By TheGraveMind
In a game to both practice the upcoming Frostycon missions, and to gain
more experience with the New tyranid codex, I pitted my tyranids
against Nemesis' Crimson fist army.
The crimson fists are a small chapter, and have limited resources. Thus the bare models and unfinished droppods. haha.
We
placed multiple objectives, and I chose to score each round, while He
went for grabbing them at the end. I escalated the warlord secondary, to
gain a point for each character I killed, while he chose line breaker
to score a point for each line breaking unit he had.
He hit my left side with his first wave, killing both a warrior squad
and a carnifex straight out. This gave him first blood and limited me to
my far right objective while pushing towards the middle.
He
then dropped more of his units into the middle, and managed to either
contest or pull me off by half an inch each round. My mawloc proved
effective, killing off 5 man squads every other round either by
tunneling or in combat. The game looked bleak for the tyranids until the
fatefull combat when I got my hive tyrant and Hive guard in combat with
Pedro's unit. Pedro failed enough saves and LoS to die, but saved the
squad for a turn. This huge turn of events allowed my forces in the
middle to move out and pressure other quarters.
By
turn 5, I had pressured enough of his units, where I was ahead by 1
point if the game had ended then. But I only had two units that could
move out and three directions I needed to go to. In the end we He had
Slay the warlord, and first blood, two objectives and two line breaking
units for 12 points. I had line breaker, Four characters killed, and
five points from objectives netting me 11 points.
As
I had expected, the tyranid book still struggles in the same
circumstances it always has. I was limited in my mobility, and in my
ability to limit far reaching units. It took me 6 turns before I was
able to get a unit to deal with the devastators he had brought. And they
in turn kept my Warriors from moving to midfield as they were blowing
apart a unit a turn. Due to my short range of weapons, and dependance of
synapse, I could not attack both neighboring quarters at once, while he
was able to fire onto me at near full effect regardless.
And
this is why you will continue to see the use of Flying hive tyrants,
mawlocs and Tervigons. A Tervigion unlike warriors, you will not lose
ground when hit by missiles or lascannons until dead. The Mawloc ignores
IB for most purposes, and replaces Doom and Other spore units as
disruption and is basically uncounterable. The Flying hive tyrant is
still the best AA, can handle a wide variety of units through shooting
or assault, and brings a very mobile platform for synapse.
In my own playtesting experiences, I found that outflanking a tervigon with the ability to spawn gants at the end of the move did indeed apply backfield pressure and synapse too, no less. Using D-gants on the other flank also gave needed firepower on the flank to kill OBJ campers. Of course, you have to take hive cdr 2x . I saved those points from one tyrant's wings by walking him across the board and hoping for that 5+ cover save for intervening models. The other HT was the usual Flyrant. Another Tervigon iin your backfield provides rear area OBJ holders and a MC for anything like jetbikes trying to steal a win. The Mawloc is a fool's choice, tho. 2/3 of the time you won't hit and scatter harmlessly. And left with your you know what hanging in the wind. Take hive guard instead behind those 60 gants acting as a screen from taking two mama bugs as troops. Exocrines constantly moving forward for some much needed AP2 rounds out a nice little list that can shoot and punch. Oh - take a aegis line and park it across the center of the table to hep the mass of gants moving forward if can squeeze in the points. More importantly, it has troops in his face turn 2 that forces him to choose which immediate threat to deal with instead of constantly ganging up on one bug at a time.
ReplyDeleteSure the Mawloc may scatter, but then you still have a large MC in their face. And when it doesn't scatter it does damage. That said I don't like the Mawloc, but what other reliable disruption do we have? Sure I can take hiveguard, but they wont actually do much damage against marines, and they still wont cross midfield. Exocrines are cool, but I don't feel like going out and buying tons of new models just for meh shooting.
DeleteI would consider Outflanking Tervigons, but this was only 1.5k, and I still need back/midfield synapse. and I'm still convinced I need both flying hive tyrants.
Crones crones crones crones crones crones.
DeletePeople got hung up on the statline and the 4+ armor and forgot that we've never actually seen a cheap FMC before.
Tyranid Flying Circus is way better than Daemon Flying Circus ever was; at 1850, you can afford 5 FMCs and still have enough points to not have to cut everything else. Daemons get 4 (representing fewer wounds), pray they hit decent Gifts or Powers to give them some semblence of survivability, and then have to take minimum Troops to make it fit.
The biggest difference in the end is that Tyranid FMCs can actually kill enemy Troops without having to stop flying (Dakka Flyrants/Drool Cannon/S8 Vector) while Daemon FMCs almost never can. The Tyranid FMC lists are AMAZING at playing to the mission right now; particularly since they instantly put the opponent in a position where they can't afford to focus on the Tervigons until lategame, and by that point it's almost always too late.
The huge added benefit is that the whole thing basically plays around Synapse's weaknesses. Crones are Ld10 and don't need babysitting, meaning they're fine even after the Flyrants die. Everybody else is hanging back with the Tervigons.
I've been helping Brett test his 1850 version on Vassal and he's been doing great with it. At 1500, you can almost certainly still fit 4 FMCs and the Tervigons and still have some spare room left to work with.
Auretious Taak (cause wordpress and blogger hates me every time I try and sign in):
DeleteThe Mawloc as a fools choice? At 140pts it's the cheapest per wound T6 model in the army (at 23.33 pts per wound). It also brings a large ap 2 blast with ignores cover to the party and even that as a threat, even if it doesn't come into play, is enough to warrant attention. Meanwhile, your statement that Exocrines are constantly pushing up to unleash much needed ap 2 firepower doesn't recognise that the exocrine is easier to kill (1 less wound at 5) and only has a 24" range gun, not to mention that gun does not ignore cover. As much fun as it is, it also is subject to instinctive behaviour whereas the mawloc, by it's rules, can ignore the effects of instinctive behaviour even when it affects it. The exocrine on its' leadership of 7 however...yes, we all love that the exocrine has to shoot the nearest target and vs space marines, that's as good as anything most times, but when you are looking at say a cheap screen of kroot or termagants for example, haha fools choice mate.
The point is - the mawloc is more immediately threatening, is more reliable (you miss the first time you get to go again), and more survivable. It's also effectively synapse independent. Taking one gives you a unit that may not always hit its' target but it is a threat which can't be ignored as it isn't going to always burrow and explode out of the ground, it is still a 6 wound T6 MC that can lock devastators in combat or destroy armoured support with str 10 smash attacks. It is in effect, like a suicide unit in other armies, you drop it in and it'll do damage and likely die - but it is cheap and you know this and the likely fate of it so it is a worthwhile investment.
the Heavy Support section is the most contested in this codex, and until we get the other two dataslate's projected (one of which is an MC horde supposedly - the other a swarm one to compliment the current vanguard one), this won't change, but dismissing a cheap and highly threatening unit purely for the threat potential it has, is more of a fool's errand then taking one. If you know it is going to die first turn, then you use that knowledge to your advantage. This is part of the strategic game, if it survives the first turn, you are now ahead in the tactical game. The codex is not straight forward, you need to think more open-minded to abuse it fully and unlike other codicies you will find there is more redundancy of unit role then of unit choice to achieve this.
@dodger, yeah, crones/harpies are cheap and really arn't that bad. But I don't feel like buying multiple 80$ models just to perform ok. Maybe its my fault for not wanting to spend $250+ on three models that I don't like, maybe it's their fault for making a poor codex.
Delete$80? Try $115 in Australia. Bloody joke is what it is.
DeleteI like the Tyrannofex over the Tervi for the 2+ and torrent flamer. A lot of gamers are coming to the conclusion that Tervigons and gants are a thing of the past now .
ReplyDeleteAtleast here there are enough AP2 weapons where that 2+ doesn't make any difference, and really a S6 AP4 flamer isn't that impressive when I have so much anti infantry. The tervigon may not be as good as it used to, but what other troops am I going to take that has a chance to survive?
DeleteI do hope something good comes out of the Dex. Any hope in data slate help?
ReplyDeleteNothing will. People keep acting like time will magically add something to the codex. When it is sooo similar to the previous one, it is kind of easy to know what will work. A few point drops here and there do not make units play different.
DeleteI don't see data slates helping a lot. All they will really do is tweak unit options and break the FOC. With out a lot of redesign or special rules, I don't see anything helping a lot. The one that needed the most help, already came out, and they didn't really fix anything.