Bug Hunting

[Giga]

A warrior with that poisoned upgrade, boneswords, and their scything talons costs like ~50 points a piece, no?

[Koremu]

Yes, thankfully.

 

Remember though that 4+ cover saves are going to be standard if you're firing at anything more significant than a Gaunt though.

[kaiserstole20]

Power. And remember that upgraded, they can have furious charge and poisoned (4+). And re-roll 1s to hit in CC. And have a drop pod.

 

You remember what I was saying earlier about 'nids and the "OMG kill it NOW" factor?

 

The Tyranid Prime when paired with a warrior unit is on of the best HQ values in the game IMO.

 

I'm running a Prime with 2x Boneswords, Toxin Sacs, and scything talons. That's only 100 points for a WS6, BS4, I5, 3 wound, 4 attack model with a 3+ save that upgrades all of my other warriors (I only have 1 squad, and he's attached) to WS6 and BS4. With the 2x boneswords he's a character/MC killer for sure.

 

The only thing I truly fear is vindicators vaporizing my whole squad.

 

The lack of eternal warrior and general lack invulnerable saves just makes sense on 'Nids. Organic armor without a power field shouldn't shrug off krak missiles. I think the new codex will be be a lot more fun and fluffy.

[Koremu]

Yeah, almost everything 'nid now is massively offensive with little innate defence. Hence cover and high WS/Init is their defence mechanism.

[kaiserstole20]

A warrior with that poisoned upgrade, boneswords, and their scything talons costs like ~50 points a piece, no?

 

My standard warrior costs as much as a terminator. Toxin sacs, deathspitter, and scything talons. Might not be worth it if not for the Tyranid Prime upgrading the WS and BS.

[Giga]

Well, either way, they cost a lot for a model that can be removed with a single krak missile, not to mention completely decimated by usual stuff like battlecannons, orbital bombardment, earthshaker cannons, monolith pieplates, etc.

[Koremu]

Yeah, if you are going to use Tyranid Warriors you need to have other things available to draw Krak fire...

[kaiserstole20]

Yeah, if you are going to use Tyranid Warriors you need to have other things available to draw Krak fire...

 

Right now I have a tervigon and zoanthropes to take krak fire but that's not enough. The zoanthropes come down in a drop pod so they aren't around in turn 1.

 

When I first read the codex I thought (along with a lot of other nid players) that the carnifex was dead as a competitive unit. Now I think it might be mandatory to take a couple in a brood with heavy venom cannons to lay some hurt down and take heat off of the warriors.

[Koremu]

Yeah, if you are going to use Tyranid Warriors you need to have other things available to draw Krak fire...

 

Right now I have a tervigon and zoanthropes to take krak fire but that's not enough. The zoanthropes come down in a drop pod so they aren't around in turn 1.

 

When I first read the codex I thought (along with a lot of other nid players) that the carnifex was dead as a competitive unit. Now I think it might be mandatory to take a couple in a brood with heavy venom cannons to lay some hurt down and take heat off of the warriors.

Aye, like I've been saying for a while, the 'nid list is all about having a throwaway attitude to your units. The Hive Mind doesn't care if you shoot the sacrificial wave, and nor should the players now. I like how the flavour has been bought forward with a few simple changes like that.

[minigun762]

Yeah, if you are going to use Tyranid Warriors you need to have other things available to draw Krak fire...

 

Which is easy to do when you have the Tervigons, Carnfifex and Trygons in almost every list.

 

I don't think you're going to see many Tryanid armies with less then 4 MCs (in 1500).

Standard practice will probably be:

1-2 scoring Tervigons

1-2 Trygons

0-2 Carnfiex

0-1 Hive Tyrants

[Giga]

Zoanthropes are bad krak missile targets, I think. They're much better taken out with good ol' nullzone+tacticals rapid fire combination, or simply assaulted (they will get owned in assault sooner or later by pretty much anything in a marine army).

 

IMHO, the only way to draw high strength shooting away from close combat warriors is to have lots of other dangerous close combat stuff coming, such as assault carnifexes, hive tyrant(s), etc. Tervigons don't exactly strike me as the priority target for krak missiles.

[Justicar Valius]

Uhm yes they are. With each one producing 10.5 gaunts a turn it really really is.

 

But the thing about the tervigon is that it can take the krak ( ;) weird phrase there) whilst warriors can't.

[Koremu]

Realistically, you have to fire 10 Krak missiles at a Tervigon to down it. Probably 11.

[minigun762]

Realistically, you have to fire 10 Krak missiles at a Tervigon to down it. Probably 11.

 

The best bet with Tervigons is to put some wounds on them at range, then run up, dump some Plasma/Mleta into their face and finish them off with a Power Fist (since you're hitting on 3's)

[Koremu]

Realistically, you have to fire 10 Krak missiles at a Tervigon to down it. Probably 11.

 

The best bet with Tervigons is to put some wounds on them at range, then run up, dump some Plasma/Mleta into their face and finish them off with a Power Fist (since you're hitting on 3's)

That advice is true of almost all the Tyranid multi-wound beasties.

[Giga]

Uhm yes they are. With each one producing 10.5 gaunts a turn it really really is.

 

But the thing about the tervigon is that it can take the krak ( ^_^ weird phrase there) whilst warriors can't.

With a little proper positioning of a couple heavy flamers, one can reliably take out ~30 gaunts in a single shooting phase. Vulkan helps a lot, too. It's safe to let them amass so much simply because gaunts on their own can't do much, especially not to a mechanized force.

 

On the other hand, taking out those terrofyxes, assault carnifexes, hormagaunts, assault warriors, tyrants, zoanthropes, hive guard, trygons etc. seems a lot more important from my perspective, so I'd rather focus on taking them out first and just slaughter gaunts enmasse later on. It's Killhammer philosophy really - take out their killy stuff early on, so you can have it easier later when they can no longer retaliate properly.

 

IMHO, spending the early shooting phases focusing on tervigons and a bunch of gaunts is a recipe for disaster.

[Koremu]

That's an entirely abstract viewpoint Giga. The Tyranid list is fast enough (especially with Spore Pods) that they get to dictate your targeting priorities, not you.

[Giga]

That's an entirely abstract viewpoint Giga. The Tyranid list is fast enough (especially with Spore Pods) that they get to dictate your targeting priorities, not you.

Well, not really. All of their killiest stuff is still just as slow as it always was. Hive tyrants, carnifexes, warriors, genestealers, etc. all have to footslog, giving us 2 or 3 turns (depending on deployment and the opponent's run rolls) of shooting the bejesus out of them before they can arrive in any numbers.

 

Deep striking is okay, but it's like drop pods; if you have too much of it your army ends up arriving piecemeal. And deepstriking nids aren't exactly a scary concept as far as I'm concerned. The only ones that can actually do some damage on the turn they droppod are zoanthropes, and they can get completely neutered by psychic hoods and the like, not to mention will die the turn they arrive. The rest of them deep strike, and immediately find themselves within assault range while being unable to assault themselves.

 

BTW, I don't think we'll be seeing as many droppod zoanthropes as people seem to think. There are builds among other popular armies that will completely negate the efficiency of psychic lance and the like. Just think of farseer 3d6 thingie, space wolf runestaffs (not to mention njal), etc. I think hive guard will be more popular.

 

Also, are zoanthropes still synapse in the new codex?

[minigun762]

Is it just me, or does Tac Terminators seem to be a perfect counter to alot of the Tyranid threats?

 

5 man squad has 4 Power Fists for squishing Warriors or any MC that gets close.

You have 10 S4 shots @ 24" and the mobility to kite Gaunts or Genestealers around (atleast delay a charge a turn)

Add on either the Assault Cannon or CML for added punch and it seems like a great backup squad.

 

I don't see Chaos Terminators performing in the same way since we lack ranged firepower on them. Instead you could try to dakka them down with Plasma/Melta shots supported by a Heavy Flamer but its more of a one shot deal.

[Giga]

Tactical terminators get owned by whatever strikes at initiative higher then 1. They suffer from the same weight-of-fire death that kills th/ss termies, only they ALSO die from AP2/1 and power weapons.

 

For example, imagine pitting them against a unit of warriors with boneswords? Or against a trygon? Doesn't look good for the home team.

[minigun762]

Tactical terminators get owned by whatever strikes at initiative higher then 1. They suffer from the same weight-of-fire death that kills th/ss termies, only they ALSO die from AP2/1 and power weapons.

 

For example, imagine pitting them against a unit of warriors with boneswords? Or against a trygon? Doesn't look good for the home team.

 

Once they hit HtH yeah but you're likely to get 1-2 turns of firepower on them prior to that.

Those Warriors are atleast as expensive as your Terminators, possibly more depending on upgrades and you will likely be popping 1 a turn just with the CML.

 

The issue here is that you can be a threat past charge range. TH/SS Terminators are great if/when you get to use them the way you want to, but being bound to a Land Raider is a big problem. 160 points gets you 2x Zoas in a pod and there is an above average chance of them popping your Land Raider early. Then you're exposed to gun down by dakka or tied up by Gaunts.

[kaiserstole20]

Realistically, you have to fire 10 Krak missiles at a Tervigon to down it. Probably 11.

 

If there's a nearby venomthrope it goes up to a little over 16 krak missiles to take one down.

[Giga]

Once they hit HtH yeah but you're likely to get 1-2 turns of firepower on them prior to that.

Those Warriors are atleast as expensive as your Terminators, possibly more depending on upgrades and you will likely be popping 1 a turn just with the CML.

 

The issue here is that you can be a threat past charge range. TH/SS Terminators are great if/when you get to use them the way you want to, but being bound to a Land Raider is a big problem. 160 points gets you 2x Zoas in a pod and there is an above average chance of them popping your Land Raider early. Then you're exposed to gun down by dakka or tied up by Gaunts.

Tactical termies still suffer from same things, they can get gunned down by dakka and tied by gaunts, too.

 

Their shooting, apart from the cyclone missile launcher, really isn't something worth mentioning. Five of them get what, 10 bolter shots at 24"? On average, it'll kill 3.5 gaunts, providing they don't have any cover.

 

Tactical termies can be useful, but they still aren't gonna cut it against nids, because against bugs sooner or later you have to get stuck in (unless the nid player is really terrible), and that's when you need either reliable firepower or reliable close combat ability to get rid of the big gribblies.

[minigun762]

and that's when you need either reliable firepower or reliable close combat ability to get rid of the big gribblies.

 

I'd say that Tac Terminators cover both those options.

 

Don't get me wrong, this isnt a knock against TH/SS Termie's in a Land Raider. Instead I'm just saying that I think there are viable options out there and your standard Terminators are one of them.

 

Point wise, you can get 10 Terminators w/ 2 CML for about the same as 5 TH/SS in a Land Raider and in the right kinds of list, I see either of those choices working well.

[Giga]

I dunno.

 

5 tactical termies with cyclone cost 230 pts.

 

Let's say they assault a trygon. It has 6 attacks, at str 6 and ws4. That's on average 3 wounds and 2-3 dead termies. They reply with 6-9 power fist attacks, resulting in 3-4.5 wounds. Trygon lives. Even if one of them survives in the next assault phase and kills it, it's still not effective enough in my opinion.

 

Odds become even worse against things like warptime daemon princes, hive tyrants with guard, units with a bunch of power weapons (like banshees), etc.

 

 

 

Don't get me wrong, I think tactical terminators are an okay unit. I just think that they aren't good enough when attacked by armor-ignoring stuff, which is sadly plentiful in the new nid dex.