# Tyranids need to beat Space Marines



## Hivemind Demeter (Nov 6, 2007)

Okay, quite frankly, I'm sick of my friend walking all over me.
Tyranids haven't really been performing too well. 

It's probably just my lack of some of the models I need.
Regardless, I need some tips on how to beat Marines.

Mostly Dark Angels.
And then Chaos too.
(And maybe IG and Eldar. xD I've been failing a lot lately.)
: D


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## Ordo Xeno Commander (Jan 17, 2007)

get some genestealers and give them a brood lord. infil, stick em behind some cover as close as possible to the enemy. move 6, fleet X and assault 6. kick ass first turn carnage, or second turn if your not quite close enough


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## Hivemind Demeter (Nov 6, 2007)

You can't fleet with the Broodlord in the group.

On top of that, I always take him because I know he can deal out damage.
I just never manage to get close enough, and in putting him in perfect place for second turn assault he just gets raped by fire.
If I leave him to hide then he moves to shoot the Lord.
Almost no matter what, he gets screwed.


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## The Son of Horus (Dec 30, 2006)

A tide of gaunts does wonders. The most obnoxious Tyranid armies I've fought have been ones with absolutely no monstrous creatures. As many hormagaunts as you can stuff in, backed up by enough warriors to keep them in synapse. If you beef up hormagaunts with what little they can be given, they'll shred Space Marines. And if you can shred Space Marines, you can handle pretty much anything else.


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## wolf. (Nov 10, 2007)

genestealers, genestealers, genestealers.
they are fantastic and annoying to the death


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## Fat Cat Hay (Nov 24, 2007)

u need to get lots of those nids with claws and guns get lots of them and a awsome close combat big heavy carnerfex ok i can not spell but thats u need and genestealers dont forget the broodlord k:


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## Jezlad (Oct 14, 2006)

To be able to advice you we need to know what you're up against.

What Chaos build does your friend use? 

It's be pretty easy to form an army to beat another. Building a good take all comers list is a harder task.


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## The Wraithlord (Jan 1, 2007)

The Son of Horus said:


> A tide of gaunts does wonders. The most obnoxious Tyranid armies I've fought have been ones with absolutely no monstrous creatures. As many hormagaunts as you can stuff in, backed up by enough warriors to keep them in synapse. If you beef up hormagaunts with what little they can be given, they'll shred Space Marines. And if you can shred Space Marines, you can handle pretty much anything else.



Agreed. The more gribblies you have the harder it will be for the SM player to wipe you out as he just won't have the sheer number of shots needed, especially when hormaguants can move a total of 24" in a turn. The 2000pt list a friend of mine runs looks something like this:

Tryant
2x8 genestealers w/carapace
2x16 hormaguants w/+1 strength and Init, leaping
2 h2h fexes
2 gun fexes
zoanthrope
a few raveners as well

Just off the top of my head anyway. But this list gives an enemy a choice to either shoot the supremely fast smaller things coming his way or go after the big things in back. If he goes for the gribblies, the MC's reach his lines and begin to kill everything in sight while going for the MC's first guarantees that the stealers and gaunts are going to slam into the enemy and pull them down with rending attacks and sheer weight of numbers.


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## Hespithe (Dec 26, 2006)

I always had more luck with Tyrants over Broodlords. As you mentioned, while the Broodlord is a monster in combat, he just can't get there without getting shot to pieces first. Take as many fast units as you can. A tyrant with wings is a good choice, and a few, just a few, longer ranged weapons are a good idea too. For the most part, though, you need to get your troops into combat asap, while in synapse coverage. 

Four or five Synapse creatures (Tyrant, Warriors, 3 Zoats) out to do it. Genestealers with Scuttlers, and as many Gants and Gaunts as you can fit it will tear up anything short of a Mech Eldar list.


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## Hivemind Demeter (Nov 6, 2007)

And the problem being is that all of these ideas I've employed.

I suppose my opponent is just damn good with his Marines.

He keeps his unit totals high by taking only what he needs to fill out a troops choice, that way he can split his fire equally.
In the end I'm really getting screwed by the FoC.


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## The Wildonion (Dec 21, 2006)

What point value do you play most often and what is your list composed of at that level? What are some of the things that your opponent takes?


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## Hivemind Demeter (Nov 6, 2007)

We typically play anywhere from 1000-1500.
Sometimes it's 2000 for me and 1000 for him and 1000 for another of our friends.
My list most typically comprises of the following:

1500 pts:
Tyrant (Venom Cannon, Barbed Strangler, Enhanced Senses, Extended Carapace)
Broodlord (Extended Carapace, Flesh Hooks, Implant Attack, 11 Genestealer w/ Extended Carapace.)

3 Lictors
3 Warriors w/ Scyth and Rending

10 Hormagaunts
10 Hormagaunts
10 Termagaunts
10 Termagaunts

Raveners Scyth/Rend
Raveners Scyth/Rend

3 Zoanthropes w/ Warpblast and Synapse
Carnifex w/ Barbed, Venom, Enhanced


3 Warriors
3 Warriors
2000 pts:
Flyrant w/ 2 TL dev, Toxin Sacs, Winged, Warp Fields, Enhanced Senses.
Broodlord w/ Extended Carapace, Toxin Sacs, Flesh Hooks (11 Genestealer Retinue w/ Feeder Tendrils and Extended Carapace)

3 Lictors
3 Warriors w/ Extended Carapace, Adren (I), Scyth and Rending.

10 Hormagaunts
10 Hormagaunts
10 Hormagaunts
10 Termagaunts
10 Termagaunts

Ravener Scyth/Rend
Ravener Scyth/Rend
Ravener Scyth/Rend

3 Zoanthropes w/ Synapse and Warpblast.
Carnifex w/ Enhanced Senses, Barbed Strangler, Venom Cannon
Carnifex w/ Crushing Claws, Scything Talons, Tusked, Regen, Extended Carapace, Reinforced Chitin, Bioplasma, Flesh Hooks, Adren WS.

That's roughly how my army tends to look.
My opponent typically runs some sort of special character, Azrael or Ezekiel or something.
He has heavy weapons like Rocket Launchers and crap perched somewhere out of the way, and then a bunch of Marines that break up into their little squads and shoot or melee everything.

He usually gets his scouts infiltrated right into my area. My Carnifex usually dies to this.

Lately he's getting more into fielding vehicles, which is fine by me.
(I get really lucky on rending tanks with Raveners. ;D)


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## The Son of Horus (Dec 30, 2006)

Your problem is that your gaunt squads are TINY. I'd combine them into one squad of 30 hormagaunts and one squad of 20 termagants, or maybe 2 of 15 if you can find the points to do that. Tyranids are about weight of numbers with the little 'uns. More importantly, when the little 'uns charge, bigger squads are safer. Once they're engaged, they're not going to get shot up.


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## The Wildonion (Dec 21, 2006)

Two large squads of Twenty Horm. Gaunts should serve you well; they will be harder to kill that way. I would also look into getting leaping on those warriors. Another squad of twenty Horm. Gaunts (not sure what you would drop, maybe a couple Lictors?) would be excellent.


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## Hivemind Demeter (Nov 6, 2007)

It's funny, because I thought I had tried mass armies.
But looking at the list I started with, I was using mass units, yes, but not correctly.
Too many spinegaunts, and only a few Hormies.
I guess it was really in front of me the whole time.

Now the hard part, Gaunts come 16 to a box (8 horms, 8 gaunts).
I need to get a whole lot of them.

I should just get an Endless Swarm.


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## Accommodator (Nov 24, 2007)

You want good Tyranid tactics, try www.warpshadow.com

Okay, that plug out of the way, your walking Tyrant needs Guard, preferably two. Drop the strangler and replace with twin-linked devourers - loads of twin-linked rerolling shots and some anti-tank in one package. He should have psychic scream.

Warriors - ug, with their T4, sooo very fragile. Drop 'em. Enjoy the splosh sound they make. Use your Zoans aggressively. I often swap out warp blast on one or two for scream as well.

Larger broods of gaunts are key - 15 minimum for hormaguants, 25 for spine gaunts to bring enough attacks to bear. Of course, going the genestealer route is also very good as well. Keep them cheap, to keep the numbers up.

Um, where are the ubiquitous Devfex? You know, those elite 2xtwinlinked devourer armed Carnifex? 8 str 6 re-roll to hit re-roll to wound shots generally generate 2 MEQ kills a turn...

Apocalypse tactical advice is quite different - take as many Hive Tyrants as you can - 5 or 6 is good, preferably Flyrants...^_^


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## dander (Jan 13, 2008)

i have the same problem and more stealers didnt help. they all got slaughtered.


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## Coffeemug (Jan 4, 2008)

is your marine friend building army's to beat you specifically? because i used to play tyranids and rarely lost to marines. 
I used the same tactics Wraithlord is talking about.
Are you charging right up without using cover? 

my list was this. i think i was playing 1550

flying tyrant dual t/l devourers +1st warpfield +1I
x2 Fex dual t/l devourers
Fex devourer sything talons, strangler 2+sv 5w t7 tusked misma +1ws
Fex tallons crushing claws, tusked,2+sv T7 5w misma thornback +1ws regeneration

16 hormagaunts no upgrades
10 rippers +1 st leaping

2 zoanthrops warp blast synaps

16 won spine gaunts +1st

i won 90% of the games i played with this list, and most of them were against some type of marines.


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## purepolarpanzer (Jan 8, 2008)

dakka tyrants are great. Dakka fex? not so much. Yes, higher strength (not much) but less shots and less BS. I kill 3-4 MEQ a round with dakka flyrant, and they are kinda cheap if done right. Fexes are better as sniper fexes. 36" outranges alot, and a str 8 barbed strangler and a str 10 venom cannon kills tanks easily. Especially three of them. That is all the anti-tank you need, especially since most tanks (damn skimmers) can only be taken down with glances. And if you can't his a skimmer, it's amusing to watch all the eldar die to large blast barbed stranglers.

Mass gaunts. Of all types. I typically rape 2-3 armor ten vehicles a game just by tossing gaunts at the rear armor.

Also- warriors are sweet. Multi wound models that never get insta killed. Deathspitter squads will kills many MANY MEQ a turn, and they can move into bolter range and survive through cover and multi wounds. Rockit launchers? Pah. Can't insta die. And they provide much needed synapse for not much. The enemy can shoot them and not kill them or shoot gaunts and get nuked by warriors.

Tyranids should beat marines most of the time. Also, try acid mines in fast attack to kill pesky non-skimmer vehicles. Cheap points and if you miss with two SQUADS and hit with one you make the points back for them all most of the time. Also, no amror save for marines=yay.


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## Zeldrin (Feb 23, 2008)

As a rule of thumb, maxed out (numbers wise) groups of spinegaunts are your friend. A lot of troops will die before you hit the line so embrace it and makes your troops a pittance. Spinegaunts are actually really effective on the board too. They are not great at shooting but in numbers they can pack a blow and they may just surpirse you in cc. Having these in large enough number will overwhelm even the most shooty space marine force. 

If mid range weapons are lacking go with rippers too.


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## Andros (Dec 10, 2007)

I've got to admit that swarms of Gaunts are a right pain in the arse..... I've had a maxed out unit go against my expensive 420pt Chaos Biker Squad..... T7 proved a problem for him, but once I ran into his Gaunts, I couldn't kill enough of them to get through and into his Deployment zone..... so I'd say pretty large units of Gaunts, couple of shooty Warriors, and plenty Stealers.... try them without the Broodlord, they'll get into Marines, and MUNCH them.........

That my advice, seeing as it always works against me <.<;

Andros


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## Lothissen (Feb 25, 2008)

I saw a list a while ago (on warpshadow i think) where the guy recomended useing armies made up almost completely of warriors, you can use them as HQ, Elite and Fast attack, with swarms of rippers making up troop slots.
Bigest problem with this is it's expensive point-wise but set up right it's got potential: gun-warriors hitting from a distance, winged warriors hitting H2H first followed by H2H-warriors on foot and rippers.
Have to admit i haven't tried this, haven't got enough warriors yet


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## Zeldrin (Feb 23, 2008)

warrior heavy can work. They survive a little better these days and they do work well in a range of roles. It depends if you like big bodies or lots of little ones. Both have their advantages and disadvantages. Financially speaking its not the cheapest option by any means.


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## GhostBear (Feb 17, 2008)

Not knowing the terrain situation in your games, I wonder how you're getting shot up so much. ALL Tyranids having the move through cover special rule means they hug terrain better then anyone else I've faced. And cover saves are a saving grace of theirs considering the majority of their armor.

As for killing Marines, Genestealers can do quite well. I find the Broodlord to be interesting but not worth the points, he takes away one of the main tactical advantages of a Genestealer, Fleeting. If the terrain will be good you can forego the better armor saves in favor of Scuttling and/or Scything Talons.

Genestealers while nice and devastating to things with armor saves can't put out the sheer numbers of other troops choices. So throwing in large squads of gaunts as fire bait can give your Genestealers time to work their way up the flanks or through terrain. I've been surprised at how effective a large squad of Termagaunts can be at shooting things up.

More importantly then what you field is how you field it. I've made some terrible tactical deployment errors in my time. Tyranids more then anyone else I've seen need to use cover. With lousy armor and practically worthless invulnerable saves on a handful of their options, cover is the only way you can get your bulky high number armies into combat. If the terrain setup is sparse and/or terrible for moving into close combat the alternative is using large broods of cheap units to a similar effect.

A large brood of Gaunts can take a while to kill and as long as they stay in Synapse range your opponent will have to kill every last one of them to keep them out of the fight. Two full squads of Gaunts can be fielded for as little as 320 points. That's a lot of bodies for anyone to shoot up. And as useless as a minimum troop like that may seem, if nothing else they can act as cover for your better troops. Then again, that many troops shooting anything is bound to do something.

Vehicles can be troublesome for Tyranids. Large hordes of S3/4 troops will not get through 11/12/13/14 armor ever. And yes, Tyranids have guns that can do some damage and even one nice shooty psyker power. Unfortunately against the tougher vehicles 13/14 your best long range options are not very reliable. Glancing only on the Venom Cannon isn't fun. Having to pass a Leadership test then a ballistic skill test is just asking for the dice to come up wrong more often for Warp Blast. In short those faster vehicles are going to be troublesome more often then not. Monstrous Creatures can be nice but they have to get to the vehicle first, Flying Tyrant is good for this. Deep Striking a Mine on top of a vehicle might also be an option, though the Spore mines don't do so well on the tougher vehicles. Rending can stack up nicely against the slower tougher vehicles.

In the end, Tyranids can field some pretty diverse armies with some pretty good choices. What you use and how you use them is up to you and how you like to play. Sometimes victory isn't a change in the army list, sometimes it's just a different way of approaching the same battles or a roll of the dice. When I lose a battle I analyze everything, was my loss because of the wrong troops, a bad deployment (usually) did I use them wrong, what did my opponent do? More often then not my unfamiliarity with a troop (My opponent's mostly) and/or their special rules gets me. I''m still learning, experience is a slow and patient teacher. 

Good luck and happy hunting.


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## demon of greed (Jan 20, 2008)

Hivemind Demeter said:


> On top of that, I always take him because I know he can deal out damage.
> I just never manage to get close enough, and in putting him in perfect place for second turn assault he just gets raped by fire.
> If I leave him to hide then he moves to shoot the Lord.
> Almost no matter what, he gets screwed.


do you realise that if hes part of a squad then he cant be targeted specificly so your opponent cant say im going to shoot at the brood lord they have to shoot at the squad this means that the b'lord should usualy make it into combat even if the 'steelers in his group are a bit dead they're still very effective though.


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## coldstuff64 (Feb 11, 2008)

a good thing to do would be to take about 30 gaunts with devourers and about 30 gaunts with sything talons. wear down the marines with the talons first, then finish them with the devourers.


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## Archangel41 (Mar 9, 2008)

i played this guy who used nothing but genestealers that could infiltrate. my BA army was getting raped by the start of turn 2.


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## Archangel41 (Mar 9, 2008)

I've also seen an army that had infiltrating genestealers, lictors, a biovore, 2 broods of warrors, a tyrant, a wave of gaunts with devourers and without number, and a tusk shovler fex do very well in battle.


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## coldstuff64 (Feb 11, 2008)

Archangel41 said:


> my BA army was getting raped by the start of turn 2.


whats BA? blood angels?


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## sneakNINJA (Jan 24, 2008)

Genestealers can only infiltrate if you have a broodlord. If you do, they can't fleet. 

Gaunts are very good at tying up guys until the real threats get there, if you have a synapse creature in range. Hormagaunts are way too expensive for what you get-a minimum of 10 points per model for a s3/ws3/i4 guy with a 6+ save. Obviously, synapse becomes even more necessary considering that gaunts are likely to fail almost all of their saves and take several more wounds (ws3/t3) than the marines are. It then becomes necessary to have a synapse creature that can protect your gaunts with its synapse while still protecting itself. I think winged warriors or a winged tyrant would be absolutely necessary in such a case. 

I can give you a Bugzilla all-comers list that has been very good for me. Essentially you can max out your t6 guys, hide raveners (which are amazing) behind terrain and/or walls made by monstrous creatures, and set out a wave of attacks.

It also depends on points. My default list is 1850. You can make it 1500 by cutting the hive/guard and two raveners. The big problem is that the list is almost all pewter, and is therefore very expensive. Building this army will show you the idiocy of paying retail for anything 40k. 

HQ:
Hive Tyrant w/ Wings and 2 Scything Talons (Minimum 133pts)
Hive Tyrant w/ Venom Cannon, Scything Talons, Toxin Sacs, 3 Tyrant Guard

Troops
3 Rippers
3 Rippers

Elites
113pts Carnifex + 2 Twin-Linked Devourers + Enhanced Senses
113pts Carnifex + 2 Twin-Linked Devourers + Enhanced Senses
113pts Carnifex + 2 Twin-Linked Devourers + Enhanced Senses

Fast Attack
200pts 5 Raveners (all have rending claws)
200pts 5 Raveners
200pts 5 Raveners

Heavy:
153pts Sniper Carnifex: Venom Cannon, Barbed Strangler, Enhanced Senses
153pts Sniper Carnifex: Venom Cannon, Barbed Strangler, Enhanced Senses
113pts Carnifex + 2 Twin-Linked Devourers + Enhanced Senses

I've heard many people harping off about how great genestealers are with bugzilla, and I must say categorically that they have no idea what they are talking about. One of the biggest advantages of bugzilla is the ability to block line of sight with a wall of carnifexes and/or hive tyrants, effectively creating an additional piece of terrain to shield a unit. Raveners are exceptional at taking advantage of this, since they threaten a minimum of 19" every turn with their fleet and 12 inch assault. The squad is small enough to hide effectively and move at the same speed, trailing the carnifex wall, then to come out on the turn of assault and come with 25 rending attacks. Granted, it's not as scary as if more than half of your squad of scything-taloned genestealers came into CC, but let's be realistic in admitting that the genestealers will receive the dakka fire (because heavy weapons are terrible against them) while the t6 guys will get all the heavy weapons fire. Most armies are configured this way, with a split of specific weapons and dakka shooting squads. By contrast, raveners are able to automatically threaten an assault from 19-24", the edge of bolter fire range, have two wounds per model, and with proper terrain placement and movement are nearly impossible to shoot before they get into close combat. Outside of synapse range, they are still extremely likely to pass their leadership 10 test. Genestealers are better in close combat, but raveners don't die before they get there. If you're building a genestealer army and running 4-7 broods up there, go ahead and try it out, but know that the genestealers' weakness to dakka and your big bugs' weakness to heavy weapons are going to fit most opponents' strategies, and that genestealers are not going to be able to threaten nearly as much of an area for assault (which is what shooting armies are actually afraid of, not the model that actually kills them) as raveners can.

Anyway, what you do is you run the raveners up behind cover or carnifexes. Sniper carnifexes are used to prevent enemy vehicles from shooting you, and blowing a hole in your carnifex wall. When you're (usually) on turn two, the raveners are able to assault a squad. Depending on how threatening the opposing squad is, you don't necessarily need to be afraid of going last for charging through cover if you're fighting troop dorks with ws<6 and s3. You have two wounds per model, and a somewhat legitimate 5+ armor save. On this turn, the flying hive tyrant also goes into CC (because you placed your terrain correctly and flew him behind a piece of level 3 terrain) to tie something else up and potentially kill it. After your raveners slaughter a squad, they should be able to massacre into another squad (since they'll have to clump up in order to avoid being threatened by the raveners assault, and if they counter that idea by staying near the edge of their deployment zone, they'll be vulnerable to the four dakkafexes on turn two, as well as the assault of the raveners). By the time most of your raveners die off, you should have progressed into your third turn at the minimum, which is when your dakkafexes are going to get in devourer range, with very few wounds suffered (I once had an absurd situation where wolf scouts and a wolf-guard infiltrated and killed my carnifex with plasma weapons and failed armor saves on turn one, killed another carnifex the next turn, and still got badly destroyed). Usually the situation is more favorable than that. Sometime around turn 4 or 5 the hive guard and the carnifexes should be able to get into close combat. They aren't particularly scary by themselves, but once you get two or three of them going, they are essentially a power fist that takes forever to kill. 

Note that your opponent either kills the 4-wound, t6 carnifex and gets 113VP for a dakkafex, or he gets nothing VP wise for doing three wounds or less. Even a daemon prince with lash would likely last for only one turn if he decides to jump out in order to pull a squad of raveners out of hiding, or to open a hole in the carnifex wall for heavy weapons (remember, synapse rule saves your raveners from ID). Then he immediately becomes vulnerable to dakka fire (s6 vs t5, re-roll wounds, 3+ save), you should be able to kill a DP with two volleys of dakka devourer fire.

The big drawback: $$$. Raveners retail at $15 and carnifexes and hive tyrants in the $40s (which are absurd).


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## The Swarmlord (Aug 21, 2010)

You should try taking a squad of 9 warriors with boneswords (just convert scy talons) and adrenal glands, since they can take a few hits and in combat they ignore armor saves, re-roll 1s to hit, and cause instant death on Ld test of 3D6 which is useful with adrenal glands giving +1 to I and strength on the charge giving them 5I and 5S overall and tactical marines have 4I so you own them with Instant death.


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## Katie Drake (Nov 28, 2007)

You might notice that the last post in this thread was in 2008...


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