Saturday, February 9, 2013

Mawloc vs Trygon

By TheGraveMind
Found this over at BOLS

Tie, same T, W and Sv values

The mawloc will come up as a large blast, S6 AP2 when it arrives, which averages to about twice a game. Being (very) generous and assuming hitting 5 models with the blast, considering to wound and cover saves, it comes to 2.75 per blast, so 5.5 wounds to MEQ a game.

A trygon charging with 7 attacks, rerolls to hit and S6 will cause 5.1 wounds to MEQ, and that is only in one round. Now it may take a turn or two for the trygon to even get into combat, but any round after the first surpasses the mawloc.

Granted the Mawloc has 3 base attacks on a TMC, so it could raise its kill count up a bit, but the trygon has a basic shooting attack, so we'll call that a wash.

The mawloc will almost always be able to blast in on turn 2, and with Hit and Run has a pretty good chance of getting to hit again later in the game if he lives. What he can't do consistency is hit models. Full 2d6 scatter can easily see him in the middle of no where the turn he comes in.

The trygon can struggle to get into combat, which is the whole reason for taking him. The opponent can just play keep away (though fleet helps to negate this a bit) and has a good chance of just shooting him dead if they are overly concerned. While he can deep strike in, it isn't a guaranteed that he will come in, so isn't considered as reliable, though most of the time safer.

Board control:
The Mawloc has the amazing ability to show up anywhere on the board, and do damage. On top of that, he can move opponents models, which isn't a common ability. He can also re-submerge and come back elsewhere on later turns. This makes him very strong at objective/table quarter grabbing. His ability also allows him to circumvent Greyknights warp quake power, and getting inside their zone faster.

The Trygon also can deepstrike, and avoids mishap much like a drop pod. This can allow him to appear behind enemy lines and force them to deal with him lest he be able to assault at his leisure. But he can also march up the board, running and assaulting with speed thanks to fleet. This can force target priority on him and thus save other units.

Overall, the Trygon has a lot more damage potential than the mawloc, and if you already have a way of hitting your opponents backfield by turn two (Flying hive tyrants, ymgarls, spore pods etc) then the mawloc may not be needed in your list. One huge benefit of a mawloc though would be to counter the popular idea of DA with a banner/forcefield in a landraider surrounded by support. One direct hit from a mawloc could easily remove the land raider and all contents from the game. But this is situational, and I prefer to build towards consistency.

So what are everyone's opinions? Is the unknown damage from a mawloc more fearsome than the rapid approach of a trygon or two down field?


  1. They both have their uses and it really comes down to three things.

    1. What roll do you need that unit to have in your army.

    2. How many of said unit you are running. (IE Trygons suck if your only running one of them whereas Mawlocs can do fine on their own)

    3. The armies your most likely to face. My guard army wouldnt give a crap about a trygon that might make it to me turn 3. However, a Mawloc would give me fits on turn 2 guaranteed.

    All this aside it comes down to how you play them. I personally had more luck running the Trygons but I ran no less then 2 and chose to deep strike them unless it was beneficial not too. In addition, with nids ability to bring so much biomancy powers it is hard to find point for either with Flyrants and Tervigons almost being auto includes now.

  2. Trygons all Day.

    A few of them, paird with Raveners, Yargamals, and doom is an amazing turn two combo. with Hive Tyrants to Boos reserves... Yeah.

    Gives them too many targets to shoot down.

  3. This comment has been removed by the author.

    1. As someone playing an Assault army with weak Troops, Trygons are useless speedbumps and Mawlocs scare the hell out of me.

      There's virtually nothing in my army that can't punch either of them to death easily, and a Deep Striking Trygon is 50/50 (at worst) to come in before my Plaguebearers even hit the board. But a Mawloc can just chill out (as my shooting is no threat whatsoever) and re-DS himself to my back lines whenever he feels like. If there's an Assault he can meaningfully contribute to in the meantime, he can go right on in and help bail out a Tervigon or something.

      Hit and Run is also about the most annoying special rule conceivable to an Assault army, particularly since the bastard can just disappear next turn and more or less strand a unit sent to deal with him. It's hard to put out six wounds on T6/3+ in a single Assault phase, even for my army, and if you don't he's gone.

      I basically have to either play my Plaguebearers closer to my army than I'd like to or forfeit a unit of Screamers to babysitting them.

      Though I'm quite a bit more flexible now with Ahriman in the backfield, and any given situation is much more reliant on what powers he's pulled up. I specifically don't want to see Trygon Primes now--they can challenge and threaten to ID Ahriman, whereas against non-Primes or Mawlocs, he can sit in his pile of ablative wounds and Force Weapon them out at no risk. Plus Primes have SitW, which is also a bummer for him, though most people seem to be using Flyrants for mobile SitW nowadays (which generally results in my army mulching a pair of Flyrants by Turn 3).

      But the Cultist squad generally isn't close enough to my Plaguebearers to intervene directly, and most players are smart enough to not send Mawlocs hurtling to their deaths against Ahriman.

  4. From playing you I say either take the prime because the shadows, synapse, etc. If you have room for 2, I say 1 of each. Others will tell you to have redundant units but I think you are good enough to use both.

  5. I have been running 2 trygons, and I've been thinking about knocking them down to 2 mawlocs to save some points.
    @dodger, I feel a trygon shooting the turn it comes in would do about as much to some plague bearers as a sometimes hitting mawloc blast.

    @spag, I don't really see the need for the prime upgrade, it is 40 points more per trygon, and only really gives me 6 more S5 shots. I have plenty of shadows and synapse, and making him a character will often have a drawback as well as benefit.

    1. The initial damage from either is about the same, which isn't the relevant point--either one will easily kill 5 Plaguebearers if noone else intervenes--the relevant point is that the Mawloc allows you to control the timing, whereas the Trygon just comes in whenever he feels like and you only get one shot at it.

      If my Plaguebearers aren't on the board yet when the Trygon comes in (or if they're too close to the rest of my army) then he's wasted. He's either too early or you get to chuck him at my Plaguebearers, watch him kill one or two, and then get killed by everything else.

      The Mawloc has zero worries in that regard; he gets to wait until some Plaguebearers are vulnerable prior to making any move--which, from my perspective, means I'm not able to leave Plaguebearers unprotected until after the Mawloc is dealt with, which is rather crippling since I'm either giving up a unit to protect them or putting the PBs out of position.

      Like I said, either one can kill an unprotected unit of Plaguebearers easily. But a Trygon trying that on Turn 2 is going to get himself killed, whereas a Mawloc trying it on Turn 4-5 can lose me the game.

      I certainly have no idea how they interact with any other armies in any other circumstances, all I can tell you is that Trygons (outside of Primes, given their ability to screw with Ahriman) don't worry me whatsoever while Mawlocs force me to play differently or risk losing the game to them.

  6. But can you run 1 each? Play test it

  7. The PRime Upgrade is Great against Things with powerfists. Challenge, , massacre the guy, then then win by more in THEIR turn, and hope they fail, so you can Nom Something else.

    1. I'd much rather take the 1 powerfist wound, and kill half of the squad instead of being stuck there extra turns.

  8. It really depends on what you want your list to do, or more precisely your favored angle of attack - are you focusing on disruption or unsubtle, direct assault? Equally important is what tools do you want in your toolbox to deal with opposing disruption? What are your other investments in disruption if any? The ability to move an opponents unit is huge, but less than reliable. Whichever you choose, as long as they aren't a lone theme in the list, you can't really go wrong and it comes down to playstyle preference.

    1. p.s. I agree with the Prime/Mawloc approach. I ran Prime/Harpy last weekend and definitely liked the flexibility.

  9. Trygons. It's not even a contest. Besides the fact that you only get to use the Mawloc 2-3 times in one game, you can take cover saves against his attack. I know, it makes no sense, but there it is. What's scarier? A monstrous creature with T6 and 6 wounds that deep strikes using drop pod rules (AND gets to shoot when he arrives AND has SitW), or what is effectively 2 (maybe 3) plasma cannon shots that have terrible scatter probabilities?

  10. I agree with Spag on this. Both over 2. It gives you more tools. I personally think most armies can handle 2 trygons running at them. But if able to diversify the location and threats with others it can make one or more of them effective.

  11. When fielding Mawlocs, a common newbie mistake is to deploy them in reserve.

    Never do this. If you read the rules, it says the Mawloc *atuomatically* comes in from reserve if it burrowed the previous turn.

    As such, always start the first turn with the Mawloc on the table. It's first move is to burrow, thus foregoing the reserve roll on the next turn.

    1. I just built a Mawloc/Trygon 1000 point army and was looking for extra ways to use my beloved little earthquake machines later tonight. Let me tell you, I almost made that common newbie mistake. That's definitely gonna save my butt, or at the very least make my brother's Tau army work for its victory. Thank you very much!


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