I have been coerced into a tail of 4 gamers at my local GW
and i'm doing nids

first let me put your bolters down by reassuring you all that my beloved IVth Legion will always be my 1st and favorite army!

so, i decided for nids as i like their concept and design
i've plumped for a nidzilla style list which is listed below for your enjoyment (hatred)

HQ
Tyrant w/ 3 Tyrant Guard
lash whip, bonesword, stranglethorn cannon
regeneration, acid blood, old adversary
thorax swarm w/ desiccator larvae
psychic powers: leech essence, paroxysm

Tyranid Prime
pair of boneswords, scything talons
adrenal glands

Elites
3x Hive Guard
2x Zoanthropes
1x Venomthrope

Troops
5x Tyranid Warriors
Scything Talons, Devourers
Adrenal Glands, 1x Barbed Strangler

10x Genestealers

10x Genestealers

Heavy Support
Trygon Prime w/ regeneration

Mawloc w/ regeneration

Mawloc w/ regeneration

total 2k on the button

may Perturabo forgive me for indulging

Iron Within

Not surprised to see no Carnifexes in that list, they got hit hard with the nerfhammer. Zoanthropes went the same way, so you can probably axe them and spend the points better elsewhere.

Other than that looks pretty good. Be aware that you've only got the Warriors and Genestealers to capture objectives, both of which are quite squishy targets. Plus in 2k games armies like Guard can pack in an abhorrant amount of firepower, so don't be surprised to lose a Monstrous Creature or two in Turn 1-2. Get up in their face and hope you can keep their army busy. Be very wary of Space Marines, Eldar and Orks, all of whom have HQ choices that will tear your MC's to pieces. Also be wary of armies with cheap tar-pit units like Necrons, Orks and Imperial Guard, as they could well just tie your heavies up in Assault with worthless units while their Troops secure objectives and blow your poor 'stealers to bits.

thanks for the tips khargoth - much appreciated
i like the zoanthropes - 3+ invun & str 10 lance!
its all about target saturation!
the venomthrope is only in the list to give the warriors a 5+ cover save & defnsive grenades if they're assaulted
mawlocs are deployed on the table at start of game and both burrow in turn 1 giving auto deep strike turn 2!
with all MC's having regen as well, hopefully they'll prove troublesome to kill. the stealers are they're to take out stuff w/ poison shooting (dark eldar amongst others) or static firebases at the back of the board

If this is a list for fun, this I wish you the best of luck! =D

If it's competative...I may have a LOT to throw your way(I used to play highly competative nids, they're my main army)

I must ask though, are you even LOOKING for list improvements? If not, then again, best of luck! =D

list improvements are very much appreciated!!

as it stands i've changed my 2k list as follows

tyrant w/ 3 guard
stranglethorn cannon
LW & BS
Hive commander
Old Adversary

Flyrant (*)
(awesome new kit - not sure on if he'll ever get his points back tho!)

3 Hive Guard

3x Zoanthropes

2x Lictors

10 Stealers

10 stealers

trygon prime

mawloc

mawloc (*)

notes

units marked with (*) are prime candidates to be dropped
i wanna keep the nidzilla theme where poss tho..
i do have a prime and 5 warriors which could be called upon
other stuff (model wise) can be purchased so pls suggest improvements!!

^your list. Let's analyze it and pick it apart! (mwahahahahaha) ^.^

flyrant-not cost efficient, will die easily, if he stays with the guard, he can't fly...guard aren’t good independent of a tyrant. Also, three is excessive. Two will be cheaper and do the job of giving the tyrant more wounds in ADITTION to having lash whips(which your guard don't have) which make the tyrant better in combat.

while whips and swords are cool, I don't think they're very efficient either. The whips are better on the guard, and taking the bonesword is meh. moreover, taking shooting AND combat biomorphs means that your tyrant lacks a definitive purpose. EVERTYTHING in the army should be a job, and if you’re trying to get in combat, u can't run and shoot your cannot, whereas if you’re trying to use the sword, every turn you spent out of combat is a turn wasted that you could be getting to your foe.

Overall tyrants are iffy and they need to be focused on a task.

hive guard-GREAT! =D they're cost effective; they shoot well and are AT platforms of doom. All for 150 pts.!

zoanthropes-from my experience, VERY good. However they can sometimes be a tad unreliable as well as squishy. Not a bad unit though.

lictors-what? People still use these? But seriously, they cost a lot of points, are not very effective, and the reserve...I'll get to that later...XD

stealers-don't like them. Not cost effective, die to dakka(which competitive army doesn't shoot?) doesn't do the kind of damage you'd expect of old genestealers. I guess there aren't necessarily BAD, but I believe you have better options.

trygon prime-synapse is good. Sure, I can see you using him. It IS godzilla after all.

mawlocs- ok THIS is where I will do my little rant on reserves.
You pay 170pts for a mawloc. Every turn you wait to use your mawloc there is 170 points not on the board being scary, 170 pts of decision making your opponent doesn't have to deal with. What if he doesn't come out 2nd turn, or third turn! He’s doing nothing.

but you can burrow him first turn. Cool. A neat trick.
That means that on turns 2, 4, and 6 you can put your chompy template somewhere on the board (hopefully) eating a nice chunk of models before leaving in the next turn. but...what if your opponent assaults it? Well, your mawloc isn't really in a position to leave, also, he isn't too great in combat compared to your other options.

Realistically he seems like a gigantic waste of points. I know he looks cool, I painted one for a competition and I tried, I REALLY tried to make him viable, but it’s just not to be.

The same not on reserves really applies to ANYTHING you can deep strike. Enough of this game revolves on dice rolls and random chance. the more random chance u eliminate from the game, the more control you have over your army, the battle, and your opponent.
*end minirant*

So in order to make things not so long and horrible, I'll throw down another sample list in my next post and go over WHY I picked everything in detail.

my attempt at a godzilla list:
Hive Tyrant
2 TL devourer
old adversary

2 guard
whips

10 termagaunts

10 termagaunts

tervigon

tervigon
catalyst

14 hormagaunts
adl
Tsac

3 hive guard

3 hive guard

2 hive guard

trygon
adl

trygon
adl

trygon
adl
prime

If I haven’t forgotten anything or made any grave math errors, I believe it comes out to 2K exactly.

First and maybe most important...your list had 5 MCs mine has 6! :P Godzilla-y enough for you? ^.^

So I noticed your list had a distinct lack of scoring units. From what I've seen of competitive play, that's kind of a problem. So my solution was to add tervigons, right now the army has at LEAST 7 scoring units provided you get at least one turn to use a tervigon. 7! That's WAAAAAYYYY better than two.

If you look at the tyrant, it's job should be clear-shoot stuff dead. 12 TL str 6 shots...you know, no big deal right? ;)
Should he find his way into combat, he's still an MC, with rerolls and whips on the guard. While he is by no means a combat monster, he is not bad, and will put a strong presence in the shooting phase (lol imperial guard squad/platform? eat worms!!!! ^.^)

trygons are pretty cost effective should they make it to combat, and they have 6 wounds, meaning they the likelihood of your opponent killing them all AND your 2 tervigons, AND your tyrant and guard is highly unlikely. Even if they do, you've still got your...

8 hive guard. eeyup, they're really, incredibly cost efficient, and make harlequins look like guardsmen. they are SO cost efficient, in fact, that I put three units of them into the army, armor can be a real problem, these guys can SOLVE those problems ^.^

note of the hormagaunts-I LOVE these guys. I mean not only do their models look cool, but provided they charge, their first round of combat is pretty great. and really, with all the models you'll have on the field, it might be easy for your opponent to forget they exist...once.

Remember though. You can have the best list in the world, but if you don't PLAY the Tyranids with some things in mind, you'll die a horrible and painful death and I'm sure you don't want to end up looking like an Imperial Fist. ;)

Rule#1- this is easy. synapse. Make sure you have it and use it. no unit should ever be out of synapse. Sometimes you may have to plan for assaults and such as well, keep that in mind. It is often times better to run a synapse unit so that your assaulty dudes can be in synapse the following turn.

rule #2- your army needs to complement each other. Each unit has a "job" more or less and it’s important that you use your units with each other to maximize effectiveness. (Think eldar and you won't be far wrong)

rule #3- so this is a bit weird, but it is a bad idea to just have one unit assault another 1 unit (MCs aside of course ^.^). Why? Well you want to KILL the ENTIRE unit in one round of combat. Yes, I know, your dudes can't be shot while in combat, but very rarely will your entire army be in combat, you want to make sure your meat and is in front and your assaulty bits are ready to kill something again next round.

I risk sounding silly here, but it is better to overkill something than to underestimate it and end up losing combat, or be tied down for a couple turns.
Moreover, when your nids assault three of his tastiest units and you mercilessly slaughter then all in one brutal round of combat, that will have a SERIOUS psychological effect on your opponent. If he talks about your army being OP or whatever, that's good because he's worried that he's going to lose. If he gets mad, then he's already lost, he's going to make many bad moves. I could go on for a novel talking about the psychology behind this game, so I'll leave it at that, but if you have any questions about it or anything else, feel free to ask.

The best advice I can give you is to play a LOT of games. Play more games! Do it! It’ll make you a better player and it will familiarize yourself with the army. Practice is some good stuff, like tea, I like tea. =D

As always, these are suggestions and I don't think you are unwise for disagreeing with me. I love constructive dialogue, so I'd love to help any way I can. ^.^

deathmonkey thanks for the advise bro - lots to chew on there!!

i was just drivel on a bit now.....

i know my list is sub-optimal, i'm not a tourney player!!

i'm starting to get a grasp on the whole 'each unit must have a specific purpose' thing

the escalation league i'm in is as follows

250pts kill teams
500pts cities of death
850pts custom scenario
1200pts battle missions
1500pts planet strike
2k custom scenario

each list needs to be picked from your final 2k

my 4 opponents are:
Dark Eldar
Orks
Space Wolves
Tyranids

my theory behind the stealers and the mawlocs (here me out here!)
is to force deployment mistakes that can be exploited!
i.e.

2x 10 genestealers outflanking with rerolls for which side they arrive on forces an opponent to deploy more centrally

which is where the threat of the mawloc(s) comes into play!

if my opponent then assaults a mawloc, its t6 w/ 6wounds and it has hit and run!

this also ties in with the lictors and their deep striking teleort homer, thus allowing the said mawlocs to NOT scatter away from their intented lunchtime meals

once the league is over i can then start to make te list a little more all comers friendly!

so i wanted a stranglethorn cannon for 2 reasons
i) large blast
ii) str6

which is good against the dark eldar, vs their av10/11 open topped vehicles and IDing their t3 dudes

also handy against horde stuff from the orkses

and handy against the uvva 'nid player

wounding marines on 2's is also nice, cause enough wounds and he'll fail some of those 3+ invuns!

i wanted to try and make a competitive MC's list (of a sort) that doesn't include a tervigon to see if it is possible as everywhere i look i see tervigon spam!

plus Lictors are soooooo cool! (fluffwise anyways and now in finecast!)

thats enough rambling from me

Well then. This is why I asked if it was supposed to be competative.

I either:
a ) play just for fun and fluff with no concern for victory only fun
B ) win at all costs(no be a jerk, mind you). "It is not enough to win, all others must lose"

So in my mind I was thinking the latter! XD

I guess if you don't mind I will make another couple comments.
I wouldn't tailor my force to beating any specific army, I'd make a generally good list and than tairlor my PLAY to defeating my opponent. That way I can play the same list 100s of times and learn the army really well.

I think reserves are silly. As I already explained why I'll try to explain something else.

It's much easier to force mistakes on your opponent when he has too much to worry about AND when your are annhilating(not just killing) his units. Putting him on the back foot through superior play and tactics is better than a couple cheap reserve tricks imho.

*It's always a good reason to include something because it's cool so long as your not trying to win 100% of the time! XD
It IS a hobby after all, right? =]

I noticed you at least had plans for what your army was supposed to do, that's REALLY good. some people just take things cause they're there. Having a purpose for your dude-mans is very importrant.

Also, why the hate on the tervigon? Its one of the only things in the books that's half-way decent. (Also, I don't consider 2 of them "spam" ;) )

Anyways, glad you think I helped! =D
IRON WITHIN YOUR GRIBBLY STOMACH!

i didn't mean 2 of them as spam!!
i meant every tyranid list i see in a game or on the net seem to have at least 2 tervigons in them!!!

mawlocs are also cool! but 2 is probably super fail!!

You play with what you want man =]

BUT I do ask that you at least TRY playing with some of my advice(for lists and play). Just test it. It's not like it'll hurt you or anything, and hey if you don't like it, then you know FOR SURE that it isn't for you! ^.^

And again, people play with tervigons because they're good. When a lot of people use the same stuff that should give you an indication that what they're using has stood up to the test of time and expirence. XD

but anywhoozle. (offtopic) Which tyranid organism(s) do you find the most visually pleasing? =]

definately the mawloc model i find the most visually pleasing!

if i dropped the flyrant, lictors and both squads of stealers
that'd give me points for 2x tervigons and 2x squads of termigants?

its a shame that lictors are so fail in game when in the fluff they're absolutely awesome!!

Yea, well lictors still look cool! XD
Have you ever seen a lictorfex?!!!? It's pretty much one of the coolest conversions I've ever seen. It was done by a guy named Hydra(I think).

That addition definatly gives you more scoring units. I guess now you just gotta test it out and see what happens. ^.^