Steal the winning tech from The Emperor’s Wrath GT and check out the top 40k army lists for Astra Militarum and Tyranids.
The Emperor’s Wrath GT seemed to have it all when it came to Warhammer 40k factions.
We’ve rounded up the top 40k army lists from the event that crushed it, so you can see what’s winning right now, and maybe steal a few ideas for your army.
The Emperor’s Wrath GT: Final 40k Army Lists & Tournament Standings
Checking out these winning army lists and their tactical synergies can really help you sharpen your strategy, especially with the latest updates to the balance dataslate rules and points.
If you’re looking to level up your game even more, think about applying to Team USA to compete in the Warhammer World Team Championships!
Plus, thanks to Best Coast Pairings, we can look back at the event as if we were all there ourselves. Click this special promo link to save $20 on a year’s subscription to BCP.
1st Place: John Work, Tyranids Army Lists
Hive Fleet Cherry Hill is basically a pop-up nightmare list. It wants to threaten three places at once, force bad screens, then punish anyone who overcommits by vanishing back underground and popping out somewhere worse.
Subterranean Assault is doing a ton of heavy lifting here: the whole army smooths damage with re-roll ones to hit, and the Burrowers leaving reserves start planting Tunnel Markers that turn the midboard into a Tyranid subway map.
The Hyperadapted Raveners are the list’s headline bully unit. Deep Strike keeps them unpredictable, Sustained Hits on their weapons keep the damage honest, and the free Rapid Ingress or free Heroic Intervention once per battle round is the kind of tempo swing that steals games.
They are also Burrowers, so they help fuel the Tunnel Marker game while being a real threat to tougher targets with their anti-vehicle and anti-monster claws.
The other character is a Neurotyrant, the brain that keeps the whole mess from wandering off to chase squirrels. It helps anchor Synapse, pressure with psychic output, and generally makes the midboard monsters and bugs play like a coordinated plan rather than a fistfight in a parking lot.
Biovores are pure utility. They are there to complicate movement, tag easy points, and force awkward choices on the opponent. The list already wants to control space with Tunnel Markers, and a Biovore adds another layer of “nope, stand over there instead.”
Haruspexes are a midboard problem solver. This thing wants to get into the scrum and start eating whatever is trying to hold primary. Redundancy matters, and a second big melee blender means trading one out does not fix the matchup.
Lictors are classic Tyranid utility: pressure, screening, punishment, and being annoying in exactly the spot the opponent wanted to feel safe.
Maleceptors are an anchor piece. They also help the list fight for the middle while the Burrowers cause chaos on the edges, and it brings reliable psychic pressure to targets that do not care about little claws.
Two of them means the list can commit one to a flank or a shove play without the center collapsing, and re-roll ones to hit keeps their output steadier across the game.
Psychophage is the glue monster. It likes sitting near the brawl, hosing infantry with its torrent, and providing the kind of close-range board presence that discourages light units from trying to steal objectives for free.
Two squads of Raveners are fast-scoring pieces that still hit hard enough to matter. Deep Strike plus the detachment’s Tunnel Marker tricks let them show up closer than the opponent wants, and if they survive the clap back, they can slip back into Strategic Reserves at the end of the opponent’s turn.
That constant threat of “they are not really gone” forces conservative play.
Then, two Tyrannofex with rupture cannons are straight-up damage dealers. They sit back, point at something expensive, and benefit a lot from rolling ones to hit. They also love when the rest of the list forces opponents to expose armor to deal with the midfield bugs.
Von Ryan’s Leapers are the early game speed bumps and counterpunch threats. They exist to make opponents think twice about advancing onto mid objectives, and they are great at forcing inefficient trades while the real pieces set up the tunnel plays.
Zoanthropes are the ranged punch that does not care about most defensive tricks. They bring reliable pressure into hard targets, and they pair nicely with the Neurotyrant’s whole Synapse and psychic plan to keep the army functioning as a single weapon.
How This Tyranids Army List Scores
It scores by being everywhere and refusing to stay dead. The Raveners, Hyperadapted Raveners, Lictor, and Leapers handle the messy work: flipping side objectives, tagging actions, and forcing the opponent to waste turns clearing units that can just leave and come back.
The Maleceptors, Haruspexes, and Psychophage fight for primaries in the midboard, while the double Tyrannofex and Zoanthropes keep the opponent honest by deleting anything that tries to brute force the center.
Overall, the Tunnel Markers tie it together by turning scoring moves into threats and threats into scoring moves, which is exactly the kind of loop that wins on mission play.
2nd Place: John Helbig, Astra Militarum Army Lists (Imperial Guard)
Grizzled Company is Astra Militarum doing the classic “take the board, dare someone to shove it back” game: Krieg bodies and Cadians plant flags, Chimeras push the pace, and Lord Solar plus the command pieces keep the whole machine humming with orders while it trades up all game.
The double Rogal Dorn package is the real threat profile, sitting mid-board and deleting anything that tries to muscle in, while mortars and Bombasts keep steady pressure on scoring units hiding out of sight.
Overall, the Bullgryn are the brick that turns a key objective into a fistfight, Kasrkin and Engineers handle the nasty close-range trades, and then Marbo, Scions, Rough Riders, and a Scout Sentinel do the annoying jobs: popping up where they should not be, stealing points, and forcing opponents to waste real units on cleanup duty.
3rd Place: Yueming Heng, Astra Militarum Army Lists (Imperial Guard)
Another Grizzled Company list plays the classic game of Guard bully-ball.
First, the orders stack up from the Cadian Command Squad and Lord Solar to keep the army efficient, then Commissars help the line stay put when trading gets ugly, and Gaunt’s Ghosts handle the annoying “wrong place, wrong time” jobs like snagging a point or messing up a backfield plan.
The Chimeras sling Kasrkin into the midboard so they can punch out key pieces fast, while the Bullgryns take over an objective and basically refuse to leave.
Rough Riders do the speed-trade thing, darting out to spike something important or flip a flank at the right moment.
Finally, the armor package does the heavy lifting, with Vanquishers hunting big targets and the pair of Rogal Dorns acting like rolling problem statements that shove lanes, soak fire, and keep pressure on the scoreboard.
Final Thoughts From Us: The Emperor’s Wrath GT
So, overall, that is the punchline from The Emperor’s Wrath GT. Once again, the winners are not chasing heroic table wipes; they are building lists that make the mission feel unfair.
The Tyranids’ army list turns the board into a trapdoor floor, shows up on the wrong side of every screen, then slips away right when the return fire is supposed to matter.
Both the Astra Militarum army list builds do the opposite kind of rude, planting bodies, stacking Orders, and backing it all up with armor that makes “just push them off” sound like a bad joke.
If that sounds familiar, it should. These are two different flavors of the same plan: take space, trade smart, and keep scoring even when the game gets messy.
No matter which faction is getting the spotlight this week, the takeaway is the same: the lists that win are being built to score first and fight second, not the other way around.
See the Top Warhammer Army Lists & 40k Tournament Schedule for This Year
What do you think of the results and top Warhammer 40k army lists at The Emperor’s Wrath GT for Astra Militarum and Tyranids?
