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What is good in vanguard detachment? Here is my dilemma: I see vanguard detachement I do 18 von Ryan's Leaper with redeploy for early game pressure. And then I don't know where to go from there.

I look at my shooting options, all who would be better under invasion fleet.

I have no idea what stratagems, or upgrades that I want to put in my vanguard list that gets better with vanguard. Lictors for instance are good anyway.

I am not very experienced but my takes are.

1.) read the Goonhammer article

2.) Remember that Flyrants, Winged Primes with Warriors and Flyers (Hive Crone and Harpyies) are Vanguards. So they can get some really annoying things going on like "lone operative" aka untargetable outside 12 inches on Harpyies.

3.) Use Enhancement Hunting Ground as a hard counter against reserves armies like GSC. Each reserves unit appearing must roll a dice and on 2+ have to do a battleshock test. Ouch!

4.) Neurolictors

The harpy is 215 points for a twin linked S9 gun. That is not great.

Is the nurolictor that good? The timing seems hard to use.

I think the Harpyie is not great, but with untargetable beyond 12 inch this might still be pretty nice. Also it can do a bomb run and its anti-infantry weapon got a lot better.

Neurolictor seems awesome for 65 points. You have to lean a fair bit into Battleshock shenanigans but the tyranids are really into it anyways.

What are other battleshock shenanigans? Because it is quite difficult to have the neurolictor within 12" on your command phace.

Well the Neurolictor can infiltrate so there is that. With the strat mentioned before he is untargetable outside of 6 inches.

Battleshock related:
- Hierophant
- Screamer Killer
- Neurotyrant
- deathleaper
- Mawlock?
- ...?
- some strats

Can someone sell me on the Neurolictor?

I've made a bunch of lists recently and always end up with exactly enough spare points to include one, but I'm not sure if it's worthwhile.

I want to include a regular Lictor, but I'm very sour that they inexplicably lost the 5+ Invul they've had since 2nd Ed.

Lictors most of the time did not have an inv but instead a bonus to their armour saves via chameleonic skin.

The Neurolictor is great for forcing battleshock tests, disrupt the enemy forces and thus keep them from scoring.
You should probably not expect that one 65 points model is doing too much though. He hangs around, annoys and you have to keep im alive.

 Astmeister wrote:
Lictors most of the time did not have an inv but instead a bonus to their armour saves via chameleonic skin.

It had a 5+ Invul or a de facto one with in-built cover saves.

And sometimes it had negatives to hit. And then it got its Invul back... and then immediately lost it when every other variation of the Lictor kept theirs.

That's why it has to be a mistake.

Haven't played my 'nids in a long while, but the new codex has me wanting to come back to them. Specifically with a vanguard detachment because most of my collection is 'stealers. So I could be way off base here, but...

My take is that the neurolictor is "good" because he's cheap enough to splash in, and when his abilities work, they can be a big deal. I think we want to consider working the Parasite into our lists as he's yet another source forced battleshock tests (along with the neuro, SitW, and one of our strats).

It seems like Vanguard units are better at forcing battleshock tests than any of the other list archetypes which means that your neurolictor is more likely to find himself in range to make it easier for your other units to win fights against shocked enemies.

In general, the vanguard playstyle seems to be about being annoying, locking enemy units down, and trying to control the flow of the battle. We have...
* Lots of ways to force battleshock.
* Tools for sniping out enemy characters.
* The parasite who forces battleshock but then also spawns lictors who make it harder for the enemy to control objectives.
* Army-wide fall-back-and-charge.

So my basic plan is to put 'stealers and lictors forward behind terrain so that my opponent feels nervous about moving forward into no-man's land, then spend all game tarpitting key enemy units (and hopefully killing them along the way) while my non-vanguard units support from my backfield.

Now, my own collection is unfortunately kind of lacking in shooty bugs, so I'll probably end up trying to back up my vanguard with a second wave of distraction carnifex or something. But if I had whatever models I wanted, I think I'd be looking at some of our longer-ranged shooty bugs that could hold home objectives and also put enough pressure on the enemy that they feel like they have to move forward towards all those lurking genestealers (who have advance+charge mind you). Weirdly, I'd be sort of tempted to go with shooting units that can focus on enemy infantry rather than vehicles. My thinking being that infantry are more likely than vehicles to have the volume of fire to mulch through my 'stealers while vehicles are more likely to have low RoF weapons that are easier for my 'stealers and their invulns to tarpit while I'm locking things down.

I feel like there's maybe some potential for biovores here too? Their damage isn't amazing, but attacking from out of line of sight will add more pressure for the enemy to move forward into the 'stealer blender, and plopping a few spore mines down for movement blocking (and advance move prevention) seems like it synergizes with the overall lockdown strategy.

But again, I haven't given my poor 'nids much love in a long while, so take my advice with an ocean of salt.

There is a good amount of play in fallback, shoot, charge. Lets you always strike first. Drawback would be getting shot yourself in overwatch. Which battleshocked units can’t do. And we’ve got some tools for that.

Vanguard type units are probably going to be solid board control mobility picks. I think you would want to spend as much time in CC as you can with some shooting units as backup. Leverage what battleshock tricks you can to try to shut down their tricks and not get hammered using ours.

I think it could be a very fun list to play, still trying to work out what do I have from my collection to make it viable on the table personally.

I have quite a large model range. But I have no idea how to do this. So confusing. I need some long ranged support.

My biggest issue is trying to fit on the Swarmlord. I think I need some CP for the tricks.

 Niiai wrote:
I have quite a large model range. But I have no idea how to do this. So confusing. I need some long ranged support.

My biggest issue is trying to fit on the Swarmlord. I think I need some CP for the tricks.

You are probably right.

I skew more to the fluffy/casual side of things, so would rather use a flyrant or broodlord, as they are more thematic for a vanguard swarm. But swarmy forthr CP sounds like a solid tactical choice.

Edit: lictors can eat brains for CP. think it would be enough?

I think that Lictors will probably die when they charge most targets. Also their melee profile only lets them kill quite squishy characters.

 Astmeister wrote:
I think that Lictors will probably die when they charge most targets. Also their melee profile only lets them kill quite squishy characters.

Neurolictors are only going to be eating GEQ characters in one bite, but normal ones should have good odds of eating anything less then a marine captain.

And while not the toughest bug in the swarm, they are still T6. If you are just picking characters out of squads armed with riflebuts and harsh language, you should be OK.

Against Guard and Tau this might work. But you need those 6s to have the precision strikes anyway. I am not confident, you can reliably kill much with that. Maybe against GSC worth it?

A Lictor only does 1.11 wounds on a Cadian Castellan per fight phase. That's pretty poor although he is maybe his best target. The 6s you need for precision are just bad.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Now that I look at it? Is a lictor doing precision without criticals?
In this case he does 5.55 wounds on average to the Castellan killing him.

That would be good against squishy characters. But the unit's overwatch is still not good for him.

I didn’t think precision requited 6’s. Just slap wounds onto visible characters in the unit.

Edit.
Saw your edit. Flashback to previous editions were it did require 6’s? If that was the case, than yes, it would be pretty useless.

I think I got confused from the "precision hyper adaptation" of the Invasion swarm detachment.

Overwatch does seem like an issue. Trying to keep key units battleshocked is one potential. The swarmlord’s ability to make a strat cost another +1CP seems like it could also be useful. Or normal LOS/tarpit/junk unit charges tricks.

 Nevelon wrote:
I didn’t think precision requited 6’s. Just slap wounds onto visible characters in the unit.

Edit.
Saw your edit. Flashback to previous editions were it did require 6’s? If that was the case, than yes, it would be pretty useless.

I made the same mistake with my haemonculus initially. I think it's just that some rules do only trigger precision on 6s, so I mis-memorized all precision rules as working that way.

Something I'm having trouble wrapping my head around regarding vanguard armies is that it seems like we just have to be comfortable losing some units on the way in and trading pieces. Which can hurt a little when you're talking about something with genestealer points cost. Like, I feel compelled to run 30 'stealers both because that's a big part of my collection (I think I actually have more like 50) and because it seems thematic for the army. But by doing so, I know it's going to be that much harder to hide them, and they'll inevitably end up taking hits at some point in the game. So I just have to wrap my head around the idea that my 'stealers are just there to be an expensive speed bump and tie up the enemy as long as they can.

Similarly, lictors seem prone to dying as soon as they attack. So I'm going to try to focus on using them as sneaky objective scorers. They can assassinate squishy characters pretty reliably, but I'm not sure how often I'll run into especially squishy characters. Removing a spiritseer from an eldar wraith squad would be big, but the only other faction I've seen running lots of characters so far are necrons. I'm not sure lictors are quite nasty enough to kill 'cron charactes reliably.

Thinking on what elements to add to compliment a vanguard force, I'm wondering whether it might actually be better to spam gaunts/goyles rather than ranged shooting elements. My thinking being that if the vanguard units are focusing on locking down/whittling down/assassinating key enemy units, we'll want to be able to capitalize on that by covering as many objectives as possible. Plus, that can functionally leave our opponents without a lot of good targets for lascannons and lances. Basically, we could focus on killing/shutting down their anti-infantry stuff, then just have so many infantry bodies they can't deal with us.

-----------------------------------

Talk to me about 'stealers and brood lords, guys. The broodlord kind of seems not worth it? His stats aren't bad, and 'stealers don't seem to hit very hard without him. Then again, normal 'stealers don't have full to-wound rerolls, so fishing for DWs on crits doesn't seem like a huge boost to offense either. Like, if you're facing lightly-armored foes, 'stealer claw AP is already good enough so you don't need the DWs, and if you're facing marines, the DWs aren't reliable enough to suddenly make 'stealers good against marines. So he's not really a big force multiplier for large 'stealer squads. His own melee attacks seem like the bigger contribution, but are those attacks worth nearly 100 points? I guess using the Assassin Beasts strat with him is a solid option to have.

Being able to give a squad of 'stealers the Chameleonic enhancement might be good? As written, the broodlord would gain Stealth, but I'm not sure if that gets conveyed to his unit? Depending on how that works, being able to get your 'stealer squad down to a 3+ save (Stealth + Cover) would be pretty good for making them resistant to bolters, but only getting them down to a 4+ save (just cover) is meh. His Gaze is nice for reducing casualties if we have to charge an enemy melee unit, but past edition instincts tell me we should just be murdering such units so hard that they aren't a threat by the time they swing at us anyway.

And then 'stealers on their own feel a little weird to me. The Vanguard detachment gives them advance + charge again, which helps a lot. They do about 1.33 damage to marines each, which isn't awful. We need basically a full squad to wipe out a 5-man meq unit in a single turn, but that means that we're more likely to be able to take the meq unit hostage and finish them off on the enemy turn. (Is tripointing a thing this edition?) The second wound on them is fluffy and helps them evaporate to bolters less quickly, but they are still susceptible to bolters in general. I think they're probably in a good place; it just feels weird to have a unit that has good-but-not-absurd speed, offense, and defense compared to the gimmicky stratagem-fueled antics of yester-year. 190 points for 10 T4 bodies with a 5+ save still feels like a hard pill to swallow, but I guess 8.5 points per wound isn't too shabby. And if our opponents throw D2 or better at them, they aren't putitng those same attacks at our other medium/big gribblies and risk wasting AP on our invuln saves.

Seems like 'stealers are probably "good," but we have to be comfortable losing some on the way in and using our strats to mitigate losses?

 Wyldhunt wrote:
Something I'm having trouble wrapping my head around regarding vanguard armies is that it seems like we just have to be comfortable losing some units on the way in and trading pieces. Which can hurt a little when you're talking about something with genestealer points cost. Like, I feel compelled to run 30 'stealers both because that's a big part of my collection (I think I actually have more like 50) and because it seems thematic for the army. But by doing so, I know it's going to be that much harder to hide them, and they'll inevitably end up taking hits at some point in the game. So I just have to wrap my head around the idea that my 'stealers are just there to be an expensive speed bump and tie up the enemy as long as they can.

I've got 70 or so painted stealers (some with Ymgarl heads, some with expanded carapaces...). I dearly wish they had boosted max squad size; I'd love to send 3 units of 20.

Here's what I'm thinking at the moment.
1) Vanguard is going to be terrain dependent. (Having just returned from the Nova Open, where the average field of fire was about 12", that seems like a fine thing right now.)
2) COMMIT to the bit. Target saturation is essential, as is accepting losses.
3) Win games by constraining an opponent's mobility options, even at the cost of bodies. This makes fighting armies with good redeployment options more painful, but any fighting that is happening in the enemy deployment zone is usually going to make it hard for them to complete objectives.
4) I don't see a path that involves relying on battle-shock. Stratagems aren't fundamental to most opponents, though this might save a few models here or there. But without something akin to Chaos Daemons "fail a battle-shock test and take mortal wounds," it doesn't seem like something to build around.
5) The playing surface is only 44"x60" these days, which makes it easier to cover in bugs!
6) Screening, layering, and concentration is probably key. What can we do to prevent the opponent from supplying mutual support to his units?

So, with that in mind:

A core of 3 units of Genestealers, probably each with a Broodlord. Yes, the BL is kind of expensive for situational return, but a full unit is throwing 45 melee attacks on a 2+; you're going to see 6's on the Wound rolls.

Some Gargoyles, probably with a Winged Tyranid Prime. They're not stellar (and Alpha Warrior is wasted on Gargoyles), but they fill up a lot of volume, and can deep strike, shoot, them scamper onto someone's objective in a way that will require some effort to dislodge. Not sure on quantity yet.

Flying Hive Tyrant. Maybe 2. This is the hammer. I'm tempted to go versatile here, with the flying Venom cannon, specifically because of "Questing Tendrils" - they should always be pulling out of combat & reengaging (although QT doesn't seem to allow you to shoot when you fall back, just to charge). Also, Will of the Hive Mind means you can use Surprise Assault or Assassin Beasts whenever convenient. This is probably where Chameleonic and Stalker go, too.

Zoanthropes in Tyrannocytes. Zoanthropes are as good as it's going to get for AT work, and Tyrannocytes mean a) first turn delivery; and b) since these are ALSO Vanguard Invaders, you can pick them up again with Invisible Hunter and drop them on remote objectives, where Unseen Lurker can perhaps keep them safe from long-range sniping in later turns.

Unless you want to use Fixed Secondaries, I don't see a great use for Lictors. The "Assassin Beasts" stratagem means you can achieve Precision whenever you need it, with units that are far more likely to kill a character (run the math on a unit of Precision Genestealers against most characters).

Delivery options are many and varied here. Seeded Broods means you can Deep Strike on turn 1 if you want, or come out of Strategic Reserve in no man's land on Turn 1; this could be significant for some mission/deployment combinations. I do think careful layering is going to be crucial - using gargoyles to keep most units >12" from your Flyrant (for Unseen Lurkers) is a cost-effective option, but you can do similar things with Biovores dropping spore mines. The gargoyles, using Seeded Broods, can be a game-time decision, too - you can drop them to screen the Flyrant, or a Genestealer advance (after the Advance roll, even), with their shoot-and-scoot to further push back enemy movement options.

So, assuming about 1650 pts for some combination of the above list, we've got about 350 points left to play with. The Swarmlord is attractive for CP generation and to bat clean-up as your Vanguard units charge then flee forward to charge something new; he can also make a Battle Tactics stratagem more expensive for your opponent, which can target the Command Re-roll stratagem. If you want more fire support, you can fit in a second batch of Zoanthropes & pod, or a T-fex; I may try out a Barbed Hierodule (because I have one). Raveners aren't Vanguard for some reason, but are a good thematic fit, reasonably cheap, and can handle the "go get a distant objective" role without requiring a CP to do so (which would reduce the need to bring The Swarmlord). Von Ryan's Leapers have some potential for increasing the pressure on your opponent right from the outset; they may die quickly, but they'll be soaking fire that would otherwise be killing Genestealers. I'm also tempted to try and fit in a unit of Venomthropes, just to drop Stealth all across the (non-monstrous) lines for the first turn or so; it's easy to keep a little tail going back into their protective bubble, at least initially. Ripper Swarms are dirt cheap, can deep strike, are easy to hide, and have a shooting attack, making them viable for a number of secondary objectives (consider Fixed Objectives if you go this route).

It's not Aeldari by any means, but on the right terrain and maneuvered very carefully, I think there's potential here. Some pieces remain over-priced (Neuronode probably isn't worth 30 points to a list with this much post-deployment flexibility; Swarmy and the Tyrant options are overpriced for what they do right now, as are Lictors and the Harpy & Hive Crone), but I think we can do much of heavy lifting while remaining on-theme.

 Janthkin wrote:
5) The playing surface is only 44"x60" these days, which makes it easier to cover in bugs!

This is not always the case. Not everyone plays with GW's Approved Recommended Minimum.

You could be playing on an entire football field. Go wild. Only range 120" weapons are worth a damn. And you could walk for five turns and never reach the objective.

I only play on the new boards and it is so much better. I think it is safe to assume that when we talk about 40k we talk about the new board size. And if you use a bigger board you are and outlier. And that is fine. It is just not very common. You can also not use updated points. Or make up your own missions. Or tweak army rules. Or not follow the instructed rules for terrain. It just means it is harder to participate in the general online discourse of the game.

 Wyldhunt wrote:
. (Is tripointing a thing this edition?)

Only if you can surround so badly he can't move into position he's not within 1" of enemy.

Tripointing is bad. Tanks/monster can still shoot. Everyone can move out of engagement if they take a damgerush eskape test I believe. (Die on 1 and 2 on a model basis.) Better then 9th. But it is not such a good trick as it used to be.

 Niiai wrote:
You could be playing on an entire football field. Go wild. Only range 120" weapons are worth a damn. And you could walk for five turns and never reach the objective.

I only play on the new boards and it is so much better. I think it is safe to assume that when we talk about 40k we talk about the new board size. And if you use a bigger board you are and outlier. And that is fine. It is just not very common. You can also not use updated points. Or make up your own missions. Or tweak army rules. Or not follow the instructed rules for terrain. It just means it is harder to participate in the general online discourse of the game.

Yea alas gw wanted to make profits, tounament organisers wanted to make profit and players follow like lemmings making game worse. Shock horror about manouvering mattering...

It was all about profit. Gw wanted to sell the kill team boards. And itc guys admitted they hated the change until they realized they can cram more people into same room for more profits.

Oh and fyi as distances are measured from center distance to walk to objective doesn't change. And if enemy is so far he needs 120" range he automatically loses as he's about 80" from objectives so getting 0 primary, virtually no secondaries.

 Niiai wrote:
I only play on the new boards and it is so much better.

Congratulations on being suckered in by good PR.

And not using GW's board sizes has never prevented anyone from participating in "general online discourse".

The new board sizes where better. Both me and my Ork opponent agreed. Gunlines got worse on them. Melee armies got better. And we require less space to play on.

Yeah. A discussion about strategy will be impacted by how big the game board is. Gunlines will be better in one of them.

I also find it baffling the argument about quieting a new board. I already had the old board. Now I just use less of that old bigger board. Do you think people went out and bought smaller boards?

Oh the two armies that want to get up close quicker agreed that smaller boards were better.

Well I 'spose that settles it.

Removed - rule #1 please