Post by jifel on Dec 20, 2017 1:43:24 GMT
I'm sure this will sound redundant as there are several similar threads, but I figured I would share my experience with the Nids this weekend. After some recent frustrations with a Jorm/Behemoth/Kronos list I decided to bring kraken, and also as a twist a fortification. Going into the event, I was intending to place my Hive Guard in the plasma oblit and have them shoot out, being stationary kronos and also using the strat to double shoot twice from a position of safety. I had cleared this with the TO in advance. Upon arriving at the event, we checked the rulebook one more time, and discovered a line I had missed previously and sadly we decided I could not use stratagems on units in a transport. Naturally I was pretty bummed out about having a tactic yanked out from under me 5 minutes before pairings went up, but my list was printed and those were the models I had on me, so I persisted! Here's the list:
The event was 20 man ITC format using the new Champs missions. Round 1 saw me paired up against my regular sparring partner, an accomplished GT player who I had already played 3 times that week. Still, he's a very tough opponent and beat me a week prior in an RTT so not to be underestimated, as we are both very intimate with eachothers tactics! He runs the following (roughly)
2x GM Dreadknights with Psilencer/Cannon
3x Strike Squads
3x Purgation Squads (all Psilencers)
Celestine
Company Commander (CP stuff)
Culexis
2x10 Infantry Squads
5x Space Marine scouts
2x3 Mortar HWT
Inq acolyte
I won the roll off and pushed out, growing my bubble and killing off two three man mortar teams plus a 10 man infantry squad. I also chose to reveal my Stealers from their hole, I am hoping catalyst and -1 to hit will keep them alive. Naturally I fail catalyst. Still, Hive Guard do work while hiding inside the bastion. He drops on me, putting purgation squads into the stealers (cuts them down to 8-9 man) and manages to kill almost all of the gants, I am down to less than 10 from 38. One dreadknight drops in and passes sanctuary. My counterattack is brutal. HG get out and pass onslaught then shoot twice, as does the Exo. I also pass a super smite and pick up a 5 man strike squad. The end result is all 3 purgation squads dead to shooting, as well as once strike team. The flyrant and last stealers mob Draigo and kill him (thank you implant attack!) then consolidate and wrap up an infantry man so he cant fall back. Biovores also managed t
block the Dreadknight and Culexis from advancing any farther. His turn he drops the second DK into my lines and again gets sanctuary off despite me popping the "deepest shadow" Kronos strat. His damage is minimal shooting until his DK makes the 9" charge on my Exocrine and slaughters it! Uh oh.
My turn 3 I do not have a good turn at all. I manage to pick off a straggler on a strike squad for my kill a unit but completely whiff on the full strength dreadknight in my lines. I do 8 mortal wounds with smite but he makes 6/8 5+ saves with truesilver armor! I then do 7 wounds with hive guard and watch him make 7 invulns! I immediately shoot him again and this time he fails 2 saves, but I roll ones on both d3s to my extreme disappointment. To make things worse I charge him with a Neurothrope to tie him up, but lose him to overwatch after failing both saves. Finally my flyrant fails a 6" charge with a command point. If there's any solace, it's that I blocked most of his movement with spore mines and ruins, as well as pinning the culexis in again. He is running out of units and fails to do much in his turn, other than nuking the malanthrope and putting a few wounds on the Flyrant. He has played celestine very conservatively to deny me kingslayer points which is why I havent mentioned her yet. My turn 4 I go big, trying to land on 5/6 objectives to take the bonus point. He is out of CPS and so truesilver armor cant stop my smites this time, I take one DK down and damage the other, I finally managed to deny sanctuary in that last turn. The inevitable starts to show at this point, Celestine is hiding and his last DK makes a desperate push at my Flyrant but is a little far to charge and settles to kill some Rippers. My turn 5 I kill the dreadknight and finish off his culexis (who had been wading through spore mines and rippers trying to get to something useful, taking occasional mortal wounds to this point). His turn 5 he moves Celestine onto a single objective for the bonus point and we call the game, 24-19 in Tyranids favor. He was down to Celestine and a 5 man strike squad sitting on an objective, while I still had 7 of 8 Biovores and 6 hive guard and a 9 wound Flyrant buzzing around.
Game 2! I went up against another close friend of mine who I have traveled to GTs with, playing a Chaos soup list that was based on Alpha Legion and Black Legion
Abbadon
Chaos Lord on bike, powerfist (World Eaters for DTW strat) with talisman
3x Nurgling
3x Nurgling
10x Brim
Changeling
JP sorceror
10x Brim
10x Brim
10x Brim
JP Sorceror
40 cultists
10 Noise Marines
Dreadclaw
3x Obliterators (Tz)
3x Obliterators (Tz)
3x Obliterators (Slaanesh)
This one I had a strong feeling would come down to first turn. Luckily I could keep my drop count below his by putting Neurothropes in the Plasma Obliterator. This paid off as we tied the roll off four times with the +1 before I finally won it, and he failed to seize! I have my only picture of the event from this game funny enough. My deployment was fairly boring, with Stealers hiding in the node and a central firebase with Flyrant/Mal coverage. I did put my Exo in a far corner away from his Nurglings after he deployed them so that I could hide him with Meitocs if I went second, which fortunately didnt come up at all. He deployed his alpha legion cultists surprisingly close to my lines, a crucial mistake. He has all 3 oblit squads, Abby, the Noise Marines and Claw in reserve. Only image is below!
This is during my turn 1 deployment, you can see that I'v brought Rippers in relatively close and I am currently setting up stealers in charge range of the cultists. In shooting I get to have a lot of fun. I move all the biovres and shoot at Brims in changeling range without being in synapse range, for -3 to hit! I basically get to place all my mines where I want them and completely surround his lines, using Rippers to take up more real estate as well as the Meiotics. I barely make the Stealer charge and kill 11 or so cultists, losing two in return. He burns 2 cps to save them. On his turn he realizes that I have completely denied him area to land, with only space for 3 models on top of a ruin outside of range of a model of mine! He deepstrikes one unit of Oblits. I deepest shadow his Death Hex on my flyrant and deny his prescience, causing him to fire at my flyrant with extremely low effect. He charges his Khorne Lord off to kill a Ripper unit and fails to kill more than one model, while his cultists (who didnt fall back) lose 18 more as I get more stealers in range to swing. The rest die to morale as he realizes they arent worth saving.
Tyranid turn 2: Genestealers use opportunistic advance to move 20", charging and wiping out 20 brims. Flyrant hits the middle of his army, wounding changeling and consolidating into his Oblits. Hive Guard and various shooting kills a third Brim unit. I "double move" the meiotics into 3" from his chaos lord. They explode for 3d3 mortal wounds and kill him. Biovores rain more spores down.
Chaos turn 2: He has the changeling, 3 oblits, and sorceror and 10 brims. All 4 are locked in combat between the Flyrant and stealers, he is now completely incapable of landing on the table. My opponent concedes here, he is about to have a very poor turn followed by inevitable tabling as close to 1000 points sit in reserves, where they will never leave. My opponent commented on how stupid spores were, and I am forced to agree. Its a good thing this was a friend of mine or much harsher words might've been directed at me... xD
Game 3: vs Eldar
Yet again, a regular opponent and good friend of mine, and winner of the previous RTT at the store. His Eldar/Ynnari list was no joke!
Yvraine
Spiritseer?
Spiritseer?
9 DE Warriors
9 DE Warriors
9 DE Warriors
9 Dark Reapers
7 Wraithblades
Farseer?
Farseer?
5 Rangers
5 Rangers
5 Rangers
9 Dark Reapers
Hemlock
Hemlock
This is vanguard and to my extreme pleasure there is a massive LOS blocker in the center. Even better, the Plasma Obliterator with Neuros inside is able to give me a lower drop count and first turn once again! My opponent reserves a Reaper unit and the Wraithblades. I spread out gant shields along the line with Plasma Oblit as close as possible. turn 1 I move all 6 HG straight forwards and end up right behind the LOS blocker, with 4 of my HG in range to hit the reapers, killing 2. I also Opportunistic forwards my Stealers, murdering a screening Warrior unit. I then trigger overrun, and finally I attack twice. I use the pile in and consolidate to tag his reapers and wrap a spiritseer (I think) so that it cant leave. A flyrant also drops and murders a Ranger squad. Turn 1 I killed 2 ranger squads and 2 warrior units.
He falls back and uses a stratagem to shoot again. He also is able to bring in the Ynnari reapers on top of a ruin, the only place I had not covered by my Rippers and spores. His blades were unable to enter. I used deepest shadows to stop doom and the tyrant denied his soulburst power on the reapers, but both units (one guided) were able to kill the Flyrant because they didnt care about his negatives to hit! That was the main extent of his damage however. He also charged several characters into the stealers after smiting, doing some significant casualties. Hemlocks also killed 2 hive guard. In CC I killed the one spiritseer I had wrapped last turn and wounded Yvraine. I also gained 2 CPs from feeder tendrils!
Turn 2 I use the 4 Hive Guard to kill most of his Ynnari reapers, while my genestealers fall back and then recharge all the characters he sent into me. I have 8 left, but its enough to kill a spiritseer and take Yvraine down to 2 wounds left. Fortunately I get another 2 CPs back, and decide to use my last ones to swing again! This kills the warlord and a third character, both part of my secondary objectives.
My opponent is on the back foot but pushes back, killing gants and 2 biovores with the hemlocks and surviving warriors. His last Ranger unit dies here in cc with the other gant blob, as I had ground him down. He still can't bring in the Wraithblades as I have a very thorough spore coverage saturating his deployment zone and no mans land. He also smites out the rest of the Genestealers who were unable to be catalyzed last turn. He clears me off one objective and holds his own but I am sitting on two.
On my turn, I do manage to use smites and the Exocrine to kill one Hemlock here and further consolidate my lead on objectives, also finishing off the last of the Warriors. He is down to a wounded Hemlock and 2 depleted Reaper squads with a few characters behind them, huddling in his deployment zone. I can't really damage him much without moving past the LOS blocking mountain, but I am content to sit there and control 3/4 of the board.
His turn 3 he starts killng visible Rippers with Reapers. It nets him a few points, but I have a very solid lead and continue to hold objectives while he is cornered up and unable to move or risk being deleted by hiv guard if anything moves forwards.
The game is called here as we are low on time and I have a solid lead. If we went on he would lose his hemlock and I would continue to gunk up his lines with spore mines while sitting on 3 objectives out of line of sight, daring him to move within 36".
Final result: 3-0, first place! A very satisfying day for the Hive Mind. As great as that was, I think I will likely drop the Plasma obliterator as it cant really shelter my hive guard for long. I also am afraid that I lack quantity of shots should I see an Ork horde or the like, I may try to add Devilgants back in at some point. The Biovores, FLyrant with Chameleon, Genestealers Hive Guard and Malanthrope all proved their worth repeatedly. Exocrine did very little, but he has done lots of work for me in the past so I am undecided on him at the moment. He certainly could become gone if I feel I need the points. Curious if anyone else has used an Exocrine successfully, as two were a staple in my tournament winning index army but feel a little outclassed lately. More testing needed...
Thoughts on the list, questions and suggestions are always welcome!
Kraken Batt:
Flyrant (HVC, MRC, AG, TS) Chameleon
Malanthrope
19 Genestealers
19 Gants
19 Gants
Exocrine
Kronos Batt
Neurothrope
Neurothrope
3x3 Ripper Swarms
6 Hive Guard
3x Meiotic Spores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
2x Biovores
Plasma Obliterator
Flyrant (HVC, MRC, AG, TS) Chameleon
Malanthrope
19 Genestealers
19 Gants
19 Gants
Exocrine
Kronos Batt
Neurothrope
Neurothrope
3x3 Ripper Swarms
6 Hive Guard
3x Meiotic Spores
3x Biovores
3x Biovores
2x Biovores
Plasma Obliterator
The event was 20 man ITC format using the new Champs missions. Round 1 saw me paired up against my regular sparring partner, an accomplished GT player who I had already played 3 times that week. Still, he's a very tough opponent and beat me a week prior in an RTT so not to be underestimated, as we are both very intimate with eachothers tactics! He runs the following (roughly)
2x GM Dreadknights with Psilencer/Cannon
3x Strike Squads
3x Purgation Squads (all Psilencers)
Celestine
Company Commander (CP stuff)
Culexis
2x10 Infantry Squads
5x Space Marine scouts
2x3 Mortar HWT
Inq acolyte
I won the roll off and pushed out, growing my bubble and killing off two three man mortar teams plus a 10 man infantry squad. I also chose to reveal my Stealers from their hole, I am hoping catalyst and -1 to hit will keep them alive. Naturally I fail catalyst. Still, Hive Guard do work while hiding inside the bastion. He drops on me, putting purgation squads into the stealers (cuts them down to 8-9 man) and manages to kill almost all of the gants, I am down to less than 10 from 38. One dreadknight drops in and passes sanctuary. My counterattack is brutal. HG get out and pass onslaught then shoot twice, as does the Exo. I also pass a super smite and pick up a 5 man strike squad. The end result is all 3 purgation squads dead to shooting, as well as once strike team. The flyrant and last stealers mob Draigo and kill him (thank you implant attack!) then consolidate and wrap up an infantry man so he cant fall back. Biovores also managed t
block the Dreadknight and Culexis from advancing any farther. His turn he drops the second DK into my lines and again gets sanctuary off despite me popping the "deepest shadow" Kronos strat. His damage is minimal shooting until his DK makes the 9" charge on my Exocrine and slaughters it! Uh oh.
My turn 3 I do not have a good turn at all. I manage to pick off a straggler on a strike squad for my kill a unit but completely whiff on the full strength dreadknight in my lines. I do 8 mortal wounds with smite but he makes 6/8 5+ saves with truesilver armor! I then do 7 wounds with hive guard and watch him make 7 invulns! I immediately shoot him again and this time he fails 2 saves, but I roll ones on both d3s to my extreme disappointment. To make things worse I charge him with a Neurothrope to tie him up, but lose him to overwatch after failing both saves. Finally my flyrant fails a 6" charge with a command point. If there's any solace, it's that I blocked most of his movement with spore mines and ruins, as well as pinning the culexis in again. He is running out of units and fails to do much in his turn, other than nuking the malanthrope and putting a few wounds on the Flyrant. He has played celestine very conservatively to deny me kingslayer points which is why I havent mentioned her yet. My turn 4 I go big, trying to land on 5/6 objectives to take the bonus point. He is out of CPS and so truesilver armor cant stop my smites this time, I take one DK down and damage the other, I finally managed to deny sanctuary in that last turn. The inevitable starts to show at this point, Celestine is hiding and his last DK makes a desperate push at my Flyrant but is a little far to charge and settles to kill some Rippers. My turn 5 I kill the dreadknight and finish off his culexis (who had been wading through spore mines and rippers trying to get to something useful, taking occasional mortal wounds to this point). His turn 5 he moves Celestine onto a single objective for the bonus point and we call the game, 24-19 in Tyranids favor. He was down to Celestine and a 5 man strike squad sitting on an objective, while I still had 7 of 8 Biovores and 6 hive guard and a 9 wound Flyrant buzzing around.
Game 2! I went up against another close friend of mine who I have traveled to GTs with, playing a Chaos soup list that was based on Alpha Legion and Black Legion
Abbadon
Chaos Lord on bike, powerfist (World Eaters for DTW strat) with talisman
3x Nurgling
3x Nurgling
10x Brim
Changeling
JP sorceror
10x Brim
10x Brim
10x Brim
JP Sorceror
40 cultists
10 Noise Marines
Dreadclaw
3x Obliterators (Tz)
3x Obliterators (Tz)
3x Obliterators (Slaanesh)
This one I had a strong feeling would come down to first turn. Luckily I could keep my drop count below his by putting Neurothropes in the Plasma Obliterator. This paid off as we tied the roll off four times with the +1 before I finally won it, and he failed to seize! I have my only picture of the event from this game funny enough. My deployment was fairly boring, with Stealers hiding in the node and a central firebase with Flyrant/Mal coverage. I did put my Exo in a far corner away from his Nurglings after he deployed them so that I could hide him with Meitocs if I went second, which fortunately didnt come up at all. He deployed his alpha legion cultists surprisingly close to my lines, a crucial mistake. He has all 3 oblit squads, Abby, the Noise Marines and Claw in reserve. Only image is below!
This is during my turn 1 deployment, you can see that I'v brought Rippers in relatively close and I am currently setting up stealers in charge range of the cultists. In shooting I get to have a lot of fun. I move all the biovres and shoot at Brims in changeling range without being in synapse range, for -3 to hit! I basically get to place all my mines where I want them and completely surround his lines, using Rippers to take up more real estate as well as the Meiotics. I barely make the Stealer charge and kill 11 or so cultists, losing two in return. He burns 2 cps to save them. On his turn he realizes that I have completely denied him area to land, with only space for 3 models on top of a ruin outside of range of a model of mine! He deepstrikes one unit of Oblits. I deepest shadow his Death Hex on my flyrant and deny his prescience, causing him to fire at my flyrant with extremely low effect. He charges his Khorne Lord off to kill a Ripper unit and fails to kill more than one model, while his cultists (who didnt fall back) lose 18 more as I get more stealers in range to swing. The rest die to morale as he realizes they arent worth saving.
Tyranid turn 2: Genestealers use opportunistic advance to move 20", charging and wiping out 20 brims. Flyrant hits the middle of his army, wounding changeling and consolidating into his Oblits. Hive Guard and various shooting kills a third Brim unit. I "double move" the meiotics into 3" from his chaos lord. They explode for 3d3 mortal wounds and kill him. Biovores rain more spores down.
Chaos turn 2: He has the changeling, 3 oblits, and sorceror and 10 brims. All 4 are locked in combat between the Flyrant and stealers, he is now completely incapable of landing on the table. My opponent concedes here, he is about to have a very poor turn followed by inevitable tabling as close to 1000 points sit in reserves, where they will never leave. My opponent commented on how stupid spores were, and I am forced to agree. Its a good thing this was a friend of mine or much harsher words might've been directed at me... xD
Game 3: vs Eldar
Yet again, a regular opponent and good friend of mine, and winner of the previous RTT at the store. His Eldar/Ynnari list was no joke!
Yvraine
Spiritseer?
Spiritseer?
9 DE Warriors
9 DE Warriors
9 DE Warriors
9 Dark Reapers
7 Wraithblades
Farseer?
Farseer?
5 Rangers
5 Rangers
5 Rangers
9 Dark Reapers
Hemlock
Hemlock
This is vanguard and to my extreme pleasure there is a massive LOS blocker in the center. Even better, the Plasma Obliterator with Neuros inside is able to give me a lower drop count and first turn once again! My opponent reserves a Reaper unit and the Wraithblades. I spread out gant shields along the line with Plasma Oblit as close as possible. turn 1 I move all 6 HG straight forwards and end up right behind the LOS blocker, with 4 of my HG in range to hit the reapers, killing 2. I also Opportunistic forwards my Stealers, murdering a screening Warrior unit. I then trigger overrun, and finally I attack twice. I use the pile in and consolidate to tag his reapers and wrap a spiritseer (I think) so that it cant leave. A flyrant also drops and murders a Ranger squad. Turn 1 I killed 2 ranger squads and 2 warrior units.
He falls back and uses a stratagem to shoot again. He also is able to bring in the Ynnari reapers on top of a ruin, the only place I had not covered by my Rippers and spores. His blades were unable to enter. I used deepest shadows to stop doom and the tyrant denied his soulburst power on the reapers, but both units (one guided) were able to kill the Flyrant because they didnt care about his negatives to hit! That was the main extent of his damage however. He also charged several characters into the stealers after smiting, doing some significant casualties. Hemlocks also killed 2 hive guard. In CC I killed the one spiritseer I had wrapped last turn and wounded Yvraine. I also gained 2 CPs from feeder tendrils!
Turn 2 I use the 4 Hive Guard to kill most of his Ynnari reapers, while my genestealers fall back and then recharge all the characters he sent into me. I have 8 left, but its enough to kill a spiritseer and take Yvraine down to 2 wounds left. Fortunately I get another 2 CPs back, and decide to use my last ones to swing again! This kills the warlord and a third character, both part of my secondary objectives.
My opponent is on the back foot but pushes back, killing gants and 2 biovores with the hemlocks and surviving warriors. His last Ranger unit dies here in cc with the other gant blob, as I had ground him down. He still can't bring in the Wraithblades as I have a very thorough spore coverage saturating his deployment zone and no mans land. He also smites out the rest of the Genestealers who were unable to be catalyzed last turn. He clears me off one objective and holds his own but I am sitting on two.
On my turn, I do manage to use smites and the Exocrine to kill one Hemlock here and further consolidate my lead on objectives, also finishing off the last of the Warriors. He is down to a wounded Hemlock and 2 depleted Reaper squads with a few characters behind them, huddling in his deployment zone. I can't really damage him much without moving past the LOS blocking mountain, but I am content to sit there and control 3/4 of the board.
His turn 3 he starts killng visible Rippers with Reapers. It nets him a few points, but I have a very solid lead and continue to hold objectives while he is cornered up and unable to move or risk being deleted by hiv guard if anything moves forwards.
The game is called here as we are low on time and I have a solid lead. If we went on he would lose his hemlock and I would continue to gunk up his lines with spore mines while sitting on 3 objectives out of line of sight, daring him to move within 36".
Final result: 3-0, first place! A very satisfying day for the Hive Mind. As great as that was, I think I will likely drop the Plasma obliterator as it cant really shelter my hive guard for long. I also am afraid that I lack quantity of shots should I see an Ork horde or the like, I may try to add Devilgants back in at some point. The Biovores, FLyrant with Chameleon, Genestealers Hive Guard and Malanthrope all proved their worth repeatedly. Exocrine did very little, but he has done lots of work for me in the past so I am undecided on him at the moment. He certainly could become gone if I feel I need the points. Curious if anyone else has used an Exocrine successfully, as two were a staple in my tournament winning index army but feel a little outclassed lately. More testing needed...
Thoughts on the list, questions and suggestions are always welcome!
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