Editing Warhammer 40,000/5th Edition Tactics/Tyranids (section)

==Why Play Tyranids==
From a gameplay perspective, the Tyranid army is a tactically engaging force with a lot of strengths, as well as some weaknesses which must be dealt with in order to make the most of them. The army itself is noted for being able to purchase a variety of deployment options, including manipulation of the Reserve Rolls, Mycetic Spores, the ability to reroll the table edge from Outflanking, and other options to complement conventional Deep Strike and Infiltration options; the Tyranids therefore have a degree of flexibility in building a force which operates in a manner besides simply lining their force opposite the opponent's guns. Likewise, they possess a fair amount of support units, capable of either buffing or debuffing units as need be, or otherwise acting as force-multipliers to the army as a whole. 

In melee, the Tyranids operate off numerous cheap infantry, complemented by larger (and far pricier) Monstrous Creatures; the former are exceptionally point-efficient at taking out enemy infantry, and when properly supported will defeat most anything in close-combat on account of their high initiative and mass of Poisoned attacks. The Monsters *can* deal with heavier infantry, but their lack of attacks for their cost generally make them more useful for finishing off vehicles or acting as a living shield to pull attacks away from your swarms. In some cases it is a good idea to make assaults into cover using heavy linebreakers like Trygons since the overwhelming majority of Tyranid units (every Troop Choice in the codex) lack Frag Grenades. This said, the generally Fearless nature of Tyranids means that if one is not careful, a well-executed multicharge can overwhelm multiple Broods and pile up the No-Retreat Wounds. Learning to screen you army and understanding which units to sacrifice to achieve victory is critical.

Tyranid shooting is primarily geared towards anti-infantry, with quite a few Large Blast weapons and rapid rate-of-fire weapons available to them. However, their long-range anti-tank is either short-ranged, inaccurate, does less damage on the Vehicle Damage Chart, or any combination of those three; as a rule, Tyranids don't kill vehicles by shooting, so much as disable them and render them vulnerable to being torn apart in melee.

<strike>Addendum: As it stands, the Tyranid codex itself does not have an official FAQ yet.</strike> It took a while, but the Tyranids did finally receive a brutal, somewhat loathsome FAQ/errata. In it, most rules disputes were decided against the Tyranid army, so Mawloc deepstrikes and Doom of Malantai powers both confer cover saves (and don't harm units in transports). <strike>Enemies in transports are positively invulnerable to the effects of Shadow in the Warp</strike> (January 2012 update eliminated this), and when an enemy assaults a spore mine, the explosion only hits one squad member. Fortunately Tyranid close combat weapons do stack, but most things turned out as poorly as the rulings could possibly go for the bugs.

Something to keep in mind is that most of the newer armies can absolutely wreck your shit with ease. You are the one side with absolutely no vehicles, in an edition that hates on monstrous creatures and makes vehicles god. If you play this army, be prepared to take a lot of casualties against newer armies. That is not to say you are at the bottom of the heap as far as armies go, but yours is not an army that is terribly forgiving of mistakes or mediocre builds.  

But in Apocalypse games, things change for the better for you. You've got something Matt Ward armies by and large don't; Forgeworld Support. Your rather mediocre army transforms into a devastating force so profoundly you are left with the impression that Apocalypse is the proper place for Tyranids. Indeed, a lot of choices that are of questionable usage in normal 40k games become far more viable in apocalypse, Carnifex Poison sacs find their usage against Gargantuan creatures, Gargoyles can be brought into the fray in silly numbers by Harridans, Tyrannofexes with rupture cannons become cheap shadowsword equivalents, Biovores become essential long ranged blob removal, Pyrovores...are still completely useless.  

In Apocalypse, your Titans' main strength is volume of high strength attacks, both ranged and melee. This makes them geared towards attacking heavy enemy units while they tank shock things not worthy of their attention out of their way. You have a glaring lack of pie plate dropping ability, but the sheer number of regular 40k models you can field will allow you to mop up what your Titans leave behind, and Forge world is slowly but surely taking a lot of old, goofy, and obscure Epic, CCG, and Chapter approved beasties and bringing them into your game. So if you decide to play the Tyranids, it's best for you to go all the way and build an Apocalypse force so that you can experience the bugs the way they were meant to be played. In vast hordes of monsters large and small bringing devastation to everything in their way.