First Nid List

[Pyrotechnics]

Hello everyone!

After my last game we got to discussing the subject of second armies. Now, this weekend, the Eldar player is going to try Daemons, and I am going to try nids. Now, this is all proxies, just getting a feel for the army and seeing if we like it. Sadly, I don't have enough guardsmen to swarm fully (I only have roughly 60 bases). This is my first nid list, as you can see. I'm pretty sure I've made some poor decisions, but I have no idea what I'm doing. Constructive criticism and suggestions are welcome and appreciated.

It's a 1000 point game, btw.


<<HQ>>

Hive Tyrant - 235
Base: 170
Hive Commander: 25
Armoured Shell: 40
Leech Essence, Psychic Scream.

Tyrant Guard x 2 - 120

<<TROOPS>>

Genestealer Brood of 10 - 140

Termagants x 20 - 100

Hormagaunts x 20 - 120

<<HEAVY SUPPORT>>

Trygon Prime - 240
Regeneration - 25

[WestRider]

OK, from the top:
- Tyrant: Why Hive Commander? This list doesn't need to put much in Reserves, if anything, and certainly doesn't need to be Outflanking those Hormagaunts or anything.

Next point: Take Paroxysm. It's one of the best Psychic Powers in the entire Game. Pretty much completely shuts down one Unit within 12" of the Tyrant each Turn. Leech Essence is my usual secondary for a Walking Tyrant, and even more so against a T3 army.

A pair of Devourers instead of his Scything Talons might be worth considering. Even one pair is a surprising amount of Firepower, and it's S6, so it'll Instakill a Farseer. Probably even worth going to 2 pairs, since you're not going to be using your Psychic Shooting Attacks as often against Eldar.

He probably only needs one Guard at 1K, especially with Armoured Shell. A second one doesn't hurt, but dropping either that or the Shell could free up some useful Points. Keep in mind that Eldar don't usually have much AP3, but they do have a lot of AP1-2.

Lash Whips aren't as good in 6th as they were in 5th, but they're still pretty good, and they're cheap enough on Tyrant Guard that they're pretty much a gimme unless you have a good reason to take BoneSwords.

Stealers: Still solid, even with the 6th Ed nerfs they've suffered. Remember that they can't Charge on the turn after they Outflank, and if they Infiltrate, they can only Charge on the first Turn if you go second.

Termagants: Consider splitting into two Broods. You don't have much Scoring presence here, and 10 Gaunts can get ignored for a while in a lot of circumstances. Might be worth picking up Adrenal Glands as well (See Hormagaunts for why).

Hormagaunts: Want Adrenal Glands in this List. Your only answer to Vehicles is Assault, letting the Gaunts help out with that at least improves your coverage. Usually Toxin Sacs are a better buy, tho.

Trygon Prime: I wouldn't bother with Regen. If you want to make use of it, the Tyrant does much better, as he can take a couple of Wounds, and then LOS! them onto the Guards while he tries to roll 6s and Regen. It's cheaper for him, too. Normally I wouldn't take the Prime upgrade either, but since you've otherwise only got 1 Synapse Unit, I think it might be justified here.

Other Units to consider:
- A Tyranid Prime can dish out almost as much damage in Combat as a Tyrant, can hide in other Units, and is way, way cheaper. Give him Regen and stick him in that big Brood of Termagants for a Synapse Source that'll take forever to kill. Frees up over 200 Points for other options, too.
- Tärvigons are also a great HQ choice, in between the other two in cost. They've got some good Psychic Powers to choose from in the Dex, and access to three solid Disciplines worth of Rulebook Powers. These days, I usually buy both extra Powers and roll Biomancy, and then add Toxin Sacs, Adrenal Glands, and Crushing Claws. Smashing only halves the base number of Attacks on the Profile, so she only loses one Attack by going to S10, and then gets an extra d3 from the Crushing Claws, and potentially more if you roll up Warp Speed.
- Hive Guard are no longer the no brainer choice they were in 5th, but they're still excellent. A Fire Prism or Falcon could give this list fits, and they give you a good answer to that.

[Pyrotechnics]

Right...Right. I thought I had screwed things up royally. It didn't feel right, but I put that down to it being a new army. I've got an update on the enemies I will face, however. It's going to be Daemons, Tau and Orks, in a round-robin style bunch of games. I've heard the Daemons player saying he was going to take a tzeentch-themed army, and the Ork that he probably wasn't going to try and swarm because he can't outswarm me as nids. The Tau player...I know what he brings. Always the same thing. Hammerhead, Broadsides, Devilfish, Crisis Suits.

Sadly, I don't have the amount of proxy-bases to take a Tervigon. One idea I had was letting the Hormagaunts run ahead of the main force out of synapse range so they get Rage, for more attacks, since it no longer makes it lose control anymore. Or has that been FAQ'd?


EDIT: Right, I knocked up another list. Hopefully this one is better.

<<HQ>>

Tyranid Prime - 90
Base: 80
Rending Claws: 5
Deathspitter: 5

Tyranid Prime - 90
Base: 80
Rending Claws: 5
Deathspitter: 5

<<TROOPS>>

Termagants x 20 - 100

Hormagaunts x 20 with Toxin Sacs - 160

Termagants x 10 - 50

<<ELITES>>

3 x Hive Guard - 150

<<HEAVY SUPPORT>>

Trygon - 200

Carnifex - 160

[WestRider]

That's looking pretty good. I'd upgrade the Primes to LashWhip/BoneSword and give them Regeneration, tho. Turns them into absolute combat monsters, and Regen is cheap enough on them that it's worth the gamble.

Abusing Rage like that with Hormagaunts is really risky, because you almost always have to leave them outside of Synapse during your Opponent's Turn to pull it off, and it doesn't take much firepower to force a Ld6 Morale Test. Note also that they only go into Rage if they fail their IB Ld Test, and they have a good enough chance of passing that it's a very unreliable tactic.

You don't really need it, anyhow. Even without those extra Attacks, 20 Toxic Hormies kill something like 15 Orks on the charge on average.

[Pyrotechnics]

Alright, so I gave both the primes the lashwhip/bonesword, and regen. However, I had to free up some points to do so. I decided to drop some termagants and instead have two broods of 12, rather than one of twenty.

Now, as for where I should put the primes...I assume one in each termagant squad, and then keep them within 12'' of the hormagaunts and the carnifex? And then...basically just advance. Cause some backfield madness with the Trygon whenever he decides to show up.

Although against Daemons it might be worth playing defensive since they're forced to deep strike. I don't know. I've never fought daemons before...or played nids before. XD

[WestRider]

I think I'd actually put one Prime in a Brood of 14 Termagants, toward the front, and then the other 10 stay back a bit to mostly hide and camp an Objective. The other Prime, I'd maybe put with either the Hive Guard or the Fex, probably the Hive Guard. Put him out front, and he can soak AP4 fire for them as well as bailing them out when they inevitably get charged.

My usual tactic against Daemons is to try to spread out with my Deployment and first Turn and cover a huge blob of area, everything at maximum Coherency, to deny them good landing spots. Keep some Gaunts on the outside to screen everything else to a certain extent. You can either keep your Units close enough to each other, the Board Edge, and any Impassible Terrain to deny them any DS targets within your formation or you can spread out even a bit further and give them very risky targets between your Units/Board Edges/Impassible Terrain. If you can force him to choose between landing in Difficult Terrain (Dangerous for Deep Strikers) and landing too far away, all the better.

If playing for Objectives, try to force him to Deep Strike as far away from them as possible. Even a small Nid Swarm can cover a huge amount of the Table when you really stretch it out.

[Pyrotechnics]

Well, it went relatively well today for a first game with new army. Only lost to Daemons. So much warpfire... But I destroyed Orks in an Annihiliation game, and I won against the Tau player due in part to his terrible rolling (he hit only once with a markerlight the entire game) but also due to the fact I could stretch my 10-gant brood of termagants across my entire backfield with maximum coherency to sit on both objectives, got first blood, and he didn't bother at all with linebreaker or targeting my warlord... and my hormagants got a nice charge onto his broadside which gave them the distance to contest one of his objectives. End of game, score was 9 VPs to 3 VPs, I won. The Ork and Daemon players finished before us and watched our game, they commented that he didn't bother playing to the objective and that was why he lost. Then he got mad and left. >.>

[WestRider]

Nicely done. A Unit can only claim one Objective at a time now, tho (pg.123), so it was actually just a 6-3 Victory, but still, good job keeping your eyes on the prize.

Above all else, that's the key to winning in 40K. I've actually won a Game with only two Models left, while my Opponent had over half of his Army, because I had a Gaunt sitting on my Home Objective, and a Fex contesting his.

[Pyrotechnics]

Ah, alright. I asked our rules lawyer/bearer of the rulebook if it was allowed and he said he thought it was (we didn't think there was much point in our group of friends if more than one person got a rulebook, so we take turns reading through it and ask him if we have questions). Still, I'm happy with that victory.

[WestRider]

It's still early days for 6th, and it did work that way in 5th.

I only know most of this Rules stuff because I keep my Rulebook by my Computer and check it any time a debate or question comes up on any of the three fora I hang out on. Even given that I've been doing that for the past month, I wasn't entirely sure on this occasion, and looked it up again.

It's part of why I almost always give page references as well. One of the best ways to learn is to actually dig out the book and re-read the relevant section every time there's a question or issue. Gives some extra context for it, makes it easier for your brain to remember.

[Pyrotechnics]

Alright. If I were to start a nid army, what models should I start with? Is the Battleforce good value, or would I be better dropping say the genestealers from it and getting more gants or something?

[WestRider]

The BattleForce is still a good buy. Hormies and Stealers are still solid, while Termagants are excellent with a Tärvigon around, and still decent otherwise. The only real weak point is the Warriors*, but they're pretty easy to Convert into a lot of other things. Tyranid Primes, most obviously, and a couple of those should be part of any Nid collection, but they can also be used to make Hive Guard, Tyrant Guard, Raveners, Zoanthropes, pretty much any of the 40mm based stuff.

A Tärvigon, some Hive Guard (possibly Converted from Warriors), and a couple of boxes of Gargoyles are also all good early purchases. Beyond that, it's largely still up in the air. Rumours have some FAQs and Amendments coming that are supposed to shake things up pretty seriously, and we'll need to see how the Chaos and DA dexes change up the Game, but those should all still be solid Units.

[3ff3ct]

Pyro, please take the individual points costs down off your lists. If the mods see, they'll kick your arse

If GW see, they'll kick ALL our arses!

Great to see players trying something new too, I find playing different armies a very rewarding challenge, and by knowing how an army works, it's much easier to beat it when you're playing against it yourself!