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Right...... I didnt want to hijack the tyranid threat thread so i thought id start this...

Say the current encounters with the tyranids are indeed 'testing' the galaxy and adapting the genus to cope with our defense tactics. Due to my lack of fluff knowledge of terra and the ' our'general solar system in 40k, What would happen if the hive mind attacked terra from beneath the galactic plane. I can guess that if it waas a splinter fleet it would be repelled quite easily, but what if it was a combination of multiple splinter/hive fleets?
Apart from the fact it would be one hell of an epic confrontation, what are dakka's views?


Dan

Well, there are things to consider here. The galaxy is not paper thin and there are planets and everything between the bottom of the galaxy and terra. If they are still strong enough to make it through terra's defenses after this than it is what you said...... it will be one hell of a confrontation. However I love Tyranid and what will happen in my world is that they will win and they will gain all knowledge and psychic power from humanities best and be unstoppable

haha, I realise that there is quite a 'thick'? (hard to find an appropriate description lol) layer of planetary systems making up the thickness of the galactic plane, and its safe to assume the imperium has set strong defense networks in and around the neighbouring systems to Terra. But as humans are involved, there will be weaknesses
I have a gap in fluff knowledge on the defenses of terra, but im very curious as to the scale of an attack needed.


Dan

Basically, if the theory on the massive tyranid fleet that is just waiting to attack the galaxy is true than that is what is needed.

From what Games Workshop has pushed in the fluff, I don't think there are enough Tyranids currently in our galaxy to take on the defences of Terra, even if all the hive fleets worked as one. However, a massive hive fleet that makes them look like small squads might do the trick.

Armageddon isn't exactly near Terra, even if it's in the Segmentum Solar, and look at how many men the Imperium has to throw at the Orks there, so they simply don't get any closer. When GW gives the defences as pretty much countless, to me it says they've really turtled up on Terra.

I mean, there's all the hundreds of thousands of men in static defenses, and then the forces they'd pull from surrounding areas (Space Marine Chapters, Imperial Guard regiments, Imperial Navy Battlegroups), as well as the defenses of Mars, the Grey Knights based on Titan....it would have to be a swarm truly without number, and then it would be an epic saga for the ages.

What sort of psychic monstrosity would be spawned if the nids ever got hold of the emperor's DNA?......omnomnomnom

Reanimator wrote:What sort of psychic monstrosity would be spawned if the nids ever got hold of the emperor's DNA?......omnomnomnom

A cross between chuck norris and mystic meg?

If they ever did the hive mind would definitely have something to chew on

Epic Man, i read somewhere, i forgot that an estimate of the actual size of the main nid fleet that sends the current hive fleets into the milky way would require every man, woman and child to take up arms just to be able to stop them. Imagine that.

remeber:
Battlefleet Terra is supposedly larger than all other segmentum fleets put together
Terra is surrounded by defence platforms, like hundreds, possibly thousands
Terra itself is a fortress
Mars is just next door
The moon, think deathstar
and the Grey nights, Inqusition and Imperial Navy are all based out of terra

Nids would just have to make a beline for the surface, the Navy would never dream of bombarding Terra, It would be the epic battle of all epic battles, then the orks would join in cause they would feel left out

Very true, planet fall would be the nids only chance at having a crack at terra, possibly planting a genestealer brood with the aspiration of becoming a cult, forming trouble on terra? giving it a second chance


Dan

It'd probably take the entire might of the main Tyranid fleet to take down the Solar system to be honest, and I'm one who tends to overhype the Tyranids even.

Not only do you need to take Terra and its orbital defenses/fleet, but also the Moon and Mars as well.

Tyranids would lose without doubt. Humanity is far more powerful than we appear to be. To even begin to be able to land on Terra, the Tyranids would have to expend many Hive Fleets.

Tyranids, like any predator, are lazy. They won't attack anywhere near terra till they've exhausted other, easier resources. This is good for them because, by this point, the imperium will be in a bad spot, making the Tyranids' job easier. The splinter fleets will probably circle in and wait till they've collected together and are good and ready.

If tyranidsw ever reached terra then, as a swarm, i think they would doninate it. However, if the imperial fleet and chaptor fleets reached terra b4 the tyranids, i reckon they'll beat back the tyranids with some fancy stategies, like in Taris Ultra


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If tyranidsw ever reached terra then, as a swarm, i think they would doninate it. However, if the imperial fleet and chaptor fleets reached terra b4 the tyranids, i reckon they'll beat back the tyranids with some fancy stategies, like in Taris Ultra

The Tyranids are on their way to Terra anyway. Two hive fleets, Scylla and Charybdis, are on their way there. The good ol' astronimican is like a huge buffet sign.

Scylla and Charybdis are going to be destroyed before they ever see terra. As I said, the main hive fleet outside the galaxy that has been sending these small fleets is what is needed to take down terra and eat the emperor.

Daykinator wrote:If tyranidsw ever reached terra then, as a swarm, i think they would doninate it. However, if the imperial fleet and chaptor fleets reached terra b4 the tyranids, i reckon they'll beat back the tyranids with some fancy stategies, like in Taris Ultra


Automatically Appended Next Post:
If tyranidsw ever reached terra then, as a swarm, i think they would doninate it. However, if the imperial fleet and chaptor fleets reached terra b4 the tyranids, i reckon they'll beat back the tyranids with some fancy stategies, like in Taris Ultra

Please use better grammar and spelling...
And if you mean every single Tyranid together... well then yeah they could probably win but the casualties they would take would be onstrous.
If you mean single hive fleets then no. They wouldn't even get near. The Sol system has the biggest and best in space defenses and ground defenses come to think of it, not to mention the amount of chapterfleets and other sector fleets that would be helping...

The Tyranids would attack Terra, put up a decent fight, and lose. However, with the knowledge the Hive Mind gathered from their loss, it would make a new fleet that fixes the flaws the last one had. They will then proceed to launch another attack on Terra and win.

See, whenever I look at the fluff pages, it only ever shows the action on the veeeeery tips of the tendrils.

The rest of the tendril is like the width of a quarter of the galaxy.

I had always assumed the Tyranids were going to eat everything, thus the "Time of Ending"


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Enough to choke out pretty much everything.

Eh. I feel to gather enough knowledge from the attack they'd have to get to the inner sanctum of Terra, where the best and biggest defences are going to be. To do that, they'd need to throw almost everything they had at it to do it, which would weaken them enough to have a followup taken against them. On top of that, they would have little to no biomass for their losses.

Personally, I think they'd throw a huge force at Terra, get beaten back and spend a lot of time licking their wounds, but another race will see Terra being weak and start to invade. Cue Mankind constantly fighting off invasions at the heart of the empire... In short, 'Nids wouldn't win, but Humanity would be screwed, in my opinion.

If Tyranids are at Terra's doorstep that the imperium is in rough shape. There won't be support from anywhere else and they will be surrounded, and every fleet will have joined back together in one giant force.

Van Braun wrote:Eh. I feel to gather enough knowledge from the attack they'd have to get to the inner sanctum of Terra, where the best and biggest defences are going to be. To do that, they'd need to throw almost everything they had at it to do it, which would weaken them enough to have a followup taken against them. On top of that, they would have little to no biomass for their losses.

Why do you think that the Tyranids use most of the biomass they harvest? They don't. GW did a little writeup a while ago, and just one planet proves so much biomass, the fleets seen couldn't possibly be carrying it or even using it. It's somewhere in the void being stockpiled - I mean, there's even fluff about hiveships that dwarf Imperial battleships that arrive in the final stages of consumption that drink it all up. There's so much biomass being harvested and so many hive ships that are only ever seen after a planet is consumed, that they could very well outnumber even Orks. And that's not even considering the theory of the Tyranids that are in the galaxy are just the tip of the iceberg.

-Loki- wrote:

Van Braun wrote:Eh. I feel to gather enough knowledge from the attack they'd have to get to the inner sanctum of Terra, where the best and biggest defences are going to be. To do that, they'd need to throw almost everything they had at it to do it, which would weaken them enough to have a followup taken against them. On top of that, they would have little to no biomass for their losses.

Why do you think that the Tyranids use most of the biomass they harvest? They don't. GW did a little writeup a while ago, and just one planet proves so much biomass, the fleets seen couldn't possibly be carrying it or even using it. It's somewhere in the void being stockpiled - I mean, there's even fluff about hiveships that dwarf Imperial battleships that arrive in the final stages of consumption that drink it all up. There's so much biomass being harvested and so many hive ships that are only ever seen after a planet is consumed, that they could very well outnumber even Orks. And that's not even considering the theory of the Tyranids that are in the galaxy are just the tip of the iceberg.

Didn't know most of that, cool piece of fluff there. My statement was eithe rworded wrongly or misinterpreted, to clarify, I meant to say that I don't think that if they were trying to gether knowledge to land the killing blow, they wouldn't commit all of their power, which wouldn't completely overwhelm the Imperium, which means that they would lose and be unable to take the biomass from the Custodes etc. They'd gather tactics, but not the superior genetics. That's all I was saying.

Personally, although the very heart of the Tyranid race is an unknown quantity, I believe that once the IoM realised the size and strength of the Tyranid threat heading towards Terra they'd pull back the vast majority of their forces to defend it.

I personally believe that in such a case the IoM could be able to defeat the Tyranids (once again, unknown quantities of course), however they would suffer crippling losses, at least temporarily.

As a result, the IoM would eventually die as a result of such an invasion. Although I believe they'd beat back the Tyranid threat at a huge cost, they would leave themselves vulnerable to the predations of other races and threats, allowing the likes of Tau, Orks, Necrons and Chaos to expand.
Ultimately causing an almost 'Old Night' scenario again, but worse.

Its possible the IoM could prevail. However the resulting opportunistic invading forces would push them over the edge.

I am Inclined to think that the invasion would fail for several reasons, Shadow In the Warp takes away the element of surprise for the Tyranids(hence the ability on Tarsis Ultra to get some DKoK Valhallans Ultramarines and Mortifactors to defend that planet). So I would imagine the battle that would result in the Sol System(since I could easily see the fight taking up the whole system) would put the battles for Armageddon to shame in the number of whole SM chapters, battalions of IG, massive fleets etc. I would actually be legittimately surprised if the Tyranids even set foot on holy terra .If they did I am more inclined to think they would rather blow the world to smithereens then let their xeno claws touch the Emperor.

Wardragoon wrote:I am Inclined to think that the invasion would fail for several reasons, Shadow In the Warp takes away the element of surprise for the Tyranids(hence the ability on Tarsis Ultra to get some DKoK Valhallans Ultramarines and Mortifactors to defend that planet). So I would imagine the battle that would result in the Sol System(since I could easily see the fight taking up the whole system) would put the battles for Armageddon to shame in the number of whole SM chapters, battalions of IG, massive fleets etc. I would actually be legittimately surprised if the Tyranids even set foot on holy terra .If they did I am more inclined to think they would rather blow the world to smithereens then let their xeno claws touch the Emperor.

Good point, they would definitely be less lazy than when the shadow envelopes fringe worlds and "unimportant" colonies. However the tactic the 'nids use will be very important; go behemoth style and just drill towards Terra? Kraken and just have tons of tendrils in many areas scattering the defending forces? Maybe Leviathan and pincer the entire system stopping all communication.