I might have been telling a few fibs.
Earlier in the year, updates on the blog were somewhat intermittent and although I did have quite a lot going on at that time, the real reason for the dearth of updates was that I was secretly spawning a swarm of gribbly insectoid aliens from beyond known space.
Why?
Put simply, our little gaming group has a history of producing surprise armies when they are least expected: Matt's Japanese, Pete's Tau and numerous units are assembled behind closed doors in preparation for our Christmas games.
Also, Pete isnt the biggest fan of Tyranids. He says it's a specifically 2nd edition thing, but I think he's carrying some deep-seated trauma.
Therefore I was particularly saving them for him.
The initial impetus for starting a Tyranid army was a batch of 20 Genestealers I still owned from the second edition of Space Hulk.
I had planned to save them for a classic Genestealer Cult army for 2nd edition 40k, but when this project popped into my head, already having a swarm of elite melee troops helped with motivation.
I had also picked up a Broodlord more recently, with the intention to use it as a Patriarch in the aforementioned Genestealer Cult army.
I'd mainly bought it because every so often Games Workshop sends me a £10 voucher which is really hard to spend as even with the discount, having to buy fire yvfrom their website and pay postage makes it not worth the effort.
I just about managed to get this more cheaply than from a discount retailer.
However, the final straw was when the hype for 11th edition 40k began and I remember being annoyed that I hadn't taken advantage of the deal that the starter set representer in terms of miniatures.
Determined not to miss out again, and with 21 Genestealers whispering in my ear, I picked up the 10th edition starter set before it disappeared off shelves forever. I think I paid around £50.
Although several of the units in the box are not in the version of 40k that we play (5th edition), they are useable with a little bit of imagination.
For example, if I ignore the wings on the Tyranid Prime and manage to pick up another Ripper Swarm base, they are suddenly useable.
Similarly, although Von Ryan's Leapers are absent from the 5th edition codex, they are the same size as regular Tyranid Warriors and if equipped with scything talons, they're also WYSIWYG.
The 20 Termagants are no problem, other than the fact that there were a lot of them to paint.
I should really mention that I've done the whole army with contrast paints, but began with a black undercoat and drybrushed with Grey Seer to begin. The main bodies were done with Skeleton Horde, whilst Magos Purple was used for highlights.
The carapace has been done the same way I did my Giant Ants. It was painted in Doombull Brown, drybrushed Ratskin Fresh and then given a wash of Agrax Earthshade.
The Psychophage (here pictured before I'd finished the base) perhaps provides the biggest problem, but the model is pretty much the same size as a Tervigon.
So, instead of munching on psykers, you can expect this beast to be spawning plenty of new Termagants.
In addition to the models I already hand and those from the starter set, I also used a bunch of vouchers I'd received for my birthday to pig up a couple of big beasties.
First up is the Hive Tyrant which I opted to build with wings as I thought it looked cool, and armed with a heavy venom cannon to go ce it a chance of popping vehicles from a distance.
Last up, and probably my favourite model in the army, is the Trygon Prime, a nasty looking monstrosity whichbrings both combat potential and command and control yo the horde.
I chose to build the Trygon Prime over the regular Trygon and the Mawlock because I reasoned that the extra abilities outweighed the extra cost.
Needless to say, I'm posting this now because I've finally managed to get a game in with the army - a three way battle, the Broken Alliance scenario, with both Matt and Pete bringing Eldar of differing Craftworlds (Biel-Tan and Iyanden).
I'm not the arrival of the Tyranids upset Pete as much as I'd hoped, but he did immediately pivot his army and focus his fire on the Tyranids, suggesting that he's not keen on them.
Unfortunately, he'd brought an Avatar of Khaine fir which I had no answer. The Tyranid Prime was cut down quickly, but the Trygon did manage to hold him up for a couple of turns.
Fortunately, the fiery demigod eventually turned it's attention towards Matt's Wraithguard and Wraithlord, which it battles until the end of the game.
On the up side, it turns out that Genestealers are pretty good in close combat, and paired with the Tyranid Warriors, they managed to chew through a unit of Howling Banshees, a unit of Dire Avengers and a unit and a half of Guardians.
The final Tyranid was dropped by indiscriminate fire from Matt's Jetbikes into the combat with Pete's Guardians.
Ultimately, as is often the way in threey-way games, Pete and I took big chunks out of each other, allowing the slower advancing Matt to largely mop up what was left and take the victory.
I've got a fair bit of learning to do with this army, but it definitely plays differently from what I already have. It'll be fun getting to grips with it.
No changes to my numbers in this post as observant readers with have spotted that I've been adding what I painted as I went along.
