Codex: Tyranids: 2nd Edition Written in 1995 by Andy Chambers 88 Pages More Grimbright than Grimdark. Taste the rainbow. Notice the great old-school Hive Tyrant and. Dec 10, 2009 Codex: Tyranids: 2nd Edition Written in 1995 by Andy Chambers 88 Pages More Grimbright than Grimdark. Taste the rainbow. Notice the great old-school Hive Tyrant and.
The second generation of Tyranids was ushered in by the army's first codex. What a lovely tome that was, allowing everything from Warriors through to Lictors, Zoanthropes, Carnifexes, and Hive Tyrants access to Tyranid-specific Wargear called 'biomorphs.' As this was second edition, these biomorphs were not your simple +1 Str improvements, they were mad abilities like feedback-causing forcefields and ranged bioplasma attacks that you could mix and match on some of the larger creatures. They were as far beyond our current biomorphs as a conversion beamer is beyond a bolt pistol.
But I digress. This series is meant to be about the evolution of Tyranid models, not about the unique rules that we loved and lost along the way. However, it was a theme of the 2nd Edition of 40K that you could give units some pretty amazing options. This was also the era before force organization charts, when there were suggested ratios for how much of your force should be made up of troops or heavy support, and Hive Tyrants were limited to something like 1 per 1000 points, but you were still able to do mad, broken things like fielding 4 Lictors in one army.
Come to think of it, 2nd Edition seems to be the last time that anyone would want to have 4 Lictors in one army. Yes, second edition gave birth to the Tyranid army in earnest with the introduction of the Tyranid Codex. We received our first plastic kits in the form of Genestealers (though these probably first appeared in a space hulk revision), Termagants, and Warriors. With all this added shooting, the close-combat nature of the Nids was not forgotten. Second edition saw the introduction of the one the sneakiest weapons in the Tyranid arsenal, the Tyranid Lictor. I still believe that all of the fear of lictors that remains these days has been carried over from way back in the day when a lictor could really tear you a new one. Lictors have never measured up to the terror their were in 2nd Ed., a fact that I believe is illustrated by the fact that I stripped all four of my lictors to repaint them for third edition, then never bothered getting around to it as each subsequent iteration of the Tyranid codex has made them less and less impressive.
In second edition, the Tyranids received their first air support in the form of Gargoyles. These metal models were hell for mounting on flying stands as they'd easily tip over, often snapping off the flight stands when they did so. That being said, they were kind of hell on the battlefield as well, coming equipped flamespurts, one of the first tyranid weapons to use the flamer template and, as far as I recall, the only shooting weapon that would force all those covered by the template to move to the edge of the template if they survived. What's more, the gargoyles could fly high: essentially disappearing one turn only to deep strike back onto the board the next. Then there were the models that were so aesthetically impressive and whose rules were so inspiring that I forgot to add them to this post and no one noticed they were missing until GW cheakilly recast them in finecast: the Ripper Swarm. The only thing to write home about when it came to ripper swarms in second edition is that they could eat any terrain that was organic, removing it from the board.
A friend bought me a pack of these as a birthday gift because he knew I didn't have any. I asked him if I could return it in exchange for something useful like a pewter warrior. To round things out, we had the reintroduction of my favourite model, the Screamer Killer, now as a living creature rather than a biological walker with armour values. He was now called a Carnifex, he had ten wounds and a 2+ armour save that was rolled on 2 dice (effectively rolling it out of 12, which was how Terminator armour used to operate.though in 2nd Edition we used armour save modifiers of -2, -3, etc, rather than the current system of an AP of X negating saves entirely-but I digress). He had a shooting attack in the form of Bioplasma (36' range), and he could make four close combat attacks at Str 7 or combine all four to make a single attack at Str 10. Basically, it was his job to kick ass and take names, which made it all the more hilarious when one of my female friends, upon seeing the model with all those curving, hug-y arms dubbed him 'the love bug.' Jumpstart games.
METAL CARNIFEX And, with the exception of some Genestealer Cult models that I'm not really sure where to slot-in yet, that was the full Tyranid line in second edition. However, second edition was a bit of an Age of Wonders. Not only did you ludicrous rules and wargear that meant special characters who could carve their way through entire armies (don't believe it?
I once had to spend half a Tyranid army bringing down Dark Angel Commander Azrael), but there was also Epic, with models so small that you could field entire Space Marine companies on a budget, and imaginations were coming to life in the western United States, where a company was granted a license from Games Workshop to dream bigger than anyone else ever had. More on what these developments meant to the Tyranids on Friday.
Ah second edition, not my favourite 40K gaming experience, thats for sure. While I like the look of the creepy, jellyfish like Zoanthropes that have been around for the last decade or so, I still love that goofy, Mekon-like, ragingly angry looking original Zoanthrope: pure pulp sci-fi. Those gargoyles and hormagaunts looked cool, but they really were terrible gaming pieces. I dont know if I ever saw a fully intact unit on the table. Gravity always took them down a few pegs. I know that I am going to sound like the classic comic store know-it-all here (even though its not my intention to be a d.k, honestly), but in the interests of accuracy here I go anyway (PUSHES GLASSES UP BRIDGE OF NOSE THEATRICALLY). The plastic 'stealers shown above were the same sculpts as Space Hulk 2nd ed and are indeed 2nd ed.
They differ from the earlier plastic 'stealers (the SH 1st ed sculpts) because the raised arms available alternate from right to left and every second 'stealer is bending one of its feet back at the ankle. The earlier plastic 'stealers were all identical I think (if memory serves.) and they definitely came out in the Rogue Trader era, 1989 I think. The (pretty rubbish looking) plastic Hybrids (either '89 or '90) predate Tyranid Attack by a few years as they were included along with the plastic Terminator Librarians in the Space Hulk expansion named 'Genestealer'. Tyranid Attack reused the same card components as Advanced Space Crusade, including the 'Dermal Sphincter'. In ASC the Dermal Sphincter was used to get Marine reinforcements onto the hive ship.
Essentially they crawled up the ships bum. The least welcome reinforcements ever, smelling like alien arse. We got a few laughs out of that back in the day:D I am really enjoying these posts, keep it up!
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If you are already a member then feel free to. I thought with the upcoming Tyranid releases it would be good to have a look back to where they began back in 1995. This will be done to the style of reviews we see from H.B.M.C. And KidKyoto, with the drawback that I didn't start playing W40k until 4th Edition so a lot of rules don't make sense to me. But we won't let such details stop us!
On with the review!.NOTE TO MODS. This has scanned pages from the old Nid codex. I don't want to invoke a C&D on Dakka, so if you have concerns just send me a PM and I'll delete them Disclaimer: Copyright Games Workshop all terms and images are property of Games Workshop.
Games Workshop reserves the right to smite fansites who reproduce, mimic or refer to any intellectual property it owns. Codex: Tyranids: 2nd Edition Written in 1995 by Andy Chambers 88 Pages More Grimbright than Grimdark. Taste the rainbow. Notice the great old-school Hive Tyrant and the awful thing beside it on the left.
That was what Carnifexes used to be. I call it the cuddlefex. FLUFF The fluff section contains what we are used to, Hive Fleet Behemoth, the Battle for Macragge, Kraken, Kryptman's cunning plan and so forth. However this codex also covers genestealer cults.
For those of us who weren't around genestealer cults were human organisations that had been infiltrated and corrupted by genestealers, creating half human genestealer hybrids that destabilised worlds in preperation for Tyranid invasion. There is a great piece of fluff about a genestealer cult that masqueraded as a religious sect tolerated by the Eccliesiarchy who gain popular support and incite civil war against the Imperial Government.
Just when defeat seems certain Ultramarine Terminators teleport into the headquarters of the cult, lay waste to swarms of genestealers and genestealer hybrids and then knocking off the patriarch (Big 'ole Genestealer with a huge head who is behind everything). Genestealer cults also get an army list, but more on that later. ARMORY Each bio-weapon is described in detail, with fluff stats and rules. The weapons have interesting and complicated effects, for example the spinefist fires a flamer template (there are 3 flame templates) but still rolls to hit. A flamespurt uses a flamer template and automatically hits but any models hit but not slain by it are pushed to the edges of the template. TYRANID FORCES Very much like the forces sections we have today- for every unit in the codex there is a a fluffy unit description, a piece of artwork and special rules. Most things have quite a lot of special rules, there is a lot of flavour.
Of particular note is the Carnifex entry. For 199 points you get one hell of a statline: WS6 BS4 S7 T8 W10 I6 A4 LD10, and a 3+ save on 2D6. Obviously T8 W10 and 3+ 2D6 save looks utterly obscene by modern standards, but this is from a more complicated time when weapons could deal several wounds in a single shot and had save modifiers.
Also, gargoyles if gargoyles did not run or charge they could move 20”. ARTWORK AND COLOUR SECTION Little insectoid flourishes come up everywhere, the guns drip with foul liquids and the bugs look pleasingly sharp and hostile. Very cool bio-titan-cannon thingy in the background and a warrior sporting the most horrific vagina of the 41st Millenium in the foreground. Ah, ye olde Hive Tyrant.
I do love that sinister grin. Ye olde cuddlefex, I utterly utterly loathe the sight of it. If you disapproved of the Toxathrope or whatever they called it take a good long look at this abomination. It's arms are so barren of detail. And the legs are just. I'm having trouble conveying how much I hate it. It's worse than Youtube comments.
The single redeeming feature is to compare it to the modern carnifex so we can appreciate how much better it is. In my humble opinion. Warriors: I don't hate these as much as I hate the cuddlefex. The old Gaunts are quite little.
Notice the mix of weapons in the squad. Today it is all about the options of the squad, there used to be more freedom to customise individual models. Interesting but I'd guess that this would slow the game down rolling for all the different weapons if you didn't have a plentiful variety of coloured dice. Thick claws aside, those genestealers haven't aged too badly. And who would of thought there was a biovore uglier than the current one? The flesh hooks on these Lictors are actually shooting weapons with an 18” range that drags models into combat and help it climb terrain.
WIN and AWESOME. MISSIONS AND EVENTS CARDS No pics because it isn't terribly interesting, although there is an event for a walker called a “what the.!” result. ARMY LISTS Yeah, that is lists plural.
Tyranids and Genestealer cults. There is no force of command chart, instead everything falls under one of three categories: Individuals, Broods and Support. At least one Individual ( HQ) must be taken, and no more than half of your points can be spent of individuals. No more than half of your points can be spent on support, and at least a quarter of your points must be spent on Broods.
Amusingly, the justification for this system is so that you can't just have an army made of Hive Tyrants and Carnifexes. The entries are: -Hive Tyrant -Zoanthropes -Lictors -Warriors -Genestealers -Termagaunts -hormogaunts -Gargoyles -Carnifexes -Rippers (0-1 choice, but can have unlimited of bases. Tarpit anyone?) -Spore Mines -Biovores (with 100” range) In a great example of the little things being important, the weapons in the Hive Tyrant entry are “Claws, jaws and a bad attitude”. That little extra flavor in the description would totally justify a 10 page YMDC discussion over the RAW of “bad attitude”. The Genestealer cult is like a small IG army with genestealers mixed in. It can have Chaos allies (there was evidently an allies system back in the day) It includes such awesomeness as the tunnelling Mole Mortar and the Thudd Gun.
Frustratingly there are no statlines or rules for these in the codex, they must come from an imperial book. Sadly this cool little list was squatted.
Entries: -Genestealer Patriarch -Genestealer Magus -Cult Icon bearer -Genestealers -Genestealers hybrids -Brood Brothers -Brood Brother heavy weapons -Rapid Laser Destroyers -Tarantulas -Mole Mortars -Thudd Guns TACTICS There is a two page text wall on tactics, and it actually looks respectable. It contains useful advice like not taking a one-trick army because when your opponents figure it out they will just beat you routinely. Surprisingly worthy.
So there you have it! As is Dakka tradition if you were not born when this was released (1995, so that should be all of us) mention it in your post.
Nice write up I remember when this came out and suddenly everyone in the store was playing tyranids (doubt that'll happen this time). Some of those statlines are obscene but, like you say, weapons could deal a heck of a lot of damage back then - a multi-melta gave a -5 save modifier and caused 2d12 wounds iirc. The only downside to the codex was a small thing called blind grenades which could be taken by almost any infantry for about 1pt and effectively negated all the HtH in a tyranid army. I can recall a guardian with a PF (i kid you not) taking down a hivetyrant. My first army. I must admit I was drawn in by the original Screamer Killer, Hive Tyrant and Lictor models. They were incredibly bad-ass at the time.
While they look incredibly dated and undetailed now, those models were great back then (still love that Carnifex Model - the first model I bought, a 'cheap' $25 metal mini back in the day). The biomorphs you could give to Carnifexes and Hive Tyrants were simply sick.
I think you could have a 10W Carnifex that could regenerate all of its wounds every turn, and bioplasma was an incredibly strong ranged attack. And a Lictor that was actually useful and could dish out damage in combat. Ah for those days. I'm still pissed they got rid of the Genestealer Cult list. I still have a crap ton of the 2nd Ed. Metal models. Mayhaps I'll put some back together and paint them up for nostalgia's sake.
@Zad Fnark - To be fair, I think those particular plastic Warriors were vestiges from Rogue Trader. I have about 4-5 of the Metal versions that were out then that look considerably less goofy and look like very stripped down Hive Tyrants. This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2009/12/10 15:59:16. I still love the old Lictor model, wish I could get hold of one now I was never a huge fan of the other 'Nids of that era, but I still think the Lictor was one of the best looking models I'd seen. I didn't actually start playing until 3rd Edition ruleset, so a lot of this is new to me- I looked at the Zoanthrope's Warp Blast section and just laughed at some of the formulae for working out Armour Penetration. It's nice to see a Codex as old as this one, it really gives you an idea of how much the game has changed since- for better or worse.
Neith wrote:I didn't actually start playing until 3rd Edition ruleset, so a lot of this is new to me- I looked at the Zoanthrope's Warp Blast section and just laughed at some of the formulae for working out Armour Penetration. It's nice to see a Codex as old as this one, it really gives you an idea of how much the game has changed since- for better or worse. If you didn't play 2nd ed, you won't remember, but armor values were considerably higher than today's due to the different method of determining armor penetration. A lot of units in 2nd ed had armor values that don't today - bikes, jetbikes, eldar dreadnoughts (wraithlords), and wraithguard to name a few. Every 'vehicle' unit had it's own datafax with charts detailing exactly what happened when it was damaged. Still have all the old datafaxes and this codex, along with a few others.
Great stuff, TehK42! What harm can it do to find out? It's a question that left bruises down the centuries, even more than 'It can't hurt if I only take one' and 'It's all right if you only do it standing up.' Terry Pratchett, Making Money 'Can a magician kill a man by magic?'
Lord Wellington asked Strange. Strange frowned. He seemed to dislike the question.
'I suppose a magician might,' he admitted, 'but a gentleman never could.' Susanna Clarke Jonathan Strange & Mr.
Norrell DA:70+S+G+MBIPw40k94-DA/mWD160RT(m)DM+. Neith wrote:I didn't actually start playing until 3rd Edition ruleset, so a lot of this is new to me- I looked at the Zoanthrope's Warp Blast section and just laughed at some of the formulae for working out Armour Penetration. It's nice to see a Codex as old as this one, it really gives you an idea of how much the game has changed since- for better or worse. If you didn't play 2nd ed, you won't remember, but armor values were considerably higher than today's due to the different method of determining armor penetration. A lot of units in 2nd ed had armor values that don't today - bikes, jetbikes, eldar dreadnoughts (wraithlords), and wraithguard to name a few. Every 'vehicle' unit had it's own datafax with charts detailing exactly what happened when it was damaged.
Still have all the old datafaxes and this codex, along with a few others. Wow, almost sounds like a totally different game to what it is today. I struggle enough to remember what Armour Penetration rolls do sometimes; I can't imagine having to check what a shot did for every individual vehicle. Thanks for the insight, I never realised the game had changed so much in terms of rules.
I loved the fact that they had no armour save to speak of. If they were wounded, you just removed them. And yeah, back in the day a 6 or 8 point model was a big deal. You could bring heaps of them.
Gargoyles were one of my fav units. As mentioned above, their Flamer weapon, the Flamespurt, was so powerful that enemy models had to be moved to the edge of the template after being hit. If they couldn't move to the edge, they got hit again. Excellent for attacking units in thin high fortifications - they can either get hit twice, or jump off the building to get away. Their choice. Add to that that Gargoyles could 'Fly High' (remove from table, start of next turn they appear wherever you want, no scatter), and you'd have these amazing ambush unit. I never bought more than 12 due to the fact they were metal models on those horrific old hexagonal tiny flying bases.
But now they're in plastic. It's a great book, full of fluff. These Tyranids are among my favourites.
I like some of the current releases, but the stuff released for 3rd edition was gak. Tyranids appeared in Rogue Trader, but in a much cruder form, there were Screamer Killers (Carnifex) and Termagants, Zoats and Squig Swarms. Why are squigs working with the Tyranids??
Genestealer Cults were much better defined under Rogue Trader. Tyranids really took shape in 2nd edition which is more the form they still take now. The only major loss is the Genestealer Cult list which was an entirely seperate list in the book. It's sad to seem so much of the colour washed out of the game today, but minor lists receive little support after initial release and are dropped in short order, just look at Lost and Damned or 13th Company. The second edition books are probably all the best, quality publications unlike the 3rd edition when they dispensed with all the fluff to slim them down and save money.
Some seem almost collectible, I saw the Sisters of Battle for £15 on eBay recently (it was probably the last 2nd Edition published, or maybe that was Assassins). I've got one of these lictors and wouldn't give it up for anything, it's not been improved upon IMO. This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2009/12/10 21:53:12.
Great Look Back, now get ready for the C and D letter. I still have a few of these guys, great looking book at the time. The squigs were Tyranid, back in the day. They had a couple of different blisters of them. I still loved that Deathwing story about the last squad on thier original planet. These books are great if you are having a lack of information on any of your particular armies. Between the second edition and Rogue trader, there is still alot of idea material out there for you to get in on.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2009/12/10 21:52:41. I wasn't around for 2nd Ed., either, but let me just say I'm kind of glad that they have done away with different movement stats for each model and made it more universal.for one, it's much easier to remember; and I personally feel that in a game like this it helps to even the playing field a little bit. I mean, look at some of the difference in the models the OP posted, ranging from 6 to 20! Of course, I'm sure it worked 'back then' but I'm still glad to see a generic movement stat for every model. I preferred the seperate datafaxes for every vehicle for the most part, I suppose it would be hard going in a modern Apocalypse game. But it was a good idea to see the back of datafaxes for Bikes.
Bike squads of 5 vehicles each with datafaxes? Afte a few turns you'd end up with two perfectly good bikes, one that can only go half speed, one that has to test for steering every turn incase it veers out of contol and one Marine having to run to keep up. Oh dearie me, Ravenwing armies must have been hell.