Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Just your friendly neighborhood Tyranid player with a short (by which I mean comprehensive) list of Monstrous Creatures. The list is divided up by "Competitive in spite of Grav" and "Noncompetitive (for reasons)" and does not include named MC or Gargantuan Creatures cause I don't feel like it...except for Wraithknights because screw them.

Competitive in spite of Grav:
Wraithknight
Riptide
Flying Hive Tyrant (but only because of the 'Hard to Hit' rule)
Flying Daemon Princes (but only because of the 'Hard to Hit' rule)
Canoptek Spyder (but only because of the Canoptek Harvest formation)

Noncompetitive (for reasons):
Bloodthirsters (all types)
Walking Daemon Princes
Keeper of Secrets
Lord of Change
Great Unclean One
Kastelan
Cronos
Talos
Wraithlord
Dreadknight
C'tan Shard (all types)
Transcendent C'tan
Walking Hive Tyrants
Tervigon
Tyrannofex
Haruspex
Maleceptor
Harpy
Hive Crone
Carnifex
Exocrine
Mawloc (except in the one meta-breaker Lictor Shame list that is no longer relevant)
Sporocyst
Tyrannocyte
Toxicrene
Trygon and Prime

While I'm sure I've forgotten an MC here or there, this the best list that a 10 minute search on Army Builder came up with. Needless to say if I've forgotten one then there's a good chance it's going in the Noncompetitive list. So let's take a look.

- I spy 5 competitive MC's that are 'Competitive'. 1, the Canoptek Spyder, is only competitive due to its role in a powerful formation. 2, the flying Hive Tyrant and Daemon Prince, are competitive due solely to the "Hard to Hit" rule in the main rulebook. Now the "Hard to Hit" rule is not the only thing they bring to the table, BUT neither MC is competitive without it. That leaves 2, the Wraithknight and Riptide, that are competitive on their own merits.
- 25 MC's, not including variations of Bloodthirsters, C'tans, etc, that are not competitive 'for reasons'. Those reasons come down to points cost, purpose or lack thereof, weak or even self-destructive rules, and an inability to stay alive long enough to serve any purpose due to weapons like grav among others. So we're left with 7-20% of the available MCs that are worth fielding in a given competitive game.

tl;dr - MCs are not broken. Wraithknights and Riptides are broken. MCs are not overpowered because they are better than vehicles. The rules for vehicles are weak and poorly designed. Any weapon that can take out a Wraithknight or Riptide in a single turn will slaughter all other MCs so efficiently that the dice rolling is almost superfluous. The weapon is not balanced. The weapon is not necessary. The weapon needs to be nerfed just as badly as those Wraithknights and Riptides that it kills so well.

MCs are pretty strong. They stand up against a lot more enemies than vehicles or infantry do.

Grav is extremely necessary againt elite mcs and gmcs. One can't spam grav guns because they are so bad vs vehicles. Cannons are much more spammable

You don't know what you're talking about, as you listed ALL Bloodthristers as uncompetitive, ignored that Mawlocs ARE competitive, said Dreadknights are not competitive, and that Ctan shards are used in that Conclave which actually helps them.

Also doesn't matter if the target is ONLY competitive because it's hard to hit, it's still competitive and high shots are necessary to kill it.

Of course the list is subject to change based on variations in people's local metas. However even if you accept that ALL Bloodthirsters are competitive, along with Mawlocs, Dreadknights, and ALL C'tan variants...that comes to 12 out of 33. Just over 1/3 of MC's that are competitive. 2/3 that have no place in any competitive list.

That situation is not even in the same county as 'balanced'. That is grotesquely skewed and that's for the unit type that is supposedly broken. Who knows what the situation is for infantry or, God help us, vehicles.

Hmm, not a bad list. Just missing the Avatar of Khaine and the Ghostkeel I think.
A bunch of others if also including forgeworld stuff. Pretty much all of which live on the non-competitive side, except for riptide variants.

 Quickjager wrote:
AP4 or AP5 would kill the gun, it needs to keep AP2 but the volume of shots it has is ridiculous.

I have toyed with alternatives besides the one above. With GW pushing 32mm bases for SM it opened up a new idea of wounding based off of base size.

Wounding based off toughness was another idea, but that is just wonky. Why should a Nurgle unit take more wounds?

It all came down to me just wishing cover worked like it should, as a stacking save or as a BS modifier.

You understand to get that amount of shots people pay a premium for relentless platform. The day people quit spamming bikes is the day the grav whining stops. Centurions minus gate are stupid easy to counter or kill and are balls expensive on top of it.

What I find bitterly funny about this...

Back in fifth edition, I made a Sisters of Battle fandex, with a vehicle mounted rotary heavy bolter called the Boltcannon. People made fun of me for it, saying it was ridiculous to try to have a bolt weapon. These days, there are two of these things (rotary version on the Avenger, and a regular version on the Castigator), and people just casually accept them as additions to the game.

A pity we won't be seeing them added to Sisters stuff any time soon.

Might as well add my ideas of melta-shells for an MBT's cannon, have the option of turning the exorcist into skyfire air unit annihilator, amongst the many other things that my fandex included, because even WITH all of them added in, it would still be pretty damn tame by seventh edition standards, with no really new concepts introduced, merely expanded upon.

Even worse: go back and tell people in 6th that scatterbikes will be a thing. They'd have had you committed to the looney bin.

Martel732 wrote:
Even worse: go back and tell people in 6th that scatterbikes will be a thing. They'd have had you committed to the looney bin.

This is true of so many things since about the end of 2013, stuff that was once the realm of late night 4chan hyperbole are now common reality. 2+ rerollable invul saves, scatterbikes, 35pt T6 Fearless infantry with D weapons, armies comprised of units from 3 different books getting all their upgrades and weapons options for free, etc ad nauseum.

Martel732 wrote:
Some MCs are pretty strong.

I fixed that for you.

The grav is out of the bag and included in the brand new Space Marine tactical squad box.

It isn't going anywhere.

The thing is, grav cannons are a really neat tool, gameplaywise, in how they function so differently than normal weapons. They need tweaking, IMO, not removal.

I can agree to that.

 Melissia wrote:
The thing is, grav cannons are a really neat tool, gameplaywise, in how they function so differently than normal weapons. They need tweaking, IMO, not removal.

I'd rather tweak invisibility and many other things first. It's not like grav is the only thing making terminators terrible.

I'd rather tweak 7th edition as a whole in a book burning and just play 5th edition, but to each their own.

Martel732 wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
The thing is, grav cannons are a really neat tool, gameplaywise, in how they function so differently than normal weapons. They need tweaking, IMO, not removal.

I'd rather tweak invisibility and many other things first. It's not like grav is the only thing making terminators terrible.

I've always found that argument hilarious. Grav didn't make your Terminators less durable or have gak damage output. They aren't used for a reason!

Also grav wouldn't be necessary if there weren't 200 pt models with the durability of a warhound titan. Or more durability even.

Martel732 wrote:
Also grav wouldn't be necessary if there weren't 200 pt models with the durability of a warhound titan. Or more durability even.

the problem there is that even with Grav, a lot of these units are absurdly hard to take down. Stuff like Necron Wraiths and TWC's, and even Riptides, can be stupidly immune to Grav, D, high S, AP2, and sheer volume of fire to boot.

Yeah. TBH grav is a good mechanic, it's just coming in at a bad time balance-wise.

 Melissia wrote:
Yeah. TBH grav is a good mechanic, it's just coming in at a bad time balance-wise.

I'm not sure I can even agree with this. 2+ and 3+ infantry are already in deep trouble in the meta. You need multi-wound models with invuln saves to survive. Grav is hilariously poor vs something like Wulfen.

Martel732 wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
Yeah. TBH grav is a good mechanic, it's just coming in at a bad time balance-wise.

I'm not sure I can even agree with this. 2+ and 3+ infantry are already in deep trouble in the meta.

Infantry in general are in deep trouble, aside from those that have ridiculous ways to avoid damage. But that has nothing to do with gravguns.

Martel732 wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
Yeah. TBH grav is a good mechanic, it's just coming in at a bad time balance-wise.

I'm not sure I can even agree with this. 2+ and 3+ infantry are already in deep trouble in the meta. You need multi-wound models with invuln saves to survive. Grav is hilariously poor vs something like Wulfen.

High ROF wounding on 4+ (often with rerolls) does not seem so bad?

Sure, they get a 3+ save if they buy storm shields, but whoever thinks it is hard to kill T4 3+ save infantry with high ROF weapons clearly has never faced tactical marines.

 Melissia wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
Yeah. TBH grav is a good mechanic, it's just coming in at a bad time balance-wise.

I'm not sure I can even agree with this. 2+ and 3+ infantry are already in deep trouble in the meta.

Infantry in general are in deep trouble, aside from those that have ridiculous ways to avoid damage. But that has nothing to do with gravguns.

The high shot ap2 stupidly easy to wound gun isn't a problem for infantry?

 Ashiraya wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
Yeah. TBH grav is a good mechanic, it's just coming in at a bad time balance-wise.

I'm not sure I can even agree with this. 2+ and 3+ infantry are already in deep trouble in the meta. You need multi-wound models with invuln saves to survive. Grav is hilariously poor vs something like Wulfen.

High ROF wounding on 4+ (often with rerolls) does not seem so bad?

Sure, they get a 3+ save if they buy storm shields, but whoever thinks it is hard to kill T4 3+ save infantry with high ROF weapons clearly has never faced tactical marines.

Wulfen have FNP and 2 wounds as well.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

pm713 wrote:

 Melissia wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
Yeah. TBH grav is a good mechanic, it's just coming in at a bad time balance-wise.

I'm not sure I can even agree with this. 2+ and 3+ infantry are already in deep trouble in the meta.

Infantry in general are in deep trouble, aside from those that have ridiculous ways to avoid damage. But that has nothing to do with gravguns.

The high shot ap2 stupidly easy to wound gun isn't a problem for infantry?

At least it has less range than the scatterlaser.

Martel732 wrote:


Wulfen have FNP and 2 wounds as well.

So a wulfen with a SS is 2.66 tactical marines.

They are not much cheaper than 2.66 tactical marines and can be IDed, so I still don't see the problem.

Against a grav gun, a wulfen w/SS is actually 10.6 tactical marines.

So against one unit it's slightly less good. Whoopty freaking do. That doesn't mean that gravguns, with their unique to-wound feature, have no place in 40k.

 Melissia wrote:
So against one unit it's slightly less good. Whoopty freaking do. That doesn't mean that gravguns, with their unique to-wound feature, have no place in 40k.

What place would you give it?

 Melissia wrote:
So against one unit it's slightly less good. Whoopty freaking do. That doesn't mean that gravguns, with their unique to-wound feature, have no place in 40k.

I never said that. I was just pointing out how they are not a cure-all.

Martel732 wrote:

 Melissia wrote:
So against one unit it's slightly less good. Whoopty freaking do. That doesn't mean that gravguns, with their unique to-wound feature, have no place in 40k.

I never said that. I was just pointing out how they are not a cure-all.

Which I wasn't saying, so why are you arguing with me?