Tyranids - The Gaunt Screen

[Djokovic]

Want to know a way to give your entire tyranid army a 4+ cover save?
Put gaunts in front in a line. Seems pretty simple, right? As Auxellion will be able to tell you, there is more to it. The key to it is to pool 50% or more of the gaunts unit off to the side in cover. This way, you can take casualties withough compromising covver for the rest of your army.

Now, lets say you are playing against the angry faces (representing space marines/orks/other tyranids). What you would do is wait till they charge your gaunts, and then BAM you charge back and kill all of those jerks.

: angry::a ngry:


I would love it if Auxellion himself (from whom I first learned this strategy) would post on this thread. Enjoy hearing your opponents swear when you just remove casualties from the left AND get a cover save!!!

[Ragewind]

Clever....

[Mud213]

I'd be real pissed if my Tyranid friend learned of this dastardly tactic.

The only problem I see is that after a large blast template or two in that big cluster in cover, the gaunt line will no longer be <50% of the unit. But in the first turn or two the Nids that you really wanted to shoot at, have a 4+ cover save.

[Wolf_Lord_Skoll]

I've been using this tactic for ages, it does work. Hehe.

[Crimzzen]

I don't think you can counter charge with another unit unless you can get into base, and with that many gaunts and pile in, seems unlikely...

But yes, the gaunt screen is awesome.

[Imperial Dragon]

I often use this tactic now mainly vsing gun lines the gaunts are doing what there ment to do meat shields

The only army this doesn't work do well is eldar as they will often try and zip around your sides, some tau armies can do that too so be careful.

[Spot The Grot]

Your just stealing his work and posting it .

watched it before and it was really interesting. You should see the new list he did.

[Someguy]

There are a couple of ways around this, though it is always a useful tactic that makes life hard for your opponent.

Firstly, bear in mind that you can shoot most MCs without cover in this situation. MCs may or may not be your priority targets but if you have guys with lascannon s and the like, fire them at the MCs.

Killing the gaunts is an option, though they will be cheap and take a lot of shots to remove. Putting a few flamer templates on the forest is a good way to reduce their numbers, though you will often be charged by other stuff afterwards. Thunderfire cannons, incendiary rounds from whirlwinds or sternguard and Tau airbursting frag launchers can all help.

If you play chaos, lash the gaunts somewhere and you will be find. Other armies can attempt to replicate this by charging the gaunts in their bit of cover. The ones in the open have to bundle towards the charging unit and will quickly get out of the way. Unfortunately though, they will still be there for one shooting phase at least.

[Greatdevourer]

One of the things about the meat shield I have noticed is a tendency to crowd the gaunts in together leaving them with less than an inch of space between each other. This is good if you are trying to block line of sight, but really doesn't help when you are trying to extend the meat shield as much as possible.

By having the gaunts spread out a little you can also have your genestealer or hormogaunts behind the gaunts ready to pounce any unwary enemy unit that gets in too close.

[sooch]

Originally Posted by Someguy

There are a couple of ways around this, though it is always a useful tactic that makes life hard for your opponent.

Firstly, bear in mind that you can shoot most MCs without cover in this situation. MCs may or may not be your priority targets but if you have guys with lascannon s and the like, fire them at the MCs.

Killing the gaunts is an option, though they will be cheap and take a lot of shots to remove. Putting a few flamer templates on the forest is a good way to reduce their numbers, though you will often be charged by other stuff afterwards. Thunderfire cannons, incendiary rounds from whirlwinds or sternguard and Tau airbursting frag launchers can all help.

If you play chaos, lash the gaunts somewhere and you will be find. Other armies can attempt to replicate this by charging the gaunts in their bit of cover. The ones in the open have to bundle towards the charging unit and will quickly get out of the way. Unfortunately though, they will still be there for one shooting phase at least.

Just a quick note about MC's and cover - it's possible to get cover for all your MC's by lining up your hive tyrants with guard behind, and since the guard represent >50% of the unit, the tyrants get cover. Then you put fexes behind the TG and the TG are tall enough to give fexes cover. Voila, cover saves for most of your army.