Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So, My main army is Tau, And my main backup army is Necrons. But I want a melee army too and since the two main melee armies seem to be Tyranids and Orks (And Daemons but I'm just not into them..) I was curious if someone could tell me a bit about Orks and tyranids melee capabilities. I know tyranids are probably getting updated in a month or two but I doubt their capabilities or playstyle will be changed much.

Neither are particularly competitive when outfitted for a melee game. From my personal experience, Nids are better off overall than Orks and are better at melee, if that's what you want.

Daemons are the best right now for melee armies.

Merellin wrote:
So, My main army is Tau, And my main backup army is Necrons. But I want a melee army too and since the two main melee armies seem to be Tyranids and Orks (And Daemons but I'm just not into them..) I was curious if someone could tell me a bit about Orks and tyranids melee capabilities. I know tyranids are probably getting updated in a month or two but I doubt their capabilities or playstyle will be changed much.

Tyranid melee viability is sole based on number of attacks and not power of attacks. Your best bet is to run some sort of Hive Tyrant, tons of gargoyles, and Trygons. Genestealers will never get into melee range, Hormagaunts are to pricey for what they do and will never make it into melee, Carnifexs are to overpriced and have to few attacks to make them viable in a melee list. Tervigons with 3 biomancy powers and crushing claws can do some nasty things in melee and are ALWAYS a good choice.

Honestly if I were to build a Tyranid melee list I would run a flying Hive Tyrant, some Ymgarl Genestealers, Termagaunts and Tervigons as troops, SWARMS of Gargoyles with Toxin Sacs, and a Trygon or two.

Can't help you with Orks, I am just starting to look into them as a possible 7th army.

Tyranids are at their best when you combine close-range shooting with melee, they lose very little for swapping out CC biomorphs for guns.

both are still very nasty and both are still competitive. As they are older codexes, they aren't used very often anymore because of the shiney new stuff sybdrome. Many mistakenly think this lack of use means they are weak, but anyone who knows the game can tell you different.

The ork basic troop unit is cheap and plentiful, there statline throws a bucket of dice on top of anything that they can get the charge on. Shoota boyz can fire a metric ton of dice at opponents and still swamp an enemy with CC attacks if they can get the charge.

The choppy green tide relies on a Nob(Character) krumpin people with his power klaw. Sadly, this isn't as effective because the first round of combat he is certain to be challenged out. If your numbers get shot too thin before CC starts by the 2nd round of assault your unit might be breaking from combat. This is especially noticeable in smaller trukk boy units. Which has been suggested as the only way to try and run Slugga Choppa boyz.

The nob biker squad is nice because you can get several power klaws that aren't getting challenged into CC. They have pretty good defenses and are largely countered by volume of fire. You'll need to manufacturer a way to hide them from large quantities of models.

Orks strike at a low initiative we will always be going last so it's pretty much Power Klaws or close combat weapons. So ork melee capabilities revolve around your abilities to get several bodies into a cc and how to keep power klaws out of challenges. This is blocks of boyz, nob bikers, small squads of mega nobz or stormboyz with nob.

If you like one model epic CC you might like a Mega Armored or Biker Warboss. However if you like individually strong models then you may prefer the bugs and the MC's in that dex.

I hear we are in a bad place competitively. Close as orks get to being competitve is a scorched earth style of amassing cheap bodies with cheap shooting. Typically done with Lootas and Kannonz offering cover fire while shootas and sometimes maybe some grots get close enough to make maximum use of there number in a shooting phase while standing in an objective. Remember, while all this shooting is going on, our guns are all still assault. If you can close on someone you still have a CC with a statline that can still handle lots of units barring those dedicated to CC. Deploy on all the real estate in your deployment zone, fire all the guns, don't aim!, just fire them all as many times as you can, close on your enemy, waaagh, hit last in all CC, remove lots of casualties, drown the enemy in dice. If that appeals to you then maybe orks are for you.

There are also bikes -> Fewwer models, less dakka, smaller footprint(more tactics?)
and Vehicle squads, because it should be mentioned that every transport worth talking about is fast and open topped.

i find when youuse 3-5 battle wagons full of boys/nobs, you tend to get a LOT in combat turn two... and a trukk or bike mob or two thrown in for good measure

20 av 14 hull points + the bikes/trukks, 80-100 possible boys in CC by turn two

I dont even bother with nobs for the most part, I put the bosses with PK's where they need to go with one knob with them, so at least something can krump stuff when one gets challenged out, or the nob can take one for the team the first round.

but yeah... lots of ifs and maybes since there are lots of counters and the codex is laughably out of date.

Thanks for all the replies! I'm kind of leaning towards Tyranids, They got cooler models, Hordes of small bitey things to overwhelm with numbers and big horrible monsters to destroy stuff with.. XD

Good luck on the bugs.
Something that may help you with the big beasties whether they are moving forward or sitting back (that I disagree with but it's in the rules) is that they only have to stick their toe (base need to only be in a fraction of a millimeter to count) into area terrain to count as being "in" area terrain and thus get the cover it provides even if the vast majority of the model's base is outside it along with it's entire body. this makes your big beasties a lot more survivable.

I will warn you with Tyranids they get boring extremely fast with the current codex. You'll find that about 2/3rds of the codex are just terrible units and always playing the same 1/3rd of the codex...It gets boring but they can be powerful with that 1/3rd.

Yeah, but with a new codex in December/January, doubt they'll have time to get bored.