Interesting topic.

I can see the reasoning in an Army Champion wanting to keep playtesting, ideas and interest concentrated on one 'main' Tyranid list.

But I also understand that with a project like Tyranids there are hugely differing opinions on how it should be done- tonnes of special rules, bare minimum special rules, dozens of slightly different unit types, a basic unit type that several models can represent, etc, etc.

Just to throw fire on the debate, I'm working out my own variant Tyranid list too...
Hopefully, taking the best bits from v9.2.1, from other lists, from 40k, from my head, etc, etc.

I agree with the simplyfying on unit types.

There is essentially a:

-Combat Beast= Carnifex, Haruspex
-Gun Beast= Venomfex, Malefactor, Exocrine

This allows the Tyranid player to choose slug or fex depending on model preference. It doesn't alienate the older players slug models, and it doesn't put off new players who like the fex and find the slug a fugly, silly model.

It also means less variables when balancing the list. Your working out a 'combat beast', not half a dozen slightly different combat beasts.

I also agree with the comments that Epic is about formations/activations, and that breaking the very basic structure of the Epic ruleset to shoehorn an army in isn't appealing. If an army can't fit into Epic without Epic being re-written to fit it (as evidenced by different army list structure, different Victory conditions, different unit/formation rules, etc) somethings wrong.

A back to basics of preset formations with limited options (like most of the official lists) is my preference- and again it's much easier to balance. It even stresses in the rulebook that the Tournament Army Lists are the most 'common' armies, but outside of Tournaments, armies can vary hugely. Marine Tactical formations could include a Devastator stand, etc, player's discretion. But tournament lists need limits.
The ideal of Epic list design is to make the most accurate protrayal of a race with the bare minimum of new special rules. If the existing Special Abilities/Weapons can be combined to make it, it's better.

Spawning is another tricky issue. It's a cool name, but it's deceptive in that Nids aren't actually being born on the battlefield. It represents severely wounded or feral Tyranids being rounding up by Synapse creatures and controlled to fight again.
Semantics aside, I also believed it was intended to allow Tyranid players to have an 'endless tide of tooth and claw', the iconic living carpet of Termagants and Hormagaunts- without having to buy a bucketload of OOP models, or having to write an army list consisting solely of Gaunts.
In practice, Gaunts are the last thing you want to spawn, it inevitably brought back Raveners, Carnifex (and back in v9.1 my favourite was reborn Heirodules). The opponent could often feel cheated when I rolled some dice and the big monster they just killed rears up again.
I've restricted Spawning to Termagants/Hormagaunts and simplyfied it considerably.

Just a few other minor things to throw out there for critique.

+1 To Engage/Rally. +2 seems overkill.
Tyranid Warrior= Infantry...
Ravener (infantry)= only available with Trygon (and then generally as Tunnellers)
AV/War Engines don't take Danger Terrain tests, but do suffer -5cm move penalty for each move in Danger Terrain.
Synapse/Brood- Brood within 15cm of Synapse are Expendable. Brood are non-scoring, that's it, no more complex.
Lictor- FF4, with MW Extra Attack. Also infantry. So he can use Cover Saves like a Lictor should (6+ RA normall), MW gives him his balls back.
Aerial Spore Mines have Scout.
Few other niggles I can't remember right now.

Always happy to read more tyranid lists.

If I like them, I may also playtest them too  

I will always keep my battle reports and responses for the current army champion as a priority of course unless another list shows promise or the AC list goes in a direction that I am not interested in.

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Sorry, but what possible rationale could there be for Lictors to have a 4+ Firefight stat?  I assume this is a typo for "CC" or something.

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Yeah, it is, sorry. CC 4+, with a CC MW 4+ Extra Attack.

He's still FF -, just like Hormagaunts and Genestealers, making him literally pointless against Eldar- but that can't be helped.

I'm surprised that's the only typo in my ramblings.

i really like the idea to make respawn only to gaunts and return tw to infantry but then you had to lower the price of most of the av type (the current price take count of the respawning rules).
The synapse rule can be simplified negating the merge brood thing
So i assign at the start of the game the creature to that formation and the remain the same(just respawning possibility).
Other thing to be redone is marshal spawning ;if i take some bm i can respawn in marshal and at the end of the turn(maybe choose to respwan or remove bm if take a marshal action?) In reality the lictor and genestealer can have a 6+ ff value because in 40k the can have flesh hooks (in 40k the count as offensive grenade).

This i really like and would like to see it adopted for the main Tyranid list. If it is seen as too eradical then how about that the first one or two spawning points have to be used for Gaunts?

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I partially agree with Jeridan on the Combat Beast/Shooting Beast designation but there appears to be a huge gulf in the stats approach, the Carnifex based variants are slower and generally weaker than the Assault spawn.

Spawning is a double edged sword, we know that it's not overpowered but gaunts are spawn of last resort.

You'd need to drop the points on things that can't be spawned or have more limited spawning.

I've looked at the spawning rate for AV's assuming the Tyranid player can get 1 Turn spawning at 2D3 and 1 Turn at 1D3 (with the remaining turns being broken/killed). Focussing solely on spawning an AV you get over the course of a game per synapse formation.

7% chance of not getting enough to spawn an AV.
56% chance of enough to spawn a single AV.
33% chance of enough to spawn 2 AV's.
4% chance of enough to spawn 3 AV's.
Total of potential AV's spawned per synapse formation averages 1.33.

If you force the 1st spawning point to be applied to gaunts then the AV spawned average falls to 0.67 and the maximum number of AV's spawned per synapse formation falls to 1.

1st 2 spawn points the maximum stays at 1 but the average falls to 0.33.

I would say this translates to a points reduction per AV brood cost if spawning is forced to gaunts first (~25pts) or only gaunts (upto 50pts).

But is there any spesific reason why the Assault Spawn cannot be brought down to Fex power level? Or why the Fexes could not be beefed up a bit so that they mach better?

Sctually in Wh40k Monstrous Creatures as the Carnifex have it easier to move through difficult terrain (usually you roll 2D6 and use the highest result as the moving value, MC roll 3D6 and chose the highest, they are simply so big and strong that they smash through trees and smaller obstacles). If you assume that an Epic board is actually riddled with small bushes and patches of cover and difficult terrain which have no in-game effect (other that it bestows cover if a Infantry units go in Overwatch) then Monstrous Creatures have could move faster than ordinary Speed: 15cm Infantry.

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I think Epic Tyranids already get enough help in moving through terrain. I think it's slightly more abstract as it appears to be assumed that at the epic scale the medium and small creatures (Gaunts, Warriors, Raveners) can keep up a higher average speed hence general 20cm moves.

On Carnifex/Assault Spawn yes you can adjust fexes up or spawn down in stats but I still think that there is a distinction in size and ability between the Heaviest Fexes and Assault Spawn that should be maintained.

The Assault Spawn have to remain the primary designation until such time that Heavy Fex variants are available based purely on the fact that only Assault Spawn models are available. In the list it should stay as Assault Spawn and anyone who has Heavy Fex models (Scratchbuilt or if E&C's models appear) can use counts as. If a time appears in the future when Heavy Fexes are readily available then changes should be made to accomodate them. It's not that time yet.