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Everyone knows how handy toxin sacs are on gaunts and gargoyles, this upgrade for both are well worth it. Not everyone is so convinced with adrenal glands however. I`m just wondering why not?

Myself personally will not leave home without either, i feel its either take both or dont take the units at all. For me it comes down to 2 things:

1, It makes them, on the charge, a 4`s to wound with re-rolls against T4 units, am sure you will all agree thats priceless these days.

2, For me more importantly it is for this, All of these units, on the charge again, can now lay down a fantastic amount of S4 attacks. Which can now hurt rear armour 10.

I run all my gaunt type units no smaller than 15 models as i find this equates to about the right size for points, any more begins to get too costly. 15 h-gaunts with t-sacs and a-glands = 150 pts, bargain me feels. 15 gargoyles, as above, = 120 pts, Even bigger bargain. These 2 units now have the potential to kill anything in the game short of L-raiders, monoliths, our best mate av 11+ and walkers. This for me is why i think ive been having a bit of success with my nids, it adds a bit more options to what these units can offer.


So what do people think, usefull additional option, viable tactic, or too expensive

I think it comes down to, people want their cheap troops, to be cheap. For the upgrades your tacking onto the gaunts for example, you could have MORE gaunts for the same price, more bodies means, the unit survives longer, and has more attacks. Same reason you dont ever see Ard Boyz in Ork lists. Sure a 4+ save sounds nice, but in the end, having more cheap bodies is more deadly then having less, tougher bodies

I run both adrenal glands and toxin sacs when I run Gargoyles, and I agree that they are mandatory.

However, I don't like hormagaunts. They only have three real advantages over gargoyles; +1 attack, re-roll 1's to hit, and their 'scoring' status. However, they lose out on fleshborers, they are smaller models and hence can't give cover to MC's, are not Jump Infantry, and are 2pts more with both upgrades.

Seeing as 'Nids seem to have no trouble holding objectives, I'd run gargoyles over hormagaunts in every situation unless the 'Gants are being outflanked by a Hive Commander Tyrant, and that would require a very specific list. Really, gargoyles are fantastic, but I struggle to justify Hormagaunts...

Genestealers. 15 super-H-gants or 10 naked stealers.

Stealer have fewer bodies but can;
-Operate independently
-Deploy in more favourable positions
-Ample chance for 1st-turn charge
-Point-for-point, will destroy vehicles better than h-gants ability to glance them to death.
-Do well against dedicated CC infantry.
-Has a chance to damage walkers.

The long & short of it. Bold is the important bit.

Edit: The same statement about super H-gants & gargoyles can be applied to super T-gants, either naturally buffed or buffed by a tervigon or three. Then you can easily have ample bodies.

I wouldn't use adrenal glands to glance vehicles to death, but I agree that adrenal glands/toxin sacs is a great combo and makes a mediocre assault troop extremely killy against MEQ.

If you have a venomthrope nearby the gaunts get defensive grenades, so will count as S4 against vehicles (only one attack each though).
It can work if you really don't want to take adrenal glands, or want to have another go at hitting the vehicle on your opponents turn (provided it didn't move away).

cheers all for the response, i`m not running loads of them just 1 unit but i like them and theyve done well for me so far, thank fully.

i do appreciate that quantity has a quality all of its own but i feel that just having loads of gaunts is almost pointless if they cant do anything.

i`m also running 2 units of genestealers with broodlords as well these do great and terrify every1, but i use the h-gaunts in a counter attack fashion it they tend to hurt a lot of things with this set-up.

i generally dont have m/c in my nids, theyre almost pouintless like all m/c`s in my area, too easy to kill, except for my trygon, that backs up my gargoyles and parasite and causes holy terror especially when the raveners are thier as well.

i`m not convinced about the ard boyz example, i run 12 in trukk, and i love them, they are total win as far as i`m concerned. no point in having a hundred useless troops when 50 usefull ones will do twice the damage.

once again thanks for all your opinions, if anyone else has anything to add, crack on. K

except when we are having a match man and my grey knights squish them lol

Yeah yeah yeah jambo, they didnt squish them, they cleansed them, bloody crowe, damn you mimsy:-)

kryczek wrote:Yeah yeah yeah jambo, they didnt squish them, they cleansed them, bloody crowe, damn you mimsy:-)

lmao so did the dreadnought if you remeber and you can call me Jimmy

I hate you jimmy with all that i am. lol.

lmao just genious

Obviously not a genius with spelling then jambo m8 lol.

Arson Fire wrote:If you have a venomthrope nearby the gaunts get defensive grenades, so will count as S4 against vehicles (only one attack each though).
It can work if you really don't want to take adrenal glands, or want to have another go at hitting the vehicle on your opponents turn (provided it didn't move away).

I'm not really sure thats how it works...

Seeing as you know... all it is, is Toxic Spores....

Bloodhorror wrote:

Arson Fire wrote:If you have a venomthrope nearby the gaunts get defensive grenades, so will count as S4 against vehicles (only one attack each though).
It can work if you really don't want to take adrenal glands, or want to have another go at hitting the vehicle on your opponents turn (provided it didn't move away).

I'm not really sure thats how it works...

Seeing as you know... all it is, is Toxic Spores....

Toxic Spores that have friendly units within range "count-as being armed with defensive grenades"; then you can check what Defensive grenades do against vehicle on page 63 of the BRB.

I more than agree with giving Garg's TS + AG. They'll go from 6 pts per model to 8 pts per model, sure, but what's MORE important than this, IMO, is efficiency. If you land your assault, you'd like your units to be able to actually kill your opponents units, rather than better survivability.

Against MEQ's and other T4 units, your Garg´s will benefit GREATLY from having these upgrades. If you run a Flyrant aswell, you'll get re-rolls on both to-hit and to-wound.

Gargs are sure one of my favorite units for a good number of reasons. Only downside to them it that they're so fragile when needing to carry them around -.-

so you are saying to make gargoyles do well in CC you should spend 8*#of gargoyles in points, then add 255 points... That is a minimum of 335 points to have 10 Gargoyles that only have an 18.75% chance to kill a MEQ/attack(and only have 20 attacks, if you get all 10 engaged). That is 3.75 dead Marines in your assault(and only 7.5 dead guardsmen), or a return of 60 points in marines, or 37.5 points in guardsmen.

That is, btw, 15 hits, 11.25 wounds, followed by 3.75/7.5 failed saves(on average). And your Flyrant has just ut himself within 6" of the combat. If you add in the Tyrant(as in he is able to attack); he adds 3.2921 dead whatevers(or 52.6749 points in marines, and 16.46091 points in guardsmen) while this nets you about 7 dead marines and 11 dead guardsmen, that is still 335 points to kill 112 points in Marines, or 55 points in guardsmen.

Taking a unit that should be cheap, and adding points to make that unit a little better at killing is fine, even at a 1/3 increase in cost/model; but adding a 255 point model to get an even lower increase, while simultaneously endangering the 255 point model... that is not sound tactics.

They can be, but why would you want to use them in such a role? That's what we have Hive Guard and Zoanthropes and Tyrannofexes for...

You are correct odorofdeath, i wouldnt use them in specifically that role, but theyre handy when the rest have been annihillated.

Well some people just use Gargoyles as cheap LOS blockers, which is totally viable, and in which case they should be run un-upgraded.

I tried this, and it has some fatal flaws. First off, not every tank has 10 in the rear. You need another solution for those. Second, you have to get them there, so it's very unlikely you get chances at knocking out tanks early. Third, a lot of antitank melee can be mitigated by moving more than 6"...forcing the melee attacks to need 6's to hit.

Funny enough, the monstrous creatures are better at popping tanks than the little infantry. You could try that.

I don't know about your small gaunt squads. Seems to me that anything that can put out just average hurt can really be laying the skaeth down on them and removing a brood that was already at half strength (Beeing only 15 strong) for something that only has a meh threat to vehicles.
But hey whatever floats your boat, if it works for you then it works for you and then it's just awesome.