Gargantuan Creatures for Tyranids

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**MechaEmperor7000**

Ok now before you come at me with pitchforks and torches (and torches made from pitchforks), hear me out.

With all of the LoWs running around and the fact that the Wraithknight got reclassified, maybe some Tyranids should be changed to Gargantuan Creatures. The ones I specifically think so are:

Trygons (and T-primes), Mawlocs, Exocrine, Haruspex, Tyrannofex, Tervigon.

The reason is that three of these, the Trygon, Exocrine and Haruspex, use to be Biotitans in Epic, on the same scale as stuff like Stompas and whatnot. The rest is because they're either based on the same kit (Mawloc) or are of similar stature. Harpies and Crones are not included because while they are roughly the same size, they were explicitly made with lighter bones so they can fly, and thus would not be Flying Gargantuan Creatures. They would all roughly get a 100 point increase to compensate for this too, or at least enough to get them close to around 300 points. They would stay at their current toughness and wounds to represent how they're still a bit more fragile than FW level Gargs.

For most of them, I think this would increase their usefulness. And yes, they would all be LoWs (with the possible exception of the Tervigon, which maybe should be a HQ and the only Garg usable in a non-LoW slot), and be able to be taken as a unit like the Stormsurge (although not mixing).

**Martel732**

No more GMCs, please.

**jade_angel**

Relative to MCs, GCs have FNP, 12" movement, Poison/Sniper resistance, the ability to shoot in multiple directions and Stomp. Of these, which is it that would make these various Tyranid beasties too hard to deal with as GCs? Recall that they'd be LoWs, so at most you'd see one.

Now I think the Stormsurge was gratuitous (it's kinda squishy, but come on, 4 S10 AP2 Ordnance pie-plates? Yikes!), and the Wraithknight is too cheap, but I think of all the factions that have any business having GCs, Tyranids are pretty high on the list.

I would quibble with the Exocrine, however - moving that to a LoW slot needlessly nerfs Tyranid shooting. It's one of the few sources of AP2 shooting in the codex, and, for a shooty bug, it's already a pretty good fighter. The only change I'd make to it, is to permit squads of 3.

**MechaEmperor7000**

Note that I did not suggest anything related to a Tyranid Decurion that lets you spam these, as I think that idea (especially paired with the Wraithknight) was just plain stupid, so the idea is you still only get 1 choice of this in a normal CAD. So you get one flavour (with the possible exception of the Tervigon) and up to three scoops of said flavour, but that's it.

**Martel732**

One immortal model is one too many.

**Vineheart01**

jade_angel wrote:
Relative to MCs, GCs have FNP, 12" movement, Poison/Sniper resistance, the ability to shoot in multiple directions and Stomp. Of these, which is it that would make these various Tyranid beasties too hard to deal with as GCs? Recall that they'd be LoWs, so at most you'd see one.

Now I think the Stormsurge was gratuitous (it's kinda squishy, but come on, 4 S10 AP2 Ordnance pie-plates? Yikes!), and the Wraithknight is too cheap, but I think of all the factions that have any business having GCs, Tyranids are pretty high on the list.

I would quibble with the Exocrine, however - moving that to a LoW slot needlessly nerfs Tyranid shooting. It's one of the few sources of AP2 shooting in the codex, and, for a shooty bug, it's already a pretty good fighter. The only change I'd make to it, is to permit squads of 3.

Stormsurge fires 2 s10 ap2 pieplates when its anchored. The gun profile only has 1 shot. Its the OTHER gun (the nonblast D at 10") that fires twice. And yes WK is way too cheap for what it is - vastly harder to kill than the Surge due to immunity to small arms and resistive to plasma weapons and about ~100pts cheaper.

OP: Theres no way any of the current MCs would be made a GMC without being made LoW, and quite literally all of them just getting the WK treatment of +GMC rules, none of them would be any good. They'd need a toughness/wound overhaul on top of decent/great guns, since not a single Super in this game doesnt have a few good guns even if its meant for melee. Might not have D weapons or apoc barrage, but they always got something that does some damage.
Also none of them are really that big. Mawlocs are tall but theyre a serpent creature, which are always "tall" when they sit like they are posed currently.

All Tyranid units need help, but making them GMC isnt the answer. If they were spammable GMCs because they didnt goto LoW, nids would become the new eldar with stomp spam lol

**jade_angel**

Doh, I read it wrong. Could have sworn the Pulse Driver Cannon was Ordnance 2.

**Matt.Kingsley**

Martel732 wrote:
One immortal model is one too many.

Most of the Tyranid MCs being changed only have a 4+ save and T6 iirc.
Giving them FnP and Poison near-immunity is hardly going to make them immortal. They aren't WK level with a 3+, with either ranged D or a 5++ on top of god-tier toughness and high wounds.

You could kill them with heavy bolters easily enough.

**Lance845**

I love my exocrine. Awesome units. I would despise moving it to low without some major changes to that gun.

**StarHunter25**

Anyone remember the trygon's old profile? It was demoted from a GMC after all. Perhaps give it back its status, up its toughness a bit, and give it access to an expensive D melee weapon. Boom.

**MechaEmperor7000**

StarHunter25 wrote:
Anyone remember the trygon's old profile? It was demoted from a GMC after all. Perhaps give it back its status, up its toughness a bit, and give it access to an expensive D melee weapon. Boom.

This. This is why I think these should be GMCs, because the Trygon use to be a GMC but got demoted because 5th edition didn't have superheavies and GMCs in normal games. Plus the Hierophant, who is still currently a GMC, is more or less the same size as a Tyrannofex or a Exocrine.

**Martel732**

No more GMCs, thanks. They're quite literally the worst mechanic in the game to me.

**jade_angel**

Why, precisely? Stomp? The fact that the Wraithknight is too cheap? Free FNP? Sniper resistance? (That honestly can be a pain, since sniper scouts are a half-decent way to deal with Sv 3+ or worse MCs.)

Stomp is a bit much. The S6 AP4 hits are fine, but "just remove them all" is... dumb. Even "every model under the blast marker takes a Destroyer hit" is more forgiving than that.

My complaint is much more about specific GCs than about the GC unit type, though. For example, the Barbed/Scythed Heirodules don't scare me all that much. (T8/3+ is tough, but no invuln, BS3, no D, etc adds up to "strong but manageable". OTOH, they're also 500+ points.)

**Kap'n Krump**

I thought not too long ago I saw a rumor for a new tyranid psychic GMC, though that may not mean much at all.

**MechaEmperor7000**

You mean the Dominatrix? I'm skeptical of that one because it's just like the Plastic SoB rumor; pops up at the beginning of every year and gets kicked back 2 months at a time. Come January the entire cycle starts again.

Although with the release of the Exocrine and Haruspex, GW might go back and revisit that idea.

**Vineheart01**

"No more GMC" is such a dumb plea. Yes lets start giving every race access to 1 super without FW and stop doing it halfway through.

You give it to one race when its not their shtick (if Nids were the ONLY GMC, i'd be fine with limited GMCs since it makes more sense for them to have it than Tau) then you gotta give it to everyone. What the hell else would you put in LoW for Nids? Swarmy? If he goes there he's getting the Ghazzy treatment...LoW only because of fluff not because of stature/power.

And i could totally see the Nid GMC being a psyker. Either just a ML1 tacked onto a model for the access, or a psyker-specific GMC thats ML4 or something ridiculous like that but thats his primary thing, so he has little else outside his toughness/wounds. Maybe a special rule where the played actually PICKS his/her damn spells on him? And cannot peril, since that would be comical/terrible to see him Perils and roll a 1/fail the test lol. Yes i know that wouldnt "remove" him cause Unstoppable, but thats still a ton of free damage.

**MechaEmperor7000**

Personally if it were up to me, I'd make it so that Nids could actually field an entire army of dirt cheap MCs and GMCs, simultaniously allowing them to do the "godzilla" thing and "zergrush" thing. And for those that think this is unbalanced, all I'm gonna do is point towards the Imperial Knights....

**Imateria**

MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
StarHunter25 wrote:
Anyone remember the trygon's old profile? It was demoted from a GMC after all. Perhaps give it back its status, up its toughness a bit, and give it access to an expensive D melee weapon. Boom.

This. This is why I think these should be GMCs, because the Trygon use to be a GMC but got demoted because 5th edition didn't have superheavies and GMCs in normal games. Plus the Hierophant, who is still currently a GMC, is more or less the same size as a Tyrannofex or a Exocrine.

Hierophant is pretty damn big, I think you meant Hierodule, which is only slightly bigger than an Exocrine.

To be honest, hell no to making the Trygon, Mawloc, Exocrine, Haruspex, Tervigon and Tyrannofex GMC's. They're not big enough and the Haruspex is the only one that could possible benefit from the GMC rules (moving 12" per turn minumum, FNP, stomp and being immune to instant death with poison and snipers on 6's would mean it can finally get into combat and do some damage).

Tyranids need a major overhaul and any changes to their MC's need to be made with army changes in mind.

**epronovost**

I would personnaly create the class of Monstrous Beast for Trygon, Mawloc and Haruspex to give them the ability to gain a 12'' movement and fleet which would help them get in combat. The Tyrannofex could and should be a GMC.

**Galef**

epronovost wrote:
The Tyrannofex could and should be a GMC.

Drop its 2+ sv to a 3+ and you can make it a GMC without a point increase. I like the idea of GMC Nids and would like to see the Trygon & Mawloc be GMC's but I think you need to reduce their Wounds to represent their smaller size.

Honestly, when I heard the "rumor" that the Wraith Knight was gonna be a GMC, I was hoping they would reduce it's wounds as well. 5W instead of 6 would have not only made it's low points cost more appropriate, but it would match the other "Wraith-Constructs". A WraithLord only has 3 wounds, yet T8 makes a big difference.

**Vineheart01**

Actually it makes more sense for it to have 6 wounds. GMCs all have a ton of wounds, the WK has the lowest of them all afaik but its also the cheapest and still has the god-tier toughness. Its current stats arent a problem to me they sound/feel like a super, but its just way...way too cheap for what it does. The fact that the Stormsurge is T6 and has 8 wounds is a pretty good example of GMCs just being a ball of wounds by default.

**MechaEmperor7000**

I personally think the Wraithknight should be dropped to T8 W3. It looks like it's about to shatter with the right punch.

**jade_angel**

The Wraithlord is already T8 W3... I suppose maybe if it had a 2+ armor save, but folks would hate that...

**Vineheart01**

Wraithlord isnt a GMC though. The T8 is annoying on him but you can bypass it since it ISNT a GMC. WK was given free ignorance to such threats. Thats the problem, and i imagine thats why so many people dont want more GMCs even if its for Tyranids. Much like MCs, the rules GMCs have arent OP its the most common units with GMC that makes people hate them.

i bring this up alot but whatever. Stormsurge is the durability codex supers should be, if not slightly more durable for a bit more cost. Its not easy to kill, but its by no means immortal. WK is borderline immortal thanks to that fethin T8 stat on something outside apoc games.
Nid GMC should be T7, rendering it immune to S3 and all troop weapons need 6s (including Tau/Necrons). That way its not immune to majority of the damn army, but still durable as nails.
Yes i know that makes Guardsmen unable to hurt it. Not sad about that in the slightest, they should be shooting something else anyway.

**MechaEmperor7000**

I think Tyranid GMCs should vary in toughness and wounds depending on their role. Like, I can see a Tervigon being T6 or even T5 because most of it's body is egg clutches, but it would have something like 6-8 wounds to compensate. It isn't hard to harm it, but it takes a hell of a lot of wounds to put it down. A tyrannofex, on the other hand, should probably be T7, but only 4 wounds to represent an extremely armored shell, but soft insides. Meanwhile an Exocrine should be T6 and 4 Wounds, since it's an artillery beast and shouldn't be up in the front lines while still being durable enough to stave off light gunfire, while the Haruspex probably would have T7 and 6 wounds as a frontline fighter. Trygons would probably bridge the gap between Tyrannofex and Haruspex at T7 W5, while the Mawloc, being more fragile, dials both back for the sake of cheapness.