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Hi,

I've never actually played Tyranids, but I was wondering how effective this list would be at 1500pts:

1 Tyranid Prime, deathspitter, bonesword and lashwhip, adrenal glands = 110

3 Warriors, Adrenal glands, deathspitters, boneswords, 1x Barbed strangler = 160
3 Warriors, Adrenal glands, deathspitters, boneswords, 1x Barbed strangler = 160
3 Warriors, Adrenal glands, deathspitters, boneswords, 1x Barbed strangler = 160
3 Warriors, Adrenal glands, deathspitters, bonesword and lashwhip, 1x Barbed strangler = 175

2 Zoanthropes = 120
2 Hive Guard = 100
2 Hive Gurad = 100

Carnifex, Stranglethorn cannon, crushing claws, toxin sacks = 215
Carnifex, Stranglethorn cannon, scything claws, adrenal glands = 200

gives me 4 S4 AP5 pinning large blasts , 2 S6 AP5 pinning large blasts, 8 S8s, all long-range, plus plenty of 18" power and the 2 psychic attacks (not really reliable, but cheap enough). I could drop some lashwhips and upgrade a couple of the weapons to venom (or heavy venom): I lose template size but gain a bit of strength. I had also considered the Tyrannofex, but he's a bit too pricey.

Any advice on how to optimize a shooty tyranid list? Is it just not worthwhile?

If you want shooty, those fexes need to ditch those CC upgrades. They can still charge a tank relatively wellish. Not a big fan of warrior spam, too many battle cannons/kraks can instantly vaporise a unit. Plus as with the fexes, ditch the CC upgrades. I'd toss in some shooty gants/gargoyles

I agree on the shooty gaunts. My wife uses and LOVEs gaunts with devourers and I can tell ya, thats alot of hurtin. The first time I played against her those were my biggest downfall because I remembered them not being so awesome, but in 5th, they are friggin great lol

Thanks for the advice. If I dropped all the close combat upgrades (and dropped the Prime's weapons down to just a deathspitter and a pair of boneswords) I can afford 24 gaunts with devourers and toxin sacs, or 21 gaunts (fleshborers) and 20 gargoyles (with toxin sacs and adrenal glands). That might be the way to go, as far as providing cover to my warriors goes, and getting some mobility, though the extra deathspitters are tempting.

I cannot reinforce enough the idea that the warriors are a bad choice. T4 without eternal warrior means that all lascannons, lances, and missile launchers are going to be pointed right at them, popping them into wet blobs every turn until they are gone. Zoanthropes are *very* limited in range, and not giving them a drop pod also means that they're going to get nuked from across the table by STR8+ weapons.

Why don't you sub out the warriors for a tervigon or two, and drop in a huge mess of shooty gants?

Dashofpepper wrote:I cannot reinforce enough the idea that the warriors are a bad choice. T4 without eternal warrior means that all lascannons, lances, and missile launchers are going to be pointed right at them, popping them into wet blobs every turn until they are gone. Zoanthropes are *very* limited in range, and not giving them a drop pod also means that they're going to get nuked from across the table by STR8+ weapons.

Why don't you sub out the warriors for a tervigon or two, and drop in a huge mess of shooty gants?

Tervigons with devourer termagants screened by regular termagants would be shooty

Although that is ALOT of termagants (especially if you spawn)

well than it's alot of shooty,

agreed with shooty gaunts
warriors lost their appeal along with EW imo

and Dash a heat lance doesnt instagib a warrior

well for troops you could have:

10 x Termagants - Devours 100pts
Tervigon - AG/TS/Catalyst 195pts
10 x Termagants - Devours 100pts
Tervigon - AG/TS/Catalyst 195pts
20 x Termagants 100pts (screening unit can switch out)
20 x Termagants 100pts (screening unit can switch out)

790pts for troops, can save 200pts for something else

Also Hive guard 3 x 2 is 300 pts and gives you 12 str 8 shots that ignore los

I wouldn't go pure shooty nids because that isn't where we excel the most but if you really wanted to I can offer some suggestions of shooty things I've found to do really well.

Carnifex's with 2x TL Devourers each. Replace both ScyTals for 2x TL Devs ea and thats 12 TL Str6 shots. That's a lot of anti-infantry shots!

Another good one is the Tyrannofex. His rupture cannon is good if you can afford to run 2 of them in 2,000+ games but in lower games he an insane anti-infantry shooter. Acid Spray + His other template shots to makeup for his BS3 and its just a bunch of templates all over the place with an almost impenetrable armor. 6w t6 2+ is crazy. The hardest to take down anti-infantry we can get. My fex went up against 15, loota shots, 2 shoota boys squads, and 2x SM dev ML squads and lost 1 wound. He's amazing!

I tend to run shooting heavy `Nids right now. HQ tends to be an Alpha Warrior or Tervigon depending on points. Elites are some Hive Guard and Venomthropes. Troops or Devilgaunts, Gaunts, Tervigon/s, and usually a unit of Warriors. No Fast. Heavy is a T-Fex or two with Rupture Cannons.

Make sure you get Onslaught for the Tervigons, it can be pretty useful in a shooting list.

While Warriors are susceptible to Str8 shots, the vast majority of those get directed at the Hive Guard/Tervigons/T-Fexes. Any that do go towards Warriors are that much longer those elite units last, and still aren't guaranteed to kill because of Cover from the Gaunts/Thropes. The exception to this is Guard, where their Abundance of Str8 Large Blasts can afford to send one or two at the Warriors to deal heavy casualties without much effort.

If I were to go for shooty Tyranids, I would say something like this would work:

Hive Tyrant-345
Old Adversary
2x Devourers
2x Tyrant Gaurd

3x3 Hive Gaurd-450

2x11 Devilgant-220

2xTervigon-390
Cluster Spines
Catalyst
Adrenals
Toxin Sacks

2 Biovores-90