CODEX ::: TYRANIDS 0 Codex: Tyranids An Unofficial Alternative Codex for Warhammer 40,000 By Azathoth DCLXVI This game supplement is completely unofficial and in no way endorsed by Games Workshop Limited. Adeptus Astartes, Battlefleet Gothic, Black Flame, Black Library, the Black Library logo, BL Publishing, Blood Angels, Bloodquest, Blood Bowl, the Blood Bowl logo, The Blood Bowl Spike Device, Cadian, Catachan, the Chaos device, Cityfight, the Chaos logo, Citadel, Citadel Device, City of the Damned, Codex, Daemonhunters, Dark Angels, Dark Eldar, Dark Future, the Double-Headed/Imperial Eagle device, 'Eavy Metal, Eldar, Eldar symbol devices, Epic, Eye of Terror, Fanatic, the Fanatic logo, the Fanatic II logo, Fire Warrior, Forge World, Games Workshop, Games Workshop logo, Genestealer, Golden Demon, Gorkamorka, Great Unclean One, the Hammer of Sigmar logo, Horned Rat logo, Inferno, Inquisitor, the Inquisitor logo, the Inquisitor device, Inquisitor:Conspiracies, Keeper of Secrets, Khemri, Khorne, Kroot, Lord of Change, Marauder, Mordheim, the Mordheim logo, Necromunda, Necromunda stencil logo, Necromunda Plate logo, Necron, Nurgle, Ork, Ork skull devices, Sisters of Battle, Skaven, the Skaven symbol devices, Slaanesh, Space Hulk, Space Marine, Space Marine chapters, Space Marine chapter logos, Talisman, Tau, the Tau caste designations, Tomb Kings, Trio of Warriors, Twin Tailed Comet Logo, Tyranid, Tyrannid, Tzeentch, Ultramarines, Warhammer, Warhammer Historical, Warhammer Online, Warhammer 40k Device, Warhammer World logo, Warmaster, White Dwarf, the White Dwarf logo, and all associated marks, names, races, race insignia, characters, vehicles, locations illustrations and images from the Blood Bowl game, the Warhammer world, the Talisaman world, and the Warhammer 40,000 universe are either ®, TM and/or © Copyright Games Workshop Ltd 2000-2012, variably registered in the UK and other countries around the world. All Rights Reserved Used without permission. No challenge to their status intended. All Rights Reserved to their respective owners. All art, illustrations and concepts used without permission. 1 -Table of Contents-______________________________________________________________________ The Fall of Malvolion ……… 4 TROOPS ……… 32 Tyranid Warrior Brood ……… 32 Tyranid Special Rules ……… 6 Genestealer Brood ……… 33 Gaunt Brood ……… 34 Tyranid Psychic Powers ……… 8 Hormagaunt Brood ……… 35 Ripper Swarm ……… 35 Biomorphs ……… 10 General Biomorphs ……… 10 DEDICATED TRANSPORTS ………36 Armor Biomorphs ……… 11 Mycetic Spore ……… 36 Ranged Biomorphs ……… 12 Close Combat Biomorphs ……… 13 FAST ATTACK ……… 37 Tyranid Shrike Brood ……… 37 Tyranid Army List ……… 14 Winged Ripper Swarm ……… 37 Ravener Brood ……… 38 HQ ……… 14 Gargoyle Brood ……… 38 Hive Tyrant ……… 14 Harpy ……… 39 The Dagon Overlord ……… 16 Meiotic Spore Sacks ……… 40 The Swarmlord ……… 17 Spore Mine Cluster ……… 41 Tyranid Guard Brood ……… 18 Genestealer Patriarch ……… 19 HEAVY SUPPORT ……… 42 Alpha Warrior Brood ……… 20 Carnifex Brood ……… 42 Malanthrope Brood ……… 22 Old One Eye ……… 43 The Parasite of Mortrex ……… 23 Trygon ……… 44 Mawloc ……… 46 ELITES ……… 24 Biovore ……… 47 Lictor Brood ……… 24 Tyrannofex ……… 48 Deathleaper ……… 25 Zoanthrope Brood ……… 26 The Doom of Malan’tai ……… 27 FORTIFICATIONS ……… 49 Venomthrope Brood ……… 28 Tyranid Flora Infestation ……… 49 Tervigon ……… 29 Pyrovore Brood ……… 30 2 ______________________________________________________________________ -Table of Contents- Reference ……… 50 Notable Tyranid Swarms ……… 58 Planetary Assault Swarm ……… 58 Sample Tyranid Builds ……… 52 The Psychic Choir ……… 59 Hive Tyranid Builds ……… 52 Vanguard Swarm ……… 60 Alpha Warrior Brood Builds ……… 53 The Unending Tides of Dagon ……… 61 Warrior Builds ……… 54 Mycetic Assault Swarm ……… 62 Shrike Builds ……… 55 Carnifex Builds ……… 56 Tyrannofex Builds ……… 57 3 THE FALL OF MALVOLION By Dan Abnett By his wrist-chronometer, it was not yet noon, but They'd reached the pumping station early that the air was warm and clammy. Trooper Karl morning. A cluster of machine-barns and modular Grauss of the Mordian IronGuard 15th let his habitats, it stood at a confluence of irrigation lasrifle swing loose on its harness strap, wiped the channels which watered the entire delta area and perspiration from his eyes, and pushed the fed over a dozen farm steads. The suns were low angular nose of the wrench-bar into the rusty and cool. There had been no sign of life, not even door lock. the ever-present water birds that Grauss had seen everywhere in the marshes. He paused and glanced around at Major Hecht. The officer was tensed, his lasrifle pulled up tight And once they had got inside, with no answers to with the butt in his armpit, ready to fire. Beads of their voice or vox calls, it had been so damned hot sweat dotted his face too, and it wasn't just the and humid, like someone had set the environment heat. controls to ''tropical''. 'What are you waiting for?' he hissed. The latch popped and Grauss kicked the door inwards, swinging aside so that the major could Grauss shrugged. He didn't know, exactly. He slide in, gun raised and aimed. Before them lay didn't know anything except what Hecht had told some kind of hydroponics workshop, with a high, him and the others of Zwie Company that cera-glass roof and metal support pillars rusting in morning: get out to that pumping station in the the steamy air. Samples of crops and yield-plants delta and find out why they hadn't checked in for stood in labeled pots and trays and bins all three days. Grauss jiggled the wrench-bar until the around. The walkways between the bins were tool locked against the latch mechanism, and then metal grille. Sappy moisture dripped from the began to wind the ratchet so that the door release transparent panes above. slowly began to turn manually. The Mordians fanned out into the hothouse, Down the low hallway behind him, the major and dripping with sweat in their temperate zone-issue six other men from Zwie hugged the walls and fatigues and tunics. braced lasguns. This was the job at its worst, thought Grauss as he cranked the tool. Sneaking 'What's this?' called Trooper Parnell. Grauss into a mystery and opening doors blind when you moved over to him, and the major joined them had no idea what in the name of the God-Emperor too. Parnell gestured with disgust at a rack of lay on the other side. culture-trays set under some daylight lamps. Nutrient feeder sprays intermittently misted what But, dammit, they were Iron Guard! More was in the trays with chemical washes. disciplined and determined Imperial soldiers you couldn't find. 4 Major Hecht cursed. The things in the trays looked Looking aside from the corpse in distaste, Grauss like rotting, globular fungi: puffy, swollen, the size saw that the tractor was hitched to a big flatbed of human heads. They pulsed irregularly. None of cargo truck, with something large and strange the Mordians had any horticultural training and chain-lashed to it. Caked in the mud of the delta, it none had been on Malvolion long enough to get a looked for all the world like some kind of ship: feel for the local flora, but they all knew this stuff those bulbous projections at the rear could only just wasn't right. be propulsion units. But… it was small, not large enough for anything more than a single human, 'Burn it. Get a flamer in here and burn it all.' Hecht and it made him sick to look at it. It wasn't made looked away from the obscene crop. of metal. It wasn't technology as he understood it. Grauss was about to obey the command when It looked… organic. Fleshy, pod-like, akin to the they heard the las-fire. Close by, two or three things he had seen growing in the hothouse but buildings away. Six short, frantic bursts, then a many, many times larger. Was this something the longer report made by several guns on auto, firing station crew had found out there in the delta and together. Zwie Company's vox-intercoms hauled back for study? spluttered out an overlapping, unintelligible series of ear-splitting cries and yells. There was a cry and a burst of las-fire behind him. Grauss spun around, in time to see Trooper The platoon turned and ran towards the sounds, Parnell's body sailing across the chamber in a Hecht in the lead. Platoon Two, scouting to the welter of blood and torn flesh. Lasguns roared and left of them, was in trouble. Hecht's men burst flashed. Something was moving through the into the chamber that had been Two's last gloom with terrifying rapidity. Something with recorded position. It was a hangar barn, with claws. Four sets of claws. several big-wheeled agricultural vehicles parked in it. The air was full of smoke from discharged It sliced through Major Hecht at the waist, and his weapons. body fell in two, still firing. There were two bodies on the floor, both men It was right on Grauss now. He howled and started from Two, both looking like they'd been to fire. dismembered by industrial crop-reapers. Platoon One crept forward through the gloom, twitching for targets. Grauss found the headless corpse of Genestealer … another man from Two leaning against the wheel- arch of one of the agri-tractors. 5 -Tyranid Special Rules-________________________________________________________________________________ Synapse Creature Synapse Creatures and Tyranid units that have a model within 12” of a Synapse Creature are said to be within synapse range. A unit that is within synapse range is not subject to the Instinctive Behavior rule (see below) and gains the Fearless special rule as detailed in the Warhammer 40,000 rulebook. Additionally, Tyranid units within synapse range may use the synapse creature’s Leadership value in place of their own for all Leadership tests they are called upon to make. If a unit that is falling back is within synapse range before it moves, it automatically rallies, regardless of any normal restrictions.