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Hi,

I have just recently started a Tyranid army. I am thinking of modelling a brood of Tyranid Warriors and I will include a Prime. I am currently faced with the difficult decision of what weapons/biomorphs to use. The Warriors will be a mixture of close combat and range.

I was thinking of this...

A pair of Boneswords
Deathspitters
Adrenal Glands

One Warrior in the brood would carry a Barbed Strangler.

Any suggestions would be kindly appreciated.

Warriors are always a gamble in my opinion. Too many armies have S8 weaponry able to just completely pulp them.

Whenever I take them, I take them with Devourers and lashwhip/bonesword, and toxin sacs. Delivery of 7 by Mycetic spore.

What usually happens is that I spore in, shoot some stuff, then take 2 deaths by shooting and am then charged. This is because the opponent knows that they are fragile to S8, and one of my more expensive units worth his attention.
The setup I give above allows you to attack first and reroll wounds against most opponents. Adrenal glands serve the function of letting you attack 1st against marines if you get the charge, but only on the first round IF you get the charge. Instead, try re-rolling the wounds since your Str will likely be equal to the toughness. You'll also get a chance for ID and power weapon armor denial.

My one piece of advice is this: Keep them cheap and have support.

Warriors by themselves will crumble but if you have them protected by gaunts and big monsters they can be quite effective. I agree with Doomthumbs in that boneswords are great and so are lash whips... All the enemy has to do is sit back in cover, shoot you with the special/heavy weapon in the squad, wait for you to charge, and then go first because we have no grenades. Taking lash whips at least permits you to go simul. I use them primarily for synapse and counter charge since they are not very effective with only 3 attacks.

With scything talons, adrenals, and rending they can hurt vehicles pretty well though. Re-roll 1's with S5 and rending can be very useful at only 35 points per model. It's not great, but again good for counter charge or vehicles that can't shoot much in return.

Hiya, welcome to the Hive Mind!

I'm sorry to say that Tyranid Warriors are a very difficult unit to use and widely considered to be overpriced, points-wise, for what a T4 W3 model can do in a game where S8 long range guns are very popular.

That's not to say they're to be avoided at all costs (though don't expect to see them in any high-ranked tournament lists). If you can get them into combat whilst avoiding powerfists and S8 shooting, they can inflict frightening amounts of casualties on MEQs and Terminators who don't carry Storm Shields. Mycetic Spores and Hive Commanders (activating Outflank) can really help with this, though in both cases you have to leave the Prime behind.

Being an expensive unit to start with, tooling them up to multi-task makes them eat up even more of your army budget. If you can save 50pts on the unit, that's another 10 Gaunts you can throw at your opponent. With this in mind, Warriors are most likely to give a return on the investment if you equip them as specialists rather than arm them to the teeth with weapons for all occasions.

If you want them to shoot stuff up, they're going to compete with other units for the role. Each basic Warrior with Devourer costs the same as three Devourer-armed Gaunts, who will not die to a single Krak missile and have three times as much firepower. Upgrading to Deathspitters and including a Prime does make them more powerful, and capable of blowing up Trukks or disabling Rhinos. A venom cannon might seem like a helpful addition to this role, but in all seriousness it does less damage to armour than a Krak Grenade. A barbed strangler is my weapon of choice, to force infantry to roll pinning tests. Of course, the more powerful you make the unit, the more tempting a target it becomes for S8 shooting to wipe it out.

If you want them to fight in melee, then dual boneswords are very powerful. However, the number of multi-wound models you're likely to encounter makes the 3D6 test a bit unnecessary; characters tend to be either too mobile for this unit to catch, or hiding in a blob of TH/SS termies that will beat you down. On the other hand, an army with no Frag Grenade factories can benefit really well from Lash Whips - which also force Grey Knights and Blood Angels FC'ing with LC's to strike at I1. With the enemy pushed to I1, and other units like Hive Guard and Tyrannofexes and Trygons having anti-tank work in hand, AG is a bit unnecessary; TS, on the other hand, increase the number of MEQs and Terminators you kill by 50% (and laugh in the face of MC's).

Unfortunately, every Powerfist-wielding Nob or Veteran Sergeant is still going to kill three wounds' worth of Warrior with almost every hit. You remember how Devilgaunts out-shoot Warriors? Well, Genestealers outperform them in this MEQ-stabbing business as well - and have built-in Outflanking. It's because of the above issues that most plastic Tyranid Warriors I see have been converted into Primes (who make excellent bullet sponges when joining Venomthrope, Tyrant Guard, Hive Guard and Carnifex units), Hive Guard or Tyrant Guard.

Like I say, there's no reason not to take a unit you really like aesthetically in friendly games, but be warned - there's not many situations where Warriors outperform another Troops choice.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Interesting suggestion there, Doomthumbs. I'm wondering how it might benefit from a foot-slogging Prime in a Gaunt blob running over to join the unit where possible to maximise its killing potential and soak up a few S8/9 hits...

Warriors are not that bad at all. They require a lot of experience though and you need to play ten - fifteen games with them top begin to understand their true strengths. But then Nids are not a beginners army are they? Run them with a Prime ( Dual Boneswords, Adrenal, Regen). A squad of five w/ LS/BS Toxin and either VC or BS will hold the middle of table well. You can always GTG when your Prime takes a wound. You need a good solid cc unit to take on your opponent's heavy hitters. Warriors fill this niche. I would screen everything with two squads of Gargs myself ... run three squads of Stealers and then HG for AT.

No winning lists have Warriors? That's just not true. I've seen lists without Tervigons or Hive Guard win. The net is full of advice on what works in the Terv/HG lists because Nid lists are all based on mutual support. But thsat are different ways to field Nids ... it takes practice though. I have a friend who plays a list with dual primes and dual squads of Warriors at 1500 points. He uses three squads of Stealers, two squads of HG and two squads of Gargs. Now Catalyst would be nice but not having any MCs really is what makes the list tick. He gets a lot of cover and easily overwhelms a flank if you are not careful. He maintains mid table control well.

lindsay40k wrote:...Hive Commanders (activating Outflank) can really help with this, though in both cases you have to leave the Prime behind...

I am unsure if this is the case, as per this thread: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/371378.page#2859268

This is really open to interpretation as the rules are vague, so depends on who you are playing.