Tyranid Vanguard on the way!

Up next for Tyranids..

What can this be?  What rules do you think will be in this one?
Does this feel like a day 1 DLC?
Is GW really taking after some video games of releasing an "unfinished" product and patching in playable fixes?

I hope they give every Genestealer old Ymargl rules.  That would be insane.

A quick word on Nids

Squirt, spurt, squirt, dead.

By now, most of you know that I'm a Dark Eldar player.  In the last 3 or so years since the Codex release, I've built only a single Venom.  Just last night, I put together my second Venom out of sheer boredom because I felt like modeling while I'm home sick.  Some of you who have been following my blog for a while will also know that I like playing my Dark Eldar a certain way.  It might not be the most effective or even the most tournament worthy, but it's the way I like to play and its been working out pretty well.

For those of who don't know, I like to play Kabal heavy with no Haemonculi elements and I like Raiders over Venoms with full man squads.  Unfortunately, I get the shit kicked out of my by Ignore Cover because mech heavy Dark Eldar needs their tricks to survive.  It goes without saying that I'm not doing so well vs. optimized Taudar lists.

Just today, I played against a chap on Vassal who I know is running the new Nids.  Alright, cool, I figure why not.  Let's put my 1850 pure DE list to the test.  Keep in mind once again that my list is built for all-comers, Raider heavy, Lance heavy, and it only sports 2 Venoms.

Exact list is the following:

1850

20 kp

HQ:

Succubus (Agonizer, Haywire) = 90

TROOPS:

5x Warriors (Raider NS, Blaster) = 130

5x Warriors (Raider NS, Blaster) = 130

10x Warriors (Raider NS/SR, Blaster, SC) = 195

10x Warriors (Raider NS/SR, Blaster, SC) = 195

10x Warriors (Raider NS/SR, Blaster, SC) = 195

9x Wyches (Raider NS/AS, Hekatrix/VB, Haywires) = 198

ELITE:

3x Trueborn (Venom NS/SC, 3x Blaster) = 156

3x Trueborn (Venom NS/SC, 3x Blaster) = 156

HEAVY:

Ravager (NS) = 115

Ravager (NS) = 115

Voidraven (FF, 2x Shatter) = 175

The guy I played was running Swarmlord with 3 Tyrant Guard, 3x Exocrines with Regen, 2x 2x Venoms, and a unit of 3x Zoans.  The rest of the army was filled with 20x man units of Terms and I think that was it.  Regardless, he was running fodder cover, 3+ Shrouded play from the Venoms, and Exocrines because they're pretty good units overall.

After 2 turns in, he calls the game, calls me a douchebag cheater, a list tailor and leaves the game.  Now I don't know what planet he lives on, but I don't think a Raider-heavy, lance heavy list that runs 2 Venoms is anything close to tailoring lists.  If anything, this list shits on MEQ much harder than anything else out there.  He just got outplayed and outplayed hard:  I always run Night Shields on my ships and I used their range to pick apart the first Exocrine (extreme focus fire), waited until his Terms covering one unit of Venoms moved into range before focus firing and destroying them utterly.  I then focused lances into the exposed Venoms, ID'd them off and finished off a second Exocrine before the rage rant started happening.  Even after I explained to him that this is my standard list, it's not a tailored list and I pretty much play the same shit every game, he doesn't believe me and tells me off.

Gah, it's so lame man.  Get a better sense of sportsmanship please!  Even with 2x Flyrants, I don't think he would of done well.  One failed grounding test and you're done, every lance in the army will go into you, especially since Dakka Flyrants have to get close to do damage to my ships.  Once the Synapse units are dead, it's pretty much a turkey shoot.  If anything, Nid players should take from this game one important thing:  No matter what happens, enough wounds will do you in.  The 3+ cover Shroud is awesome to have, but you really need a way to hide those Venomthropes entirely.  S8 might be pretty rare these days, but there's some armies out there that are still packing them.  If they get an opportunity to hit your exposed Venomthropes, their measly cover save in the open will not be able to save them!  The name of the game is opportunity, and good players will always find an opening.

One last thing:  If you're going to bitch the second you hear Dark Eldar when you're playing Nids, you need to expand your horizons a bit more.  You're never going to become a better player if you give up before trying to out-think your opponent.  Unless he's packing a douchebagery 9-Venom/Blasterborn/3 Ravager list, you should be alright.

I'm back! My Nids list

This marine is so fucked.

Here's what I'm going to roll with this weekend since I'm still missing my Flyrants. Keep in mind that this list can be well-equipped in a huge number of ways to fight different metas. It just happens that I play in a pretty MEQ heavy meta and this list is more casual than for tournament play. However, it's still pretty mean with all things considered. There's a huge number of psychic potential and T6 wounds in this list.

1850
14 kp

HQ:
Swarmlord = 285
Hive Tyrant (Strangle, Reaper, Adrenal) = 240

TROOP:
10x Termagaunts = 40
10x Termagaunts = 40
10x Termagaunts = 40
10x Termagaunts = 40
10x Termagaunts = 40
10x Termagaunts = 40

ELITE:
3x Hive Guard = 165
Venomthrope = 45
Venomthrope = 45

HEAVY:
3x Carnifex (TL Devo) = 450
Trygon = 190
Trygon = 190

This can be re-adjusted to take Mawlocs, in fact, it'll drop your list to 1750 exactly. This gives you 2x Tyrant Guard if you so choose. Another variation would be 1x Mawloc and 1x Trygon Prime for added Psyker hate.

The biggest thing to note in this list is that I'm walking just about everything. The way this list will be successful is by interlacing infantry and hiding your Venoms behind the wall of Fexes. Cover is pretty easy to come by, and even your most basic Terms can get cover if you use a dotted formation to mix the squadrons and maximize on cover. Swarmlord and the other HT can get cover from the Fexes, and the two Trygons will offer a lot of deadly options for your opponent to shoot at. In total, you're looking at 39 T6 3+ wounds through Shrouded cover that your opponents need to chew through to.

Just don't pop out your Trygons like an idiot, the 2+ reserves from Swarmlord should help. Play with 4x Term units for starters and then reserve 2 to backcap points. Keep the Venoms separate because your opponent will have to waste fire at one without wounds carrying over the other.

Oh, and I don't care about flyers much.  You can ignore them just fine, but if they don't down your Fexes, they'll be walking into a no-fly zone.

So how about those Tyranids

I'm still on vacation in Southeast Asia and I've read some crappy stuff on the new Nids book.

The gist of it is that while costs went down on most units, we lost Biomancy, a lot of problem areas were not fixed, and some units were nerfed for no reason.

I'd love to read what you guys think..

Tyranids, BFG and Overtime

Working, working, working..

Sorry for the lack of updates guys, but you know, Heart of the Swarm is coming out soon and we're crunching pretty hard for it!

Anyways, you might remember in my earlier posts that I acquired a fairly large Tyranid army.  This is true.  Now.. how am I going to run them?  Well, my Swarmlord will be leading the way, just like it did in 5th Ed.  Fortunately, we now get to roll some badass spells via Biomancy and its going to be pretty exciting to play with the new and improved Nids.  If Tyranids had a superhero, it would be Bioman the Fearless.

Check out the list:

1751

HQ:

Swarmlord (Bio) = 280

+Tyrant Guard (LW) = 65

TROOP:

10x Termagaunts = 50

Trevigon (Claws, Cluster, Adrenal, Toxin, Catalyst, Onslaught) = 235

10x Termagaunts = 50

Trevigon (Claws, Cluster, Adrenal, Toxin, Catalyst, Onslaught) = 235

19x Genestealers = 266

ELITE:

Doom (Pod) = 130

2x Hive Guard = 100

2x Hive Guard = 100

HEAVY:

Trygon (Prime) = 240

Look what I picked up today

Looks like I got a bug problem.

Man.. Merry Christmas to me!
Looks like that some very alien battle reports are going to be rolling out in the next couple of weeks.

Have fun with this one guys.  I need to grab myself the new Hive Tyrant kit and 3x Tervigons to finish it all.

PS - If anyone has any Carnifex Devourer sprues, let me know.  Two of my fexes don't have any weapons!

PPS - The Blood Angels are claimed! Everything else is still left!

More Tyranid stuff

In my first article, I touched upon some rather unexplored options in the Tyranid bestiary in hopes to expanding your Hive Mind.  A lot of the units I mentioned are often overlooked, but I assure you, they kick ass when giving a specific purpose.  The more I play with Tyranids, the more I realize that army design is very important.  Each and every unit has to play a specific role and they have to work in conjunction with the rest of your list.  I'll provide some lists in my following article so I can show you guys what I mean.

So far, we have explored the following units:
Swarmlord
Deathleaper
Venomthropes
Dakkafexes
Genestealers

Now, we will talk about:
Tyranid Warriors, Shrikes
Gargoyles, Harpies, Winged Tyrants
Zoanthropes
Ymgarl Genestealers

Some Tyranid tactics

The purpose of this article is to touch upon some of the units that people might not use, but they're actually really good in their own right.  I advise everyone to think outside the box every now and then.

Have any of you guys try the Swarmlord yet?  I have and I think he's amazing.  For 280 points, I think that's perfectly acceptable for a T6 5W 3+ and 4++ in close combat.  When the close combat invul combine with the WS9, the Swarmlord becomes an absolute menace in close combat.  Throw on the fact that he's I6 with 4 Bonesabres that cause Instant Death, I think we got ourselves a real winner.

My favorite thing about the Swarmlord is his 18" synapse and the ability to give a unit Furious Charge or Preferred Enemy.  This happens every turn and there's nothing your opponent can do about it.  Throw in the fact that he can make units WS/BS1 for 1 entire turn with Paroxysm, I see no reason not to take him when the Hive Tyrant I want is about the same amount of points.

If I was to take a Hive Tyrant, he would have..
Hive Tyrant, Stranglethorn Cannon, Hive Commander, Old Adversary = 240

So for 40 points more, I get a 2 psychic powers a turn, WS9, 4++ in CC, awesome special rules and a cooler looking model.  I think there's just no comparison imo.

Let's say I didn't want to take a Hive Tyrant at all, to save points I'd probably just take a Tyranid Prime w/ Toxin Sacs and Lash Whip/Bonesword.  He's 120 points and is perfect for taking Warriors w/ the same load out.  He's perfect for allocating S8 missile shots (especially with cover) and he's just a very solid buffer.  I don't know about you guys, but 5x Warriors with BS/LW makes every assault unit in the game think twice about assaulting your lines.  No one, not even assault-heavy armies wants a piece of WS5/6 Warriors that strike first with power weapons that always wounds on 4s and re-rolls vs. T4 and under.

Tyranids, the new pro?

The more I look at the Tyranid book, the more I think it's one of the most difficult armies to play.  It's been a long time since Tyranids joined the 5th Edition party and I think it's time to revisit them as an army.  Let's talk about some of the flaws of the Tyranid book really quickly:

• A lot of stuff doesn't make sense:  Why aren't there frag nade equivs on a lot of the assault units?  Why can't the Carnifex take 2+ armor?  Why the hell is it priced so high?  Why can't Lictors pop out and charge?  There is a LOT of these questions vs. the last army book.
• The FOC is all messed up:  The elite slot has like 3 pages worth of units.  Really?  All this for 3 unit slots?  Why couldn't some of these been placed in the heavy slot.  In fact, why's there so many units all over the place?
• Why is everything so expensive?  Compared to the 3rd Ed. army book, almost everything went up in cost.. by a lot.  This leaves lists with very "limited" options for the most part.  I put limited in quotes because what I'm going to say next is going to make you think Trygons over Carnifex isn't as clear cut any more.

Now that that stuff is out of the way (and if you disagree, please let me know), let's talk about the good stuff:

• Everyone knows that compared to Cruddace's other book, the IG codex, the Tyranids book looks like a rush job, sloppy piece of shit that's horribly imbalanced both internally and externally.  Then we look at how the book plays and it is nothing like last edition.  Then we slam our faces against a wall for over a year, bitch and moan all over whinseer and fakka and then play with every single unit in the book trying to "crack" the winning build.  Just when all hope is lost, I'm here to tell you that Tyranids is actually a "master-class" army.
• What?!  You can't be serious?!  Well, I kind of am.  I think Tyranids are one of those armies who's synergy and list composition has to be so tight that there's virtually no room for error.  Everything in the army has to make sense and every unit you take has to do its job according to your army's design.
• But, what do you mean?  I mean the general has to be superb, the list has to be a well-oiled machine and that he must play his heart out against the horrors of the current meta.  Like Dark Eldar, the only other army I would put into the mythical "master-class" category, there needs to be a battleplan in your head before your deployment against every army.  This isn't a I'm-going-to-shoot-this army like Vendetta/Chimeras, Razorspam or Psyfleman where the only true skill of the army lies in target priority, but an army that can be destined to fail from deployment to movement, to shooting to assault.
• Lastly, I want to say that no matter what, by book flaws alone, that they'll struggle to place at the top tables.  It doesn't help that Venom spam ruins the shit out of the army and that seems like the new WAAC DE thing.

I will elaborate more as the week goes on.  I want to hear what you guys think first.

Revisiting Tyranids

So Tyranids have been out for a year now and people have got in a lot of games with them.  I've heard many things from many different people, but one thing's for sure:  A lot of players don't like the current book.  To make a long story short, they find the book stale, some thing's don't make sense, it's overcrowded and limited in competitive options.

This is not going to be another one of those posts complaining about Tyranids, but it'll be a post to talk about why I think Tyranids are actually fun.  Call me a loyalist bastard all you want (considering I have like 4 MEQ armies), but Tyranids is still pretty fun to play.  Let me rephrase; Tyranids is a blast to play in a semi-competitive to non-competitive environment.  At the top tier competitive levels, Tyranids just isn't there.  Now I know this depends from region to region, but there's a lot of competitive options from other books that causes a lot of issue for the options that Tyranids like to field competitively.  Big scary bugs are indeed pretty scary, but you can only get so many of them on the field before things get melta'd or plasma'd to death.  Compared to the Nidzilla of last edition, the combat effectiveness vs. cost just isn't there anymore.

I've been playing with my 2K Swarmlord list on Vassal lately and I have yet to lose a game.  Sure, I'm not playing against the most competitive lists vs. the most competitive people, but that's exactly what I'm talking about.  Tyranids might not be the best army competitively, but they're definitely not out of the game.  Check out my list:

My Swarmlord Tyranids list

Here's the list:

2000

HQ:
Swarmlord = 280
+2x Tyrant Guard w/ Lash Whips = 130
Warrior Prime (BS/LW) = 95

TROOPS:
10x Genestealers = 140
10x Genestealers = 140
14x Termagaunts = 70
14x Termagaunts = 70
+Trevigon (Catalyst, Onslaught) = 190

FA:
3x Raveners (Rending) = 105

ELITE:
2x Hive Guard = 100
2x Hive Guard = 100
2x Hive Guard = 100

HEAVY:
Trygon Prime = 240
Trygon Prime = 240

Strategy, deployment and game plan:

• Termagaunts form a wall of cover in 2 14x1 formations.
• They will cover the Hive Guard who will in turn, cover the Swarmlord & Co.
• The Warrior Prime will be moving from the Swarmlord's unit to absorb wounds with T5.
• Genestealers will deploy in reserve and will outflank with the help from the Swarmlord.
• A single Gene unit can also opt to deploy behind the Swarmlord and offer a strong counter-charge unit.
• Trevigon will be behind the Hive Guard ~around the Swarmlord and generate more cover.
• Catalyst will be cast on the Termagaunts giving the cover or be used on the Swarmlord's unit.
• Raveners will be a distraction/harassment unit that will apply pressure on any long range guns.
• Hive Guard will shoot at everything that needs to be shot and can-opened.
• Tyrgons will be in reserve and will come in to apply pressure on the opponent's flanks or rear.
• Hopefully things don't suck for me and I roll my opponents off the board.

Let me know what you guys think.

DE vs. Mech IG and Tyranids

I don't normally take anything from Warseer seriously because most of that forum is filled with terribads and trigger happy mods.  Good thing that once in a while, I'll run across a thread or two that's actually worth a damn.

The topic of the day here is about footslogging IG being a problem for Dark Eldar.  Umm.. no.  I don't know how many times people have tried to talk across the table in 5th Ed. and have lost.  If you're not playing Castle Eldar or Horde Orks w/ Killakanz then I have no idea what you're doing outside of transports.  The only time I've seen Horde IG work was against 50/50 Blood Angels list because there's too many IG dudes to kill before they shoot you to death.  Seriously, one of the worst things to happen to assault units this edition is not being able to consolidate back into assault.  You know what, I really hope next edition features some kind of "overrun" option for assault troops winning combat.  In this edition, you almost always want to stay in combat so you don't get fucking shot in the face by Mech IG's 3 billion AP3/2 blast weapons before you can do anything heroic.

Tyranids: The good, the bad

When the new Tyranids codex came out, I quickly rushed to my LGS and picked up a copy.  Every good soldier of the Imperium must understand his enemy before he can defeat them.  Maybe that's why I own almost every codex.. especially those of the xenos and traitors!

After looking through the codex, I quickly noticed that a lot of the issues in the older codex were fixed (I'll just list a couple):

1. You could no longer spam nothing but Carnifexes and Hive Tyrants and win games - A moment of silence for my footslogging Grey Knight army back in the 4th vs. the countless number of Nidzilla lists..
2. Tyranids anti-tank no longer blow ass because Zoanthropes are the now go-to unit for blowing up anything within 18" with their S10 AP1 Lance.  And in a lesser form, the Hive Guard at 50ppm and 2 shots of BS4 S8 shots with no LoS needed.
3. And finally, some new monstrous creatures and better core choices so you didn't see the same Nidzilla cookie-cutter (I swear everyone thought theirs was unique) list in every game that you played.

With those things in mind, I was pretty thrilled that Tyranids were going to be something special, something truly unique in the world of Warhammer 40K.. but this was not the case.