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Thanks; I will try them out!
You need to make the most of them quickly, before other players unlock their T6+ units, particularly fliers which Carnifexes can't deal with at all. But there's a good period in the midgame where Carnifexes can handle anything, they're the perfect way to rush whoever had the bad luck to spawn near you. You won't use them in the late game, but they're the tool that gets you to the late game.
I focus mainly on the monstrous units - carnifexes, exocrines, tyrannofexes, trygon, eventually heirodule. Most of the infantry feel a bit underwhelming. Obviously you use Termagants because your hero spawns them for free, but I never pay to train one.
I somewhat like Raveners as a support for Carnifexes, they're quite good at sweeping aside no-armor/high-figure infantry units. But they're fragile for a T4 melee unit, they have a relatively brief window where you can use them before they start dying too fast to be worth the investment.
Of course Tyranids being Tyranids, training a temporarily-useful unit like Raveners is never a waste, you just reclaim them when they become obsolete. Same for Carnifexes: make the most of them while they're at their peak, eat them the moment they fall off and you unlock a stronger replacement.
In that sense, when you realise that infantry are really supporting troops, you realise that Tyrannids have some awesome infantry for the cost.
- Termagants are your cannon fodder, really, mostly used to boost your economy by consuming them when spawned by a Tervigon. Still they can be really cool scouts and unit-finishers, thanks to their speed and ease of movement on the map
- Hormagants are really better than Termagants, they are even more maneuverable and ignore enemy cover. Best scout in the early game.
- Tyrannid warriors can be many things depending on your playstyle. For most people they are tanky infantry killers who are the only non-psykers and non-heroes being synapse units, so you need a couple of them before you get access to Hive Tyrants. If for some reason you want to make more battle use of them, you can focus your Tyrannid Prime on the +2 accuracy aura for them and spam them for some effective infantry melee force. They fall flat in the late game and they can't fight fliers but otherwise they hit like a truck and can withstand hits too.
- Biovores suck, let's be honest. They are infantry artillery focused on fighting infantry. Talking about meh. They give you anti-infantry capability in a faction that has no issue whatsoever at fighting infantry. I seriously can't make effective use of them, if anyone knows an effective use case, please let me know.
- Gargoyles suck too, i give you that. In my opinion they should remove their jump ability and give them the flier trait instead, after all they are fliers, aren't they? Or at least give them a hover trait to remove all movement penalties and allow them to travel on water. As it stands, i see no reason to make those, seriously. An extra tech to get something that is barely better than Termagants in most scenarios.
- Raveners are seriously underrated. Remember your main force as a Tyrannid commander are the monsters, the infantry is essentially your "cavalry" since it can move faster, lol. Raveners are great scouting units for the middle game, plus they can hunt down any escaping unit and finish it, or flank important targets while the enemy's main force is engaged with your monsters. Raveners main asset is their speed, they are not supposed to go toe to toe with most opponents. Using them in this way, they are actually quite good.
- Lictors are basically buffed up Raveners. They lose a movement point but otherwise they are overall stronger and can avoid overwatch as well, which adds to their scouting/flanking/chasing/skirmishing potential considerably. Use Lictors extensively as you would use any light cavalry or skirmisher unit in every strategy game under the sun, and you will see the value.
- Carnifex is essentially the backbone of your armies for the early-mid game. You are expected to spam those, and they can deal with everything except fliers quite well. Carnifexes are slow, despite being the "equivalent" of a vehicle. Carnifexes are your real line infantry, so to speak.
- Haruspex is your main anti-armor and anti-fortification unit. It is tankier than Carnifex and has life-steal, meaning it can survive worse odds than the Carnifex. It does awesome armor-penetration damage and is really underrated for some reason. Obviously it gets eclipsed later in the game but if in the middle game you need some anti-armor or you need a sieging unit/living battering ram, use Haruspex.
- Exocrine, like previously said in the thread, is really an awesome artillery unit. Definitely among the best artillery units in the game, and is not entirely eclipsed by Tyrannofex in the late game because Tyrannofex is not a clear-cut upgrade. The exocrine can hit like a truck at range 3 and does some even heavier damage at range 1. My usual tactic is depending on a combo of Haruspexes+Exocrines+Raveners in the middle game (i typically ditch Carnifexes cause they are squishier and Raveners+Exocrines can handle the enemy infantry most of the time)
- Trygon, is a very important unit as well, and sometimes it is easy to discard as mainly a "broodhive maker", but it is more than that, it can actually fight pretty damn well, especially vs infantry. It is also the only "monster" unit with a movement of 4, same as Lictors, while it costs 50% more than Lictors (but is obviously tankier). Basically, after you can field enough Trygons, you can remove Lictors from the game and use Trygons to perform that role. Trygons are hard to kill, fast, and decimate infantry. The broodhives are just gravy.
- Tyrannofex, is essentially your Haruspex (or if you are a Carnifex guy, your Carnifex) replacement. It does not replace Exocrine, in fact they have similar costs and are comparable in power. You see, Haruspex as the game goes on becomes a little too squishy vs heavier vehicles and lacks the ability to hit fliers, and also lacks range. Tyrannofex is 3 ranged, is much tankier, and can hit fliers. It can also do some nasty range 1 damage to infantry, especially with the Larvae upgrade, and your previous anti-armor unit could not handle infantry very well at all.
- Hive crones, are your only air unit, and are mainly there to protect from other air units and do some skirmishing on the side. Most important for protecting your hive tyrants than anything else.
- Scythed Hierodoule, is essentially an unstoppable war machine. If you are looking for dominant, you found it, lol. It is very expensive but also very effective.
And there are your psykers too,
- Malanthropes, your builder units, also happen to provide a range damaged reduction buff aura, are synapse creatures, give you science for each kill in their range and can eat biomass as well. They also have a fear aura to psyker units, plus some nice auxiliarry skills. One of the best builder units in the game
- Zoanthropes, are often overlooked psykers too. Great at hurting both infantry and vehicles.
As for the heroes, you know, Primes are some of the best melee fighters in the game, Tervigons can heal and spam fodder for free, and Hive Tyrants are some of the best heroes in the game, period.
Now that i wrote all these, i suppose the answer is clear, Tyrannids have many dominant units at most tiers, the player just needs to realise their potential. People just need to stop focusing at end-game super-units and thinking that only those matter. Sometimes units can be good, you just use them wrong. For example putting Lictors vs Obliterators and thinking they are comparable, they are not. Obliterators are meant to form the battleline for Chaos, Lictors are skirmishers. Sent Obliterators vs Exocrines and Tyrannofexes instead, lol.
I guess this was my fundamental problem. I was experimenting with using Lictors like Terminators - as an all-purpose, all-comers unit and in particular a central anchor. They evaporated too quickly against anything that can do damage. You are also correct about Tyranid single figure units being excellent. I am used to mid-tier single figure vehicles - the Russ tank, Predator, etc. - being mediocre. But the monsters look noticeably stronger than their tank counterparts.
Otherwise thanks for your detailed unit-by-unit analysis. I profited immensely from it.
Now do the same for the other factions - especially the newer with whom I am unfamiliar! ;)
A non-upgraded Carnifex deals more damage on 11 armor than a Haruspex.
Even on a 14 armor Chaplain (I could probably go for a 16 armor Warpsmith, but by then you'd have better units than either Carnifex or Haruspex to deal with it so whatever), a Carnifex with literally 0 upgrades deal more damage than a Haruspex.
Haruspex is not your "main anti-armor" or "anti-fortification unit"'. Because. It. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. Sucks.
"But it has 6 more HP and regen'!"
Oh yes, fantastic. BUT IT DEALS NO FRIGGING DAMAGE.
"But regen'!" No. Because for the regen' to matter you'd need :
-To be able to survive more than one turn (You won't. You'll die horribly in one turn, whether you have 30 or 36 HP. The difference is the Carnifex can KILL the enemy and reduce the firepower. Haruspex can't)
-To deal enough damage for the regen' to matter. (You don't. Haruspex deals no meaningful damage to most units).
I'm skipping on hormagaunts being better than termagants (they usually are not due to their tech cost, their increased squishiness (-2 models) and their lack of armor penetration (the short range upgrade is earlier, allowing termagants to sport a decent 2 AP when hormagaunts still have 0)), gargoyles being useless (Jump can help you use a cliff to your advantage, but more importantly blind can counter infantry heroes and/or mess up vital infantry unit that you cannot easily kill (like a range 3 unit, or the dreaded Heavy Destroyers)), Biovores being useless (calling your early only ranged option useless is audacious, even after their nerfs) or Tyranids Warrior being a must-have (No they're not, you can completely fill your synapse needs with Malanthropes and use the biomass you save to make units that are not blast bait).
But a lot of what you said is very wrong.
I will (again) invite you to come on the Discord to play some PvP with the various players there. I think that will help broad both of our vision of the meta :)
Yes, this realisation about the Tyranids may be obvious but sometimes it goes over the head of the players the first few times they try them because they are used to how the other factions are doing things. Vehicles tend to be the fast auxiliary units for most factions, things like scout bikes and land speeders, but with Tyranids it is the infantry that is fast and skirmishy. Almost all infantry units have 4+ movement and/or ignore cover movement penalties, for example. They are supposed to be fast skirmish units overall, not your main battle force. On the other hand, every Tyranid single figure "vehicle" is slow except Trygon.
Lictors and Raveners should be used vs Terminators only if the Terminators are already damaged and/or fleeing to heal. You typically want to use those flankers to hit the Devastators and the Apothecaries, not the Terminators. Sometimes it may not be possible though, if the enemy is protecting them well. That is why you don't build a main Tyranid force out of Lictors, you just use them as an auxiliary unit in small numbers and rely on your monsters for the main fighting. By the usual time Lictors are in the game, most opponents are heavily armored and Lictors lack armor penetration.
But think of this this way: What would happen if Tyranids lacked Raveners and Lictors? The monsters, like i said, are slow. Any time you damage a lot an enemy unit but fail to kill it, the enemy would retreat them to heal (even the AI consistently does this and it is irritating), and you wouldn't be able to stop it because your units are slow and most lack range until the end game. That is where Raveners and Lictors come in, they make sure no one escapes. They have lots of unrestricted movement and can benefit from cover unlike your monsters. They are also cheap so you don't care too much about losing them and Lictors can also deny overwatch to the enemy. Every single thing about their design screams "cavalry"
Tyranids have awesome ground based forces due to their monsters. Most enemy faction ground vehicles cannot really compete on a one-on-one basis vs Tyranids monsters. Tyranids weaknesses are the lack of proper air power, the lack of range on most of their units, their almost total inability to heal (except Tervigon's skill), their lack to put weak units into transports and save them, their dependency on synapse creatures to keep morale high, the fact that they have no "repairable" vehicles so again no ability to heal monsters, etc. They also don't have defensive structures.
See, that is a huge list of weaknesses to compensate for the fact that Tyrannids ground force horde can be unstoppable.
A bit tangential but:
Can any units do significant enough damage to threaten a fully-leveled and equipped player hero? At 14 armor and a Dusk Blade and Joat Jerkin, I don't ever recall my Captain or Chaplain being in danger. Of course, the AI didn't have enough time to build any gargantuan or super heavy, but I didn't think even they could make a difference. Basically, the AI has to be able to kill the hero in 1 turn, as a human player will retreat and heal a severely wounded hero. So it's come to the point where I feel I have to go a bit light on tanking equipment to give the AI a chance.
Ah, a good point - I never paid attention to movement speed differences. I have a tendency to fixate on a few select stats on a unit (HP, armor, and damage) and coming to premature conclusions! ;)
No, i am not wrong, in fact i am mostly correct. If i was wrong, and your viewpoint correct, then why the devs didn't buff those units in so many patches? Do you think the devs are incompetent and can't see what the "discord" can see? Well, if that's what you think, then say it plainly.
Carnifex could do slightly more damage to most lesser armored targets but still it is far squishier. You may think 6 HP do not matter but 36 compared to 30 is a 20% boost (and 36 with experience becomes more impressive later on), this in addition to the 100% life steal is a tremendous boost to survivability vs enemy vehicles that tend to be able to do some damage at that stage in the game. Let's put it this way: Both Carnifex and Haruspex are melee units vs vehicles and fortifications, but Carnifex is going to melt way sooner than Haruspex. In a vacuum, Carnifex can go toe to toe with damage with a Haruspex, but remember the opponent can hit as well, not just you, and 30 hp + 8 armor is not that tanky against most mid game opponents. A Haruspex especially vs fortifications can really do some nasty siege damage if the fortification has no backup, his life steal will mostly heal any damage the fortification does to him.
Carnifex is mostly better at dealing with infantry. Plus you need to research 2 additional technologies to make his damage really great, and those technologies are useless later in the game as Carnifex becomes obsolete while Haruspex Scythes technology is shared with Exocrine which is likely to remain in service throughout the game anyway.
In any case, it is not a real dilemma "Carnifex or Haruspex, you can't have both". This is ridiculous, it is like comparing Ork Boyz vs Tankbustas and claiming you don't need Tankbustas. Haruspex is needed vs enemy vehicles and fortifications, so you mix in some with the Carnifexes. Carnifex is mostly vital vs infantry, that is what it kills the most and his armor penetration is better used to kill armored infantry, until Exocrines Trygons and Tyrranofexes can make Carnifex totally obsolete. If the enemy uses a lot of vehicles your Carnifexes are going to suffer even after the upgrades because they are easy to kill and you have no way to heal them.
As for the rest of the units, i stand by what i said. Hormagants are very fast scouts. They are not meant to be fighters. Hormagants are the Tyranid equivalent to the scout bike. They move extremely fast even inside ruins and forests and have no penalties for rivers either. You can cover a lot of ground even with just a single hormagant and that is what is important about them. Plus, the early game is full with ground enemies that abuse cover, like the Stingwings. Termagants are doing 50% reduced damage in Stingwings in imperials ruins, for example. Hormagants do the full damage. Does it seem like an insignificant benefit to you? Hormagants can't hit fliers, but it is not like termagants are good vs fliers either...
Gargoyles are bad, period. I see no reason to make them and i never do. Perhaps if i play a 1vs1 game with no neutrals on a small map, then a Gargoyle could be useful to disable better enemy infantry, true, but in most settings by the time you meet an opponent Gargoyles are long obsolete and die just by looking at them. And the game shouldn't be balanced or considered only along the lines of 1vs1 pvp with no neutrals anyway. My advice is mostly about default settings.
Biovores, again, are useless. Yes they are your only ranged infantry, so what? They hit like a noodle and their mines are on a 5 turn cooldown, can be easily killed and only good vs weak infantry. What is exactly good about biovores, and why you should spend the research and the biomass on them? Do you have issues taking on infantry?
Tyranid warriors are a must have for synapse simply because Malanthropes are too important and too squishy to place on the frontlines. It is not like an opponent, especially a human one, won't target them first. Tyranid warriors can withstand tremendous punishment for a relatively early unit, and can deal significant amount of damage to enemy infantry, which is what you will most likely face at that stage of the game. I don't normally go that route, but the +2 accuracy aura by the Prime is turning the Tyranid warriors into a great force early in the game. They lack armor penetration, true, but their baseline damage is high enough that they can even kill light vehicles with the +2 accuracy buff.
Warriors being "blast bait"? Dude, do you even play the game? At the point you are going to be using the warriors, most units do not have blast yet. Blast comes online for most factions way later, your warriors are going to be biomass by then and you are going to be getting your synapse needs covered by hive tyrants.
You should really play some Tyranids first before claiming someone else is wrong dude.
Because they don't know how to change Haruspex?
If you were on the Discord, you'd know :).
The problem of Haruspex is they can't simply give it more damage. It would either still be inferior to Carnifex, or be straight up superior to it, and thus Carnifex would become the one that is useless. Furthermore with more damage in addition to the regen', it would become too oppressive.
Making it a bullet sponge doesn't work because... Well Tyranids don't have anything to put behind to shoot at the enemy (Exocrines is two tiers above and require the same building...)
You could put Biovores, but Biovores can't deal with tanks (and neither can Haruspex), so it won't work.
So Haruspex remains as is because no one knows how to make it a good unit without making Carnifex irrelevant. (There have been several propositions to turn it into an utility monster, but nothing that really stuck)
For Zoanthropes we got told "Zoans get some love in different patch." three weeks ago. We'll see when it happens.
For Hormagaunts, there are no changes because there's the ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ necron lobby opposing it.
Instead of getting a buff on Hormagaunts, we got a buff on the Tyranid city (+ Spider parlour on T1) to make rush against Tyranids a bit less efficient.
Wrong. (Again).
First, Termagants can perfectly kill Psychneuien.
Second, Termagants are actually pretty good at killing Umbra. You'll need 4 packs of Termagants to kill an Umbra.
Third, Termagants are pretty good at killing Dakkajet (which is the earliest flyer you'll encounter, since orks don't have an air building).
How many factions field Vespids?
Your example is meaningless.
"But a lot of units use cover!"
Yes. And inside cover, the difference of damage between Termagants and Hormagaunts is too low to matter, compared to the fight out of cover (extremely beneficial to termagants) and the overwatch.
*sigh*
Wrong. Wrong. Aaaaaaaaand, wrong. Again. And again. And again.
First, the mines have 5 turns cooldown, but one-hit almost all infantry units (even under cover).
"Yeah whatever, I have raveners to kill infantry"
What if the infantry has retreated behind other units?
What if you don't have 50 000 melee tiles available? (Which, you know, often happens, because some units can be juuuuuust too tough to kill and chokepoints exist)
What if there is a lot of overwatch and you can't just send an unit in? (Not spore mines here, obviously, just the main attack of biovores)
What if you need to poke the enemy safely?
What if you want to scout a far away tile (yeah spore mines don't **need** to be used offensively)?
I'm not saying Raveners are bad, or Biovores are must-have.
But saying Biovores suck is clearly short-sighted.
Have you read me? Even a 11 armor unit takes more damage from a NOT UPGRADED Carnifex.
EVEN A 14 ARMOR UNIT takes more damage from a NOT UPGRADED Carnifex.
If you call 14 armor "lesser armored targets" you miiiiiiight need to reevaluate your view of the game.
No.
What kind of fortification are you going to send it against?
A Neutral Imperial bastion? Who cares, Carnifexes will raze it to the ground faster.
An AM Imperial Bastion? Yeah, they will really care a lot about a 40 ore fortification that has no back up (hint : If there are no units nearby, the goal of the bastion is not to fight you there) and that will still survive 10 turns against your Haruspex.
A Fortress of Redemption? Do you really think you will have a FoR completely isolated from its owner? (How many turns do you need to kill a FoR with a Haruspex? 9?) Either you are already winning enough that you can afford to send parts of your army hunting in the wild and it doesn't change anything, or your main army can't afford losing units somewhere else.
A City? Really? A city with no backup for the 50 turns the Haruspex will need to kill it?
Yes, Haruspex is superior to the Carnifex in a pure 1v1 setting (that is one UNIT vs one UNIT).
But that never happens. In the 5 turns you need to kill one unit with a Haruspex, the enemy will have sent reinforcements (and it's not like it really needs a LOT to kill a Haruspex to be fair).
:')
Still waiting to see you in multiplayer.
Let's do some simple (for the sake of keeping the example easy to understand) calculations. Let's put a Carnifex vs a Predator 1vs1 and then a Haruspex vs a Predator 1vs1. We are going to assume of the upgrades only the extra weaponry is available for all 3 units. Also lvl 1.
The Carnifex has 30 hp can do around 12.5 damage give or take per turn in melee range vs an 8 armor unit if he has the 2 additional techs researched. The predator has 36 hp, and can deal around 10 hp worth of damage to armor 8 assuming it has the bolters, but can hit from range 3 with the main gun and range 2 with the bolters. Both the predator and the carnifex can kill each other in 3 turns, but it is more than likely that the predator is going to kill the carnifex first due to being ranged and probably having gotten the first hit. Even if the carnifex does kill the predator, it is going to be left with 10/30 hp.
A Haruspex, indeed, does less damage vs an 8 armor target. It does around 8.8-9 damage per turn total if you have the additional scythes researched. But a Haruspex has 36 hp. The predator needs 4 turns to kill a Haruspex instead of 3. The Haruspex also needs 4-5 turns to kill the predator. But this is not where it ends. The Haruspex is going to be self-healing for around 9hp per turn due to the life steal. So essentially it is only going to be getting 1 hp worth of damage each turn, assuming it keeps attacking. After 5 turns, the Haruspex is going to kill the Predator and remain at 32/36 hp. Let that sink in.
So, after the fight, Carnifex is so-so to kill the predator instead of being killed, and even if it does kill it it is going to be left with 10 hp, while the Haruspex is sure as hell to end the predator no matter what and exit the fight almost unscathed. Yet you apparently think that Carnifex is much better vs vehicles.
Also, i didn't include regeneration into the example to keep things simple, and because both units get it anyway, but in Haruspex's case 2hp passive regeneration per turn literally means that it gets no damage whatsoever in a matchup with a predator. Any vehicle that goes 1vs1 in melee vs the Haruspex needs to be able to dish out more than 11 damage vs 8 armor each turn at lvl 1 if they can hope to damage Haruspex, if Haruspex has passive regeneration too.
And yes, 1vs1 almost never happens, but it is not like you are likely to send 1 Haruspex unsupported vs the enemy either. The thing is, vs vehicles Haruspexes can easily self heal for much damage, meaning they can also soak more damage that would otherwise hit your other units. Tyranids lack healing capabilities in general outside of the regen, so Haruspex self-healing for 9ish hp each turn if he attacks single model units is no joke. Even vs infantry the Haruspex will deal less damage and obviously heal for less, but on the other hand most infantry won't be able to deal as much damage to it either.
Haruspex essentially can boost the survivability of your army tremendously if the enemy uses vehicles. The enemy either has to focus the haruspexes leaving your carnifexes and exocrines alone, or the haruspexes will keep doing their thing and exit the fight without a scratch. you are not meant to choose haruspex over carnifex, you are supposed to use both, like you use both guardsmen and heavy weapon squads, both boyz and tankbustas. They complement each other. You should only be avoiding Haruspexes if the enemy has no monsters/vehicles to leech on.
They are built from the same building. Making Haruspexes mean not making Carnifexes.
If I have to choose between two haruspexes + 3 carnifex and 5 carnifexes, I will take the 5 Carnifexes. Because they get ♥♥♥♥ done. (and haruspexes don't).
Pointless.
Predators with bolters are T8 unit. Carnifex with upgrades are T6 units.
They won't meet (You'll have Exocrines or maybe Tfex, or hell, maybe you'll have decided to spam Hive Crones for some reason).
Yes. That's exactly why Haruspex is bad.
Two Carnifex will kill the Predator. Getting XP, reducing enemy morale, reducing counterfire....
Two Haruspex won't. When it's the SM turn, His Predators (or you know, some Assault Marines with a Melta Bomb) will focus down one Haruspex and kill it (making its regen pointless).
I insist, there is a saying "A dead enemy can't hit back". You don't need to be tanky or to regen yourself if there's no enemy left to hit you.
A Haruspex with a Tier SEVEN technology will deal 7.7 damage to a Dreadnought.
So you either need several levels, plus a T7 tech or a T9 tech to heal 9 HP per turn.
Either way, by the time you can heal 9 HP per turn, the enemy will be able to take you down before your unit can play.
For comparison, a Carnifex with a T5 and T6 tech will deal 11.8 damage to the same Dreadnought. If you thought +20% HP was great, what about +50% damage?
The thing is... I'm going to repeat myself but Haruspex' damage are TRASH.
It's as if you said "You either need to focus the baby vampire that can latch on your leg, or the man with a chainsaw coming towards you."
Yeah you know what? I'll kill the chainsaw man, then deal with the baby vampire.
And more importantly, instead of having a baby vampire and a man with a chainsaw, you could have TWO men with a chainsaw.
If the Haruspex was a range 2 unit, it could maybe act as a support to the Carnifex... But honestly even then, its damage are so bad, I'd almost always rather have two Carnifex that can't hit this turn, than two Haruspexes.
If you can get a Haruspex close enough to melee to be a "threat" (I can't type that seriously :/ Haruspex is not a threat), you could instead have a Carnifex close enough to actually get ♥♥♥♥ DONE.
I'm still waiting for a PvP match showing how a mix of Carnifex and Haruspex is better.
1) Carnifexes and Haruspexes are made from the same building. And you can have more than 1 building, especially on Tyranids which typically city-spam and their unit-buildings produce biomass at a competitive enough rate to the biomass pools. The monster building is the most important unit-building for the Tyranids, if you have those on just 1 city you are playing Tyranids wrong.
2) The example wasn't entirely pointless despite bolters being T8, the point was to compare how the 2 units can handle a typical tank of 8 armor. You could use any other vehicle and in fact the comparison would have been worse against the Carnifex's case, because earlier tier vehicles have no chance at all to kill a Haruspex.
3) Again, you are using your "my rules apply to you, not to me" tactics (plus some fake news). 2 Carnifexes cannot take down a Predator in 1 turn, i am not even sure if 3 can. And if the space marine player can focus fire the haruspex, he can focus fire the Carnifex too, don't you think? After all the Carnifex has 8 armor, same as the Haruspex, but alas 30 hp instead of 36, so it dies faster. Why are you using the argument that haruspex can be focus fired, but apparently the Carnifex can't?
4) Again, you insist on just the damage buff of the Carnifex alone as being superior, ignoring the self heal of the Haruspex. A Haruspex is not just a damage dealer, it is also essentially a tank. It tanks damage, it has a serious self-heal attack in a faction that lacks healers. What is so hard to understand? You can use Carnifexes to do damage to enemy vehicles but there is no chance you don't lose Carnifexes in the process. They are too squishy and Tervigon can only heal for a little and you endanger him too. Haruspex can last for longer on the frontline, which is his specialty. No one said Haruspex is immortal. It is still much better than the Carnifex though. Tyranids secret of success is recycling biomass to make better units. If you keep losing units you are losing biomass that could be better spent to produce your later Tyrannofexes and Hierodules. Tyranids are not Orks, to have limitless food and produce ore and influence just by fighting, you know. Haruspex is very significant for his ability to stay on the frontline for more than any comparative unit the Tyrannids have until the Tyrannofex. And i am not even sure Tyrannofex is better than Haruspex at resisting damage when you include self heals in the equasion, i haven't done the math yet.
5) Carnifex, all in all, is a jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none unit. It is the first unit you get when building the monster building, can deal with infantry and vehicles, and can be upgraded well into the game. I get that. But remember that Carnifex is its own category. It takes 2 unique researches to make him reach his peak, while you could spend those 2 researches to get Haruspex and Exocrine out instead. Haruspex tanks while Exocrine kills everything from behind. This is a better setup and better suited to handle later tier units, due to being tankier. Carnifex can be a tool to lose biomass and exp. Remember, if you lose the unit, you don't just lose the resources made to make it, you also lose the exp it gathered. Exp are a hidden resource. And i think, i am not sure but i think that experienced units give more biomass when recycled. So hitpoints are always better than pure damage, unless we are talking about suicide units. With enough hitpoints but low damage, it can take many turns but eventually you kill the enemy, and if you are losing you can retreat and keep the experience and biomass. With low hp but more damage, you may get to kill but die afterwards, throwing both biomass and experience to the garbage bin. I understand that people love the generic simplicity of Carnifex and the fact that it can be upgraded to last for several tiers, but my playstyle prefers to focus on getting a Haruspex+Exocrine combo out sooner, and i think that is the optimal solution unless you are getting rushed by the enemy or the enemy is infantry-focused.
6) Haruspex does lower damage to most units compared to a fully upgraded Carnifex, but without upgrades the difference is not that big, and again, Haruspex can live long enough to kill the enemy while Carnifex may die sooner. You don't ignore a Haruspex if you are a vehicle because the damage he does is not insignificant. Just because he does lesser damage than an upgraded Carnifex, doesn't mean that Haruspex tickles vehicles. At the very least, the vehicle will attempt to change positioning. A Haruspex can easily destroy any vehicle if the vehicle owner ignores him and focuses on killing Carnifexes. Carnifex becomes obsolete when Exocrines and at the most Tyrannofexes come out. But both Exocrines and Tyrannofexes suck at tanking damage, so Haruspex can still be useful as a frontline until you get Hierodules.
Stop with that hatred of Haruspex. Try to actually understand the unit before hating on it.
Keep your insults to yourselves. Haruspex is a decent unit and i proved it with examples and math. Using special niche use cases like "a tiny map free for all besieged by 2-3 ais at turn 20" is not the way to judge unit balance.
I mean yeah, at such an early point in the game it makes no sense to focus on Haruspex since it is more useful for surviving fights than dealing damage, but this does not make it a bad unit. You are talking turn 20 and you are judging a Haruspex based on that? Are you serious?
At this point i consider your posts trolling because you are using specific niche scenarios to prove that a unit is "bad", while in fact it can be proven that the unit is good if used properly.
Let me give you this scenario:
Assume that 2 players, 1 has an army of Carnifexes and Exocrines, and the other has an army of Haruspexes and Exocrines. Carnifexes and Haruspexes cost the same, so assume same numbers. Which is gonna win and why?
If you are a smart betting man, your money is on the Haruspex + Exocrine army, not on the Carnifex, simply because the Haruspexes will be regenerating tons of HP each turn, plus they have +20% hp.
And yes i used to be a pro-tier player and thus i tend to figure out these stuff pretty easily, don't be angry at me. And leave out the name calling please.
And I thought I was agressive :').
It's fine, you can prefer playing whatever you want. Everyone has the right to like playing their own combo.
But your combo is simply not efficient.
One last time, I invite you to play some multiplayer to confront your opinion to others in a very efficient manner.
If you keep refusing it, then no matter, but please stop trying to make it seem as though you know better.
Multiplayer alone is not proof of anything. I told you before, unless 2 players are precisely equal and start at exactly equal starting positions on a symmetrical map and both playing Tyranids, you don't prove game balance by having people having matches between them. You only prove that one player beat another.
And perhaps my combo is efficient but the opponent plays the game for more time than me and is more efficient at establishing an early economic lead. What then? Does it disprove the combo's effectiveness if i lose? No dude, you only prove the other player is better than me at playing the game, this doesn't mean that he is better at analysing the game balance than me. The developers of this game know this game in-and-out, they built it, but i am not sure they are the best gamers available if they get to compete with others in multiplayer either.
I repeat for the gazzilionth time, Haruspex is essentially a tank unit (as it is defined in RPGs/MOBAs, not as in an actual battletank). It is supposed to receive damage more gracefully than other units, it is a frontliner. It is supposed to keep the enemy vehicles at bay and not let them swarm your Exocrines/Tyrannofexes. It does decent damage but its most important quality is the self-heal. Carnifex can kill infantry better but has no staying power against vehicles. Carnifex is a glass cannon vs most vehicles. And Exocrines are not ideal at melee either, they can hit better at melee but are not the tankiest of units lacking the hp leech Haruspex has.
So tell me, assuming you ignore Haruspexes for a second, if the opponent decides to ignore making infantry and starts building tanks, what do you do? Can your Carnifexes withstand the damage? 30 hp and 8 armor and no cover, remember. No other damage reductions either, that's about it. It is not that strong vs a tank. The Exocrines without a frontline are only little better at 36hp. Who holds the line? Tyrannofex is much later tier, he gets 10 armor and 42hp, but no self heal either. Even when Tyrannofex is out a few Haruspexes can still be useful for holding the frontline and pestering enemy tanks. And if the enemy uses only-infantry this late, your Trygons and Lictors will be having a field day.
From this conversation, i suppose the main reason you view Haruspex as useless is because you are focused on early game. Makes sense, most people wouldn't play lengthy games on pvp and a Carnifex can seem far more valuable when a game gets decided in a pvp 1vs1 on the first turns. I get that, i really do. But this still does not make Haruspex a bad unit, it just makes it unsuitable for the job you want it to perform. If the game goes on for very late during a war of attrition, the Haruspex is so good it can only be really replaced when you get Scythed Hierodule, not before.