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

===Elites===
The first thing one notices about Tyranid Elites is that every unit is a straightforward purchase. There are no upgrades, biomorphs, or any other upgrades aside from the prospect of purchasing a Mycetic Spore. Tyranids have a lot of Elite options, but many builds ultimately boil down to taking Zoanthroapes or Hive Guard. This is because of the emphasis on mechanized warfare in 40k, and the need for reliable anti-tank. A common trap many players new to Tyranids tend to take, is taking a single Hive Guard unit and a single Zoanthroape unit, and hoping this will cover all their anti-tank needs. This is frankly retarded, for it leads to lack of unit redundancy. Whether you choose Hive Guard or Zoanthroapes as your mainstay Elite Choice will do a lot to shape what your army looks like.
*'''Doom of Malan'tai''': Decried as cheese by some, the DoM is something of a gambling model. It can be downright devastating: every shooting phase, including the Tyranid phase and the enemy's, all enemy units within 6" of the DoM must take a leadership test on 3D6. For every point they fail by, the squad takes one wound and the DoM gains a wound up to a maximum of ten. It has a 3+ invulnerable, but it's only T4, so the way to deal with it is Instant Death. It always comes in a spore pod if it's coming at all, so if the Deep Strike scatters off target the DoM will be unlikely to do anything for the entire game. However, sometimes it does wipe out most of a squad, and it is just so cheap and draws so much expensive fire that it really is worth the risk of it not doing anything - or it would be, anyway, if the DoM weren't taking up an essential elite slot. May be nice to have up your sleeve in Apocalypse.
*'''Hive Guard''': Hive Guard are one of the premier Tyranid armor hunters. For the cost of a Land Speeder, you're getting model with two wounds, T6, and a 4+ save armed with the bastard offspring of a Krak Missile and a Storm Bolter. Firing two BS 4, Strength 8 shots a turn, a unit of three, or even two, of these guys will bust open transports, light skimmers, or even heavier armor should they be able to flank-it. Like everything else in the Tyranid codex, it maintains full fire-efficiency on the move. The two drawbacks to this unit are it cannot take a Mycetic Spore, and 24" is a relatively short range for popping light transports and for some unfathomable reason it only has AP4, making it useless against MEQs. However, the Hive Guard does not need line of sight to hit a target, and it does not give a fuck about any intervening cover.
*'''Lictors''': The Lictor gets worse every edition, and the 5th is no exception. They are ambush units that have lost their ambush ability, and their performance on the table demonstrates how useless that is. Thanks to the Stealth universal rule, Lictors are decent at surviving shooting, but they're actually rather poor at surviving close combat because they have a toughness of four and a 5+ save. Rather hilariously, because they enter play by Marbo-Deep Strike, they can be assaulted before they make their own assault, which is pretty much the polar opposite of an ambush. Even better is when the enemy wheels flamers around to their "ambush position" and burns them to a crisp before they make their move. They could be extremely mediocre harassers if they weren't competing for a gravely important elite slot. They are, incidentally, one of the three Tyranid models with frag grenades.
*'''Deathleaper''': Are you taking Zoanthroapes and are worried about Psychic Hoods? Are you running a dual-Tyrant all-spore army, and want to make sure all your forces are in by turn 3? Introducing the new-and-improved Lictor at nearly three times the cost of a normal one. Deathleaper is point-per point the most fragile unit in the codex, partially to compensate for the relative difficulty one can have in targeting him. All shooting at him is done as though it were a Night Fight check, with distance halved. Unfortunately, the special rules have very situational usage. One allows the Tyranid player to pick an enemy model and lower its leadership by D3, which is useful for negating enemy Psykers, or a Psychic Hood; alternatively, for setting up high-priority enemy models for being Bone-sworded, or negating bonuses from abilities like Rites of Battle. Another rule causes nearby enemies to roll fewer dice while moving through cover, but it's such a short-range power that the Deathleaper has to be in danger to use it. Deathleaper tends to get used mostly in a Reserve Army where one doubles up on Zoanthroapes and <strike>dual Hive Commander Tyrants</strike> looks like it's a single Tyrant now that Hive Commander doesn't stack, his Phermone Trail acting as a buffer in anticipation of the Hive Tyrant being shot, and his Leadership reduction ability used to further ensure that the Zoanthroapes work more efficiently (though against non-hood based Psychic Defenses, this last element doesn't work as well). From there, he might either act as a minor assassin unit, or continually shuttle back into Reserve, reappearing on the last turn to contest an objective, in a more reliable version of the Swooping Hawk yoyo. Although he's not for many armies, his utility can come into play.
*'''Pyrovores''': <strike>Universally agreed to be the stupidest, most useless, most confusingly detrimental unit in the entire Tyranid codex</strike> barely edging out ahead of Old One Eye for most pointless unit in the codex, the Pyrovore has no idea what the fuck it's supposed to be doing and neither does the guy who designed it. In short, it's a heavy flamer with power weapons that explodes when it gets bumped too hard and bleeds acid. It's slow, so it's really best for bracing against assaults; for Tyranid armies based on assault, this is pointless, and for shooting armies, this is also pointless for they compete with Hive Guard. Its close combat abilities are dreadfully menial, so the power weapon attacks are wasted. It has the potential to harm enemies in close combat, but only when it is wounded, which means sacrificing the damn thing is its only positive use. The only way this unit could be of use is dependent on how Games Workshop FAQs Acid Blood to work, in which case it might work as a sacrificial gimmick for killing enemy deathstar units, but armies based on gimmicks seldom work. Ask Lukas the Trickster.
*'''Venomthropes''': Venomthropes would be kind of a beautiful choice if they weren't in the highly competitive elite slots. All models within 6" of them get a 5+ cover save, are armed with defensive grenades, and force dangerous terrain checks on assaulting enemies. They're fantastic support units for protecting gunlines, and they also confer a save to monstrous creatures that would normally find it very difficult to get cover, like the Trygon or Tyrannofex or even a fucking Heirophant (A Heirophant with Warp field and Regeneration and a 5+ cover save is the type of thing that makes most people cry). Units with stealth, such as Rippers and Lictors, can take a 4+ cover save from being near Venomthropes, increasing the screening potential of Rippers if they need to advance across open ground. Venomthropes also have a 2+ poison, but they don't really belong in close combat.
*'''Ymgarl Genestealers''': The fluff behind the Ymgarl Genestealers doesn't really make a lot of sense. They're creatures that can, at will, make themselves stronger, thicken their own carapace, or turn their limbs into tentacles, which stretches the limits of plausibility without "lol, warpmagic" explanations. It's a gimmicky way of altering the units' stats, frankly. In any case, they're basically just genestealers that mutate and hide in terrain for deployment. When they appear from reserves, they pop out of the terrain piece that was marked for them and they can assault afterward. They ambush the way that Lictors ought to, and they wouldn't be a bad choice if the elite slots weren't your best source of anti-tank. Even so, they can really disrupt anything with big weapons that's sitting around in the back *cough*longfangs*cough*. Since they can assault when they come in, and you choose where they're going after both sides deploy, they come in more or less where you want to (unless you play on planet Q-ball, and if so, god help you), can assault w/ a toughness boost to not murder things on your turn, then can finish on your opponent's turn. Taking one is a decent choice for most players, even with Hive Guard trying to crowd into all three slots, the disruption they give (denying where an opponent can deploy their heavy-weapon infantry in cover) is worth it. There's a reason why Space Wolves choose Wolf Scouts, and that same reason is why one unit of Ymgarls, even a low number of them like 6-8, is a decent choice.
*'''Zoanthroapes''': This is another unit that any player would be a fool not to consider investing in. They are arguably some of the best anti-armor units in the game right now, using a S10, AP1, Lance attack to punch through nearly any heavy armor on the field. They also have a S5, AP3, blast template to throw at Space Marines that get too comfortable with their good saves. A brood of them can lay down touhou esque barrages of firepower with FUCKING MIND BULLETS. Three full broods of them can lay down an truly epic amount of mental dakka that will fuck up the shit of everything and anything in front of them. The only drawback to Zoanthropes is that their attacks are psychic, so Psychic Hoods can mess everything up, and that their lance attack is short range, only 18". They can be dropped into play with pods, though.