Can 'Nidz stand up to Marines?

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**Jeff**

It's a simple question. Given a fully optimized marine list (Mauleed Marines, for instance) in a gamma level game, does the Tyranid list really have any option for victory?

The thing is the assault cannon simply owns tyranids. I don't really see what options the Tyranids have against this kind of army - what am I missing?

**methoderik**

I think the billion guant list can do pretty good.

**celticpride4246**

absolutly nids can win against marines, even mauleed marines. The main advatnages of the nids are speed and the lictors. Use your lictors to get into assault on turn 2...2 lictors = 2 marine units who arent firing and are in alot of trouble. Non assault specced marines are going to die in a heartbeat to genestealers and even assault speced have problems with that many rending attacks. You really just have to not get discouraged by taking casualties. If you pile in on one flank of any marine force, your going to pile on through to the other side. Drop pod armies are tough, but with proper placement of your forces, that unit will get 1 turn of shooting off before you assault them. You just have to use the troops you have to tie up his shootiness, for you tyrants and warriors to get there.

**Jeff**

Neither of you guys really addressed the central issue - that being that the marines have enough mobile guns (speeders w/ HB/assault cannon and terminators w/ assault cannons and FoA) to pretty much shred nids before they can make it into assault.

**Voodoo Boyz**

You simply have to be kidding me. Nids have how many units that can do a turn 2 assault, easily, and in great enough numbers to ensure that one gets there?

Try playing a footslogging Ork hoard, I wish I had half the options you do for gaunts. The speed and number of units you can put down on the table to get into turn 2 or 3 Combat, while simultaneously fielding monsterous creatures that will draw huge amounts of fire, you can effectively pull out "target overload" on the opposition and ensure a combat on turn 2 or 3.

**DarthDiggler**

Yes they can. I am amazed by the number of people who must play on a board with no terrain in the center 2 feet of the table. One level 3 area terrain somewhere in the middle and the bugs have a good chance, two such structures and it's lights out for the marines. I have a friend who has played a couple of games on the east coast recently and he said every time he showed up to play, the table was already set up with terrain in each deployment zone and almost nothing in the center 2 feet. That set up favors shooty armies. Is that how the games are played outside the midwest?

Of course I speak from the perspective of a Godzilla list. I just played in a tournament where I faced two 5-man assault cannon termie squads, a vindicator, a crusader, a destructor and an annhilator, along with the rest of the Black Templar army. The two termie squads were screened by a building in no mans land for 2 turns and had minimal to shoot at. Eventually a stealer squad and the flying tyrant showed up and mowed through the two termie squads in 1 1/2 CC rounds. The rest of the Templars died to shooting and a few assaults.

**vsurma**

I have yet to come up against a marine player that has beat me so I guess that is where I am coming from.

Drop pod marines: why would they be tough? marines that die after shooting just 1 round, even if it is rapid fire...does not sound great against tyranids.

Assualt cannons: great but the range kills them, our devs are 18" if the assualt cannon had any more range then yea they would be really tough but as it is if the assualt cannons fire the devs fire back the next turn.
As is I don't mind putting my devilfexs against assualt cannon termies, or you can use your ravaners to assualt the terminators, with synapse and no instakill its not a bad deal even if the marines attack back.

For me I have found that BAs are the toughest (though I admit the BAs players I have met have been better than most other marine players)

S5 force weapon librarians, S5 init5 in general, furious charge, Death company. Good stuff they have.
Even though the DC has never done much dmg to my tyranids lists the fact is they are really hard to shoot to death with nid guns and the 4-+ fists in there do scare most anything.

Darth the terrain setup you explained is just silly, I have been to alot of tournaments and they have ALL had good terrain.
Many even favour CC armies.

**lord_sutekh**

On the opposite side, I have yet to face a Nid army that gave my Marines a serious challenge. Careful choices in shooting, and proper separation of squads, means that little gets to HtH, and those that do are left standing afterward, awaiting my guns. The last time I was significantly challenged by Nids was pre-Shoot-the-Big-Ones.

**Anarchyman99**

As said before you have to stick with your guns Nid's will die but when you get in to H2H you will own, I have both Genestealers are gods.....Extened Carapace is all you need.....I use about 58 of them and Broodlord, Hormagaunts in unit's of about 12 to 18 work well just till the Stealers make it Raveners are very fast buy keep them in Synaspse Range so they don't Insta Kill.....Broodlord is good for that. In short yeah they can do it, use walls of bodies to make it to them.

**Augustus**

No

**vsurma**

The static nature of most marine lists tends to give tyranids a help.

Sure the terminators can move and shoot but the low range on the guns tends to give them only 1 direction to move in if they want to be firing those guns.

Will have to see what I can do with my list if I manage to get to the UK GT this year, atm I have only been playing 1500pts games in tournaments and that is near idea for my army, 1600pts is still good but really after 1500pts I cannot add any significant guns to my army, even when trying to run a shooty Zilla army I am forced to put the rest of my points into CC as all my slots where I can take decent shooters are all used up!

**mauleed**

The short answer is no. My sort of shooty marines simply have too many of the exact right guns to destroy nids. A turn 2 assault is sure to happen, but I don't care. The gaunts (anything else is shot dead) get there without synapse, and bounce, or hold a couple of units at best. I will say though that the marine player must be extremely on the ball with his target selection. He has to make sure the right targets die at the right time, and it's very situational.

But Lictors? Lictors are useless against an army like mine. I simply fill all the terrain that I'm concerned the lictor might appear in, and he's forced to come in somewhere else and get shot to death.

I think drop pods can (and should) have a real problem with properly composed and run nid list, at least in Gamma.

Vsurma, have you ever played against my style of shooty marines? Almost nothing in it is static but 5 lascannons.

**Moz**

I know a Godzilla list starts at a severe disadvantage, and slowly works up to even or advantaged with each piece of cover and mission objective beyond "kill kill kill". If there is ample Lvl 3 area terrain and a mission objective such as recon, take and hold, secure and control, or cleanse. The tyranids have a great chance of taking it.

Depending on the lists, it may take a ton of cover to even the playing field, but it will happen.

Example where cover gave the nids the advantage (escalation even): http://www.dakkadakka.com/Default.aspx?tabid=93&forumid=17&postid=34680&view=topic

Example where there was no cover at all (there was cover but I failed to use it rather): http://www.dakkadakka.com/Default.aspx?tabid=93&forumid=17&postid=14480&view=topic

Played a flipside game a few days ago as well using someone elses marines vs. my own bugs, decent terrain on the board but secure and control ended with most of the tokens in the open. To sum up a terrible boring match, bugs shot to pieces by turn 3. Roughly 2-3 bigbugs dying per turn to assault cannon fire in the open.

**vsurma**

Probably not, only good marine players I played have had BAs.

What's this list look like?

**Lemartes**

No. I have yet to lose to a nid player with my marine list builds. Destroy the Synapse and stealers first and the force unravels. Three Tornados are usually difficult for nid lists to deal with becase of thier mobility and range, throw in 3-4 las/plas squads, and Devs with 3-4 Heavy bolters in each and that deals with most nid lists.

**vsurma**

Depending on the lists, it may take a ton of cover to even the playing field, but it will happen.

just 1-2 in the right place will do with certain missions.

Played against deathwing at the scandi GT (take and hold I think), managed to get most of my shooty MCs into a single 4+ cover save building near the center. Lost 1 MC that game.

We shot it out untill he was down to 1 squad of terms then I took them out in CC.
Assua Cannon range somewhat works into the dev range as although the ACs shoot first, devs get to return fire the next turn.

**mauleed**

Posted By vsurma on 02/21/2006 9:47 AM
Probably not, only good marine players I played have had BAs.

What's this list look like?

The last shooty list I was using was:

2XEpistolary in terminator armor, fury, fear, 4 terminators, 2 assault cannons, furious charge, chainfist

2X6 las/plas

3X5 las/plas

3 tornados

3 destructors.

**vsurma**

I'd give it a run, doesn't look too scary.

Hard to say as I've never really run into any good marine players that weren't BAs so I don't have anything to compare too.

The person I played for the scandi GT final game (table 1) was indeed a BAs player. Very different list though.

**mauleed**

Yes, very different from BA.

This doesn't have to ever get into hth with you, and has the guns to make sure that none or few of the things that marines fear in hth make it intact. Gaunts of course will make it, but it's not hard to make sure they aren't in synapse when they do.

**xtapl**

The short answer is: Of course they can. Any given Sunday, and all that. The long answer is: It depends. Terrain, scenario, experience of both players, and army composition are all significant variables. In a mission that's an actual mission (not just set 'em up and knock 'em down), on a table with 6+ pieces of terrain arranged equally, given two players with equal experience and decent army composition that isn't min-maxed on both sides, I'd give the Tyranids right around 50% odds. It shifts more in the Tyranids' favor with more terrain, and more in the Marines' favor the closer to min-maxed trash the Marines' army composition is.

**The Happy Anarchist**

It may not look like much but it packs a tremendous punch and is tricky to deal with.

In the advantage of the zilla list, if your not very careful with the speeders then a single devilfex can bring it down in 1 turns shooting. The Preds are not as tricky either with the gunfexes making a show of things. If you can manage to wing your stealers up and charge the termies, you may have a chance, but good luck doing that.

The advantage to the marine list is that only 5 squads are stationary, which are somewhat throwaway squads (very inexpensive) and pack LCs that can hurt any MCs that make a showing. Assault Cannons are ideal versus MCs and little guys, particularly extended carapace stealers, which pay a premium to die. The stealers can be blocked from most shooting by hiding behind the MCs, but that won't protect from dual Fury strikes every turn. (Fear is somewhat worthless) They can also teleport in behind you and waste the stealers first turn they arrive, not sure if that would be wise.

Very tricky list overall. Ed's marines are fine tuned to an extreme that is largely unmatched by most other players.

**HFLep**

The assault cannon list lie the one described above, backed by the predator destructors, is an incredibly tough thing for Tyranids to face. It is not impossible to beat it, but you would need good terrain and a cool head to prevail.

The list has two potential weaknesses (if those can be called weaknesses at all). The first is that, if the Tyranid player has Venom Cannons, he can actually hurt the marines harder than they can hurt him. Venom cannons have a 36" range, while most of the marine weaponry has 24"-36" range (barring the five lascannons and autocannons). However, advocating being out of the marine range to shoot up his vehicles is usually a bad idea since it's pretty hard to knowck out vehicles. Such a tactic would only work if you want a tie.

The second weakness comes into play only if the marine players is foolish enough to attemp to deep strike with his speeders and terminators. If that does happen, the 'nid list has a chance to knock out the infantry squads and the tanks before the terminators come into play. However, it only works if the marine player is not that smart, which is something you shouldn't plan on.

Just about the only list I can think of that might be able to deal with this kind of a SM list is an all un-upgraded Genestealer list who have scuttlers, backed by a flying tyrant. And even then it'd be a tough fight. If the terrain is favorable, it might be better, but it's definately a tough fight.

**mauleed**

Ed's marines are fine tuned to an extreme that is largely unmatched by most other players.

Hence all the whining about cheese!

**mauleed**

HFLep:

You won't be able to outrange my guns with your venom cannons. Venomcannons are only effective against the preds and speeders. Against everything else they'll lose the firefight in short order. It's not hard to set things up so that the carnifexes can only shoot the tanks by stepping into range and LOS of my best anti-TMC guns. I just assume the speeders are dead and hope to get a couple of rounds of shooting out of them before the venom cannons remove them.

As for deep strike, why would I ever deep strike against nids? There isn't a mission that where I'd need to do it, except perhaps Alpha recon. But as you mentioned, no smart marine player would try this, and it makes little sense to design your tactics around the premise that the other guy will make mistakes.

I haven't had a chance to play against a genestealer heavy list, but I'd think it would fare much worse than a gaunt heavy one against me. Even if I go second and am in assault on turn 2, I can drop half the genestealers before a single one ever touches me, lose a couple of units and repeat.

And for all the people mentioning terrain, it's not as if anyone is playing without 25% anymore. What I find is that nid players start complaining about terrain if it isn't 25% size 3 terrain, which they aren't entitled to. But just to be safe, I generally practice with it all like that.

**vsurma**

Well my tourny army does not really rely on getting into CC much.

I run a shooty nid army, only gaunts are the 2 min troops choices so 16 5pts gaunts.
Nothing in the army requires synapse much (ld 10 all round)

6 shooty MCs, winged tyrant, 3 zoans with scream and blast.
Gives me decent things against psykers with shadows and 4 screams all up and devourers do pretty decent dmg to anyone in range. Ravaners and winged tyrant take care of the CC when needed.

No problems with marines so far, though we play at 1500pts round here and the better players seem to play eldar or BA.

Will have to see how badly I get my *donkey*handed to me at the GT this year but I think it will be ok with average terrain.

Great thing is that my army actually benefits from the terrain unlike a marine army that gains....well nothing much from the terrain. (least against nid guns).

**mauleed**

I think marines and nids (and in particular my marines and your nids) play differently enough at 1500 and 1850 that we are talking about apples and oranges.

**vsurma**

Might be true but I have put a little thought into what I will be adding to move it up to 1850pts, nothing in the current one will be changing much, just adding a few things, 3 more ravs, another tyrant guard, then I need to put 200pts somewhere....not sure where though.

**Moz**

I mention terrain because it's vital to the discussion. If it's an open field, the nids have no chance, zero, none. The more terrain that goes down, the better it gets for the nids. Up to the point where a full LVL3 filled (jungle?) board would be auto-win for nids.

There will be a balance in there somewhere where the odds are 50/50 for the marines vs. the bugs. Plenty of room for player ability too, but you start with the above assumption which I believe to be very true. No terrain, Marines win easy. Full terrain, bugs win easy.

Now if you're playing 25% lvl 3 area terrain, I'd say the zilla nids have a good chance to take it. They could probably make it a 50/50 game with less, but if you're an amazing marine player you can probably make it a good game with that much big-bug-blocking material on the table.

**mauleed**

Why the assumption that terrain hurts marines? Marines aren't static shooters anymore, or at least don't have to be. The same way nids can use terrain to keep models from being shot marines can use terrain to keep their more vulnerable units from being shot. With enough terrain speeders and tanks aren't getting hit with venom cannons (at least not without having to walk in front of las/plas squads and every assault cannon to do it). And when these things can shoot and not worry about return fire, they're brutally effective, since they shoot more.

Sure, ridiculous amounts of terrain, like 50%+ will make it so that marines only have a single turn (or sometimes not even that) to shoot nids, but when are you going to see terrain like that?

**HFLep**

You misunderstand me. The weknesses I mentioned aren't much of a weakness (as I said). The stay-away-and-snipe-vehicles tactic would, at best, give the 'nids a tie (as I said). And deep striking, again, as I said, would only be done by someone who is inexperienced. Against an experienced player with that marine setup, the Tyranids would be in a lot of trouble.

However, I do think a Genestealer list could do it. 6 units of 12 basic genestealers with scuttling run 1368 points, leaving the 'nids player with a healthy 482 points on other stuff. I'd most likely spend it on a a couple of VC-equipped Carnifi, and a walking, VC-carrying Tyrant. At that point, it'd be a matter of die rolling for who gets first turn. If the marines get it, they have the potential to do around 60 casaulties before the 'stealers hit (2 turns of shooting). If the 'stealers get first turn, they'd only suffer around 30 casaulties and hit the enemy lines with 40 Genestealers, which would most likely win due to the complete lack of CC ability of the marine list. It'd be about a 50-50 chance for the 'nids to win, but you have to admit that's better than the odds a more conventional Tyranid list would have.