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What follow is the outline for the forming of a SINGLE Tyranid base list using the same units and same special rules. Within that list will be TWO horde army lists to cover the old bugs and the new bugs (More later). All below includes a rational to follow as a guidline to forming the special rules, the unit stats, and the way in which the army is put together. Anything in italics is the rational, all the rest are my views and opinion on how to impliment each.
The Tyranids are the pinnicle of what a horde army should be. All the troops, and the control creatures that 'lead' them, blindly follow their orders and themslelves have zero initiative. Even the Hive Mind itself is reactionary rather then pro-active. Basically it decides on a course of action and then carries it out to the bitter end, no matter what. Tactical Flexibility and Deft Maneuvers are concepts totally beyond the grasp of the Hive Mind, instead it treats its entire army like a huge cannon with its units being the bullets. It simply points the huge cannon at the objective and pulls the trigger. If the target isn't destroyed it simply reloads and pulls the trigger again. It continues to reload and shoot until the target is destroyed or it runs out of bullets. The Tyranid Army IS the definition of using a six ton press to break open a walnut!
Ok we know that actually playing an army like this on the gaming table would be damn boring, so for enjoyment sake we will let the Hive Mind be less mindless (That would actually be us the players in the Hive Mind role. Am I claiming that gamers are mindless!). However the formations that make up the army DO need to follow the above definition to the letter to reflect how the Tyranid Army really fights.
The Hive Mind doesn't create multi-purpose units, basically it doesn't think that way on that low of a level, everything is specialized to carry out one function. What it does do is create both specialized and multi-purpose formations. So unlike other armies who do have multi-capable battle units, the Tyranid Army contains exactly ZERO units of this type. The Hive Mind does not concern itself with what humans would call 'small issues.' They are just too far below the Hive Mind for it to even comprehend their exsistance, much less address them. This would be similar to a Field Marshal being concerned about how many bullets Private Jones has in his magazine, it is just too far below the mans pay grade for him to be concerned about it. That Private Jones has bullets is all that matters to the Field Marshal.
In very broad terms all Tyranid Units should be specialized to carry out a single function on the battlefield, no multi-purpose units. There are exceptions (Hive Tyrant) but they should be very, very rare. Small Tyranid formations should be pure specialists, like Lictors being scout/pure CC assault for example. Only in large formations should the Tyranids be able to put together a multi-capable force, and that formation must be large in size/number of units. Right now my thinking is a base size of ten to twelve combat units.
While Synapse Control IS the ultimate in combat communications/control/information, it is not perfect because of the creatures using it. Do not forget in many ways these creatures are mindless robots that are incapable of thinking for themselves. So while instant and total information is right there at their finger tips they themselves are totally incapable of acting on that information without orders from above. Worse, all of the information going up the line is being concentrated in central command nodes and most of that information is useless to the that 'commander' and the task it is trying to perform. To overcome this flow of useless information, and the inability of the lower commanders in having anykind of initiative, the command and control structure has to be very rigid. Each commander has a set duty to perform, using a fixed force to carry the task out with, and a single objective to obtain. The information flow up the line is then reduced to just the basics of 'this is my position, this is what I have left, and this is how many enemy I am facing,' and nothing else. The strength of this system is that it overcomes the lack of initiative in the lower level commanders by placing almost instant information in the overall commanders lap allowing him to react quickly to the changing chaos of the battlefield. The weakness is that once the chain of command starts to fall apart it is impossible to put it back together again while the battle is still raging. The best the overall commander can hope to do in that situation is to compensate for the loss of control using formations it still has control over, and hope the formations no longer under its control survive the ordeal
A lot of the above is based upon the background for the Nids themselves and how the former Soviet Unions command structure worked. In battle, based upon history now, when command nodes were taken out the Soviet style command fell apart below that command node. Those units, now out of direct control, fell back on their last orders and continued to carry them out until they were stopped or defeated. Worse, these units lost all ability to coordinate their actions and found themselves most often picked apart piece by piece. Though their are instances where their actions, while out of control, were successful. Both the Egyptians and Syrians used this type of CCI in the Yom Kippur war, the Iraqis during Desert Storm, and the Vietnamese in Vietnam. So there is plenty of factual history to backup how the system worked in battle. Using the above as a model we need to build the Tyranid Command structure to reflect it, because it reflects what I have read about them very well.
One of the great strengths of the Tyranids in the WH40k universe is that, unlike all the other armies, their units evolve at an alarming rate compared to their foes. In effect the rest of the WH40k universes armies create, or forget, new units here and there over a very long period of time. There armies will change structure and orgainization, but their units will remain pretty much constant. The Tyranids are the exact opposite of this creating new units constantly in reaction to the enviroment and enemies they are facing. In comparison to the rest of the WH40k universes military establishments the Tyranids are doing this in the blink of an eye!
There is just no way to cover this constant evolution of the Tyranid Army in a single list. It would be just too hard to play balance the mass of possible formations and unit combinations. The only possible solution is therefore to create at least two base lists, one of the 'Old Nids' and one of the 'New Nids'. These lists will have the same special rules, the same orgainizational structure, and units common between them will have the same stats. Doing it in any other way is going to create far more problems then anyone could possibly solve, and the endless treadmill would then continue. I have decided that the first to lists will be small bug heavy horde lists and that the variation lists will follow after that. Again, trying to make an 'all encompassing' list that contains all the possible variations is destined to fail before it even has a chance to get started.
This does not mean play-testers shouldn't work on variant lists, they still should. They will be laying the ground work for when those list types are addressed by the AC and 'The Committee' (Sounds like a SF book)
My plans for now are to pound out the special rules and get that mess cleaned up. To start with I am going to list the ones we will be working on, which ones will be put aside for now, and what new ones we should be scoping out. Considering that most of the polls weren't that clear cut I am most defintely going to tick off someone with my decisions. Well it is a tough life here alone at the top, but then that is the ACs job, to make those tough decisions. I only hope those that do not like the choices I make will still continue to work on the list, because the objective here isn't to score social points on the boards, it is to turn out a working army list for everyone to use, and to h*ll with who get the credit.
Cheers All,
Jaldon
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I know a dead parrot when I see one and I'm looking at one right now.
Tyranid AC
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