Tiny Tyranids - 2nd Edition Epic 40k

  My favourite ever edition of anything was 2nd edition Epic. I played it the most and loved the grand feel of it. The game was simple enough to understand quickly and you had tons of miniatures. On top of the base game there was Armies of the Imperium, Renegades and Ork & Squat Warlords then at the end there was this one which I missed out on.

    It came out in 1995 just as I was discovering, or trying to discover, other distractions. However with the magic of ebay I got myself one 19 years later.

    Hive war is different to all the other expansions in the way the army is created. No longer do you need a company card to get 5 detachment cards. Here you link all the cards together through the synapse and theoretically you could have a never ending swarm but it would be impractical and vulnerable. I will explain how the swarm works in a later post.

    Each card is a different colour to signify the units behaviour when out of synapse. Blue = rampage, green = hunt and red = nest.

    All Swarms start with a Dominatrix. You can place cards in any direction there is an outward arrow. A brief description can be found here. It is the centre of the swarm and a swarm cannot exist without one. As a white card it does not have an Instinctive behaviour and is a command vehicle. so always charges and has first fire orders.It also brings into the game wounds. In 2nd edition, generally, if something failed its save it died but without void shields it needs protection so it can withstand 4 hits and can even regenerate.

    Here is my Dominatrix, don't tell my wife, the model is well detailed and some nice touches. The six appendages give it that Tyranid vibe and alien feel. The tiny head show that this in not where the brains of the beast are.

   For the the brains behind the swarm we have this guy hiding up top. He is never really explained in the literature of the Hive war manual all we get is this: "This rider is a form of Tyranid as far advanced beyond ordinary Tyranid Warriors as Tyranid warriors are beyond the genetically constructed sphincter portals of the bio-ships."

   Then we have the rather large gun which shows that the brood mother is not just a target.

   From her all other Tyranids spring. Next time I will go over the Swarm mechanic and how it effects the units themselves.
 Oh and here is a scale shot with a confused Ork Boy.