Keeping it Simple

Finally got to use the new Tyranid codex today! I know I'm way behind on it but free time has been limited and of course I had a visit from Nurgle all over my house recently. When you've got two youngbloods down from zombie rot your priorities change from gaming to "oh dear god stop havin stuff come out of you!"

The Battle Report will be coming soon.

So my trouble came while putting together my list. I love new codex's, the new units, the new playstyles, the new ugly surprises you can drop on your opponent. It's all a lot of fun but it's easy to lose sight of the basics with all these new toys to play with.

So here's the list I came up with:

HQ
Tyranid Warrior Alpha
2 Boneswords
Deathspitter

Elite
Deathleaper

Troops
3 Tyranid Warriors
2 Boneswords each
2 Deathspitters
1 Barbed Strangler

10 Termagaunts w/ Poison
10 Termagaunts w/ Poison
20 Genestealer w/ Broodlord w/ Implant Attack

Heavy
Carnifex w/ Heavy Venom Cannon and Mycetic Spore

A reasonably balanced list for 1000 points I felt and while I lost out in the end it was very bloody and costly for my opponent. At the 1000 pt level I felt a Hive Tyrant was to expensive as an HQ while the Tyranid Alpha had a good balance. The huge genestealer brood, while very unpleasent to see at the outset of the game got tangled up in close combat with a dreadnought. I should've split them into two groups of ten which would've given me more tactical options and not locked up the entire brood for most of the game.

The carnifex dropping with the spore would've been very cool unfortunately it landed after the last of my synapse creatures were killed and spent what rounds it had mindlessly chasing Space Marines.

All this aside I found myself trying to jam to many new toys into my list while I was building it. Oooh, new Hive Tyrant! Oooh, Old One Eye is back! Oooh, got to take all those new goodies that my opponent hasn't seen thrown at him yet! Originally my army list looked quite a bit differant. After I had built it I made a 1000pt Imperial Guard list as well since I wasn't 100% sure what I would use today and while building that list I started rethinking my 'nids list and the options I had taken for it.

This made me realize that while I always put the basics in my army, I tend to get caught up in the one trick ponies or the surprise units that either completely take my opponent by surprise or die in a blaze of humiliation. With my Imperial Guard army that thought took up after I put in my usual drop squad of Stormtroopers. I love to use them as tank busters, the deep strike ability and the power of two meltas plus melta bombs has a pretty good chance of killing a tank or difficult unit. For example, trying to cram 3 Leman Russ tanks into 1000pts, while doable presents a very poor trade off. Based on this I took a look at what those Stormtrooprs were accomplishing versus what other units of similar points cost could do in their place.

It broke down like this

1 Stormtrooper squad w/ 2 meltas = 105 points
or
1 Guardsman Marbo = 65 points

In a lot of ways they have equivalent kill power and survivability. Both are designed to pop off sometime over the course of the game, kill one key opponent and then probably die very quickly afterwards. They're both nasty surprises and no one wants them to show up on their side of the board.

However, what I went with was 1 Veteran squad with 3 meltas for 100 points. Equal points to the Stormtrooper squad, roughly equal ability as well but more survivability based on the sheer number of troops. The extra melta gives them that much more killpower and once I loaded them up in a Chimera they had free reign to chase down troublesome enemy units or shore up a hole in my own defenses for a total of 155 points. Yes slightly more expensive and the wow factor doesn't seem as likely but at least on paper they look like a better bargain.

The same thought process went back into my Tyranid list. I had taken a squad of 3 Lictors, looking to them to take out a key squad somewhere in the game. For the 195 points they cost me I took a second look and dropped down to a single Deathleaper instead. The enhanced Rending attack, the better camoflage and the equivalent killpower made it a more attractive unit and once it was on the field it did it's job by annhilating my opponents Devestator squad.

The genestealers were another tough call and while the Deathleaper paid for itself by locking down a devestator squad for two turns and then killing them all, the genestealers wound up not being worth the points for that large a squad. Originally they were slated to use the Mycetic spore and drop down on a key location during the game and either I should have stuck with that instead of shifting the spore to my Carni or broke the 'stealers up into two smaller squads, infiltrated them both seperately and left the mycetic spore off the list completely. Those extra points could've beefed up an existing unit or gving me more 'stealers so their surviviability would have grown.

Anyone's thoughts on it all would be greatly appreciated of course, the comment section is there for a reason hahhah! Has anyone else found themselves overdoing one aspect or another of their army? Given the list above, what would you have changed to make the army more killy?