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 N.I.B. wrote:

 jifel wrote:
@luke: I did in 6th, but it hasn't come up in 7th at all, I'd have to check the wording.

The wording hasn't changed at all. You still get a cover save if a toe nail is obscured.

Excellent! Doesn't really help Crones much but could be useful for Flyrants and the like.

Where do those rules appear (page number) ?

Well... this should be interesting...


Types of Saving Throws
Cover Saves: "Often, you’ll find enemy models are partially hidden or obscured by terrain, which is also known as being in cover.

So *any* level of obscurement means you are 'in cover'. But being 'in cover' is not enough to grant a cover save, there is another requirement.

Determining cover saves: "If...the target model’s body (see General Principles) is at least 25% obscured from the point of view of at least one firer, Wounds allocated to that model receive a cover save"

So, you need to be 'in cover' enough to be obscured 25% in order to get a cover save from terrain.

What about intervening models

Intervening models:"If a target is partially obscured from the firer by models from a third unit, it receives a 5+ cover save in the same way as if it was behind terrain."
So according to this, you treat intervening models "in the same way" as you treat terrain. And as we saw above, terrain requires you be in cover enough to be obscured 25%.

But intervening models have a unique characteristic, and additional rule

Intervening models: " Similarly, if a model fires through the gaps between models in an intervening unit, the target is in cover, even if it is completely visible to the firer"
So, even the space between models is sufficient to provide cover.... but being 'in cover' is *not* sufficient to grant a cover save. You need to be in cover enough to be 25% obscured.




Some people like to assert that the last sentence really means the space between automatically provides a cover save. But lets look at an example of this.
Lets say you are shooting at a Wraithknight, and there is a single leman russ in front of it, obscuring 10% of the model. Well, there is no gaps, so that last sentence can have no effect, so there can be no cover save allowed.
Now lets say that leman russ is part of a squadron, and they are separated enough so you can see the wraithknight between the two leman russes. Now there is a gap... so now some people say the wraithknight would get a cover save.
So... according to their logic, if the object is obscured 10% by an actual object, no cover save, but if you can see it between two objects, yes cover save.... Just doesn't make sense.

Now, sometimes rules don't make sense. But in this case, the rule says the space between puts you "in cover", it does *NOT* say it automatically provides a cover save.
It says to treat it "the same as" terrain...which requires you be in cover and be obscured 25%.

Thanks for clearing that up.

It's about as clear as a Venomthrope's spore cloud... seriously, this needs an FAQ.

Asmodas wrote:
It's about as clear as a Venomthrope's spore cloud... seriously, this needs an FAQ.

Agreed. Personally, I recommend a YMDC thread rather than sidetrack here, but I disagree slightly with Coredump:

Intervening models:"If a target is partially obscured from the firer by models from a third unit, it receives a 5+ cover save in the same way as if it was behind terrain."
So according to this, you treat intervening models "in the same way" as you treat terrain. And as we saw above, terrain requires you be in cover enough to be obscured 25%.

But intervening models have a unique characteristic, and additional rule

The sentence fragment "in the same way as if it was behind terrain" does not apply to the "partially obscured" part of the sentence, it is directed at the 5+ cover save. All that fragment means is that the save (a 5+) is the same as that granted by intervening terrain. The only requirement to receive that cover save, by the rules of English Diction, is to be "Partially obscured from the firer by models from a third unit".

Again, I recommend a YMDC thread because I think it is a poorly worded rule that needs clarification. I know that it's a widely disputed issue, and so I try to avoid using or bringing up the rule in competitive play by ensuring cover saves through other means. However, in 6th edition, the majority consensus was that only "partially obscured" was required and that this could be less than 25%. The wording has not changed in 7th edition.

Seems like you're looking for an advantage not meant to be IMO. You can discuss it on YMDC til you're blue in the face and not reach any clear resolution.

 jifel wrote:
@luke: I did in 6th, but it hasn't come up in 7th at all, I'd have to check the wording. But, I buy barricades for my Bastion so I know the tyrants will have cover turn 1, after that they're too far ahead to ever get gant cover, and I usually rely on ruins/forests for cover

When I want to screen Tyrants, I look to Gargoyles, I have not looked it up, because they do obscure the Big Bug...

 jifel wrote:


The sentence fragment "in the same way as if it was behind terrain" does not apply to the "partially obscured" part of the sentence, it is directed at the 5+ cover save.

But that is an assumption you are making. There is nothing in that sentence restricting the similarity to only that. (It would also make that phrase meaningless...)

Further, 'same way' denotes a process... not a value.

If two things *are* the same, they are not the "same way".
If they *happen* the same, they happen the 'same way'.


You can not "cover save in the same way"
You can "receive in the same way"
"in the same way" makes no sense if applied to "cover save", it *does* make sense if applied to how something is received.

Can you guys take it to YMDC?

This thread is beginning to go off track and I'd like to get it back to the Tyranid talk.

 Dozer Blades wrote:

Anyways now that the BAO has debunked the current Tyranid meta I think we can go back to the drawing board for a fresh look... Exciting !

Uhhh, what? Did you see something there that I missed? How and why does the Tyranid meta need to go back to the drawing board?

yeah i haven't seen anything ground breaking from the BAO, everyone kind of figured that pod spam and IK were going to be a pain in the rear, and we already knew that bikes/gravspam were pretty annoying.

i'd be happy to see some new lists but i'm not seeing anything that shakes the list building tech up, aside from malanthropes.

If you're liking what you currently run that is fine and more power to you. It does seem like there is some divergence which to me is always actually a good thing. I do think that just throwing down SB has some limitations. I like Ichine's list and what he is doing with Tyranids.

i had to look those up, i'm not on dakka a whole lot so i'm not familiar with many of the posters here. lot of us are running similar over on the hive. looks good ^^

things are in a bit of a flux right now, we're in a brand new edition, armies are coming out quickly, and we've even got a couple of new units that are (shockingly) usable. i wasn't really expecting (or happy with) this new edition, but IMO it's better than 5 years with the same ruleset and way longer often with the same codex.

didn't mean to poo-poo any new approaches, just meant from the data coming in from BAO, there wasn't much shocking.

 Dozer Blades wrote:
I like Ichine's list and what he is doing with Tyranids.

What did his list have in it?

 gigasnail wrote:
didn't mean to poo-poo any new approaches, just meant from the data coming in from BAO, there wasn't much shocking.

See the thing is there isnt much new data because everyone uses the same old stuff. We already knew the capabilities of most of the units that were used, people are discouraged from trying to use new units or tactics on this thread. Any attempt to say that a unit is useable is quickly shot down by a dakkafex! The only new info we have is what other people are using.

So Nids were slapped down to earth day 2. Out of 115 the four best Tyranid players placed 17, 35, 38 and 51. All using lists with Imperial Armour/Forgeworld units and/or Formations, unless I'm mistaken. Pretty depressing that even with Skyblight we can't even break into top ten.

4th ed Nidzilla were the good old days, we've been tier 2 since then. I wouldn't mind, if the internal balance was better.

 CKO wrote:

 Dozer Blades wrote:
I like Ichine's list and what he is doing with Tyranids.

What did his list have in it?

 gigasnail wrote:
didn't mean to poo-poo any new approaches, just meant from the data coming in from BAO, there wasn't much shocking.

See the thing is there isnt much new data because everyone uses the same old stuff. We already knew the capabilities of most of the units that were used, people are discouraged from trying to use new units or tactics on this thread. Any attempt to say that a unit is useable is quickly shot down by a dakkafex! The only new info we have is what other people are using.

wait, aren't you the guy that hasn't actually played any games with tyranids yet?

Is Skyblight the current meta for Nids? While I will say that it performing worse than ground lists comes as no surprise to me and no doubt many others, I think jy2s results at the BOA are not definitive and could be easily be bad luck, I mean he was the only person running Skyblight it's not on it's own enough to call for a meta switch. But regardless, judging by this thread alone I think the meta appears to be some combination of Living Artillery and Dakkafexes, look at all the lists posted for the last pages. It seems to me that the only people still running SB are the people who can't use the models for a ground list or maybe just prefer the play style, at this point it's pretty clearly the subpar build.

Ok. So, a bit delayed but time for a summary of how things did in the local Charity Tournament.

For those wondering...my list was as follows...

Flyrant - 2 x Twin Devourers
Flyrant - 2 x Twin Devourers

Zoanthrope
Zoanthrope
2 Venomthropes

14 Termagants
14 Termagants
5 Warriors - 3 Deathspitters, 2 Rending Claws

3 Raveners - Rending Claws

Trygon

Barbed Hierodule

Now we had some...interesting lists show up. Because the tournament was a mish mash of organisation it became a clusterduck. From memory...

Necrons - 4 Pylons, Tesseract Vault, Barges, minimal troops
IG - Mini tank company, conscripts, Shadowsword or some variant
IG Tank Company - something like 10 Russes, a Basilisk and some Vet squads
Few SM army

And the comedy value of the entire day - Reaver Titan, Sniper Scouts, Tac squad and captain. Yes. There was a Reaver.

So...onto mini battle reports and evaluations of how things performed.

I'll sum up some things right now.

Termagants - Did Gaunt things. As standard. Sat on objectives, scampered about, nothing too special. Don't really need to evaluate their performance so much.

Venomthropes - Did Venomthrope things. That is, cover bubble and little more. Another thing that doesn't need to be evaluated so much.

Zoanthropes - Love or hate them, they did what they were meant to. Warp Blast did bugger all, but they kept the Synapse bubble strong and their second powers (Onslaught/Catalyst/Dominion) did the real work.

Game 1 - IG Armoured Company

Opponent's list was a Company Commander Russ Squadron in Punishers, Pask with a squadron in Vanquishers, one of the ignore cover russes, 2 Demolishers, a few normal russes, a basilisk, some Veteran squads and a mini squad of storm troopers.

Warlord Trait for me was MoA - resulting in the Flyrants and Hierodule starting further forward. Got first turn, Flyrants went forward, multiple glances on rear armour wiped out the Punisher Squadron and the Basiilisk popped. The Hierodule popped a Russ and stripped a Hull Point off Pask.

First turn's fire was all thrown at the Hierodule which ignored it all.

Second turn, Popped the Vanquishers, popped another two Russ and popped the Eradicator. My opponent then conceded.

The Flyrants did all the work. Major stars of the show there.
The Hierodule sort of soaked fire and killed very little.
The Trygon had only just shown up before my opponent conceded.
Same with the Warriors.


Second game was...Mechdar. Opponent got first turn, Warlord trait was so useless I forgot what it was, Night Fight happened.

To sum this game up - I could not make a FNP save to save my life if I tried. My opponent was also ridiculously lucky with Overwatch. Never have I see someone casually pick up ten dice, roll 6 6s and then roll a similar amount of 6s to wound.

Flyrants - did about as well as could be expected. Efforts greatly hampered by 2+ cover saves on turn 1 and then further hampered by the fact that I couldn't roll D6s the rest of the game. My D2 skills were pretty awesome though.

Hierodule - At least he took 2 and a half turns to kill. And the entire eldar army shooting at him. I'm sure if I actually could make a single FNP save he would have lasted longer.

Trygon - Showed up, ate some warp spiders, ate some dire avengers, could do little more.

Raveners - Did you know a 5+ save sucks against Serpent Shields? Yeah. Me too.

Warriors - tried their damndest to do some objective grabbing. In the end fell apart due to a Wraithknight taking offense at their existence.

Yeah, surprise, objectives flipped over and my opponent won on those alone.

Third game - I get to face the Reaver Titan. YAY ME.

To sum it up. I get first deployment. I get first turn. I get MoA - result is Trygon, Hierodule and Tyrants starting closer.

First turn goes as follows - Trygon slithers closer, Tyrants fly forward and strip off Void Shields, Hierodule opens fire and strips off 4 HP.

Titan returns fire - 3 D hits on the Hierodule. 3 6s. Well. Pop goes the Hierodule. Automatic 18 wounds. Ouch. Other shot hits the rest of the army. Pop go the venomthropes. The rest get away unscathed. Phew.

Second turn - Trygon assaults, One Tyrant comes down to land, second Tyrant remains airborne just in case. Raveners pop up nearby.

Trygon smashes. Strips off 5 more HP. Hilariously survives return attacks (WS 5 vs WS 2!) and my opponent gets one stomp with a 1.

In the following turn the tactical squad and captain assault the Trygon. Trygon takes a few hits. Loses 4 wounds. Survives. Strips off more HP.

Third turn - Raveners assault captain and tac squad, destroy the tac squad with impunity. Tyrant joins Trygon in smash fest. More HP stripped off the titan. Everyone continues to wail on the Trygon. Trygon survives with one wound left.

More hitting ensues. Captain starts taking wounds but kills a Ravener. More efforts to splat a Trygon. More HP stripped off the Reaver.

Suffice to say this repeated itself until the Captain died to Raveners and the Reaver got smashed to death by the Trygon. And then exploded. Killing the Trygon. One lone scout squad found two Tyrants eating it alive afterwards.

Summary - not a lot that could be done there really. The warriors just...sat around.

The Tyrants did the best they could.

The Raveners turned out useful.

The Trygon made his points back SO FETHING MUCH.

But yeah, overall results...

Placed 3rd.

Another tournament coming up in October and there will be some changes.

Planned changes for future tournament!

Flyrant - 2 x Twin Devourers
Flyrant - 2 x Twin Devourers

Zoanthrope
Zoanthrope
Malanthrope

10 Termagants
10 Termagants
10 Termagants
3 Tyranid Warriors - 2 Devourers, Barbed Strangler
3 Ripper Swarms - Deep Strike

Crone
5 Shrikes - 3 LW/BS, 2 Twin BS, Toxin, Flesh Hooks

Carnifex - 2 x Twin Devourers
Carnifex - 2 x Twin Devourers
Carnifex - AG, Spinebanks, Crushing Claws

Look Ma! Better synergy. Units that are more useful. Shiny things!

 DarkStarSabre wrote:

Second turn - Trygon assaults

Trygon smashes. Strips off 5 more HP.

With his single Smash attack? You were playing 6th ed rules?

Even then he only had 4 smash attacks on the charge. Let alone needing pretty insane rolls to hit them all.

 N.I.B. wrote:

 DarkStarSabre wrote:

Second turn - Trygon assaults

Trygon smashes. Strips off 5 more HP.

With his single Smash attack? You were playing 6th ed rules?

Well, it would appear the person using the superheavy done goofed there.

Meh. Such I shrug.

Trygon still was the miracle worker of that game.

It was a miracle worker because you played it wrong.

I generally tend to blame myself when I make a play mistake, rather than my opponent. Endeavour to follow the rules, it might benefit you for the game but falsely deserved wins will only hold back your learning and skew your game sense. Like thinking Trygon is a good unit.

 SHUPPET wrote:
It was a miracle worker because you played it wrong.

I generally tend to blame myself when I make a play mistake, rather than my opponent. Endeavour to follow the rules, it might benefit you for the game but falsely deserved wins will only hold back your learning and skew your game sense. Like thinking Trygon is a good unit.

It still survived an obscene amount of abuse thrown at it through sheer luck, tying up the most destructive element of his army for the longest period of time.

But hey, throwing out personal attacks once more. It's k, continue as it were.

More to the point - I don't field super heavy vehicles for the most part or at all. I have exactly 0 super heavy vehicles in my collection. When I encounter them there's generally one approach - strip away hull points for a result. That tends to be the tyranid response for most vehicles as a force of habit. Generally, when my opponents come to me and ask what a gargantuan creature does, I tell them. In fact, I keep that page as a reference - if I am using one I will need the reference there for it. If my opponent is going by an older version of the rules rather than the more current one - on his head be it. I had my own rules to keep track of and to that point had encountered zero other superheavy vehicles.

If you field something - I expect you to have the rules for it or to at least know them sufficiently enough. Hence why my bookmarks were on Gargantuan Creatures, Stomp and the Psychic Phase.

So please, do try less with the personal attacks here. It seems all you have gone for this entire thread is one scathing personal attack after another. Did I say the Trygon was a particularly good unit? Not really. But by fluke it did something and by fluke it performed admirably well. Perhaps if your focus wasn't on deliberately trying to push me down into the dirt and perhaps if you actually approached things with any purpose but that you too could smile and appreciate the odd flukes that happen every now and then.

If you were playing by the rules, every HP a Trygon did that game a Mawloc would have done as well. Except for 2/3 the price. With hit and run. And burrowing to safety if successful. And an AP2 blast the next turn. Considering you weren't even using his deep strike that the model pays so much for, a Tyrannofex would have had the exact same results in combat except also Haywire grubs HP, Acid Spray turn 1 thx to MoA, and +2 save. Still cheaper. Absolutely no advantage to taking Trygon compared to either of them in that game.. This is what I mean by skewing your game sense and unit perception.


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DarkStarSabre wrote:
But hey, throwing out personal attacks once more. It's k, continue as it were.

What? Please, show me WHERE in my last post I made a personal attack. Even once. Hell even the first time since you are speaking as if I've done it previously. I'm the guy who defended you when core dump was making all the personal attempts against your character by calling you bias - please do not sit here and claim I'm personally attacking you by explaining why playing by the rules is for your benefit, not your opponents.

 SHUPPET wrote:
If you were playing by the rules, every HP a Trygon did that game a Mawloc would have done as well. Except for 2/3 the price. With hit and run. And burrowing to safety if successful. And an AP2 blast the next turn. Considering you weren't even using his deep strike that the model pays so much for, a Tyrannofex would have had the exact same results in combat except also Haywire grubs HP, Acid Spray turn 1 thx to MoA, and +2 save. Still cheaper. Absolutely no advantage to taking Trygon compared to either of them in that game.. This is what I mean by skewing your game sense and unit perception.

There's this thing called WYSIWYG. Don't know about you but where I am, the tournament actually had a ruling that units had to be WYSIWYG. And, well, a Trygon isn't a Mawloc. Sure, I could have fielded it as a Mawloc. Pretty sure with it showing up in 0 games due to violation of that rule it would have performed better.

There's also this thing where in most tournament compositions you actually get points for a painted army - as I mentioned a while back I was aiming for a fully painted list. Sure I could have had a Tyrannofex who, unpainted would have docked points from the overall composition. Oh, and at WS 3 would have been hit far more often by the tac marines and the Titan itself. Oh, and at I2 would have really been taking free hits from the Marines before the Raveners even got involved in that assault.

Oh, and probably wasn't even a guaranteed turn 2 assault to actually stop the Titan firing its load off on the rest of the army from that point onwards (Move closer, run closer, next turn assault and with a fleet reroll..well...there we go. Titan tied up and no longer shooting from that point onward).

As I stated - the Trygon did...poorly. The Raveners overall did poorly.

But they were painted and for every little success it's somethng at least.

But hey, I'm sorry I wasn't fielding your army. I mean, that's crazy right? That this is a general tactical thread for Tyranids that considers different army compositions and not just one person's army. Crazy that it takes into account the experiences of multiple people rather than just one.

But between two people on this thread - and only two people I have never been put off a community more in my life. The rest of you, including the guy who started the thread in the first place have been amazing but just two individuals in particular seem to have gone all out recently for some pretty aggressive personal attacks.

Tell you what Shuppet.

Next tournament you can field your army. And I won't judge you for it. I won't judge you for circumstances that come up between one point or another preventing certain elements being altered, I won't judge you for wanting a generally softer list for a Charity tournament with a focus on actually having a painted army for it. But in return please, extend that courtesy to others, k?

@Wilson: I'd probably go 2 for 2. Stonecrushers are nice but the best thing they provide is that amazing bubble of AT that we are otherwise lacking in, as applying it to the tank you want dead isn't guaranteed due to their assaulty nature. This allows you to cover both sides of the board fully, or band together and ensure one side of the board is yours, in games where one might be the first thing to die. I'd say when taking 1, take 2!

I was swaying for 2 for 2 too. I like the symmetry! I am wondering if the stone crushers are worth it though, being the same cost as a dakkfex, I could just get a normal fex and give it crushing claws for +1 attack and AG for fleet...

I'll have to test both and see which one draws the least fire and makes it's own back.

If you have nothing constructive to post or can only flame another poster then it's best you don't bother posting.

3 and 1.

Let's not get this thread closed. Bummer you did the rules wrong but hell that guy should know what smash dies so his Reaver could live. Anyways gray job tyranid players fighting the gid fight at BAO. You threatened and placed higher than I expected any tyranid player would. Great job! !


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Let's not get this thread closed. Bummer you did the rules wrong but hell that guy should know what smash dies so his Reaver could live. Anyways gray job tyranid players fighting the gid fight at BAO. You threatened and placed higher than I expected any tyranid player would. Great job! !