Tactics vs Tyranids

Hey everyone,

I play casual games against my friend, he generally likes to use a flying Hive tyrant, infiltrating genestealers, a Tervigon, hormogaunts, termagaunts, zoanthropes, hive guard, tyrannofex, carnifex and the doom. I've used the search option and only found old posts on nid tactics.

I'm only very new to dark eldar and have only played a handful of games of 6th edition and 40k for that matter. I've actually only played one game with my new eldar toys and managed to beat his CSM by claiming secondary objectives. I'm just wondering what sort of list you would recommend and what tactics I should be employing to out manoeuvre his tyranids. He usually likes to charge up the board as quick as possible and get into assault ASAP. Sometimes he deep strikes in by mycetic spores filled with the doom, or other nasty blobs of nids.

I have a lot of models at my disposal, 3 ravagers, 3 raiders, 5 venoms a razorwing, 12 reavers, 5 scourges and enough warriors, wyches and wracks to make a horde. I'm looking at some examples for a 1500 point list. Any help would be greatly appreciated!! Oh and the game is in 2 days... Sorry for the late notice!

Thanks again!!

HA! You should feel guilty with the amount of tyranid killing stuff we have, GUILTY! But ok, you have all the tools at your disposal. Venoms have two splinter cannons (they HAVE two splinter cannons, forget about the other option) and thats 12 shots from up to 36 inchs away, and poisen will mean it will put the hurt on the big beasties and even have enougth shots to force grounding tests on the flyrant. Raiders with splinter racks and a big warrior squad and you will never look back. NOTE:- SR only effects the rifles, not cannons.

Put a unit of 4 trueborn into a venom and give them ALL blasters, fly up two a monsterous creature and watch it go up in smoke. Keep dark lances on the ravager, they are ace at killing monsters and we have enough of them to be worth it when vaporising hive guard who will be a MAIN target. Give razorwing Nuerotoxin missiles and fire 1, just one into that massive termaguant squad and it will evaporate. The razorwing should focus on ground troops till its missiles are gone, then if the tyrant is flying (which it shouldn't be) then take pot shots at that.

Your best assult troops will be believe it or not the wracks, give them a haemon for re-rolls and liquifier and go slaughter everything they can throw at you, the only thing you have to be scared of are genestealers and hormaguants because they strike before you but have them charge through cover and POOF I 1 , it wont even be a fight. Use scourges as moving splinter cannons, as they are able to put out 21 shots when not moving with the Carbines, more then enought to shred any tyranid.

In truth we have i'd say the best tools to kill tyranids, and id put good money on him being tables quickly with the amount of poisen your throwing at him.

1 last thing for Sh*ts and giggles take an Archon with venomblade, huskblade and soul trap, weaken a monster, charge him in and get strength 6. I challange you to try get a strength 10 Archon/Haemon!

LOL! Well that's some solid advice, I don't feel guilty though because that would be un dark eldar like!! Haha. I was considering taking 2 ravagers with dissies, do u advise against this? I suppose there are a lot of poisoned shots on the board already... What unit should I use to accompany the archon?

Shadowfield84 wrote:

What unit should I use to accompany the archon?

Kinda depends on what your Archon will be hunting. Wracks are good for giving a free pain token and poison attacks, Wyches/Bloodbrides are nice for the Invulnerable save + Drugs + Shardnet when hunting big beasts. The other retinues that I commonly see (Incubi & Grotesques) are a bit less impressive in my mind vs nids because they are somewhat wasted on Nids (Incubi's Klaives and Armor are either kinda pointless or Ignored by nids while Grotesques are a bit less impressive then usual since their high tough is countered by big nids strength and little nids poison).

only having played nids twice im not an expert but this list has served well;

archon, hb,vb,cd,sf,st.

succubus,vb.

ravager,ns,ff,3Xdl

razorwing,ns,ff,2Xnecrotoxin,2Xdl

3 tb 2Xsc
venom,ns,sc

3 tb 2Xdl
venom,ns,sc

3 tb 2Xblaster
venom,ns,sc,eb

8 wychs,hek,pgl,vb
raider,ff,tgl,1Xdisi

10 kw,sc
raider,ns,sr,tgl,eb,1Xdisi

6 kw,blaster

aegis defence line
quad gun

total 1497 pts. been running this list recently as more footsloggers are out their, with the huge amounts of fire power on offer here they will be hard pressed to cross any table, use your speed to keep them at range for as long as possible, archon can handle a spore and once you ave IK a MC and then ST a few times he will think twice when deploying spores, the quad can fire after reserves have moved and will take out 2/3 of his infiltrating stealers or shoot down the tyrant. did laugh the first time my TB with SC shot, they killed 9 stealers, normaly my wychs would carry haywire grenadesbut swapped em out for tgl on raiders and eb on a venom

Who ever says the Archon needs a possy??? Isn't it way more epic for him to be rolling around in his own personal venom which will soften up a Carni a wound or two, blast pistol will take off another and the sheer amount of V.Blade will take the last wound, there strength 6. Back in pimp mobile, fly over to next hardest thing and hit first, hit hard and cause instant death and bada bing bada boom strength 10!

I would advise against dissie's for the ravagers because of there strength and they will only wound the big besties on 5's while the dark lance wounds on 2's with the added bonus of insta killing hive guard and zoanthropes and this is incredibly important.

Its a bit hard for me to see what the wyches can do as they are tarpits, and if it all works out there should be nothing for them to tarpit.

Make this list around the venoms, ravagers and the razorwings. Everything else is of little import as if all goes to plan the main parts the list is made form will kill everything of his.

Why have a possy? So you don't get swarmed and killed as easily? One Archon by himself is just asking to get overwhelmed. Give him a squad of troops at his back and they can at least buy him time to kill off his first target and get to the new guys (ie being a tarpit which is what wyches are good for as you mention). I mean I suppose the wyches could get overwhelmed as well and they all die together but it's at least slightly safer with a group. They also have the added benefit of removing an attack off the target monster (less chance of the Archon getting his shadow field popped) and can act as a bit of a cushion against shooting he might be exposed to after the kill.

D.E. Killing nids is easy, trust me I am a nid player that is getting into D.E. Venoms, and target his synapse creatures, (hive tyrant, tervigons, warriors, Trygon prime, Zoos, etc.) Use your speed to stay way from his swarms/ tarpits. You have range, and speed on him. I suggest if he loves his flyrant, which almost every nid player does as it is the only decent AA unit in our codex. Take a razorwing, or bomber it's mission is to hunt FMCs then mop up on other units. Poison units hunt MCs.

How would you guys recommend using wyches to fight Tyranids? What would their role be? I'm not advocating them as the most effective thing but I've yet to play Tyranids and I don't taylor lists. I have two 8 strong wych squads with haemonculi in them for my main list. I assume they'd be eaten up by a swarm.

My main two cents here is going to be that wyches or bloodbrides are great retinues for a MC hunting archon. My one friend who plays nids loves his MCs and wyches are a great retinue for hunting with the archon as it lets his squad have a bunch of invuln saves against those big MC smash attacks and can take down the number of attacks they get using shardnets. All you need from there is a huskblade, a soul trap and some luck for an outrageously strong archon.

The normal amount of Splinter Cannons, Dark Lances, and any Disintegrators in a balanced, take-all-comers list should handle Tyranids nicely. Certain Fast Attack choices may work better than others, but none will do poorly.

I played against them again yesterday, 1750pts with venomspam so there was little trouble. (never lost to them in 5th or 6th ed actually)

He fielded 40 Genestelers, 40 Termagonts, and alot of small flying crap, like 20-40 of those, 9 Zonethropers and some HQ, tervigon?

Anyway I frak up deployment so I got stuck in a corner since he filled the table, but somehow managed to scrape out a win. It was the worst game I have ever played tactically against Tyranids, but even tho with frak I managed to win.

I think most lists should do fine against them.

wittykid wrote:

My main two cents here is going to be that wyches or bloodbrides are great retinues for a MC hunting archon. My one friend who plays nids loves his MCs and wyches are a great retinue for hunting with the archon as it lets his squad have a bunch of invuln saves against those big MC smash attacks and can take down the number of attacks they get using shardnets. All you need from there is a huskblade, a soul trap and some luck for an outrageously strong archon.

I'm sure this tactic is lethal but what are wyche's roles if you don't have an Archon in your list. Like I said just 8 with a Hekatrix and Haemon. No wych weapons.

Sorry I went a little off about the archon thing there, but wyches/bloodbrides are good against large hordes of termagaunts or hromagaunts since they put out a large number of low str attacks which is average against most things is good against low toughness hordes like them. I have also found that wyches can be good at tying up nasty MC's that aren't squadded up to have a lot of attacks like if for example due to points they had a lone carnifex or were fielding one of their unique MC's like Old One Eye or Doom of Malantai. The Wyches are able to handle the relatively low number of attacks sent at them with their invuln saves and can hold up these types of things for a while saving you having to worry about them some. Wyches also do surprisingly well against genestealers mainly because genestealers have bad armour saves too so the weight of attacks wyches can put out will put a dent into a medium sized unit of genestealers although I would recommend multi charging some of these things and trying to add in shardnets for tying up things and I like the hydra gauntlets for getting as many attacks as possible if you can. Also try to use your splinter pistols before charging in as they can make a big difference in how many nids get put down and less attacks come your way when it is time for them to hit back. And VENOM BLADES, they make even a single hekatrix a force to be reckoned with as she puts can reliably put out wounds when using a venom blade, even against the big MC's that nid players have.
These are just things I have noticed from playing against my friend who is a nid player and works for me but it might not work as well for your army and you could also end up finding a bunch of better uses for them against nids.

This looks similar to the 'Indus I usually get stuck against. Fighting tyranids is a good exercise in target priority. The fact is that no matter what you take it can usually deal with the enemy. Your tactics should be to begin the game by killing the small units, taking what pain tokens you can before moving on.
As a general rule getting a squad or two to start the day on a unit of hormagaunts (an appetising first course), before taking on a warrior squad (tough meaty main course), then moving on up (with support) to a carnifex (decadently large dessert) works well, as power from pain makes allows your units to move up the threat ladder with every kill.

Also, if all else fails, throw one of the haemonculi's nasty little insta-death causing toys at their biggest creatures. This WILL result in fun, either for you or the tyranids.

So I played my mate lastnight... needless to say i managed to scrape out a win 6-4, thanks to secondary objectives.

He didnt really run the Nidzilla army i was expecting, he basically had a big squad of termagants and a big squad of hormagaunts, a squad of warriors led by a prime, 3 hive guard, a mawloc, the doom, 3 zoanthropes and some raveners. I ran pretty much ran a venom spam list, led by an archon, 2 units of blasterborn in a venom, a 5 man squad of warriors with blaster in venom, a warrior gun boat, a raider with wracks and a haemy with LG, 2 ravagers with lances and a razorwing with to necrotoxin missiles.

I really wanted to boost my archon but killed his mawloc with the venoms (boy was he suprised at the amount of poisoned shots he had to wear!). Once again the shadowfield failed me and my archon was instantly killed...

He said next time he is gonna run 2 tyrannofexes (strength 10...) and deep strike in carnifexes, im a little concerned to be honest. I also have a game coming up against his cousin who plays Tau, no idea where to start? Railguns scare me.

Well good job, you sure showed them bugs whos the real apax predator!

Tyrannofexes wont do much at all really, its about 300 pts for 1 stength 10 shot isn't to good at all really when all of our units have a 1/3 chance to evade it. Devourer Carnifexes could be annoying as it should glance to death what it shoots at even with its abismal B but it should still go down the next turn to focused poisen. I'd also very much advise that you get a razorwing as they fill serveral nichts as AA and horde brakers.

Tau are a bit harder as they out gun us (Gasp!) but lord knows they carn't fight us. any of our units can easily beat down the average tau, the problem will be getting there. DE have a lot of fast transports, and it will be more a case of target satuation to get your people in there. I would surggest you make another forum for this as it would help get attention.

Dont be worried, just run a standard DE list and you will be fine against Tyranids.
Tau however can be tricky at times. Been a while since I've faced them, and havnt faced them in 6th ed. So you have to get advice here from others :p anyway I just remember it was tight games, but I cant remember me loosing to them. You have to use your manouvrebility because he got some nasty jump crap that he properly will jump out and shoot and then back in to BLOS.

Going to play Tau on Saturday myself, can give some hits after that... anyway Railgun isnt all that nasty.

I would never recommend using a melee unit against nids.... who are primarily melee monsters. Going toe to toe against nids helps them. stay at range use you poison weapons and laugh as the poor cute little monsters helplessly die. I know this works and frustrates the hell out of the nid player. I have lived this experience time and time again.

If you can take vect against nids he is incredible! with his obsidian orbs. Then scepter of the dark city, wounds on 3's ap3. and he get prefferred enemy against everything! he has taken out several monsterous creatures in the games i have played.
I run an 1999pt list with vect + incubi + raider, 2 ravagers, razorwing, with 8 venoms.
The amount of shots is ridiculous, and stealing the initiative on a 4 helps alot!
Also remember on turn one if the flying monstrous creature start on the table its in glide mode so you can shoot it at normal ballistics skill