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So, essentially, I want to cheat.

What I'd like to do is ask for all of your opinions of the best ways in which to field troop choices, to do troop-choice things, for a Tyranid army, including ideas behind the units.

So MC stampedes with tervigons, gaunt walls and venom thropes, outflanking genestealers, Tyranid Warrior broods - Now that nids have been out for a while now, What actually works and how does it work best?

Gratz

I generally field my nids with the following Troops:

Terivgon: Cluster Spines, Toxin Sacs, Adrenal Glands, Catalyst - 195
Terivgon: Cluster Spines, Toxin Sacs, Adrenal Glands, Catalyst - 195
Termagants x12 - 60
Termagants x12 - 60
Genestealers x14: Toxin Sacs - 238
Genestealers x14: Toxin Sacs - 238

Warrior squads aren't very good IMO. A mix of tervigons, genestealers and gants works best. Never really tried Hormies though.

Razerous wrote:So, essentially, I want to cheat.

What I'd like to do is ask for all of your opinions of the best ways in which to field troop choices, to do troop-choice things, for a Tyranid army, including ideas behind the units.

So MC stampedes with tervigons, gaunt walls and venom thropes, outflanking genestealers, Tyranid Warrior broods - Now that nids have been out for a while now, What actually works and how does it work best?

Gratz

What works? Short awser. We do not know.

Long awser: Instead of trying to decide what sort of soft drink you want, decide what you want to dinner first.

Or to explain the analogy try to decide what you will do vs mech in your list, and fill in the blanks aftewards. Why is this important?

Well, if you meet mech and you do not have a list suited for it, you will lose. Check out this thread:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/348200.page

EDIT: You need to think of the nid codex very diferently then any other codex. In the other codexes you build a skeleton, srarting with a spine (Grey hunters and long fangs/Mephiston and priests) and adding what you like. Tyranids have more of a hydrostatic skeleton, like yellyfish. In short, we have had them around for a long time, but the internett at large do have no idea what the codex needs to do.

I like hormies, stealers gnats and warriors. I usually out flank the warriors using the ability from the tyrant. They can usually get the jump on those pesky missle spam devs as well.

Tervigons are amazing.

Hormies are quite nice as well, especially with FNP from Big Mama.

Seems pretty simple to me.

In an army without Tervigons a small 3 man shooty warrior squad makes a good objective holder and center synapse unit. They are of little direct threat threat so are often ignored by the big guns for the first few turns, which is often all the time you need to deal to missiles.

If you find they are not ignored by big guns early in the game you need more units that demand immediate attention ie: Trygons.

Hormies make a great screening unit. Add toxin sacs to make them good at assault, and enough bodies to soak up some fire. I don't like giving them both toxin sacs and adrenals cause they still die just as easy but cost almost double the points.

Niiai wrote:

What works? Short awser. We do not know.

Long awser: Instead of trying to decide what sort of soft drink you want, decide what you want to dinner first.

Or to explain the analogy try to decide what you will do vs mech in your list, and fill in the blanks aftewards. Why is this important?

Well, if you meet mech and you do not have a list suited for it, you will lose. Check out this thread:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/348200.page

EDIT: You need to think of the nid codex very diferently then any other codex. In the other codexes you build a skeleton, srarting with a spine (Grey hunters and long fangs/Mephiston and priests) and adding what you like. Tyranids have more of a hydrostatic skeleton, like yellyfish. In short, we have had them around for a long time, but the internett at large do have no idea what the codex needs to do.

Couldn't have said it better .
Sorry bro but your best bet is to just play you cant ask people to tell you how to win cuz you can take 15 termagants with toxin and win combat against terminators I know from experience but then again that same squad could wipe your field in 3 turns the next game. We've all seen crazy stuff happen.

This isn't some consule game where there's an I win button or invisibility modes. The game is ever changing, challenging, and rewarding. Instead of trying to get that I win button make your own and play to win not expect to win cuz if you go into a mta h expecting to win your gonna lose...

Okay then to answer the general response;

What one troop choice would be viable to outflank (via a Hive Tyrants ability). Squad of gants, hormagaunts or a Tervigon? Would be in fact a good idea to bother making use of this ability? Etc.

I like the idea of the synergy between a Hive Tyrant (with Hive Commander and Old Adversary) moving up with a Tervigon, venomthrope and a screen of gants. Essentially the gants become super gants and the entire bubble protects itself. But would one Tervigon be enough?

Outflanking a tervigon and drop striking a brood of devilgaunts in a spore has always been good to me, unexpectedly resilient as a team, auto-synapse, 3+ (4+ including the spore) scoring units and decent anti hordes/AV (light to medium ) capability.

Tervigon, toxin sacks, adrenal glands and crushing claws. Outflank this guy into the back of a mech gunline and watch him just wreck face. He tears apart that artillery pieces that's trying to annoy you the entire game and then the turn after he comes in (must spawn before movement) he can squirt out a unit of terribly strong freebies that can mix it up and cause havoc wherever you need them to.

How much do you really get out of the crushing claws there?

Razerous wrote:Okay then to answer the general response;

What one troop choice would be viable to outflank (via a Hive Tyrants ability). Squad of gants, hormagaunts or a Tervigon? Would be in fact a good idea to bother making use of this ability? Etc.

I like the idea of the synergy between a Hive Tyrant (with Hive Commander and Old Adversary) moving up with a Tervigon, venomthrope and a screen of gants. Essentially the gants become super gants and the entire bubble protects itself. But would one Tervigon be enough?

But you are still starting at the wrong end: How do you deal with mech? Both Homogaunts (w. adrenal glands!) and the trevigon are very good at outflanking. Both perform well. There is still the matter of zynapse though.

I usually start each of my Tyranid lists with at least 1 unit of Termagaunts and 1 Tervigon in my troops. The overwhelming majority of the time though, I'll want at least 2 Tervigons as troops.

I also LOVE big units of Genestealers. They wreck house, especially when they have FNP to help protect them. They have flexible deployment options as well.

Niiai wrote:But you are still starting at the wrong end: How do you deal with mech? Both Homogaunts (w. adrenal glands!) and the trevigon are very good at outflanking. Both perform well. There is still the matter of zynapse though.

Okay - I want two Tyrgons. Due to this and their potential to burrow & win at life, I've fielded a Trygon. Subsequently he fits in well with a blob squad of a Tervigon, Gants and Venomthrope. So those two will deal with a lot of mech well.

I've also liked the look of both Hive Guard and Zoanathropes. The Hive guard are tough and bullet-spewing but, mainly due to facing dual monoliths @ 1500pts fairly often, the AP1 str10 weaponary (+ lance vs all else) is too good to pass up; so Zoanies as an additional ranged supplement.

So far, so good?

Cool. Go for 2 units of 2 hive guards (I am looking at you landspeeder/vyper, chimeras/rhinos/) and one unit of 2 or 3 zoantropes. They will work well with your trygons.

A trevigoon is good. Give him toxic sacks and catalyst (unles you wanne turbo boost the zoantropes.) It is good as scooringk, but if you do not have a better plan it will do very vell as an HQ as well, as it produces scoring units.

Niiai wrote:Cool. Go for 2 units of 2 hive guards (I am looking at you landspeeder/vyper, chimeras/rhinos/) and one unit of 2 or 3 zoantropes. They will work well with your trygons.

A trevigoon is good. Give him toxic sacks and catalyst (unles you wanne turbo boost the zoantropes.) It is good as scooringk, but if you do not have a better plan it will do very vell as an HQ as well, as it produces scoring units.

200pts in Hive guard. 120-180 in Zoanthropes. 420 in Trygons. 220 in Hive Tyrant. 400pts for two tervigons.. I'm left with 80pts. I was hoping to field a more substantial troop core than that, more like 150pts worth of gants (compared to 80) and a squad of stealers. I run out of points so quickly, too many toys.

Good point on the run + shoot onslaught power via the tervigons for the Zoanthropes.

Yes well now you see why the tyranid list is more like a yellyfish and why you need to decide how you deal with tanks.

I think your list do not need the hive tyrant (that being sead I think he is shitt, so other people might disagree) the runn and shoot with the trevigons can also work on the hive guard.

If you cut the hive tyrant and the two trygons (why do you have 210 points on each?) you get 620 points to play with.

Requia wrote:How much do you really get out of the crushing claws there?

A lot. It gives you D3 extra attacks at the cost of initiative 1. A quick stroll over by the Tyranid codex where we take a gander at the Tervigon's base initiative coupled with vehicles not having an initiative anyway makes that a complete non-factor and with 3 base attacks it's going to get a lot more mileage than if you were giving an extra D3 attacks to a Trygon somehow. A little pricey at 25 points to be sure but it's a price I'm willing to pay for some hefty insurance on monstrous creature/rear armor fun.

For Troops, I like running 2 Tervigons, 30 Hormagants With AG/TS, and 15 Devilgaunts.

First off, those Tervies are gonmna poop out alot of extra fleshborer gaunts, so your devilgaunts can get a bit of screening and its insanely great for objective based games.
And I looooooooooove Catalyst, I'll get into that with the Hgants

The 15 Devilgaunts are great, because with 3 shots each, thats 45 shots. Statistically, even with the weak bs skill, the enemy is gonna take some casualties. And Devorers cause units to take toll's on thier morale checks if they have to make one, and with 45 shots, they will proooobably have to take one.

And the 30 Hgants, at first, seem like just a great screening unit. But once you use the Tervie to slap FNP on them, now they can survive alot more shooting and can be used to take care of units you don't want to deal wih using your more valuable units (Like TH/SS Termies, the Hgaunts will beat them through sheer numbers, especially if you nail the Termies with some Devilgaunt shooting beforehand) Plus, personally, I like fielding Raveners with the Hormies as well, along with a Trygon Prime. that makes a very fast, very deadly CC phalanx with alot of threats and alot of leeway with the FNP if ou position your Tervigons well. Plus, in a pinch, you can use the Hgants as anti-tank by glancing the hell out of the tank.

Thats just my two cents on the troops for Tyranids issue.

If you want to see an opponent's jaw drop use the following recipe; 1 Hive Tyrant with old adversary, 1 Tervigon with catalyst, 30 Hormagaunts with toxin sacks. Tervigon's feel no pain and a cover save means when running across the board your gribblies get a 4+ and then another 4+ save. They're going to make it there alive. When they do nail a target with Paroxysm from the Hive Tyrant. He'll have to be nearby to use that anyway so the Hormagaunts get his old adversary. Now you have 90 attacks at 3+ to hitthat reroll all to-hit misses, have minimum 4+ to wound and frequently a reroll on that 4+ to wound and have feel no pain for any fearless wound resolution although nine time out of ten you won't need that. When you get that many rerolls on 90 attacks, stuff dies. Hard.

SumYungGui wrote:If you want to see an opponent's jaw drop use the following recipe; 1 Hive Tyrant with old adversary, 1 Tervigon with catalyst, 30 Hormagaunts with toxin sacks. Tervigon's feel no pain and a cover save means when running across the board your gribblies get a 4+ and then another 4+ save. They're going to make it there alive. When they do nail a target with Paroxysm from the Hive Tyrant. He'll have to be nearby to use that anyway so the Hormagaunts get his old adversary. Now you have 90 attacks at 3+ to hitthat reroll all to-hit misses, have minimum 4+ to wound and frequently a reroll on that 4+ to wound and have feel no pain for any fearless wound resolution although nine time out of ten you won't need that. When you get that many rerolls on 90 attacks, stuff dies. Hard.

What cover save?

I don't really understand the question. A cover save, typically obtained from having 50% or more of the unit in...cover. So, that cover save.

Oh I see, your assuming you can fit your rather large 30-strong squad (16+) behind cover or in area terrain. Fair enough, personally I'd favour fielding a venomthrope. I also think that a supergant is more effective than a AG/TS hormagaunt.

In fact it is 10pts for a decent charge range (usually the full 18" due to Bounding Leap) and 3 attacks on the charge or 5pts for 2 attacks on the charge and standard 12" charge range would suggest that the 5pt Termagant is much more cost effective.

Yeah, but honestly, a Termagaunt bare-bones isn't much good. If your going to field them, if you ask me, make them Devilgaunts (Gaunts with Devourers). The only reason fleashborer gaunts should be in a game is A: En Masse. Ridiculous mass. or B: Pooped out by a Tervigon.

Honestly, I think Hormie's potential as units are too often overlooked because they don't have guns. But honestly, they are great because they are fast and hit hard when they hit, and honestly, with Fleet+Bounding Leap, they will get to the enemy very very quickly.

I miss the days of hormies having the Beast subtype.

In regards to Gants, guns and shooting; I intend to be running everything at pace, I will only shoot them when I'm confident I can charge that same turn and only when that shooting won't cause the target unit to potentially fall back.

I don't require good shooting, just good troops. In order to field both Tervigon's as Troop Choices, I'd have to field two termagant squads.

Yeah I am assuming I can get a large group of Hormagaunts cover because I do it all the time. They have move through cover and a terrain ignoring 3D6-take-highest run. Between that and appropriate stringing out/knotting up it's very, very easy to get an entire pack of Hormagaunts 50% cover no matter where they're shot from.

The true potential of the Venomthrope is not the cover save. Yeah it's icing on the cake and worth taking for anti-shooty army role but that is not the jaw-droppingly effective thing he has going for him. He really, truly shines against other assault armies. Dangerous terrain 1-in-6-models 'charge tax' every time they want to chew on a unit of spawned termagants is brutal and defensive grenades on the same guys makes the incoming attacks noticeably less powerful.

Use them against Blood Angels and watch their feel no pain 3+ armor shenanigans become meaningless against dangerous terrain tests. Same for Dark Eldar, dangerous terrain means no feel no pain and wyches don't get their 4+ invul against it either.

SumYungGui wrote:Yeah I am assuming I can get a large group of Hormagaunts cover because I do it all the time. They have move through cover and a terrain ignoring 3D6-take-highest run. Between that and appropriate stringing out/knotting up it's very, very easy to get an entire pack of Hormagaunts 50% cover no matter where they're shot from.

The true potential of the Venomthrope is not the cover save. Yeah it's icing on the cake and worth taking for anti-shooty army role but that is not the jaw-droppingly effective thing he has going for him. He really, truly shines against other assault armies. Dangerous terrain 1-in-6-models 'charge tax' every time they want to chew on a unit of spawned termagants is brutal and defensive grenades on the same guys makes the incoming attacks noticeably less powerful.

Use them against Blood Angels and watch their feel no pain 3+ armor shenanigans become meaningless against dangerous terrain tests. Same for Dark Eldar, dangerous terrain means no feel no pain and wyches don't get their 4+ invul against it either.

Of course, I agree with all of that. On the whole I think I will prefer investing 300pts into things like genestealers and Tyrgons as vehicles is what I often face and need to be able to deal with. There is nothing worse than a heavy assault LRBT with rear AV11 when you only have str4 attacks to play with.

Cover saves for the larger broods of gants is indeed quite mediocre and can often be exceeded by standard 4+ cover saves but when applied to MC's when being targeted with AP2/3 weapons, it simply multiplies their total wound pool by about a 1/3. Venomthropes, I feel, are one of the single most underrated units in the game

They'd probably be a lot higher rated if they didn't have to compete with only decent ranged anti vehicle. But yeah, a venomthrope or two and a prime (to help absorb ID attacks) seems indispensable on a nidzilla list.