Leaked Shield of Baal: Leviathan Tyranid Formations and Early List Builds

The Shield of Baal rules for Tyranids have been leaked (finally - been on the lookout since Monday) and there are a couple gems in there right off the bat. My two favorites are the Skytyrant Swarm and the Sporefield. The former allows a Flying Hive Tyrant to be joined to two units of gargoyles for 20-60 ablative wounds to get him across the board. The other provides recycling Spore Mines and Mucolid Clusters.

In addition to joining the units of Gargoyles, the Flyrant in the Skytyrant formation gains 6" to his synapse range.  To me, this pushes my close combat flyrant from a bit tough to pull off to a reality as, with 20+ added wounds, he should be making combat. Combined with trailing back to a Malanthrope or Venomthrope and the unit is tough to remove.

The Sporefield strikes my fancy in part because it is cheap, checking in at a bottom end of 90 points. The units in the formation recycle on a 4+ and can infiltrate, in addition to deep striking. The whole Ongoing Reserves and Deep Strike/Outflank thing is a little shady (though the Mawloc gets to DS out of Ongoing Reserves all the time - precedent). This formation essentially creates some strong board control and movement denial tactics. It also recycles 15 point units that have to be dealt with, forcing wasted fire.

In addition, the famed Skyblight formation is included. It's hard to make out for sure, but is looks like 3 Skyblight formations, a Skytyrant formation, and a Sporefield formation create a Skytide formation, which is absurdly huge.

The final two formations are the Hypertoxic Node and the Neural Node, featuring the recent kits that are not Tyrannocytes.

The first, the Hypertoxic Node, is a Toxicrene, a Hive Tyrant with Toxin Sacs, and 3 broods of Venomthropes. All regular poisoned attacks from models in this formation cause instant death on a 6, and the Toxicrene's attacks cause instant death on a 5 or 6. The Hive Tyrant also gets Toxic Miasma for free and can use it as many times as he'd like, as can the Venomthropes and Toxicrene when within 12" of the Hive Tyrant.

The Neural Node is simply a Maleceptor and three broods of Zoanthropes with Neurothropes. The Maleceptor's Shadows in the Warp extends an extra 6" and all units from the formation within 12" of the Maleceptor can reroll 1s on Psychic Checks.

In addition to the formations are new warlord traits, some of which are worthwhile while others are repeats from the Tyranid codex, and a new Detachment which has 3 required Troops and the option for 6 more in addition to 1 additional optional HQ choice. The detachment also gets to reroll instinctive behavior results.

From the leaked formations, I threw together an 1,850 point list using my two favorites, the Skytyrant Swarm and the Sporefield.

• CAD:
• Hive Tyrant: Wings, 2xTL Devourers, Electroshock Grubs
• Hive Tyrant: Wings, 2xTL Devourers, Electroshock Grubs
• Malanthrope
• 3 Rippers: Deep Strike
• 3 Rippers: Deep Strike
• Carnifex: 2xTL Devourers
• Carnifex: 2xTL Devourers
• Tyrannocyte
• Tyrannocyte
• SkyTyrant Formation:
• Hive Tyrant: Wings, Reaper of Obliterax, Scything Talons, Old Adversary
• 10 Gargoyles
• 10 Gargoyles
• Sporefield Formation:
• 6 Spore Mines
• 5 Spore Mines
• 5 Spore Mines
• Mucolid
• Mucolid
• Mucolid

The Sporefield infiltrates into the midfield and denies movement areas and threatens elements of the opposing army that wants to move forward. The SkyTyrants Swarm chains up to the Malanthrope holding things down in the back and moves into the midfield while the two regular flyrants do their thing, as do two dakkafexes dropping from the sky. 

Personally, I'm pretty excited for what these formations bring. For the rest of the leaked images, including the Tyranid Detachment (+1 min troop, +1 Optional HQ, reroll Instinctive Behavior results - kind of meh in my opinion) and Warlord Traits (better and usable than the codex options), check out the thread on DakkaDakka.

What about the new Tyranid Rules catches your eye?