Tyranids: the Respawn - A codex for Xenos, by Xenos

Alright, so as a followup I'm going to provide some INTENSE INSIGHT into the basis for my ideas so far. This is the army-wide stuffs, there will definitely be some changes to individual units (most things will go under the knife at least a little, and yes, there will be some debuffs mixed in, don't you worry your pants).

Army Wide:
Synapse needs and overhaul. Compared to Ork Mob Rule, which is great, you have an even lower base Ld (with no sgt option) but get fearless no matter how many casualties you take (unless those casualties are the synapse creatures, but whatever). And *then* you start to go crazy if you're out of synapse on top of it, with a laughable bonus on a lucky 6. I wanted something that gave you a real, useable boon if you maintained a proper synapse web, but makes your army fall apart (ie, your opponent starts to dictate its actions) if you go animalistic. Your hormagaunts won't eat themselves, but they sure will charge right at that land raider, or move right into rapid-fire range of those fire warriors.

Also a bit of a boost to Synapse Creatures themselves. EW is a bit much, especially with such a focus on multi-wound models. But no one ever likes Warriors, because 3W is meaningless when every S8 thing looks at them. This is a nice little middle ground that allows them to still get b*tchwhipped by a leman russ, but still have a nifty special rule that makes you say "hey, warriors aren't complete garbage".

Shadows got two things - a) useful. I'm partial to the "lose a success" version off hand, as it means you can never try casting a power with 1 die - you will *always* risk perils. B) linked its range to Synapse. Making the Norn Crown, or Lynchpin, that much more effective for the army.

The Nid Psy Phase got a pretty big overhaul as well. Easy to calculate and keep track of - the idea is that they're not using the warp at all, and those rule make no sense for them (FLUFF!). It further creates the theme of Synapse Creatures supporting the swarm in all manner of ways, makes them more of a target for the enemy (every part of the army weakens as they go down, every part strengthens when they're alive an in number). It also says "hey, taking warriors isn't garbage" as it's the cheapest way to pump up your psy pool. Oh my gosh, it's almost like I want there to be a reason to use the unit that's supposed to be seen all the time, but never is.
Further, the option to trade a power for Warp Field seems a fitting way to "buy" an invulnerable for your most important creatures. It's not like our powers are bad at all, so it's a real trade-off, especially as, if you're taking warriors, you'll have a lot of Charge to play with (initially, at least). But when an army looks up and says "What, invulnerable saves? What are those?", you have a problem.

Warlord traits... aside from Lynchpin, which is solid for the army, there is NO REASON to ever roll on the Nid table now. So basically, don't ever do it. I wanted to focus the chart to fit the theme of the army... so you have planet manipulation on 2, a few based on synapse range, and then the "I'm a tank" on a 6.


Weapons - Talons are pointless. AP5 means something, so there. Moving Rending to a 5+ puts it about back where it was when it first came out, only for Nids, only in CC (our version of a power weapon). And look what gets rending... 40 point models, genestealers, Lictors... it makes them legit scary in combat without straight up ganking everything always. Of course, MASS rending will gank anything, but mass powerfists will, too. Rending should be a real weapon in our arsenal, especially for the cost.

Ranged stuff -
Devourers got knocked to 5, to keep them as an anti-infantry thing, but now there's a reason to take MC Deathspitters (light vehicle work).
The Rupture Cannon looks hella scary with 6 shots, but remember that it's ONLY on a 200-ish point platform, at BS3, and AP4 means it can only ever HP a vehicle to death. It needs to have enough shots to actually threaten an AV10 vehicle, kay? Kay.
Shock Cannons got a range boost, and they really shouldn't be a costed upgrade. They're not "better" than the Impaler in any way, they both serve different functions. Impaler is great at being rate-of-fire S8 that you can hide behind a rock and still shoot things. Shock Cannon has more versatility (still S5 blast vs infantry) and is better vs heavy armors. Different roles, is all.
Venom Cannons need to not be basically worthless. A solid-shot (ie, Assault 3, again on BS3 platforms) needs to exist. Tyranids need to up the anti on their ranged AT options. Single shot things with no real AP don't count, friends. They just don't.

Biomorphs
A lot of these are just pointless as is, so I've tweaked them a bit to make them do something. Likewise, Regen isn't an auto-take (I don't think, correct me if you feel differently) at 20 points as opposed to 30... so there's no reason it should cost that much. I'd say at 15 you'd probably throw it on everything. At 10 you'd just assume everything costs 10 points more than the book says, because obviously you took Regen. At 20, especially with some of the other like-costed options, it actually becomes an option.
And speaking of new options, I pulled some from the 4th ed Fex that never should have gone away. A bit of utility in increasing survivability (like, you know, every other army being able to buy better armor) is a good thing.

The fancy ones -
Norn crown is laughable at 40 points. Because really?
Reaper really should be AP2. It's 45 effin' points. Fourty. Effin. Five. Points.
Maw Claws shouldn't replace your talons, because they're claws. On your Maw. You know, just like the name? I realize that this means, combined with a tail, you can add 2 attacks and still have a gun (and maybe a thorax weapon). Go figure, Tyrants (or even Primes) may be rolling a lot of dice in combat. Like... 7-8. What? You mean Tyranids will be pretty nasty in combat? It's almost as if that's meant to be a thing... you're also pumping more and more points into not-super-cheap things for a couple of extra dice. But you know, tell me what you think.


That's the overview of the shared stuff. Carapace would make a comeback on a few other things, maybe. But those point costs would be unit-specific. Flesh hooks should really be 1 point, not 4... because why do we pay 400% more than anyone else for grenades? Oh, because they're S6? Cute, it's a 6" range and a bs3 model. With 2 shots. And no AP. Even Frag has AP. Seriously kids, it's silly.

As mentioned, I'll go through units next, once I have a chance to actually go through and write things up. It will mostly be small tweaks, and again not everything will get better. I'm looking for a proper balanced list here, not an "ZOMG I LOVE BUGS" reaction. So... that's a thing.

Idea for Smash - When a Tyranid MC smashes, it reduces its base attacks to 1, rather than trading *all* attacks. Meaning a decked out CC monster will get 3-4 (1, +charge, +CCW, +tail). Also remember that the majority of our MC actually can't even take 2 pairs of CCW's. Not to mention with how powerful the dual devourers currently are, and still would be, dedicating to combat should make them pretty solid on the whole.

I've tried to offer more ranged solutions to high armor (the Rupture cannon, and improved shock cannon, being the two main contenders). However, I feel that MC's in combat is iconic for Nids, and should be a viable option. Shooty big bugs will still be rocking a massive TWO attacks at best, and only ever 1 if you charge them (so walkers can still give us plenty of issues). But this allows for a decked combat tyrant or trygon to actually be able to hurt armor in combat. Go figure. It puts them back on par (for a few extra points, actually) with where they were pre-7th, which is basically where they've been since 3rd ed. Things like Exocrines can jump on a non-CC heavy thing and have a go at it, but a walker or other combat-enhanced monstrosity will actually do a good job of rolling them in combat, which really is okay (as these things also are paying a lot of points for being good in combat).


As always, THANKS FOR THE FEEDBACK so far. Slackers.

Notes:

While I don't think people look at Devourers now and scream "ZOMGBROKEN!!!!1one", that's in part because that's about the *only* viable build we have right now. For anything that can take them. Ever.

That said, any time you have one real option, that one option typically needs toned down once others move forward to compete. As it stands, MC Devs are amazing at anti infantry, great at light armor popping, and can even start to work on "medium" armor. Dropping them down to S5 actually gives them a more designated role of anti-infantry (with some ability vs light armors). While MC Deathspitters join the fray as a mid-level buster, toting the AP4 to cull xenos, and that lovely S7 to reach out and touch most vehicles. They're also sporting a fairly impressive rate of fire.
Further, the Venom Cannon family, with its single-shot option (which actually should probably go down to Assault 2) starts to actually threaten HP's off of heavier armors. It will also be a great source for anti-flyer duty, making the Crone a little more versatile in that respect, while still allowing the Crone to be the superior choice for anti-air (the cost of the HVC on the crone should probably go up 10 points or so to compensate).


I rather agree that bio-artepharts are terrible... but if you think of them as "new mutations that are very rarely seen", it's much easier to digest. Or something like the Swarmlord, where it's an incredibly bio-mass dense creation, only brought forth from a very serious stress-response by the Hive. GW really boned up trying to match them completely to the artifacts of normal armies, but the idea of something extremely rare within the fleet isn't that awful, I don't think.

I actually think that if the Shock Cannon weren't a blast, it would continue to pale in comparison to the Impaler. Being blast gives it real versatility vs infantry. Armor? Haywire. Guard? S5 ap5 blasts. Yes, you lose the option to skyfire (or snapfire at all), but I think enough other options are being added in here to give some viable answers. We still need to take Flyers to deal with Flyers, but *all* of our flyers will have real answers to deal with anything we'll see in the sky.

I really hate the current charts... I think it bogs down the game, is a huge hindrance to the army, and is just a mucky system. Personally I think my more streamlined version captures the feel of it, while allowing Synapse to be a real, tactical boost. But yeah, the idea is to stay in synapse either way. That doesn't always happen, though. I've been running into more and more problems with that lately, actually. It's almost to the point that I want to start using a walking tyrant, because my Flyrant is always off doing his own thing, leaving me with effectively one less bubble on the table.

As for old fleet... honestly I think making it army wide may be *too* good. I've been using hormagaunts a bit in 7th, and the MTC changes have actually been enough to, so far, see them hitting combat regularly. I'd love to see the ability sprinkled back in, but I don't think it needs to be everwhere, per se. Requires much testing, of course, but everything always does (said at GW never).

Yeah, but BS3 shooting on LD6 and 7 "I NEED SYNAPSE" platforms is really not that great. We're worse at shooting than every other army out there except for orks, but even they get random guns so they might accidentally shoot 48 S7 shots in a turn. We're stuck shooting rupture cannons and the like, traditionally terrible for their points.

I think giving CC geared creatures the option for fleet glands makes sense. Maybe don't give it to everyone, but I think it makes sense for hormies, stealers, raveners, and maybe some of the bigger guys like trygons, tyrants, and carnifexes which are supposed to be big CC monsters.

Would take playtesting, but I like the idea of being able to field a true CC list, foregoing shooting if I so choose, and actually making raveners useful.