Swarmlord help

[virtualsniper]

I would like to know how you guys are using the swarmlord. what tactics/strategies you use.

I know he is strong in melee, but he is good against another powerful character. But for him to do is job, then the other army has to have a strong character and you have to get your swamrlord in CC with him.

Usually, the army I encounter have some generic HQ, or a big HQ but that stay back to buff the army. So it is pretty rare my swarmlord can really get to kill a powerful character.

And let's face it, putting the swarmlord in CC against a 10 man string unit (which are often fearless) is getting it stuck there for 2-3 rounds.

In the end, in most of my game, the swarmlord is still alive, but didn't do much more than kill a single squad.

Am I forgetting something? How do you use him effectively?


btw, I usually run a dakka flyrant, 2x2 hive guard, 2 tervigon as troops, 2 trygon, some gargoyles, and genestealers.

[Raven]

The Swarmlord's primary use is a force multiplier, and its secondary use as a deathstar. To give you some idea of what I mean, I'll use one of my 1750 point lists as an example:

HQ: Swarmlord, 1 Tyrant Guard, Tyranid Prime
Elites: Doom of Malan'tai in Mycetic Spore, Ymgarl Genestealers, Hive Guard
Troops: 2 Tervigons, 10 Termagants, 15 devilgants in Mycetic Spore
Fast Attack: 19 Gargoyles

Now here both the Swarmlord and Prime join the Guard for a really powerful and durable deathstar unit that makes it very hard for my opponent to get the Slay the Warlord VP, especially with psychic buffs. I'll send this right at my opponent and force them to manoeuvre around or sacrifice units to it, making it very good at knocking things off objectives.

Thanks to Hive Commander my devilgants, Doom and Ymgarls are all coming in on a 2+ and can provide disruption and take out key threats like Devastators.

The Gargoyles usually act as a screen to my army, giving my big bugs cover, the Swarmlord with his 4 powers and mastery level 2, is then able to support them via Endurance, and one of the Tervigons may also use Telekine dome to make them even more durable. Thanks to the Swarmlord's 18 inch synapse range, I don't have to worry about the Gargoyles getting out of synapse, so I can feel free to move them up quickly.

Next you have the Swarmlord's ability to grant Furious Charge or Preferred Enemy to a unit, while it's occasionally useful on his own unit, I can also use them to support my other units. Going back to the Gargoyles, I can give them either Preferred Enemy to increase their infantry killing potential, or Furious Charge to make them strength 4, and then glancing rear armour 10 vehicles. I can also do the same with Termagants and Tervigons, but if I'm able to get in range of my devilgants I can give them Preferred Enemy which is a huge buff to their shooting.

Readdressing the Swarmlord's abilities as a Psyker, he has a lot of options with his 4 rolls on the charts. While he can buff his and other units with Iron Arm, Warp Speed, and Endurance, he can also use Smite or Psychic Shriek to do something in the shooting phase, Puppet Master, Invisibility, Gate of Infinity (surprise, there's a Swarmlord right next to you! is rarely something an enemy wants to hear) Telekine Dome, Objuration Mechanicum, etc. The rulebook powers really do add a lot of potential to the Swarmlord.

Of course, there's also the psychological aspect of the Swarmlord, much like Mephiston the Swarmlord has quite the reputation that you can take advantage of depending on your opponent. I hope I've been helpful, once you tap into the Swarmlord's potential he is both a powerful and fun to use leader for your ravenous swarm.

[virtualsniper]

that is what I was looking for. That helped me greatly. Thanks.

I was so focus on his physical strength and psychic ability on himself, that I was paying no attention to his potential at buffing the rest of the army.

I think I will re-open my brb and read the psychic powers again to make sure I know them like the back of my hand and be able to use them at their full potential.

[Raven]

Glad to be of assistance

[infornography]

In general I would recommend rolling Biomancy until you get Iron Arm. If you have rolls left over start on telekinesis to try to get gate of infinity, OM, and/or telekine dome.

[Superstringy]

I hadn't really thought of this until Jabberwocky started using it in games against me, but The Swarmlord has a good chance of rolling Gate of Infinity and then he suddenly gets crazy mobile - usually in combat range turn 2 and he hasn't had to weather loads of ranged fire on the way in. As soon as you get Gate, roll on Biomancy for some serious buffs...

[Raven]

Gate of Infinity is best used in an army with a strong focus on reserves/infiltrating/gargoyles, you want to have that target saturation there. Consider a single Swarmlord (with Guard) showing up next to a gunline, they'll blow it to pieces. Now consider the Swarmlord, and a Trygon, and the Doom, and inflitrating Genestealers getting dangerously close, they really can't afford to blow all their shots on the Swarmlord, they need to take out the Doom and minimise the threat to their army, so your Swarmlord will probably live long enough to get into combat. Fritz did a video that focuses primarily on deep striking the Swarmlord if anyone wants to see it:

[patsfan32]

I'm assuming you can not assault after using GoI since it follows deepstrIke rules? Is gate or invisibility more worthwhile on swarmy?

[Raven]

Feb 6, 2013 14:43:18 GMT patsfan32 said:

I'm assuming you can not assault after using GoI since it follows deepstrIke rules? Is gate or invisibility more worthwhile on swarmy?

First question: Yes
Second question: It really depends on a lot of things like army composition, deployment, objectives, the opponent's army and deployment, ambient room temparature, average airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow...

[patsfan32]

Feb 6, 2013 16:59:31 GMT Raven said:

Feb 6, 2013 14:43:18 GMT patsfan32 said:

I'm assuming you can not assault after using GoI since it follows deepstrIke rules? Is gate or invisibility more worthwhile on swarmy?

First question: Yes
Second question: It really depends on a lot of things like army composition, deployment, objectives, the opponent's army and deployment, ambient room temparature, average airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow...

We talking about an african swallow?

[PumpkinHead]

European...

[infornography]

If you have Iron Arm already, I'd rather have Gate of Infinity since invisibility is a warp charge 2 power.

[patsfan32]

What are the odds of ol swarmy getting shot to bits tho after the deepstrike?

[coredump]

Well, that depends on where he gets placed, and how many other threats are around.

But really, it doesn't matter, if he is on the board he is a target. If GoI gets him into CC a turn faster, it is for the good.

[infornography]

If you are afraid of your high value MCs getting shot up, you are playing the wrong faction I think.

I really think if you are fielding high value MCs, our best strategy is to rock them on turn 2 with lots of emerging threats. If you can make SL one of those threats then you are definitely making your presence known. If they focus down old swarmy then they have left alone the rest of your swarms and you will devour them, if they ignore swarmy to deal with the flyrant, the Trygon, the podded dakkafex, the podded zoeys, the podded devilgaunts, the outflanking tervigon, the waking Ymgarls, etc then they will be too divided to do anything and you will devour them. No matter what they do, they will get eaten. Meanwhile your spawned termagants quietly camp all the objectives and when the smoke clears, even if they did survive getting rocked by all your emerging threats, you still own all the objectives and win.

If you are too scared to risk your swarmlord, then run a swarm list. Then a single model having a bad day is of absolutely no concern.