Poisoned attacks

[Just_Me]

Now I just recently got my Tyranid codex, and I was thumbing through it when I noticed that Carnifexes can take Toxin Sacs, which confer the "poisoned (4+)" rule on their CC attacks. Now perhaps I am being dense here, but Carnifexes have Str 9, which means that against just about everything in the game, they will wound on 2+, so wouldn't taking toxin sacs be paying to nerf the 'fex?

If the poisoned rule said that they wound on X+ unless the comparison of strength and toughness would be better, then I could (maybe) see taking them (particularly with the additional component of poisoned allowing you to re-roll failed wounds if your Str is greater than the target's toughness). But otherwise how on earth is this a viable option?

Also, if one happened to have a 'fex with toxin sacs already, do you think WYSIWYG would demand that it be given the upgrade?

[Nabterayl]

It's a downgrade unless you're fighting T8 and up, in which case it's an upgrade. Not one you'd want to take very often, admittedly, but not useless in 100% of cases.

[kdetro]

If the to wound role is better than the poisoned attack the better one applies. Also under the rule for poisoned attacks states that is the toughness is equal or less you get to re-roll failed rolls to wound.

[Nabterayl]

If the to wound role is better than the poisoned attack the better one applies.

While a perfectly sensible way to play, that's not actually true. Do you have a rules quote to back that up?

Also under the rule for poisoned attacks states that is the toughness is equal or less you get to re-roll failed rolls to wound.

That is true, which is why a carnifex with toxin sacs has better odds of wounding a T8 or T9 model than a carnifex without (and of course against T10 models, wounding on a 4+ because of poison is better than wounding on a 5+ because of Strength-Toughness comparisons).

[Lerra]

Are there any 40k models with a toughness higher than 8? I think the highest in non-apocalypse 40k is T8 (the Necron C'tan).

Hierophants are T9 I think, and probably some other Apoc models as well.

Toxin Sacs on a Carnifex is probably one of the more useless upgrades in the game, just ahead of all the wargear that doesn't function at all anymore

[Nabterayl]

While on the one hand I agree with you, Lerra, on the other hand I think it's nice that they've included upgrades in the codex that can allow carnifexes to take on the biggest, nastiest stuff in the game.