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Hi everyone! As I read the Tyranid Codex looking at every unit available, I noticed something odd about Spore Mines, and particularly Spore Mine Clusters.
Spore Mine Clusters arrive via Deep Strike, so you place one in the designated point and then place the remaining 'members' around it as usual. After they have landed all Spore Mines are treated as an individual unit, meaning they should be affected by the rules saying
"Spore Mines that drift off the table or into a friendly unit are immediately removed from play" under Living Bomb on page 48 in the Tyranid Codex.

So lets get to the point. Spore Mine Cluster Deep Strikes. Spore Mines move. Spore Mines most probably scatter and bump into eachother, being so close. Spore Mine dies, since they all are individual, friendly units. Have I missed something? Is there an exception somewhere? I looked at the Tyranid FAQ and it didn't say anything about it.

Be sure to drop a comment, give me your thoughts

You got it right.

Yep. If, after you have deeptriked in (none are removed on deepstrike, despite touching, as they havent moved INTO each other) if any scatter "through" themselves they will get removed.

Not only the spore mine moving would be removed. Thats why you don't take units bigger than 3.

And there I thought spore mine clusters deepstroke separately, thus if you deployed a 50 points worth (5 spores) unit, you placed them on the battlefield apart from each other (no coherency applies, 5 scatter die)...
Can't remember where I got that from, but first time I put them on any of my lists, it became apparent somehow.

nope they drop as one big cluster per FOC choice
if you aren't using gargoyles (eg, you are nuts) its not a bad investment to fill your foc with single choices to cut down your opponents deployment options, 3 spore mines right in the middle of the board forces him towards the edges where your genestealers are coming in, or in some deployment types can pretty much ban him from the middle of the board (lol)

Them it escapes my grasp how can you deploy them all in a single unit, but think you have to scatter them individually, I mean, I know nid FAQ is a pain in nid player's @ss, but rendering a unit plainly useless is a bit beyond the trend, IMHO.
Just remember the unit's minimum size is 3 models, greatly increasing the chance of auto-killing itself on turn 1.

Either deploying every model separately or scattering the whole unit together each turn should have sense, but even in the second case, getting close to a single mine should activate them all, inevitably wasting the rest of blasts, farther from contact point.

To sum up, and of course if you are right (really, why not?) either the unit is broken or there is some sort of secret combo that makes it worth the cost.

I have nid codex here and I found out why I deployed them separately.
Biovore entry:"Living bomb: each spore mine model is treated as an individual unit".

To sum up, and of course if you are right (really, why not?) either the unit is broken or there is some sort of secret combo that makes it worth the cost.

Yes in most circumstances having 3 will mean at least 1 scatters into another and is removed. They are still useful in all reserv armies as you can force the enemy to either bunch up in one side or another (fun for Mawlocs and Doom) Try to spread across just half their deployment zone (fun for outflankers) or split their force in 2 (fun for deepstrikers and outflankers and allowing you to concentrate on half his force at a time). They are still useful but yes the rules are a bit stupid and they should not be subject to removal in that first move...

Yeah, but don't try to deepstrike too close to the enemy or mishaps will get them out even before landing.

One use I saw for them was shooting target saturation, but since their offensive power is shooty and not CC (it hits front AV) and moving vehicles (AV 11+, almost anyone out there) through them cleans the path efficiently at absolutely no cost for the enemy, so I discarded them.

Yeah, but don't try to deepstrike too close to the enemy or mishaps will get them out even before landing.

? They are deepstruck before either side deploys. You can only misshap by scattering off the table.

D'oh...!

They're not terribly good for denying your opponent deployment space either. As soon as there's AV 11 anything in the entire army they've made your mines completely worthless. Seriously, no value at all. Place the vehicle close enough to trigger the mines, with AV 11 facing the blast. The vehicle is immune to such a low strength and you've wasted your points.

They're not terribly good for denying your opponent deployment space either. As soon as there's AV 11 anything in the entire army they've made your mines completely worthless. Seriously, no value at all. Place the vehicle close enough to trigger the mines, with AV 11 facing the blast. The vehicle is immune to such a low strength and you've wasted your points.

? whats your point you're not deploying them to kill stuff just as area denial.

In that situation who just deployed that vehicle, you or your opponent?

Also in Dawn of War your opponent can't legally deploy within 18" of them...they can be useful.

SumYungGui wrote:They're not terribly good for denying your opponent deployment space either. As soon as there's AV 11 anything in the entire army they've made your mines completely worthless. Seriously, no value at all. Place the vehicle close enough to trigger the mines, with AV 11 facing the blast. The vehicle is immune to such a low strength and you've wasted your points.

except in some deployment types you cannot deploy within 18" of an enemy, so you can drop a big globe 36" around of "you cant put stuff here" in your enemies deployment zone.

Grundz wrote:

SumYungGui wrote:They're not terribly good for denying your opponent deployment space either. As soon as there's AV 11 anything in the entire army they've made your mines completely worthless. Seriously, no value at all. Place the vehicle close enough to trigger the mines, with AV 11 facing the blast. The vehicle is immune to such a low strength and you've wasted your points.

except in some deployment types you cannot deploy within 18" of an enemy, so you can drop a big globe 36" around of "you cant put stuff here" in your enemies deployment zone.

That's pretty genius thinking! I've never thought of it like that! may be worth the 30 points, if you roll Dawn of War.

Billinator wrote:

Grundz wrote:

SumYungGui wrote:They're not terribly good for denying your opponent deployment space either. As soon as there's AV 11 anything in the entire army they've made your mines completely worthless. Seriously, no value at all. Place the vehicle close enough to trigger the mines, with AV 11 facing the blast. The vehicle is immune to such a low strength and you've wasted your points.

except in some deployment types you cannot deploy within 18" of an enemy, so you can drop a big globe 36" around of "you cant put stuff here" in your enemies deployment zone.

That's pretty genius thinking! I've never thought of it like that! may be worth the 30 points, if you roll Dawn of War.

If you can do it, and your army contains several units of genestealers, It's a pretty bad situation for the other guy, esp against something like an IG gunline army if you have yargarbl stealers as well.

More and more, my armies contain a 200 point insurance policy.

2 groups of 3 mines, for dawn of war/spearhead
and Deathleaper, for contesting a single objective guaranteed per game.

Now, my army does take a 200 point hit for these bets that I will have those game types. But Deathleaper covers 2/3 of the missions, and spore mines cover 2/3 of the deployment.

I LIKE those odds.

Fresh thinking, i love it - aaand i kinda envy it too...

@Doomthumbs
BTW. that insurance policy of yours cracked me up a little...
.oO(Whats next? Health insurance?) *giggles*

I was actually starting to miss the D-leaper... I've grown pretty fond of him over the yrs (yes! We go WAY back!). Using him for contesting is good thinking... A shame he's only T4, as he's too damn vulnerable to S8+ - but then again, if using mines denies deployment, you might aswell look at a fully-divided army, which leaves you better capable of utilizing winged bugs and even the Leaper itself (well, with a proper amount of LoS-blocking terrain or similar!)

Doom, i must give it to you - you're living proof there's much more fun to the 'nidz than they ever get credit for

Check out my 3k reserve list. It shoves the opponents face in it pretty hard, and severely punishes any mistakes.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And hell yeah. This is a game right?
I get waaaay more satisfaction from nids than I would Space Marines, say.

Move... away? Like, retreat? GTFO... I'm never doing that.

Doomthumbs wrote:Check out my 3k reserve list.

I would love to, since all reserves is a tactic I like to play, specially with nids... Should I search for list threads you opened?

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/342936.page

You could, but its right there.

Doomthumbs wrote:Check out my 3k reserve list. It shoves the opponents face in it pretty hard, and severely punishes any mistakes.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And hell yeah. This is a game right?
I get waaaay more satisfaction from nids than I would Space Marines, say.

Move... away? Like, retreat? GTFO... I'm never doing that.

More satisfaction from 'nidz? You don't say

My sparrings plays Ultramarines, and from that i've got only two words to add: I agree!

Btw. I've commented on your 3k list...