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I think it is too bad that rippers are such a big part of Tyranid’s fluff but do not really have a place on the table top. I think the unit needs a revamp to make it worth playing. I would like to see something like this:

Unit size 1

Unit type: Infanty

FOC: troop (with wings fast attack)

Cost: 90 points

Base size: Monstrous creature

Stat line
WS 2 BS 0 S 2 T 2 W 9 I 4 A * LD6 Sv –

Universal rules:
Fearless
Feel No Pain +5
Swarms
Fleet of claw
Move through cover
Rage
Eternal Warrior

Tryranid rules:
Regeneration: Free
Wings: 60 points

Special rules

Wall of teeth and claws!: The base number of attacks of a ripper is equal to the number of wounds +1 aslo rippers can perfom smash attacks.

Mindless: Rippers cannot gain bonuses or penalties to leadership or moral by other units (other than synapse effects), if outside of synapse range at the end of the
tyranid players turn Rippers lose 3 wounds on the roll of a 5+.

Teeming mass: All snap shots against rippers are taken at normal ballistic skill

Chew trough steel!: All defenders armor saves are taken at +1 (i.e. a +3 save becomes a +4 save) and when attacking units with AV the rippers may elect to exchange their regular attacks for a single strength 6 AP – attack.

There is no end to them!: Attempting to hold back a ripper swarm can shake even the most disciplined defender. Units assaulted by Rippers suffer -1 to moral checks.


What do you think? I am open to suggestions.

Can you explain your thinking behind giving them Eternal Warrior?

Eldercaveman wrote:
Can you explain your thinking behind giving them Eternal Warrior?

Well the language of the rule does not really fit but the idea is that you should not be able to kill a whole ripper swarm with one las gun blast or krak missle. I could cook up some fluff for the rule but I am sure you get the idea.

Zookie wrote:

Eldercaveman wrote:
Can you explain your thinking behind giving them Eternal Warrior?

Well the language of the rule does not really fit but the idea is that you should not be able to kill a whole ripper swarm with one las gun blast or krak missle. I could cook up some fluff for the rule but I am sure you get the idea.

Hmm OK I get where you are coming from with that, but I personally think it would be better to make them cheaper and lose EW, yes you can ID a whole base, but the idea of them (for me) is that there should be so many of them that it shouldn't matter losing a whole base.

Personally I think the best way to make them useful, would be to make them pretty much the same as the Necron Scarabs, just 'Nid' them up a bit. And create some way of being able to spawn/reproduce more bases. Prehaps use the Parasites rule of creating bases, and apply to models that the rippers kill.

I guess at the minute as you have it, the unit is just too clunky for what it is.

I did a few edits, I see were you are coming from on the EW rule, but I think it gives it Niddy flavor to have one huge base that wont die to represent a massive swarm (maybe put it on a Mawloc base the wide part of the oval being forward (I think that would look cool on the table). That way rippers are not just the nid version of scarabs or nurglings.

Zookie wrote:
I did a few edits, I see were you are coming from on the EW rule, but I think it gives it Niddy flavor to have one huge base that wont die to represent a massive swarm (maybe put it on a Mawloc base the wide part of the oval being forward (I think that would look cool on the table). That way rippers are not just the nid version of scarabs or nurglings.

I dunno, I prefer having the swarm of little bases, something like a unit of 3-15 bases with 3 wounds each.

I don't like the idea of eternal warrior on them but at the same time I can see why a base full of little creatures would die from a direct hit from a tank killing weapon. And at the same time, it makes them very ineffective, especially when a single krak grenade kills an entire base. I notice you have 9 wounds on the base, which is pretty extreme. But taking that into consideration, if instead of eternal warrior, you had some new ability that made it so any instant death attack instead reduced the total wounds of the base by half, round up, that might reflect the kind of carnage a powerful weapon would do as it effective blows through the mass of creatures. With that modification I think you could reasonably bring the T and S back up to 3, or bolters would then be slaughtering the bases too.

Rumbleguts wrote:
I don't like the idea of eternal warrior on them but at the same time I can see why a base full of little creatures would die from a direct hit from a tank killing weapon. And at the same time, it makes them very ineffective, especially when a single krak grenade kills an entire base. I notice you have 9 wounds on the base, which is pretty extreme. But taking that into consideration, if instead of eternal warrior, you had some new ability that made it so any instant death attack instead reduced the total wounds of the base by half, round up, that might reflect the kind of carnage a powerful weapon would do as it effective blows through the mass of creatures. With that modification I think you could reasonably bring the T and S back up to 3, or bolters would then be slaughtering the bases too.

I like the idea of a low toughness high wound model because I think that it fits the idea of a carpet of Ripper consuming the surface of a world. But I see your point about high strength weapons and killing lots of rippers.

What about this as special rule instead of Eternal Warrior:

(In addition to the swarm rule of being susceptible to blasts)

"Teeming mass":

Fluff: Due to the fact that Ripper swarms blanket the entire landscape, no weapon short of exterminatus class could hope to kill them all in one volley. But this also means they are is very hard target to miss and it is easy to hit multiple Rippers in single shot.
Rippers cannot be instantly killed due to a weapon strength.

All regular shooting attacks done to Ripper swarms gain a +1 to the BS.

All snap shots against rippers are taken at normal ballistic skill.

Weapons that are more than two time the strength of a ripper toughness (5-6) cause two wounds, weapons that are more than 3 times the strength of a ripper toughness (7-8) cause three wounds, and weapons that are more than 4 times the strength of a ripper's toughness (9-10) cause 4 wounds.

I like it more then my own suggestion. Its a bit complicated but then this is 40k. A few things reduce toughness so you would have to spell out the multipliers equals # of wounds instead of just being able to say weapons of x to y strength cause Z wounds and you already did that so you are set there.

I wonder about that working with blast templates though, because swarms take 1 additional wound from a blast template as part of the swarm rules right? So the question for me would be if a blast template of Str 8 would inflict 3+1 (3 for the Str 8 weapon effect and 1 added for the blast) or 3+3. I think the 3+3 makes sense more.

Oh, and I think the part that says "Ripper swarms cannot be instantly killed due to weapon strength" should be stated as something more like "Ripper swarms don't fall under the normal rules for instant death. If a ripper swarm is hit by a weapon whose Str is {your section on Str vs Wounds inflicted). If a ripper swarm is hit by a weapon that has the Instant Death rule as part of its characteristics (I am mostly thinking force weapons here) the swarm is not killed but takes the Wound normally." I am sure I am ignorant of some weapons that would cause a problem.

But I like it a great deal in general. I agree its really sad how pathetic rippers are in 6th.