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Well I have have this heap of rippers left over from Parasite days. It was a fluffy fun list, but alas not more. However since rippers don't exactly die off out of synpase any more I have been looking to do something with them. And found that for 19 points a base you can get a 3w, terrain ignoreing, deepstriking, assault 4 twinlink gun. While not quite as good a 4 termigaunts on the whole it is 1 point cheaper and can pop-up anywhere on the board.

I think this about the best build you can get for Rippers. They are a bad unit but I have enough of them I want to find some way to field that is almost not bad vs just plain bad.

Repeat after me: Rippers are not a bad unit.

It will take some time to sink in, but it is a fact. What makes it a good unit? Fearless.

So lets take that unit of termigaunts. While in synapse it's great! Lose synapse and you have a 25% chance that it will break and start running off the board. If your in CC then IB checks are not an issue, but that Ld6 drops rapidly if it loses combat and then they can break and get run down.

So lets take Hormigants. Lose synapse and you have a 25% chance that you will loose @45% of your unit and a 12.5% chance that you will lose 45% of the unit and then it will break and try to run off the board. Again get them in CC and they loose more wounds then they cause and they can break and get run down or just run off the table.

Rippers? They don't care about casualties. They fail IB Feed and they might cause a wound on a few stands and sit there stupid for a turn, but the unit will not lose effectiveness. They can take a pounding and not run off like our other units. They are about the only tarpits we truly have left.

So how do you use them? Drop them in with DS or just run them up the board where you know your synapse coverage will be the weakest. You can guess how long they are going to be sitting there based on how many wounds they take. Give them Toxin and they can even do a few wounds to the units they are tarpitting.

Mh... the biggest Problem of Rippers is T3. They will be Instant killed by many Weapons (AC, Plasma, Powerfists, etc) and 19 Points per Base isn't that cheap. Think of a 125 Point stormtalon killing 5-7 bases just the turn it arrives because of its twin-linked AC and S7 Missile-Launcher on BF5. You also can't really tarpit the units you need to tarpit (MCs, Assault Terminators etc.) cause they have enough strength to wipe the whole unit. Sure you can tarpit fire Warriors, but why should you, when you can kill them easily? Think Gaunts are the much better option and you can outflank them with the tyrants Special rule, thats much safer than deep striking.

Rippers are non-scoring, non-denial infantry speed models with T3 and 3 wounds each. The only applications i see with them are:

Tie up enemy support shooting units (long fangs, crisis suits, etc) that won't ID them.

Distract the enemy for other more important elements to move into place and shoot/assault.


Now the fact that they will die under focused enemy firepower is not an issue at all -- the entire army is basically designed to die at some point in the game. Bodies over bullets is the tyranid mantra, after all. The point is that the enemy wastes time by killing your ripper swarm (that will earn you no points except for purge the alien sometimes), or focuses their s6+ firepower into your synapse creatures and then gets tied up by said rippers. It does give the opponent a list of choices to make -- this can backfire when your other army elements aren't threatening the enemy. If they only have 1 or 2 pressing units to focus on at a time, that's what will happen and you'll lose the war of attrition.

All that said, i do see tunnel swarm being a very good option to add to rippers, but spinefists i can take or leave. Since i don't really expect to kill many (any) models with their shooting attacks i'd rather save the points and just let them tarpit in CC for 15 points/base. Also when they're out of synapse (likely for a deep striking unit) they'll be under the effects of Feed and unable to shoot anyway.

Rippers aren't my first (or even third) troop choice, but i can see a brood of 3-8 having a use vs certain armies.

MasterOfGaunts wrote:
Think of a 125 Point stormtalon killing 5-7 bases just the turn it arrives because of its twin-linked AC and S7 Missile-Launcher on BF5.

Darn, StormTalon didn't shoot my FTMCs...

Shuriken Cannons, Seprent Shields, MIssileSides, and Necron Tesla can't afford to be wasting their S6-7 on infantry...they'll still be targetting bigger stuff, they will attempt to kill your infantry with their infantry fighting guns...

And rippers will handle this well enough, for around or under 100 pts.

MasterOfGaunts wrote:
Mh... the biggest Problem of Rippers is T3. They will be Instant killed by many Weapons (AC, Plasma, Powerfists, etc) and 19 Points per Base isn't that cheap. Think of a 125 Point stormtalon killing 5-7 bases just the turn it arrives because of its twin-linked AC and S7 Missile-Launcher on BF5. You also can't really tarpit the units you need to tarpit (MCs, Assault Terminators etc.) cause they have enough strength to wipe the whole unit. Sure you can tarpit fire Warriors, but why should you, when you can kill them easily? Think Gaunts are the much better option and you can outflank them with the tyrants Special rule, thats much safer than deep striking.

The problem is that the gaunts are not any more durable without synapse. That stormtalon will also send a 120pt gaunt unit heading for the hills with the same shooting vs killing 70pts of rippers that will just sit there and take it.

As for MCs lets look at a riptide. A riptide will kill one stand of rippers a turn (possibly 2). The rippers have fearless so they will stay there. Lets say you send in 20 termigaunts. If you get less then 10 gaunts able to attack and the riptide hits with two of his attacks he will will combat. Lets say he wins by one wound. That is a Ld check with a Ld5. If that gaunt unit fails (and it probably will) the riptide will most likely run down the entire unit. So I can trade 14-28pts of rippers a turn vs. losing a 80pt unit AND with the rippers the riptide will not be able to shoot next turn.

So gaunts are better as long as they are in synapse. Outside of synapse the rippers are better.

ductvader wrote:

MasterOfGaunts wrote:
Think of a 125 Point stormtalon killing 5-7 bases just the turn it arrives because of its twin-linked AC and S7 Missile-Launcher on BF5.

Darn, StormTalon didn't shoot my FTMCs...

Shuriken Cannons, Seprent Shields, MIssileSides, and Necron Tesla can't afford to be wasting their S6-7 on infantry...they'll still be targetting bigger stuff, they will attempt to kill your infantry with their infantry fighting guns...

And rippers will handle this well enough, for around or under 100 pts.

If you dont want you re precious shooty unit to be tarpittet for 2 or 3 turns you might think of targetting them with high strength weapons. Most of the times I shoot at the biggest threats to my army and thats not automatically the 200 point Dakka-Flyrant. If a swarm of rippers is going to tarpit my broadside-team i ll shoot them first. Its better to shoot one turn with my S7 Weapons at a low cost unit to continue Shooting the next turns than shoot 1 time at the flyrant and being silenced for the rest of the game.

Gloomfang wrote:

MasterOfGaunts wrote:
Mh... the biggest Problem of Rippers is T3. They will be Instant killed by many Weapons (AC, Plasma, Powerfists, etc) and 19 Points per Base isn't that cheap. Think of a 125 Point stormtalon killing 5-7 bases just the turn it arrives because of its twin-linked AC and S7 Missile-Launcher on BF5. You also can't really tarpit the units you need to tarpit (MCs, Assault Terminators etc.) cause they have enough strength to wipe the whole unit. Sure you can tarpit fire Warriors, but why should you, when you can kill them easily? Think Gaunts are the much better option and you can outflank them with the tyrants Special rule, thats much safer than deep striking.

The problem is that the gaunts are not any more durable without synapse. That stormtalon will also send a 120pt gaunt unit heading for the hills with the same shooting vs killing 70pts of rippers that will just sit there and take it.

As for MCs lets look at a riptide. A riptide will kill one stand of rippers a turn (possibly 2). The rippers have fearless so they will stay there. Lets say you send in 20 termigaunts. If you get less then 10 gaunts able to attack and the riptide hits with two of his attacks he will will combat. Lets say he wins by one wound. That is a Ld check with a Ld5. If that gaunt unit fails (and it probably will) the riptide will most likely run down the entire unit. So I can trade 14-28pts of rippers a turn vs. losing a 80pt unit AND with the rippers the riptide will not be able to shoot next turn.

So gaunts are better as long as they are in synapse. Outside of synapse the rippers are better.

Well without Synapse they are better in CC thats right, but whats the point about running a tarpit unit without synapse? You first have to get into CC and therefore you have to be lucky with your IB. Furtheron you have to withstand one turn of fire. Therefore you need lots of bases to avoid being shot of the table by S6+ and thats gonna cost you a lot of points. 16 (13+3? for DeepStrike) per base.

A unit of 30 Gaunts cant be handled by a single storm talon. It kills 7 at max and thats less than 25%, so no need for a morale check unless another unit supports it.

The only use for rippers i can think of is as a support-tarpit unit. 30 outflanking gaunt + 3-5 rippers deepstriking and threatening the same target. mh... but I would probably pay 2 more Points and take the flying ones. They also have deepstrike included and are pretty fast, so you can run them down the table, assault in turn 2 and at the beginning of turn 2 you should be in snapse range, so no reason to worry about IB. Only drawback, they cost you a fast attack Slot.

So normal rippers are a distraction unit for high strength weapons at best in my eyes...

It comes down to list building in the end I guess. All Tyranid lists will have to revolve around synapse now. If you want lots of gaunts you need lots of synapse and ways to protect it. If your like me and say screw synapse, then your buying more expensive units or oddball units, but saving pts by not paying the synapse tax.

 Gloomfang wrote:
It comes down to list building in the end I guess. All Tyranid lists will have to revolve around synapse now. If you want lots of gaunts you need lots of synapse and ways to protect it. If your like me and say screw synapse synapse, then your buying more expensive units or oddball units, but saving pts by not paying the synapse tax.

THe strength in rippers is not "not needing synapse", it's not needing synapse after entering combat.

 Gloomfang wrote:
It comes down to list building in the end I guess. All Tyranid lists will have to revolve around synapse now.

Nah. Shooty Tyranid MCs crap over synapse. They are Fearless and their IB does exactly what they would do normally. You only need to worry about synapse if you bring swarmy units. But why on the sweetest earth would you want to bring those crapstastic swarmy units?

Also it is worth noting that a Ripper base is exactly 1 point cheaper than a Jeanstealer. And the Jeanstealer can do whatever the Ripper swarm can do, but only better. For +1 point mid you.

 Gloomfang wrote:
It comes down to list building in the end I guess.

Yep 100% agree. The worth and usability of a unit alwas depends on youre list, but in general i would say the niche of rippers is rather small.

I also think the new nid dex isn t that bad as everbody says. Maybe not hypercompetetive, but thats more a problem of all those WAAC Gamers. I think I can still win a decent number of games in my Group.

 AtoMaki wrote:

 Gloomfang wrote:
It comes down to list building in the end I guess. All Tyranid lists will have to revolve around synapse now.

Nah. Shooty Tyranid MCs crap over synapse. They are Fearless and their IB does exactly what they would do normally. You only need to worry about synapse if you bring swarmy units. But why on the sweetest earth would you want to bring those crapstastic swarmy units?

Also it is worth noting that a Ripper base is exactly 1 point cheaper than a Jeanstealer. And the Jeanstealer can do whatever the Ripper swarm can do, but only better. For +1 point mid you

Rippers wont be one shotted by a boltgun.

I've been thinking about Rippers and I intend to try them out in a game soon not so much as a tarpit (although they will likely be doing just that at some point) but as a mobile screen for my gaunts which both ignores difficult, and provide a 5+ (or more, Venomthrope included) while eating the high strength fire that should really be targeting my MC's. The bases are big enough to easily screen a big gaunt squad for a turn or two with just a few bases. I think it could be very strong.The only thing that sucks about them is they eat up a troops slot.

aushlo wrote:
The only thing that sucks about them is they eat up a troops slot.

Which is a problem only Tyranids have.

I miss Parasite.

 ductvader wrote:

aushlo wrote:
The only thing that sucks about them is they eat up a troops slot.

Which is a problem only Tyranids have.

I miss Parasite.

Depends on the build. I have space in mine for a big unit of rippers and if I use the dataslate I could probably take even more. I think they will get a LOT more table time if they make a ripper formation in the 3rd dataslate.

 Gloomfang wrote:

 ductvader wrote:

aushlo wrote:
The only thing that sucks about them is they eat up a troops slot.

Which is a problem only Tyranids have.

I miss Parasite.

Depends on the build. I have space in mine for a big unit of rippers and if I use the dataslate I could probably take even more. I think they will get a LOT more table time if they make a ripper formation in the 3rd dataslate.

If the third dataslate gives them faster movement, shred, FNP, or some other incredibly useful rule I will definitely give rippers a whirl. Too bad that'll probably be somewhere around march 25.

You might have found a little gem here. Trying to put a list together now with 3 mawlocs and a bunch of deep striking 9 unit ripper swarms. In theory the 216 shots they would all put out turn 2 plus the mawlocs would mess up any gunline. Plus each swarm in theory could glance rear armor of tanks to death if you run the numbers...

Shingen wrote:
You might have found a little gem here. Trying to put a list together now with 3 mawlocs and a bunch of deep striking 9 unit ripper swarms. In theory the 216 shots they would all put out turn 2 plus the mawlocs would mess up any gunline.

You do know that this combo is 1446 points, right? I mean, for that amount of points, they are better wipe out and not "mess up" a gunline...

Shingen wrote:
Plus each swarm in theory could glance rear armor of tanks to death if you run the numbers.

They can't because their spinefists are only S3.

So they are... Must read codex!!!

The only thing I have found the spinefists to be good for is for overwatch when I am using them as a firebreak or to ground FMCs. I tend to keep mine geared for CC so I don't generally spend the points, but I needed to try them out.

Deepstriking 5 rippers with spinefist for 95 pts,,,, that worth the cost. They died, dont care if that can be a pain in the ass for a few turn.

 hellpato wrote:
Deepstriking 5 rippers with spinefist for 95 pts,,,, that worth the cost. They died, dont care if that can be a pain in the ass for a few turn.

For 5 Points less you can also deepstrike 15 Gargoyles. Same Range, higher strength and harder to kill. IB is also better. Worst case is snap-shots while sitting around. If you compare theire Dakka Gargoyles are also better against T4 and can glance Av10. Only drawback again, they will take a FA slot.

Its not that Rippers cant be useful, but most of the times there are Units that do the job better and are also more versatile.

MasterOfGaunts wrote:

 hellpato wrote:
Deepstriking 5 rippers with spinefist for 95 pts,,,, that worth the cost. They died, dont care if that can be a pain in the ass for a few turn.

For 5 Points less you can also deepstrike 15 Gargoyles. Same Range, higher strength and harder to kill. IB is also better. Worst case is snap-shots while sitting around. If you compare theire Dakka Gargoyles are also better against T4 and can glance Av10. Only drawback again, they will take a FA slot.

Its not that Rippers cant be useful, but most of the times there are Units that do the job better and are also more versatile.

My gargoyles will give a cover save to a monstrous creature, so they always start on the board at the front (not trygons, but tyrant, carnifex in case you were going to query). Troops is strangely the FOC slot with the least pressure on nowadays, one 30 strong gant squad, one tervigon and the rest is lacklustre at best. For the price I want the enemy to be shooting S6+ shots at the rippers, it means they are not shooting at my MCs. The spinefist option does seeem to be the way to go, deepstriking is maybe less certain. As they can always screen a flank where there are bikes, drop-pods around to keep them out of range of the big stuff.

 ruminator wrote:
For the price I want the enemy to be shooting S6+ shots at the rippers, it means they are not shooting at my MCs.

Rippers only make your synapse creatures even sweeter targets. So all those S6+ weapons will turn towards the closest synapse creature as soon as the Rippers show up. Because no synapse -> no problems with those silly Rippers.

 ruminator wrote:
. The spinefist option does seeem to be the way to go, deepstriking is maybe less certain.

If you dont deepstrike them, nobody would shoot theire S6 weapons at them, cause they are slow and therefore not an immediate thread. There is also no guarantee for them to be a S6 distraction. 2 or 3 flamers will also kill them quiet effective. All in all they are to fragile.

Yes you can use Rippers and they may fullfill theire purpose most of the times in youre games, but I think in 95% there will be a better option for the same job and maybe less points.

MasterOfGaunts wrote:

 ruminator wrote:
. The spinefist option does seeem to be the way to go, deepstriking is maybe less certain.

If you dont deepstrike them, nobody would shoot theire S6 weapons at them, cause they are slow and therefore not an immediate thread. There is also no guarantee for them to be a S6 distraction. 2 or 3 flamers will also kill them quiet effective. All in all they are to fragile.

People run flamers?

I haven't seen a flamer outside of IG or GKs in forever...

 AtoMaki wrote:

 ruminator wrote:
For the price I want the enemy to be shooting S6+ shots at the rippers, it means they are not shooting at my MCs.

Rippers only make your synapse creatures even sweeter targets. So all those S6+ weapons will turn towards the closest synapse creature as soon as the Rippers show up. Because no synapse -> no problems with those silly Rippers.

Not seeing this. Surely the same goes for termagants .... which is every Nid list out there. Why would they target synapse more because of ripper swarms?

My gargoyles and rippers are never intended to do anything, ever. Just soak up hopefully 2 rounds of shooting, screen off deepstrikers while the rest of the army gets within about 18". You need to anticipate losing at least 25% of your army on the way in on T1 and T2. Key is to get your opponent to kill the stuff you are happy to lose - naked gargolyes and rippers are great at this as gargoyles are so noticeable they always get picked on and when people see swarm bases they get all concerned for some reason - probably due to scarabs, beastpacks which are dangerous. The low toughness stuff I want to live to reach 18" is the 20 devourer gants.

 ruminator wrote:

 AtoMaki wrote:

 ruminator wrote:
For the price I want the enemy to be shooting S6+ shots at the rippers, it means they are not shooting at my MCs.

Rippers only make your synapse creatures even sweeter targets. So all those S6+ weapons will turn towards the closest synapse creature as soon as the Rippers show up. Because no synapse -> no problems with those silly Rippers.

Not seeing this. Surely the same goes for termagants .... which is every Nid list out there. Why would they target synapse more because of ripper swarms?

Because Rippers have Ld5 and Feed. If you kill the synapse, they will go haywire with a 72% chance. Shooting them is a total waste if you can kill the synapse instead. With the added benefit that if you kill the synapse then the rest of the Tyranid army will suffer too.

Termagants are better because they are like CSM cultists: their only job is to camp on an objective and GtG 24/7 (note: Rippers can't GtG). Even if they lose synapse and fai ltheir Ld they are still OK half the time. And you can have them for free via Tervigons.

 AtoMaki wrote:

Because Rippers have Ld5 and Feed. If you kill the synapse, they will go haywire with a 72% chance. Shooting them is a total waste if you can kill the synapse instead. With the added benefit that if you kill the synapse then the rest of the Tyranid army will suffer too.

Termagants are better because they are like CSM cultists: their only job is to camp on an objective and GtG 24/7 (note: Rippers can't GtG). Even if they lose synapse and fai ltheir Ld they are still OK half the time. And you can have them for free via Tervigons.

I see you’re talking about just sitting there. If you just want to have them sit there camping an objective then termigaunts are better. However you have a few numbers wrong:

You can't just GtG, the unit has to be shot at by an enemy unit and they cannot have Fearless. Of course if they get shot at and GtG there is the chance they will take enough wounds that they will need to pass a break test. If you have termigaunts sitting there and they have not been able to GtG then they have a better than 25% chance per turn out of synapse of breaking and running to the table edge. If they fail IB they cannot shoot unless they are in area cover and they cannot assault. So unless they are already in area terrain they are now basically useless except for being a screen or standing on an objective more than 25% of the time they are out of synapse. If they are in combat then they also have a huge chance of just cutting and running and getting run down by a sweeping advance. Termigaunts outside of synapse will get destroyed in CC.

Rippers have a lower leadership, so they will fail IB 72% of the time. However 50% of the time they fail they will still try to get into CC and that is where you want them 36% of the time every round they are out of synapse. If they do get the cannibalize roll the low model count coupled with the high number of wounds and armor saves mean that the unit will probably be OK. However once they are in CC they get to ignore IB and being Fearless naturally means that they will not break even if they lose combat.

So if you define “OK” as being unable to shoot or last in combat then yes termigaunts will be “OK”. If it is "OK" for them to try to run of the board more then 25% of the time they are out of synapse they are "OK". If you think that you can always cause more wounds in CC then you receive then they are "OK".

Meanwhile rippers will stand there gnawing on their arms about 36% of the time they are out of synapse, but they are doing what you want them to do (going into combat) @64% of the time they are not in combat and not in synapse.

 Gloomfang wrote:

I see you’re talking about just sitting there.

I'm talking about fulfilling a meaningful task. Something the Rippers struggle with. They can't shoot (BS2 TL lasguns), they can't beat opponents in melee (WS2, S3, I2 - they have the damage output of 4 Fire Warriors), they have almost zero durability (you will quickly run out of wounds with T3, Sv6+), they have the worst IB with the worst Ld in the whole codex, they can't score but at least they are expensive. You can buy 3 Spinegants for 1 point less so why would you choose Rippers?

If you really want to charge your opponent then consider the use of Jeanstealers maybe. Unlike the Rippers, the Jeanstelars are not a unit you can just ignore and get away with it.

 AtoMaki wrote:

You can buy 3 Spinegants for 1 point less so why would you choose Rippers?

Because I need (at a minimum) a 50pt synapse creature to make those 3 spinegaunts do anything other than run away.

 AtoMaki wrote:

If you really want to charge your opponent then consider the use of Jeanstealers maybe. Unlike the Rippers, the Jeanstelars are not a unit you can just ignore and get away with it.

I do run genestealers because I actually do charge things into my opponent. If I didn't want to charge units I wouldn't be playing Tyranids (something that this edition punishes by the way). As for Rippers they are not the greatest thing. They are tumbtacks that are used to hold a unit or suck up some overwatch. They are dependable though. They are not random. With the addition of formations I hope they get thier own formation because I would like to use them more; having some options of moving my stealers to a formation turned out to be "meh" though."

But the 6th edition Nids are all about the synapse. You play enough games against good enough opponents and you will quickly realize that you can not depend on synapse (or anything with a Ld less then 10). I've watched people think that "I can just take a Prime with a norn crown and stick him in a big brood of 30. They can't chew through that many wounds." Then you learn the painful way that they can just hit the Prime with a barrage to remove anything that can give him a LoS and then open up with either artillery, jump unit or a DSing unit. Most games I have seen that rely on synapse have either had it all killed or removed from strategic area's of the board by turn 3.