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.

I think what he's saying is he wants to include at least one unit in his army with a bit more focus towards gaining an advantage in the Cron match up, to make this match a bit less luck dependant. And I too am not exactly sure what the answer is. I suspect it's probably more Carnifex, if I knew for sure I was facing nothing but Crons, I'd take an entire army of Carnifex if I could.

 NightWrench wrote:

tag8833 wrote:

 Iechine wrote:
It sounds like you got cursed by the dice gods man, nothing to be ashamed of at all. When you start losing tyrants to single 6's and cant make any armor saves theres not much to be done.

If I played that game again, and had better dice I might indeed win it, but I want to work on strategies that aren't so dependent on dice to win games.

I assume you mean you want to limit the amount of randomness that happens when you start rolling d6's.

Yes, and no. I play enough 40k that I'm going to roll well sometimes, and I'm going to roll poorly other times. That being said, I feel like specifically when I play Necrons I either win big or lose big. It feels like a much higher degree of randomness than most other opponents I play, and I would like to bring that randomness in line with the randomness I see against other opponents.

Part of my problem is that there are 4 necron players in my local meta, but only 1 of them is a top tier player capable of giving me a competitive game when I'm running a top tier Tyranid list. So I lack the quantity of games required against Necrons to completely understand the matchups, and how to deal with them. I don't even know the right questions to ask at this point, but I am sure that moving forward with a strategy of "Roll Better" is not enough of a lesson to take from this game.

One specific question. With Imotekh he was able to make it Night fighting, and keep it Night fighting for several turns. This gave his vehicles a 3+ Jink. I could never decide if I should shoot E.Grubs or Devourers at the Annihilation Barge's back armor. E. Grubs are more reliable, but all I need is 1 pen to go through, and now my dakkafexes can deal with them from there. There was one particular shooting phase where the AB had only 2 hull points left, and I was really tempted to use E.Grubs. Does anyone have advice on this?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 SHUPPET wrote:
I think what he's saying is he wants to include at least one unit in his army with a bit more focus towards gaining an advantage in the Cron match up, to make this match a bit less luck dependant. And I too am not exactly sure what the answer is. I suspect it's probably more Carnifex, if I knew for sure I was facing nothing but Crons, I'd take an entire army of Carnifex if I could.

I had 3 dakkafexes. Turn 1 I shot all 3 of them into a Destroyer Lord that was attached to 10 Scarabs. The lord tanked all of the wounds, and only failed a single save. Turn 2, one of the dakkafexes was locked up in close combat with the Destroyer Lord (Where he would die several turns later), and the other 2 managed to kill some scarabs. Turn 3, my 2 available dakkafexes shot at Night Scythes, and between the 2 of them did a single hull point (most were jinked away). Turn 4, One dakkafex + my warriors killed 5 immortals, The other one Killed 3, but they all stood back up, he then charged them, and after 4 rounds of combat he had lost 1 wound, and none of the immortals were dead.

My 450 point of Dakkafex netted me a total of:
1 Wound off of a Destroyer Lord
8 Scarabs
1 Hull point off of a Night Scythe
5 Immortals.

I don't think I would want to take more than 3 Dakkafexes against Necrons. Top tier Necrons are every bit the mono build that we are, and that monobuild has lots and lots of armor 13 in it.

Riddle me this my little xenomorphs:
Is there a way of getting two Flyrants and a Tervigon into a single FoC list (no duals) using any of the available options without paying the Termagant tax?

 Ratius wrote:
Riddle me this my little xenomorphs:
Is there a way of getting two Flyrants and a Tervigon into a single FoC list (no duals) using any of the available options without paying the Termagant tax?

In one detachment, there is no way. You could self ally which isn't allowed everywhere, or you could run skyblight. Otherwise you've got to take the gants. Honestly 30 gants are a better usage of points than 1 Tervigon in most situations.

Cheers, its more the model tax tbh.
With the tax thats 30 needed at base. Then over the course of a game, probably another 30+ if you do well.
Added to that I want to bring 3x10 smaller units as extra fodder.
So that adds up too.....

tag8833 wrote:

One specific question. With Imotekh he was able to make it Night fighting, and keep it Night fighting for several turns. This gave his vehicles a 3+ Jink. I could never decide if I should shoot E.Grubs or Devourers at the Annihilation Barge's back armor. E. Grubs are more reliable, but all I need is 1 pen to go through, and now my dakkafexes can deal with them from there. There was one particular shooting phase where the AB had only 2 hull points left, and I was really tempted to use E.Grubs. Does anyone have advice on this?

Here's the comparison between egrubs vs 6 TL-Brainleech devourer shots. Assume 4+ jinking:

Egrubs = 5/6 chance to glance = 83% chance to cause at least 1 HP

TL-Devourers = 6 shots x 8/9 hit x 1/3 chance to glance/pen x 1/2 to get past cover save = .89% chance to cause at least 1 HP


Now assuming 3+ jink due to Imotehk:

TL-Devourers = 6 shots x 8/9 hit x 1/3 chance to glance/pen x 1/3 to get past cover save = .59% chance to cause at least 1 HP


So to answer your question, with 4+ cover, you're better off firing your devourers. With 3+ cover, go with the egrubs.






Automatically Appended Next Post:

tag8833 wrote:
I got beat pretty bad by a necron list tonight. A destroyer Lord made an epic ton of 2+ saves tanking 3 dakkfexes and a flyrant turn 1, then assaulted and Killed a dakkafex, a Malanthrope, and 20 Gargoyles. I rolled really poorly on the carnifex and never even caused a wound. Then came out of assault and help kill my bastion. That was bad enough, but on his turn 2 a Monolith ate one of my full health flyrants. Strength test, always fail on 6's. That left me significantly out gunned when his Flyers came in. My other flyrant hung in for another 2 turns but my exocrine failed 5 of 6 3+ armors saves. We were playing BAO mission and it would have been 5 (primary + Line Breaker) to 6 (secondary, plus first blood, Linebreaker, and warlord) on turn 5. It went on to turn 6, and he got a perfect 10. Kinda humiliating.

I saw that Monolith on the table, and I was sure I would win this game. Nothing went my way.

I feel like more than any other army, bad dice can hurt me against necrons. Part of it is that when a necron players gets hot rolling 6's those wounds pile up fast. I wish I could figure out a list or tactical tweak that made me a little more consistent against necrons.

I know this isn't a Necron Tactica thread, but I really feel like Necrons matchup much better against us when they don't have barge lords. They are good, but so pricey. It frees them up to add a few more flying crescent rolls which are really good for their points, and can deliver Ob sec and Dakka quickly to quite a bit of the board.

For those that care, here are the lists:

Spoiler:

CAD
Tyrant (2 TL-Devourers, E. Grubs, Wings)
Tyrant (2 TL-Devourers, E. Grubs, Wings)

Malanthrope
Malanthrope

12 Hormagants
12 Hormagants

20 Gargoyles

Carnifex (2 TL-Devourers)
Carnifex (2 TL-Devourers)
Carnifex (2 TL-Devourers)

Living Artillery Node:
3 Warriors (BS)
Exocrine
3 Biovores

Bastion w/ Void Shield (I forgot about the void shield all game).


His List roughly.
Imotekh the stormlord
Destroyer Lord (MSS, 2+ Armor)

Royal Court
3 Harbringer of the Storm (one in each group of immortals)

5 immortals in a Night Scythe
5 immortals in a Night Scythe
5 immortals in a Night Scythe

10 Scarabs
10 Scarabs
10 Scarabs

Annihilation Barge
Annihilation Barge
Monolith

Hmmm....

As a necron player, I wouldn't even call that a competitive Necron list. Monoliths are to the crons what Dimachaerons are to our tyranids....they may contribute 1 in every 3 games but mostly, they are more of a casual unit. Then he brings scarabs without any spiders?!? What's with that?

Necrons can be a very, very tough matchup for our bugs. They've got the VoF (volume-of-fire) to take out both our flyers and our ground units, Mindshackle scarabs to deal with our MC's and they can out-maneuver us. It gets worse if they spam those AV13 vehicles. I swear, Necrons may even be harder for our bugs to deal with than Dark Eldar nowadays.

Ironically enough though, I've lost 3 times consecutively against Tyranids with my Necrons. Twice it was due to bad dice on my part/good dice by my opponent. Once was because I brought a casual Necron list (no bargelords and no annihilation barges, only 1 flyer!) and then got curbstomped by a triple-flyrant/barbed hierodule tournament list. But despite those losses, Necrons have all the tools to give bugs a really, really tough fight.

 jy2 wrote:

tag8833 wrote:

One specific question. With Imotekh he was able to make it Night fighting, and keep it Night fighting for several turns. This gave his vehicles a 3+ Jink. I could never decide if I should shoot E.Grubs or Devourers at the Annihilation Barge's back armor. E. Grubs are more reliable, but all I need is 1 pen to go through, and now my dakkafexes can deal with them from there. There was one particular shooting phase where the AB had only 2 hull points left, and I was really tempted to use E.Grubs. Does anyone have advice on this?

So to answer your question, with 4+ cover, you're better off firing your devourers. With 3+ cover, go with the egrubs.

The question is would you do the same if you had 2 Dakkafexes ready to blow it away if you are able to pen it and take away the AV 13? More of a tactical quandary than a mathematical one.

 jy2 wrote:
Hmmm....

As a necron player, I wouldn't even call that a competitive Necron list. Monoliths are to the crons what Dimachaerons are to our tyranids....they may contribute 1 in every 3 games but mostly, they are more of a casual unit. Then he brings scarabs without any spiders?!? What's with that?

I agree which is why I humiliated when I brought a top tier Tyranid list, and still lost.

His plan with the Monolith was to use it to deliver his immortals if the flyers got popped, and it gave him deployment and LOS options. I don't think he was counting on it making its point back by eating a Flyrant. That was more of a hail mary. I knew the Monolith could do that, but I had a great angle to use the E.Grubs on the Monolith and also hit 4 Scarabs while using the Monolith to block LOS from the Annihilation barges. It seemed like a sound tactical move at the moment, but in retrospect, I can't decide. What do you think?

He does really well with the Scarabs generally. He uses them to pop vehicles and control the board. In my game, he kept me mainly bottled up in my deployment zone between the scarabs and the Destroyer lord. Then once I wittled them down to 1 in one unit, and 2 in another he put the 2 of an objective in his backfield out of LOS, and the 1 in a corner of my deployment out of LOS to score line breaker. Using them like Rippers. I had a great counter to Scarabs in the form of my LAN and S6 dakka. Personally I don't think they are as good as Wraiths, but in our mech spam meta they perform quite well.

You are a necron player, and so by default know quite alot more about necrons than me, but I've never been impressed with spiders. They take away a FOC slot from the most undercosted unit in the game, the Annihilation Barge. I can't imagine ever considering a necron list to be optimized without maxing out the heavy support with Annihilation barges. Spiders just don't compete. I've seen him run Spider in less competitive games, though.

Canoptek spiders are S6 T6 3W 3+ monstrous creatures who can give you a free 15-pt unit every turn. The kicker? They're only 50-pts each. WOW!!! So for 150-pts, you get 9 T6 Wounds that can give you 45-pts worth of units for free each turn. Compare that to a stock carnifex, who only gives you 1 4W T6 MC for 120-pts. Trust me, the spider is severely undercosted and is a basis for another of the Necron competitive builds - the Scarab-farm. In such an army you take 3x3 spiders who pump out 9 scarabs a turn. That's 27W of units each turn being produced by these spiders!!! Now if they can do it continuously for 5 turns, that's 45 scarabs or 135W worth of models over the course of the game!!!

It's definitely a different playstyle than 3 annihilation barges. Instead of generating a lot of shots, you are generating a lot of bodies.

 Ratius wrote:
Riddle me this my little xenomorphs:
Is there a way of getting two Flyrants and a Tervigon into a single FoC list (no duals) using any of the available options without paying the Termagant tax?

There is a Tervigon Formation I believe....

pinecone77 wrote:

 Ratius wrote:
Riddle me this my little xenomorphs:
Is there a way of getting two Flyrants and a Tervigon into a single FoC list (no duals) using any of the available options without paying the Termagant tax?

There is a Tervigon Formation I believe....

The synaptic swam formation I believe. Everyone gets 18 in synapse. If you are allowed to self ally then take a tervigon as your other HQ. The synaptic swarm does not get obj sec though.

 NightWrench wrote:

pinecone77 wrote:

 Ratius wrote:
Riddle me this my little xenomorphs:
Is there a way of getting two Flyrants and a Tervigon into a single FoC list (no duals) using any of the available options without paying the Termagant tax?

There is a Tervigon Formation I believe....

The synaptic swam formation I believe. Everyone gets 18 in synapse. If you are allowed to self ally then take a tervigon as your other HQ. The synaptic swarm does not get obj sec though.

Hmmm, I was think there was a Tervigon Formation, that gives Hyper pregger Tervigon(s) (re-roll 1's?) Fertillity node? Something like that...

 jy2 wrote:
Canoptek spiders are S6 T6 3W 3+ monstrous creatures who can give you a free 15-pt unit every turn. The kicker? They're only 50-pts each. WOW!!! So for 150-pts, you get 9 T6 Wounds that can give you 45-pts worth of units for free each turn. Compare that to a stock carnifex, who only gives you 1 4W T6 MC for 120-pts. Trust me, the spider is severely undercosted and is a basis for another of the Necron competitive builds - the Scarab-farm. In such an army you take 3x3 spiders who pump out 9 scarabs a turn. That's 27W of units each turn being produced by these spiders!!! Now if they can do it continuously for 5 turns, that's 45 scarabs or 135W worth of models over the course of the game!!!

It's definitely a different playstyle than 3 annihilation barges. Instead of generating a lot of shots, you are generating a lot of bodies.

So, I see where you are coming from. I have heard of this build. I've only had the opportunity to play against it once, and I took a very fluffy list, and stomped it. Turn 2 all of the Scarabs were dead. I threw 20 Hormagants into assault against the spiders and moved on. I guess there were only 3 Spiders so not quite the degree of spam you were suggestions.

My experience leads me to believe that perhaps the Scarab Farm isn't a terribly competitive necron build. I see how it could give Orks and marines difficulty, but Tau, Eldar, and Tyranids should be able to handle it with ease. In fact, shouldn't a Thunderfire cannon be able to wipe out a squad of Scarabs a turn?

You'd be better off taking at least a somewhat useful formation in Skyblight and getting your second Flyrant through that, while having the Tervigon+Flyrant as your HQ choices

pinecone77 wrote:

 NightWrench wrote:

pinecone77 wrote:

 Ratius wrote:
Riddle me this my little xenomorphs:
Is there a way of getting two Flyrants and a Tervigon into a single FoC list (no duals) using any of the available options without paying the Termagant tax?

There is a Tervigon Formation I believe....

The synaptic swam formation I believe. Everyone gets 18 in synapse. If you are allowed to self ally then take a tervigon as your other HQ. The synaptic swarm does not get obj sec though.

Hmmm, I was think there was a Tervigon Formation, that gives Hyper pregger Tervigon(s) (re-roll 1's?) Fertillity node? Something like that...

The Tervigon formation is called "Incubator Node"
1 Tervigon and 3 termagant broods and gain the Hyper-Progenitive special rule. This allows you to re-roll ones when spawning termagants. This means you clog up sooner, but are more consistent in the number of gants generated.

So the Gant Tax is still firmly in place, plus the gants and tervigon aren't Objective Secured if they come via an Incubator Node, so I feel like this formation actually has more penalties that bonuses, and I wouldn't recommend it.

tag8833 wrote:

 jy2 wrote:

tag8833 wrote:

One specific question. With Imotekh he was able to make it Night fighting, and keep it Night fighting for several turns. This gave his vehicles a 3+ Jink. I could never decide if I should shoot E.Grubs or Devourers at the Annihilation Barge's back armor. E. Grubs are more reliable, but all I need is 1 pen to go through, and now my dakkafexes can deal with them from there. There was one particular shooting phase where the AB had only 2 hull points left, and I was really tempted to use E.Grubs. Does anyone have advice on this?

So to answer your question, with 4+ cover, you're better off firing your devourers. With 3+ cover, go with the egrubs.

The question is would you do the same if you had 2 Dakkafexes ready to blow it away if you are able to pen it and take away the AV 13? More of a tactical quandary than a mathematical one.

Let's look further into this. What are your chances of penning the annihilation barge?


Egrubs = 1/6 = 17% of getting a pen


TL-Brainleech Devourers with 4+ jink = 6 shots x 8/9 hit x 1/6 pen x 1/2 gets through saves = 44% of a pen


TL-Brainleech Devourers with 3+ jink = 6 shots x 8/9 hit x 1/6 pen x 1/3 gets through saves = 30% of a pen


So you definitely have a much better chance to pen with the devourers than you do with the egrubs. Now whether you want to pen or not is the real question.

With Egrubs, you have a 83% chance of doing damage and only a 17% chance for a pen.

With 4+ cover, you have a 89% chance of doing damage and 44% chance of a pen with devourers.

With 3+ cover, you have a 59% chance of doing damage and 30% chance of a pen with devourers.


The answer to me is very clear.

With 4+ cover, always go with the devourers.

With 3+ cover, go with egrubs.

If you can potentially hit 2 Necron vehicles, go with egrubs. Hope that helps.

tag8833 wrote:


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 SHUPPET wrote:
I think what he's saying is he wants to include at least one unit in his army with a bit more focus towards gaining an advantage in the Cron match up, to make this match a bit less luck dependant. And I too am not exactly sure what the answer is. I suspect it's probably more Carnifex, if I knew for sure I was facing nothing but Crons, I'd take an entire army of Carnifex if I could.

I had 3 dakkafexes. Turn 1 I shot all 3 of them into a Destroyer Lord that was attached to 10 Scarabs. The lord tanked all of the wounds, and only failed a single save. Turn 2, one of the dakkafexes was locked up in close combat with the Destroyer Lord (Where he would die several turns later), and the other 2 managed to kill some scarabs. Turn 3, my 2 available dakkafexes shot at Night Scythes, and between the 2 of them did a single hull point (most were jinked away). Turn 4, One dakkafex + my warriors killed 5 immortals, The other one Killed 3, but they all stood back up, he then charged them, and after 4 rounds of combat he had lost 1 wound, and none of the immortals were dead.

My 450 point of Dakkafex netted me a total of:
1 Wound off of a Destroyer Lord
8 Scarabs
1 Hull point off of a Night Scythe
5 Immortals.

I don't think I would want to take more than 3 Dakkafexes against Necrons. Top tier Necrons are every bit the mono build that we are, and that monobuild has lots and lots of armor 13 in it.

So what would you rather than Fexes for this role? Don't let bad rolls fool you, what else does this match up better? In greater numbers you are more likely for them hit CC as well. Very little else in even useful in this match up, even Flyrants have a reduced efficiency against an army that is snaps hitting most the time anyway.

So guys, I recently thought about some of the odd ideas I came up with early in my Tyranid career. I don't suppose many remember that old Tyran Air list I came up with. Well, I was chatting with a friend about templates this evening on just how many Tyranids could field at 2000pts. Well, in honor of Tyran Air, I updated this for 7E. What do you think? Quite obviously, it will do horrible against anyone remotely expecting that many flying MCs, but overall...think it has a chance as a one off gimick?

HQ - 170
Malanthrope
Malanthrope

Troops - 180
3x Ripper Swarm w/ DS
3x Ripper Swarm w/ DS
3x Ripper Swarm w/ DS
3x Ripper Swarm w/ DS
4x Ripper Swarm w/ DS

Fast Attack - 900
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines

Heavy Support - 720
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores

Fortifications - 70
Aegis Defense Line w/ Comms Relay

I don't believe Malanthropes are HQ any longer, rather, Elites.

 SHUPPET wrote:

Spoiler:

tag8833 wrote:


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 SHUPPET wrote:
I think what he's saying is he wants to include at least one unit in his army with a bit more focus towards gaining an advantage in the Cron match up, to make this match a bit less luck dependant. And I too am not exactly sure what the answer is. I suspect it's probably more Carnifex, if I knew for sure I was facing nothing but Crons, I'd take an entire army of Carnifex if I could.

I had 3 dakkafexes. Turn 1 I shot all 3 of them into a Destroyer Lord that was attached to 10 Scarabs. The lord tanked all of the wounds, and only failed a single save. Turn 2, one of the dakkafexes was locked up in close combat with the Destroyer Lord (Where he would die several turns later), and the other 2 managed to kill some scarabs. Turn 3, my 2 available dakkafexes shot at Night Scythes, and between the 2 of them did a single hull point (most were jinked away). Turn 4, One dakkafex + my warriors killed 5 immortals, The other one Killed 3, but they all stood back up, he then charged them, and after 4 rounds of combat he had lost 1 wound, and none of the immortals were dead.

My 450 point of Dakkafex netted me a total of:
1 Wound off of a Destroyer Lord
8 Scarabs
1 Hull point off of a Night Scythe
5 Immortals.

I don't think I would want to take more than 3 Dakkafexes against Necrons. Top tier Necrons are every bit the mono build that we are, and that monobuild has lots and lots of armor 13 in it.

So what would you rather than Fexes for this role? Don't let bad rolls fool you, what else does this match up better? In greater numbers you are more likely for them hit CC as well. Very little else in even useful in this match up, even Flyrants have a reduced efficiency against an army that is snaps hitting most the time anyway.

Here are 4 options.
1) Keep the list the same. Dakkafexes aren't the worst matchup. I think 3 is a good number. To add more, I would have to drop a Malanthrope and 20 Gargoyles, and that would have been bad. Alternatively, I could have dropped the LAN. I'm not convinced that would have been a good trade.
2) Crones work better against Necrons than Dakkafexes. Also Ignore cover S6 AP4 is stunningly powerful against Scarabs.
3) The best way to Deal with AV 13 is the Barbed Heirodule.
4) An off the wall approach to Necrons is Raveners and Shrikes. Rending Claws can deal with Barges with ease. Necrons don't have much ignore cover, although lightning killed 6 Gants, 8 Gargoyles, 2 wounds to a warrior, 1 wound to a Malanthrope, and 1 Wound to a Dakkafex. He rolled alot of 6's.

I think the LAN is 450 points that would be much better as 3 Dakkafexes, or Crones if you insist they are better (possibly are but I doubt it, +450 pts of them will do a combined total of 2 HP all game with their tentaclids, and vektor striking every turn which you won't be able to do x3 will do an average of 1.5 wounds, in reality its gonna be lower than that - I think Dakkafexes are just leagues better even here).

Massed Shrikes is another option when building to beat Necrons I guess. I can't even envision how it would go so I'm gunna withhold any comments. Might leave the game a bit more playskill dependant however which is what you wanted right.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Unyielding Hunger wrote:
So guys, I recently thought about some of the odd ideas I came up with early in my Tyranid career. I don't suppose many remember that old Tyran Air list I came up with. Well, I was chatting with a friend about templates this evening on just how many Tyranids could field at 2000pts. Well, in honor of Tyran Air, I updated this for 7E. What do you think? Quite obviously, it will do horrible against anyone remotely expecting that many flying MCs, but overall...think it has a chance as a one off gimick?

HQ - 170
Malanthrope
Malanthrope

Troops - 180
3x Ripper Swarm w/ DS
3x Ripper Swarm w/ DS
3x Ripper Swarm w/ DS
3x Ripper Swarm w/ DS
4x Ripper Swarm w/ DS

Fast Attack - 900
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines
Harpy w/ Cluster Spines

Heavy Support - 720
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores

Fortifications - 70
Aegis Defense Line w/ Comms Relay

Aside from Malanthropes being Elite and not HQ, you are also neutering the mobility of synapse less flyers if you don't have a Flyrant to move with them. They have high LD so one or two is fine, but x6 is a lot of Synapse rolls to be risking just to give you cross field mobility for a model that needs to be making VektorStrike-esque moves. On top of, 200 pts of Malanthropes being used to Synapse and Cover 6 backfield longrange artillery units already sitting behind an ADL seems like a massive waste of points here, although I can't give you a full explanation how this just requires common sense to know the Malanthropes are rarely going to make its points back here, one Zoanthrope would be fine, especially since you are attempting to build such a forward turn 1 aggressive core. The comms relay also seems like a waste of points even if just a minor one as it's pretty irrelevant when your Rippers come down. And after all that being said, you are spamming Harpies which fulfill a VERY similar offensive role to the Biovores, so you have little offensive coverage except for AP4 cover ignoring blasts. Crones probably be better although I see no reason not to just do Flyrants if this is your angle. You also have absolutely zero ways of killing even a single Rhino, besides sacrificing your Harpy's Wings for a turn to hopefully pull off an assault the next turn (even then requires multiple Harpies doing this to get the kill), or assaulting it with Bivores (lol). I couldn't imagine the type of list this would ever win a game against, but most likely it would have to be someone playing something just as silly but involving the dual CAD spamming of 4+ save models such as firewarriors and pathfinders.

 SHUPPET wrote:
I think the LAN is 450 points that would be much better as 3 Dakkafexes, or Crones if you insist they are better (possibly are but I doubt it, 450 pts of them will do a combined total of 2 HP all game with their tentaclids, and vektor striking every turn which you won't be able to do x3 will do an average of 1.5 wounds, in reality its gonna be lower than that - I think Dakkafexes are just leagues better even here).

Massed Shrikes is another option when building to beat Necrons I guess. I can't even envision how it would go so I'm gunna withhold any comments. Might leave the game a bit more playskill dependant however which is what you wanted right.

LAN is 390 points. The Biovores did alot of work. The Exocrine was my best chance at killing that destroyer Lord, unfortunately, Look Out Sirs saved him. The warriors were unspectacular, but would have taken on a squad of immortals if they hadn't failed a charge.

Would Dropping the LAN for Crones be a good call? Probably against this particular list. I don't think it yields a better TAC list. Dropping the LAN for another Flyrant would have helped me quite a lot. I still feel good about the LAN in a competitive list. I'm not quite ready to jettison it yet. But against Necrons a Trip flyrant list with Crones or Barbed Heirodule is definitely a better option.

it is indeed 390, i just went top of my head and did biovores as 140 for some reason when they are 120 and i rounded that up to the relevant number of 450 (~3 dakkafexes/Crones).



So anyway, in no way shape or form am I giving advice for a TAC list, I thought we were talking about ways to beat Necrons here. No way in hell should you drop LAN for other match ups.

In regards to Necrons, try a Tyrannofex or two. Your typical Necron list generally doesn't have much in the way of ranged AP2 and Tesla just bounces off (last time I brought a Tyrannofex against 'crons it took all 7 turns of sustained tesla fire to kill it). Meanwhile, both of the typical Tyrannofex templates are useful in the match-up (Acid Spay for clearing out Warriors in or out of Arks, Electroshock Grubs for vehicles), so it can't be entirely ignored.

I'm always harping on about dual-template Tyrannofexes, they are useful all-rounders, glad to hear that they've performed better than average against Necrons too. FWIW I enjoy running two of them. The 2+ really does come into play quite often.

(It needn't be said but run a Venom + gant screen for 3+.)

 Strat_N8 wrote:
In regards to Necrons, try a Tyrannofex or two. Your typical Necron list generally doesn't have much in the way of ranged AP2 and Tesla just bounces off (last time I brought a Tyrannofex against 'crons it took all 7 turns of sustained tesla fire to kill it). Meanwhile, both of the typical Tyrannofex templates are useful in the match-up (Acid Spay for clearing out Warriors in or out of Arks, Electroshock Grubs for vehicles), so it can't be entirely ignored.

The do indeed perform well against Necrons. Just make sure to keep them away from Scarab Swarms and Mind Shackle Scarabs.

DeviousDonut wrote:
I was the Tyranid player at the invitational. The only tyranid player, I was running a single CAD with:
2 Flyrants + Devourers + ES Grubs (Duh)
Malanthrope
Tervigon
30 Gaunts
20 Gargoyles
Dimachaeron
2 Carnifexes + Devourers

Over all I went 6-1. I lost my very first game on Friday. And I blame that on having a very good opponent with 6 vendetta valkerye elysian drop troops that I was in no way prepared for, and the fact that I looked at the mission packet wrong. I didn't realize the Objectives were cumulative until turn 5. I argued with my opponent over the end game score but in the end decided it was my own fault for not reading the mission properly and gave him the win. My next games involved facing White Scar Grav Bikers with khan, Ork nob bikers supported by lots of artillery, DE, Triptide tau with farsight and a knight, A knight Castigator with imp guard and pask including 2 wyverns and a hydra on a skyshield. Then finally for the top of bracket 2 I ended up facing my original opponent again. 6 Valkyrie vendetta elysian troops all with melta bombs. This time around I was very careful with the mission and knew to give him first turn since he started entirely in reserve. I came away with the win and took the top of bracket 2.

Taken from the feast of blades tournament thread. This list is full of genius, what do you guys think?

B-but he's not running four Flyrants! How could he win at all?! And he used a Dimachaeron and a Tervigon! That's exactly what you're not supposed to use! He should have been like, 0-1,000,000,000!

Of course things can go well for a good player in an environment that allows it. Terv is still 6 wounds and reproducing, Dima is still a beast in CC. Its not a list Id want to take simply on the grounds it starts with 50 small bodies I have to move in a tournament. : /

Im on nightshift tonight with nothing to do, so heres some discussion questions.

Next week Ill probably run in to a lot of armies I havent gotten to play much against ever. So what do I need to focus down when facing Necrons, Imperial Guard, and Orks? Thats to say, who is the focus for the quad tyrant Alpha strike?

I've got a general question. I see 1 Malanthrope showing up in every list. I almost always lose a single Malanthrope in every game these days. Sometimes that and some gargoyles are all I lose in a game. Some of that has to do with my local meta being well trained and coached by me to beat tyranids. If I was running a ground pound army like the one above, I would want a 2nd Malanthrope so that I have flexibility in deployment and my army doesn't start falling apart when I lose 1 model.

I'm curious that not only do most tyranid players seem to run only one Malanthrope, but also they never seem to lose them. Do you think that as the general player base adapts, we will start seeing more people sniping out Malanthropes before firing fruitlessly into 2+ cover?

A single Malan in a bastion is one thing, but if you are making the long walk, and/or hoping for Master of Ambush, a 2nd Malanthrope would seem to be called for.

i run two single mals and a single venom at 1850. it stops you from having to cluster around one unit, makes it less of a big deal when you have bad luck, and takes longer to focus down.