Seconded!

i'm still waiting on a reply from about two and a half months ago ~_~

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~Every Tool Is A Weapon, If You Hold It Right~

I just D/L this list and will give it try shortly with my friend who plays orcs. The Spawning queue looks pretty straitforward.

One thing I noticed is the point value of the Guants. The plain Guant cluster is 75 for 4 while a bigger Guant horde of 8 is only 125. Is that correct? twice the number but not double the cost?

Also the Trygon in the uncommon clusters only costs 75 while if adding one to a Trygon Prime swarm it increases to 100. Do both of the Trygons in the Prime cluster have the 25 point synapse?

The Harridan Prime with synapse symbiote and 4 gargoyles works out to 200 points each (plus 100 for 4 gargoyles) but if adding another Harridan to this swarm it now only cost 175 point.

Are these point value inconsistencies on purpose for balancing?

Well, it's usually better to add 2*4 gaunts rather than 1*8 as it gives more flexibility with the other choices. If you buy gaunts in bulk, then you lose flexibility but gain numbers. That's a concept that appears in a lot of lists. Generally in a tyranid army, and I play one, you want the OTHER stuff, not the gaunts.

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Completely intentional, to encourage larger numbers of gaunts. By taking the larger cluster you lose the flexibility of another uncommon cluster, but you get a slight discount. In Epic multiple smaller formations are usually the best option, and so discounts should usually be offered for constructing larger ones. This is similar to in the Ork list, where the formation sizes scale linearly but the costs increase at a lower rate.



The Trygon Prime swarm is able to tunnel, and pays a premium for this ability, including the extra Trygon upgrade.



Again, intentional. The second Harridan doesn't have a synapse symbiote, and needs to be discounted for it to ever be considered to be taken.



They're a consequence of the fact that the same units have different values in different formations, and so to encourage the taking of options that would otherwise be very inefficient.

So I've played a few more games with the list, and a couple of ideas/thoughts occur.

Supreme Commander

I've failed too many crucial activations, and am starting to think that having the Dominatrix as the sole supreme commander is maybe not the best choice. Perhaps a more easily available option like a Supreme Tyrant would be viable? It's viable background-wise for a new-style list, what with the stormlord and all...

My only reservation is that it'd make the sole reason to take the dominatrix moot, meaning a price drop would certainly be neccesary (and probably is neccesary anyway).

Spawning Queue

The basic mechanic has been working very well, and the randomness it leads to has led to some amusing circumstances (Harridan spawning a carnifex). Oddly, the part that's been causing the most problems is the requirement to spawn in size order. This means counting formation sizes each turn, and can waste a little time.

Spawning needs to be done in a fixed order of some kind, but this one seems to be too slow. Other ideas I've had include going from left to right on the table, or from closest to the home table edge or blitz to furthest.

Can anyone think of any easier fixed orders?

Left to right works for me.

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Currently doing a plastic scenery kickstarter

I have said it before but just in case: wWhen playing at a tournament where spare tables and room to set up miniatures off a table are a luxury, the conga-line is clunky and not very viable. Placing minis on a side of the play table is also unnacceptable.

Here is a radical idea, ditch the spawning and go with increased numbers. It's a simple solution that I adopted.

The list should be made with Tournament play in mind, unless you mean to have it merely as a fan-list?

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Frogbear is responsible for...
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I see two problems with it: Playing corners and potential for gaminess.

It's no more clunky than the necron list's multiple death pools that have been used in tournaments successfully.

Having playtested it, I can tell you that the queue itself isn't a problem at all; I usually do it as more of a box anyway, with multiple lines next to each other.

I like spawning, and I want to try every option to make it work before considering scrapping it.

Require the nid player to number his swarms? Most people show up with an army roster anyway, would be easy to just go down the list.

It's your list so of course. It was just a suggestion apart from all the nodding heads.

I just feel sometimes, the basic 40k elements should be representative rather than displayed at an Epic level.

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Frogbear is responsible for...
Previous World Eaters
Previous Emperor's Children
Previous Death Guard
Previous Imperial Fists
Previous Chaos Squats

Understood, and I'm not against getting rid of spawning if it proves unworkable, but with how much I've cut back the other special rules, Spawning is now one of the defining rules of the list, (and actually spawns more units than previous versions too) so I'd like to try as many options as possible to keep it.

We have a winner!

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Currently doing a plastic scenery kickstarter

Simple and Effective