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Hi guys,
I'm rather bitter about the fact that my melee Carnifex(ex) cannot be used (effectively) in the game.
I have no idea why the game disigners thought it was a good idea to make a close combat monster with the normal 6" movement and be done with it.

So I thought to myself: "How can you make melee Carnifexes worth their cost?"

Leaping would be a rather strange biomorph, because...well...it's a carnifex. This beast leaping around would have the same effect as Super Mario on those strange Gribblings. Splat.

But how about this simple to do rule:

If the Carnifex is armed with two close combat biomorphs (so either 2x ST/2x RC/Crushing claws or a combination thereof), it gains Fleet.

Simple as that.

What do you guys think? Too overpowered? Especially in Cityfight? Or just the right buff, i mean, hidden powerfists are still a threat, whereas 6 of these fleeting Critters(+ maybe the flying boss) would be a nasty sight (except for skimmers of course)

Greets
Schepp himself

I'd say there needs to be a downside... Getting all that mass moving fast has got to put strain on its musculature, so how about the carni takes an unsaveable wound on a 4+ (from torn muscles, ripped tendons, and such) each time it uses Fleet? Also, Extended Carapace makes it too heavy, so CC Carnis with EC can't Fleet.

yeah! lets give it a minor buff that doesn't address it's problems *in* h2h and then pair that with a horrific drawback like sutekh suggests!

how about this: carnifex has base 2 initiative, upgradable to 3, fleet as standard, and give it base 3 attacks. crushing claws ADD d6 attacks instead of replacing the base with d6, and you drop the base cost by 15 points.

also, remove the option for two pairs of twin-linked biomorphs

That is a reasonable drawback...maybe you'd have to restrict it even more to make it balanced, for example the extra wound or Toughness update. Everything that makes a Carnifex big and cumbersome.



here are a lot of things you suggest, but I think that's necessary. The Carnifex is good as is in HtH, but it's simply slow as dirt. Sure, the crushing claws point costs needs to be rebalanced but since then, a simpler rule add on would be easier, imo.

Greets
Schepp himself

Posted By dumbuket on 04/25/2007 2:50 PM
yeah! lets give it a minor buff that doesn't address it's problems *in* h2h and then pair that with a horrific drawback like sutekh suggests!

how about this: carnifex has base 2 initiative, upgradable to 3, fleet as standard, and give it base 3 attacks. crushing claws ADD d6 attacks instead of replacing the base with d6, and you drop the base cost by 15 points.

also, remove the option for two pairs of twin-linked biomorphs

Gee, nothing like dispassionate analysis of a suggestion... oh, wait, that WAS nothing like it.

A carnifex is a str. 9 MC (you know, ignores saves, rips vehicles a new sphincter, etc.) with 2 attacks already, and the potential to have 7 attacks, 9 on the charge if tooled out.  Its ONLY issue is speed, not combat power.  How much were you planning to up the cost of the Carnifex for these upgrades, since it's already an asskicker at even its current setting?

And if you claim it isn't, I and all the other Godzilla army players will be forced to laugh in your face.

Hoh, steady guys...

The current carnifex isn't that über "in" melee, he maybe deals 3 wounds to enemies (I use the term enemies here because the carnifex doesn't care about AS and T), but hidden powerfister and rending CC units will surely wittle it down in the cause of a close combat.

You can see this as a problem or not. Buffing the combat abilities further, the Carnifex would become somewhat no-brain, imo.
A la: "just let it sprint across the battlefield and it will kill everything"

Unscathed units with Powerfist shouldn't be breakfast for a carnifex, and rending close caombat troops neither. Use the medium and small critters to make those expensive close combat stuff slash through 5-10 point fodder until you let the big boy out...

I think a little increase in speed would give the CC Carnifex enough threat so it's no longer ignored by the enemy (because it can catch vehicles now!)

Greets
Schepp himself

No way. That makes no sense to me.
Even back in 2nd edition carnies were M4.
There's a lot of things carnifexes are, and fleet isn't one of them!

How about giving it either a 5+ inv save in close combat? (as a bio-morph). That way the hidden pfist is an issue, but not a game ender for the big bad.

CC Carnifexes don't need any help once they get into combat, its just that they often have trouble getting into combat in the first place.

I'd be okay with some 'super-adrenal gland' biomorph that gives Carnifexes fleet but on a roll of '5' it takes one wound and on a roll of '6' it takes two wounds (with no armor saves allowed). That way it represents that the Carnifex is moving physically faster than it should be able to, tearing tendons and blood boiling along the way.


But the bigger issue isn't how slow the Carnifex is. The problem is the Tyranid army has no decent ranged shooting beyond the Carnifex, Hive Tyrant and Zoanthropes. That means if you start making your Carnifexes into CC creatures you're left with a shortage of quality shooting and your army hs to rely too much on CC to win games.

The REAL issue here is that the Tyranid Warrior is over-costed and because of that their shooting sucks in comparison. GW should have made Tyranid Warrior builds that were cost effective both in CC and shooting so players really had options on how to construct their army.

Since the Tyranid Warrior is the lynch-pin of the multi-faceted concept of Tyranid army building, when GW fudged up the Warrior's points cost they really shoe-horned the effective Tyranid builds into a few extreme options (none of which prominently feature the Tyranid Warrior).

Giving Tyranid players other choices for quality shooting (besides the Carnifex) is what would open up the Carnifex to be taken as a CC monster. . .of course it still does need some rule allowing it to get into combat faster, especially considering it starts off the table in Escalation missions.

Uh, I *am* a godzilla player. I *never* use carnifex in assault. Against anything with I4 and a powerfist, they flatout die, usually in two turns or less. The S9 is irrelevant - a powerfist is s8-9 anyway, and the shiny sparkly two base attacks means a single dead marine per turn on a good day *with* two pairs of talons.

But mainly, I agree with yak about the tyranid warrior - it's sad that the most iconic tyranid creature (and theoretically the progenitor species within the race) is perhaps our least effective unit. In my opinion it's an underperformer at any price and completely absurd given it's current cost.

A "takes a wound on a high fleet roll" rule for the 'fex would be lame, though. That'd mean 1/3 of the time, the thing murders itself on its way to the enemy. Fluff-wise, it's kind of slowed and it does very little for game balance.

Posted By dumbuket on 04/26/2007 8:53 PM

A "takes a wound on a high fleet roll" rule for the 'fex would be lame, though. That'd mean 1/3 of the time, the thing murders itself on its way to the enemy. Fluff-wise, it's kind of slowed and it does very little for game balance.

Well, with Tyranids the crucial fleet rolls are in the first two turns. After that you're gonna be in charge range almost no matter what (assuming non-Escalation missions, that is).

So if you are 'lucky' enough to roll a '5' or '6' you're getting a really good fleet roll along with your wounds so it's a double-edged sword.

An alternative idea could be a gimped version of fleet: something like D3+1", giving the Carnifex a fleet move of 2-4".

This could represent that while a pumped-up Carnifex still can't reach the speeds of a normal fleet model, his gigantic bulk also means that he doesn't ever fully 'trip up' and only move 1" (his momentum carries him at least 2" forward).

Dumbuket-

So, by playing the list, you admit that the Carnifex is pretty freaking good as-is; I never said that the kickassery I spoke of was its CC ability. A Carnifex is a force of considerable damage capability from shooting alone; buffing it for CC too, for no significant price increase, is expecting to possess the confection and consume it as well.

From what I've seen, leaping hormogaunts are your long range guys.
They move, fleet and then leap onto vunerable untils, pinning them in place until the slower units can catch up.

Maybe let'em buy a personal mycetic spore with an assault ramp for forty or so points?

So you can drop a fully kitted up carnie anywhere and have it rampage into assault?
For 40 points?
A bt broken.

Similar to a rocket jump? I like that image...

Seriously. I agree that fleet would be a bit overpowered and unfluffy, but I still think that the carnifex need to be faster if tooled for CC.
The D3 thing sounds reasonable, maybe even D3+1 even if this seems to be even less "GW-style" in the current edition. The wounding thing is a bit harsh, especially because you cannot control it. One six and you are half wounds, some lascannons pointing your way and good night to your big-ol-scary carnifex.

Thanks for the replies anyone, haven't expect that.

Greets
Schepp himself

easiest (and most legal...even though its permission only) way to get a close combat carnifex monstrosity with any speed is by using a trygon..

he's roughly a CC carnifex with a close combat build that moves like a hormagaunt or can deepstrike like a monolith into close combat..


and it's a heavy support slot not an extra force org..

Point taken, I've also thought about using my close combat Carnifex with the rules for a Trygon. But it would be even more fun if the cc Carnifex
would exist as in it's fluff.

Greets
Schepp himself

well fluff wise the trygon is more fitting to the carnifex fluff...minus the leaping and the hole digging thing...

its very large...it rushes forward ignoring wounds that would kill lesser tyranid beasts...and it's so freaken big you can shoot at it while your buddies try to poke it with sticks...

i love my trygon so much i wanna buy 2 more but kinda hesitant to with the rumors of the plastic trygon coming out...

Erm, what did you just said?

Greets
Schepp himself

Erm, what did you just said?

Greets
Schepp himself

well um...i guess i could use punctuation...

i love my trygon so much. i want to buy 2 mor, but, i am a little hesitant because of the rumors of the plastic trygon rumored to be coming out with Codex: Apocalypse.

i do however refuse to capitalize my i's bwahahaha

and the rumor would be relatively easy to make happen.

the trygon is the same size as the carnifex just with a long snake tail instead of 2 feet and a tail and 1 extra set of arms (basically)  and a different head...

infact the head actually fits on a carnifex body..

mmmm.... plastic trygons... Otherwise, I personally agree with the D3+1 rule, or mabye a different rule, like deepstrike that always scatters 2D6 away from the enemy deployment zone...

I understood what you were saying, but I never heard of the rumours your posted (plastic Trygon), that's why I reacted that surprised.

I was a bit underwhelmed as I saw the Trygon size wise. My Carnifex is almost as big as this guy.
A plastic version of it would still kick donkey, though.

Greets
Schepp himself

Forgeworld Stuff always appears to be smaller than the pictures indicate. I got the Tallarn Tank Commander recently, and he has an insane level of detail, but he's tiny. A while ago we used old plastic Epic Land Raiders to represent Cyclops Demo Vehicles and I felt a little cheap as they were so small - much smaller (I thought) than the real ones. In the same huge order to FW I got three Cyclops vehicles, and we weren't far off on the size. They're tiny.

The only thing that has lived up to its size is the Gryphonne Vanquisher turret. That thing's huge.

BYE

hehe iyou have a point..everything does come itty bitty sized...unless you get the BIG stuff..

ang'ggrath the unbound seems larger in real life...

and the hierophant is larger in real life...darn thing barely fits in most deployment zones!

the barbed hierodule also seems larger in real life...

ripper swarms are smaller in real life :/

the nests are smaller in real life (Bought 3 of the things and when they released the anphelion project i immediately shelved them....pieces of crap

and even though i havnt finished painting/putting it together the chaos warhound titan seems larger in real life heh

Back to the original concept, wouldn't it just be easiest to add "Powerful legs" 25 pts, carnifex gains fleet to the heap of other stuff the carnies have to choose from.

Maybe adding some of the cute **** that prevent it from being taken with any of the +w/+sv/+t options.

 

(From a fluff perspective, fleet represents Tyranids getting down on all sixes. I'd see a Fleet Carnifex as a "Carniphant" configuration with three pairs of scything talons. Maybe it would be balanced to allow Carnifexes selected as Elites only to upgrade to fleet for free, but fleet Carnifexes are limited to scything talons as weapon options. (?) Scything talons are the only bio-weapon in whose monstrous version I see a limb capable of supporting something as big as a Carnifex - you could imagine one of those second edition Screamer-Killer makes kicking and scrabbling its way to a target - it would probably balance the edge of its base and its talons fairly well - but had it spindly bio-guns instead of big crustaceous blades, it would be somewhat less believable.)

Procella Genus 114 points
Carnifex Procella is a specialized form of heavy assault construct used for leading larger attacks. Procella Genus Carnifexes may be purchased as Elites choices by a Tyranid army of 1500 points or greater value. The Procella Genus is genofixed as a simple, disposable design. The unique Procellum Gland, identified by Imperial Xenologists as the marking characteristic of the diverse sub-breeds that fall under this category, pumps neurostimulants into the creatures sickening vessicles. When prey-that-fights is sensed nearby, the Procellum accelerates this process, increasing the toxic byproducts beyond the capacity of the Carnifex's filtration systems. The excess flows through vents at the bases of the beast's massive talons and then along grooves in the talon itself. Each blow drips with neurocorrosive venon when a Procella Genus Carnifex throws itself at its prey,

WS BS S T W I A LD SV
3 - 9 6 4 1 2(4) 10 3+

Weapons - a mass of scything talons (+2 A, taken into account in profile)
Biomorphs - flesh hooks, Procellum Gland (see special rules)
Special Rules - Monstrous Creature; Fearless; Procellum Gland: Fleet of Talon, Furious Charge.

Question:
Is the problem with the CC carnifex :
1. That it dies on its way to close combat (shot to pieces)?
2. Anything it wants to charge can run away?
3. It doesn't arrive until too late in the game to have enough turns left to do suffcient wounds(turn 4 or later because of escalation)?

1. Not really
2. Yes
3. Yes

even if they hit h2h, they're not exactly the game-breaking, unit-eating, h2h monstrosities the codex suggests. They have a couple attacks... they usually wiff on half of them and kill maybe a marine or two with the rest (and it is a marine... it's almost always a marine). Odds are they get powerfisted to death by a support unit the following turn or two.

getting very tired of the complaining about carnifexes. "ban elite 'fexes! they're better than dreadnoughts! waaa waaa waaa!". I'd be fine with removing the "two of the same weapon" option, to be honest, but only if they got something in return... or they made medium bugs truly viable