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I was thinking about getting a squad of three for anti-tank purposes in my Tyranid army. 3 guys are 165 points, come with 3 Impaler Cannons, that's 6 S8 BS3 shots at 24" so 3 hits, all of them ignore cover, none of them need LoS at all so that's 1.5 HP taken off a Wave Serpent with one round of shooting and it cannot take any fancy jink save and I dont even have to see it at all. So in 2 turns its downed.

So what makes this unit decent in my eyes is the combination of defensive capability (T6, 2 wounds each, okay armor saves...which makes them pretty resistant to grav weaponry) with offensive capability (no need for LoS, high S cover-ignoring fire) that I figured they'd be an interesting anti-tank unit in any Tyranid army.

However, they are in the Elites section and thus compete with Lictors, Venomthropes and Zoanthropes.

Thoughts?

If you are worried about filling up elite slots you can always take the lictor dataslates, or venom/zoan formations from leviathan.

Their short range really hurts them in my experience. With the BS drop and points raise they are difficult to justify compared to all the extremely points efficient other stuff we have (Flyrants, Dimachrons, Carnifexes, etc).

How about cities of death missions rigeld? They look perfectly suited for those.

did they gain anything compared to the old dex?

rigeld2 wrote:
Their short range really hurts them in my experience. With the BS drop and points raise they are difficult to justify compared to all the extremely points efficient other stuff we have (Flyrants, Dimachrons, Carnifexes, etc).

the above is very true.

they did gain shock cannons but I believe the range on those is even lower...

Range is 6 inches shorter and cannot hit fliers due to being blasts.

The only time I run hiveguard is when I'm running swarmy and have boosts to make them worthwhile.

 ductvader wrote:
Range is 6 inches shorter and cannot hit fliers due to being blasts.

The only time I run hiveguard is when I'm running swarmy and have boosts to make them worthwhile.

Impaler Cannons aren't Blast weapons, but are rather Assault 2 weapons.

I think he was commenting about my statement regarding shock cannons.

Poly Ranger wrote:How about cities of death missions rigeld? They look perfectly suited for those.

Maybe. How prevalent is armor in Cities of Death? I'd guess not as much, so their value goes down - 2 shots at BS3 isn't that impressive against infantry, even at a high STR (and bad AP).

Sir Arun wrote:did they gain anything compared to the old dex?

They gained the ability to take Shock Cannons, but cost more and lost a point of BS. Shock Cannons aren't that good.

In other words, they're basically just worse than the old dex.

I wish I had built mine as Tyrant Guard.

I like the cheesy grin they have and having some ignores cover high str is nice but isn't quite enough. If you're dealing with heavy armor I feel it's best to use those points giving your big bugs the electroshock grubs thorax mod which allows you to put a haywire template down (glances vehicles on a 2+ and pens on a 6) that and the template is Str 5 AP 5 so it isn't bad against troops either.

blaktoof wrote:
I think he was commenting about my statement regarding shock cannons.

Derp. Sorry

But I still think the combination of not needing any LoS, having high Strength and ignoring cover is good. Is there anything else short of charging into melee in the Nid codex that can reliably put wounds on Wave Serpents, Hammerheads and the like without them jinking on a 3+ using their vehicle upgrades?

Just as comparison: A flying hive tyrant with dual tl-devourers only does 0.59 HPs on a Wave Serpent with holofields, while a unit of 3 Hive Guard do 1.5 HPs damage.

Is a unit of 3 Zoanthropes overall the better tank hunter? They cost similar amount of points, have the same wounds, worse toughness but waay better saves, a small chance of getting insta-killed, and better firepower against non-skimmers (2 hits at S10 AP2 lance > 3 hits at S8 AP4) but obv. do not ignore cover and need LoS and also have shorter range but can use their attack also as small blasts against TEQ

Hive Guard are awesome, and I think they are great to have in most lists.

That being said, they're not great *specifically* at killing Wave Serpents. While yes, they are probably one of the better non-assault methods Nids have for killing Wave Serpents... Wave Serpents simply have the maneuverability to stay out of their threat area. Other good options for nids include Haywire templates from fliers. Their range can really be helped if you manage to augment them with the Onslaught power though.

Their area denial can still be really great though. As Eldar, I lost a game once because I couldn't manage to kill my opponent's Hive Guard, and so he kept me away from the middle of the board, and thus kept me away from a couple objectives. Even though they didn't kill any of my Wave Serpents, he still used them really well for table area denial, and that got him the game.

However, there are enough things out there besides Wave Serpents that Jink that Hive Guard can shoot at and do really great against that they are usually worth taking. If anything competes with them, it's probably the Exocrine.

 Sir Arun wrote:
But I still think the combination of not needing any LoS, having high Strength and ignoring cover is good. Is there anything else short of charging into melee in the Nid codex that can reliably put wounds on Wave Serpents, Hammerheads and the like without them jinking on a 3+ using their vehicle upgrades?

Just as comparison: A flying hive tyrant with dual tl-devourers only does 0.59 HPs on a Wave Serpent with holofields, while a unit of 3 Hive Guard do 1.5 HPs damage.

Is a unit of 3 Zoanthropes overall the better tank hunter? They cost similar amount of points, have the same wounds, worse toughness but waay better saves, a small chance of getting insta-killed, and better firepower against non-skimmers (2 hits at S10 AP2 lance > 3 hits at S8 AP4) but obv. do not ignore cover and need LoS and also have shorter range but can use their attack also as small blasts against TEQ

Why are you not using electroshock grubs?

With e-grubs it would increase the total HP damage of the flyrant to 0.867

 Sir Arun wrote:
With e-grubs it would increase the total HP damage of the flyrant to 0.867

Um.
1 Template does .84 hull points and ignores cover.
6 TL S6 shots, 5.36 hit, .8576 glance, .4288 after saves.
.84+.4288=1.2688.

Did you forget template weapons ignore cover?

e grubs are quite good, the thing rigeld2 isnt including in his math is that 66.6% of the chances of doing anything are glances, 16.6% chance for a pen is the best haywire gets. [the other 16% is no effect]

Against Av 12 Str 8 pens 33% of the time, against AV 11 50% and AV 10 66% of the time. Many many vehicles have av 10 rear armor.

given you can now drop 3 hiveguard in a tyrranocyte behind something and probably hit it at av 10 much easier then a flyrant could with egrubs, you have a much better chance of destroying most vehicles in one go for less points than the cost of a winged flyrant with 2x twin linked brainleech devourers and e grubs which is what, 240-260pts? compared to ~225.

there are a decent amount of situations where tyrannocyte hive guard would out perform a flying tyrant.

Overall the flyrant is of course better because its highly highly mobile, but its not actually good at taking out many threats on its own. until it closes to egrub range the standard loadout most flyrants have [2 twin linked brain leech devourers] have no effect on armor 13-14 and are unlikely to do much to armor 12. average result from shooting is 1 glance if the model has no cover save. Of course as many people run 3-5 of these things they become much scarier.

3 podded hive guard drop in, and fire 6 shots, 3 hits, many things being av 10 in rear your looking at 2 pens and a glance on average. Then at the end of the phase the tyrranocyte can shoot, if it happens to also be in rear arc it has a chance to finish off the vehicle if it isn't dead. Chances are the hive guard just did 3hps total +2 effects on the pen chart barring saves for cover.

much more efficient for that round of killing than the flyrant at certain targets.

the real strength of e grubs is against open topped transports as they have a decent str value, so you have a chance to get an effect from the strength of the hit, and then you get a haywire effect, and if there are embarked models they suffer no escape hits. Which is very very good.

blaktoof wrote:
e grubs are quite good, the thing rigeld2 isnt including in his math is that 66.6% of the chances of doing anything are glances, 16.6% chance for a pen is the best haywire gets. [the other 16% is no effect]

Because we were discussing Hull Points caused, not pen results - against Wave Serpents getting a pen is anything but guaranteed.

Against Av 12 Str 8 pens 33% of the time, against AV 11 50% and AV 10 66% of the time. Many many vehicles have av 10 rear armor.

given you can now drop 3 hiveguard in a tyrranocyte behind something and probably hit it at av 10 much easier then a flyrant could with egrubs, you have a much better chance of destroying most vehicles in one go for less points than the cost of a winged flyrant with 2x twin linked brainleech devourers and e grubs which is what, 240-260pts? compared to ~225.

15 points cheaper for a suicide unit? That isn't much of a threat at all after it drops down?
6 shots, 3 hit, you'll average 2 pens against AV10 - not quite destroying a single vehicle in one go. And that's if you can get rear armor without scattering off the board.

rigeld2 wrote:

 Sir Arun wrote:
With e-grubs it would increase the total HP damage of the flyrant to 0.867

Um.
1 Template does .84 hull points and ignores cover.
6 TL S6 shots, 5.36 hit, .8576 glance, .4288 after saves.
.84+.4288=1.2688.

Did you forget template weapons ignore cover?

yes

So does anyone know if a trio of Zoanthropes is a better tank hunter than a trio of Hiveguard?

rigeld2 wrote:

blaktoof wrote:
e grubs are quite good, the thing rigeld2 isnt including in his math is that 66.6% of the chances of doing anything are glances, 16.6% chance for a pen is the best haywire gets. [the other 16% is no effect]

Because we were discussing Hull Points caused, not pen results - against Wave Serpents getting a pen is anything but guaranteed.

Against Av 12 Str 8 pens 33% of the time, against AV 11 50% and AV 10 66% of the time. Many many vehicles have av 10 rear armor.

given you can now drop 3 hiveguard in a tyrranocyte behind something and probably hit it at av 10 much easier then a flyrant could with egrubs, you have a much better chance of destroying most vehicles in one go for less points than the cost of a winged flyrant with 2x twin linked brainleech devourers and e grubs which is what, 240-260pts? compared to ~225.

15 points cheaper for a suicide unit? That isn't much of a threat at all after it drops down?
6 shots, 3 hit, you'll average 2 pens against AV10 - not quite destroying a single vehicle in one go. And that's if you can get rear armor without scattering off the board.

Im not really in agreement with your assessment.

3 models with toughness 6 and 2 wounds, and a tyrranocyte with 6 toughness 5 wounds is not really a suicide unit.

yes there save is 4+, but very few people have weapons that are AP4 most weapons are AP2,3 or 5. so the weapons that are ignoring their armor that you will mostly see, would be ignoring a tyrants armor as well.

Its not hard to get to the rear or even side armor without scattering off the board, given the size of a tyrranocyte and average scatter, then the 6" disembark you can almost always get the rear armor if the model is more than 8" from the table edge.

6 hive guard will average 3 hits
against AV 12 they will score 1.5 effects avg
against AV 11 they will score 2 effects avg
against AV 10 they will score 2.58 effects avg

the other thing to consider there is the possibly to roll lower to 0 effects, there is the possibility to roll higher than average for 6 pens. against AV 13 or less.

the opponent cannot jink.

The tyrranocyte itself can also fire, with an average of 5 hits out of 15 shots with deathspitters. This has a chance to hurt AV 11 or 10.

a Hive tyrant cannot hurt av 10 rear armor until turn 3 on average. any vehicle with AV 13+ it will not be able to hurt [slim chance if opponent deployes badly, and or HT rolls very very well with a possible onslaught power] until turn 2 which will be a .86 chance to do something with e grubs. Most likely a single hp glance. Against AV 12, it will average 1 glance a turn from 2 twin linked devourers until it gets into egrub range, at which point it will be able to fire egrubs + 1 twin linked dev, for a total of 1.66 hp average. This assumes you have LOS to the unit, and its not behind a giant hill firing indirectly at your stuff that you have to spend a turn or two flying to get around. None of this includes the fact the target can get cover saves from these twin linked dev shots, further reducing the tyrants effectiveness.

while yes a HT can tear through av 10 quite well, and even av 11, against higher av it struggles, and a squad of hiveguard in a tyrranocyte has a much higher chance of landing in a position to threaten rear armor or side armor and kill the target. Yes they are slower than the HT when they arrive, but they have an 30" threat range if you include they can move and shoot. Yes their armor is 1 worse than the HT, but they can probably get cover and they can take a lot more hits than a HT can.

So if you need to neutralize a threat with rear armor 10 in one turn of a unit doing something, statistically they are better. Does the HT offer more maneuverability and threat to the table over the course of the game, but the HG in the tyrranocyte for AV 10 rear armor offer more for 1 turn than a HT can come close to doing. And there are a lot of vehicles with AV 10 rear armor.

3 zoanthropes need to pass a psychic test, then roll hits, lets just say they past the psychic test and do not get denied. (note if you factor this in it does weigh on their ability to get things done)

they fire 3 shots, hitting on average 1.5 times. Lets say you are lucky and hit twice.

they get lance, and ap 2, so anything less than 12 is 12.

so against 12 they need to roll a 2 or higher to have an effect. on average this is 1.72 effects, with ap2 remember you get +1 to the roll on the pen table.
the chance for them to hurt av 13 or 14 is the same due to lance.

this means they are better than hiveguard against av 13 or 14 , the hive guard are actually better at having an affect on av 12 over the course of a game than the zoanthropes, but not much much. its like .21, and then the zoanthropes still get +1 to the chart roll so it may be even or the zoanthropes slightly better.