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What are the chances for a flying Hive Tyrant with 2 TL devourers to actually bring down a zooming flyer ?

12 TL S6 shots should have a chance to score a hit. Those AV12 flyers might be hard to get but the AV10 should be in trouble...

Is it a waste to take a 285 pts character to chase after a 200~ pts flyer ?

WRONG: 12 TL shots will hit about 3.666 times, with a S6 it wil penetrate AV10 1.22 times + glance it 0.66 times. So with some luck (and vector strike) it shoots it out of the sky. But when it's AV12 It only glances 0.666 times, so that's not working so well. Also, for 190 pts you can have a Carnifex with the same load-out (2x Devourers), so I think that's a better option to take on flyers.

edit: Didn't read the new FAQ.. Flyrant has Skyfire now

12 TL shots will hit about 9 times, vs. AV10: 1.5 glance, 3 penatrating hits. vs. AV12 1.5 glancing hits + vector strike this makes it the best anti flyer unit in the Tyranid Codex, by far!

 feluca wrote:
12 TL shots will hit about 3.666 times, with a S6 it wil penetrate AV10 1.22 times + glance it 0.66 times. So with some luck (and vector strike) it shoots it out of the sky. But when it's AV12 It only glances 0.666 times, so that's not working so well. Also, for 190 pts you can have a Carnifex with the same load-out (2x Devourers), so I think that's a better option to take on flyers.

Flyrant has Skyfire... your math is off.

Sadly the Flyrant doesn't have skyfire, in fact no Tyranid have that rule...

A FMC on the other side does have vector strike.

It's D3+1 hits resolved at S6 on the flyer side armour, then he can fire 6 TL shots at it since he can fire 360º...

Too bad we can't upgrade his strength a little...

So do I have better chances with vector strike rather than trying to shoot him down ?

Proxy wrote:
Sadly the Flyrant doesn't have skyfire, in fact no Tyranid have that rule...

A FMC on the other side does have vector strike.

It's D3+1 hits resolved at S6 on the flyer side armour, then he can fire 6 TL shots at it since he can fire 360º...

Too bad we can't upgrade his strength a little...

So do I have better chances with vector strike rather than trying to shoot him down ?

Q: Flyers are entitled to choose whether or not to use the Skyfire
special rule at the start of each Shooting phase. Can Swooping
Flying Monstrous Creatures also do this? (p49)
A: Yes.
-Official Update Version 1.0a

So yea, they can have Skyfire.

TheKbob wrote:
Q: Flyers are entitled to choose whether or not to use the Skyfire
special rule at the start of each Shooting phase. Can Swooping
Flying Monstrous Creatures also do this? (p49)
A: Yes.
-Official Update Version 1.0a

So yea, they can have Skyfire.

Didn't see this in the FAQ ! I need to reread it !
That kinda change everything... the Flyrant become a much better flyer hunter !

Awesome ! Thanks a lot for the clarification !

As per the FAQ flying tyrants have become much better at hunting fliers. Sadly Storm Ravens in zoom mode are still nearly untouchable (but less untouchable than before).

I think the points are the issue. 285 is staggering. It would have to kill more than 2 vendettas to make it's points back, and 2 vendettas will tear the tyrant's face off.

Just the rules and theory out it aren't bad, but way too inefficient.

 ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:
I think the points are the issue. 285 is staggering. It would have to kill more than 2 vendettas to make it's points back, and 2 vendettas will tear the tyrant's face off.

Just the rules and theory out it aren't bad, but way too inefficient.

Yeesh, units are not always about being killy. First turn, that Flyrant will not only cause serious damage to a vehicle or squad (or both with a good VS), it will also absorb a heinous amount of fire power that your Tervigons or other Big Bugs are not.

Grounding tests suck, yea, but if you can put a lot of weight with target priority and clever flying with the Flyrant, he can succeed.

Just don't do like what I have seen... fly it right in front of my army near my Lone Wolves. I used storm bolters to knock it out of the air and then charged it and squished it.

I agree it's inefficient, but the Tyranids have no good way of dealing with flyers. We either have low range weaponry or template weaponry...

Since I'm going to field a Dakka Flyrant most of the time, if he's doing nothing of note and see a flyer pass by he might as well swoop and try to take it down.

Can someone do the math ?
Is vectro strike/shooting 1 TL devourer more worth it than swooping and shooting both TL devourers ?

Shooting is almost always better. You'll average 4-5 Str6 hits shooting while you average 2-3 Str6 hits with a Vector.

Only Vector Strike if you want to "split fire" - fly over a Transport and nuke it in the movement phase, then shoot something with the other Devourers.

TheKbob wrote:

 ArtfcllyFlvrd wrote:
I think the points are the issue. 285 is staggering. It would have to kill more than 2 vendettas to make it's points back, and 2 vendettas will tear the tyrant's face off.

Just the rules and theory out it aren't bad, but way too inefficient.

Yeesh, units are not always about being killy. First turn, that Flyrant will not only cause serious damage to a vehicle or squad (or both with a good VS), it will also absorb a heinous amount of fire power that your Tervigons or other Big Bugs are not.

Grounding tests suck, yea, but if you can put a lot of weight with target priority and clever flying with the Flyrant, he can succeed.

Just don't do like what I have seen... fly it right in front of my army near my Lone Wolves. I used storm bolters to knock it out of the air and then charged it and squished it.

Of course there is more to a unit than raw killing power. But the post was about the unit's raw killing power vs flyers.

Flying MCs aren't even all that resilient. Especially for nids when they can only get a 3+ save and are only putting one or two on the table. It's other qualitative values don't justify 285 pts either.

 TheKbob wrote:


Yeesh, units are not always about being killy. First turn, that Flyrant will not only cause serious damage to a vehicle or squad (or both with a good VS), it will also absorb a heinous amount of fire power that your Tervigons or other Big Bugs are not.

The problem with this kind of argument, is that you could spend the 300 points on more big bugs, helping build in redundancy and target saturation rather than bring an inefficient flier hunter that can be taken down without much worry.

I think Flyrants with devourers are the go to HQ choice anymore... they're just so good.

I'd almost say two is mandatory for competitive lists.

Hope for iron arm like the rest of the TMCs and run with it.

The answer to flyers? Fly behind them, they won't be able to skyfire you next turn and you can still shoot at things behind you due to the fact your a FMC. Stormravens still are a problem but I don't feel like many armies will be taking them.

Position yourself to shoot up their rear armor and you'll be set.

Don't worry about the cost, you'll make up for it in other parts of your list. You really want at least one flyrant on the table.

I run:

Flyrant, 2x Devs, Hive commander
Flyrant, 2x Devs

I'd even take this as low as 1500.

I must agree on the 2 Flyrant being almost mandatory, they are really good.

For now I don't run an ultra competitive list, I do run with a dakka Flyrant and 2 Tervigons tho... can't escape inevitability entirely.

I was wondering how good they are against flyer as I will encounter more of them on the battlefield... Doom Scythe... Heldrake... Razorwing... they are the last 3 I played against, in the last 3 games...

But I learned that a zooming FMC now have the skyfire rule and they are much better with it, not particularly for hunting down flyers, I mean, there is so much to hunt with a dakka Flyrant, but if one of them get in my way I will try to bring it down knowing that I actually have a good chance at it. I just want to show my opponents that they are not invulnerable against Tyranids or they are going to bring 2 of them every games... if they do so I will just bring 2 dakka Flyrant and see how it goes .

Is a Flyrant worth 285 pts ? In an army with 3 deep strinking MC's I would say yes and those 12 TL S6 shots can wipe out whole units in a turn. It's a great infantry and AV10 killer and the fear factor make my opponents go sideways to bring him down.

Will I hunt only flyers with it ? No and I agree that there's more to a unit than just raw killing power.

Flyers that kill Tyrants

Vendettas
Helldrakes (vector strike)

Mild threats

Night Scythes
Storm Ravens


You really have to rely on going to T9 with Iron arm.


The only other way to threaten flyers with Tyranids is spam Hive Guard (ignores jink saves) or mount a venomthrope on a quad gun (hehe, BS4).

Flying Tyrants and Tervigons appear to me to have become the go-to monstrous creatures in a tyranid army, much in the way the carnifex used to be in the 4th ed book.

Great for right now, but it makes me wonder how much they'll get nerfed if we get another update in 6th ed.

Thatguyoverthere11 wrote:
The only other way to threaten flyers with Tyranids is spam Hive Guard (ignores jink saves) or mount a venomthrope on a quad gun (hehe, BS4).

Yeah, got that too... the Hive Guards spam not the ADL with a quad-gun. ... still have to try 6 of them shooting on flyer tho, out of those 12 shots an average of 2 should hit and then depending on the AV I have good chances to blow a flyer apart.

6 hive guard are more slots and points for a single flyrant. They're our current efficient flyer hunters.

Also the FAQ updated that neither emplaced weapons nor weapon emplacements may be fired by nids - so no venomthrope quad gunning.

Crud, well when did that change.

Now I feel stupid for specially converting a quad gun for my army...

Right, 9 hive guard in my lists from now on.