The new Red Terror 40k rules are here, and his Swallow Whole maw turns one attack into auto-Devastating Wounds the moment he burrows up.
Tyranid players who’ve been around since the 3rd Edition Codex probably still remember the Red Terror as the nightmare bioform that swallowed Commissars whole on Devlan Primus. Until now, though, getting it on the table meant kitbashing a Ravener and giving it an oversized maw.
That’s finally changing thanks to GW’s latest rules reveal. The Red Terror now has an official datasheet, and he’s making his big return in the Kill Team: Terror on Devlan box before slithering into the wider 40k range.
So, if you play Tyranids, and especially if you’ve been running Subterranean Assault lists, this datasheet drops a character-seeking missile into your detachment for 130 points.
- Single model, 130 points: only five points more than a unit of Raveners, and he carries the VANGUARD INVADER keyword by default.
- Swallow Whole + Devastating Wounds + Precision combo: one melee attack that auto-triggers Devastating Wounds against your pick of the unit’s MVP.
- Heals off the kill, so chump-blocking him backfires: eating a sergeant restores wounds, which means the swap math goes the other way.
- Scything talons hit at Strength 7: chews through Plague Marines, Einhyr Hearthguard, and Gravis-armored Marines without funny business.
- BURROWER + Subterranean Assault re-roll Hits of 1: Deep Strike in, swallow your target, then burrow back underground for the next move.
The Red Terror Returns to 40k With His First Real Plastic Kit
The Red Terror’s been kicking around Tyranid lore since 3rd Edition, where he carved up an entire mining colony on Devlan Primus before a search-and-destroy team finally cornered him in the tunnels. Still, the model side of the conversation fell quiet after that, and conversions carried him through 8th, 9th, and 10th.
But now a new sculpt has arrived, and looks every bit the super-Ravener the source material always implied: bigger, meaner, and unmistakably the bioform that earned the name.
The first place to grab the model is inside Kill Team: Terror on Devlan against the new Spectre Squad, but you can get his 40k datasheet rules now before the box even drops.
The Red Terror Datasheet Eats Sergeants Whole and Heals Off the Kill
The new datasheet will let the Red Terror eat models that matter and recover wounds from that kill. It’s the gimmick we saw before, but now it has refreshed rules with the updated gaping maw and the Swallow Whole combo, which gives you a single melee attack that redefines any combat.
- Swallow Whole + Devastating Wounds + Precision: A single super-powerful attack that auto-triggers Devastating Wounds and lets you pluck enemy characters right off the table.
- Self-heal off the kill: The flavor text frames it as the Red Terror digesting the biomass for a couple of wounds back, so the character who tried to swing a power fist ends up paying for their mistake twice.
- Scything talons at Strength 7: the catch-all infantry profile chews through Plague Marines, Einhyr Hearthguard, and Gravis-armored Space Marines without much fuss.
Getting that maw into base contact is the other half of the job, and this is where the Subterranean Assault detachment comes in. He picks up the same BURROWER keyword as a unit of Raveners, and the detachment rule turns that keyword into a re-roll on Hit rolls of 1, so the one attack with its maw is the one attack you trust to land.
- Deep Strike + burrow-back redeploy: drop him in for the Swallow Whole pop, then send him back underground to redeploy where the next priority target is sitting.
- BURROWER inside Subterranean Assault: the re-roll Hits of 1 from the detachment essentially insures the Precision attack, since single-attack profiles live and die on whether the hit lands.
- VANGUARD INVADER for Vanguard Onslaught: he can also slot next to the Deathleaper for a stealthier game plan if you’d rather hunt characters from the shadows than from underneath them.
At 130 points (in 10th Edition), he sits a little more expensive than a unit of Raveners, which is the tradeoff because it seems like GW priced him as a Subterranean Assault upgrade rather than a standalone monster.
But it’s still easy to play with the model, though, just drop him into the detachment, point him at the unit carrying the warlord or a support character, and suddenly, the game tilts the way you want.
Final Thoughts on the New Red Terror 40k Rules
Subterranean Assault finally has a real character-killer anchoring the detachment, rather than relying on Trygons and Mawlocs to do the assassination work as a side effect of being big and angry.
Sure, single-attack precision tools are usually fragile experiments, but locking the math down with a re-roll keyword and a self-heal turns this into a pick that pays for itself the first time the opponent commits a unit they can’t afford to lose.
He’s coming first inside the Kill Team box in May 2026, before the wider 40k rollout, which usually takes a few weeks to about a month.
🔗 Related Reads:
- 40k Kill Team Terror on Devlan Brings the Red Terror & Spectre Squad
- GW Reveals Kill Team Terror on Devlan & Nemesis Operatives Pre-Orders
- All The New Tyranids & Rumors For 10th Edition Warhammer 40k
- 40k Factions Explained: Tyranids Army Playstyles Guide
- Tyranids Warhammer 40k Hive Fleet Paint Schemes
