Nid players who also play fantasy: Read this plz :

[wilsonundead]

Hey everyone, I'm new here as you can see, and I'd like some help from any of you fantasy players.
You wonder: "Why is he posting about fantasy in the Tyranids section?" and "Why is he asking 40k players about fantasy?". WELL. I'll try to keep this as brief as possible:

I'm a fantasy player, never played 40k, and neither does anyone I play with, but Tyranids have always been my first love. During a recent mid army crisis, I realized I want to start a new Fantasy army, but didn't like any of the options (I'm a Nurgle WoC player atm), and then it hit me. FANTASY TYRANIDS.

Now I know what most (if not all of you) are going to say, because I've heard it all before. Tyranids are aliens, you'll have to convert like crazy, they don't belong in fantasy, blah blah blah.

I'm hoping to not get any of those comments because it's not what I'm asking for. Anyone who would like to help me, those are the people I'd like comments from please.

Down to business. I've translated all the 40k rules and stuff into their fantasy counterparts (or as close and fairly as I could). What I'm asking is that anyone who also plays fantasy take a look at the rules I've typed out, and help me make changes, make it fair, make it playable.

Pretty much it's a fun little project that I need help making the rules for because honestly, it's not my strong suit. I'm already aware of the work and problems involved, like I said, I just want help. So I'm hoping there are some people out there who would like to help me on my little project

Thanks guys. The rules I have so far are here:
www.4shared.com/office/MsD29cL7/fantasy_rules.html

and another file which is the weapons and biomorphs:
www.4shared.com/office/7eTV3TpQ/nid_upgrades_weapons.html

And there are some things that I haven't quite tweaked yet, especially the ranged weapons, you'll notice in the weapons file I only have 3 guns, I gave them rules from some of the fantasy guns (Dark elf crossbow, empire guns...) and I don't want to use more than 3 guns (it IS fantasy after all).

[wilsonundead]

Oh, right, so after this (assuming at least someone wants to help) I'm going to need to make a magic lore (I don't know if any of the psychic powers will really work... but maybe, like I said, I need help )

[Davor]

Ah so you are doing the opposite of Sasha. He is using Skaven, I believe as Tyranids. Sorry I can't be of any help, I just wanted to say it can be done, so don't get discouraged.

[jahatch42878]

The only thing is isn't Sasha using the rules for Tyranids just substituting/converting Skaven models???

So, is there a fantasy army that could use Tyranid models as stand ins? (I know that isn't your question as you've done a lot of work on the conversion already, but still..)...

what about Dark Elves? Seems like they might be the best translation as far as sharp, pointy, potentially poisoned weapons, are already fast, and isn't that much of a stretch to use things like biovores as repeating heavy crossbow things... already have access to flying monstrous creatures for using the big guys that 'nids have access too...

Only thing is lack of Tyranid Warrior style monster/unit unless you ally ogres or trolls from somewhere...?

doesn't have the same "swarm effect" as like Skaven or goblins, but those suffer from such poor leadership it would seem uncustomarily 'tyranid-esque'...

Also, do you have a group of fantasy gamers you can test these rules out against?... I know there are a lot of fan-made army lists for Fantasy from different factions.. so what you are doing has been done before with other themes (Arabian, halflings, etc) so I think it might work... - J

[coredump]

Welcome to The Hive. I think what you are doing sounds like a blast. I would help but I don't have a clue about Fantasy.

As mentioned, another option is to use the Nid models in a 'counts as' army for a current fantasy codex.

Also, while a Nid/fantasy player might be the best source for ideas and rules conversions; I imagine that any knowledgeable Fantasy player could chime in if the rules are balanced or not.

[wilsonundead]

Thanks for the replies guys!
Yeah many have mentioned using them with Daemons rules and stuff but I think the whole appeal to me is having an entirely unique fantasy army, rules and all.

And as jahatch said, yeah the Araby and halfling thing is what I'm going for.

Also I posted this thread on the Chamber of the Everchosen but mostly what I got was silence and the odd disapproval

Well, all I can do is just cross my fingers and hope someone will help! But even if that doesn't happen, you can expect and army blog soon enough

Thanks guys!

[Jabberwocky]

The simplest thing to do would be run Nids as counts-as beastmen.

You have MCs for some of the monsters, raveners for razorgors, gargs for harpies, hormies for ungors, termies for raiders, stealers for bestigors.

you can build a spore chimney for a herdstone and model some psykers as shaman.

[wilsonundead]

Yeah, I'd rather not do the counts as thing. Half the fun of the project is to experiment and make Tyranid rules work in fantasy.
I contacted a guy on the Armies Project site, (the ones that made the rules for Nippon and Cathay and all that jazz) and showed him my rules, hopefully he will get back to me and help me out, and if not I'll just playtest it until I find out what works

[Draezymous]

A friend of mine actually uses his Nids as Lizardmen in some cases, representing Hormagaunts as Saurus Warriors, Termagants as Skinks, Gargoyles as Pteradon Skinks, etc. He uses tervigon as Stegadon, and a Hive Tyrant with Warriors as a Slann + Temple Guard. I must admit the sizes are off compared to the original line (ie, sarus warriors ar ebigger than skink, while Hormagaunt and Termagant only vary a little due to pose), but it doesn't stop us from having fun with it.

The only thing that gives him ''problems'' are saurus warriors on Cold Ones, as he uses raveners, but the bases don't go too wel with the body (Fantasy Cavalery frame vs 40K Character frame).

Otherwise, as Jabberwocky said, Tyranids make great Chaos minions, wether it be unfortunately mutated humans, demon spawns, or beastmen.

Have fun!

[vecuu]

You could use the old 3rd ed Raveners. They would fit on a cavalry base just fine.

[afewveiws]

im not a fantasy player, although i have acuired a mediocore lizardman army, however from what ive read in your rules set is that you have rending claws ignoreing armor saves completely. if fantasy dosent have a rending rule already then you should specify that rending weapons only ignore armor saves if you roll a 6 to wound (or to hit like it use to be) otherwise the power of rending claws wont be accurate.

also i noticed that you have gargoyles as coming with poisonous attacks standard. shouldn't this be an optional upgrade?

as for a spell list (im assuming you only get 6 random ones and 1 alternate right?) these are some you could think about:
-Hypnotic gaze: something that prevents an enemy hero or unit leader from contributing to a combat sequence.
-Catalyst: gives a secondary weak save to a spacific unit or if that doesn't work maybe gives it a weak invulnerable sv in place of its armor sv.
-The horror:forces a leadership test to stop from fleeing. (i know how low leadership is in fantasy so it might work)
-some kind of blast attack str5-6

that's what comes off the top of my head but im not sure how the spells work in fantasy so these may not be very balanced (too weak or strong idk)

[Jabberwocky]

Poison in fantasy is exactly the same as blinding venom in 40k.

Catalyst wants to grant regen (5+).

Rending claws probably wants to be armour piercing. At S4, that's pretty good. Adrenal glands could give devastating charge (and even +1S on charge).

I'd go through all the rules but I'm on my phone so don't really want to download them ...

[wilsonundead]

Awesome guys that's exactly the kind of stuff I want.
@afewviews, for all the rules like rending and blinding venom I just matched them to the closest fantasy version, so yes like Jabberwocky said about Poison. Also that's a good start to a spell list, thanks

Jabberwocky, regen is a good idea for that, seems to suit an insectoid theme, and as for Adrenal glands, ya that makes more sense right now I just have it as +1S and +1In but maybe I'll change it to Devastating charge +1S

Thanks for the help so far guys! Oh, I added points costs to every unit, I'm going to just keep re-uploading them everytime I change something for anyone who's interested. To come up with the points I used 40k Daemons and fantasy Daemons to compare and get a rough idea of points difference between the two game systems, and then used Daemons and Ogres lists to establish fair costs.

www.4shared.com/account/dir/vF5R2iSf/_online.html#dir=vF5R2iSf there we go updated stuff

[snowdaman]

Rending claws could give killing blow instead of armour piercing. cause killing blow only works on 6s like rending but armour piercing will be good all the time

Sent from my GT-I9100M using proboards

[Jabberwocky]

Killing blow is a bit much even on an elite unit. Generally only slow units and characters have it, not I6 blenders.