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Since they plan to eat the planet anyway, wouldn't it be easier to just kill everything via orbital bombardment, thus averting the possibility of having the ground troops wiped out and being unable to eat the planet?

Perhaps because the nids dont have the tech to do that and it would most likely dammage the DNA that could be absorbed.

Scrubbing bubbles, dude!

Deathbot wrote:Since they plan to eat the planet anyway, wouldn't it be easier to just kill everything via orbital bombardment, thus averting the possibility of having the ground troops wiped out and being unable to eat the planet?

You do know that the Nids Recycle their dead, so the total loss is minimal, even over years, especially when you factor in the fact they will get enough new material to replenish the energy suspended.

Don't forget the nids eat everything. EVERYTHING! Even the Air! Orbital Bombardment could mess with the Air!

Well, the whole thing about the tyranids is that they want to eat all of the biomass.

So any strategy that destroys the yummy, helpful biomass is pretty fail from their point of view. Which is why none of their weapons have anything to do with asplosions or fire. Plus, it doesn't matter if all of their gaunts get shot, because they're still biomass and can be eaten again to be 'reborn'

Orkestra wrote:Well, the whole thing about the tyranids is that they want to eat all of the biomass.

So any strategy that destroys the yummy, helpful biomass is pretty fail from their point of view. Which is why none of their weapons have anything to do with asplosions or fire. Plus, it doesn't matter if all of their gaunts get shot, because they're still biomass and can be eaten again to be 'reborn'

Yes, but if their ground forces are defeated they can't land the creatures they use to eat the planet. Therefore, if they can't reinforce them, their biomass is lost. Besides, matter is neither created nor destroyed. Explosions merely make it change form. Into gas. And the tyranids eat the atmosphere anyway.

Gwar! wrote:

Deathbot wrote:Since they plan to eat the planet anyway, wouldn't it be easier to just kill everything via orbital bombardment, thus averting the possibility of having the ground troops wiped out and being unable to eat the planet?

You do know that the Nids Recycle their dead, so the total loss is minimal, even over years, especially when you factor in the fact they will get enough new material to replenish the energy suspended.

Don't forget the nids eat everything. EVERYTHING! Even the Air! Orbital Bombardment could mess with the Air!

Mess with the air? How? And they can only recycle their dead if they can deploy the creatures used to eat the planet, which can only be done after the enemy is wiped out. So if their ground troops lose, they can't recycle them.

You know they deploy them WITH the creatures.

And if the first wave is defeated, they send a bigger 2nd wave.

Gwar! wrote:You know they deploy them WITH the creatures.

And if the first wave is defeated, they send a bigger 2nd wave.

And if that is defeated too? My point is that if the Tyranids in orbit over the planet only have so many they can make and send, and should they lose then the biomass of the soldiers is lost and the planet can't be eaten. If they just annihilated the enemy from orbit they could eat the planet at their leisure.

Deathbot wrote:And if that is defeated too?

They send a Bigger 3rd Wave.

Are you seeing the pattern here? Imagine a 60 Mile Long by 40 Mile Wide Block of Carnifexes, Zoanthropes and Bio Titans

You don't know -how- they eat planets do ya?

They use spores to pollute the land. These spores transform and mutate the land. They create Spore Chimneys to help speed up the total process and kill off all advanced life faster. They create acid pools to break down biomass. And they create Capillary towers that climb all the way up to the Hive Ships to feed the Biomass to them. It's not a creature. The invasion just prevents the Defenders from taking action against these measures.

So no, they don't deploy a creature to actually eat the planet. That's all done and grown from spores. Not some huge creature. well I guess Capillary towers -are- creatures... sort of... but they're not mobile and they die once the Hive Fleet abandons the planet. So if they seed enough spores into the atmosphere, then they don't really need to fight. The spores are toxic to most life forms. But that's boring. So they invade because it makes it more GRIMDARK

EDIT: Besides, when a splinter fleet attacks, it's usually part of a bigger tendril. If that splinter fleet was destroyed, and that tendril, which would likely number several times the galaxy's Ork population, really wanted that planet, it would jam a big middle finger into the face of whoever survived the first attack and send another one against them.

They do need Rippers to bring the Biomass to the Towers of course.

Yea, but Rippers take up so little biomass that it's hardly of concern. I mean they jump into the biomass pools when the job is done anyway

metallifan wrote:You don't know -how- they eat planets do ya?

They use spores to pollute the land. These spores transform and mutate the land. They create Spore Chimneys to help speed up the total process and kill off all advanced life faster. They create acid pools to break down biomass. And they create Capillary towers that climb all the way up to the Hive Ships to feed the Biomass to them. It's not a creature. The invasion just prevents the Defenders from taking action against these measures.

So no, they don't deploy a creature to actually eat the planet. That's all done and grown from spores. Not some huge creature. well I guess Capillary towers -are- creatures... sort of... but they're not mobile and they die once the Hive Fleet abandons the planet. So if they seed enough spores into the atmosphere, then they don't really need to fight. The spores are toxic to most life forms. But that's boring. So they invade because it makes it more GRIMDARK

EDIT: Besides, when a splinter fleet attacks, it's usually part of a bigger tendril. If that splinter fleet was destroyed, and that tendril, which would likely number several times the galaxy's Ork population, really wanted that planet, it would jam a big middle finger into the face of whoever survived the first attack and send another one against them.

No, I didn't know that. I started 40k last week, have fought one battle, and have devoted most of my research time to Chaos Space marines when I decided I like them best. And if they can deploy spores to eat the planet, then they should just be able to launch an bioweapon to kill anything on the planet to be good and sure. So why don't they?

Deathbot wrote:No, I didn't know that. I started 40k last week, have fought one battle, and have devoted most of my research time to Chaos Space marines when I decided I like them best. And if they can deploy spores to eat the planet, then they should just be able to launch an bioweapon to kill anything on the planet to be good and sure. So why don't they?

Because Fresh Things are so much tastier!

And because, as I said, Just launching off a bunch of spores and waiting for everyone to die just isn't GRIMDARK 40K ENOUGH

metallifan wrote:And because, as I said, Just launching off a bunch of spores and waiting for everyone to die just isn't GRIMDARK 40K ENOUGH

I dunno, watching people scream in agony as their skin dissolves and they die painfully, helpless to respond, seems pretty GRIMDARK to me.

Deathbot wrote:

metallifan wrote:And because, as I said, Just launching off a bunch of spores and waiting for everyone to die just isn't GRIMDARK 40K ENOUGH

I dunno, watching people scream in agony as their skin dissolves and they die painfully, helpless to respond, seems pretty GRIMDARK to me.

Not as grimdark as sending billions of beasts to make people scream in agony as their skin dissolves and they die painfully while bugs eat them from the inside out.

Or as GRIMDARK as watching them get torn in half by an angry Carnifex that wants it's din-din, and then getting your limbs torn off by gaunts when it drops you

I get it now. The Hive Mind simply wants to toy with the puny mortals, giving them some hope that they can win before eating them. Hope makes things taste better, clearly.

Deathbot wrote:I get it now. The Hive Mind simply wants to toy with the puny mortals, giving them some hope that they can win before eating them. Hope makes things taste better, clearly.

The Hive Mind does not have any concept of "Hope", it just Is.

Gwar! wrote:

Deathbot wrote:I get it now. The Hive Mind simply wants to toy with the puny mortals, giving them some hope that they can win before eating them. Hope makes things taste better, clearly.

The Hive Mind does not have any concept of "Hope", it just Is.

And how do you know what the Hive Mind thinks?

Alright... I'll finally say it.

Gwar! is so right it should be wrong.

But the Hivemind does use terror tactics often so you're right about the rest

Deathbot wrote:

Gwar! wrote:

Deathbot wrote:I get it now. The Hive Mind simply wants to toy with the puny mortals, giving them some hope that they can win before eating them. Hope makes things taste better, clearly.

The Hive Mind does not have any concept of "Hope", it just Is.

And how do you know what the Hive Mind thinks?

Because I know the fluff? Because I have been reading about 40k since I was 8? And Playing since I was 10?

Google "Lexicanum", its a big Wiki about 40k and WHFB Fluff. Read and be Edumacated.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

metallifan wrote:Gwar! is so right it should be wrong.

How I wish I could sig that, but alas, I hath a Moral Code to only siggify Rules Agreements

Gwar! wrote:

Deathbot wrote:

Gwar! wrote:

Deathbot wrote:I get it now. The Hive Mind simply wants to toy with the puny mortals, giving them some hope that they can win before eating them. Hope makes things taste better, clearly.

The Hive Mind does not have any concept of "Hope", it just Is.

And how do you know what the Hive Mind thinks?

Because I know the fluff? Because I have been reading about 40k since I was 8? And Playing since I was 10?

Google "Lexicanum", its a big Wiki about 40k and WHFB Fluff. Read and be Edumacated.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

metallifan wrote:Gwar! is so right it should be wrong.

How I wish I could sig that, but alas, I hath a Moral Code to only siggify Rules Agreements

Thanks, but if the Hive Mind was operating on pure logic, with no emotion, it would have thought of the bioweapon. I mean, I'm just one mind, while it is the collective mind of quintillions.

Here are some Samples of what we "Know" about Nids:

The more I learn about these aliens, the more I come to understand what drives them, the more I hate them. I hate them for what they are and for what they may one day become. I hate them not because they hate us but because they are incapable of good, honest, human hatred.--- Inquisitor Agmar on Tyranids

As I looked into its dead black eyes, I saw the terrible sentience it had in place of a soul. Behind that was the steel will of its leader. Further still I could feel its primogenitor coldly assessing me from the void. And looking back from the furthest recesses of the alien's mind... I can only describe it as an immortal hunger. It is this we cannot kill. --- Chief Librarian Tigurius of the Ultramarines

Don't forget that the Tyranids are an entirely Alien Entity, they are not even from our Galaxy. They do not think like us. It does not run on Logic, it runs on Hunger. Desire to Feed, to Survive.

In the planetstrike book, the larger nid creatures allow the fleet to combat the planet at all levels, from the bacteria on up. It describes how the fleet fights orks with bio-titans and swams even while the fungoid spores and phage cells duke it out.

The mobile creatures are just there to protect and harvest the nid plantlike creatures that actually harvest the mineral resources of the planet. Once all resistance is crushed the rippers and undescribed "sessile" nid creatures harvest the resources from the planet and move them to the digestion pools. Then the hive ships slurp it up through the towers, drink up the atmosphere and move on.

Gwar! wrote:
Here are some Samples of what we "Know" about Nids:

The more I learn about these aliens, the more I come to understand what drives them, the more I hate them. I hate them for what they are and for what they may one day become. I hate them not because they hate us but because they are incapable of good, honest, human hatred.--- Inquisitor Agmar on Tyranids

As I looked into its dead black eyes, I saw the terrible sentience it had in place of a soul. Behind that was the steel will of its leader. Further still I could feel its primogenitor coldly assessing me from the void. And looking back from the furthest recesses of the alien's mind... I can only describe it as an immortal hunger. It is this we cannot kill. --- Chief Librarian Tigurius of the Ultramarines

Don't forget that the Tyranids are an entirely Alien Entity, they are not even from our Galaxy. They do not think like us. It does not run on Logic, it runs on Hunger. Desire to Feed, to Survive.

Awww, cheer up Tigurius. The Imperium has something that makes it completely unbeatable. Plot armor!

The gaunts etc.. are all there to just protect the Hive Fleet as it collects.


They are basically Security guards for transports of biomass.


If they did not invade and destroy then the umans etc.. could possibly harm the collection.

That's it.

In the rule-book it has quite a detailed step-by-step acount of a tyranid invasion.

Because you can't have a game where one side deploys and the 'nid player just looks them in the eye and says "We release spores into the atmosphere which kill all your soldiers and turns them into yummy soup".

Mostly because it means that GW can't sell any tyranid models, but also because it would mean that there would be very little point have tyranids as a playable race if they had no ground troops

It might also have something to do with how they "rate" the DNA they want to absorb into their creatures. There if fluff where 2 hive fleets mix, slaughter each other until one is left, then it absorbs all the biomass from the loser and all the best bits of DNA and other creature features to become even more killy.