Tyranids, round 6: Jordan's settings and the movement rules (2026-10-02)

T-557 (Jordan, 2 Oct, via the supervisor). Made by the round-5 command with --kinds --own-kinds --every --round6 <this file> (tools/tiertest.js). Base: round 5's end state, every army scored with its own abilities, the engine kinds, its army rules and its best detachment (T-552). Oath of Moment counts at full share and army rules count as on, as Jordan confirmed. A report: nothing here changes a published score or page.

Jordan's settings (2 Oct), as run here:

• A CP is worth 0 for now. Abilities that give or save Command Points count nothing in the letters. T-558 will price a CP from the stratagems each unit can actually use.
• Two constants stay as they are:
  • Battle-shock resilience: 10% of a median unit's points (V5C.SHOCK).
  • Enemy debuffs: half face value (V5C.NEAR).
  • Both are marked in design/scoring.md as tunable, to revisit if they count too much or too little.
• The detachments' movement rules are read in full, through the same delivery closed forms as everything else, so a rule's reach counts for three jobs:
  • Hammer: turns in reach. Tunnels bring an arrival from Reserves to 7" away, a Deep Strike grant adds that way in, a surge adds to Move, and Vanguard Onslaught allows a charge after an Advance.
  • Anvil: a new position factor.
  • Runner: reach, now taken from a position track instead of Utility's fixed reach.
• The position track follows each way in (walking with Scouts and Infiltrators, Deep Strike, Strategic Reserves, tunnels) round by round:
  • Anvil is scaled between 0.5 and 1 by the share of the game the unit holds the midfield objective (15" out) and the one in the enemy's half (21").
  • Runner's reach is the same share over those two and the enemy's deployment zone (27"), as a percentile over every unit.
• The other three move keys (Crusher Stampede's +2 OC, Feed the Swarm's regeneration and the Norns' re-pick) are read in the same pass. Feed the Swarm goes through the heal closed form on the squad a Harvester helps most, lent like the Tervigon's heal. It no longer gets the flat whole-game credit of the coverage what-if.
• Unchanged: Oath of Moment at full share, army rules counted as on, and the highest Toughness in a mixed unit (T-546's rule; in the tier test it moves no Tyranid).

Where it lands.

• Against Auspex: ρ 0.37 → 0.34. The same letter: 13 → 12 of 44. Within one letter: 23 → 26.
• Tyranid list share: 0.28 → 0.27.
• Every unit's list share: 0.155 → 0.169, the best this test has had with every army scored.
• The drop isn't the movement reading as such. Taking the settings in turn:
  1. A CP at 0 costs 0.02, because the Hive Tyrant and the Swarmlord lose their CP Banner.
  2. The position track alone lifts ρ to 0.41 and Tyranid list share to 0.36.
  3. Then the movement keys, one at a time, on top of the position track:
     • Tunnels: leave ρ at 0.40 and lift list share to 0.36.
     • Surge: a point for the gaunts.
     • Advance-and-charge and the Deep Strike grant: move nothing. The units they name already have Deep Strike or pick another detachment.
     • Crusher Stampede's +2 OC: costs the most (ρ 0.35, list share 0.30). It lifts every monster's Anvil by 13 to 19 points.
     • Feed the Swarm: makes Pyrovores and Ripper Swarms B Banners (Auspex: A and B).
• Read the old way, in Hammer only with no position, the same rules give 0.27, the 0.28 of the coverage what-if.

Verdict on the movement reading.

• Keep it, through position. Fed through the delivery closed forms into all three jobs, the movement rules themselves (tunnels, surge, a Deep Strike grant, advance-and-charge) hold or improve agreement, and the position track is the biggest single gain of the round.
• The two rules that cost agreement aren't movement; they're worths to recheck:
  • Crusher Stampede's OC. The +2 OC at Starting Strength counts at 0.9 of the game. That's likely too high for a monster that loses Starting Strength the first time a model in its unit dies, and it's every big monster's Anvil.
  • Feed the Swarm. The heal belongs to the healed squad, but it's lent in full to a 30- or 40-point Harvester. Per point, that makes the cheapest Harvester the army's best Banner.
• Both are constants for Jordan's read; nothing in the movement reading itself needs one.

The round-5 column is T-552's end state, run again on today's rankings.json. T-546 (a mixed unit's highest Toughness) and T-556 (heals) moved the live Defense the pool is built on. The Tyranid figures don't change. Every unit's list share goes from 0.156 to 0.155, and Space Marines from −0.05 to −0.06.

The yardsticks, round 5 against round 6

Each setting, alone and cumulative

Each row is round 5's end state with the setting switched on alone, then every setting so far. Yardsticks as in round 5: ρ with Auspex's order (44 graded units), the same letter and within one letter of Auspex's, ρ with Tyranid list share (52 units, 23 lists); the Space Marine and Ork panels and every unit's list share as the check.

Alone:

Cumulative:

The movement rules key by key

Each on top of settings 1 to 3 (so a rule's reach feeds Hammer's turns in reach, Anvil's position and Runner's reach), alone. "Letters" counts Tyranid letters that move against settings 1 to 3.

The Tyranid table, round 6

Every Tyranid unit, by round 6's composite. Letters are global (the quota over every unit of every army); the four job percentiles are round 6's; the detachment is the one the Context rule picks. Auspex's letter where it grades the unit.

The biggest movers and why

Composite change from round 5 to round 6, with each setting that moved it by half a point or more (cumulative order), the job percentiles it moved by 3 or more, and for the movement rules the key that moves it alone (on top of settings 1 to 3). Position: the share of the midfield and enemy-half objective rounds the unit holds by its best way in, and its reach over those two and the enemy's deployment zone.

Up:

Down:

What the movement rules move

Settings 1 to 3 → all four: 13 Tyranid letters move; every unit whose composite moves by half a point or more, with the job percentiles before → after and the key that moves it alone.

Every army, round 5 → round 6

146 of 1161 letters move, 79 up and 67 down (armies with no letter moving left out). Only the Tyranid coverage writes movement rules under move, so outside the Tyranids the moves are the CP, Toughness and position settings, and the quotas shifting under them.