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Fateweaver wrote:

I don't do tournaments but I'd hardly say the 'nids are that bad and I do play against competent players in my group. Yep, I win more than I lose, guess that really proves that 'nids suck.

Fateweaver wrote:
I know my opponents don't suck so I guess they don't suck all that bad.

All things being equal, (meaning you use the same codex as everyone else) the only variable is the quality of your opponents.

For friendly, non tournament games nids are just fine the way they are.

Anyone saying otherwise plays friendly games against people using tournie lists or doesn't know how to play 'nids...

Fateweaver wrote:For friendly, non tournament games nids are just fine the way they are.

Anyone saying otherwise plays friendly games against people using tournie lists or doesn't know how to play 'nids...

The Quoted post is brought to you by the Dakka Casual Players Mafia

One of the top three players in local tournaments is non-zilla 'Nids. I myself restarted 'Nids recently, non-zilla, and am currently sitting on 5 wins, 2 ties, 0 losses. Half of those are from a tournament.

Are 'Nids the best army around? No, but they're hardly the laughing stock of 40k. That job is reserved for Necrons.

Fateweaver wrote:For friendly, non tournament games nids are just fine the way they are.

Anyone saying otherwise plays friendly games against people using tournie lists or doesn't know how to play 'nids...

No, I have used them in Friendlies. They still stink. Even the most casual of casual gamers I have played against have gone `Oh, so I just kill the synapse creatures?', turned their Dark Reapers, etc onto the Warriors/etc and finished them off in a turn or two. I now have no scoring units, a bunch of useless Gaunts, and not enough Carnifeci to hope to table them. Gaunts are too useless, Lictors are a joke, and Biovores just do not compete with Carnifeci (but, yes, if Carnifeci were less powerful, Biovores would not look as bad as they do). The Fast Attack options are just a joke.

Hmm, I have no less than 6 syanpse creatures in 2500 pts and I never have snyapse issues. Although I do only run 2 broods of guants, 1 spine and 1 hormo and yes the horms do disappoint but synapse has never been an issue.

If I can replace the gaunts with more stealers before the new codex is out I'll drop synapse on the zoants to make them a little cheaper. Maybe give each of them the Horror so my opponents will have a choice of shooting at them and trying to go through a 2+ save/4++ for being screened by my tyrant and his guard or assaulting them which being within 4 models with Scream is going to mean needing 4's on a Morale roll or standing there in front of some very pissed off 'nids.

Not saying the codex is NOT weaker than the current crop; I'm saying it's not absolute garbage, I reserve that for the 3.5 CSM 'dex.

Flame me for saying that about the old CSM 'dex, someone will. LOL

Something I always thought was cool, and was surprised when they came up with Rending instead, was the idea that a brood of Tyranids would be capable of taking down vehicles like a Talos's Claws rule where the number of hits could translate into bonuses for a single hit against the vehicle. Rending, like the Heavy Close Combat Weapon, seems to me to be a kludge, whereas there was something right about how the Talos affected vehicles, particularly for swarms.

So it's a bit of a wish-list item, but I think it would be cool if a brood of Tyranids could sacrifice successful hits on an enemy model for additional points of S on a hit to represent the swarm tearing its victims apart in a well-co-ordinated display of violence.

For example, suppose a brood of Termagants gets thirty attacks, and hits with fifteen against a Land Raider. The brood could get one automatic penetrating hit (S3+14), or two hits, one at S9 and the other at S10 (S3+6 & S3+7).

Make this an effect of having the brood within Synapse, and suddenly those little bugs can pull down tanks.

PS: I agree with Fateweaver about the 3.5 Chaos Space Marine Codex: the 4th edition one got me back in the hobby.

Fateweaver, if you stopped posting about your opinion of the Nids' power level you'd annoy us a bit less which would improve your image. You're not going to convince us, especially when you pointed out that you're not a serious player AND you skipped over my pointing out why everything else in the codex was garbage.

I know for a fact that the next codex could be the same as the current codex but with doubled point costs and people like you would still play the army (and defend it in the same way). You appear to be immune to logic, and thus this conversation isn't appropriate for you.

So what, Fateweaver isn't entitled to his opinion because a loudmouth like you says so?

He's entitled to his opinion, but he's perpetuating an argument without actually contributing to it.

Do you always refer to yourselves in the plural Broken?

Broken Loose wrote:Fateweaver, if you stopped posting about your opinion of the Nids' power level you'd annoy us a bit less which would improve your image. You're not going to convince us, especially when you pointed out that you're not a serious player AND you skipped over my pointing out why everything else in the codex was garbage.

How about this for you then. I've won 6 Gladiator tournaments including the Adepticon Gladiator. I've won the Adepticon Team event and finished in the top 5 two other times. I've also won the Ard Boyz Semin-finals twice. I think that qualifies me as a serious tournament player. Yes there are some bad units in the Nid Dex, as is the case in every codex. The current nid codex can produce a very competitive tournament list. There is no doubt about that. The BOLS tourney winner, over 7 tournament games to remove luck, was a standard Tyranid list. This list included three units of 20 Hormagaunts and they worked very well over 7 games.

Serious tournament players can make almost every codex a serious tournament list.

DarthDiggler wrote:How about this for you then. I've won 6 Gladiator tournaments including the Adepticon Gladiator. I've won the Adepticon Team event and finished in the top 5 two other times. I've also won the Ard Boyz Semin-finals twice. I think that qualifies me as a serious tournament player. Yes there are some bad units in the Nid Dex, as is the case in every codex. The current nid codex can produce a very competitive tournament list. There is no doubt about that. The BOLS tourney winner, over 7 tournament games to remove luck, was a standard Tyranid list. This list included three units of 20 Hormagaunts and they worked very well over 7 games.

Serious tournament players can make almost every codex a serious tournament list.

Okay, I'll bite. Post your list.


Oh, on the BoLS tourney winner, let's look at who he fought over those 7 rounds, based off his batreps:
Game 1: Footslogging marines with landspeeders.
Game 2: Footslogging Berserkers and 2 defilers. No daemon princes, obliterators, plague marines, nothing.
Game 3: Abbadon, a single daemon prince, and more footslogging Berserkers.
Game 4: A really good Imperial Guard list that kicked his ass 14 ways to Thursday. During the fight, "Goat boy had come over and checked on the game and we had a small talk about power lists vs. fun lists." If I was at a tournament and the tournament organizer came over to talk about how fluffy my list was, I'd start worrying.
Game 5: Army 1 but with Vulkan. "Then it happened, my zoie actually shot something with warp blast and blew it up!" If you went 5 games in a tournament without blowing up an enemy vehicle using a footslogging army and STILL managed to nab first place, doublecheck to make sure you're not playing at Disney World.
Game 6: More Salamanders. "The only armor he had was a Land Raider Redeemer and two Iron clads, plus drop pods."
Game 7: Fighting the IG guy again but this time the IG player took it easier on him and he rolled better.


I made it to Semis at 'Ard Boyz and threw my final so my opponent could attempt to place 3rd (whoever won would have been in the runnings for 3rd, and he's a good friend of mine). I fought in round 1 twice for fun. Here are my opponents:
Round 1, Day 1:
Game 1: Mechanized Dark Eldar.
Game 2: Mechanized Orks and Kommandos with Nob Bikerz and Kanz.
Game 3: Mechanized Plague Marines, 2 Lash Princes, 9 Oblits.

Round 1, Day 2:
Game 1: Elfzilla.
Game 2: Mechanized Eldar.
Game 3: Nidzilla.

Round 2:
Game 1: Mechanized Eldar.
Game 2: Mechanized Orks and Kommandos with Loota spam.
Game 3: Mechanized Orks and Kommandos with Nob Bikerz and Kanz.


So, the winner at the BoLSCon had a bad Tyranid list, the 2nd place guy had a bad Ork list, and the rest of the tournament was footslogging marines. Luck be damned.

BoLS Frontpage wrote:I think their success has a lot more to say about the quality of their players than the perceived strength of the armies.

In other words, with the exception of the IG player, everybody at the tournament sucked. The BoLSCon argument of non-Zilla Tyranid lists being "tournament quality" doesn't hold any water-- especially when the tourney organizer was going around scrutinizing the power levels of the players' lists.

Aduro wrote:Do you always refer to yourselves in the plural Broken?

I'd say the plural is for everyone who has more or less given up on participating in threads like these because of posters like Fateweaver who go "la la la la everything is fine" and more or less disregard any proof that the codex is mostly garbage at the moment. So I'd say the plural works just fine!

Nice personal attack. I'm not immune to logic. You are sticking your fingers in your ears and shouting "lalalalala" like some little kid that doesn't want to listen.

I posted what units I use and how I use them and I did say that I also feel that hormogaunts suck. I can make ALL of the units I use in my army work and do what they want. Just because they are not tournament optimized does not make them suck.

I'm arguing with people saying that Tyranids are garbage. I can make them work and win with suboptimal units against competent opponents. Not every goddamn Marine army is 'Mech, not every IG list is 9 Ven, not every ork army is 'Nob biker heavy. Sheesh, come down off your high horse Broken and realize just because a codex can't win a tournament more than it loses doesn't make the codex bad. It's the goddamn tournament, I'm better than you because I'm hardcore, players that ruin this game. Except for that persons own self-inflated ego nobody cares if a person can stomp and get a massacre every game in a tournament involving plastic toy soldiers.

Compete in the Olympic games and win the Gold and then I'll be impressed. Otherwise your opinion on what is good or bad in a codex has no more weight than mine.

Darth did say "standard" Tyranid list. Standard, contrary to interweb belief, does not automatically mean suboptimal. WAAC lists are the minority, not the means, to the relevance of a good codex.

I'd say the plural is for everyone who has more or less given up on participating in threads like these because of posters like Fateweaver who go "la la la la everything is fine" and more or less disregard any proof that the codex is mostly garbage at the moment. So I'd say the plural works just fine!

Wow, way to not pay any attention to what I post and just post your own opinion. In a NON-tournament setting against armies that ARE NOT optimized for tournaments (you know, the imaginary make believe armies that most tournament players can't conceive exist outside of tournaments) Tyranids do just fine, in fact they are better than fine. I take Lictors and Broodlords and Genestealers and Warriors and Raveners. I have a fluffy army and a themed army and I use the "garbage" units and I still win more than I lose. I'm not saying the codex is fine for tournaments but a codex should not be judged on how it does in something that constitutes maybe 20% of the hobby.

As I said in the post before yours. Thinking someone who plays a "fun" army using suboptimal lists as being someone immune to logic and common sense is a personal attack and is a troll. A codex is only garbage if it cannot win at all, even in friendly games against friendly, themed or fluffly lists. I merely pointed out that while some units are garbabe, with which I do happen to agree hormogaunts fall into that category, the codex as a whole is not garbage. If it was it wouldn't even be possible to win friendly games and I know 1'000s of 'Nid players who don't do tournaments that would laugh in your face or spit in your eyes (or both) and tell you to stick a sock in it.

@fate: I'm not at all sure what the Olympics has to do with Warhammer, anymoreso than actual marksmanship or running ability.

I gather it's something to do with competition. I think he's suggesting that there's an element of real competition in the Olympics that makes claims of being a competitive Warhammer player seem somewhat ridiculous.

John,

It's addressing the fact that some players feel that because they play competitively a game involving plastic models that their opinion on a codex should hold more weight and relevance than someone like me who doesn't do tournaments.

Winning Olympic Gold is far more impressive to more people than winning a game of plastic toy soldiers, hence why I said if he wins Olympic Gold I'll applaud for him and grant him recognition. Until such time comes, if ever, he and his opinions on the codex hold no more bearing than someone who feels the codex is not total garbage.

Edited in response to Nurglitch.

Well, my opinion is that most WAAC lists play themselves or at the very least could be played by MJ's pet chimpanzee but I've been shot down and told it takes skill to dual lash opposing units into the open every turn and drop 3 or more plasma blasts onto that unit using the 9 oblits found in such list. Sounds fairly easy to me to achieve but I don't do tournaments so I'll be told I'm just blowing smoke out my ass.

I'm not against a new Tyranid codex. I look forward to the new models that will come with it more than the rules themselves. I just don't feel the current one is as bad as some claim it is and I have posted why I feel that way. I even start my posts with something to the effect of "this is how I feel" or "in my opinion." If people with differing opinions feel the need to flame me to raise post count or inflate their ego then nothing I say will matter to them. I am not the one with the "finger in ear" syndrome, some of the accusers should look in the mirror to see who's really doing it.

Broken Loose wrote:[

Okay, I'll bite. Post your list.

Game 7: Fighting the IG guy again but this time the IG player took it easier on him and he rolled better.


I made it to Semis at 'Ard Boyz and threw my final so my opponent could attempt to place 3rd (whoever won would have been in the runnings for 3rd, and he's a good friend of mine). I fought in round 1 twice for fun. Here are my opponents:

First I rarely post lists and almost never a good list. That's for people who need an ego boost because that can't win anything outside the 15 year old Saturday tourney at the GW shop. Next, I like how you say the IG took it easy. Last round of a two day tourney and after all that time invested he probably just said 'screw it! I'll charge with my veterans.'. I don't think so. Finally it is easy to get to a Semi-final, it is another thing to win it, which you couldn't do. It sounds convenient to say you threw the last round game. We've heard that before from someone in Utah. What makes it worse for you is that it shows a lack of character on your part and an ability to cheat other tournament players for your own justification.

You threw the last round of the Ard Boyz for a friend? You tried to team up and rig the tournament so someone, who would be deserving to go to Chicago, would be denied by your actions. This has to be the very worst act of Unsportsmanship and dirty underhanded play I have ever heard of. At least when you cheat to someones face they have the opportunity to call you on it, but what you did was cheat someone else out of their rightful finish and possible chance to go to the Ard Boyz final behind their back. You might as well have been running the tournament and changed the scores in the computer.

If you want to scream to the heavens that you are unable to get a Tyranid army to work, then go right ahead. There is no need for me to argue with your lack of army list building or tactics on the tabletop, you admit you stink at it and can't get it done with the Bugs. Apparently there are other people who play this game who can get them to work. It is not my job to educate you, you go figure it out for yourself. I would suggest getting rid of your defeatest attitude to begin with and instead of trying to tear down other posters comments you should try to listen and learn.

Broken Loose wrote:

DarthDiggler wrote:How about this for you then. I've won 6 Gladiator tournaments including the Adepticon Gladiator. I've won the Adepticon Team event and finished in the top 5 two other times. I've also won the Ard Boyz Semin-finals twice. I think that qualifies me as a serious tournament player. Yes there are some bad units in the Nid Dex, as is the case in every codex. The current nid codex can produce a very competitive tournament list. There is no doubt about that. The BOLS tourney winner, over 7 tournament games to remove luck, was a standard Tyranid list. This list included three units of 20 Hormagaunts and they worked very well over 7 games.

Serious tournament players can make almost every codex a serious tournament list.

Okay, I'll bite. Post your list.


Oh, on the BoLS tourney winner, let's look at who he fought over those 7 rounds, based off his batreps:
Game 1: Footslogging marines with landspeeders.
Game 2: Footslogging Berserkers and 2 defilers. No daemon princes, obliterators, plague marines, nothing.
Game 3: Abbadon, a single daemon prince, and more footslogging Berserkers.
Game 4: A really good Imperial Guard list that kicked his ass 14 ways to Thursday. During the fight, "Goat boy had come over and checked on the game and we had a small talk about power lists vs. fun lists." If I was at a tournament and the tournament organizer came over to talk about how fluffy my list was, I'd start worrying.
Game 5: Army 1 but with Vulkan. "Then it happened, my zoie actually shot something with warp blast and blew it up!" If you went 5 games in a tournament without blowing up an enemy vehicle using a footslogging army and STILL managed to nab first place, doublecheck to make sure you're not playing at Disney World.
Game 6: More Salamanders. "The only armor he had was a Land Raider Redeemer and two Iron clads, plus drop pods."
Game 7: Fighting the IG guy again but this time the IG player took it easier on him and he rolled better.

BoLS Frontpage wrote:I think their success has a lot more to say about the quality of their players than the perceived strength of the armies.

In other words, with the exception of the IG player, everybody at the tournament sucked. The BoLSCon argument of non-Zilla Tyranid lists being "tournament quality" doesn't hold any water-- especially when the tourney organizer was going around scrutinizing the power levels of the players' lists.

I hope you are being sarcastic on that last bit, as I was playing on the 2nd place table on game 6 out of 7 with my Salamander Marines... Id have to say his army wasnt all that (I should know I play nids), but he did play them differently then I am used to seeing.

That and the fact I rolled 11 to try to assault a Tyrant with the Horror with my Vulcan and we FUBARED the rules in assault that caused my 2 ironclads to die to a group of hormagaunts and a single carnifex.

First I rarely post lists and almost never a good list. That's for people who need an ego boost because that can't win anything outside the 15 year old Saturday tourney at the GW shop.

Ok, the rest of your post about how cheating and throwing games is bs - I agree.

But this? What? Posting good lists is for people who need their ego fed?

Whaaaaaaaaaat? So you should only post bad lists?

... I'm honestly completely stunned by the (lack of?) logic behind this. What the hell is wrong with good list building? It's like saying feth trying to figure out a good opening for chess, I like making zig-zag patterns with my pawns -_- (that was my pro-strat at age 5, offensive pawn line, no can defend!!).

Okay, carry on, just needed to rant about this.

number9dream wrote:

First I rarely post lists and almost never a good list. That's for people who need an ego boost because that can't win anything outside the 15 year old Saturday tourney at the GW shop.

Ok, the rest of your post about how cheating and throwing games is bs - I agree.

But this? What? Posting good lists is for people who need their ego fed?

Whaaaaaaaaaat? So you should only post bad lists?

... I'm honestly completely stunned by the (lack of?) logic behind this. What the hell is wrong with good list building? It's like saying feth trying to figure out a good opening for chess, I like making zig-zag patterns with my pawns -_- (that was my pro-strat at age 5, offensive pawn line, no can defend!!).

Okay, carry on, just needed to rant about this.

I just don't want other players to see everything in my army until I am done playing that army. It's like opening football practice to the other teams to see. Call it superstition, call it paranoia, call it smart list building. I'll give you my list before we play, but I don't want to let someone see a rundown of what I'm bringing weeks in advance.

That is a much better reason, I think. I don't have a problem with you not wanting to post your list (although it does limit discussion somewhat, but it's fair) =]

It's addressing the fact that some players feel that because they play competitively a game involving plastic models that their opinion on a codex should hold more weight and relevance than someone like me who doesn't do tournaments

I don't think that is the point. The point is to bring a tourney perspective on Tyranid units and their effectiveness. Tournaments that are run as "hardcore" or otherwise for winning and not for fun are great for pointing out the limitations and inequalities present in a codex, because spread over so many tournaments and games, the relative skill of the players becomes more of a constant and the unit performance is allowed to be seen as is. In this light the many important arguments against Tyranid units have been made, again and again, and one guy winning a tourney with a very nicely modeled Tyranid army doesn't make these limitations cease to exist. All respect to him, and I like the army. But it doesn't make the points made against the Tyranid codex invalid.

Might sound all good and well to you but me being called an illogical child who will not listen is not needed. My reasons for the codex not being a steaming pile of gak are as valid as the reasons given that it is. 2 different perspectives, 2 different opinions. Neither one wrong.

It irritates me that winning with a codex that is not uber OTT in a tournament is seen as a fluke or just luck regardless of opponents or player skill. I counter with the argument that I'd rather win through luck or skill than win by using a seriously broken power to manipulate my opponents army in such a way he cannot counter it.

I would love it if GW would stop promoting and worrying about tournaments and build codeciies for fun. 2nd edition was the "fun" edition; ever since it's no longer about fun, it's about what works best.

If min-maxing and stomping the crap out of an opponent because he brings an army that can't counter lash (nids, cron, any non-mech army) is someones idea of fun than I really feel sorry for those people who get their rocks off in that manner.

I see the same attitude in 40k as I did years ago in paintball. I quit the latter because in order to play I would have had to play in tournaments and that's not what appeals to me.

So I say it for a 3rd time. I have nothing against a new 'dex for 'Nids as with a new 'dex comes new models, which to me are AS important as the rules. I AGREE that hormogaunts suck for the points, what I DISAGREE on is that the codex as a WHOLE is garbage. I'm not going to post a win-loss record as that's just a measure of epeen IMO but I'll say I have won more than I have lost, against people who have a more tactically sound mind than me. No one in my group plays WAAC lists so in the grand scheme of things IN MY GROUP the codex is a good, balanced codex.

My thinking this and experiencing this is no way LESS relevant than someone who only plays 40k in tournaments and who only wants a better codex to raise the power bar. Tournament players are the minority; not the majority. Make the codeciies fun to play in a FRIENDLY game first, even if the units aren't exactly the most powerful or game breaking. If the WAAC players figure out the game winning army (and they will as that is the only thing that fuels there existence is mathhammering a codex until not a single equation is missed) than so be it. I just don't want them telling me that everything else is garbage and the codex as a whole sucks. I swear a nuclear physicist probably uses math less than your average 40k tournament player in any given month. It's only when someone tells me that a codex sucks because it cannot place first in 'ard boyz is when I get frazzled and annoyed. To that person Lictors suck, for me they do what I want them to and they fit the theme of my army.

So many complaints about lack of fluff in codeciies. From what I'm gathering nobody gives a damn about the fluff anyway, they only care that X unit is so many points and can majority of the time beat up Y unit so Y unit sucks compared to X unit even if Y unit has cooler rules or fluff.

I wonder what all this argument will solve? GW is going to release whatever codex they want next no argument on the internets will change that.

Just be glad we aren't getting another color of space marine next.

As long as you had sportsmanship scoring (And the way people use that for scoring comp), the fact that a nid list won BolsCon is meaningless, as that affected the strength and type of armies that he would have played against.

skyth wrote:As long as you had sportsmanship scoring (And the way people use that for scoring comp), the fact that a nid list won BolsCon is meaningless, as that affected the strength and type of armies that he would have played against.

Not sure how that works. You are saying that those lists he played against were chosen because the WAAC lists would have gotten poor scores resulting in him matching up against what he/she did?

Sounds to me like you are saying he wouldn't have had a prayer in hell against the typical WAAC list.

Or am I way off base?

Linkdead wrote:Just be glad we aren't getting another color of space marine next.

But... We are getting another color of space marine next.

But hopefully we won't see any more of that until after the armies that actually need a new codex get attention.

With Grey Knights, Blood Angels and Black Templars all supposedly currently in development, I think we have plenty more Marines coming in the near future. Not to mention that they plan to split Chaos Space Marines into three (Renegades, Daemons and Legions) or more (multiple Legions books) separate Codices this edition.

Frankly, the argument here is going nowhere. Neither side cares what the other has to say, so it would be best to either drop the whole topic before the thread gets locked. Some of us think that the book is terrible; others believe it is fine. No one is arguing that it is awesome in a tournament environment, so just drop that line altogether --- both sides --- and the only real debate is to the quality of the majority of units in the book (notably dropping Hormagaunts... we get the idea already, stop reiterating that we all agree they are terrible!!) in a casual setting. Hardcore tournament players are unlikely to see eye to eye with the most casual of players no matter what either side does, so neither side should bother trying. Even those of us in the middle are completely dismissing the `arguments' in this thread. We get the idea, every last poster in this thread is a complete tool: end of story!

(Yes, I do appreciate the irony in my last statement: it was intentional).