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Hey guys, with the launch of 7th edition and Tyranid's having a harder time cracking vehicles, I was looking more into their codex to see what I could do, since Smash was nerfed. Unfortunately though, I don't wanna put Crushing Claws on a Carnifex, because they have great options for shooting. But, then I saw the Haruspex. I've been wanting to like him, for the longest time, but I always just assume he actually sucks on the tabletop. But, those Crushing Claws.....

Anyone have any experience with him? Does he actually do alright? Is he worth the 73 bucks for the model? Is he worth his points?

I have fielded him twice, and each time he was a bullet magnet. So never actually got to use him in his appropriate role. Then again he kept the bullets away from others who then wrecked face. But I will keep trying him and report back. Waiting to see what other say too.

He's pretty terrible. Ive legitimately tried using him a few times, but now I only bring him as a joke, occasionally .

I have had very hit or miss results with him. I love using him, cause the idea of him is great, but like most non 2+ save nids (that should be fast or have 2+ saves) he does not last very long under focused fire.

Most of the time I just leap-frog him from cover to cover and if it seems the opponent wants to focus him, Ill give him feel no pain if I have it. He, like all melee MCs tend to become bullet magnets so keep that in mind.

So, would it just be more appropriate to bring a full brood of Carnifexes and give 1 or 2 of them Crushing Claws?

 krodarklorr wrote:
So, would it just be more appropriate to bring a full brood of Carnifexes and give 1 or 2 of them Crushing Claws?

Neither is an optimal choice. Crushing Claws would be questionable for a carnifex at 5 points. Generally it is the D3 Hammer of Wrath of the Carnifex that does the heavy lifting with vehicles. What specific vehicles are giving you problems?

tag8833 wrote:

 krodarklorr wrote:
So, would it just be more appropriate to bring a full brood of Carnifexes and give 1 or 2 of them Crushing Claws?

Neither is an optimal choice. Crushing Claws would be questionable for a carnifex at 5 points. Generally it is the D3 Hammer of Wrath of the Carnifex that does the heavy lifting with vehicles. What specific vehicles are giving you problems?

Land Raiders, and Hammerheads. Hmmerheads typically keep their front army facing me, so S6 doesn't do anything, plus its hard to keep up and actually get to them to do damage. And Land Raiders are just annoying, since Smash doesn't do nearly anything.

Aside from haywire flyers how DO tyranids deal with av14 all round vehicles now that smash is awful?

Crushing claws on carnifexes are the best way to kill a land raider. D3 S9 hammer of wrath + 4-5 S10 armourbane can rip a land raider apart even in one turn. The problem comes with their slow movement. 6" + D6 run vs 12" cruising speed means you can never count on catching it.

Warp Lance is another good option. Zoanthropes are relatively cheap, resilient, and useful even if you aren't fighting AV14. If you can get it on your flyrant then that is an added bonus. But with the changes to the psychic phase, using warp lance also takes dice away from casting other powers like catalyst.

3rd best option. Ignore it. Tyranids just don't have a lot of good ways to deal with anything above AV13. So focus on what you can kill and play for objectives. With the change to smash and not being able to assault after changing flight options were probably put into place to nerf deamon MC but kicked Tyranids in the nuts way worse. Tyranids will survive somehow. This isn't the first time we have been in a tight spot.

Haywire hive guard work well.

I like running cc carnifexs with bio plasma but the haruspex I see no use for.

Poly Ranger wrote:
Aside from haywire flyers how DO tyranids deal with av14 all round vehicles now that smash is awful?

Ignore them and kill everything else or grab all the objectives. But......between 4 tentaclids from my Crone and an EGrub Flyrant, I killed my buddies redeemer the other day.

I rather like mine, but as a caveat he has had some obscenely good rolls in all of the matches where he wasn't focused down first thing. In its most memorable game (while on loan to a friend to try out), it managed to take down an Imperial Knight in two rounds by itself and survived the encounter with 1 wound left. In other games, it has generally done very well against other monstrous creatures (especially ones with only 3 attacks), Terminators, Dreads, Kans, and the smaller Wraith Constructs. Main problem really is just getting him to the enemy in one piece, as he is a scary looking model and he has a bit of reputation thanks to the aforementioned incident with the Imperial Knight...

Still, I do like the unit. I think it really needs to be in a list that has enough footslogging monsters to draw attention away from it though. The last list I brought it in had a pair of Tervigons, 6 Hive Guard, and a pair of Mawlocs, so it was more or less ignored until it charged. I generally run mine without any upgrades at all, but Adrenal Glands are rather nice to have if points can be found (we tend to play at 1000-1500, so...).


If nothing else, I'd say the model itself is worth it. It is extremely easy to magnetize, so if the Haruspex doesn't work out you can do a quick head and arm swap for an Exocrine.

 shamroll wrote:
Crushing claws on carnifexes are the best way to kill a land raider. D3 S9 hammer of wrath + 4-5 S10 armourbane can rip a land raider apart even in one turn. The problem comes with their slow movement. 6" + D6 run vs 12" cruising speed means you can never count on catching it.

That is why this is not a viable solution. It is going to take you 4 turns to catch it, and that means for 4 turns you opponent has to ignore the only unit that can threaten his Land Raider. A Land Raider can by itself Kill a Carnifex in 2 rounds of shooting.

 shamroll wrote:
Warp Lance is another good option. Zoanthropes are relatively cheap, resilient, and useful even if you aren't fighting AV14. If you can get it on your flyrant then that is an added bonus. But with the changes to the psychic phase, using warp lance also takes dice away from casting other powers like catalyst.

Sure throw warp lances at it. But depending on Warp Lance to kill it is folly. You will probably strip 1 HP between 2 single Zoeys and 2 Flyrants. If you want to kill it you are going to need something else.

 shamroll wrote:
3rd best option. Ignore it. Tyranids just don't have a lot of good ways to deal with anything above AV13. So focus on what you can kill and play for objectives. With the change to smash and not being able to assault after changing flight options were probably put into place to nerf deamon MC but kicked Tyranids in the nuts way worse. Tyranids will survive somehow. This isn't the first time we have been in a tight spot.

This is by far you best option if you want to win games. If winning games isn't important to you then a Hauspex or Carnifex with Crushing Claws is probably a good option.

If you are facing alot of AV 15 fortifications the Hausprex can be a beast at ripping through them. That is fluffwise what it is built for, and happens to be decent at.

AG can get it up to a max 10 attacks on the charge, and do some serious damage with acid blood, but it is hard to spend the points on.

 Strat_N8 wrote:
it managed to take down an Imperial Knight in two rounds by itself and survived the encounter with 1 wound left.

It's S7, S8 on the charge. So it needs 5+ to glance, 4+ to hit as well, and it swings after the knight. 5 Attacks, 2.5 hits, with each hit having 5/6 chance to at least glance. Call it 2 hull points on the charge. Afterwards you are looking at ~1 hull point per phase.

Knight is hitting on a 3, it's hits average D3 wounds with potential to crush it in 1 swing. Rough math shows ~6 wounds when not charging, on average.

It's not IMPOSSIBLE for a Haruspex to win, but it's far more likely the Knight will kill the Haruspex before it can even swing than it is for the knight to die. Average outcome of this battle is a dead Haruspex, with maybe 2-3 hull points off the Knights. I would not suggest this as a match up unless you are desperate. This is like throwing an imperial guard lieutenant with a powerfist at Draigo.....not's not going to be pretty for the sergeant.

If you are facing alot of AV 15 fortifications the Hausprex can be a beast at ripping through them. That is fluffwise what it is built for, and happens to be decent at.

AG can get it up to a max 10 attacks on the charge, and do some serious damage with acid blood, but it is hard to spend the points on.

5 Attacks on the charge, S8, 2D6, needing a 7 to glance, 8 to pene, auto-hitting. Looking at 0.83 glances and 2 pens. Almost 3 hull points a turn out of 5....not too bad actually. The 2 rolls on the damage table could potentially finish this up too. The real issue is actually getting to melee of course, and a Carnifex would do more damage with crushing claws thanks to S10.

In a perfect world with a charge bonus, hammer of wrath and every attack hitting and wounding, you could IN THEORY kill 11 models. 3 Base, 1 for charging, 1 for a pair of weapons....doubled, plus 1 for hammer of wrath.

Haruspex is a miss IMO. It should have been a beast, or had some interesting special rules. It does not. Use your Elite choices on better units.

Edit: Forgot it had crushing claws, went back and re-did math. Also forgot that tyranids count multiple CCWs for an extra attack now....bleh.

He is str 7 str 8 (with AG) on the charge with Armor bane. He is pretty powerful against most vehicles, his problem is that he only has 3 attacks base, 4 on the charge +1 due to scything talons and crushing claws. hitting on 3's and then decimating the enemy from there.


He might not be a great AV14 killer but he can handle anything else. Remember also that impact hits are on the facing armor value so try to assault from the side or rear if possible.

Yeah... no. The Haruspex is just plain bad. It is really good at tarpitting a Tac squad. If for some reason you have a need to tarpit a tac squad....

Nids do not any good ways of dealing with AV13-14. The nerfing of Smash Attack, Vector Strike, and FMC glide-assault have really been a kick in the jimmies.

For the OP, keep the TLDevs on the fexes, but give them AG. It will help if you Run, help when you charge the vehicles, and give you S10 on the charge.

Other than that, egrubs on flyrants and the odd tentaclid is your best bets. (maybe warp lance... but even that got nerfed.)

 Carnage43 wrote:

It's not IMPOSSIBLE for a Haruspex to win, but it's far more likely the Knight will kill the Haruspex before it can even swing than it is for the knight to die. Average outcome of this battle is a dead Haruspex, with maybe 2-3 hull points off the Knights. I would not suggest this as a match up unless you are desperate. This is like throwing an imperial guard lieutenant with a powerfist at Draigo.....not's not going to be pretty for the sergeant.

I fully agree. As I said, it was its most memorable kill thus far and due entirely to stupidly good luck on its part. In general though, it has done best against other monstrous creatures rather than vehicles (though admittedly, the only vehicles that tend to appear at our shop are Knights and skimmers...).

I suppose it ultimately comes down to how valuable is having a melee Carnifex available in a different slot is to your list. An army that is making heavy use of Exocrines or some of the 6-wound big bugs will probably get more out of the Haruspex than one making heavy use of Carnifexes, as the two have similar preferred targets while the vast majority of the 6-wound bugs are more or less strictly anti-infantry at this point.

 Gray1378 wrote:
He is str 7 str 8 (with AG) on the charge with Armor bane. He is pretty powerful against most vehicles, his problem is that he only has 3 attacks base, 4 on the charge +1 due to scything talons and crushing claws. hitting on 3's and then decimating the enemy from there.


He might not be a great AV14 killer but he can handle anything else. Remember also that impact hits are on the facing armor value so try to assault from the side or rear if possible.

Go take a look at the Haruspex entry, he doesn't even have Scything Talons, making a bad unit even worse.

Every game I play with my nids I pull out my Haruspex because I love the model that much, sadly he just can't DO anything. With the advent of 7th and the massive nerf to smash MCs have a hard time even poping vehicles anymore and Tyranids may as well just stay home when it comes to high AV. Haywire Hive Guard are probably your best bet, but with how expensive they are and the fact that they scatter with BS 3 means they are still terrible at it. A single Hive Crone will on average not even kill a Rhino with its Tentaclids which is just pathetic after two turns of shooting.

The Haruspex has a low WS, low number of attacks, and is pretty damn squishy. He is best at popping vehicles but even then he struggles to get the job done in a meaningful amount of time.

 krodarklorr wrote:

tag8833 wrote:

 krodarklorr wrote:
So, would it just be more appropriate to bring a full brood of Carnifexes and give 1 or 2 of them Crushing Claws?

Neither is an optimal choice. Crushing Claws would be questionable for a carnifex at 5 points. Generally it is the D3 Hammer of Wrath of the Carnifex that does the heavy lifting with vehicles. What specific vehicles are giving you problems?

Land Raiders, and Hammerheads. Hmmerheads typically keep their front army facing me, so S6 doesn't do anything, plus its hard to keep up and actually get to them to do damage. And Land Raiders are just annoying, since Smash doesn't do nearly anything.

For Hammerheads and similar units like Wave Serpents, I'd bring Hive Guard with Impaler Cannons. With the poor range and line-of-sight requirement their Haywire weapon is pretty bad in comparison, and only performs better against AV14. On the other hand, Impaler Cannons will let you ignore line of sight and cover saves (notably Jink) from further away. Position the Hive Guard to draw their AV13 facing, letting other units with S6 firepower hit the sides. Beyond that, Flyrants with Electroshock Grubs can score free hullpoints, and their Devourers can easily find a way to hit rear armour.

If you're against slow AV14 like Land Raiders, then honestly your best bet will still be Fexes. Just take as many as you can with Devourers and Adrenals, use Onslaught to push them on if you can, and make it so that these lumbering tanks can't avoid you. The Bio-Blast formation is really good for this, as on top of multiple Fexes you also get a Tyrannofex as a good distraction for any Lascannons. In the meantime those dakkafexes can shoot a wide variety of other targets until they're in charge range.

 krodarklorr wrote:
So, would it just be more appropriate to bring a full brood of Carnifexes and give 1 or 2 of them Crushing Claws?

I don't think you need Crushing Claws...if I want to spend an extra 15, I'd toss Adrenal on That makes it easier to strike home, and adds 1 ST on the charge.