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Hating all things imperial and power armored has lead me to acquire a Daemons, Tau, Ork and now Tyranids army. I like to be as competitive as possible but with the models I'll be receiving and what I'll be able to scratch build I wanted to see if this army was worth the time of day. This also would be a candidate for me to take to the Bay Area Open, or at least I would like it to be.

1850

HQ
Hive Tyrant - Heavy Venom Cannon, LW/BS, Old Adversary, Adrenal Glands, Regen, Paroxysm, Leech Essence
Tyrant Guard x2 - Lash whips

Elites
Hive Guard x2

Hive Guard x2

Hive Guard x2

Troops
Termagaunts x10

Termagaunts x10

Termagaunts x10

Tervigon - Adrenal Glands, Toxin Sacs, Single set of Scything Talons, Catalyst

Tervigon - Adrenal Glands, Toxin Sacs, Single set of Scything Talons, Catalyst

Tervigon - Adrenal Glands, Toxin Sacs, Single set of Scything Talons, Catalyst

Heavy Support
Trygon - Adrenal Glands

Trygon - Adrenal Glands

Couple notes on some of the upgrades: Regen on the hive tyrant and the scything talons on the tervigons were bought because I had 35 points left over and didn't know what else to do with them. (20 for the regen on the tyrant and 5 per tervigon talon set)

I'm trying to wrap my head around how to play tyranids and it seems like target saturation is one of the most effective ways to keep the bugs walking till they get to eat something. Without anybody local that plays them competitively or even tries to I'm left with perusing blogs and the odd battle report over here. I'm somewhat at a loss though as I would like to keep FnP on the bigger and scarier targets for as long as possible and make decisions between who to shoot at as difficult as possible. With the Tervigons getting cover from the trygons and tyrant I'm aiming to present few good decisions when shooting at 6 wound MCs and with the centrally located tyrant hopefully getting both fnp and cover being the toughest nut to crack.

Obviously I need to be very wary of being multi-charged with my gants getting caught with say a trygon and losing combat by some absurd number, but that's a skill I'll just have to learn and I've been getting much better at judging charge ranges, especially for 18" charge range units so I'm hopeful I'll be able to recognize when that's going to happen and adjust with movement and runs.

Anti tank seems to be THE issue with nids but since this is more the beginning of the swarm rather than the culmination I'd like to be able to put up a good fight against most armies at this point before I look at the more nuanced play for nids.

I would throw in some warriors.
and for anti-tank a bio-vore.

OrionDisciple. wrote:I would throw in some warriors.
and for anti-tank a bio-vore.

Warriors are bad, and Bio-vores aren't anti-tank....are you drunk?

@OP, your army is literally THE cookie-cutter net list. Not likely to get much better then what you have really.

I'd suggest dropping the HVC on the tyrant personally, and regen, and Adrenal glands.
Drop the scything talons on the Tervigons for toxin-sacs so your gaunts are poisoned.

Carnage43 wrote:

OrionDisciple. wrote:I would throw in some warriors.
and for anti-tank a bio-vore.

Warriors are bad, and Bio-vores aren't anti-tank....are you drunk?

@OP, your army is literally THE cookie-cutter net list. Not likely to get much better then what you have really.

I'd suggest dropping the HVC on the tyrant personally, and regen, and Adrenal glands.
Drop the scything talons on the Tervigons for toxin-sacs so your gaunts are poisoned.

Agree on dropping scything talons for toxin sacs on the tervigon. Fairly solid 1850 list - maybe the tyrant is a bit overtooled and you could maybe look at making one trygon a prime.

OrionDisciple. wrote:I would throw in some warriors.
and for anti-tank a bio-vore.

This guy was obviously joking.

Anyway, the tyrant:
Lash whip/adrenal glands, the first renders the second next to useless... 10 points
HVC, not TL, so not that reliable, not to speak of -1 to damage roll, and it is the only "long" range weapon in the army... 25 points
Regeneration, the tyrant has leech essence and having 2x guards, he's got more than a chance to get to use it... 20 points

55 points I would use in TL brain leech for the tyrant and upgrading a trygon to prime, for +6 shots and the possibility of DS him providing synapse where needed (not that there's lack of it, at all, but since you chose old adversary and not hive commander, no tervigon will outflank so DSing is not very advisable)

You can also get those 15 points spent in scything talons for the tervigons for perhaps onslaught for one of them, this way you can have any one shooting unit gain up to 6" range (at the cost of one less catalyst, bear in mind)

9+ scoring units is nice, more so if poisonous, so nothing to object there.

Change the Tyrant to double devourers and take a single Guard with a whip.

Eiltes are fine.

Talons don't do a fat lot for the Tervigons. If you want them combat affective get crushing claws and add toxin sacs to make the Termagants more affective.

@mercer

The original list I'd thought up had the 2 t/l devourers so that's easy enough to change back especially in my head as to how the army would work. Why should I drop a guard though? It seems like he would be a pretty high priority target as the source of preferred enemy and paroxysm so wouldn't keeping the 2nd tyrant guard be better than removing it?

@Enkhana
I'm not sold on the prime upgrade with this much synapse coverage atm which is why I think what I have works. Since I'm new to playing bugs I want to keep the list pretty straight forward to play for now before I get into deepstriking trygons and outflanking tervigons and such. I guess the same can be said for only keeping catalyst instead of trying out onslaught for now, I'm just not sure how it would work but it's definitely something to try out and expand upon later.

So current list is now looking like:

1850

HQ
Hive Tyrant - 2 t/l Devourers, Old Adversary, Regen, Paroxysm, Leech Essence
Tyrant Guard x2 - Lash whips

Elites
Hive Guard x2

Hive Guard x2

Hive Guard x2

Troops
Termagaunts x10 - Toxin

Termagaunts x10 - Toxin

Termagaunts x10

Tervigon - Adrenal Glands, Toxin Sacs, Catalyst

Tervigon - Adrenal Glands, Toxin Sacs, Catalyst

Tervigon - Adrenal Glands, Toxin Sacs, Catalyst

Heavy Support
Trygon - Adrenal Glands

Trygon - Adrenal Glands

More comments and criticism is of course welcome! If you think something doesn't work please also explain why as I don't have any tabletop experience playing as nids. Thanks!

If a Tervigon has Adrenal Glands and/or Toxin-sacs, any termigant brood with at least 1 model within 6" get them for free. Therefore it's pointless to put toxin-sacs on those 2 gaunt broods.

I still suggest dropping regen on the tyrant.

Carnage43 wrote:If a Tervigon has Adrenal Glands and/or Toxin-sacs, any termigant brood with at least 1 model within 6" get them for free. Therefore it's pointless to put toxin-sacs on those 2 gaunt broods.

I still suggest dropping regen on the tyrant.

I understand that but what would I be able to use those 40 points on? 8 Gaunts? I guess there's an argument to be made for that, I'm just not sure though. Do you think I need a trygon prime? What does it do for me other than being a source of synapse and 6 more str 5 shots?

I think it all looks pretty solid.

With Leech Essence and presumably FNP (catalyst) you can probably get away with one Tyrant Guard and no regen on the Tyrant. The amount of firepower that would need to be pummeled into this unit to take them down would be significant, and would leave your enemy with two relatively untouched Trygons to deal with.

More Gants would be better than the Toxin, but if you're worried about you foot Tyrant and have 40 points to spare - armoured shell is probably the one to take. It's very satisfying in the current missile spam to watch as 15 longfangs fire into you Tyrant and they kill...nothing

MrDrumMachine wrote:@mercer

The original list I'd thought up had the 2 t/l devourers so that's easy enough to change back especially in my head as to how the army would work. Why should I drop a guard though? It seems like he would be a pretty high priority target as the source of preferred enemy and paroxysm so wouldn't keeping the 2nd tyrant guard be better than removing it?

You get cover easier with a single Guard and costs less points too. With double Guard you need to make sure both those Guard are in cover to get cover save, with just one then only that Guard needs to be in cover which is a lot easier to do and same benefits.

mercer wrote:

MrDrumMachine wrote:@mercer

The original list I'd thought up had the 2 t/l devourers so that's easy enough to change back especially in my head as to how the army would work. Why should I drop a guard though? It seems like he would be a pretty high priority target as the source of preferred enemy and paroxysm so wouldn't keeping the 2nd tyrant guard be better than removing it?

You get cover easier with a single Guard and costs less points too. With double Guard you need to make sure both those Guard are in cover to get cover save, with just one then only that Guard needs to be in cover which is a lot easier to do and same benefits.

I see what you're saying now, thanks for clarifying. What do you suggest I do with the extra 65 points (85 if the toxin sacks are removed from the termagaunts)?

Turning a single hive guard brood into a 2 "man" zoanthrope brood w/spore takes just 60, so you can ambush that slippery skimmer...
25 points remaining could go for a pair of crushing claws for that tyrant's FnP provider, and it could benefit from old adversaries, to boot.

@slice'n'dice:
I like the armored shell idea, if there are nowhere else for those 40 points to be spent.

MrDrumMachine wrote:

mercer wrote:

MrDrumMachine wrote:@mercer

The original list I'd thought up had the 2 t/l devourers so that's easy enough to change back especially in my head as to how the army would work. Why should I drop a guard though? It seems like he would be a pretty high priority target as the source of preferred enemy and paroxysm so wouldn't keeping the 2nd tyrant guard be better than removing it?

You get cover easier with a single Guard and costs less points too. With double Guard you need to make sure both those Guard are in cover to get cover save, with just one then only that Guard needs to be in cover which is a lot easier to do and same benefits.

I see what you're saying now, thanks for clarifying. What do you suggest I do with the extra 65 points (85 if the toxin sacks are removed from the termagaunts)?

Armoured shell is great for taking krak missiles.

Thanks for the good ideas everybody, I'll be trying them out over vassal for a little and see how it all comes together and hopefully once my army arrives I'll get some real games in.