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being my first post on dakka dakka, i wanted to share something that me and my buddy Trance_Phoenix (a Nid player) had recently come up with.

it all started when i mentioned to my buddy that i was thinking about making a custom character for our in house games, being a Tau player i have always only had crisis suits HQ's and wanted something different. I could have gone with an Ethereal but..... seriously those guys are useless. So i after a quick rant of all the ideas that popped into my head in rapid succession i stopped on the idea of a commander whos main ability was drone usage. This is where Phoenix came in. After giving him the idea he ran with it and a short few hours later he already had written enough backstory and rules for it to be in the next codex.

Here is what he came up with...

Shas’O’Siepher…………………………….. 90pts
BS WS S T W I L SV
5 3 3 3 1 3 10 3+

Unit Type: Jump Infantry (Jet Pack)
Special rules: Infiltrate, Tactical deployment, Containment of the warp, Tactical redeployment, Overwatch, Positioning
Wargear: Pulse pistol, Shield Generator
Unit composition
2 shield drones
2 gun drones


Wargear must include between 2-5 experimental drones
Battlefield report drone………..15pts per model
The battlefield report drone starts with any one of the following for free

- Advanced terrain analysis
- Detection grid
- Advanced guidance system

They may take any one system.
- Advanced terrain analysis……. 10 pts
- Detection grid …………………….. 10 pts
- Advanced guidance system…. 10 pts
- Marker light…………………………. 20 pts

Defense node drone …………….. 20 pts
-Pulsefire Gatling gun

Electro-static pulse emitter …………. 20 pts

Any drone may be equipped with a tactical detonation unit for 5pts



Experimental drones.
Experimental drones may not move unless within the same unit as Shas’O’Siepher. If an Experimental drone is deployed outside of unit coherency of Shas’O’Siepher it is treated as a separate unit in all accounts. All experimental drones are removed from the board, but not as casualties, when Shas’O’Siepher is removed from the board.

Electro-static pulse emitter
Armed with a small yet incredibly powerful energy core the Electro static pulse emitter creates a dome of unstable energies and radiation dangerous to all machines or biological forms, any unit moving into 12” or starting their movement phase within 12” of an Electro-static pulse emitter must treat the movement as dangerous and difficult including tanks regardless of the units upgrades.
In addition, any enemy units within 12” of the Electro-static pulse emitter must reroll any successful invulnerable saves made.

Unstable: Whenever the electro static pulse emitter is removed from the board as a casualty place a large blast template were is was with the following profile.

Str 6 Ap 2 type: Large blast

Defense node drone
The node drones offers surprising firepower and quick deployment into one small package, great for bolstering a defence or cover your flank from enemy troops. With an accurate targeting array and rapid fire capabilities it was designed to slow enemy movement while troops could be repositioned.

Pulsefire Gatling gun
The puslefire gatling gun may fire during any players movement phase, or assault phase. If an enemy unit ends or begins movement within 12” of a drone with the pulsefire Gatling gun you may fire with the following profile

Heavy X twin linked Str 4 Ap – type:pinning
X – Role 2d6 keeping one to determine how many shots the pulsfire Gatling has this turn. If a result of doubles is roled you may get the shots but the unit is immediately removed from the game after.

Battlefield report drone
In great need of intelligence gathering of the battlefield without the risk of casualties came the first blueprints of the battlefield report drone, the drone contains many sophisticated sensory equipment to provide accurate information on enemy movements within its proximity and relay it to the rest of the army to better co-ordinate their attack to destroy the enemies defensive tactics.

Advanced terrain analysis: The drone analyses the data of any terrain or generated force field and target its weakness and compare it to the weapons in the tau army allowing the best strategy to defeat the defense. Be in were a wall is thinnest or the frequency of a flickering force field the drone will catch it and let the tau army know where and when to shoot.

Any enemy unit within 12” of a drone with advanced terrain analysis cannot take cover saves of any form.

Detection grid: The battlefield report drone has detailed information about its surrounding terrain and is aware of any changes in temperature, movement, and even pressure.

If you fire on a unit within 12” of a drone with detection grid you do not have to role for night fighting for any reason.
Advanced guidance system: The drones unique terrain detailing allows for unites to easily find safe passage and can even guide entry from orbit

Any of the players units May deep strike within 6” of a drone with advanced guidance without rolling for deep strike. Furthermore any vehicle owned by the player that is within 12” of a drone with advanced guidance systems is counted as having sensor spines.

tactical detonation unit: A TDU of tactical detonation unit is used when the drones efficiency has been compromised, if and when an enemy locates and attempts to destroy or capture a drone an alert is sent and the commander detonates the device.

When a unit assaults any drone equipped with a TDU after consolidation make an initiative test for the drone commander if successful remove the drone and replace it with a small blast template with the following profile, no scatter role is done.

Str 5 AP - type: small blast, Pinning

Shas’O’Siepher
Shas’O’Siepher starting his rise to tactician in the Tau army as a pathfinder, dedicated to gather information and give support were needed in the battle. During his time on one of the outer Tau planets Siepher was called to action against the forces of the emporium of man, betrayed by their supposed alliance they assailed onto the small mining planet for resources. Siepher led the defence thou non was ordered, outnumbered and outgunned he attempted a suicide hold as he sent a distress to nearby fleets of the invasion he knew if he let the planet be taken it would be lost to them. Using mining drones he was able to set up a networked interface of the entire enemy camp recording all their movements and precise numbers. This posed a great problem for the enemy forces as Siepher would launch attack after attack on the weakest targets, destroying ammunition, transport, and communications he managed to cut off any attempt the made to spread out and take control of the planet.

Siepher held this tactic for 2 weeks crimpling enemy support lines and constantly pestering their lines. Until the emporium brought in their psychers, channelling the warp they devastated sought out and destroyed resistance. Though Siepher was one step ahead he was now on the defensive. For 2 more weeks they hunted him down until one of the Tau fleets arrived from the distress call, Siepher watched as the great Tau Manta came into orbit laying waste to the invaders force, he relayed all of his tactical data to them and the Manta spat death as suits rained down, tanks erupted and the enemy force annihilated.

Siepher was quickly promoted and given his own division of research one that even lead to the discovery of preventing the warp from being accessed. The information his enemy gave him while trying to hunt him will be their downfall if ever they are foolish enough to face his people again.

Special rules: Infiltrate, Tactical deployment, Containment of the warp, Tactical redeployment, Overwatch, Positioning

Tactical deployment: Drones added to his unit always start the game of in reserve regardless of the game type. Note that the drones and not Siepher start in reserve. When the drones become available they enter via deep strike without scatter within 6” of Shas’O’Siepher. The player may also choose a tactical deployment and have them deep strike within 24” of Shas’O’Siephier reducing the scatter by his BS.

Containment of the warp: As a brilliant tactician and scientist Shas’O’Siepher was the first to development ways of battling psychers. Using the information of his drones he can sometimes manipulate the energies around the psyche and block their abilities to tap into their power.

If an enemy psycher is anywhere within 12” of two or more experimental drones or any two drones within his unit he may attempt to cancel out their power. Both players role a D6 and add their leadership if Shas’O’Siepher has an equal or higher value the psychic ability has been canceled, this ability is applied after the psycher has rolled for perils in the warp.

Tactical redeployment: If Shas’O’Siepher comes within 6” of any experimental drone he may have it rejoin his unit OR remove it from the board and have it return the next turn via deep strike.

Overwatch: Shas’O’Siepher is renown by all Tau as a brilliant tactician and commander, as long as a unit is within 12” of him or an experimental drone they may use his leadership for all leadership tests.

Positioning: Shas’O’Siepher and all of his experimental drones and any unit with 12” of Shas’O’Siepher benefit from the stealth universal special rule.





Now it is not in there but all drones would probably have the same stat line as a gun drone maybe the defense node drone having bs3



the next morning i went and made up the models for siepher and his new drones and here is what i came up with


Shas'O'Siepher and one of each of his experimental drones (left to right: ESPE drone, Defense Node Drone, Battlefield Report Drone)


Shas'O'Siepher (front)


Shas'O'Siepher (back)


Shas'O'Siepher (side)


His pulse pistol was a pulse carbine that had the bottom and mid section cut out to shorten it. His jet pack was the bottom half of a gun drone with the carbine's cut down to just the butt end of the rifles and a drone controller cut out from the hand of another firewarrior to cover up the hole in the gun drone rifle mount.


ESPE Drone (front)


ESPE Drone (side)


ESPE Drone(bottom)

2 bottoms of pulse carbines were use as the front prongs and the rear power pack was made from the butt end of a skyray seeker missile. the gun drone was carved out a bit to fit the power pack in.


Defense Node Drone (front)


Defense Node Drone (side)


Defense Node Drone (bottom)

the gatling gun is from a piranha and mounted on the pulse carbine mount for a gundrone by cutting of the tip that would normally insert into the saucer of the drone. again two butt ends of a carbine were attached to the mount and glued to the saucer.


Battlefield Report Drone (front)


Battlefield Report Drone (side)


Battlefield Report Drone (bottom)

just took a senor spine for this and carved out a rounded area to glue it right to the pulse carbine mount for a regular gundrone. the extra antennae is the tip of a pulse carbine.


seriously, pulse carbines are awesome for conversions.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
just realizes his base stat line didn;t line up well so here it is reprinted

BS 5
WS 3
S 3
T 3
W 1
A 1
I 3
LD 10
SV 3+

Love the idea, but not realy femiliar with the workings of drones.... so I cant help much there.

The whole psycher thing i'm not to sure about. :/ I could see how it could shield him from some of the effects but the "tap into it" part bothers me to be honest.

Also he seems a tad cheap for the special rules he brings in.

Also fluffwise this doesnt make sense. He is of the fire cast, his job is to kill things. Fire cast are no scientists mate !

how do you, with no warp technology, cancel a warp effect. Tau CAN'T do that so far, because they dont have warp tech.

First off i'd like to say thanks for commenting on the fluff, makes me super happy to see it.

Now this was written by my buddy so i don't know if he has an actual explanation for it but the way i see it is siepher is pioneering tau studies into the warp and warp technology, which is why its dodgy as to wether or not he can interfere with it. I know thats a loose explanation and involves no scientific lore, but maybe i can get pheonix to elaborate on it.

As for the fact that he does science and is of the fire caste, you got us there, the only semi valid explantion is that he is multi talented even tho genetic upbringing would have it otherwise. So he's like 1 in a billion. That mistake however comes from the fact that the fluff writer is primarily a nid player so he isn't 100% familiar with the tau caste system. I let it through cause it was unique crazy and awesome. He still kills gak tho so i wouldn't say he's not of the fire caste


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh and here is a quick rundown of how drones work for you. Basically in large enough groups their collecttive AI is strong enough to function on there own. Anything smaller an 2 or 3 however generally need someone controlling them.

To answer all of these questions.

Tau could use some warp defense, also they can't access the warp but they could easily manipulate the physical effects of a power as it manifests in the physical world. Psychers open a door and then draw energy manifesting it into a power, he can use his drones to gain information on the energy drawn and how it's manifesting a find a way to counter the pure energy. It is just energy they draw and TAU certainly have tech to do that.

His research division is another cast, I assume tau casts work together but I honestly never read to much into them. He collects data from the field, tells them what he needs, they make it. He was given a division of incredibly talented individuals to create the machines he uses, he does not create them himself so I don't thin it breaches their cast system

Unlike most HQ or elite choices his special abilities can be targeted by weapons and destroyed. You cannot shoot an orbital bombardment, synapse, or conversion beamer. These all have drastic effects in game play and only go away with the model. Against this character his abilities can be directly countered thus the points for utilizing them was reduced so he could take doubles,

Not to argue and say a point was wrong, simply stating why I chose these powers and points costs. I hope this helps to clarify.

As far as him being a scientist, it was more to the explanation of being able to bring theory onto the battlefield, he doesn't actually build his drones but he is increasingly resourceful. I've never read much of the lore fore Tau but I never got the impression they were confined to one method of thinking, he may be tasked to fight, but if he fights with his mind and intelligence I thought it would fly.

Shas'O'Siepher wrote:


Electro-static pulse emitter
Armed with a small yet incredibly powerful energy core the Electro static pulse emitter creates a dome of unstable energies and radiation dangerous to all machines or biological forms, any unit moving into 12” or starting their movement phase within 12” of an Electro-static pulse emitter must treat the movement as dangerous and difficult including tanks regardless of the units upgrades.
In addition, any enemy units within 12” of the Electro-static pulse emitter must reroll any successful invulnerable saves made.

Unstable: Whenever the electro static pulse emitter is removed from the board as a casualty place a large blast template were is was with the following profile.

Str 6 Ap 2 type: Large blast

Okay, this is a little OP for the points. The 12" radius is a little large for the effects- six would be more usual- and Unstable is just waaay out there. I'm not saying change the rules, but maybe bump the price of this guy up to ~35-50 would be more appropriate, especially as you can essentially use it as a minefield for half the board without needing to keep in near the Shas.

Defense node drone
The node drones offers surprising firepower and quick deployment into one small package, great for bolstering a defence or cover your flank from enemy troops. With an accurate targeting array and rapid fire capabilities it was designed to slow enemy movement while troops could be repositioned.

Pulsefire Gatling gun
The puslefire gatling gun may fire during any players movement phase, or assault phase. If an enemy unit ends or begins movement within 12” of a drone with the pulsefire Gatling gun you may fire with the following profile

Heavy X twin linked Str 4 Ap – type:pinning
X – Role 2d6 keeping one to determine how many shots the pulsfire Gatling has this turn. If a result of doubles is roled you may get the shots but the unit is immediately removed from the game after.

Battlefield report drone
In great need of intelligence gathering of the battlefield without the risk of casualties came the first blueprints of the battlefield report drone, the drone contains many sophisticated sensory equipment to provide accurate information on enemy movements within its proximity and relay it to the rest of the army to better co-ordinate their attack to destroy the enemies defensive tactics.

Advanced terrain analysis: The drone analyses the data of any terrain or generated force field and target its weakness and compare it to the weapons in the tau army allowing the best strategy to defeat the defense. Be in were a wall is thinnest or the frequency of a flickering force field the drone will catch it and let the tau army know where and when to shoot.

Any enemy unit within 12” of a drone with advanced terrain analysis cannot take cover saves of any form.

This right here is a bit odd- I understand where you're coming from, but there are certain things that give cover saves without being bypassable, such as the Kustom Force Field (it's a Field effect, and thus has no 'gaps') or Flickerfields and such(again, a Field effect). I'd say switch the wording to "...cannot take cover saves from terrain or intervening models."

Detection grid: The battlefield report drone has detailed information about its surrounding terrain and is aware of any changes in temperature, movement, and even pressure.

If you fire on a unit within 12” of a drone with detection grid you do not have to role for night fighting for any reason.
Advanced guidance system: The drones unique terrain detailing allows for unites to easily find safe passage and can even guide entry from orbit

Any of the players units May deep strike within 6” of a drone with advanced guidance without rolling for deep strike. Furthermore any vehicle owned by the player that is within 12” of a drone with advanced guidance systems is counted as having sensor spines.

tactical detonation unit: A TDU of tactical detonation unit is used when the drones efficiency has been compromised, if and when an enemy locates and attempts to destroy or capture a drone an alert is sent and the commander detonates the device.

When a unit assaults any drone equipped with a TDU after consolidation make an initiative test for the drone commander if successful remove the drone and replace it with a small blast template with the following profile, no scatter role is done.

Str 5 AP - type: small blast, Pinning

Shas’O’Siepher
Shas’O’Siepher starting his rise to tactician in the Tau army as a pathfinder, dedicated to gather information and give support were needed in the battle. During his time on one of the outer Tau planets Siepher was called to action against the forces of the emporium of man, betrayed by their supposed alliance they assailed onto the small mining planet for resources. Siepher led the defence thou non was ordered, outnumbered and outgunned he attempted a suicide hold as he sent a distress to nearby fleets of the invasion he knew if he let the planet be taken it would be lost to them. Using mining drones he was able to set up a networked interface of the entire enemy camp recording all their movements and precise numbers. This posed a great problem for the enemy forces as Siepher would launch attack after attack on the weakest targets, destroying ammunition, transport, and communications he managed to cut off any attempt the made to spread out and take control of the planet.

Siepher held this tactic for 2 weeks crimpling enemy support lines and constantly pestering their lines. Until the emporium brought in their psychers, channelling the warp they devastated sought out and destroyed resistance. Though Siepher was one step ahead he was now on the defensive. For 2 more weeks they hunted him down until one of the Tau fleets arrived from the distress call, Siepher watched as the great Tau Manta came into orbit laying waste to the invaders force, he relayed all of his tactical data to them and the Manta spat death as suits rained down, tanks erupted and the enemy force annihilated.

Siepher was quickly promoted and given his own division of research one that even lead to the discovery of preventing the warp from being accessed. The information his enemy gave him while trying to hunt him will be their downfall if ever they are foolish enough to face his people again.

Special rules: Infiltrate, Tactical deployment, Containment of the warp, Tactical redeployment, Overwatch, Positioning

Tactical deployment: Drones added to his unit always start the game of in reserve regardless of the game type. Note that the drones and not Siepher start in reserve. When the drones become available they enter via deep strike without scatter within 6” of Shas’O’Siepher. The player may also choose a tactical deployment and have them deep strike within 24” of Shas’O’Siephier reducing the scatter by his BS.

Containment of the warp: As a brilliant tactician and scientist Shas’O’Siepher was the first to development ways of battling psychers. Using the information of his drones he can sometimes manipulate the energies around the psyche and block their abilities to tap into their power.

If an enemy psycher is anywhere within 12” of two or more experimental drones or any two drones within his unit he may attempt to cancel out their power. Both players role a D6 and add their leadership if Shas’O’Siepher has an equal or higher value the psychic ability has been canceled, this ability is applied after the psycher has rolled for perils in the warp.

Tactical redeployment: If Shas’O’Siepher comes within 6” of any experimental drone he may have it rejoin his unit OR remove it from the board and have it return the next turn via deep strike.

Overwatch: Shas’O’Siepher is renown by all Tau as a brilliant tactician and commander, as long as a unit is within 12” of him or an experimental drone they may use his leadership for all leadership tests.

maybe not the drones...

Positioning: Shas’O’Siepher and all of his experimental drones and any unit with 12” of Shas’O’Siepher benefit from the stealth universal special rule.

Interesting idea- at first I was wondering about all those special abilities at only 90 points, but then I saw his statline, and realized he's pretty much just a support character, so yeah.


Speaking of drones, though- a friend and I (Benamint, actually) were looking at the old Tau codex, and realized you could potentially get a full hundred Gun Drones on the table in a legal army list of around 1500 or 2000 with points to spare. Can you still do this with the current Tau codex?

While I'm not really sold on the idea of a character whose specialty is drones, the model you built for him made think of tau fire warriors with jump packs (the ones other armies use, not the crisis suit jet packs). Or maybe stealth fire warriors. Either way, I think having a special character that did something with these ideas might be more appealing.

Now that I think about it, having ghost reconish fire warriors with their fire support drones could be really cool. This could be a good replacement of stealth teams and play into the whole, tau tech experimentation then mass-production thing.

Sorry if I rambled

@ anvildude

unfortunately i don't think you can do that any more (tho it may be possible i am just not seeing it) squad sized is maxed at 8 i think and they are fast attack, which gives a total of 24 adding 2 per troop squad (via drone controllers) is another 12, and then another 2 per possible crisis suit in the elite is another 18 which gives 54. and that would be expensive to take.

now the one other idea i had was giving him the ability to move gun drones in to a troop choice instead of a fast attack, just for fluff reasons really, gundrones < firewarriors imho. mostly i like the idea of an entire army of drones, seems like something tau would do, prevent lives lost for the greater good and all that jazz

and yeah i thought the EMPE drone was a little cheap myself, and is the one i am considering upping in points, the only thing that concerns me is that because its only 12" then most guns will be able to pick it off safely being that it is on its own, also it hurts your own troops (excluding drones and siepher which i forgot to mention), which would be the advantage of being able to take drones as a troop being that they would be "immune" to its effects.


@silent apocalypse

good to see some other cool ideas come out of this, never thought of trying to make a stealth FW team. and yeah i also like the jetpack idea,


Automatically Appended Next Post:
also rambling on here about tau stuff is encouraged

Trance_Phoenix wrote:
Tau could use some warp defense, also they can't access the warp but they could easily manipulate the physical effects of a power as it manifests in the physical world. Psychers open a door and then draw energy manifesting it into a power, he can use his drones to gain information on the energy drawn and how it's manifesting a find a way to counter the pure energy. It is just energy they draw and TAU certainly have tech to do that.

So how do you fix a 200kV air-cable without knowing what electricity is and how it works? Thats still a no on my side, tho the idea IS great.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Shas'O'Siepher wrote:
good to see some other cool ideas come out of this, never thought of trying to make a stealth FW team. and yeah i also like the jetpack idea,

i had a modification for the pulse weapons of the warriors:
Disruptor: all Tau FW with a higher rank team leader may upgrade their weapons to also have the Disruptor weapon type for 5pt per modell.
On a roll to wound of 6 on a d6, the weapon has AP1. This system is not perfected, so any rolls to wound of 1 on a d6 cause that weapon to jam, and it cant be fired on your next round.
and a few mods for my Black OPS Tau.
All Tau - vehicles also - may be equiped with BSF for 1pt per modell.
All higher rank Tau team leaders and vehicles may upgrade their BSF to Eclypse Filter for an extra 4pt.
Eclypse Filter: Works as a normal BSF, with the exception that the MINIMUM range is 18", regarless of the rolls for nightfight.

Black OPS armies may not include Ethreals, Kroot, Vespid and Gundrone squadrons.
All Black OPS Tau gain the scout and infiltrate USR.
Eclypse tactics: these tau are adept at fighting at night, but are unused to losses. All Black OPS Tau have their leadership reduced by 1.

These are just some krazyyyy ideas, would like a few thoughts on them, well maybe in a nother topic to not screw up this one, but in pm is good to

Well that's unfortunate. It was in the old codex, where you could take up to 3(?) Drone Controllers on all Crisis Suits, and each Controller would allow you to take up to 4-5 Drones, I believe. As you could get up to 3 suits per HQ slot, 3 per Elite slot, that was up to 75 or so just from there, plus the FA slots- and everything was cheap enough you could easily do that in a 2000 point game.

Anvildude wrote:Well that's unfortunate. It was in the old codex, where you could take up to 3(?) Drone Controllers on all Crisis Suits, and each Controller would allow you to take up to 4-5 Drones, I believe. As you could get up to 3 suits per HQ slot, 3 per Elite slot, that was up to 75 or so just from there, plus the FA slots- and everything was cheap enough you could easily do that in a 2000 point game.

You actually just gave me an awesome idea to use O'shava. Since his bodyguard can be up to 7 suits, and i am pretty sure they get access to the wargear list aswell (at work don't have thw codex on me) they could each potentially take up to 8 drones (3 controllers for the hard points and the hard wired controller) for a total of 56 drones in one squad. 56 twinlinked pulse carbines.... Lulz. Throw in a pathfinder squad for some marker lights and some bare bones firewarriors, and if you have the points some broadsides for anti armor, and watch your death star chew everything in 18" of it.

Yesss. You have got to put up pics if you end up doing that. Drone Swarm! And you can add in some pure Drone Squads in FA for flavour.

enfernux wrote:

Shas'O'Siepher wrote:
good to see some other cool ideas come out of this, never thought of trying to make a stealth FW team. and yeah i also like the jetpack idea,

i had a modification for the pulse weapons of the warriors:
Disruptor: all Tau FW with a higher rank team leader may upgrade their weapons to also have the Disruptor weapon type for 5pt per modell.
On a roll to wound of 6 on a d6, the weapon has AP1. This system is not perfected, so any rolls to wound of 1 on a d6 cause that weapon to jam, and it cant be fired on your next round.
and a few mods for my Black OPS Tau.
All Tau - vehicles also - may be equiped with BSF for 1pt per modell.
All higher rank Tau team leaders and vehicles may upgrade their BSF to Eclypse Filter for an extra 4pt.
Eclypse Filter: Works as a normal BSF, with the exception that the MINIMUM range is 18", regarless of the rolls for nightfight.

Black OPS armies may not include Ethreals, Kroot, Vespid and Gundrone squadrons.
All Black OPS Tau gain the scout and infiltrate USR.
Eclypse tactics: these tau are adept at fighting at night, but are unused to losses. All Black OPS Tau have their leadership reduced by 1.

These are just some krazyyyy ideas, would like a few thoughts on them, well maybe in a nother topic to not screw up this one, but in pm is good to

I like the idea of pseudo-rending guns, but i would change its downfall to something like lower strength or shorter range, mostly because tau prefer not to use unreliable equipment ( hence why their plasma rifles are weaker). But thats just a fluff thing. Mechanically its pretty sound.

I also like the improved BSF, tho for the points cost i'd change it to just straight up tripples range instead of makes the minimum 18(minimum would stay at 18 with a triple effect). Because an extra 5 points per fire warrior adds up really quickly.

@anvildude

If i ever get enough drones (which with my new made up commander i now have the incentive). I will totally field that and put up pictures. Provided it is still legal, i am not sure if you are allowed to triplicate support systems yet. Will know more when i get homefrom work.

Going back to the main topic (lulz sidetracks) think it would still be fair to give siepher the ability to field drones as troops in groups of 6-12? Also i was thinking of ways to fill the FA and HS slots with drones and i was thinking marker drones for FA(squads of 4-8 like pathfinders) and forge worlds heavy drones for heavy support. And maye the stealth flyer drones for elites?

Just throwing that out there, wanted to see if anyone has any ideas on it, i really would like to see an all drone army, fluff wise they would be controlled via a modified orca dropship with a drone operator crew on board

i beleave the heaviest weapon a drone can carry is a rail rifle, but at s6, you wont do much vs say a land raider.
On the idea: Marker drones will be like pathfinders, but more fragile w.out the transport. They dont basically have the relentless rule, so wont be able to fire the gunz if moveing, but w.out moveing it is hard to "pinpoint" and enemy unite.
On the heavy: drones w. Fusion guns?? Btw dont know FW, we dont play it.

On Black OPS: well, they are only used to night fighting, so basically you would only field's them if the mission rules-lawyering apply night, or if not, you wait for it to be night - just being a hardars vs the opponents
And i know they add up fast, but if a modell in the squad sees the enemy, the wholesalers squad may fire. So basically if you have a few points extra, and cant spend it on anything, you can takeoff these on the FW, AND/or you're can equip the FW leaders w Eclypse filters, Makeing it a good chance to shoot at enemies from a mid field's distance w.out much a threat that FWs williamson be fired uppon - well, basically thats the idea.

On the rifles, the original wound was a roll of 6 is ap2 and causes instant death, but i modded that, cause it still seams to OP. You roll a few of that from 12" and the hurt this would put out is just punishing.

enfernux wrote:i beleave the heaviest weapon a drone can carry is a rail rifle, but at s6, you wont do much vs say a land raider.
On the idea: Marker drones will be like pathfinders, but more fragile w.out the transport. They dont basically have the relentless rule, so wont be able to fire the gunz if moveing, but w.out moveing it is hard to "pinpoint" and enemy unite.
On the heavy: drones w. Fusion guns?? Btw dont know FW, we dont play it.

On Black OPS: well, they are only used to night fighting, so basically you would only field's them if the mission rules-lawyering apply night, or if not, you wait for it to be night - just being a hardars vs the opponents
And i know they add up fast, but if a modell in the squad sees the enemy, the wholesalers squad may fire. So basically if you have a few points extra, and cant spend it on anything, you can takeoff these on the FW, AND/or you're can equip the FW leaders w Eclypse filters, Makeing it a good chance to shoot at enemies from a mid field's distance w.out much a threat that FWs williamson be fired uppon - well, basically thats the idea.

On the rifles, the original wound was a roll of 6 is ap2 and causes instant death, but i modded that, cause it still seams to OP. You roll a few of that from 12" and the hurt this would put out is just punishing.

the remora stealth drone flyer carries seeker missiles on it so there is potential for some strength 8 weapons there, limited shots tho. the idea of a fusion blaster drone is quite amusing. also marker drones would be able to move and shoot their marker lights being that they are jetpack infantry and automatically gain the relentless special rule, also the forgeworld marker drones have a burst cannon on them instead of a target lock, which i don;t know if they would be good or too good at that point, could just balance them with a points cost. which would be a bonus over pathfinders because they cannot.

and yeah that makes sense for the eclipse filters i guess. if you only need it on one guy then the points are fine.

for the rifles, instant death lol. yeah that would be OP, i'd be charging my FW at carnifexes and hive tyrants all day just to get double shots.


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@ anvildude

I just took a look at my codex and unfortunately they did remove the option for multiple drone controllers on one suit, so you can't legally take more than 2 drones per suit anymore. :(

Rather unfortunate, that. I think they might have made a mistake there. Who knows, Drone-spam might have been enough to put Tau back on the table. Or it would at least have been interesting.

I like all these Tau ideas getting bounced around On the topic of drone spam:
While I think it would have been humorous I highly doubt that drone spam would be a very liable list and almost definetly not enough to put them back on the board for competitiveness. Yes you could eat anything in an 18" range but they would still be wrecked in CC (though drones can do crazy things in CC, it never seems to happen for me or any other consistent Tau player I know) Essentially coming out to be pulse carbine armed FW with jet pack and re roll misses. Not too bad but still not really smart or good. Keep up the conversation! It is shaping up to be fun!

Ben

Again thats why i was thinking of adding the other drones into their own squadrons, especially the forgeworld ones plus maybe any drones we can come up with in here. What we currently have to work with are;

Gun drones (twin-linked pulse carbines)
Marker drones (forgeworld sells models with burst canons as well as the markelight)
Heavy gun drones (FW, twinlinked burst cannons)
Remora stealth drones (FW, large flying twin-linked burst cannons with 2 seeker missiles)
Sniper drones (rail rifles and target locks)

Also someone mentioned earlier the idea of a fusion blaster drone as well, and really you could modify any drone to hold any weapon. Maybe could make the heavy drones have that capability, kinda like how crisis suits can fit any weapon.

As for the disruptor weapon, i gave it some thought, and maybe you could make it an assault weapon with 18" range. Maybe even assault 2. The 18" range kind of synergizes well with the Eclipse filters. At assault 2 however may be getting into OP again, but i see it as based on the cyclic ion canon that the crisis suits use with the same pseudo rending ability, and it has 5 shots. Could maybe balance it out with a points cost. But then again you already lose one in leadership....