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I agree 100% with this. I would be willing to bet they always pitured the Fex to be nothing more than a close combat monster. Too bad they suck at that.



that codex has been around for what, 2 years now? more? its not exactly new, and i have yet to come up with a consistent way to defeat it. the army is mobile, hits hard, tougher than hell to kill, fearless and is good in HtH. it has every advantage with very minor drawbacks. Compare that to IG who have huge drawbacks with minor advantages.

The big bugs are far far too efficient for their points cost. They need some kind of weakness, like getting minus one to their cover save or no cover save at all. It is assanine that a giant monster can get a 5+ save standing behind a fence that covers its shins.

MC's are meant to be the counterparts to vehicles, and they just blatantly outshine vehicles in every repsect.

I still like some sort of damage table. Roll a dice: 1 or 2: No further Damage; 3: Can't Shoot next turn; 4: One weapon/arm (chosen by attacker) is destroyed (blown off); 5: The wound is doubled; 6: The shot hits a critical area and causes d6 wounds instead of one.

Obviously it would need to be tested, but a damage table would bring them back in line w/ vehicles.

Ozymandias, King of Kings

Except, vehicles can move more, and carry units, and have more than 2 guns, can penetrate other vehicles, can be invulnerable to certain guns, etc.

Wraithlord,
Better WS, better BS, better S better T better I; one less wound.
For 120pts gets 4 12" shots, and 4 36" shots, and they can pen vehicles.

Same (or worse) save, and are limited to 3 in an org chart.

The problem is monstrous creatures, but it is epitomized and exacerbated by the current Tyranid list, which lets you bring up to 8 of them.

Janthkin is correct, if you could give the WL a 2+ save he all of a sudden becomes FAR harder to kill. Then you multiply him by 8 and allow one of hime to fly and now you have an Elfzilla list of doom.

and a Str 10 weapon, even if it cant pen vehicles, is still nothing to sneeze at. A gunfex in cover trading shots with ANY vehicle in the game, regardless of relative points costs, comes out ahead every time unless he is out-ranged.

Vehicles have their uses in other lists, especially skimmers, but MC's stay at full efficiency until they are dead. Vehicles do not.

many of us zilla players wish we did have vehicles (or an organic equivalent, some sort of giant slug with ready-to-hatch eggs, perhaps) - walking everywhere can be very annoying.

I'd give up some of the carnifex strengths in return for a biomorph that could make it Fleet of Claw or otherwise fast - a close combat fex is so so fulffy, but almost impossible to play sensibly in the current rules as the enemy just walk away.

BUt you *can't* have 8 2+ saves. The dakkafexes will all have 3+. Same as the WL, or the common marine.

People were complaining about the dakkafex, so compare it to the wraithlord.

You are correct there. Only 5 of the 8 MC's can have a 2+ save.

A Dakkafex would be killed by a tooled out WL in the open. Also, a tooled out WL is more expensive than a Dakkafex and has one less wound.
A comprable WL with a S.Cannon and wraith sword or 2 S.Cannons is 110 points, about the same as a Dakkafex. Those two going head to head and the Dakkafex wins every time since the WL will never make it into HtH. The dakka fex hits more and wounds more. That is about as direct os a comparison as you can get.

However, the real problem is the amount of MC's. It just so incredibly difficult to kill them all if they are shooting from cover at you at full efficiency until one dies. They do more damage than they take.

No drama is needed. All they'd have to do is increase the cost of a Devourer by one point. Then you couldn't build a Dakkafex for an elite slot.

Of course, if they did do that, there'd be drama galore, and with good reason. You can't put out a list, let people paint up the best build they can get out of it, then decide that 3 models, each of which cost ~$40, are no longer usable.

Well, hold on, what am I talking about. Of course you can do that, and I'm sure GW will. They like to get both edges of every sword. Piss everyone off who has to face an undercosted power unit... Then once everyone's adjusted and found ways to deal with it, nerf the list and piss off everyone that's playing the unit.

It's magic really. Maybe if I make some jokes about how chubby I am, or how I always lose at 40K, you won't be mad?



I have a feeling you're correct. I have a feeling that they thought everyone would take the "Screamer Killer" varient, and didn't even bother to notice what other possibilities there are.



At BS3, it takes 36 Lasgun shots to inflict a wound. It's exactly as unlikely as a Lasgun wounding a Plague Marine, for example... And they cost a lot less.



They can Pen AV10... Having played Speed Freeks just yesterday, I can tell you it's very nice to Pen a Trukk before it gets near you.

Aren't Devourers AP -? No AP = no penetrating hits, regardless of strength/armor.

Yup. And I spent about five minutes looking through the Tyranid Codex, trying to figure out why he'd say they can't Pen.

As a zilla player, I can tell you from experience that not being able to pen doesn't mean it can't kill low AV vehicles. Great vs Rhino hulls or speeders. Heck, I've even downed a Falcon with a dakkafex (Got damn lucky, but still...)

Posted By Ozymandias on 07/11/2007 10:16 AM
Its obscene that TMC's are this effective for their points cost. GW needs a Tyranid redux that does one of 2 things:
1) Dramatically increase the cost of all shooty Fex's (especially the 113 point "DakkaFex" . This can be done by increasing the points cost of weapon systems.
2) Introduce some sort of MC damage table on par with the vehicle damage rules. Something like every time the MC takes a wound, roll a d6 and consult the table with things like take additional wounds, lose an attack/weapon, can't shoot/move, etc.

The points/effectiveness ratio of TMC's is so far off its crazy.

Ozymandias, King of Kings

Nah, they're good but they don't need to be made worse.

Posted By onlainari on 07/16/2007 5:59 AM
Nah, they're good but they don't need to be made worse.

Why not? 

According to most everyone they are too effective for their points.  If that is the case there are only two options:

1) Increase the points
2) Make them worse to fit their points value

I'm fine with either, just providing some options.

Ozymandias, King of Kings

Because it's easy to hate against bugs. People just don't do it. Start doing it people!

People did it at the UKGT heats and the bugs went down, performing worse than supergaunt lists.

You know what's good against bugs, use them.

They went down at the UKGT because every other player there usually takes Iron Warriors. And if there is one army that really puts the hurt on a 1500 Point Zilla Nid army, it's a 1500 point Iron Warrior list with lots of Oblits and lots of heavies and some countercharge.

Posted By Voodoo Boyz on 07/16/2007 5:52 PM
They went down at the UKGT because every other player there usually takes Iron Warriors. And if there is one army that really puts the hurt on a 1500 Point Zilla Nid army, it's a 1500 point Iron Warrior list with lots of Oblits and lots of heavies and some countercharge.

From what I read of the event on this forum they didn't do well at the recent US tourney (was it las vegas?), and that din't sound like it was IW issues.

Eldar kicked butt at Vegas, Nids dominated Baltimore, IIRC.

OKay, let me try this again.

Look above, see all the posts saying the Dakkafex is too powerful??? Lets address that issue. Lets compare it to a wraithlord.

Wraithlord with scatter laser and 2 shuriken catapults... 110pts (cheaper than the fex)

Wraithlord has a better WS, a better *BS*, one less wound, better S, better T, better I

HtH, the wraithlord is much better. (much) but lets look at shooting...

The fex gets 8 S6 shots, of which 6 will hit.
The Wlord gets 4 S6 shots, of which 2.67 hit.

But the wraithlord gets to start shooting at *36"* not 18.
So how many rounds does the Wlord get to shoot while the fex is still looking for a target? Or how many times does a fex have to shoot at whatever is in range, while the WLord gets his choice of targets.

Sure, if the fex can get close enough, it can shoot, but if the WLord gets close enough, it gets another 2.67 hits with a S4 gun.

And lets not forget, while people are *female dog*ing about the sniper fexes having T7 (if they pay for it) the Wlord has T8, already.

A straight up fight is a dumb way to compare, but since it was brought up.
The Wlord would win, because the fex would never get into range.If it did get into range, it would already be wounded.
But even if they did stay in prime 'fex' range, The fex does 6 hits, *1* wound, 2/9 unsaved.
The Wlord does 2.67 hits, 1.33 wounds, 4/9 unsaved.

So the Wlord is *much* better in Hth, better range, more resilient.... but lets get back to complaining about the dakkafex...


The reason that Zilla lists are tough, is not because the models are soooo good, but because they compensate for their weaknesses. A weakness of the dakkafex is the relatively poor range and crappyish hth, but having 3 of them makes a great killing field. But they are still slowwww...





Sure, but that is what... 47 pts of guard??

Seriously, two points here.

First 20 guard (120pts) rapid fires for 40 shots, one wound.
Fex returns fire for (8 shot, 6 hit, 5 wound, 3.33 dead) for 3
34 shots, one wound
Fex kills 4
26 shots, one wound
fex kills 3
20 shots, no wound
fex kills 3
14 shots, dead fex

Wow, pretty impressive fex you have there.... 120 pts of guard will flashlight him to death.(It gets a *lot* easier with one plasma/melta gun) Now, what vehicle can that happen to??

Second issue
Lasgun was to prove a point. *every* vehicle is invulnerable to a lasgun. (and few opponents are stuck at BS3)
But what about bolters, storm bolters, flamers.... many vehicles are still invulnerable.... the best they can do to *any* vehicle is glance.


But now lets consider the predator/vindicator. AV13.... now even S6 weapons are *worthless* (including the dakkafex) unless you can get to the side. Take as many heavy bolter or assault cannon shots as you want..... nothing.
But only 9 shots will wound a dakkafex


Now lets look at the rest of the codex.... how many Nid weapons can Pen that predator?
*Only* a Barbed Strangler *if* it is wielded by a Heavy support Carnifex. Yep... that is it. And the range is 12" less...
Better yet, if 2 carnifexes shoot all game, the BS will get *1* pen total. (Granted, it will also get 1 glance from the BS, and there will be 8 glances from the accompanying Venom cannon)

Check out your armies codex.... how many ways of getting multiple S6 shots.... landspeeders, terminators, scatter lasers, etc.
The Nids get Dakkafex..... thats it, and that is at BS3
The Dakkaflyrant is S5 (assuming Toxin sacs)
the sniperfex gets 2 S10 shots and 1 S8 shot.... thats it folks
(warriors or HT with VC or Deathspitters will be S6 or S7 depending)

And it *still* only gets an 18" range....

Oh, if your tank gets assaulted by a putz unit.... you just drive away, or better yet, tank shock them into oblivion. the dakkafex? Stuck for the rest of the game. Of course, it is hard to assault a tank that has a 36" range anyway...


It only takes 7.2 shots with a lascannon to drop a dakkafex. Since you have double the range...
two annihalators have a good chance of taking one out each turn. (4.44 hits, need 4.8 hits for kill)

They are tough, yes. They are also slow, with poor range....

Uh huh, and they also compliment the whole army very well, are hard to stop from shooting when initially damaged (all you have to do is glance that vehicle once, and it's not shooting next turn, good possibiltiy of being destroyed).

Not so with the Fex. And the point is you can take 3 of them in that hyper efficient configuration. Couple that with the Sniper Fex's, the Flyrant, the walking Tyrant with Guard, and you're looking at an army that only the other most abusive armies have a hope of dealing with.

Take away the Dakka Fex as a possible unit for an Elite slot, and you're making the army much less efficient, cohesive, and much less abusive on the whole.

I still think tooled Tau and Iron Warriors will beat the nid MC list in general.

I'll use the following Magic: The Gathering analogy.

Tier 1 is the best and does not lose to lower tiers unless the lower tiers is their nemesis (made to beat them). In magic, they are called netdecks, decks that win major tournaments. The only tier 1 40k armies currently are tau and iron warriors.

Tier 1.5 is like saying it's tier 1 in that it also only loses to its nemesis, or tier 1. Tier 1.5's don't generally win major tournaments. 1500 mech eldar (2*6 dragons, 6 harlies, 3 falcons) is tier 1.5. [And yes many run double harlies over double dragons in other metas.] 1850 mech eldar is tier 1. Nid MC lists go here.

The problem with this analysis of course is that 40k involves dice and in some cases a more important first turn roll, you will get tier 1.5 winning 40k more often than magic.

Tier 2 is really good. Tier 2 will always win friendlies and dominate small tournaments. Necrons armies in tournaments are almost always tier 2.

There is no tier 2.5, it goes straight to 3. Tier 3 is the 50/50 mark. Tier 4 will pretty much never win games except against other tier 4 and really bad players with tier 3 lists.

onlainari: r120, do you think dark eldar are tier 1?
onlainari: personally I think they are but there's not enough evidence to support that theory
r120: dark eldar are funny :p
r120: whenever I face them its either tier 1.5 or tier 4 :p
onlainari: so true
r120: mostly cos theyre either played by dudes with like 10 years experience
r120: or little timmy who runs his dudes at me on foot -_-

Yep, and hit that fex with some scarabs, or one squad of guard, and it is tied up for the whole game. The tank just runs them over and keeps going.
Or stay more than 18" away, and the fex can't hurt you, the tank can hit you up to 48" away
Gee, some units have different strengths and weaknesses. Nids have to have something with an advantage, since they are missing out on so much else. Lousy saves on most units, have to have synapse for many units, no vehicles, no transports, no drop pods, no ability to penetrate vehicles, nothing better than AP4, and only one of those, very few High S weapons, short ranged weapons.
And yes the compliment the army... in the sense that they are the *only* way to get decent firepower. How many lascannons or assault cannons can a marine army have? Don't forget those ablative wounds.


That is a different argument. The statement was made that the dakkafex was too powerful, and not playtested enough. It is weaker than a Wraithlord of equivalent cost. It has substantial weaknesses.
Is a Nidzilla list strong? sure. But that is not because the dakkafex is too powerful, it is because it is a powerful combination.

Yes, you make all the Nid armies much less efficient, and much weaker. In fact, you make them almost a joke.

Don't forget that Dakka Fex's provide Heavy support style durability and shooting in an elite slot (competing with plenty o' Garbage). The Wraithlord is competing against the falcon (a top shelf unit), War Walkers and Fire Prisms (potent, but not overpowering), and Dark Reapers and support guns.

The Dakka-fex, as a unit, isn't Obscenely overpowered. Being able to take three of them in essentially unusable slots (I know, some people swear by Warriors or Lictors. Neither are really high end units) for a total of 350 points is what makes them so brutal.

The dakka fex is still too powerful for the points. No other unit in the game combines survivability, firepower, and mobility for that low of a cost. The wraithlord comparison is a bit specious, if only because most wraithlords are fielded as anti-armor, in a role more properly comparable to the Sniper-fex.

Posted By coredump on 07/17/2007 6:30 PM
Seriously, two points here.

First 20 guard (120pts) rapid fires for 40 shots, one wound.
Fex returns fire for (8 shot, 6 hit, 5 wound, 3.33 dead) for 3
34 shots, one wound
Fex kills 4
26 shots, one wound
fex kills 3
20 shots, no wound
fex kills 3
14 shots, dead fex

 

Whilst I don't quite go in for the dakkafex is some uber unit, the above is being rather generous to the guard.

In reality the above scenario favors the fex not the guardsmen.  The total 134 shots taken over 5! turns have a 51.27% chance of killing the fex, however whilst that is just in the guard favor it ignores the chance of the of very basic 120 pt guardsmen having succesfully passed all those  fallback tests. There is a 84% chance each turn of a guard squad taking 3+ casualties and having to take ld check (ld8 if I remember on basic guard?), the second test on a squad will be at -1 and with no chance to rally. Given that the fex can always pull back to range 17-18 first, a broken guard unit that rallies in its turn will find itself way beyond rapid fire range and quite likely beyond even range 24. That leaves the more likely scenario that after 5 turns the fex is still alive, and quite possibly even still a scoring unit. The guard on the other hand have very likely lost 2 scoring units, and at the least given up 60 VP, very possibly 90 or maybe a full 120.

If this was a betting sport my money wold go on the fex each time for the above scenario, as the odds favor it not the guard.

PS the most likely result per turn is 4 dead gurd,  you'd be better of reversing the rounds when they lose 4 or 3, that in turn reduces the overall shots they get which in turn reduces there odds even more.

Puree beat me to the punch,

Coredump, your math is off in every example you give. First, the gaurd would take a volley before the ever rapid fire if you insist on bringing range into the equation, which is a bad idea anyway as then you also have to factor in cover which becomes far too abstract.

second of all, as Puree said, the gaurd will be running away (ld 7) and the fex can engage them in HtH long before he takes 5! rounds of fire. The gaurd will likely take 1 or 2 casualties in the first round of combat doing none in return, plus 4 or more casualites from the shots on the way in (and BTW, the fex averages closer to 6 wounds on IG, not 5), then get rundown.

That example was just not a good one to use at all. And look at reality, Nidzillas usually punk Gaurd, big time. they beat nearly any other army out there. Gaurd with flashlights dont.



Again, the math is off. With range on an open field where they start 24" apart with infinite range to back up and shoot, yes the dakafex loses, but assuming both start in each others range, the Dakkafex averages slightly more wounds per turn than the WL even with the 2 shurikan catapults factored in (which, BTW, i have NEVER seen anyone use, they always use the flamers). The extra wound means that the Dakkafex will win nearly every time.

Comparing the Dakkafex and a Pred is a bad comaprison, the Dakka goes after infantry and light vehicles, not tanks. The Gunfex (which i fear more than a dakkafex) is the counterpart to the pred, and it is FAR better. even in the open, it will completely dismantle a pred, in cover there is no comparison. Only a chaos pred could hope to stand up to a gunfex, and even then not so well.

If you think Fex's are anythnig other than spectacular for their points then i have to completely disagree with you. The only thing that stops Nidzilla from being the uber list of doom is escalation.

I was only glancing over the post earlier, and didn't really pick up on the things Reecius said, but yes there are a few other miscalculations as well.

WL vs Fex, the fex averages 1.833 wounds a turn (before saves), so does more wounds on average to something that needs less wounds to kill. In terms of probability, if the WL that can spend 6 turns out of range of the fex the it has 27% chance of killing the fex, hardly massively overwhelming for 6 turns of dedicated attention.  Put them at range 18 for 6 turns (yes know it aint gonna happen, but this is theory) and the WL kills the fex just 15% of the time whereas the fex kills the WL 63% of the time, thats a pretty serious fex advantage.

As to nid weapons that can penetrate AV13, the Strangler is range 36 not 12, and the strangler isn't the only *ranged* weapon - there are Zoeys with S10 attacks, and Biovores (erratic, but their mines can penetrate av13), of course if we are just looking at any weapon then the nids are not lacking in melee can openers.


As a side issue, I tend to grimace a bit at the use of terms like 'does' 'will do' 'need' 'takes' when stating avergae results.  e.g. {It only takes 7.2 shots with a lascannon to drop a dakkafex}.  Whilst I understand that all you are saying 7.2 is the average, it is a bt of spin to say 'only takes' which implies a high degree of certainty. To get say a 95% certainty which is the sort of direction your phrase seems to be giving the impression of,  you would actually require 16 shots with guard lascannons (12 if bs4).

Also don't forget the WL needs a babysitter now or you need to take out one turn of shooting.

I've seen Godzilla nids do very well at tourneys.....any tourney w/ comp scoring is likely going to be difficult for them due to the stigma attached to that list. That's the sort of list that wins all or most of it's games but does not take the overall.

One of our club players had 3 20-0 massascres at atlanta w/ a godzill nid list with good soft scores. Paininting did him in and Clark walked away w/ the overall. Capt K's record at the Necro was also very good but the soft scores hurt him.

As to defeating the list: I play eldar and when I see Godzilla nids accross the table I'm automatically fighting for a draw that I'm hoping will have the opportunity to improve to a win. I put a unit of pathfinders in my standard tourney list specifically to help deal with stuff like that. Doom makes them way better at what they do I might add.  No matter how you look at it the list is really tough for most armies to face.

As for "fixing" the list: Probably just need to adjust costs / configuration of the elite carnifexes....

Lazarus.

How would Tau fare against a generic MC list?

I'm thinking railguns, mobile and static, fireknives on every crisis suit jsj-ing every turn, and firewarrior/kroot to deal with the cannon fodder.

Lazurus,

There is a difference between saying Nidzilla lists are 'too powerful' and saying that a dakkafex is too powerful.

If you want to stop Zilla lists, just limit the number of fexes to 0-4, regardless of FoC slot. (or perhaps 0-3).

Or, people can start adjusting their list to compensate for Zilla lists. Since they are slow and have terrible range.