in fleet of foot, and scouting moves, and they can be across the table fairly quickly. I like to couple them with hormagaunts, who consist of the first wave to weaken the enemy units, and carnifexes that are too large to ignore.

FoxPhoenix135 wrote:Genestealers are very hard assault units, its true. Their initiative is high, and they get a lot of attacks on the charge if you pay the points for scything talons, and their attacks are rending. Add in fleet of foot, and scouting moves, and they can be across the table fairly quickly. I like to couple them with hormagaunts, who consist of the first wave to weaken the enemy units, and carnifexes that are too large to ignore.

In the past week I put together a heavy stealer list that did just this. Though, I omitted Carnifex's completely (shocking, I know), and just fielded more stealers. It's been a lot of fun and really effective. Turn 2, 4 outflanking squads plus the HT gaunts and stealers already on the middle of the board? Good times for 'Nids.

-Fool Whip

I do my best to use the tyranid rules to play a genestealer cultist army. This is of course limiting myself by fluff, but I enjoy the story elements a lot. One of my main issues is that many of the tyranid troops are pretty tricky to represent with a genestealer cult. This is of course very painful when it comes to carnifexes. Best plan so far is to spend a lot of money and time to get hold of a few of the old Inquisitor 54mm scale genestealers, they should look the part.

Lacking carnifexes I find tanks and mech armies to be pretty hard targets for me. Warpblasts from my Zoanthropes (a magus and her two acolytes) and from my HT (the classic throned patriarch being carried into battle on the shoulders of four BDSM-dressed men) are my only attack with str over 6. The rest of my army are stealers, lots of spinegaunts (brainwashed imperial citicens) and some warriors with deathspitters (hybrids w grenadelaunchers). So it's pretty much a horde army with extra synapse.

I have yet to face any amount or kind of infantry that poses a problem to me.

I use everything I have (which really isn't much). So basically 2 battle forces (i don't use the hormy's and the second squad of stealer's. On top of that i've got the brood lord and i'm hoping to get a hive tyrant soon (finally)

I basically move everything up apart from a squad of three warriors, a gun fex and a squad of gaunts. three squads of gaunts then move forward with a dakkafex and another squad of warriors. a broodlord then goes to infiltrate with a retinue. it works awesomely in my oppinion