Grey knight Aegis line of Doom. Impossible?

[moonreaper]

I just experienced the hardest loss in my history as a tyranid player:

Vs GK, 1750

My list , Swarmlord +Tguards +Prime
6 hive guard, doom +Pod
2 maxed Tervis + 2 termasquads
5x Biovores (2x2x1)

Swarmlord got Iron arm, Endurance, enfeeble, lifeleech

His list was:
Henchmen unit with 4 jokaeros and a Hereticus Inq(Psycolum) in a Chimera
10 Purifiers with Hereticus Inq(+Psycolum)
Strike squads
3 Rifledreads
3-4 Razorbacks with Hbolters

He just deployed behind his Aegis with All his units overlapping Warp Quake and 2x Divination reroll powers.

I was playing first but he seized.

His ap4 weapons were killing my Hive guard even in cover (my biovores were hidden from LOS). They barely managed to get in range to scratch the chimera
His Mass psycannons meant a lot of rending for my Swarmstar which meant wounds that had to be given (FNP cant heal everything)
He caused 2x wounds on Swarmlord with his one shot weapons that cause Psishock(perils) if they hit (just hit).

His massive unit with henchmen and lass cannon jokaeros had BS 10 (!!!) when he shot Either the swarmlord OR the tervis (because he gets BS 10 if the unit he shoots has a psyker), meaning there were no misses, Lots of high strength wounds. Same with the Purifiers
My deep strike unit (doom) Could barely drop near him (He had a 12' warp quake bubble all around).

My biovores didnt do much on marines (2 kills), his henchmen hid in the chimera.

It was ridiculus, I never managed to touch his aegis, lost all units and conceded at turn 3 after he eradicated my Swarmlord .
The mission was Relic, Anything I sent to pick the relic died really easily from Heavu bolters, psycannons (lots), Str5 Bolters etc
I killed a total 3 marines, a fourth died from perils of the warp because of shadows ...

He didnt use the Movement phase at all, nor the Assault phase either, He just rolled dice and used his codex mathematical rules. That, was NOT a wargame play.

I will create a new self help group GKrapedTyranids Anonymous, but untill then, anyone has any strategies what to do vs that Aegis defense line of Shooting death?
Especially those Hereticus Inqs are so ridiculously imba vs Tyranids that it feels like a bad joke. Mat Ward is a complete IDIOT (and yes I have Grey Knights too, I love the models, Im not playing them though )

[bigpig]

Did he tool his list to take you on as Tyranids? If so, I'd ask him to maybe try to bring an all comers list if it is a friendly environment. That list really isn't that strong overal against most opponents and seems to be geared against your playstyle of lots of psykers and podding doom. A couple things to remember; First the Psyshock weapons are combi so hes only getting one shot with it on each of his Inquisitors. Note also that it must his the Psyker. A simple LoS should protect Swarmy from such weapons in the future.

If he insists on bringing that set up, tool against him. He will be spread out along his line so play a refused flank by setting up mainly on one side of the board minimizing his firepower. Biovores are useless against most MeQ armies so leave them home. Double or triple Trygon running up your side behind a gargoyle screen will be difficult for him and force him to fire his Dreads againts you trygons instead of Bring 3 units of Ymgarl stealers. They do not deploy by deep strike and, as such are not affected by warp quake. Bring a minimum of psykers and reserve them or start them out of LoS and keep them there. Prime HQ starts on the board to provide synapse. You need the mass of Hive Guard to pop his vehicles so find a better way to keep them in cover or out of LoS by using the terrain deployment system in the rulebook.

[Raven]

Can you Look out, sir a psyshock wound? I was under the impression you couldn't because it causes perils rather than causing a wound.

[zephoid]

This list is geared towards nids. Therefore gear yours vs GK.

Tyranid Prime regen, BS/LW 105

7 Ymargl stealers 161
7 ymargl stealers 161

15 termigaunts pod barbed strangler
tervigon cat TS/AG 195
14 termigaunts pod barbed strangler
tervigon cat TS/AG 195


2x Tyrannofex Rupture cannon, cluster spines 530
3x biovores 135

Reserve the tervigons. You will have the biovores and nid prime in deep cover and the tervigons in ruins within 12 if at all possible. Tyranid prime provides synapse until the tervigons come on, where he then links up with a termigaunt squad spawned and walks up. Pods are simply to keep the termigaunts off the board until turn 2-3 to drop onto objectives. Dont worry about doing damage with them.

Tyrannofexes shoot the transports and rifle dreds. At 48" range, the psycannons will either have to spend 2+ turns moving up or be unable to fire. Rifle dreds are nothing to tfexes. He has no psykers to use his psyocculum on until tervigons come on,wherein the ymargls will hopefully have something to say about the jokeros. The Purifiers are very tough, so leave them until you can throw everything at them. whittle them down with barbed stranglers and biovores until you feel the ymargls can assult them. Or get the prime over there asap to provide some ability to deal with cleansing flames.

[maugrim]

Another point - the primary mission would have been a draw unless he came out from behind his shell to actually go after the Relic at any point. And he wouldn't have gotten linebreaker. Probably First Blood, and depending on which Inquisitor was his Warlord, that too. So a 1 or 2 VP point loss, which is actually a close game. In any sort of Objective based mission you'd have likely won, since you could ignore his little clump of guys and hunker down on 1 more objective than he could grab.

Play the mission, and win the game regardless to his cheese.

[bigpig]

Solid question princeraven. The text says the psyker, not the unit, must be "hit" by the weapon. This is obviously a mixed unit. LoS says that if you make the roll then the wound is applied to the other model, not the character. But what if the roll to wound fails? Then it wouldn't even have a chance to hit the psyker. May need to treat it like a mixed saves unit and roll each hit individually until you see if it lands on the psyker or not. Guard should be in front and take the hit anyways most of the time.

[ranmafan]

I hate GK armies with Divination rolls. One guy I played against basically used the Ignore Cover ability to pelt my tervigon with plasma and psyfle/etc. fire because he said he could see one of the Tervigon's dorsal spines sticking up through a window. His tactic was quite similar to your opponent's, except he used Justicar Thawn and a group of terminators to deepstrike and flank my MCs as well. Although he couldn't finish my army off by turn 3, I couldn't do much to him at all either.

[zephoid]

Via FAQ

Page 55 – Condemnor Boltgun, profile *.
Change to “* Any psyker taking an unsaved Wound from a
stake crossbow shot[…]”

Allocate wound to a guard and you dont take psyshock. However, the missiles from the stormraven still work as described.

[coredump]

Since the codex came out, my assertion has been that GK has a huge advantage over Nids *if* they can tailor their list. It sure looks like he was tailoring...
but as mentioned, if you play the mission, you may be able to deal with that anyway.


As for Psyshock.... if the blast marker covers the Psyker, it takes a Perils. You can't LOS the 'hit'. (GK FAQ)

What was the one shot weapon being used in the OP game? I could not find one in the codex. (Not overly familiar with it...)


edit: Ah, thanks Zephoid. And that also 'fixes' that problem.
3+ to hit
5+ to wound
fail 3+ save.

Should not take too many perils from those anymore.

[vecuu]

I know the list appears tailored, but the biggest tailoring factor would appear to be the Psyocculums on the Inquisitors, which can actually be found in a number of GK lists to give them an edge against other Gk players since they're rather common as of late.

-Inquisitors are cheap and effective HQs which open up Henchmen squads.
-GKSSs are solid Troops.
-2-3 Psyfleman Dreads are standard in almost every GK list. In 5e tons of tournament lists would even run a Venerable as well to gain access to a fourth Dreadnought (Ven Dreads aren't really worth it at the moment)

It's really just an optimized GK list which appears to be tailored, not against Nids specifically, but rather against a GK heavy tournament scene. The cheap HQs allow this type of list to out-number other GK lists, while the added fire-power of potential BS10 Jokaero are extremely powerful against any army with a hint of Psykers in it.

The absolute best thing you can do against GK, I find, are Ymgarl Genestealesr. In fact, I find myself wanting to use them as an answer to just about any tough list for Nids. Nids struggle against effective gunlines, and Ymgarl are a great counter. I always try to include one brood into my lists.

Remember that the Aegis Defense line can't move, and, other than his 48'' Dreads and Jokaero, his army is 24'' range. If you can keep your squishies in reserves, then Ymgarl into the enemy for First Blood, you can just sit in a corner of the board on your objective and wait the game out to a 4-3 victory.

[fragile]

A big part of the problem you had with that list is that you have no back field disruption units. Reserve units, Ymgarls, fast attack etc... There is nothing to disrupt his strategy.

Now the Relic mission is almost like our bread and butter. Line up a Tervigon directly in Line with the Relic. Round 1. Spawn Termagants and move them out. 1 of the Termagants will now be in base to base with the Relic and will pick it up. Run all the other members of that Unit forward so the Termagant with the relic (who cannot run) is now the last model. RUN EVERYTHING ELSE forward. Move the Tervigon to within 1" of the Relic Model. Give the GK maximum target saturation. He has to respect the fact that you have the Relic and dedicate shooting it. If he does, have the relic drop in BTB with the Tervigon. If he doesnt, then in Round 2, you move the Termagant back as far as possible and the Terv too. At the end of movement, do a handoff to the Terv. Continue to retreat with the relic for the entire game. The rest of your army is just fodder for the kill.

[WestRider]

You can't do the bit where you Run the rest of the Brood ahead. Every Model in a Unit that Runs counts as Running, even if it doesn't actually Move. It's kind of buried in the Rule on Pg.14, but it is there.

That said, this does work really well. Note that the Relic is 1-2" in diameter, not just a single Point, so unless it's in Terrain, you're going to be able to Move at least some of the rest of the Gaunt Brood another 1-2" ahead of the one that's actually picking it up. I haven't done it that many times, but I haven't yet lost at The Relic while playing Nids. I find jumping some Gargoyles forward over the Relic and then Running them further out as a screen helps quite a bit, too.

[revx]

Feb 1, 2013 3:57:45 GMT WestRider said:

You can't do the bit where you Run the rest of the Brood ahead. Every Model in a Unit that Runs counts as Running, even if it doesn't actually Move. It's kind of buried in the Rule on Pg.14, but it is there.

counts as having run != ran

otherwise heavy weapons couldnt fire if their unit ran and they stayed still.

[WestRider]

They can't. They can fire if their Unit moves in the Movment Phase and they stand still, but not if their Unit Runs. Pg.14 is really pretty clear about this.

[revx]

yea your right, i was thinking of moving in the movement phase.