Your Five Pet Peeves About 'Nids

[jackedup]

In your opinion, what are five specific rules that make Tyranids too weak? Can come from anywhere - Codex, BRB, etc.

[Hive Bahamut]

Not sure if they are weak, especially with the new minions. But..

1. Instinctive Behaviour: bad should just be 1, feed shouldn't be suicide on big squads.

2. Synapse: ok so fearless is to help counter the pretty bad LD for most non synapse/independent, now where is the plus? At the least it should be something simple like CC units reroll 1's to hit on the charge (litanies-esque,) and shooting units reroll 1's to hit if within 6" (LAN-esque.)

3. Smash: So you're telling me that the Trygon gets slugged to death by an AV13 Dread because the Emprah decided half was too much? Easily could have been 1+1 for charge.

4. Psychic phase: that is all..

5. Graviton: WHY bother give models T, AV or + if you just ignore it all with a gun readily available. (Why not just give everyone a Stormshield and Grav gun and conquer the galaxy overnight?)

[jemminids]

Do we really want to do this *now*?

[xtztxtxz]

Nids aren't weak, but they do have some poor internal balance and a few sub-par / poorly thought out units. Many of the issues affecting Nids are really main rulebook problems - especially assault. The main points that stand out to me are:

1) Assaulting through cover is too punishing if you don't have assault grenades. Dropping to I1 drastically reduces the effectiveness of things like Genestealers and Hormagaunts. I'd change it so that charging through terrain is -2 to initiative unless you have Move Through Cover and make assault grenades interfere with Overwatch instead, which seems more appropriate.

2) Fleet doesn't really make you any faster. While on average you'll move a bit further than non-Fleet units, the maximum threat range of both is often the same. The most extreme example of this is that a supposedly agile and light unit like a Hormagaunt has the same maximum charge range as a Terminator or Dreadnought.
I would remove the re-roll for Fleet, and instead make it add an extra D6" to Run or Charge moves. This gives light assault units a better threat range to make up for their lack of defense, while more durable assault units are easier to avoid in comparison.

3) Getting a single Smash attack now is very punishing to huge creatures like Trygons. I can see why it was changed, but it has left some of our big bugs on the sidelines, especially the ones with WS3 and no more re-rolls. Making the single Smash attack automatically hit would be a big help.

[Mauler]

The lack of:

1. Old Flesh Hooks
2. Spine Banks
3. Extended Carapace
4. Bonded Exoskeleton
5. Old Scything Talons

(And living ammo)

[Exocrine NzL]

Nov 13, 2014 11:13:49 GMT Mauler said:

The lack of:

1. Old Flesh Hooks
2. Spine Banks
3. Extended Carapace
4. Bonded Exoskeleton
5. Old Scything Talons

(And living ammo)

Living ammunition was a sweet rule! Todays scything talons probably bug me the most.

[Mauler]

I just want flesh hooks back on all medium units. I don't care if they're changed back to the old allow-models-to-scale-vertical-surfaces-instead-of-being-ranged type, just let our units hit at initiative into cover.

[Deleted]

1. Lack of biomorph availability across the board. Being able to take a lot more variety of upgrades(out of our existing arsenal) on different creatures(flesh hooks mostly) would give some units some oomph.



2. Scything talons. I want to say that they are inherently a problem but I don't. I don't as much view it as "hey, our scything talons suck" as much as the stock weapons on races across the board have scaled up and then they did this nerf to scything talons in our new book that leaves one scratching their head.



3.Drop pods uhm, I mean, fleet availability here and there would be useful, but that falls under bullet point one sort of. 

4. New psychic powers Uhm, I mean.....hrm. Yeah I like the new powers but not overwhelmed, I still want back biomancy. Makes complete sense to me that the hive mind would use its force to temporarily bolster a creature's ability to fight.

5. Warriors(and this falls under a need for general internal balancing imo). Warriors are great! but frankly with all their biomorph options there's only a handful of ways to run these guys without feeling like they scream easy target to higher str weapons. I'd LOVE to see them either get a +1 to their regular save or a +2 invuln or something(on all the warrior genus' including shrikes). If that happened you might see me run a fair bit of warriors. 

[Mauler]

Nov 13, 2014 11:36:16 GMT @nidsinrva said:

1. Lack of biomorph availability across the board. Being able to take a lot more variety of upgrades(out of our existing arsenal) on different creatures(flesh hooks mostly) would give some units some oomph.



2. Scything talons. I want to say that they are inherently a problem but I don't. I don't as much view it as "hey, our scything talons suck" as much as the stock weapons on races across the board have scaled up and then they did this nerf to scything talons in our new book that leaves one scratching their head.



3.Drop pods uhm, I mean, fleet availability here and there would be useful, but that falls under bullet point one sort of. 

4. New psychic powers Uhm, I mean.....hrm. Yeah I like the new powers but not overwhelmed, I still want back biomancy. Makes complete sense to me that the hive mind would use its force to temporarily bolster a creature's ability to fight.

5. Warriors(and this falls under a need for general internal balancing imo). Warriors are great! but frankly with all their biomorph options there's only a handful of ways to run these guys without feeling like they scream easy target to higher str weapons. I'd LOVE to see them either get a +1 to their regular save or a +2 invuln or something(on all the warrior genus' including shrikes). If that happened you might see me run a fair bit of warriors. 

See the old Extended Carapace & Bonded Exoskeleton for #5. +1Sv and +1T respectively.

[Threeshades]

1. The fact that we have so many expensive models (not only that a lot of them are too expensive for what they do, but just that there is so much expensive stuff in general), which makes building powerful horde lists difficult.
2. Lack of assault grenades, or reliable methods of circumventing the issue and the resultingfact that terrain is bad for tyranids, when tyranids in difficult terrain should be scarier than outside.
3. The names Venomthrope and Neurothrope. The suffix should be -anthrope, not -thrope!
4. The name Tervigon, it doesn't mean anything and it doesn't associate with any tyranid strain that it could belong to.

Nov 13, 2014 14:36:21 GMT arapaima said:

Underwhelming WS and I on our non tyrant based cqc MCs. The more i look at the stat of a plain carnifex or even a haru to a screamer killer predecessor, the more they look like minibosses made to be defeated by someone's space marine captain so thst it lookes cool.The bigger the MCs, the cooler it looks when an eternal shield packing captain punches it to death.

5. Tyranids eating each other! Even the most primitive instinctive behaviors in nature don't have animals eating their own, especially of they are actually social! why would the hive mind not program that little inhibitor in its feeding creatures?

[Exocrine NzL]

Nov 13, 2014 11:48:04 GMT Threeshades said:

5. Tyranids eating each other! Even the most primitive instinctive behaviors in nature don't have animals eating their own, especially of they are actually social! why would the hive mind not program that little inhibitor in its feeding creatures?

I agree, it seems like GW just couldn't think up anything better. I would have just kept it like when they had rage but without the attacks buff.

[hiveminded]

I don't accept the premise that Tyranids are weak.    

[gozolve]

Nov 13, 2014 11:13:49 GMT Mauler said:

The lack of:

1. Old Flesh Hooks
2. Spine Banks
3. Extended Carapace
4. Bonded Exoskeleton
5. Old Scything Talons

(And living ammo)

Omg I would pay so many points to make my MCs have t7 2+sv

[WestRider]

1) The current Instinctive Behaviour Rules. So many ways those could have been better and more interesting.

2) Charging through Cover. My current idea is that Units with Move Through Cover should be allowed to choose before rolling their Charge distance whether they want to ignore the distance penalty or the Initiative penalty for Charging through Cover.

3) Warriors. They should be terrifying, not something we buy as minimal backfield Objective Holders.

4) Raveners. Like Warriors, they're too fragile for their Points Cost, and on top of that, they have no Biomorph access. Toxin Sacs, please.

5) Fexen. Another of the Iconic Nid Units that's just underwhelming. So many possible ways to fix that, even despite the newer Models overshadowing them in size.

[gozolve]

Nov 13, 2014 11:55:39 GMT Exocrine NzL said:

Nov 13, 2014 11:48:04 GMT Threeshades said:

5. Tyranids eating each other! Even the most primitive instinctive behaviors in nature don't have animals eating their own, especially of they are actually social! why would the hive mind not program that little inhibitor in its feeding creatures?

I agree, it seems like GW just couldn't think up anything better. I would have just kept it like when they had rage but without the attacks buff.

The problem is you are looking at each nid as an individual. Look at them as single cells of one giant being for example the human body can often attack it's self or cannibalize its self!