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So looking at the stats for the Monstrous Creatures in the Tyranid codex is there any particular reason some of the larger ones are weaker than the Carnifex ?

Also is there any explanation for why Tyranid Monstrous Creatures that aren't the Carnifex seem to struggle against Walkers at times ?

I find it kind of odd a creature as large as a Trygon can't even harm Walkers like a Contemptor or an Orkanaut outside of Smash attacks.

It's because Tyranids suck! Outside of Flyrant spam wears the second worst army (after DA).

SGTPozy wrote:
It's because Tyranids suck! Outside of Flyrant spam wears the second worst army (after DA).

Well I don't think its that bad now.

But then again I am not a Tyranid player so I probably can't judge that.

Different creatures are designed for different functions. Carnifexes are designed to destroy vehicles and buildings. Toxicrenes are designed to provide cover. Hive Crones are designed to deal with air support.

The Imperial Answer wrote:
So looking at the stats for the Monstrous Creatures in the Tyranid codex is there any particular reason some of the larger ones are weaker than the Carnifex ?

Also is there any explanation for why Tyranid Monstrous Creatures that aren't the Carnifex seem to struggle against Walkers at times ?

I find it kind of odd a creature as large as a Trygon can't even harm Walkers like a Contemptor or an Orkanaut outside of Smash attacks.

Tyranids seem to be stuck in some kind of bad design format were almost none of their MC are allowed to have any of the following: strength and toughness higher then 6 which combined with the changes to smash screws them over when fighting vehicles, only the tyrannofex has a 2+ armor save ever other Tyranid MC is stuck with a 3+ save or worse while not having access to an inv save making them easy anti-tank bait, often have a combination of poor weapon skill, initiative without access to rerolls and finally outside of filers all the MCs are stuck moving at 6 inches a turn. Yet for all these faults Tyranid MCs cost nearly as much or more then other clearly superior units like the dreadknight, riptide, wraithknight, hell I considered the talos way better then most other tyranid MC simply due to its toughness 7 and built in feel no pain. Course Robin did work on the 5th and 6th Tyranid books and he really hates nids so that might just be his bias screwing over a whole army.

 Archon_Zarbyrn wrote:

The Imperial Answer wrote:
So looking at the stats for the Monstrous Creatures in the Tyranid codex is there any particular reason some of the larger ones are weaker than the Carnifex ?

Also is there any explanation for why Tyranid Monstrous Creatures that aren't the Carnifex seem to struggle against Walkers at times ?

I find it kind of odd a creature as large as a Trygon can't even harm Walkers like a Contemptor or an Orkanaut outside of Smash attacks.

Tyranids seem to be stuck in some kind of bad design format were almost none of their MC are allowed to have any of the following: strength and toughness higher then 6 which combined with the changes to smash screws them over when fighting vehicles, only the tyrannofex has a 2+ armor save ever other Tyranid MC is stuck with a 3+ save or worse while not having access to an inv save making them easy anti-tank bait, often have a combination of poor weapon skill, initiative without access to rerolls and finally outside of filers all the MCs are stuck moving at 6 inches a turn. Yet for all these faults Tyranid MCs cost nearly as much or more then other clearly superior units like the dreadknight, riptide, wraithknight, hell I considered the talos way better then most other tyranid MC simply due to its toughness 7 and built in feel no pain. Course Robin did work on the 5th and 6th Tyranid books and he really hates nids so that might just be his bias screwing over a whole army.

This, so much this. TMCs would be awesome if they costed about half the points the do now. I don't mind Tyranid units being worse in every way when compared to other MCs but just price them appropriately! Right now when I field Tyranids I just feel like I do not have enough units on the board at any time, I am going to take heavy casualties getting my swarm into range and that means my opponent has plenty of time to pick their targets. That works if I have redundancy built into my army but sadly Tyranids aren't cheap enough to force enough redundancy to make it across the board with threats still intact.

I could always go out and buy four Flyrants I guess...

 Archon_Zarbyrn wrote:

The Imperial Answer wrote:
So looking at the stats for the Monstrous Creatures in the Tyranid codex is there any particular reason some of the larger ones are weaker than the Carnifex ?

Also is there any explanation for why Tyranid Monstrous Creatures that aren't the Carnifex seem to struggle against Walkers at times ?

I find it kind of odd a creature as large as a Trygon can't even harm Walkers like a Contemptor or an Orkanaut outside of Smash attacks.

Tyranids seem to be stuck in some kind of bad design format were almost none of their MC are allowed to have any of the following: strength and toughness higher then 6 which combined with the changes to smash screws them over when fighting vehicles

Only if they're fighting a walker or a Land Raider, Given that most vehicles are rear AV10, and are hit against WS1, they're still *very* solid against vehicles even without Smash attacks.

Course Robin did work on the 5th and 6th Tyranid books and he really hates nids so that might just be his bias screwing over a whole army.

I've never understood where people got the thought that Cruddace hates nids? He may not have done a good job, but there's zero evidence he hates them as a faction. Quite frankly, his work on the IG book wasn't much better, the core rules were just better suited to them in 5th, but the internal balance is horrific with half the codex never seeing the top of a table.

I've never understood where people got the thought that Cruddace hates nids? He may not have done a good job, but there's zero evidence he hates them as a faction.

One can either love or hate a faction. Kelly loves his eldar, he even writes BB codex to make his eldar even better. He loves them. Cruddace writes bad codex for nids, twice. He clearly has to dislike them. The only other option would be GW making people write rules for an army they do not understand, and that would be kind of a stupid considering they expect people to buy the rules.

 Archon_Zarbyrn wrote:

The Imperial Answer wrote:
So looking at the stats for the Monstrous Creatures in the Tyranid codex is there any particular reason some of the larger ones are weaker than the Carnifex ?

Also is there any explanation for why Tyranid Monstrous Creatures that aren't the Carnifex seem to struggle against Walkers at times ?

I find it kind of odd a creature as large as a Trygon can't even harm Walkers like a Contemptor or an Orkanaut outside of Smash attacks.

Tyranids seem to be stuck in some kind of bad design format were almost none of their MC are allowed to have any of the following: strength and toughness higher then 6 which combined with the changes to smash screws them over when fighting vehicles, only the tyrannofex has a 2+ armor save ever other Tyranid MC is stuck with a 3+ save or worse while not having access to an inv save making them easy anti-tank bait, often have a combination of poor weapon skill, initiative without access to rerolls and finally outside of filers all the MCs are stuck moving at 6 inches a turn. Yet for all these faults Tyranid MCs cost nearly as much or more then other clearly superior units like the dreadknight, riptide, wraithknight, hell I considered the talos way better then most other tyranid MC simply due to its toughness 7 and built in feel no pain. Course Robin did work on the 5th and 6th Tyranid books and he really hates nids so that might just be his bias screwing over a whole army.

Well the only vehicles they really seem to struggle with are Walkers.

Outside of Old One Eye, Carnifexes and any Monstrous Creature that can take Crushing Claws it seems like a lot of their Monstrous Creatures would get mauled in a fight with much cheaper and more powerful Walkers like the Deff Dread.

Come to think of it I find its kind of odd that so few of them are as strong as Eldar Monstrous Creatures with are T 8 and STR 8 (despite some of them being volumes smaller in size than a Tyranid Monstrous Creature like a Trygon).

Makumba wrote:

I've never understood where people got the thought that Cruddace hates nids? He may not have done a good job, but there's zero evidence he hates them as a faction.

One can either love or hate a faction. Kelly loves his eldar, he even writes BB codex to make his eldar even better. He loves them. Cruddace writes bad codex for nids, twice. He clearly has to dislike them. The only other option would be GW making people write rules for an army they do not understand, and that would be kind of a stupid considering they expect people to buy the rules.

I don't think GW understands rules writing period. Hell, Kelly made the same mistake two codexes in a row, resulting in absurd Eldar skimmerspam armies of doom

SGTPozy wrote:
It's because Tyranids suck! Outside of Flyrant spam wears the second worst army (after DA).

Wrong. Nidzilla lists can still be a nightmare for TAC lists and just when your opponent thinks thats all you can field you can surprise him next time with a horde list and all his lascannons and grav cents will be moot.

Do tyranids not have 'without number' or something where they can keep coming back?

That would make them worth it. Something where all Tyranids (excpet tyrants and other leader types) on death can come back on from the tyranid edge of the table to represent endless swarms.
Or maybe like the daemon rule where you can 'summon new units'.

Nids do seem to get the shaft a lot.

Boniface wrote:
Do tyranids not have 'without number' or something where they can keep coming back?

That would make them worth it. Something where all Tyranids (excpet tyrants and other leader types) on death can come back on from the tyranid edge of the table to represent endless swarms.
Or maybe like the daemon rule where you can 'summon new units'.

Nids do seem to get the shaft a lot.

They do not. In any case without number only applied to gribblies.

Only good TMC's are Hive Tyrants (one of, if not the best Flyer in the game), Carnifexes (S9 and similar damage output to Flyrant but cheaper), Mawloc (hit's Invisibile units), Tervigon (free troops if you can bear the points tax of 30 Termagants) and Exocrine (AP2 shooting). Everything else is meh or gak.

I've shelved my Nids for the time being. I have more fun with Necrons (but may shelf them soon), DE and soon to be SM: Mantis Warriors.

Boniface wrote:
Do tyranids not have 'without number' or something where they can keep coming back?

That would make them worth it. Something where all Tyranids (excpet tyrants and other leader types) on death can come back on from the tyranid edge of the table to represent endless swarms.
Or maybe like the daemon rule where you can 'summon new units'.

Nids do seem to get the shaft a lot.

I am not sure if you are serious or sarcastic, but if you take different formations you can have the little gribblies come back and for summoning, what about the tervigon. Nids right now with their ability to spam screening units, and relative ease to get FnP and mobile cover, may be one of hte best codexes in the game. Other than the wriathknight and NDK what can compete with TMCs. Riptides, just have a mawloc pop up and hold it down, or just tarpit it, Deldar MCs, have no where the mobility and Necron MCs are even slower.

oz of the north wrote:

Boniface wrote:
Do tyranids not have 'without number' or something where they can keep coming back?

That would make them worth it. Something where all Tyranids (excpet tyrants and other leader types) on death can come back on from the tyranid edge of the table to represent endless swarms.
Or maybe like the daemon rule where you can 'summon new units'.

Nids do seem to get the shaft a lot.

I am not sure if you are serious or sarcastic, but if you take different formations you can have the little gribblies come back and for summoning, what about the tervigon. Nids right now with their ability to spam screening units, and relative ease to get FnP and mobile cover, may be one of hte best codexes in the game. Other than the wriathknight and NDK what can compete with TMCs. Riptides, just have a mawloc pop up and hold it down, or just tarpit it, Deldar MCs, have no where the mobility and Necron MCs are even slower.

I don't know them well.

oz of the north wrote:

Boniface wrote:
Do tyranids not have 'without number' or something where they can keep coming back?

That would make them worth it. Something where all Tyranids (excpet tyrants and other leader types) on death can come back on from the tyranid edge of the table to represent endless swarms.
Or maybe like the daemon rule where you can 'summon new units'.

Nids do seem to get the shaft a lot.

I am not sure if you are serious or sarcastic, but if you take different formations you can have the little gribblies come back and for summoning, what about the tervigon. Nids right now with their ability to spam screening units, and relative ease to get FnP and mobile cover, may be one of hte best codexes in the game. Other than the wriathknight and NDK what can compete with TMCs. Riptides, just have a mawloc pop up and hold it down, or just tarpit it, Deldar MCs, have no where the mobility and Necron MCs are even slower.

A Lord of Change w/2x Greater Gifts + Boomstick and Lv3 Divination will rock most TMC's... Lots of S8 attacks at typically better WS/I, a sweet invuln save and a roughly 60% chance at landing Precognition for re-rolling absolutely everything.
The Boomstick is also useful for adding a handful of extra casualties into the swarms of little guys who get caught too close to an exploding TMC.

A Kipper can also be a real nightmare, since it can take Lv3 Telepathy, (hello Psy Shriek!), and is still silly fast on the ground despite not having wings of its own... Given the same 2x Greater Gifts, its decently survivable, and can default a Lesser Gift to a sword that forces an Initiative test or take another no-armour save wound should he not outright kill whatever he's fighting.

Bloodthirsters love fighting TMC's... Axe of Khorne which it comes with as standard gives him the ability to auto-kill on a 6 to-wound. Slap on an Exalted + Greater Gifts and he's set.
The new Wrath of Khorne 'Thirster is massively expensive, but is downright rude to Tyranids in general.

Nurgle Daemon Prince is a bit light due to T5/W4, but it can grab a Balesword that gives it Instant Death attacks. It'll want to stay the hell away from a Hive Tyrant sure, but most other TMC's are lunch. Plus he can always add on some Biomancy levels for the chance at gaining Iron Arm...


Daemons definitely win the MC match-up vs. Tyranids. The only ones I really hate fighting are Flyrants, (due to the Dakka), and Mawlocs/Trygons. All the others I can rely on my own MC's to readily tear to shreds.

oz of the north wrote:

Boniface wrote:
Do tyranids not have 'without number' or something where they can keep coming back?

That would make them worth it. Something where all Tyranids (excpet tyrants and other leader types) on death can come back on from the tyranid edge of the table to represent endless swarms.
Or maybe like the daemon rule where you can 'summon new units'.

Nids do seem to get the shaft a lot.

I am not sure if you are serious or sarcastic, but if you take different formations you can have the little gribblies come back and for summoning, what about the tervigon. Nids right now with their ability to spam screening units, and relative ease to get FnP and mobile cover, may be one of hte best codexes in the game. Other than the wriathknight and NDK what can compete with TMCs. Riptides, just have a mawloc pop up and hold it down, or just tarpit it, Deldar MCs, have no where the mobility and Necron MCs are even slower.

Yes you can get your little gribblies to come back if they are apart of a specific formation, that only works with the broods attached to it, and only on the roll of a 4+...ohh and they walk back on from your table edge so they have to run all the way back across the table to do anything. It isn't exactly great. The Tervigon is okay, I wont deny that. Tervigons kinda lack because ALL they do is spawn more units and not much else. They get a token psychic power but because of the bi-polar Tyranid powers it can either be awesome or completely useless. Easy to get FnP? You mean by hoping we roll for it. Mobile cover is about the only thing I will grant you with Venomthropes, but man it would be horrible if we didn't have even that small boon. Your advice on combating Riptides is...not good. The Mawloc pops up on turn 2+ and like all deepstriking units can not do anything for that turn, so that is ample time for the Tau player to destroy it with the combined shooting of his entire army. Fire Warriors are unique as a troop choice that is an actual threat to TMCs because T6 v S5 guns means you actually have a chance at killing them.


Anyway...for every decent TMC there is OOE, Haruspex, Maleceptor, Harpy, Hive Crone(I don't understand why people think these guys are all that great,) Non-dakka Carnifex, Toxicrene, Trygon/Trygon Prime, Tyrannofex. So many of the TMCs are just so bad that it is hard to imagine what their designer was even thinking, just look at the Maleceptor and tell me I am wrong. How on earth is this thing supposed to even do anything?

WOW....So much wrong in this thread. OFC flying hive tyrants are the best unit in the game so they typically overshadow everything else in the codex...

Lets reexamine this "NIDS ARE BAD" idea.

Have you heard of a toxicrine? This thing will eat anything bio alive for the most part. 2+ poision at AP2 and 6's instant death with 6 attacks at I6. Everytime you wound it - it gives you an AP2 hit back. It also fires a large blast with 2+ poison instant death on 6...Realistically this is an excellent close combat beast.

Carnifex with double devourer is a great source of firepower

Also have you see the tyranid drop pods? OP as feth. 15 str 5 shots at 5 w 4+ save t5 and it can move. I've been smoked hard before from these things.

Really I think nids are pretty good. They get a lot of 2+ cover and can take a bunch of MC. Their troops are ultra bad but just don't take them.

 Xenomancers wrote:
WOW....So much wrong in this thread. OFC flying hive tyrants are the best unit in the game so they typically overshadow everything else in the codex...

Lets reexamine this "NIDS ARE BAD" idea.

Have you heard of a toxicrine? This thing will eat anything bio alive for the most part. 2+ poision at AP2 and 6's instant death with 6 attacks at I6. Everytime you wound it - it gives you an AP2 hit back. It also fires a large blast with 2+ poison instant death on 6...Realistically this is an excellent close combat beast.

Carnifex with double devourer is a great source of firepower

Also have you see the tyranid drop pods? OP as feth. 15 str 5 shots at 5 w 4+ save t5 and it can move. I've been smoked hard before from these things.

Really I think nids are pretty good. They get a lot of 2+ cover and can take a bunch of MC. Their troops are ultra bad but just don't take them.

You aren't really fully right either.
The Toxicrene is still a 6" moving creature with no access to fleet, while being WS3 with a 4+ sv. He's not even in the codex. The pod does make him work well i suspect (i don't have one). But the pod has it's own issues. It's a ridiculously big model and again, isn't in the codex. The Carnifex isn't a weapons platform, but yet it's his best role. The shrouded cover is life saver for Nids, but it's pure cheese and a big crutch. The troops are far from bad, Rippers deepstriking continue to win me games of maelstrom, shrouded Gaunts are cheap, provide great bubble wraps and tarpits.

Overall the Nid codex is bad. Take away the Devourers and you're lacking against the better armies. The whole codex reeks of lack of thought. While i don't care for having a "strong" codex, i would like a book which has lots in the way of versatility and meaning. Shadow in the Warp and Instinct Behaviour, pointless rules that are written so bad they needn't be in the book, but have potential to give the book character. IB never causes me hassle or benefit, and SITW does nothing, even against Grey Knights while a Flyrant has Pyshic Shriek. Easy fixes....

When i bought the Blood Angels book i was in awe.

I think everyone blows the venmthropes shroud out of proportion.

Besides the fact its generated by a T 4 model, it also forces us to spend points on chaff. Gaunts add up in the end and you need a fairly solid wall to garauntee the creatures you want to cross the board get there.

Further there is the universal trouble that all our big fighty beasties have a paltry WS 3. Which means its a 3+ for mister marine to stick gernades all over us. Add to it only Carnify get gernades, on an Init 2 model no less, and most of our monsters can be subdued by forcing them to charge through a fence.

I love my big bad bugs but they could use some love from GW too. Honestly I hate the fact our most competitive options are flyer spam or lictor/spore spam both those lists look incredibly boring.

They have received a lot of love though especially through the release of the new models, a 3w 15 point troop choice and so many formations that easily mitigate all your weak spots.

Still having more than 2 competitive builds would be ridiculous, some codices only have 1 such as GK.

oz of the north wrote:
They have received a lot of love though especially through the release of the new models, a 3w 15 point troop choice and so many formations that easily mitigate all your weak spots.

Still having more than 2 competitive builds would be ridiculous, some codices only have 1 such as GK.

None of that addresses the problems with TMCs I and other's have pointed out. Yes a W3 15pt troop is nice, but its still just a sporemine and you still need chaff for slogging monsters. As for formations, none of them mitigate poor WS and a lack of gernades.

You honestly just sound salty over the GK book, not that I can blame you.

lonestarr777 wrote:

oz of the north wrote:
They have received a lot of love though especially through the release of the new models, a 3w 15 point troop choice and so many formations that easily mitigate all your weak spots.

Still having more than 2 competitive builds would be ridiculous, some codices only have 1 such as GK.

None of that addresses the problems with TMCs I and other's have pointed out. Yes a W3 15pt troop is nice, but its still just a sporemine and you still need chaff for slogging monsters. As for formations, none of them mitigate poor WS and a lack of gernades.

You honestly just sound salty over the GK book, not that I can blame you.

Don't really care about the GK book, more of a wolves player. The TMCs, such as carnifexes need to be ws3, first of all they are basically mindless drones, so the finer points of combat escape them. Also if they had all those items they would be extremely over powered. For the issues of lack of grenades, their high toughness should be enough to mitigate that. If going against ta tac squad, if they want to go through your armor they need to use power weapons, which usually will only be wounding on 6s, or grenades. Then still only wound on 4s and you get your armor. So going after your opponent really is not that big of an issue and with how easy it is for your army to get FnP on anything if you have a psyker that can also mitigate it.

Where as an army like SW can only get it through, the warlord trait, which is from their main codex which is useless compared to champions, or a wolf priest and in still both instances it's only a 6+++. Wolves can bring a rune priest, but then it is a 1/6 where as it is less for nids.


Also every army needs a weakness, such as GK lacking any long rang shooting, or DA lacking anything good.

I feel like 'nids are always just barely not good. 5th edition ave them lots of cool units but no way to reliably take down vehicles. Hull points got introduced, but little bugs lost cost effective access to strength 4. Lots of bugs are psykers, but they lost access to biomancy. Etc.

I think the designers are also a little afraid of reworking their pricing as dramatically as they ought to. Losing things like armorbane and the changes to smash took away perfectly viable anti-tank options (even the tervigon would be a solid rhino killer). The abundance of insta-death and effectiveness of melee grenades makes them relatively easy to take down as does the prevalence of things like plasma. Many of the big bugs could use a hefty discount, especially the tervigon who got both worse and more expensive if I recall correctly as the designers tried to shut down its previous levels of auto-take.

Outside of tyrants, however, I'm not sure I'd want to see a terrible impressive invul save or otherdurability increases. 'Nids should have access to lots of MCs, but the law of conservation of 'nidjitsu demands that each of those MCs (bar a few) be mini-bosses rather than big bosses. No one wants an entire army of 2+ invul 10 wound 'nids.

Wyldhunt wrote:
I feel like 'nids are always just barely not good. 5th edition ave them lots of cool units but no way to reliably take down vehicles. Hull points got introduced, but little bugs lost cost effective access to strength 4. Lots of bugs are psykers, but they lost access to biomancy. Etc.

I think the designers are also a little afraid of reworking their pricing as dramatically as they ought to. Losing things like armorbane and the changes to smash took away perfectly viable anti-tank options (even the tervigon would be a solid rhino killer). The abundance of insta-death and effectiveness of melee grenades makes them relatively easy to take down as does the prevalence of things like plasma. Many of the big bugs could use a hefty discount, especially the tervigon who got both worse and more expensive if I recall correctly as the designers tried to shut down its previous levels of auto-take.

Outside of tyrants, however, I'm not sure I'd want to see a terrible impressive invul save or otherdurability increases. 'Nids should have access to lots of MCs, but the law of conservation of 'nidjitsu demands that each of those MCs (bar a few) be mini-bosses rather than big bosses. No one wants an entire army of 2+ invul 10 wound 'nids.

So, nids are bad now?

No way.

 KaptinBadrukk wrote:

Wyldhunt wrote:
I feel like 'nids are always just barely not good. 5th edition ave them lots of cool units but no way to reliably take down vehicles. Hull points got introduced, but little bugs lost cost effective access to strength 4. Lots of bugs are psykers, but they lost access to biomancy. Etc.

I think the designers are also a little afraid of reworking their pricing as dramatically as they ought to. Losing things like armorbane and the changes to smash took away perfectly viable anti-tank options (even the tervigon would be a solid rhino killer). The abundance of insta-death and effectiveness of melee grenades makes them relatively easy to take down as does the prevalence of things like plasma. Many of the big bugs could use a hefty discount, especially the tervigon who got both worse and more expensive if I recall correctly as the designers tried to shut down its previous levels of auto-take.

Outside of tyrants, however, I'm not sure I'd want to see a terrible impressive invul save or otherdurability increases. 'Nids should have access to lots of MCs, but the law of conservation of 'nidjitsu demands that each of those MCs (bar a few) be mini-bosses rather than big bosses. No one wants an entire army of 2+ invul 10 wound 'nids.

So, nids are bad now?

No way.

They're not necessarily "bad," but it's relatively easy to put together an army that simply doesn't work. Flyrants are popular because of their durability an because they're one of the few things that can reliably kill vehicles. A lot of players have a hard time not bringing them because they give you a potent, survivable threat. If they made regular venom cannons better against vehicles or gave biovores acid spores mines again or made hive guard not terrible or gave gaunts a way to deal with armor that didn't make them too expensive or any number of other things, I think 'nids would be much easier to build a list around. As is, I feel that it's just too easy to make a 'nid list that will get shut down hard.

Everyone keeps bring up the good things that Tyranids have, but I don't think anyone is denying that you can make a competitive Tyranid list. What is being said is that when you have a codex that has 37+ unique options and only about 8 of them see any kind of play it is a HUGE problem. So much of the TMCs are awful, but then people just start yelling about the Flyrant like that makes it all better. How many people who don't play Tyranids even know what the Haruspex does? How about Tyrgons? Seen a Tyrgon in awhile? How about the Maleceptor? I know that the Pyrovore gets joked about being the worst unit in the game but the Maleceptor gives it a serious run for its money.

Wyldhunt wrote:

 KaptinBadrukk wrote:

Wyldhunt wrote:
I feel like 'nids are always just barely not good. 5th edition ave them lots of cool units but no way to reliably take down vehicles. Hull points got introduced, but little bugs lost cost effective access to strength 4. Lots of bugs are psykers, but they lost access to biomancy. Etc.

I think the designers are also a little afraid of reworking their pricing as dramatically as they ought to. Losing things like armorbane and the changes to smash took away perfectly viable anti-tank options (even the tervigon would be a solid rhino killer). The abundance of insta-death and effectiveness of melee grenades makes them relatively easy to take down as does the prevalence of things like plasma. Many of the big bugs could use a hefty discount, especially the tervigon who got both worse and more expensive if I recall correctly as the designers tried to shut down its previous levels of auto-take.

Outside of tyrants, however, I'm not sure I'd want to see a terrible impressive invul save or otherdurability increases. 'Nids should have access to lots of MCs, but the law of conservation of 'nidjitsu demands that each of those MCs (bar a few) be mini-bosses rather than big bosses. No one wants an entire army of 2+ invul 10 wound 'nids.

So, nids are bad now?

No way.

They're not necessarily "bad," but it's relatively easy to put together an army that simply doesn't work. Flyrants are popular because of their durability an because they're one of the few things that can reliably kill vehicles. A lot of players have a hard time not bringing them because they give you a potent, survivable threat. If they made regular venom cannons better against vehicles or gave biovores acid spores mines again or made hive guard not terrible or gave gaunts a way to deal with armor that didn't make them too expensive or any number of other things, I think 'nids would be much easier to build a list around. As is, I feel that it's just too easy to make a 'nid list that will get shut down hard.

Any army, except probably Necrons, suffers from this. Also short of armor 14, nids should not have that much difficulty killing vehicles. Hive guard with their str 8 that ignore cover and do not need line of sight can really crush vehicles, even if only hitting on 4s.

Also with units that aren't viable, there is always the possibility of a formation that can mitigate their weakness. The trygon has the tunneling formation which is great, not many other armies have the sheer number of formations that nids have.

oz of the north wrote:

lonestarr777 wrote:

oz of the north wrote:
They have received a lot of love though especially through the release of the new models, a 3w 15 point troop choice and so many formations that easily mitigate all your weak spots.

Still having more than 2 competitive builds would be ridiculous, some codices only have 1 such as GK.

None of that addresses the problems with TMCs I and other's have pointed out. Yes a W3 15pt troop is nice, but its still just a sporemine and you still need chaff for slogging monsters. As for formations, none of them mitigate poor WS and a lack of gernades.

You honestly just sound salty over the GK book, not that I can blame you.

Don't really care about the GK book, more of a wolves player. The TMCs, such as carnifexes need to be ws3, first of all they are basically mindless drones, so the finer points of combat escape them. Also if they had all those items they would be extremely over powered. For the issues of lack of grenades, their high toughness should be enough to mitigate that. If going against ta tac squad, if they want to go through your armor they need to use power weapons, which usually will only be wounding on 6s, or grenades. Then still only wound on 4s and you get your armor. So going after your opponent really is not that big of an issue and with how easy it is for your army to get FnP on anything if you have a psyker that can also mitigate it.

Where as an army like SW can only get it through, the warlord trait, which is from their main codex which is useless compared to champions, or a wolf priest and in still both instances it's only a 6+++. Wolves can bring a rune priest, but then it is a 1/6 where as it is less for nids.


Also every army needs a weakness, such as GK lacking any long rang shooting, or DA lacking anything good.

First, please do not use fluff to justify your arguements. A carnifex is a mindless beast but it can easliy argued its only purpose is combat and thus deserving of a higher WS.

Second as a wolf player with access to one of the most hideously powerfull beatstick units in the game. I really dont see where youre getting we should just be happy with a half dozen useless monsters that most of your book can shred.

Finally getting acess to FNP requires a roll of a 1 when generating our psyker powers. I can count how many times Ive been lucky enough to get it on one hand. Trust me, would be alot happier if I could hand that out like candy to my units.

I love my bugs, dont get me wrong. But I know damn well most things in my book are nothing are little more than handicaps.

lonestarr777 wrote:

oz of the north wrote:

lonestarr777 wrote:

oz of the north wrote:
They have received a lot of love though especially through the release of the new models, a 3w 15 point troop choice and so many formations that easily mitigate all your weak spots.

Still having more than 2 competitive builds would be ridiculous, some codices only have 1 such as GK.

None of that addresses the problems with TMCs I and other's have pointed out. Yes a W3 15pt troop is nice, but its still just a sporemine and you still need chaff for slogging monsters. As for formations, none of them mitigate poor WS and a lack of gernades.

You honestly just sound salty over the GK book, not that I can blame you.

Don't really care about the GK book, more of a wolves player. The TMCs, such as carnifexes need to be ws3, first of all they are basically mindless drones, so the finer points of combat escape them. Also if they had all those items they would be extremely over powered. For the issues of lack of grenades, their high toughness should be enough to mitigate that. If going against ta tac squad, if they want to go through your armor they need to use power weapons, which usually will only be wounding on 6s, or grenades. Then still only wound on 4s and you get your armor. So going after your opponent really is not that big of an issue and with how easy it is for your army to get FnP on anything if you have a psyker that can also mitigate it.

Where as an army like SW can only get it through, the warlord trait, which is from their main codex which is useless compared to champions, or a wolf priest and in still both instances it's only a 6+++. Wolves can bring a rune priest, but then it is a 1/6 where as it is less for nids.


Also every army needs a weakness, such as GK lacking any long rang shooting, or DA lacking anything good.

First, please do not use fluff to justify your arguements. A carnifex is a mindless beast but it can easliy argued its only purpose is combat and thus deserving of a higher WS.

Second as a wolf player with access to one of the most hideously powerfull beatstick units in the game. I really dont see where youre getting we should just be happy with a half dozen useless monsters that most of your book can shred.

Finally getting acess to FNP requires a roll of a 1 when generating our psyker powers. I can count how many times Ive been lucky enough to get it on one hand. Trust me, would be alot happier if I could hand that out like candy to my units.

I love my bugs, dont get me wrong. But I know damn well most things in my book are nothing are little more than handicaps.

Most of your best units TWC can do nothing to, they cannot do a single thing to a flyrant, and if carnifexes get the charge their HoW will crush wolves, but even if you cannot get FnP most of your psychic powers are good and the psychic units they are on have a decent purpose. Such as tervigon or tyrants, even zoantropes can act as mobile synapse. Where as the wolves powers are terrible to useless and the user is meh.

Regarding the fluff that was just added, the 2nd part was important, where I stated that if you made them WS4 they would be way overpowered or cost more points than you would want to spend.