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I have to say that my favorite new unit in the 5th ed Nid codex is the Tervigon. A very unique and fun looking dude; I'm definitely going to try and work out a conversion where my 2 fexes can opt to load up as Tervies.

Anyway, the main feature that makes this guy unique is, of course, the whole termagant pooping ability. These guys could literally spray gants all over the field.... or... in the first turn dribble out a few turds and get constipated for the rest of the game. Just doing some test rolls double numbers came up far too often for comfort (anyone have the statistical odds on that?), and my questions is, when do you like to poop? Do you go for the gusto and roll every round, do you hold back for those strategic moments, and if so what are they? I read one players advice stating that he liked to poop early on objectives on his side of the board then wait until later for strategic moments like bogging down an enemy unit or sitting on an objective. Sound advice? Other comments? Thanks

I don't have any experience with Tervies but, I would wait to start creating gaunts until you absolutely have to. As you said they seem to roll doubles alot and stop making gaunts. I would get you're tervie to an objective and then if they send units at him you start pooping gaunts.

If it's a kp game, pooping is bad. ~11 gants are really easy to kill. In this situation, just throw the tervigon into a tank or tarpit something that would prefer to be shooting.

In the other 2/3 of games, objective based games, poop as often as you can. Have the gant squads go to ground, bubble wrapping the tervigon that squats on an objective. Every other gant squad you get has one goal: making it to another objective to also go to ground.

Gants, even gants supported by ts/ag from the tervigon, can be wiped out easily. If you multi assault, they squash gants and force fearless saves on the tervigon.

I generally take only one, saving the points for more genestealers.

Doomthumbs wrote: save the points for more genestealers.

Lots and lots and lots of geanstealers...

Yup. Make them drown in them. 60 genestealers with toxin sacs is 1020 points. Infiltrate 2 groups of 20 as close as possible. Infiltrate another group right behind the other for a cover save.
Shove that straight down their throats.
The rest is all AT and a HQ.
Tyranid prime for 80 points. 1100 total.
Fill out the rest of the army with hive guard.

Maybe a tervigon. Maybe.

Thanks for the input guys. Those 6 T6 wounds sure are tasty.

If I remember correctly I was up to around 40-50 some-odd genestealers. I was contemplating toxin sacs, sounds pretty sweet for extra chances at rending against MEQ.

I don't have much tactical advice, but the odds of rolling doubles is 1 in 6. If you aren't pooping as much as possible, you might as well use a different unit, though.

edit: Oh, Tervigons roll 3d6 and any double crap them out? I think that's a 4/9 chance of any two dice coming up the same.

Agreed, unless you're playing a KP game, then spawn Gaunts as much as you can. No sense in saving them just to have the Tervigon crap out on you with triple 1s.

infinitekarma wrote:I don't have much tactical advice, but the odds of rolling doubles is 1 in 6. If you aren't pooping as much as possible, you might as well use a different unit, though.

edit: Oh, Tervigons roll 3d6 and any double crap them out? I think that's a 4/9 chance of any two dice coming up the same.

Its 50% odds. 1/6 chance of rolling any number. Times three. 3/6. 1/2.

The odds are like this.

There are 216 possible rolls of 3d6.

6 of those are triples, which are also doubles.

Any roll containing a double, but not a triple, contains exactly two numbers.

There are (6 choose 2) = 15 unique pairs you can make from the numbers 1-6, and 3 places you can put the odd man out e.g. {2,1,1}, {1,2,1},{1,1,2}. Also, you can vary which number in the pair is the odd man out.

So, there are 15*3*2 = 90 doubles that are not triples, and 6 triples.

Leaving you with 96 / 216 = 4 / 9

So ... good guess, infinitekarma

The average number of turns before it will burn out is 9/4 (geometric random variable), and you shouldn't be surprised to burn out after 1 turn. The standard deviation is around 1, so any more than 3 turns of spawning is very lucky. So, plan accordingly. Only spawn termagants if you're sure you won't need them somewhere else, later.

I figured it without combinatorics. The odds of rolling three different numbers is (1) [the first die can be any number without doubling] x (5/6) [any of the other 5 numbers] x (4/6) = 20/36.

The odds of NOT rolling 3 different numbers is 16/36, or 4/9. But the expected number of termagants is about 24 before the Tervigon craps out. That only happens if your Tervigon doesn't die first to splinter cannons, though...

Disclaimer: I walked away from the computer long enough for my 13 year old cousin to post that.

My heart weeps for public education.
Yes, the correct answer is 4/9.

To answer the actual question, I poop from turn 1 until it runs out. My thinking is that Tervigons don't move any faster than termagants, so they'll get where you want them to be just as fast if they come out on turn 1 as if they come out on turn 4, and this way the two can move in different directions (synapse permitting, of course).

The only time I might think differently is if my opponent has more pie plates than he or she knows what to with.

The answer is 15/36, not 4/9.

Yup, the correct answer is 4/9.