Flyrant survivability turn one.

[Tempests Wrath]

Not that I have played a great many games.

But how do you guys keep your flyrant alive in that first round of shooting?

So far iv started mine on the table, and its understandably a high priority target. Now my standard Tyrant+Shell+Guard? Yeah poor shots into it to your hearts content, see if i do anything but smile.

But the flyrants inability to start the game swooping gets it shot up a bit more than I am comfortable with without the +2 armour save or the bodyguards of most walking tyrants.

So far the best tactic I had was to do a combination of pray for night fighting and drop it in area terrain right off the bat. I dont have so much terrain that I can easily get it blocking LOS right off the bat.

Im willing to, but I would rather not start it in reserves to not get my HQ shot to hell. Im not exactly comfortable leaving such a potent part of my army potentially out of the game for so long.

So, when going second.. how do you guys go about keeping a flyrant healthy on turn 1? (Note: I havent lost my flyrant turn 1 yet.. but it lost more wounds than I was comfortable with)

[fragile]

Usually the best way is to start the Flyrant behind a MC in your list for a cover save or in area terrain. Also make use of your maximum ranges on your weapons. 24" swoop +18" Devourer is a huge threat range. Usually if they are going first they will be set up. Deploy your flyrant so that it is as far from the enemy that can hurt it as possible, preferably out of range.

You can also just DS it too and come in swooping. You will potentially give up the first round of shooting but it might make you more comfortable.

[Anax]

A 4+ cover save generally saves the big guy, so I usually put him behind an ADL. I have been basically addicted to the thing since it came out, because of the guaranteed cover it provides for most of my army.
Also: ruins that you can fly into. Funny thing but a winged tyrant (even if moves as a jump) doesnt need to worry about difficult terrain test from moving into/out of area terrain because of the MTC spec.rule.
Last thought: I don't know how this goes in your local club, but we heavily encourage our members building pieces of terrain and donating it for common use. Given the new rules for setting up the board making some nice LoS blocking pieces of terrain yourself is a good investment.

[Tempests Wrath]

Local club may be a stretch, more like a local group of random players.

That said, we all do make our own terrain, and between us we have a rather large number of pieces. Many of those will easily block LOS for infantry, but the Tyrant is a big bug. Not a little bug.

I never considered an ADL for this purpose however, I could see it making my life easier if I can free up the slot/points to do it.

[l0rdf1end]

Flyrants are pretty fragile, even with Iron arm, once grounded they can go down pretty easy.

I run two and I'm agressive with them to support the rest of my list.

I always have them out of range of opponents weapons or BLOS when going second. Pontentially loosing one first turn would be rather tragic.
Because of my aggressive approach I tend to loose one in my opponents turn 1 and the second one turn 2.
But...this buys me the time I need to get my Broodlords and Stealers into combat.

As said above, their threat range is huge so having them anywhere on the board isnt a problem.

[gigasnail]

get better terrain. seriously, even if it's only a couple of land raider boxes. works wonders.

[Jabberwocky]

Target saturation also has a big impact. Have some stealers 18" away from their heavy weapons, have another 2 3+ save MCs on the board. Suddenly, pouring everything on a Flyrant where you miss 83% of your shoots compared to 33%, doesn't seem that appealing or worthwhile, or even as important.

[drakiskier]

why do you have the flyrant on the board first turn anyway? from what i can tell, if you keep it in reserves, when it arrives you can go straight for swooping...

unless ive read that wrong and have been doing it wrong this whole time...



and as for grounding tests, in 5 games ive only lost 2 grounding tests, and neither time did the flyrant get killed after...

[rhawin]

What some of you are saying is wrong, you can swoop turn one if the Flyrant is on the table.

[Anax]

Problem with keeping it in reserves from the beginning is that it's a gambit. A flyrant can cost up to around 300pts (I like to give it old adv and regen) and it won't do much good if it doesn't arrive till turn 4. I know the odds are better now, but still it can happen (happened to me with ystealers, the sleepy slobs).

I think what they mean by not swooping on turn one is that if turn 1 (player turn) is not yours (you go second).

[rhawin]

Anax: yeah but unless you don't have a totally barren/open table there is always something to hide behind when you set up.
At my gaming club we have shelves upon shelves with all kind of terrain (and 5 gaming tables )... so i might be spoiled

But something to hide behind should be possible to find!

[nalathani]

Keep your distance in mind. Since you can pre-measure, if you know you're going second, stay out of range of your opponents weapons. Lascannons have a 48 inch range right? Stay 49 inches away from devestators or longfangs (since they can't move and shoot). Stay 57 inches away from dreads, etc. You can swoop 24 inches and then run an average of 7 inches (since FMC's run 2d6). So, 31 inches of movement your first move (and then have Hard to Hit), then 24 inches of movement your second turn along with 18 inches of devourer range. That covers like the entire board, no matter how far back you had to put yourself to stay away from 48 inch weapons. 36 inch weapons are even easier to stay out of range of.

[Deleted]

Actually, HWs can move and snapfire. Which is funny because they'd need a 6 to hit your swooping Flyrant anyway so they suffer no penalty!

[Psychichobo]

It's best remembering that terrain can be anything from a low crater to a jungle to the Imperial Basilica, so despite the terrain amount rule you might not be as covered as you think...

[bloodborne]

6s to hit is still a wonderful thing.... From what I have noticed, grounding tests are not that big of a deal, and keep in mind, I run one x2 scytal flyrant....