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I was considring the flyrant vs one that walks on the ground taking hive guards to guard it.

It seems to mee that the flyrant is both better and cheaper? Or does it die a lot?

Under the new Codex you don't have to choose, since the Flyrant is still entitled to his Guards.

Essentially the only reason not to take Wings is if you are struggling to front the points for it, since it's such a massive improvement for a relatively small cost and doesn't restrict you in any way.
The Guards are less important but remain a decent option, and can provide a nice little anvil for minimal investment. It also gives your Flyrant somewhere to hide in the first turn since you cannot start airborne.

I think I have the wrong rules then.

I thought that flying MC's can start airborne?

I thought the new rules only allow the tyrant to join the guards. Not neceseraly leave them. (It says nothing about this in the wording. I asumed it would remain like this as that was in the old codex?)

The flyrant is mobile and can shoot air. The walking one spends more points on tyrant guards to get "the wounds" the the flyrant does in wings.

If you flyrant starts on the board turn 1, he starts out gliding. Then on your first movement phase you can switch to swooping mode.

It also looks like (for now atleast) they changed the rules so it appears you can have your tyrant leave the guard. Last edition is said under the rules for shield wall you could not.

Could you take a Flyrant with Guards and have a Tyranid Prime join the Guard unit turn one?

- FMCs can deploy on the table for Turn 1, but start in glide mode. They can then switch to swoop at the beginning of their movement.
- You can deploy the Prime with the Guards as it's a normal independent character.
- Sadly you are still only given permission to join the Tyrant to the Guards, not to leave the unit. Once he's there, he's stuck till the Guards are dead.

That last point sucks because a nice strategy if you are running a single Flyrant would be to start him on the board Turn 1, attached to the Guard with a Prime. This would protect him if your opponent goes first or siezes. Then on your turn you could detach him and swoop down the field, leaving the Prime in the Guard unit which gives you a pretty stout synapse source that isn't too shabby in CC. It's still worth considering taking the Guard unit with the Prime for that reason. You just can't use it to protect the Flyrant on the first turn.

OK so what is the opinion on a flyrant vs a tyrant with guards? If you can hide the flyrant for the first turn it looks much more resilient then a tyrant with guards, even though you pay more for guards then you pay for the wings.

There is even a 50% chance you get first turn, and then a 50% chance you get night fighting, both witch help the flyrant's argument. Am I wrong to think this?

I would also think that the flyrant is the best way to deal with flyers, closely followed by the crone.

There is no competition at all. Flyrants are way to good to leave at home.

You can't hide the flyrant with guards (unless you plan on him never leaving and moving very slowly across the board-that's what I was trying to say with my last post). Personally, I don't see a place for a ground tyrant in most lists. Flyrants provide much needed skyfire. If you want a support ground tyrant, I think the Swarmlord fills the role better, and if you want a shooty ground tyrant, I'd rather use a carnifex brood.

The only time I'd take a walking tyrant is if you have filled your heavy slots, and you want more firepower on a more durable MC platform that also provides some synapse. At that point though you are paying a ton of points for the tyrant and his guard.

Flyrant with no guards takes it hands down IMO. If your not getting the first turn and you can't hide them out of LOS just reserve them and bring them in via DS which automatically puts them in swoop mode.

Guards are nothing more than extra wounds for your tyrant in most cases at 25 points per wound (more if you upgrade the guard) and they severely limit the Tyrants mobility if it has wings. As wings are pretty much an auto-buy for Tyrants now I'd say save the Tyrant Guard unless your bringing the Swarmlord.

If you are looking for a cheaper way to fit a brood of 3 carnifexes, tyrant guard with crushing claws are half the cost.

I want to know if I can put my Hive Tyrant with wings in the guard and detach off on my turn and fly away. Guards might be a cool way to defend an objective or something. They could also move up the table and threaten something

Many people are still instinctively responding with a Flyrant. I wonder if any of them feel synapse control of the new Tyranids is a priority?

A walking Tyrant with 3 Guard will keep the bulk of your army within synapse control for the game. You can also give them all adrenal glands for fleet. You will need to base the army around this setup so large fast moving threats are a plus.

I wonder if Swarmlord with 3 Guards is the best way for a Bug army to maintain Synapse control over the board. The Swarmlord can also dish out furious charge to gant/gargoyle units so you can save points on them with that choice. Swarmlord also is the bugs only option for getting +1 to reserve rolls.

With the amount of Skyfire out there now, coupled with the heVy str 6-7 volume of fire units in circulation, I don't think a Flyrant or two can be counted on to do very much in most games.

The obvius question I alwasy come back to when debating this in my head is the problem of dealing with flyers.

The dakka flyrant is ouer best solution I would think?

DarthDiggler wrote:Many people are still instinctively responding with a Flyrant. I wonder if any of them feel synapse control of the new Tyranids is a priority?

A walking Tyrant with 3 Guard will keep the bulk of your army within synapse control for the game. You can also give them all adrenal glands for fleet. You will need to base the army around this setup so large fast moving threats are a plus.

I wonder if Swarmlord with 3 Guards is the best way for a Bug army to maintain Synapse control over the board. The Swarmlord can also dish out furious charge to gant/gargoyle units so you can save points on them with that choice. Swarmlord also is the bugs only option for getting +1 to reserve rolls.

With the amount of Skyfire out there now, coupled with the heVy str 6-7 volume of fire units in circulation, I don't think a Flyrant or two can be counted on to do very much in most games.

I'm sure it's more to due with their speed and sheer attack power. This does several things for an army.
-Provides an option for highly mobile synapse
-Provides a highly threatening and often hard to kill unit that draws a lot of fire(often to little effect)
-Provides quick attack options on units that you would otherwise take several turns to get to
-Allows you to remove a nearly dead Tyrant from the battlefield and return it in a more favorable position next turn.

As far as I know Tau are the biggest problem for your Flyrants but even then their speed means less time exposed to fire while closing on the enemy and they will still be drawing a significant portion of their firepower every turn until they are dead, locked in combat or have moved off the battlefield into ongoing reserves. Not mentioned the threat they pose to enemy psykers... Land one next to a gliding/grounded Daemon Prince and cast Psychic Shriek... if it does not make it's DTW roll it will very likely die in one shot.

Could you make a decent list with Tyrant Guard? Sure. That's no reason not to take the wings though. You could keep them separate until the HT is severely wounded and then have him join the Guard for protection, possibly even to regenerate safely for a turn or two. You could start it with the guard and close more distance on the Tau army while he has to chew through your Guard and by the time they are dead you may be in assault range...

To sum it up, you get so many tactical options it is hands-down nearly mandatory to give your Tyrant Wings.

Niiai wrote:The obvius question I alwasy come back to when debating this in my head is the problem of dealing with flyers.

The dakka flyrant is ouer best solution I would think?

While Flyrants are situationally better VS Flyers and FMC's I think Hive Crones will generally be better AA. They may be squishier but considering the lower point cost, haywire weapons and S8 VS I think they're the best AA choice. The Flyrant however has several other uses and so is the obvious choice pick between the two. I plan to have both.

I can see a place for a melee Tyrant in a TMC list.

Carnifex, Tyrannofex, Exocrine and Tyrants all make very compelling ranged monsters, but all fold under a dedicated enemy assault and while they are all from passable to good in melee, they lack the useful tools you need to really make sure you kill your enemy.

A Tyrant with LW/BS, Talons, Toxin Sacks and Adrenal Glands hidden behind the wall of monsters looks like a very competant counter-assault unit, with 5 (6 on the charge) S6 (7 on the charge) AP2 attacks, wounding on (at worst) a 4+, re-rolling failed to wounds in many cases, Instant Death on 6s and all of this comes with WS8/I8. It's not even that expensive (210 for the above setup).

I would be half tempted to throw a Venom Cannon on there just to give him some ranged presence, but this bumps his cost up and drops an attack.

Guard, I'm not sold on. In a real TMC overload list, Tyrants are tempting targets but there are other equally nasty-looking threats as well. I was thinking of running something like this at 2k:

Tyrant (2x Devourers)'
Tyrant (LW/BS, maybe a Venom Cannon?)
3 Venomthrope
Tervigon (no upgrades)
Tervigon (no upgrades)
30 Termagants
30 Termagants
3 Carnifex (2x Devourers on each)
Tyrannofex (Acid Spray)
Tyrannofex (Acid Spray) OR Exocrine

With a little bit of wiggle room on the biomorphs, that comes to around 2k. Winged Tyrants are great and all, but I think a list like this may actually get a bit more out of groundpounder Tyrants to oversee the monster stampede. Such a shame that the Old Adversary bubble has gone, that would have been great here.


Thinking about it, it's almost tempting to just bite the bullet and take the Swarmlord on the above list...

 Niiai wrote:
The obvius question I alwasy come back to when debating this in my head is the problem of dealing with flyers.

The dakka flyrant is ouer best solution I would think?

Personally, no. The Firestorm Redoubt with a Venomthrope or Zoanthrope inside it is the best way of dealing with this in my experience.

You get a big bunk...two very big automated guns...and a huge shrouding or synapse bubble.

S6 vs Fliers means you must get rear armor to be truly effective...though most fliers are AV 10-11, the 12s are the only ones you really need to worry about with Skyfiring models.

I personally love the "Shellrant" or "Walkrant" but when you take him you start to realize that he becomes more of a lead from the back/flank type unit. Today's meta doesn't just let him charge up front and center anymore. I'm running Stranglethorn/Deathspitter for Synapse Solidarity and Psychic Power buffing or Stock for a flanking CC monster.

I just realized something: is it possible to put 2 Tyrants with the same Tyrant Guard squad? If so, would there be any advantages?

In all the years of the past codex I've never heard of anyone doing it ever nor thought of it myself which is odd since I routinely attach 2 BikerBosses to my one NobBikerz mob.

Thatguyoverthere11 wrote:
If you are looking for a cheaper way to fit a brood of 3 carnifexes, tyrant guard with crushing claws are half the cost.

I want to know if I can put my Hive Tyrant with wings in the guard and detach off on my turn and fly away. Guards might be a cool way to defend an objective or something. They could also move up the table and threaten something

They're also half the wounds, IE they're not a brood of "cheaper" carnifexes.

Possible yes, completely not worth it when you take synapse into account...the smarter play for a "mini-deathstar" that we use attaches a Prime to the unit to tank some wounds and provide a different challenge creature.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kirasu wrote:

Thatguyoverthere11 wrote:
If you are looking for a cheaper way to fit a brood of 3 carnifexes, tyrant guard with crushing claws are half the cost.

I want to know if I can put my Hive Tyrant with wings in the guard and detach off on my turn and fly away. Guards might be a cool way to defend an objective or something. They could also move up the table and threaten something

They're also half the wounds, IE they're not a brood of "cheaper" carnifexes.

But that's not to say they can't be useful by themselves.

Together you can consider them 1 T6 Creature with 6W and a 3+ for 150 points stock with rending claws and a fair number of attacks.

Every once in a while I throw a unit in a list with a Flyrant...you never know when you're facing an AA nightmare and want to attach a flyrant for safety...or facing another short range or assault army that they can wreak some havoc on.

It's not competitive, but It's not without its benefits.