Tasoth wrote:I'd start with rippers Coalition and then move to gaunt troops.
True, I figured gaunts as the smallest semi-sentient unit (oneof them having a Hive Node) that could operateindependantly. Now a capture organism for Critical locations (Digestion Pool, that generates nutrients/requisition points), that had rippers for its defense might seem rather 'buggy' to me. Even more fun, is you click on the Digestion Pool, and it sends its rippers out to help your troops (aka building them). Higher level Digestion Pools can send more Rippers out. Make Rippers ignore terrain like current turrets.
Utsanomiko, if we go with buildings straight producing the necessary troops, the Tyranids wouldn't be any different than other armies. But by turning the Tyranids into an ecosystem, IMHO it would add flavor. Each unit, when you click the metamorphosis icon, turns it into the next version, after the metamorphosis is complete. It would require a little work, to allow the Tyranids to diversify based on the original Gaunt choices, but the army would become what you want, not what the designers chose for you. Also, I'd rather not start the Tyranids off with Genestealers, those would be a specilized unit, from a special building.
Also, for relying on large critters, early in the game, you are mainly facing Guardsmen, Scouts, Guardians, Cultists, and Boyz, so lrge units aren't needed immediately. When heavier units start coming out, you are getting access to Gaunt upgrades, and Hive Nodes (to prevent panicking). Your troops get to upgrade themselves out in the field, instead of having to rely upon reinforcements from your base.
The next step is using the light and heavy cover to hide your troops in. Light terrain can hide troop level units, heavy terrain can hide vehicle level troops. Commanders still detect stealthed units as normal. Nothing like sending your troops into heavy cover to attack the bugs, only to find Hive Tyrant(s) armed with CC weaponry waiting there.
To avoid crashing, you'd have to really reduce the polys per gaunt, mainly animating their backs, so a swarm would look like a writhing mass, but a small 'squad' would look very blocky. Fancier critters would get more polys, of course.
I'd like to see the Tyranids being able to outnumber the Guardsmen, but the small guys are so weak that the Guard lasgun is effective. Larger units would be metamorphed from the smaller guys, so you could have leaders being generated for your field units, instead of having to deploy the guys from your base. Other races have the ability to deploy troops anywhere on the battlefield (except Orks), Tyranids would get a similar ability.
