2k Kind-of-Monster-Mash

[trashcan01]

Here we go boys and girls. A grand total of 1995 points.
Roles are color coded: CASTLE, FRONTLINE PRESSURE, OBJECTIVE CONTROL, ANTI TANK 

• Hive Tyrant HVC 220 + Alien Cunning 30
• 5x Barbgaunts 50
  
• 5x Barbgaunts 50
  
• 3x Venomthropes 70 
• 3x Zoanthropes 90
• 3x Zoanthropes 90
• 3x Zoanthropes 90
  

• Haruspex 125
• Haruspex 125
• Mawloc 145
• Mawloc 145
• Deathleaper 80
• Lictor 75
• 10x Gargoyles 75
• Exocrine 135
• Tyrannofex RC 200
• Tyrannofex RC 200
  

Exocrine + 2xTyrannofexes are 535 points of pain for opponents Anti-tank. I simply want to pop a heavy or two per turn.
Killing anti tank means more survivability for our Haruspexes and Mawlocs.
Castle of advancing Zoanthropes and Barbgaunts protected by Venomthropes is my anchor.
Primary Rapid Ingress targets are Haruspexes.
Mawlocs main role is to to distract and flank.

Gargoyles are here to steal a potential objective with their Deepstrike + Shoot + Move combo.
Lictor and Deathleaper will be using Infiltrate/Lone Operative to draw out the opponent.

Will be running the list tomorrow against (again) Astra Militarum. Should be fun.

[nidsallday]

as you plan to drop one haru after the other, whats your plan with free strat from tyrant?
or is his main purpose giving assault for advancing castle?
guess mawloc could also help with secondaries (as you've got no bios)?
but the list looks super interessting!

[trashcan01]

Free stratagem from the Tyrant will probably be Rapid Regeneration on Turn 1 or Synaptic Insight when shooting with Barbgaunts or Zoanthropes in other phases.
Tyrant will come out of hiding T2 or T3 once I deal with the opponents Anti-tank or drop Monsters from reserve. I doubt anyone would bother shooting at the backline Tyrant when they have 2x Haruspexes and 2x Mawlocs in their faces. And yes - Tyrant is there to provide Assault Aura, which is very important for positioning our 24" shooters (Barbs and Neuros). Depending on the mission I might even Advance Tyrannofexes and Exocrines to use as backline objective holders or, in case of mass infantry - to bodyblock.

As far as the reserves go, my standard practice will be to reserve 490 points. 2x Mawlocs (2x145), Gargs (75) and one Haruspex (125). Depending if I'm going first or second, I'll use Alien Cunning to completely redeploy my Antitank formation for line of sight or reserve the second Haruspex as a defensive measure and reserve the Lictor for free Rapid Ingress.

Mawloc and secondary objectives? It really depends how much bodies will my opponent bring. If I see that he's able to deny deep strikes on his side of the table and depending on the deployment I might go for Tactical. Still, my best best for Fixed is to pick Bring it Down and Engage on all Fronts and this is where I expect Mawlocs, Lictors and Gargs to help me score consistently. If he decides to go for Kriegsmen spam with Psykers I'm dropping Engage and going for Assassinate. Easy points, just nomnom.

While Biovores are cool, I don't own the models and I don't want to bring super competitive list to a friendly match. I have 4-0 score against this opponent. If I manage to get to 5-0 I'll start bringing fluffier and weaker lists just for laughs.

[No One]

Just to be clear, mawloc is a normal DS so isn't anything amazing for secondaries etc.

[trashcan01]

Boys and girls, we are coming back from the weekend with 2 wins for Tyranids. We played 2 games with same lists.

Game 1 "Deploy Servo Skulls" on "Hammer and Anvil" deployment. No infiltrators/scouts special rule.
This mission turned out to be tricky because we needed to push each objective at least two times in one direction before we started scoring any primaries.
I scored 12 in primaries and 32 in secondaries (Assassinate and Bring it down). 
Opponent scored 32 in secondaries (Tactical). 0 on Primaries.
My first two turns of antitank were abysmal (didn't land a single hit with my Exocrine on 5 shots 3+). I managed to drop his first tank turn 3, with the help of mortal wounds from Neuros (I was that desperate).
All in all, it was a win despite my opponent going first and him being the Defender (important for Redeploy step as Attacker redeploys 1st).
My opponent didn't hide his characters very well so I was able to give Precision to Zoanthropes and snipe them out. MVP Zoans.


Game 2 "Take and Hold" on "Search and Destroy". Chilling raing - no effect.
This time I had luck - I was the Defender and I won for first. Anti-tank was doing okay. Pretty much big boys were shooting at each other all game long. Turn 2 massive deep striking and pressure from my side. The wave of chitin and claws broke through the wall of Astra Militarum flesh and steel.
Held my side of the board, contested for middle and went for his No Mans Land objective with the combination of DeathLeaper, Haruspex and Gargoyles and managed to win it T3.
Talked through my opponents T3 and we agreed there's no point in playing anymore. Was ahead about 30 VP. Not even gambit could save him.
Opponent kept his Characters out of Line of sight this time, so MVP goes to Gargoyles for securing objective and cementing my victory.


What I learned in those two games:

• Assassinate is crazy good/easy to score. Do not include more than 2 characters per list.
• Gargoyles are so, so, SO good. They die easy, but this is why we have Endless Swarm.
• Barbgaunts are very hard to position for max effect but their shooting/ability is super cool.
• Lictors are great.  Infiltrate + Lone operative is great for baiting the opponent out. 

[piersonsmuppet]

How did the Mawlocs work out; did they drop a decent amount of MWs and BS tests or did positioning limit TftD to only 1-2 units on entry?

[trashcan01]

Jul 10, 2023 16:32:30 GMT piersonsmuppet said:

How did the Mawlocs work out; did they drop a decent amount of MWs and BS tests or did positioning limit TftD to only 1-2 units on entry?

I think they did about average. No Battle-shock test was relevant for the game course. Terror from the Deep targeted between 2-3 units on entry at best. Usually 1-2.
To be honest I didn't count on Mawlocs to do something super impactful on their own.  Mawlocs were there to provide mid-board pressure and clean the chaff, which they did. Any that's 145 points well spent. Shooting at Mawlocs and Haruspexes kept my Exocrine and Tyrannofexes safe and vice versa. 

The game plan went okay in both games. Nothing fancy here, just oversaturate the field Turn 2 with T8+ monsters and go to town. Not a single T3 model in my list. Pew pew, nom nom.

A little food for thought:
I think it is misleading to judge only one unit in a vacuum. Haruspexes and Mawlocs have OC 4, which is solid.  They have the potential to remove great deal of GEQ/MEQ models which are usually OC2. Opponent will usually try to dominate or stalemate the objective control in No Mans Land.
Gargoyles and Deathleapers are great at providing additional pressure on the objectives. Gargs are great for brute forcing OC superiority, while Deathleaper fishes out Battle-shock for anything that you've scratched (like a single mortal wound from a Mawloc).
Mawlocs + Deathleaper are not an obvious synergy, but there it is.

Pressure here, pressure there and something will eventually break. Just keep up with the points and keep tightening the grip.
 

[N.I.B.]

Rupture cannon, good or rather take Acid cannon?

[trashcan01]

Jul 10, 2023 20:30:48 GMT N.I.B. said:

Rupture cannon, good or rather take Acid cannon?

Well, the list already has a big monster presence on the table. Navigating additional Tyrannofex through the terrain alongside Haruspex and Mawloc would be a hassle. With this list I'm going to keep Rupture Cannons. The choice of Rupture VS Acid depends on the list and the role of the Tyrannofex. You can keep on reading, but there isn't much that you already didn't know.

Here is my train of thought:
This list runs 9x Zoanthropes that have a similar anti-MEQ weapon profile.
Acid Spray 18" D6+6A Torrent, S6 AP-2 2dmg
Warp Blast 24" D3 Blast, BS3+, S7, AP-2 D3.

And now consider that you can take 6 Zoans for the price of one Tyrannofex (and save 20 points).
Zoans FLY, are INFANTRY, are always in Synapse, can heal, provide 6++ aura, deal extra MWs, have extra 6" range on their attack and you can always turn them into Anti-Tank.
But Zoans die to pretty much any kind of high volume fire.

Don't get me wrong, Acid Tyrannofex is great, durable and consistent especially in MEQ heavy meta, it's just I always feel bad to take Zoans as our best anti-tank. Their lascannon profile bounces off Leman Russes on 4+, and 24" range means I miss first round shooting in most cases.

Also, it's much easier to proxy Zoans than a Tyrannofex.

[N.I.B.]

So I took your list as a template to test the Rupturefexes and Mawlocs for the first time in 10th ed, swapped out one Mawloc for another brood of Gargoyles and 3 Leapers, which are key to get onto objectives from go. Had a blast against a mechanized SW Gladius dreadnought army, he was running 7 dreadnoughts (2 contemptors, Bjorn, Murderfang and 3 Wulfen dreads) along with a big Landspeeder thing, 2 Predators and a Vindicator plus 7 action monkey wolves.

I got first turn, moved up Gargoyles aggressively in the center and to my right flank with advance, shoot + move which blocked SW advance and bought me time. I managed to pop the Vindicator turn 1, but second Rupturefex rolled snake eyes for damage on a dreadnought. I made a big mistake with a unit of Zoans, forgetting he could choose advance + charge doctrine so I lost them turn 1 along with the Leapers who stood on an objective, lost another brood of Zoans turn 1 to Predator and dreadnough shooting. A lone Gargoyle survived in the center which was key to scoring.
I managed to hold the right flank objective all game, with help from Mawloc who popped up and had 4 dreadnoughts within range, did a bunch of MWs and charged to contest, survived clap back (dreads aren't as lethal in cc now with only -2 AP) and was joined by a hero Lictor who helped out and even killed a charging Wulfen dreadnought that had 4 wounds left, Fight First is awesome.

SW made 100% of their charges and rolled high too, important in the beginning of the game.

Venomthropes did very little, Investigated one Signal, otherwise just provided some cover and held my home objective.
Walkrant was soundly meh, I think he managed 2 wounds with his shooting for the whole game. Roughed up a Contemptor Dread a bit in cc but was gunned down. His biggest contribution was dealing out Rapid Regeneration for 1 CP (should've been free but it was Vect-ed which makes it cost +1CP). I wished I had FNP instead of redeploy on him.
SitW was great for the first time and cost my opponent 15 points in the last turn, in the end he only had 2 Preds standing (after some abysmal rolling from my Rupturefexes, including another snake eyes for damage).
68-43 win. Maybe I should've taken Bring it Down as a set secondary instead of Maelstrom (tactical missions) but I enjoy the dynamics of the randomness.

My opponent sees no point in taking infantry in a Space Marine army, except maybe Desolators.

[trashcan01]

Thanks for sharing and congratulations on the win!
Rupturefexes are swingy like that somtimes. But they're the only thing I feel safe using as AntiTank.
Yeah, Venomthropes are best used supporting Zoanthrope/Barbgants. You've even managed to use them for action.
I wouldn't change my Redeploy for anything. Did you play you re-deploy after rolling who goes first?

I was so tempted to add Leapers to my list and I'm curious how impactful were they?

[N.I.B.]

Jul 14, 2023 11:53:42 GMT trashcan01 said:

I wouldn't change my Redeploy for anything. Did you play you re-deploy after rolling who goes first?

I was so tempted to add Leapers to my list and I'm curious how impactful were they?

Yeah, after rolling for first turn seems to be the consensus now (step 11). No way it's worth 30pts otherwise. And yes had I gone second I may had redeployed a Rupturefex and a Lictor.

Leapers, as I said lost them turn 1 standing on an objective in no mans land, after a bit of a mis-play (forgot that SM can advance + charge with a doctrine) so they did basically nothing for me.