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Just started out (using battle scribe to make list). Wanting to make a Tyranid list that can possibly win games. Here we go:

1K Tyranids (995 points)

1000pt Tyranids 5th Ed (2010) Roster (Standard)

Selections:

HQ ()

Tyranid Prime (95pts)
Lash whip and Bonesword Scything talons
Tyranid Prime (95pts)
Lash whip and Bonesword Scything talons


Elites ()

Hive Guard Brood (100)
2x Hive Guard
Hive Guard Brood (100)
2x Hive Guard

Zoanthrope Brood (120)
2x Zoanthrope

Troops ()



Termagant Brood (75)
15x Termagant <---- Tyranid primes hide here


Termagant Brood (75)
15x Termagant <---- Tyranid primes hide here

Fast Attack (135pts)

Tyranid Shrike Brood (135pts)
3x Tyranid Shrike
3x Rending claws , 3x Scything talons, 3x Toxin Sacs, 3x Wings

Heavy Support ()

Trygon (200pts)

Battle plan:
Flank stealers, deploy Zoey with the hive guard to baby sit them with synapse and have the prime hide with the gaunts. Trygon can deepstrike if needed or just walk up and bash vehicles (its only 1k points)

Toxin sacs are on the shrike brood, reroll wounds for T4 = more rends.

Let me know how I can improve this, I'm nearly done painting and assembling my models. I've magnetized some of them so swapping out biomorphs and weapons are usually no issue.

EDIT: Adjusted list based on your feedback, let me know what I can improve on thanks!

Great start but from a standpoint where you are going to want to put together a lot of wins I don't see it happening with this list.

Your Shrike Brood is being left out to dry. They are very easy to kill and with only 3 they won't last long enough to make it into CC I feel. They are Instakilled my missiles and the like with ease.

One thing I would like to see is another Hive Guard to give you 2 units of 2. This will help diversify fire and add more life to the units.

Your combination of troops don't mesh well I'm afraid. I'd drop the hormagants as they are only effective with Toxin Sacs. I would get more stealers and do 2 units of 10 with TS (toxin sacs).

Your lone zoanthrope without a pod will not make it far. I would drop this unit.

One thing that is very effective in a 1000pt game is a tervigon because it is a beast at hold objectives and it produces free troops. Perhaps look at making your termagaunt unit a 10 man minimum unit and get a tervigon for a troop choice. Dropping the shikes and the zoanthrope will give you a tervigon with AG and TS. The tervigon can also give a steal unit Feel no Pain.

Lots to consider. I just don't think you list has a focus and you have grabbed a bunch of random units. I understand you are new to this so take a chance to look at other lists on dakka.

IMO Hive Guard are your best elite option BY FAR.

Best troops are stealers either outflanking or infiltrating.

Heavy I love Trygons.

HQ I typically only use a Tyrant but not because he is uber competitive but I love the modelsand he can make your force very good at certain things. Read through the codex.

Okay, I'm not going to be a big jerk about it but yeah; your list is bad. Sure the Prime is the cheapest HQ choice, but it only works with warriors. Shrikes are iffy, because strength 8 blast weapons wipe them out easily. Hormogaunts and Termagaunts work when you have 2 squads of 20+, and it requires a tervigon to produce more troops for you. Zoanthrope is useless on it's own.

Hive Guard and Genestealers are good, and you should have 2 squads of 2 HG and about 2 squads of about 10 genetealers. HQ has to be tervigon and squads of hormogaunts. You spawn Termagaunts to shield the hormogaunts, out flank with Genestealers and shoot with HG. Trygon should be upgraded to prime, to help with synapse.

You mean trygon should be prime not tervigon right?

Tervigons are very good at 1k as the above posters indicated.

If you want to run shrikes then you need at least one more in that brood and run a gargoyle screen as well. A Parasite of Mortrex build can work here at say 1,500 but may be a bit pricey at 1k.

The 2*2 hive guard is a very good idea.

Troops - base hormogaunts aren't great and vanilla gants only good for making tervigons troops.

My basic 1k list starts as follows - rest to flavour:

HQ tervigon
EL 2 hive gaurd
EL 2 hive guard
EL 2 hive gaurd
TR 10 gants
TR tervigon.

If you've started on your list so far then prime can work as HQ to babysit hive guard. If you want shrikes as well:

HQ Prime
EL 2 hive guard
EL 2 hive guard
TR 10 gants
TR tervigon
FA 4 shrikes, rending
FA 15 gargoyles
HS trygon, AG

Messed with the troops a bit and added gargoyles, but otherwise close to what you had. Use those hormogaunts as termagants for the moment.

Why do trygons take adrenal gland? They already flip vehicles with 2d6 pen roll?

Don't worry guys , criticism was very helpful, I may drop the hormagaunts and get a tervigon instead.

I've just started building Tyranid army too and I agree that the Tervigon is a must have, I can usually get at least 30 more gaunts out of him before he gets exhausted. Trygons are expensive and have to be used right if you want to get the most points of of him, do not Deep Strike him. I did this once and he didn't even get the chance to get into CC, every gun turned on him and pow, 200pts gone. If you do play with a Trygon then just have him beat it down the middle of the battlefield and run each turn rather than shoot (T6 W6 will soak up a lot of fire). Your opponent will either have to take him out or suffer serious CC casualties. I have heard a lot of people love genestealers, I personally haven't had the opportunity to use them too much but I did try out squads of 10 Hormagaunts with toxin sacs and those little guys helped me down a couple of Wraithlords in a single turn, they're small, cheap, distracting and lethal against MC of high toughness creatures. As for Zoanthropes, personally I think they are really friggin' cool and I just love the fluff behind them. In every battle I would recommend taking Doom of Malan'Tai in a spore pod ...130pts right into the middle of the enemy lines and he will suck up a whole bunch of wounds then be able to use cataclysm at a high strength. Your opponent will have to take him out or get murdered, invul save and loads of wounds should keep him around for a turn and he will buy time for the rest of your nids to close on him.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I was wondering though, what are your opinions on the less obviously good units like Venomtropes and Lictors and Pyrovores and such? I haven't used them yet but I was wondering if they're worth it.

Dr.Cuddles wrote:I've just started building Tyranid army too and I agree that the Tervigon is a must have, I can usually get at least 30 more gaunts out of him before he gets exhausted. Trygons are expensive and have to be used right if you want to get the most points of of him, do not Deep Strike him. I did this once and he didn't even get the chance to get into CC, every gun turned on him and pow, 200pts gone. If you do play with a Trygon then just have him beat it down the middle of the battlefield and run each turn rather than shoot (T6 W6 will soak up a lot of fire). Your opponent will either have to take him out or suffer serious CC casualties. I have heard a lot of people love genestealers, I personally haven't had the opportunity to use them too much but I did try out squads of 10 Hormagaunts with toxin sacs and those little guys helped me down a couple of Wraithlords in a single turn, they're small, cheap, distracting and lethal against MC of high toughness creatures. As for Zoanthropes, personally I think they are really friggin' cool and I just love the fluff behind them. In every battle I would recommend taking Doom of Malan'Tai in a spore pod ...130pts right into the middle of the enemy lines and he will suck up a whole bunch of wounds then be able to use cataclysm at a high strength. Your opponent will have to take him out or get murdered, invul save and loads of wounds should keep him around for a turn and he will buy time for the rest of your nids to close on him.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I was wondering though, what are your opinions on the less obviously good units like Venomtropes and Lictors and Pyrovores and such? I haven't used them yet but I was wondering if they're worth it.

The other elite games are good when you have larger armies (venomthrope), kill points or cities of death (lictors), and facing opposing swarm armies (pyrovores). But yeah, try a gaunt swarm army for 1k and see what you expand from there (this last statement directed towards person who started this thread).

Ok so tervigon and gaunts got it!

Yes, I suggest having a Tervigon with Catalyst, two squads of 20 Termigaunts and two squads of 15-20 Hormaguants. Remaining points can either be upgrades or support troops (maybe warriors for synapse? Trygon for power?) and just keep spawning Termagaunts in front and catalysting them as a mobile shield wall. When you're close enough, let the hormagaunts by to charge (they roll three dice for running) and use them as shock troops while everything else moves up to do wave assault. Make sure you don't lose your Tervigon early in the game, or the army will crumble.

Pyrovores are good for nothing. Avoid them.

If you're worried about swarms (don't be; Tyranids are *the* swarm army) then upgrade a gaunt squad to have devourers. But Swarms aren't big in the meta right now, and Nids are the swarmiest.

Anyway.. I second the Tervigon recommendation. Best unit in the Codex. Shrieks are fast warriors with crappier saves.. If you want to take a brood, you'll need more than 3. Unless you're devoted to them, I'd be tempted to use the points to run a warrior squad with your Tyranid Prime. They can be used without, but they're delicate and mainly good in that case just for drawing fire and/or babysitting. Alpha Warrior makes a Prime + Warriors a great deathstar unit.

I would recommend choosing between the Stealers and the Hormagaunts. Most effective Nid Lists have Tervis and Gaunts taking up a fair chunk of the Troops, and Stealers & Hormagaunts work best in big broods, rather than two little ones.

Termagaunts are only good for taking Tervis as troops, or Devourers if you want a glass cannon unit. 20 Assault 3 dice can be very intimidating, but at the end of the day they die like any other gaunt; easily.

A lone Zoanthrope won't go far. I'd recommend 2-3.

Jacko4smackos wrote:Why do trygons take adrenal gland? They already flip vehicles with 2d6 pen roll?

Average of 2d6 is 7. 7 + 6 doesn't even glance a Land Raider.

Jacko4smackos wrote:Why do trygons take adrenal gland? They already flip vehicles with 2d6 pen roll?

AG on a Trygon is great, it balances the odds of dice in better stead to get the Pen rolls you need


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Big Mek Grodclog Mekgrim wrote:Yes, I suggest having a Tervigon with Catalyst, two squads of 20 Termigaunts and two squads of 15-20 Hormaguants. Remaining points can either be upgrades or support troops (maybe warriors for synapse? Trygon for power?) and just keep spawning Termagaunts in front and catalysting them as a mobile shield wall. When you're close enough, let the hormagaunts by to charge (they roll three dice for running) and use them as shock troops while everything else moves up to do wave assault. Make sure you don't lose your Tervigon early in the game, or the army will crumble.

I don't rate Hormagaunts in a Tervigon list for two reasons, the first being cost effectiveness when building your army, they will never get reused, and they can be a pain in the arseage to transport. The second is they will never get respawned. I'd rather have the shots than hold back Hormagaunts to bullet shield them behind Termagants.

OK thanks for feedback guys, I've adjusted the list a bit. I really can't fit a tervigon and a trygon in the same 1k list. I could remove the trygon and put in a tervigon.

As suggested I moved around the hive guard and added an extra Zoey just for more reliability. The Zoeys job is primarily to babysit the hive guard and blow up stuff that comes too close

Jacko4smackos wrote:OK thanks for feedback guys, I've adjusted the list a bit. I really can't fit a tervigon and a trygon in the same 1k list. I could remove the trygon and put in a tervigon.

As suggested I moved around the hive guard and added an extra Zoey just for more reliability. The Zoeys job is primarily to babysit the hive guard and blow up stuff that comes too close

I think so long as you have AT in the list in the form of HG, then you won't need a Trygon at 1K, the Tervigon on the other hand will be great, especially if you manage to double the size of your force lols

Well hg is only str 8 and can't flip av 14 vehicles, but nOw I am lacking scoring units... Maybe you are right should replace trygon with tervigon

Jacko4smackos wrote:Well hg is only str 8 and can't flip av 14 vehicles, but nOw I am lacking scoring units... Maybe you are right should replace trygon with tervigon

from experience not many people take AV14 at 1K tbh, its just too expensive...