40K: Tyranids Take a Turn
The Tyranid codex will be coming out in the next few months. Let’s talk bugs.
Let’s talk Tyranids. We know their codex is releasing sooner, rather than later, which is a shame as it means we probably won’t see a ton of new stuff for them. Deathguard, Primaris, and spinoff games are the big releases of the year. But let’s take a moment and consider the ‘nid.
The Tyranids are an interesting faction. Big space bugs who eat everything on a world to make more of themselves–they are an all consuming threat that represents the idea of oblivion. In a fantasy novel, Tyranids would be the threat that the antagonist and protagonist both have to deal with. Where the villain might want to rule the world, kill a king, or some other temporal thing, they are the darkness that would threaten to destroy it all.
More a force of nature than an actual character, Tyranids are alien. They hail from outside the galaxy and are apart from its petty concerns. They are the ultimate end of the 40K galaxy–massive extra galactic threats that we’ve only seen a vanguard of, whose aim is wiping out all life in the galaxy.
Oops, sorry, hang on. Whose only aim is wiping out all life in the galaxy.
Let’s try that one more time: whose only aim is wiping out all life in the galaxy.
There we go. But all that was to illustrate–it’s an enduring archetype. The Tyranids join a storied tradition of the unknown as annihilation. And to fight them is to strive for existence, just like in that one speech from the end of Independence Day.
Beyond just their representation of death/annihilation, they are all about adaptation. One of their great strengths is to take on the traits of the people that fight them. So far, the only way to stop them is Exterminatus, but even this is costly. But that’s just one perspective on these big bugs from space.
What draws you to the Tyranids? How do you see them fit into the larger story?
