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 Kain wrote:

 ductvader wrote:

 tetrisphreak wrote:

 jifel wrote:

 jy2 wrote:
So I still don't really understand why rippers are so good. The meta is still S6/7-spam. That is instant death for those little buggers. And they aren't exactly cheap either. 1 little bugger costs more than 3 termagants. Am I missing something here?

Rippers are very low maintenance scoring units. For basically gant pricing, you get 1 less wound, but gain stealth and fearless. Combine with shrouding from a venom and they'll be hard to shoot down. I think the most crucial part is their size. If stronghold assault is mainstream now, you can add a single defense piece to your Bastion, and that will block LoS completely. Also, their IB really isn't that deadly.

Ld5 with feed is the issue. Though a lone ripper swarm could feasibly hide on an objective.

Rippers with feed are much better than horms with feed...only 9 s3 attacks instead of 30 s3 attacks.

Assuming they don't eat themselves or break when they start losing assault.

Which is quite a dangerous assumption to make.

Rippers are fearless.

 tetrisphreak wrote:

 Kain wrote:

 ductvader wrote:

 tetrisphreak wrote:

 jifel wrote:

 jy2 wrote:
So I still don't really understand why rippers are so good. The meta is still S6/7-spam. That is instant death for those little buggers. And they aren't exactly cheap either. 1 little bugger costs more than 3 termagants. Am I missing something here?

Rippers are very low maintenance scoring units. For basically gant pricing, you get 1 less wound, but gain stealth and fearless. Combine with shrouding from a venom and they'll be hard to shoot down. I think the most crucial part is their size. If stronghold assault is mainstream now, you can add a single defense piece to your Bastion, and that will block LoS completely. Also, their IB really isn't that deadly.

Ld5 with feed is the issue. Though a lone ripper swarm could feasibly hide on an objective.

Rippers with feed are much better than horms with feed...only 9 s3 attacks instead of 30 s3 attacks.

Assuming they don't eat themselves or break when they start losing assault.

Which is quite a dangerous assumption to make.

Rippers are fearless.

Ah right.

Still, I don't trust the IB table. It's bad juju.

And scarabs (either regular or charnel) make my rippers jealous.

Still better off than nurglings though.

That actually WAS assuming they were eating themselves...that was the point.

Yea, when self-eating, rippers only deal 1 hit per 3 wounds to themselves.
Even if they eat themselves every other turn (should not happen that much, only 50% AFTER a failed LD, if there is no synaps that happens to be near enough), it will take them about 13-14 turns to take themselves out, far more then the game length.
Yea, they will probably take some fire, but its not easy to even get LoS on them if they hide around.

Seriously, rippers cost was increased BECAUSE on 7th. they would be insane at old price.

3 Rippers can inflict a maximum of 3 strength 3 hits on themselves. Because multi-wound models are removed one at a time instead of distributing them evenly, it is physically impossible for a Ripper unit to finish itself off. It is also stealthy, fearless, and damn near impossible to see from downfield if you have any terrain. Or you know, an Aegis defense line.

So yes, if someone deepstrikes near you they can shoot you. Like gants. But, put em near a venomthrope, maybe with terrain around, and Poof! They have a 2+ save just like that. If you're going to play Nids, you'd better be going for a ton of fast threats to hunt your opponent down with. This means that any Deepstriking unit isn't going to shoot your Rippers first turn. Seriously. Rippers have been so bad, and so insignificant, that people aren't going to want to shoot them. who wants to deepstrike in their mega shooty unit and waste a turn killing Rippers?

Let's also remember that half of the IB results boil down to "you can just chill where you are if you want". Between Ld and rolling on the chart, plus wounds and 6+ AS, you are inflicting 0.45 wounds on yourself a turn with 3 Rippers. Plasma veterans do more than that! Also, the dice can't screw you over as you could, max, kill a ripper brood turn 1. Turn 2, you can (at worst) inflict 2 wounds. Turn 3, again two wounds, but you're now down to a single fearless model, who can no longer inflict wounds. More likely? By turn 5, you've two wounds from yourself, and you paid 39 points for 7 fearless, stealthy, scoring wounds that can't be seen. I mean seriously, you could buy an Aegis line and wrap it around two 3 man ripper swarms. They have 3++ cover, can't be seen by anything smaller than a broadside, can hold objectives without contesting, don't need a babysitter, and can't be assaulted by normal models because you can't see them. Have fun getting to my backfield and killing that before my 7 MCs shoot you to hell! (Because, you know, we can only land and assault if you wound us...)

Now, gants. For the same points (+1 actually) you get 1 wound, lose stealth, need a babysitter, can be seen more easily and can be assaulted more easily. I'm probably still going to bring 30 broods of gants, but 10 man gant squad are now done... why not just bring Rippers? They're cheaper and more efficient if you (as I am) bring a MTO style Tyranid list.

 BoomWolf wrote:
Yea, when self-eating, rippers only deal 1 hit per 3 wounds to themselves.
Even if they eat themselves every other turn (should not happen that much, only 50% AFTER a failed LD, if there is no synaps that happens to be near enough), it will take them about 13-14 turns to take themselves out, far more then the game length.
Yea, they will probably take some fire, but its not easy to even get LoS on them if they hide around.

Seriously, rippers cost was increased BECAUSE on 7th. they would be insane at old price.

I have trouble believing that GW is at all smart enough to comprehend arcane concepts as "balance". A random rock has more brains than the entire company.

In any case, T3 sucks hardcore on multiwound models and nobody is going to bother assaulting something they can just fry with Tesla, a Wave Serpent, Ordered Autocannons, a Baleflamer, hellhounds, eradicators, or really anything that can reliably defeat cover saves with S6 or more.

Go skyblight gargoyles or endless swarm gaunts or go home.

Gargoyles and gaunts get to respawn, rippers don't.

Please, draw LoS to the Rippers with all those weapons. Especially if you have an Aegis. It's really easy to draw LoS to Gargoyles.

rigeld2 wrote:
Please, draw LoS to the Rippers with all those weapons. Especially if you have an Aegis. It's really easy to draw LoS to Gargoyles.

Barrage. Particularly griffon mortars.

Any point spent on something that's not more skyblight swarm or more FMCs is a point not spent on the strongest tactic available.

I'm not convinced that rippers are good when compared to massing skyblight swarms.

 Kain wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:
Please, draw LoS to the Rippers with all those weapons. Especially if you have an Aegis. It's really easy to draw LoS to Gargoyles.

Barrage. Particularly griffon mortars.

Any point spent on something that's not more skyblight swarm or more FMCs is a point not spent on the strongest tactic available.

I'm not convinced that rippers are good when compared to massing skyblight swarms.

You do realize you need troops to be able to take those Skyblight swarms, right? Because... you do. And stuff.
And sure - Barrage works. Do any of the weapons I was replying to have Barrage? No? Okay then.

rigeld2 wrote:

 Kain wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:
Please, draw LoS to the Rippers with all those weapons. Especially if you have an Aegis. It's really easy to draw LoS to Gargoyles.

Barrage. Particularly griffon mortars.

Any point spent on something that's not more skyblight swarm or more FMCs is a point not spent on the strongest tactic available.

I'm not convinced that rippers are good when compared to massing skyblight swarms.

You do realize you need troops to be able to take those Skyblight swarms, right? Because... you do. And stuff.
And sure - Barrage works. Do any of the weapons I was replying to have Barrage? No? Okay then.

They are more S6 weapons that rippers melt away easily from.

Are you sure you can't just take all skyblight in unbound?

In any case I'd rather have a bare minimum of anything that's not more flying circus units and not bother with the ADL. Just park them out of sight behind some terrain and plop the needed objectives there and never pay them any heed for the rest of the game.

Any point I cannot invest into an FMC or super-scoring gargoyles is a point spent towards defeat.

 Kain wrote:
They are more S6 weapons that rippers melt away easily from.

Yes, but they're more resilient per point than Termagants overall.

Are you sure you can't just take all skyblight in unbound?

I don't care about the crapshoot stupidity that is unbound. At all. So maybe?

In any case I'd rather have a bare minimum of anything that's not more flying circus units and not bother with the ADL. Just park them out of sight behind some terrain and plop the needed objectives there and never pay them any heed for the rest of the game.

Sure. Which is essentially what I was saying. So... we agree? Okay then.

Any point I cannot invest into an FMC or super-scoring gargoyles is a point spent towards defeat.

Good news then! 3 Rippers (smallest unit) costs 1 point less than 10 Termagants (smallest unit) and is far less likely to run away if you don't babysit them (as in, it's impossible)!

 Kain wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:

 Kain wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:
Please, draw LoS to the Rippers with all those weapons. Especially if you have an Aegis. It's really easy to draw LoS to Gargoyles.

Barrage. Particularly griffon mortars.

Any point spent on something that's not more skyblight swarm or more FMCs is a point not spent on the strongest tactic available.

I'm not convinced that rippers are good when compared to massing skyblight swarms.

You do realize you need troops to be able to take those Skyblight swarms, right? Because... you do. And stuff.
And sure - Barrage works. Do any of the weapons I was replying to have Barrage? No? Okay then.

They are more S6 weapons that rippers melt away easily from.

Are you sure you can't just take all skyblight in unbound?


In any case I'd rather have a bare minimum of anything that's not more flying circus units and not bother with the ADL. Just park them out of sight behind some terrain and plop the needed objectives there and never pay them any heed for the rest of the game.

Any point I cannot invest into an FMC or super-scoring gargoyles is a point spent towards defeat.

Your can do attitude is always uplifting Kain! You're to Tyranids, what Martel is to Blood Angels.

I still think we will be fine, ok we will now struggle against parking lots and land raider spam, but that's hardly anything new. We can still field more Haywire than any other army, if those sorts of armies start popping up in your area then start spamming haywire. We will have one of the strongest psychic phases going, we may yet get an FAQ to shadows!

Also we don't know enough about how Tactical Objectives etc will effect the game at large. As with all new releases, calm down, take a step back, play a bunch of games with an open and positive mind. And then after all that, your tears might be valid.

Why not take... Sklyblight AND Rippers? Personally I think that Rippers are the perfect troop for Skyblight. You can keep them in Synapse with Flyrants for 1-2 turns, after that they'll still survive just fine on their own. Cheap, and provides the Battleforged benefits. Personally I'm using a Bastion + Venom for Skyblight to prevent an early alpha strike. That requires no synapse. Then, 2x3 Rippers for cheap scoring that can hide easily. On top of a Bastion? Can't be shot at pretty much. Then, just disembark them later for objectives. Or, hell, put the bastion by the Objective and watch as they can't kill your Rippers! That's 198 points for a rock solid core, then add 1650 points of wings to go hit stuff. I like 7th edition!

Eldercaveman wrote:

 Kain wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:

 Kain wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:
Please, draw LoS to the Rippers with all those weapons. Especially if you have an Aegis. It's really easy to draw LoS to Gargoyles.

Barrage. Particularly griffon mortars.

Any point spent on something that's not more skyblight swarm or more FMCs is a point not spent on the strongest tactic available.

I'm not convinced that rippers are good when compared to massing skyblight swarms.

You do realize you need troops to be able to take those Skyblight swarms, right? Because... you do. And stuff.
And sure - Barrage works. Do any of the weapons I was replying to have Barrage? No? Okay then.

They are more S6 weapons that rippers melt away easily from.

Are you sure you can't just take all skyblight in unbound?


In any case I'd rather have a bare minimum of anything that's not more flying circus units and not bother with the ADL. Just park them out of sight behind some terrain and plop the needed objectives there and never pay them any heed for the rest of the game.

Any point I cannot invest into an FMC or super-scoring gargoyles is a point spent towards defeat.

Your can do attitude is always uplifting Kain! You're to Tyranids, what Martel is to Blood Angels.

I still think we will be fine, ok we will now struggle against parking lots and land raider spam, but that's hardly anything new. We can still field more Haywire than any other army, if those sorts of armies start popping up in your area then start spamming haywire. We will have one of the strongest psychic phases going, we may yet get an FAQ to shadows!

Also we don't know enough about how Tactical Objectives etc will effect the game at large. As with all new releases, calm down, take a step back, play a bunch of games with an open and positive mind. And then after all that, your tears might be valid.

I'm less a downer for Tyranids and more extremely anti-GW as a whole. I hate literally everything about the company and the current debased mockery of a flaming wreck they're trying to pass off as a game at the moment. My hopes is that in convincing people that all is not fine, they will in turn spread the word and eventually lead to GW suffering enough of a financial hit to change it's course. If it merrily skips off to it's destruction then it deserves to die out anyway and I can only hope that my beloved franchise is picked up by people whose collective IQ can't be counted on a single hand.

I've become far too jaded by repeatedly being treated as a sack of money by incompetent game designers to give them the benefit of the doubt on anything they do.

Better to assume that everything GW does will be a colossal failure and be pleasantly surprised when they do something right, than be optimistic and suffer constant disappointment from the frantic keyboard smashings of a collection of some of the worst game designers to have ever made a high-profile product.

A minimum squad of rippers is cheaper than a minimum squad of gaunts. They're the cheapest troop choice available, require next to no babysitting, and are the best troop unit in cover we have. They may only net you two points, but that something allows an extra gargoyle or template here and there.

Also I think you're only allowed one formation in unbound, but I could be wrong about that. Not that it matters, it's barely a footnote in the brb. I seriously doubt it's going to become a big thing.

Eldercaveman wrote:
I still think we will be fine, ok we will now struggle against parking lots and land raider spam, but that's hardly anything new. We can still field more Haywire than any other army, if those sorts of armies start popping up in your area then start spamming haywire. We will have one of the strongest psychic phases going, we may yet get an FAQ to shadows!

So Crones can fire 2 haywire shots a turn at BS3. That means 1 hit per turn, 2 hits before they run out of missile. That is about 1.67 Hull points per Crone in the entire game from Haywire.

E. Grubs give 1 haywire hit per vehicle, but must be shot at the same target as the rest of the weapons. So Dakka flyrants have to give up a metric ton of other firepower to use it. TFexes and Tervigons can't get to vehicles to use it. They will be useful against Drop Pod spam, but not much else.

Hive Guard haywire is a joke. 1 Shot at 18" that is small blast BS3, require LOS, and allows for cover. So a unit of 3 Shock cannon Hiver Guard are likely to pick off 1 HP a turn.

Lastly Haywire has lost its ability to explode vehicles. It was only a 1/36 chance, but now it is a 0 chance.

I do not think Haywire is our answer to vehicles unless we get it in some other much more usable form like Trygons.

Has anyone seen anything about any changes to the Deep Strike rules? Mawlocs were pretty solid for what little 6th Edition Codex time they had under 6th Edition BRB, and the mishap table wasn't too punishing.

A Mawloc using Smash has only lost a single attack too, which isn't as bad as some.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

tag8833 wrote:

E. Grubs give 1 haywire hit per vehicle, but must be shot at the same target as the rest of the weapons. So Dakka flyrants have to give up a metric ton of other firepower to use it. TFexes and Tervigons can't get to vehicles to use it. They will be useful against Drop Pod spam, but not much else.

I regularly get 2-3 shots out of my Egrubs on both my lone Tervigon and my Acid Spray Tfex, plus an Overwatch shot or too as well. Plus, Egrubs are a neat little "yeah, you don't want to charge me with that walker" upgrade. Maybe my meta is just more aggressive than yours, but I rarely have problems getting into range with short ranged weapons like that.


*Edit, I also read that GTG no longer allows you to Overwatch?

tag8833 wrote:

Eldercaveman wrote:
I still think we will be fine, ok we will now struggle against parking lots and land raider spam, but that's hardly anything new. We can still field more Haywire than any other army, if those sorts of armies start popping up in your area then start spamming haywire. We will have one of the strongest psychic phases going, we may yet get an FAQ to shadows!

So Crones can fire 2 haywire shots a turn at BS3. That means 1 hit per turn, 2 hits before they run out of missile. That is about 1.67 Hull points per Crone in the entire game from Haywire.

E. Grubs give 1 haywire hit per vehicle, but must be shot at the same target as the rest of the weapons. So Dakka flyrants have to give up a metric ton of other firepower to use it. TFexes and Tervigons can't get to vehicles to use it. They will be useful against Drop Pod spam, but not much else.

Hive Guard haywire is a joke. 1 Shot at 18" that is small blast BS3, require LOS, and allows for cover. So a unit of 3 Shock cannon Hiver Guard are likely to pick off 1 HP a turn.

Lastly Haywire has lost its ability to explode vehicles. It was only a 1/36 chance, but now it is a 0 chance.

I do not think Haywire is our answer to vehicles unless we get it in some other much more usable form like Trygons.

It's hardly consistent. But, it messes with Imperial Knights and walkers, and EG on a Flyrant is 10 points... I may not use in some games, but with how stupid tough Land Raiders are now, it's 10 points I'll gladly spend. Especially because I'm not buying Adrenal Glands anymore!

Would would your tactic be against a Reaver (Chaos or Loyal) or Phantom Titan, or perhaps a Manta?

Assuming it's a 5k+ apocalypse game.

Original post:
A buddy of mine pointed out an interesting twist to the Battle Brothers Rules:

You can embark in an allies transport, but you can't disembark. I guess your Battle Brothers Lock you in.

My guess is T-minus 9 months before this gets FAQed.


ETA:

 jifel wrote:
It's hardly consistent. But, it messes with Imperial Knights and walkers, and EG on a Flyrant is 10 points... I may not use in some games, but with how stupid tough Land Raiders are now, it's 10 points I'll gladly spend. Especially because I'm not buying Adrenal Glands anymore!

A fair point. With Walkers getting such a huge buff, E.Grubs are going to be standard on my Tyrants, Tervigons, and TFexes. Give me a chance to put it on a Crone, and I would take it there as well. Vector Strike + Haywire if it survives would keep crones useful. Also, being able to drop 2 templates on Ifantry blobs would be good, but not as OP, thanks to the wound allocation changes

That's kind of hilarious...like Hive Tyrants and their guard.

...no bring it back tag

tag8833 wrote:
A buddy of mine pointed out an interesting twist to the Battle Brothers Rules:

Spoiler:

You can embark in an allies transport, but you can't disembark. I guess your Battle Brothers Lock you in.

My guess is T-minus 9 months before this gets FAQed.

Anybody who tries arguing that you can't disembark should be met with the argument that none of their models without eyes or are wearing a helmet are allowed to fire as they cannot draw TLoS.

Failing that, bapping them on the head with the rulebook is also a good counter-tactic.

 Kain wrote:
A buddy of mine pointed out an interesting twist to the Battle Brothers Rules:

Spoiler:

You can embark in an allies transport, but you can't disembark. I guess your Battle Brothers Lock you in.

My guess is T-minus 9 months before this gets FAQed.

But...but what happens if they embark in a pod...haha

 ductvader wrote:

 Kain wrote:
A buddy of mine pointed out an interesting twist to the Battle Brothers Rules:

Spoiler:

You can embark in an allies transport, but you can't disembark. I guess your Battle Brothers Lock you in.

My guess is T-minus 9 months before this gets FAQed.

But...but what happens if they embark in a pod...haha

Refer to the second plan.

 ductvader wrote:

 Kain wrote:
A buddy of mine pointed out an interesting twist to the Battle Brothers Rules:

Spoiler:

You can embark in an allies transport, but you can't disembark. I guess your Battle Brothers Lock you in.

My guess is T-minus 9 months before this gets FAQed.

But...but what happens if they embark in a pod...haha

Technically, BB can't get in a pod unless they are an IC. Units have to start in pods.

Can't start in a transport unless it is a dedicated transport, or you are joining a unit in a dedicated transport.

 Kain wrote:
Would would your tactic be against a Reaver (Chaos or Loyal) or Phantom Titan, or perhaps a Manta?

Assuming it's a 5k+ apocalypse game.

Probably a Crone Coven to take advantage of Serial Strike. Expensive (in terms of money), but very effective, fast and pretty flexible too.

Someone in the 7ed thread just pointed out brood lords will have dominion thanks to psychic focus. If it's faq'ed to work out that way, it could be a good use to endure genestealers are fearless in cc.

 tetrisphreak wrote:
Someone in the 7ed thread just pointed out brood lords will have dominion thanks to psychic focus. If it's faq'ed to work out that way, it could be a good use to endure genestealers are fearless in cc.

Sadly RAW, Dominion adds 6" to your Synapse range and Broodlords don't have Synapse, so there is nothing to add to.

I don't think that it's a valid argument in any way, but RAW wouldn't that mean that their synapse range goes from 0 to 6"?

luke1705 wrote:
I don't think that it's a valid argument in any way, but RAW wouldn't that mean that their synapse range goes from 0 to 6"?

Not if they don't have the Synapse rule to begin with. In order to have a Synapse range you need to have the Synapse rule, no Synapse rule = nothing to boost the range of. Sort of like how the Force psychic power gives all weapons in the unit with the Force rule ID. No force rule on the weapon = no effect from the Force power.

Don't get me wrong, Synaptic Broodlords would be a cool throwback to 4th Edition, but I just don't think I could follow through with that argument.

Still, I'm happy that Pinning has made units a little easier to assault so Broodlords were passively buffed a little (which is nice, since the Broodlord Hunting Pack can be pretty lethal anyway).