I see necron allies in my tau tournament future for a couple cheap flyers and haywire crypteks.

Don't forget Nova charged Heavy Burst Cannon ;-) surely 12 shots will end up with some 6s for rending?

To be honest I am looking forward to the challenge of dealing with AV14 (not that I face hardly any) by not spamming XV88. In fact I have only ever used a max of two suits in a game and always done fine.

The Riptide is frighteningly fast for how big it is and what it can do. I think my first few games will consist of rampaging across the table and using him as a massive distraction unit whilst hopefully dealing some hurt.

(I did read that it is assault cannon right?)

 gr1m_dan wrote:
Don't forget Nova charged Heavy Burst Cannon ;-) surely 12 shots will end up with some 6s for rending?

To be honest I am looking forward to the challenge of dealing with AV14 (not that I face hardly any) by not spamming XV88. In fact I have only ever used a max of two suits in a game and always done fine.

The Riptide is frighteningly fast for how big it is and what it can do. I think my first few games will consist of rampaging across the table and using him as a massive distraction unit whilst hopefully dealing some hurt.

(I did read that it is assault cannon right?)

Monstrous creatures are relentless.

So will be able to fire regardless of weapon...nice!

The fireblade has split fire.. so he can shoot his ML at something else hitting on a 2..then your pathfinders use that ML to fire their ML's at BS 4

then whichever unit has a ton of dakka uses all those ML hits to be BS lots and remove cover.

fun times ahead...

SonicPara wrote:

 lordofthegophers wrote:
Sorry, what was the problem?

$255 for 3 suits, 6 drones.

Sure the Riptide is great; it has to be to get people to spend that absurd amount of coin.

I actually got a decent deal from Wayland Games, they were £35 ($53) each with their pre-order deal. Sadly they have no stock so I have to wait

Therion wrote:

Now take three Riptides.

If I built a Tau army right now there's no question I'd take three Riptides. Not only are the models fantastic (and heavily convertable/modifieable) but seem absurdly hard to kill. Tons of T6 wounds with a 2+ save, cover and invulnerable saves and FNP on top of it all. Drones too if you insist on gathering as many eggs in the same basket as you can. I think the most reasonable way of dealing with Riptides is somehow assaulting them since they are garbage in close combat and can't leave it like vehicles can, but it'll be easier said than done considering their mobility and that other Tau stuff will get on the way.

You know, they're not terrible in combat. Monstrous Creatures always strike at AP2, so the Riptide can actually pose a threat to terminators and the like. Three attacks hitting on 4+ isn't great, but hey, you're wounding most stuff on 2+ and negating armour saves. On the downside he's WS2, so anything WS5 or better the Riptide is hitting on 5+. Better than a kick in the balls though right?

its good against tanks that cant fight back

The way some folks are reacting to the new Codex I think they'd prefer a kick in the balls.

Saturday can't come quick enough.

It's probably better to nova charge the thrusters when enemies start closing in, if you sense a charge coming. The riptide is wasted locked in cc, whether he is being killed or not he isn't shooting.

 boy wonder wrote:
The fireblade has split fire.. so he can shoot his ML at something else hitting on a 2..then your pathfinders use that ML to fire their ML's at BS 4

then whichever unit has a ton of dakka uses all those ML hits to be BS lots and remove cover.

fun times ahead...

Im pretty sure markerlights cannot benefit from markerlights

 gr1m_dan wrote:
The way some folks are reacting to the new Codex I think they'd prefer a kick in the balls.

New codex IS kick in the balls (well not all of it, but some aspects are).

I'll be buying the book, but unless it contains something meaningful which hasn't been revealed yet, it's mostly for the fluff. I only play friendly games anyway, might be I'll be sticking with the old book for them.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 MechaBeast wrote:

Im pretty sure markerlights cannot benefit from markerlights

Actually it's not explicitly forbidden either in the new entry(though it's probably just an oversight).

 tetrisphreak wrote:
It's probably better to nova charge the thrusters when enemies start closing in, if you sense a charge coming. The riptide is wasted locked in cc, whether he is being killed or not he isn't shooting.

I agree! I'm not saying you should go charging your Riptide into combat just if he does end up there for whatever reason there's a good chance he'll put up a decent fight.

Using the fusion blaster to pop a heavily armored transport, then using the 4D6 thrust move to get away seems like it will be a common tactic.

You know, they're not terrible in combat. Monstrous Creatures always strike at AP2, so the Riptide can actually pose a threat to terminators and the like. Three attacks hitting on 4+ isn't great, but hey, you're wounding most stuff on 2+ and negating armour saves. On the downside he's WS2, so anything WS5 or better the Riptide is hitting on 5+. Better than a kick in the balls though right?

Well that's better than nothing, but my point was that any assault specialist unit (like Wraiths) will kill the Riptide without any trouble, so it'll be a question if the assault troops can reach their targets or not. Shooting it isn't a points efficient solution considering the T, wounds and saves. How does the Riptide move? 6" in the movement phase and 2D6/4D6 in the assault phase with the thrusters after shooting?

Does anyone know what happened to the new battleforce? Did that turn out to be false or can we expect it in a later wave?

 Hulksmash wrote:

 boy wonder wrote:
do we know for a fact that drone controller covers ALL drones in a squad?

Pictures above include the drone controller rule:

"All Gun Drones, Marker Drones, and Sniper Drones in the same unit as a model with a drone conroller use the bearers Ballistic skill instead of their own. If a unit contains several Drone Controllers, use the highest ballistic skill amongst the bearers."

This is assuming the missile drones are considered a sub-type of gun drone. If not then the markerlight thing will still be awesome.

Oh, and the sniper team is silly with all the snipers being BS5 thanks to the marksman and his controller.

So, if the missile drone falls under 'gun drones', would this be true:

Drones fire at the BS of the Drone Controller. If Drone Controller has Skyfire, he fires at full BS at flyers, so now drones would fire at full BS at flyers in that unit?




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 tetrisphreak wrote:
I see necron allies in my tau tournament future for a couple cheap flyers and haywire crypteks.

I would also add a Destroyer Lord with 6 Wraiths for the assault Deathstar, and put some fear in your opponents....

So... if the Bomber only generates bombs on a D6 roll of 2-6... that basically means that on a roll of 1 you wasted that many points on a flyer that is almost entirely useless for a turn. Man, I can feel the cinematic already.

 MechaBeast wrote:

 boy wonder wrote:
The fireblade has split fire.. so he can shoot his ML at something else hitting on a 2..then your pathfinders use that ML to fire their ML's at BS 4

then whichever unit has a ton of dakka uses all those ML hits to be BS lots and remove cover.

fun times ahead...

Im pretty sure markerlights cannot benefit from markerlights

Are the tau borrowing from the thing about not crossing the streams from Ghostbusters?

 McNinja wrote:
So... if the Bomber only generates bombs on a D6 roll of 2-6... that basically means that on a roll of 1 you wasted that many points on a flyer that is almost entirely useless for a turn. Man, I can feel the cinematic already.

The bomber does have 3 other weapons (if the drones are still attached), possibly 5 counting seeker missiles.

 McNinja wrote:
So... if the Bomber only generates bombs on a D6 roll of 2-6... that basically means that on a roll of 1 you wasted that many points on a flyer that is almost entirely useless for a turn. Man, I can feel the cinematic already.

Yeah man... Forge that narrative! :-)

 airmang wrote:

 McNinja wrote:
So... if the Bomber only generates bombs on a D6 roll of 2-6... that basically means that on a roll of 1 you wasted that many points on a flyer that is almost entirely useless for a turn. Man, I can feel the cinematic already.

The bomber does have 3 other weapons (if the drones are still attached), possibly 5 counting seeker missiles.

While you are entirely right, the point of my post was that a bomber has a chance to not drop bombs. This may be a balancing mechanic to compensate for the fact the bombs it drops are not One Use Only, but that is easily fixed by adding "the Bomber can only drop four bombs per game" or something akin to that. Instead, we get to forge the dickens out of the narrative with grand cinematic dice rolls that are entirely pointless.

From what we've seen... I'm definitely gonna use X3 6(?) man squads of Deathrains suits!

Lucarikx

It looks like whilst you can use markerlights on overwatch this will only be of use to networked markerlights.
"markerlight counters last until the end of the current phase or until they are used"

So here is a quick question. Might of skipped over some things. What is stopping me from taking a gun drone squad, swapping out for markerlights and shield drones and attaching it to an HQ suit with a drone controller?

Also what's the weapon on the Sniper drone teams? I don't remember seeing it listed.

Is the Riptide immune from having its missile drones sniped away and then running off the table from 25% casualties? Riptide is going to be 220+ points all told.

Lots of things look a bit cheaper at face value, but most upgrades look a bunch more expensive to take.

Neuroweb system jammer looks... interesting. But its a unit within 12", which significantly increases the danger you're in. I guess that's why it's 5 points only.

A big squad of marker drones seems like it could be very interesting. If you set it up right with supporting fire, you could have a full squad of firewarriors firing 4 shots each of BS5 overwatch.... Do we have the actual supporting fire rule text yet?

Independant marker drones are going to be too hard to hit with. Much better will be marker drones with a higher BS dude carrying a drone controller.

 spears wrote:
It looks like whilst you can use markerlights on overwatch this will only be of use to networked markerlights.
"markerlight counters last until the end of the current phase or until they are used"

Unless you are getting to overwatch with multiple units. One drops marker lights, the other squads increase their BS with them.

Yup that works too.

The sniper drone weapon is the x 5 one.

jazzpaintball wrote:

Anbutou wrote:
I honestly have no real answer for what I'm going to do about the loss of my XV-88's in their real role. I used them as exactly what they are there for, in a vehicle heavy MEQ area, I needed that s10/1 reliable shooting, without it, it doesn't matter how many fusillades of missiles I can send down at them, it won't help.

Running helios suits just puts you in danger when the other player now knows you have to come to him to handle him. The hammerhead is literally the worst anti-tank tank in the game. You bring it when you need to lay down templates, not when you're actually going to use that solid shot. Hell, I use them as bait. Guys that don't quite understand what's going on tend to focus on that hideously large gun knowing that pushing tanks into my lines kills them, so I just run it up and get them going for it.

The missilespam XV-88's are going to be fun, but I would still take the (10/1)railguns on at least 2/3 in the squad, simply because they're versatile killing machines. They're either the death of equipment, or they're still solid shots at dangerous targets. Reliable in pretty much any role that's not blob army types (in which cases I would field hammerheads).

The biggest problem here is that the tau lack a real av14 killer now. Sure, you could bring hammerheads, and you could bring three, and then on average you could score hits that MIGHT equal 1.5 hull points per turn, if you're lucky. AV14 isn't usually concerned too greatly about 1.5 per turn, especially if they have multiple of them. Overcharging a suit to get s9 shots is a terrible idea, that's why we had the 10/1 railguns, because we had no s9/2 or 8/2, it was mid range MEQ and long range Anti-AV. Giving us the option to skyfire at a -2 strength would have been more than enough, they didn't need to "buff" the hammerhead by pulling the teeth out of our XV-88's.

I am glad I am not the only one seeing this problem...

Melta guns, Power gauntlet, EMP grenades, Railguns, deep striking, Mega suit..... Some people just like to pretend their butts hurt even when they dont

I believe that MC's are fearless, so it won't run.

Also, is there any possibility in the book that the tau vehicles come with multitrackers as well? I read the skyray, and it corrued to me, that if it moves (and get's the skimmer save), it can only fire one markerlight, and the other is snap fire. That isn't so good. The same way with the hammerhead. If I move it at all, I can just fire the railgun, and can't use the smart missile system except on snap fire.

Looks like I will be getting a defense line to stick them behind for the 3+ cover save and not moving. I would just prefer to be a movement force, and not allowing the vehicles to at least move 6 and fire their guns is sad.

Also noticed the Hammerhead has Twinlinked burst cannons now vice two. That's kinda disappointing. At least it helps with the moving and shooting part of it.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
So what about the Neuroweb jammer on stealth suits? It seems logical that you put them in close and in terrain, forcing the enemy to either move away, fire weapons with gets hots, or try and take down the stealth suits. Just for fun throw the gauntlet on one of the stealth suits as well. I can see that being a hassle for back field units like devastators and such.

What I am really interested in is the fact that you can take marker drones in teams of 4-12 and they have 4 toughness and an armor save of 4+, also they have relentless so they can JSJ with their markerlights. For only 12 points I feel they trump the pathfinders. They do only have 2 BS but the JSJ is the biggest thing to me, as you can just hide obscure cover, pop out mark a unit then return it.

 Rented Tritium wrote:
Independant marker drones are going to be too hard to hit with. Much better will be marker drones with a higher BS dude carrying a drone controller.

So if I take a unit of 12 gun drones attach them to a Commander who has BS5 (and buy a drone controller). They'd get 24 carbine shots at 18" range TL at BS5. Plus it'd give 12 drones that have to be shot through before getting to your HQ.

I have a feeling that pathfinders are going to be more for people wanting to try out the neat and interesting new toys and drones. I may end up bringing a few for the railguns, but will probably stick with Tetras for all my markerlight needs.

McNinja wrote:

 airmang wrote:

 McNinja wrote:
So... if the Bomber only generates bombs on a D6 roll of 2-6... that basically means that on a roll of 1 you wasted that many points on a flyer that is almost entirely useless for a turn. Man, I can feel the cinematic already.

The bomber does have 3 other weapons (if the drones are still attached), possibly 5 counting seeker missiles.

While you are entirely right, the point of my post was that a bomber has a chance to not drop bombs. This may be a balancing mechanic to compensate for the fact the bombs it drops are not One Use Only, but that is easily fixed by adding "the Bomber can only drop four bombs per game" or something akin to that. Instead, we get to forge the dickens out of the narrative with grand cinematic dice rolls that are entirely pointless.

Yet most bombers only have 1-2 bombs total, and can only drop one per turn, so they've still got more munitions than the average bomber.

Coyote81 wrote:

 AtoMaki wrote:

 Lysenis wrote:
Whats the limit on the Drone Upgrade? Can all of them do this or just a few?

Any of them can do it.

For those who are interested, here are some pics with 100% more english:

Spoiler:

Thanks for the info!

Wow, seeker missiles got a nerf as well. Instead of being essentially fired by the markerlight unit, they now have to be fired as part of the vehicle's firing action.

Not to rain on the parade but arent pictures of codex pages generally a dakka no no?

double post

Edit....I'm wrong

can anyone tell me how many hardpoints each suit has? cheers

 ironicsilence wrote:
Not to rain on the parade but arent pictures of codex pages generally a dakka no no?

They aren't "codex pages" until there is a released codex. Right now they are just pages from a mysterious book that may or may not be a codex.

Once the codex is released, they are usually taken down.

 boy wonder wrote:
can anyone tell me how many hardpoints each suit has? cheers

From what I've gathered, it' Commander = 4, Other Battlesuits = 3, Stealth/Broads = 1.


Has there been any word on if any Honour Guard is still there? Are we still able to take 84 Firewarriors? (or even 96 now!?)

 MajinMalak wrote:

 Rented Tritium wrote:
Independant marker drones are going to be too hard to hit with. Much better will be marker drones with a higher BS dude carrying a drone controller.

So if I take a unit of 12 gun drones attach them to a Commander who has BS5 (and buy a drone controller). They'd get 24 carbine shots at 18" range TL at BS5. Plus it'd give 12 drones that have to be shot through before getting to your HQ.

That's going to depend on the wording for the drone controller. It might be that it only allows drones purchased for that unit to fire at their BS, not all drones in the same unit.

If it does say "all drones in the squad" though, oh man, that would rule pretty hard.

davou wrote:


Melta guns, Power gauntlet, EMP grenades, Railguns, deep striking, Mega suit..... Some people just like to pretend their butts hurt even when they dont

Other than Railguns, which are limited to three, all those options suck. Sorry.

 Savageconvoy wrote:
Also noticed the Hammerhead has Twinlinked burst cannons now vice two. That's kinda disappointing. At least it helps with the moving and shooting part of it.

Hey, another way to screw the vehicles. Burst cannons in Hammerhead were great because you could split fire (my Ionhead once made three kills in one turn), or have BS5 volley with just 1 Markerlight.

Hammerhead sucks now, but you have to include it because it's the only way to get a Railgun. Wow...this is so awesome...not.

 Ovion wrote:

 boy wonder wrote:
can anyone tell me how many hardpoints each suit has? cheers

From what I've gathered, it' Commander = 4, Other Battlesuits = 3, Stealth/Broads = 1.


Has there been any word on if any Honour Guard is still there? Are we still able to take 84 Firewarriors? (or even 96 now!?)

cheers! how bout the riptide?

it looks like honour guard are out.. :(

Backfire wrote:

 Materia_Master wrote:

Or use a (very easy to obtain) markerlight and shoot it with a Hammerhead.
Or give the a crisis suit an onagar gauntlet and falcon pawnch the enemy tank. (might as well give the suit a melta, for synergy)

Railhead, with BS5 and cover save stripped, has 13.89% chance of destroying AV14 vehicle with one shot. I agree in principle that AV14 should be hard to destroy, but why then many other armies can spam craploads of anti-AV14 weaponry? Dark Eldar can spam BS4 lances, IG and Space Marines can spam Lascannons and Multi-meltas, Necrons can spam God knows what. Why aren't we allowed to spam Railguns, then? And don't tell me "but we have other means like Piranhas lol". Piranhas suck, and other armies have just as many "alternative" means.

What many people are forgetting that in 5th edition, Railgun could destroy or immobilize vehicles with glancing hits. This was important, particularly against Battlewagon lists. Now, glancing hits usually need multiple turns to have effect, so switch to 6ed already nerfed them somewhat.

Chrysis wrote:

Wolfnid420 wrote:
Two handed implies a boost in strength does it not? Like a power axe maybe? So kroot when down but realy +2S=5?

No, Two-Handed implies it can't be combined with other weapons for bonus attacks, nothing more. It might give bonus strength, but that's not guaranteed.

Kroot rifle is strength: User, AP5, 2-handed. It does not confer strength bonus, the "bonus" from being two-handed is AP5. It's annoying that people just gush "but they make great cheap snipers!", yeah, but maybe everyone does not always WANT to use sniper option? Aren't regular line Kroot supposed to be useful too? Only minor saving grace I can think of is that Krootox no longer seems to limit Infiltration or Outflanking, or at least I can't see anything hinting to that direction.

Lots of talk about 16% chance to destroy, but no mention of the fact that you can lock it from moving for the rest of the game 16% of the time.... Or stop it from moving or shooting 16%, or just stop it from shooting 16%.... You dont need to destroy it if I'ts gonna sit in the back field not in range of anything.

 Rented Tritium wrote:

 MajinMalak wrote:

 Rented Tritium wrote:
Independant marker drones are going to be too hard to hit with. Much better will be marker drones with a higher BS dude carrying a drone controller.

So if I take a unit of 12 gun drones attach them to a Commander who has BS5 (and buy a drone controller). They'd get 24 carbine shots at 18" range TL at BS5. Plus it'd give 12 drones that have to be shot through before getting to your HQ.

That's going to depend on the wording for the drone controller. It might be that it only allows drones purchased for that unit to fire at their BS, not all drones in the same unit.

If it does say "all drones in the squad" though, oh man, that would rule pretty hard.

From what I read "All Gun Drones, Marker Drones and Sniper Drones in the same unit as a model with a drone controller use the bearer's BS instead of their own."

So yeah, it's the entire unit. So this should work.

davou wrote:

Lots of talk about 16% chance to destroy, but no mention of the fact that you can lock it from moving for the rest of the game 16% of the time.... Or stop it from moving or shooting 16%, or just stop it from shooting 16%.... You dont need to destroy it if I'ts gonna sit in the back field not in range of anything.

Actually chance of the "Immobilized" result is only 4.63%, assuming those circumstances. But I played Railhead in previous edition, y'know, where chances of mobility or weapon kill were better than they are in 6th edition. It still wasn't really great vehicle killer.

We got haywire on emp grenades!!!!

Anyone else think this way when they saw the full pic of the tank dude?

 n0t_u wrote:
Anyone else think this way when they saw the full pic of the tank dude?

He can hang out with brother tiesto:

I can't find any mention of "networked" markerlights, even on marker drones. There seems to be only one "markerlight" profile.

Are the days of units benefitting from their own markerlights gone?

Anyone catch the author?

There are going to be so many markerlights used with this new codex that it is petty and it will be an almighty faff to have to keep track of the one markerlight that belongs to Squad A so they can't use it.

 gr1m_dan wrote:
@RogueRegault



EDIT - I CANNOT WAIT to falcon pawnch a tank :-D Completely non-Tau tactic and very risky and will result in many dead Battlesuits the turn after but just to see the reaction on my enemies face will be priceless.

I LOVE the idea of the Onager Gauntlet on a fusion gunned suit. Fusion Punch FTW! Maybe not the most optimized unit, but it makes me giggle.

There are networked markerlights, and still work the same.

Talking about Markerlight, how does Sky Ray and its Seeker missiles work now? Because I just realized that it can't move if it wants to shoot with more than one Markerlight, and that makes it, if possible, even worse than in previous codex.

 synchronicity wrote:
I can't find any mention of "networked" markerlights, even on marker drones. There seems to be only one "markerlight" profile.

Are the days of units benefitting from their own markerlights gone?

The skyray has Networked Markerlights, but nothing else seems to. Which more or less makes sense, the skyray kinda needs them to fire their seeker missiles at something the same turn without having to rely on another unit (if you took out all other markerlights, the skyray would not be able to fire their seekers if not for networking)

 MajinMalak wrote:

 Rented Tritium wrote:

 MajinMalak wrote:

 Rented Tritium wrote:
Independant marker drones are going to be too hard to hit with. Much better will be marker drones with a higher BS dude carrying a drone controller.

So if I take a unit of 12 gun drones attach them to a Commander who has BS5 (and buy a drone controller). They'd get 24 carbine shots at 18" range TL at BS5. Plus it'd give 12 drones that have to be shot through before getting to your HQ.

That's going to depend on the wording for the drone controller. It might be that it only allows drones purchased for that unit to fire at their BS, not all drones in the same unit.

If it does say "all drones in the squad" though, oh man, that would rule pretty hard.

From what I read "All Gun Drones, Marker Drones and Sniper Drones in the same unit as a model with a drone controller use the bearer's BS instead of their own."

So yeah, it's the entire unit. So this should work.

Thats uh... wow. that... Man that is amazing

The sunshark has a networked markerlight too

Backfire wrote:

davou wrote:


Melta guns, Power gauntlet, EMP grenades, Railguns, deep striking, Mega suit..... Some people just like to pretend their butts hurt even when they dont

Other than Railguns, which are limited to three, all those options suck. Sorry.

so you went from there are no options, to those options suck?


Haywire glances on 2's dude, A small squad of sacrificial fire warriors is welcome to die if it means they will drop a landraider; You're just being a princess about it.

Power gauntlet is cheap as toast, and strikes at initiative to boot; against rear armor!

Deep striking sucks? 0.o

The only option I don't particularly like among the ones I mentioned are the melta guns; and even they are decent enough if you use them right.

 YotsubaSnake wrote:

 synchronicity wrote:
I can't find any mention of "networked" markerlights, even on marker drones. There seems to be only one "markerlight" profile.

Are the days of units benefitting from their own markerlights gone?

The skyray has Networked Markerlights, but nothing else seems to. Which more or less makes sense, the skyray kinda needs them to fire their seeker missiles at something the same turn without having to rely on another unit (if you took out all other markerlights, the skyray would not be able to fire their seekers if not for networking)

Interesting. So when firing overwatch, can a Skyray benefit from its own Networked Markerlights? Can overwatching units benefit from other units' overwatched Markerlights?

 synchronicity wrote:

 YotsubaSnake wrote:

 synchronicity wrote:
I can't find any mention of "networked" markerlights, even on marker drones. There seems to be only one "markerlight" profile.

Are the days of units benefitting from their own markerlights gone?

The skyray has Networked Markerlights, but nothing else seems to. Which more or less makes sense, the skyray kinda needs them to fire their seeker missiles at something the same turn without having to rely on another unit (if you took out all other markerlights, the skyray would not be able to fire their seekers if not for networking)

Interesting. So when firing overwatch, can a Skyray benefit from its own Networked Markerlights? Can overwatching units benefit from other units' overwatched Markerlights?

As far as I can tell. The answer to that is yes. Markerlight tokens last until the end of the phase, which would be the opponent's assault phase. So a unit of pathfinders, within 6" of a squad that is assaulted, could markerlight the unit for others to benefit. Or, as you mentioned a Skyray could can use their own to fire two missiles during overwatch.

One thing I found interesting, is that I Sniper Drones do not have a networked markerlight in their unit anymore. So the spotter cannot give the drones a better BS.

Onager gauntlet? Am I the only one that find that a little rude?

Or is it... not a reference to "donkey punching"?

 MajinMalak wrote:

 synchronicity wrote:

 YotsubaSnake wrote:

 synchronicity wrote:
I can't find any mention of "networked" markerlights, even on marker drones. There seems to be only one "markerlight" profile.

Are the days of units benefitting from their own markerlights gone?

The skyray has Networked Markerlights, but nothing else seems to. Which more or less makes sense, the skyray kinda needs them to fire their seeker missiles at something the same turn without having to rely on another unit (if you took out all other markerlights, the skyray would not be able to fire their seekers if not for networking)

Interesting. So when firing overwatch, can a Skyray benefit from its own Networked Markerlights? Can overwatching units benefit from other units' overwatched Markerlights?

As far as I can tell. The answer to that is yes. Markerlight tokens last until the end of the phase, which would be the opponent's assault phase. So a unit of pathfinders, within 6" of a squad that is assaulted, could markerlight the unit for others to benefit. Or, as you mentioned a Skyray could can use their own to fire two missiles during overwatch.

One thing I found interesting, is that I Sniper Drones do not have a networked markerlight in their unit anymore. So the spotter cannot give the drones a better BS.

Very interesting...

All drones now fire at the BS of the drone controller. So they will be firing at BS 5 anyway.

Zachectomy wrote:
Onager gauntlet? Am I the only one that find that a little rude?

Yep

"The onager was a Roman siege engine that is a type of catapult that uses a torsional force, generally from twisted rope, to store energy for the shot."

Zachectomy wrote:
Onager gauntlet? Am I the only one that find that a little rude?

Or is it... not a reference to "donkey punching"?

I've always associated onagers to seige equipment, so I went to look it up on wikipedia. I never new it was a type of equine.

Thats freaking hilarious.

I can't wait to donkey punch my first land raider.

@pretre, the "onager" catapult was so named because 'onager' in Latin is Donkey in english - it had such recoil that it "kicked like a donkey".

So, yes, I think we now have canon that donkey punching is part of Tau warfare doctrine. Because it's pretty good at demoralizing your foes, right? Always hits *rear armor* if you know what I mean.

Didnt i read that our darkstrided stripped an armor point as well as a toughness.....helpful for anti AV14 maybe?

uberjoras wrote:
@pretre, the "onager" catapult was so named because 'onager' in Latin is Donkey in english - it had such recoil that it "kicked like a donkey".

So, yes, I think we now have canon that donkey punching is part of Tau warfare doctrine. Because it's pretty good at demoralizing your foes, right? Always hits *rear armor* if you know what I mean.

I lol'ed. im literally changing my list to include one of these (cheap!)

cant wait to start donkey punching me some tanks

uberjoras wrote:
@pretre, the "onager" catapult was so named because 'onager' in Latin is Donkey in english - it had such recoil that it "kicked like a donkey".

I'm aware. That is still reaching though. Which is more likely? That they were referring to a weapon when naming a weapon or referring to a sexual act?

 tetrisphreak wrote:
I can't wait to donkey punch my first land raider.

Seriously...you may not be able to get away with it all the time but hell the first or second game you play with this codex, they arent going to expect you to go after any of their tanks in close combat....bring in a suit that can do the S10 falcon punch...the look on your mates faces will be priceless...with the right upgrades you can really smack the crap out of that tank.

the courier called me earlier my codex and goodies are arriving within 18 hours

Wow... Guys... Faeit 212 posted my pics, but they should totally contact me first, because then I could give a source (spoilered to be sure) for the other pics too:


Hope they will see this .

Probably seeing what slips by the editors, honestly. Onagers are a catapult, I dunno if I would name a melee weapon after an artillery piece myself... It'd be like calling a chainsword a Howitzer.

I'm going to go with both, regardless of what the actual origin was. I'd like to think that somewhere there is a writer that still retains a little bit of the old school GW humor.

boy wonder wrote:

 Ovion wrote:

 boy wonder wrote:
can anyone tell me how many hardpoints each suit has? cheers

From what I've gathered, it' Commander = 4, Other Battlesuits = 3, Stealth/Broads = 1.


Has there been any word on if any Honour Guard is still there? Are we still able to take 84 Firewarriors? (or even 96 now!?)

cheers! how bout the riptide?

it looks like honour guard are out.. :(

Riptide appears to have it own specific options for its gun, and a twin-hardpoint I think, but I could be wrong!

n0t_u wrote:Anyone else think this way when they saw the full pic of the tank dude?

This sort of things been floating about a lot....
So tempted to scratchbuild some speakers and a turntable for one of my Hammerheads.

Does anyone have any idea/suggestions/know of a good way to get a lot of drones other than buying the suit boxes and whatnot?

 Stormcrow wrote:
Does anyone have any idea/suggestions/know of a good way to get a lot of drones other than buying the suit boxes and whatnot?

Look for used lots. Most old tau players have waaaay too many drones.

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?prodId=prod1060312

Also that kit has 4 gun drones for 10.75. Buy it and convert.

Great idea; thanks for the input

 Ovion wrote:

boy wonder wrote:

 Ovion wrote:

 boy wonder wrote:
can anyone tell me how many hardpoints each suit has? cheers

From what I've gathered, it' Commander = 4, Other Battlesuits = 3, Stealth/Broads = 1.


Has there been any word on if any Honour Guard is still there? Are we still able to take 84 Firewarriors? (or even 96 now!?)

cheers! how bout the riptide?

it looks like honour guard are out.. :(

Riptide appears to have it own specific options for its gun, and a twin-hardpoint I think, but I could be wrong!

n0t_u wrote:Anyone else think this way when they saw the full pic of the tank dude?

This sort of things been floating about a lot....
So tempted to scratchbuild some speakers and a turntable for one of my Hammerheads.

mate....do it....just do it...

Also, I would like to add that one should really think about "how hard it is to kill a riptide."

I run a destroyer lord (toughness 6) a lot with my Tau with a 2+ save and I sometimes detach him. Sure, he's hard to kill I suppose, but you WILL roll those ones at dumb times, and they will throw some sort of AP2/1 at it.

My point is that if you rely on 2 or more and expect them to be "Really hard to kill" and rely on that for the meat of your army, you may be disappointed at inopportune times when it counts, especially considering you can't hide it.

Also, just consider how many times you've fought against a Dreadknight and then think on what it took to kill it, and if it was really as hard as you thought. Maybe it was, maybe it wasn't.

 Stormcrow wrote:
Does anyone have any idea/suggestions/know of a good way to get a lot of drones other than buying the suit boxes and whatnot?

Im not sure if I am allowed to mention or advocate Ebay listings but a quick search of the site led me to
some interesting listings, I will summarize

one that had 15 drones for 20 dollars
another that had 26 drones for 15 dollars

seems like if one wanted some second hand drones for conversion, its the place to go.

Hans_Einberg wrote:

mate....do it....just do it...

Oh snap have a wub down vs the darkangel darkshroud dj station.

So about the skyray, does anyone know about the "ongoing barrage" thing that was rumored? Or is it simply the missiles?

Also, for the markerlights, when it says to expend one and shoot a seeker, does that mean it's either "expend one for a bonus of your choice and shoot the missle" or "choose to either expend one and fire a missile or pick a bonus"?

Do the new markerlights fire before or after you shoot your weapon? I've seen conflicting viewpoints here (i.e. can a skyray shoot at something, markerlight it up, and then fire its missiles at it) but does anyone know for sure?

Finally, just to clarify, are ALL markerlights usable by the whole army now, or is it only like last codex where only "networked markerlights" can be used by the army.

Sorry for these questions but I've seen a lot of different viewpoints on each and I've had local people ask me and I frankly can't sift through all the chatter on here to confirm.

I'm really excited TBH, it was an interesting challenge to make the old dex work and this one looks just as fun.

 AtoMaki wrote:
Wow... Guys... Faeit 212 posted my pics, but they should totally contact me first, because then I could give a source (spoilered to be sure) for the other pics too:

Spoiler:

4chan, /tg/, topic with Darkstrider in the OP

Hope they will see this .

Don't know about Faeit, but it looks like GW did...as the pics just got taken down.

 Stormcrow wrote:
So about the skyray, does anyone know about the "ongoing barrage" thing that was rumored? Or is it simply the missiles?

Also, for the markerlights, when it says to expend one and shoot a seeker, does that mean it's either "expend one for a bonus of your choice and shoot the missle" or "choose to either expend one and fire a missile or pick a bonus"?

Do the new markerlights fire before or after you shoot your weapon? I've seen conflicting viewpoints here (i.e. can a skyray shoot at something, markerlight it up, and then fire its missiles at it) but does anyone know for sure?

Finally, just to clarify, are ALL markerlights usable by the whole army now, or is it only like last codex where only "networked markerlights" can be used by the army.

Sorry for these questions but I've seen a lot of different viewpoints on each and I've had local people ask me and I frankly can't sift through all the chatter on here to confirm.

Before, obviously. You have to mark the target before laying down the pain.

It appears that all can be used by the army. I have not yet seen anything that says other wise.

To use the seeker special rules you have to spend a markerlight token.

The Riptide does seem to have plenty of wounds on top of the T6 2+/5++. I think the best way to run it would be to use it as bait to draw it towards stealth suits, firewarriors, and/or pathfinders. Basically using it as a giant shield, even using the nova reactor to buff the shield just so it will soak up more fire or just get flat out ignored. If the enemy charges then they will have to deal with a literal wave of support fire.

And throw on Interceptor and Skyfire just so that it can't be ignored.

I can't wait to fight against new tau. These guys look fun

I realize it's way early but what are everyone's gut reaction to the new codex thus far?

Will it be competitive in the tournament scene? Just so-so?

Wait. Seekers have to be fired at the same target the vehicle shoots at? That's a downer. So that means if the vehicle can't fire any weapons because it turbo-boosted I couldn't spend marker tokens to fire missiles. There goes the plan for tubro boosting Piranha into rear armor. Seriously, they did tone down a lot for a struggling army.

 CrazyBones wrote:
I realize it's way early but what are everyone's gut reaction to the new codex thus far?

Will it be competitive in the tournament scene? Just so-so?

They look better than before. How they actually work on the field though is anyone's guess.

Do tau have any S9 weapons? I know they have a S10 weapon, a few S8 weapons and many S7 weapons, but what would be their lascannon equivalent?

 Savageconvoy wrote:
Wait. Seekers have to be fired at the same target the vehicle shoots at? That's a downer. So that means if the vehicle can't fire any weapons because it turbo-boosted I couldn't spend marker tokens to fire missiles. There goes the plan for tubro boosting Piranha into rear armor. Seriously, they did tone down a lot for a struggling army.

Where on earth did you hear this heresy?

that would be awful.

 Savageconvoy wrote:
The Riptide does seem to have plenty of wounds on top of the T6 2+/5++. I think the best way to run it would be to use it as bait to draw it towards stealth suits, firewarriors, and/or pathfinders. Basically using it as a giant shield, even using the nova reactor to buff the shield just so it will soak up more fire or just get flat out ignored. If the enemy charges then they will have to deal with a literal wave of support fire.

And throw on Interceptor and Skyfire just so that it can't be ignored.

I personally think adding the FnP to the Riptide is one of the best ways to go. It's the only way he gets a chance to ignore the wound caused by the Nova reactor since it allows no saves. Pricey, but worth it IMO.

Says in addition to any other weapons they are allowed to fire. So it's extra shots. Not sure if it would be able to be fired after turbo-boosting but it does have the ignore cover rule which is pretty sweet.

 Desubot wrote:

 Savageconvoy wrote:
Wait. Seekers have to be fired at the same target the vehicle shoots at? That's a downer. So that means if the vehicle can't fire any weapons because it turbo-boosted I couldn't spend marker tokens to fire missiles. There goes the plan for tubro boosting Piranha into rear armor. Seriously, they did tone down a lot for a struggling army.

Where on earth did you hear this heresy?

that would be awful.

It was one of the leaked codex pages, under the marker light rule. Maybe we are missing something, but that seems to be implication.

If you dont mind used drones, ebay is your best bet.
If you want new, GW has them for £6.50 for 4.

Not stupidly expensive, but still not as cheap as ebay

 Hulksmash wrote:
Says in addition to any other weapons they are allowed to fire. So it's extra shots. Not sure if it would be able to be fired after turbo-boosting but it does have the ignore cover rule which is pretty sweet.

Ai, but are seeker missiles blast though? That would be nasty against light infantry.

Kitbashing the new drones is going to be pretty easy. I'll probably use some paulson parts for missile drones, though, since crisis missile pods are in short supply already.

Edit: disregard post

Dakka double posting then wiping both of them upon editing....dont have the patience to re write
this is getting fairly annoying.

 Desubot wrote:

Hans_Einberg wrote:

mate....do it....just do it...

Oh snap have a wub down vs the darkangel darkshroud dj station.

Don't forget Mighty Iron DJ Thunderhead!

 Magc8Ball wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

Hans_Einberg wrote:

mate....do it....just do it...

Oh snap have a wub down vs the darkangel darkshroud dj station.

Don't forget Mighty Iron DJ Thunderhead!

Let the wargame rap battle commence

And the only thing comes to mind is this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYKUa0iREwE

There was a rumor earlier that crisis suits have blacksun filters and multitrackets standard but I didn't see that shown in any of the linked or posted pics yet. Do any or all suits get "free" standard systems in addition to the ones they have the option of buying? The armor armory page with the entries for crisis/broadside/stealth suits hasn't apparently hit the preview pic circuit just yet.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 CrazyBones wrote:
I realize it's way early but what are everyone's gut reaction to the new codex thus far?

Will it be competitive in the tournament scene? Just so-so?

They look better than before. How they actually work on the field though is anyone's guess.

Do tau have any S9 weapons? I know they have a S10 weapon, a few S8 weapons and many S7 weapons, but what would be their lascannon equivalent?

There is none. Only S9 weapon seems to be overcharged S9 large blast from Riptide. S10 Railgun is limited to Hammerheads, which you can take three at most.

Tau actually have plenty of S8 now: Seekers, Broadsides, various Ion weapon large blasts, Fusion blasters.

It looks like Tau will be really scary dealing with the infantry, including multi-wound infantry which was very difficult before. However, against tanks they don't look so hot.

Yeah, seeker missiles went from being mediocre to being garbage. The entire point was that you stuck them on your transports and they gave markerlight squads on-demand access to krak missiles. Now you need to spend a markerlight, and roll to hit, and use them on the same target as the rest of the vehicle.

Can we get a confirmation of this seeker missile stuff?

 CrazyBones wrote:
I realize it's way early but what are everyone's gut reaction to the new codex thus far?

Will it be competitive in the tournament scene? Just so-so?

Looks a lot more versatile than the old Codex, with more potential options. I suspect that, like the other 6th edition books, it will be quite competitive but take a while for the community to figure out (IMO none of the 6e books are fully understood at present).

Any word on tau vehicles firing as though they were fast?

Also, any word on what an advanced targeting system will do for a vehicle?

 warboss wrote:
There was a rumor earlier that crisis suits have blacksun filters and multitrackets standard but I didn't see that shown in any of the linked or posted pics yet. Do any or all suits get "free" standard systems in addition to the ones they have the option of buying? The armor armory page with the entries for crisis/broadside/stealth suits hasn't apparently hit the preview pic circuit just yet.

Multi-trackers and Blacksun filters exist for the Battlesuits, but are not listed amongst "Support systems" wargear list: I guess it means they all have it.

Tau vehicles took a big swing from the Nerf bat, and this is my biggest grieve of the Codex. There doesn't seem to be Targeting Arrays, Multi-trackers or Target locks, or equivalent thereof. Seeker Missiles seem to be dumbed down as well.

Backfire wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 CrazyBones wrote:
I realize it's way early but what are everyone's gut reaction to the new codex thus far?

Will it be competitive in the tournament scene? Just so-so?

They look better than before. How they actually work on the field though is anyone's guess.

Do tau have any S9 weapons? I know they have a S10 weapon, a few S8 weapons and many S7 weapons, but what would be their lascannon equivalent?

There is none. Only S9 weapon seems to be overcharged S9 large blast from Riptide. S10 Railgun is limited to Hammerheads, which you can take three at most.

Tau actually have plenty of S8 now: Seekers, Broadsides, various Ion weapon large blasts, Fusion blasters.

It looks like Tau will be really scary dealing with the infantry, including multi-wound infantry which was very difficult before. However, against tanks they don't look so hot.

Well, to be fair, the necrons don't really have that many hi strength weapons available either, and they do a decent job.

From my memory, they have

2 S10 weapons - one of which is one shot only and not worth the cost, and one is on a pricy flyer

3 S8 weapons - Eldritch lance, particle whip and heat ray, only 1 of which can really be deployed en mass.

3 S9 weapons - Heavy Gauss Cannon, Doomsday cannon and trans-dimensional thunderbolt, and they aren't very common.

1 S7 weapon - Tesla destructor, which is comparatively common.

They do have gauss and entropy, but it could be argued that the tau's access to S5 and S6 weapons fulfill the same role.

Backfire wrote:

 warboss wrote:
There was a rumor earlier that crisis suits have blacksun filters and multitrackets standard but I didn't see that shown in any of the linked or posted pics yet. Do any or all suits get "free" standard systems in addition to the ones they have the option of buying? The armor armory page with the entries for crisis/broadside/stealth suits hasn't apparently hit the preview pic circuit just yet.

Multi-trackers and Blacksun filters exist for the Battlesuits, but are not listed amongst "Support systems" wargear list: I guess it means they all have it.

Tau vehicles took a big swing from the Nerf bat, and this is my biggest grieve of the Codex. There doesn't seem to be Targeting Arrays, Multi-trackers or Target locks, or equivalent thereof. Seeker Missiles seem to be dumbed down as well.

Target locks are still in. Suit multi-trackers are supposed to be built in. Targeting Arrays are out however.

Seeker missiles required to shoot at same target as rest of vehicle??? WTF? Could someone have maybe mistaken SMART missile for SEEKER missile in translating the leaked pages? That would be a huge change (and a nerf slegde) if true... :-/

I'm thinking that we're going to see a lot of Mark'Os (Battlesuit commander attached to Markerdrone Squadron) in the near future.

 Thaylen wrote:

Backfire wrote:

 warboss wrote:
There was a rumor earlier that crisis suits have blacksun filters and multitrackets standard but I didn't see that shown in any of the linked or posted pics yet. Do any or all suits get "free" standard systems in addition to the ones they have the option of buying? The armor armory page with the entries for crisis/broadside/stealth suits hasn't apparently hit the preview pic circuit just yet.

Multi-trackers and Blacksun filters exist for the Battlesuits, but are not listed amongst "Support systems" wargear list: I guess it means they all have it.

Tau vehicles took a big swing from the Nerf bat, and this is my biggest grieve of the Codex. There doesn't seem to be Targeting Arrays, Multi-trackers or Target locks, or equivalent thereof. Seeker Missiles seem to be dumbed down as well.

Target locks are still in. Suit multi-trackers are supposed to be built in. Targeting Arrays are out however.

Target locks and Multi-trackers exist for the Battlesuits, but they don't seem to be listed in Vehicle equipment list: and vehicle Codex entries don't show them either, or at least I haven't seem them.

"Advanced targeting system" for the battlesuits gives Precision shot on 5+ rather than 6+, but I'm not sure it does same thing with vehicles.

Jefffar wrote:
I'm thinking that we're going to see a lot of Mark'Os (Battlesuit commander attached to Markerdrone Squadron) in the near future.

heh, Battlesuit Commander and his mobile drone party... :-)

You guys are so upbeat. Please temper your enthusiasm a bit.....

Beast wrote:
Seeker missiles required to shoot at same target as rest of vehicle??? WTF? Could someone have maybe mistaken SMART missile for SEEKER missile in translating the leaked pages? That would be a huge change (and a nerf slegde) if true... :-/

Markerlight entry explicitly says that Seeker missile can be only fired if the vehicle/battlesuit has them, and has to be fired at same target like rest of the weapons. Basically it's like more complicated version of Hunter-Killer missile. Infantry no longer can call Seeker missiles.

Backfire wrote:


It looks like Tau will be really scary dealing with the infantry, including multi-wound infantry which was very difficult before. However, against tanks they don't look so hot.

That summarizes my feelings, although I would include that they should give flyer heavy lists issues as well, being the only army right now with a lot of units that can take skyfire. The fact is they have a lot of new anti infantry options, whether it be missile-sides, cheap sniper kroot squads, and new pie-plate options with the Riptide and Hammerhead.

However, their anti-tank options are limited and I think fusion crisis suits are going to become almost compulsory so that you're not entirely reliant on the Hammerhead and Riptide to take out AV14 vehicles. Overall not a killer, but the fact is they join the Tyranids and Orks (maybe daemons since I know nothing about their rules and don't say Eldar because they have lance) as the only armies without a S9+ weapon that isn't mounted on a tank, IC, or MC. It's a deficiency but their are options for handling it.

Jefffar wrote:
I'm thinking that we're going to see a lot of Mark'Os (Battlesuit commander attached to Markerdrone Squadron) in the near future.

Hehe.

"Mark'o!"
"Polo!"

I feel like this has promise. Battlesuit tag?

Will it be competitive in the tournament scene? Just so-so?

Some of the new Tau stuff looks great. You use the great stuff and I'm sure you have a good army. You use the stuff you like for whatever random reason and your army will probably suffer for it. The same as it's for every other 40K army.

Well, to be fair, the necrons don't really have that many hi strength weapons available either, and they do a decent job.

Come on. Spammable Necron vehicles come with S7 guns that hit more than 5 times per turn (better than 5x BS3 autocannons/missile pods), and their throwaway Gauss/Haywire squads are the best anti-tank in the game due to stripping you out of your hull points before you can say 'AV14 is garbage'. I bring 9 TL Tesla Destructors (~48 BS3 autocannons/missile pods) and 5 Voltaic Staffs myself into 1850 points. I doubt anything really compares, but while the Tau don't have spammable Haywire nor Gauss special rules, they do get plenty of S7 throughout the army (and S6 rending) and will probably deal with heavy armor with mass Fusion Blasters. I can't really see any need for Railguns at all if you have a ton of 18" range meltaguns on units that can move and shoot and keep moving.

 Therion wrote:

Will it be competitive in the tournament scene? Just so-so?

Some of the new Tau stuff looks great. You use the great stuff and I'm sure you have a good army. You use the stuff you like for whatever random reason and your army will probably suffer for it. The same as it's for every other 40K army.

Well, to be fair, the necrons don't really have that many hi strength weapons available either, and they do a decent job.

Come on. Spammable Necron vehicles come with S7 guns that hit more than 6 times per turn, and their throwaway Gauss/Haywire squads are the best anti-tank in the game due to stripping you out of your hull points before you can say 'AV14 is garbage'. I bring 9 TL Tesla Destructors and 5 Voltaic Staffs myself into 1850 points. The Tau don't have spammable Haywire nor Gauss special rules, but they get plenty of S7 throughout the army (and S6 rending) and will probably deal with heavy armor with mass Fusion Blasters. I can't really see any need for Railguns at all if you have a ton of 18" range meltaguns on units that can move and shoot and keep moving.

I'm pretty sure I said S7 was common in a necron list.
I forgot about the voltaic staffs though. I personally never use them because of their short range.

You left out the part where nearly every tau unit has access to a S5 weapon that can easily rip away hull points on light vehicles. That's pretty much their answer to gauss. Not as good as gauss, but they are slightly cheaper.
Just how much fusion can a tau list take? It sounds a bit scary.

Backfire wrote:

Beast wrote:
Seeker missiles required to shoot at same target as rest of vehicle??? WTF? Could someone have maybe mistaken SMART missile for SEEKER missile in translating the leaked pages? That would be a huge change (and a nerf slegde) if true... :-/

Markerlight entry explicitly says that Seeker missile can be only fired if the vehicle/battlesuit has them, and has to be fired at same target like rest of the weapons. Basically it's like more complicated version of Hunter-Killer missile. Infantry no longer can call Seeker missiles.

Seeker Missles were never amazing to begin with.

A S8 AP3 weapon you have to roll to hit with twice, that is one time use only and costs 10 points...not great. Plus it burned marker lights. I've never once had them be worth a damn (in about 6-8 seeker missles shots I've never even glanced or wounded a model with them).

To be honest, so far from the rumors, I see some nice tweaks, and some not nice tweaks. Removing Targeting Arrays - bad, marker lights are arguably worse (I've always thought them to be mediocre, given you need a BS 3 model to hit first to then help another unit, and Pathfinders have to all fire at the same unit...bad). The Riptide sounds decent, cheaper everything was badly needed (Crisis Suits were to expensive for what they did as were firewarriors), multiple drone units (now, have to see the codex and see if they're no longer used against unit morale, because they shouldn't count against a unit for morale or break tests, like they have at times), upgraded fusion blasters sound nice (as before they were pointless on crisis suits that were not a suicide mon'at).

What I would have liked to see, given how marker light crazy the leaks seem to be, is that a marker light lasts the whole turn for the whole army (i.e. everything can fire with the marker light bonus if shooting the marked item) and make pathfinders all have target locks or make them 'combat squadable' by breaking them up into squads of 2 (a spotter and a rifleman).


That said, best to get the codex and read through it to really gripe or praise.

Double post

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Just how much fusion can a tau list take? It sounds a bit scary.

If there are no restrictions on twinlink + 1 weapons on suits, 45 less then half being twin linked


Edit: sorry 53 with farsight.

@ therion

Oh, I wasn't worried about them not getting into range. I was worried about them getting charged by the angry squad of marines/orks/whatever that just happens to be inside/next to the vehicle.

for anti-tank: shadowsun with command-link drone, with 6 stealthsuits and 2 fusion blasters.

That gives you 4 twin linked fusion blast shots and you jump 3d6 away because of shadowsun's warlord trait.

does that sound feasable or do I have to think of something else

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Just how much fusion can a tau list take? It sounds a bit scary.

If there are no restrictions on twinlink + 1 weapons on suits, 45 less then half being twin linked

Blimey, that's scary. Good thing they are short ranged then.

I'm still amazed people are saying markerlights are worse.

3 ML's = All cover gone and hitting on BS4.

That's pretty decent if you ask me compared to the old system which on 4+ Cover save would take 4 ML's. On 3+ Cover it's even better. 5+ Cover it is the same.

Arguably we now have more areas to put markerlights to help out each other. I play against a lot of cover loving armies (IG and Dark Eldar) so even just taking their cover save off will help me massively.

So fireknives now are going to be twin linked plasma, single linked missile, built in multitracker?

 gr1m_dan wrote:
I'm still amazed people are saying markerlights are worse.

3 ML's = All cover gone and hitting on BS4.

That's pretty decent if you ask me compared to the old system which on 4+ Cover save would take 4 ML's. On 3+ Cover it's even better. 5+ Cover it is the same.

Arguably we now have more areas to put markerlights to help out each other. I play against a lot of cover loving armies (IG and Dark Eldar) so even just taking their cover save off will help me massively.

Not taking a stance on whether MLs are a good or bad, but to remove all cover for one unit and give it +1BS you need 6 marker lights, not 3, since you have to hit with them.

On average; ymmv.

It seems though that you can take more ML, so it balances it out I guess.

I'm just excited thinking about wiping guard blobs off the map on turn one by denying cover and hitting on 2's....

 Hulksmash wrote:
I'm just excited thinking about wiping guard blobs off the map on turn one by denying cover and hitting on 2's....

Why hitting on 2s?

 gr1m_dan wrote:
I'm still amazed people are saying markerlights are worse.

3 ML's = All cover gone and hitting on BS4.

That's pretty decent if you ask me compared to the old system which on 4+ Cover save would take 4 ML's. On 3+ Cover it's even better. 5+ Cover it is the same.

Arguably we now have more areas to put markerlights to help out each other. I play against a lot of cover loving armies (IG and Dark Eldar) so even just taking their cover save off will help me massively.

3 markerlights hitting, so 6 markerlights fired and that just hurts 1 unit with one of your units. The biggest problem with markerlights is that they don't benefit their own squad and apparently only Skyrays and the Bomber get the networked. They now need to shoot at the same target as a vehicle and are now going to be difficult to maneuver one unit into marker range and another with the seeker missiles it can shoot with... wait

Ok, can I shoot at a unit that I don't have line of site to? The seeker missile ignores line of sight, but I have to be shooting to spend the token and that target is out of the vehicles field of vision. Does this work?

Anyways, markerlights suffer from the problem that they aren't a unit buff, they are another unit's buff. Pathfinders are a huge target and the only real boost they get are drones to keep them out of CC, which makes you wonder who would bother with that. Seriously, just about every weapon ignores their armor, not that 5+ on a T3 model really helped in the first place.

Aren't markerlights 36" range? What's wrong with putting them in cover and letting the pathfinders snipe?

Can anyone confirm the strength of a Kroot Hound in the English codex? It clearly says strength 3 in the Spanish leaks, but I hear a lot of people talking about them still being strength 4.

 MajinMalak wrote:

 Savageconvoy wrote:
The Riptide does seem to have plenty of wounds on top of the T6 2+/5++. I think the best way to run it would be to use it as bait to draw it towards stealth suits, firewarriors, and/or pathfinders. Basically using it as a giant shield, even using the nova reactor to buff the shield just so it will soak up more fire or just get flat out ignored. If the enemy charges then they will have to deal with a literal wave of support fire.

And throw on Interceptor and Skyfire just so that it can't be ignored.

I personally think adding the FnP to the Riptide is one of the best ways to go. It's the only way he gets a chance to ignore the wound caused by the Nova reactor since it allows no saves. Pricey, but worth it IMO.

Absolutely agree, Stimulant Injector on Riptides seems like a complete no-brainer. Essentially for 35 points you get to re-roll failed invulnerable saves AND get a 5+ against wounds caused by a failed Nova charge.

Being T6 means you'll get that FNP roll against most everything, even S10.

Extra marker lights. 4=hitting on 2's and no cover.

Anyone notice that marker lights can be used to increase snap fire BS? Meaning if you land markerlight hits on a flyer you can increase the BS beyond one.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Aren't markerlights 36" range? What's wrong with putting them in cover and letting the pathfinders snipe?

Because things that kill pathfinders really good are 36" range as well. Think about it this way, you're going up against Tau and want to hurt him and help your unit the most with one round of shooting. What are you going to shoot at? Pathfinders obviously since it will hurt his entire BS3 SHOOTING ARMY. If you can even get them to run or go to ground, you're still causing a significant impact on the rest of his army. I guess my deal isn't with markerlights, it's with pathfinders in general.

I can't see any reason to take them over something like the Shas'O Why-am-I-more-expensive-now with his Marker drone squadron or tetras, which are fast and will still be able to move 12 and fire.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Hulksmash wrote:
Extra marker lights. 4=hitting on 2's and no cover.

Anyone notice that marker lights can be used to increase snap fire BS? Meaning if you land markerlight hits on a flyer you can increase the BS beyond one.

In YMDC the argument was that you're not snap-firing but just "acting like you're snap-firing"

The wording is messed up but it's basically going to increase the BS3 to BS4, then get reduced down to BS1 due to the set modifier if I'm remembering right.

 Savageconvoy wrote:

 Hulksmash wrote:
Extra marker lights. 4=hitting on 2's and no cover.

Anyone notice that marker lights can be used to increase snap fire BS? Meaning if you land markerlight hits on a flyer you can increase the BS beyond one.

In YMDC the argument was that you're not snap-firing but just "acting like you're snap-firing"

The wording is messed up but it's basically going to increase the BS3 to BS4, then get reduced down to BS1 due to the set modifier if I'm remembering right.

that's the way it used to be. With the wording of the markerlight rules on some leaked images, the codex specifically says that it also improves snapshots nad overwatch, meaning you can easily fire those shots at a BS greater than one, given that multiple units are all firing together.

Zachectomy wrote:
Onager gauntlet? Am I the only one that find that a little rude?

Or is it... not a reference to "donkey punching"?

Well, several things come to mind. One is that there was an ancient siege engine that was called an Onager, after the way it kicked on recoil, and the name is more likely a reference to the Onager's kick than to modern slang. Second is that an Onager is not really a donkey, but the "donkey punch" bit amuses me, and will continue to do so whenever I field it. Also, since it's more an ass than a donkey...well...I'm still giggling over that one, too.

 gr1m_dan wrote:
I'm still amazed people are saying markerlights are worse.

3 ML's = All cover gone and hitting on BS4.

That's pretty decent if you ask me compared to the old system which on 4+ Cover save would take 4 ML's. On 3+ Cover it's even better. 5+ Cover it is the same.

Common cover save is now 5+, including most wargear cover saves, so most of the time it's the same. Of course new system is better against Stealth, ruins etc. which give better cover save.

Yea Seeker Missiles were never that great, but they were fun and fluffy piece of wargear. Problem always was that Markerlights were so expensive that you almost never wanted to waste them firing Seekers. Now ML's look plentiful, but infantry can no longer use them.

 Savageconvoy wrote:
Wait. Seekers have to be fired at the same target the vehicle shoots at? That's a downer. So that means if the vehicle can't fire any weapons because it turbo-boosted I couldn't spend marker tokens to fire missiles. There goes the plan for tubro boosting Piranha into rear armor. Seriously, they did tone down a lot for a struggling army.

From what I remember, shooting a Seeker Missile does not count as your shot for the turn nor does it count towards the max number of missiles you can shoot. So from that, if you Turbo-Boost and have not shot you should still be able to expend a ML to shoot the missile.

 Lysenis wrote:

 Savageconvoy wrote:
Wait. Seekers have to be fired at the same target the vehicle shoots at? That's a downer. So that means if the vehicle can't fire any weapons because it turbo-boosted I couldn't spend marker tokens to fire missiles. There goes the plan for tubro boosting Piranha into rear armor. Seriously, they did tone down a lot for a struggling army.

From what I remember, shooting a Seeker Missile does not count as your shot for the turn nor does it count towards the max number of missiles you can shoot. So from that, if you Turbo-Boost and have not shot you should still be able to expend a ML to shoot the missile.

It specifically mentions that Seekers are counted for the 2 missile maximum allowance and it fires in addition to other weapons. So if it turbo boosts it can't fire anything.

 Kanluwen wrote:

Jefffar wrote:
I'm thinking that we're going to see a lot of Mark'Os (Battlesuit commander attached to Markerdrone Squadron) in the near future.

Hehe.

"Mark'o!"
"Polo!"

I feel like this has promise. Battlesuit tag?

Yeah, trying to think of a battlesuit commander configuration we could call the Pol'o

 Lysenis wrote:

 Savageconvoy wrote:
Wait. Seekers have to be fired at the same target the vehicle shoots at? That's a downer. So that means if the vehicle can't fire any weapons because it turbo-boosted I couldn't spend marker tokens to fire missiles. There goes the plan for tubro boosting Piranha into rear armor. Seriously, they did tone down a lot for a struggling army.

From what I remember, shooting a Seeker Missile does not count as your shot for the turn nor does it count towards the max number of missiles you can shoot. So from that, if you Turbo-Boost and have not shot you should still be able to expend a ML to shoot the missile.

It only doesn't count towards the number of full BS shots a vehicle can shoot, but also Does count towards the number of missiles a flyer can shoot. i think it implies that it is in fact a shooting attack of the vehicle which must expend the marker token for itself. no longer able to call random shots by infantry which i always though was cool.

so Turbo boosting which takes place of your shooting probably a no go, will have to see if they faq it

 Rented Tritium wrote:
So fireknives now are going to be twin linked plasma, single linked missile, built in multitracker?

I'm not sure if Fireknife will be the staple that it was.

Yes it's good, but it maybe a case of taking a unit of Twinlinked Fusion with another weapon to crack the shell of a tank and another unit of Twinlinked Plasma with another weapon the crack the nuts inside.

Only question is... Burst Cannon and TL Plasma? 6 shots at 12" that can do quite well against heavy and light infantry.

I think the humble Burst Cannon will make a great secondary weapon.

skyrays need a lot more love in order to take them. Once you fire all your missiles by turn 3 they are a waste of space.

 Lysenis wrote:

 Savageconvoy wrote:
Wait. Seekers have to be fired at the same target the vehicle shoots at? That's a downer. So that means if the vehicle can't fire any weapons because it turbo-boosted I couldn't spend marker tokens to fire missiles. There goes the plan for tubro boosting Piranha into rear armor. Seriously, they did tone down a lot for a struggling army.

From what I remember, shooting a Seeker Missile does not count as your shot for the turn nor does it count towards the max number of missiles you can shoot. So from that, if you Turbo-Boost and have not shot you should still be able to expend a ML to shoot the missile.

Yes, it does not count towards your total shots, but that is not the problem.

You move. In the shooting phase, you can either shoot or turbo-boost. You can not do both. Since you chose turbo-boost, you can not fire your weapons. Since the seeker is now considered part of your weapons system and not just a piece of wargear that can be activated by someone else, you can not use it unless firing.

As far as everything goes, the seeker missile is now an 8 point, one time use, glorified smart missile that needs a marker light to work.

Backfire wrote:

 gr1m_dan wrote:
I'm still amazed people are saying markerlights are worse.

3 ML's = All cover gone and hitting on BS4.

That's pretty decent if you ask me compared to the old system which on 4+ Cover save would take 4 ML's. On 3+ Cover it's even better. 5+ Cover it is the same.

Common cover save is now 5+, including most wargear cover saves, so most of the time it's the same. Of course new system is better against Stealth, ruins etc. which give better cover save.

Yea Seeker Missiles were never that great, but they were fun and fluffy piece of wargear. Problem always was that Markerlights were so expensive that you almost never wanted to waste them firing Seekers. Now ML's look plentiful, but infantry can no longer use them.

My local scene has a lot of buildings/ruins and ADLs so 3/4+ cover save is common (and annoying for me) but basically I'll be taking off their cover saves and they won't be taking mine off :-D It's still better in this edition than the last one now. I hit with 4 Markerlights and that 4+ Cover save is gone and one unit I have is hitting on BS5 - this could take a massive chunk out of a Guard Blob from a Hammerhead Sub blast or from the Riptide, etc.

We have the option of taking MARKER DRONE squads - T4, 4+ Armour and with a drone controller on our Shas'O - we now have BS5 Marker Drones. Take that.

The most important thing in 40k is target priority.

Anyone else thinking that they want to just keep playing with their old codex? I feel bad for complaining about it.

"Be careful for what you wish for..."

No.

I don't.

I want to use Riptide and my Falcon Pawnch.

 gr1m_dan wrote:
No.

I don't.

I want to use Riptide and my Falcon Pawnch.

I don't want people use the new codex.

I'd rather not have my monoliths get donkey punched by hooved fishmen.

jazzpaintball wrote:
Anyone else thinking that they want to just keep playing with their old codex? I feel bad for complaining about it.

"Be careful for what you wish for..."

Nope, as no one has played with the army yet, and there are plenty of options to explore.

Particularly looking forward to pathfinder outflanking shenanigans and mark'os

I have read the codex cover to cover and I can say that I am very happy with it.

Only problem is that elites and fast attack seem a little crowded when writing lists. You seem to get a lot of infantry for little points, devilfish still seems expensive IMO

Fighter and riptide seem good. All in all a great codex and certainly the best since necrons IMO

what page are these leaked codex photos on? People are arguing and I have no idea whats going on.

Lovepug13 wrote:
I have read the codex cover to cover and I can say that I am very happy with it.

Only problem is that elites and fast attack seem a little crowded when writing lists. You seem to get a lot of infantry for little points, devilfish still seems expensive IMO

Fighter and riptide seem good. All in all a great codex and certainly the best since necrons IMO

You have the dex? Prepare to be asked many questions by people on this thread

I'll start...

Are pulse rifles still 30"?

What do ion rifles do?

Any new aliens?

Also, I think I missed what exactly this 'donkey punch' thing is.

Additionally - do we still have honour guard???

 Ovion wrote:
Also, I think I missed what exactly this 'donkey punch' thing is.

Apparently, there's a new weapon called a Onager gauntlet, which is a S10 melee weapon that hits at initiative (apparently).

Onager is another word for donkey. So basically, GW just put a dirty joke into their codex

Ovion - Our Suits get access to a piece of wargear (can't remember name) that allows us to "punch" a tank at S10 AP1 - hence FALCON PUNCH!!! Completely against Tau doctrine but it's going to be funny as hell :-D

To answer some questions:
1.) Tau Battleforce is scheduled for 1st week in May.
2.) Author is Jeremy Vetock. And in the background section, he did a good job.
3.) Strength of Kroot Hound is 3

Zachectomy wrote:
Onager gauntlet? Am I the only one that find that a little rude?

4.) This actually IS the polite version, as according to this dictionary http://www.thefreedictionary.com/onager , Onager = Wild Ass

jazzpaintball wrote:
Anyone else thinking that they want to just keep playing with their old codex? I feel bad for complaining about it.

"Be careful for what you wish for..."

Yes. I started to play Tau because of cool tanks and vehicles, but the new Codex dumbs them down to unrecognizable. I'm not going to enjoy playing vehicles with those rules, and probably won't. Also, to play the new Codex, I'd have to remodel my battlesuits, and I don't feel like doing it.

 Kroothawk wrote:
To answer some questions:
3.) Strength of Kroot Hound is 3

Thanks, Kroot. When I began complaining about how poor Kroot are in close combat I was told that hounds were still a great buy at S 4, I 5, A 2. I'm a little disappointed to learn that I was right...

At least now I know I can start ordering parts for some more count-as stuff in the Dark Eldar codex! I've always pictured Kroot as being the equivalent of Eldar in close combat, just without the technology.

 McNinja wrote:
what page are these leaked codex photos on? People are arguing and I have no idea whats going on.

The blogs that had it were served takedown notices. 4chan's /tg/ had it, but the thread was deleted due to churn. People will probably repost them there in one of the blueberry threads in an hour or so.

 Kroothawk wrote:
To answer some questions:
1.) Tau Battleforce is scheduled for 1st week in May.
2.) Author is Jeremy Vetock. And in the background section, he did a good job.
3.) Strength of Kroot Hound is 3

Zachectomy wrote:
Onager gauntlet? Am I the only one that find that a little rude?

4.) This actually IS the polite version, as according to this dictionary http://www.thefreedictionary.com/onager , Onager = Wild Ass

"Then, having gotten behind him, I let loose with a wild ass punch..."

That's going to be even more fun than powerfisting an opponent, for a bit.

Funny. The tau got a weapon that Slaanshi marines should have

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Lovepug13 wrote:
I have read the codex cover to cover and I can say that I am very happy with it.

Only problem is that elites and fast attack seem a little crowded when writing lists. You seem to get a lot of infantry for little points, devilfish still seems expensive IMO

Fighter and riptide seem good. All in all a great codex and certainly the best since necrons IMO

You have the dex? Prepare to be asked many questions by people on this thread

I'll start...

Are pulse rifles still 30"?

What do ion rifles do?

Any new aliens?

1. Yes
2. Standard - str 7 ap 4 rapid fire / overcharged - str 8 ap4 heavy 1 blast gets hot - range for both 30"
3. No new aliens although there is a new etheral character called aun'shi the master of the blade. I5 ws 5 with 4 attacks. Has a special rule in challenge where he can re-roll hits or give himself rending

Hope it helps

 Oaka wrote:
At least now I know I can start ordering parts for some more count-as stuff in the Dark Eldar codex! I've always pictured Kroot as being the equivalent of Eldar in close combat, just without the technology.

To be fair Kroot have NEVER been awesome/good in combat against anything other than Guardsmen (and that's at a push) but now our weapons are AP5 I may field them more for some anti-Guard anti-Dark Eldar Warrior killing.

Lovepug13 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Lovepug13 wrote:
I have read the codex cover to cover and I can say that I am very happy with it.

Only problem is that elites and fast attack seem a little crowded when writing lists. You seem to get a lot of infantry for little points, devilfish still seems expensive IMO

Fighter and riptide seem good. All in all a great codex and certainly the best since necrons IMO

You have the dex? Prepare to be asked many questions by people on this thread

I'll start...

Are pulse rifles still 30"?

What do ion rifles do?

Any new aliens?

1. Yes
2. Standard - str 7 ap 4 rapid fire / overcharged - str 8 ap4 heavy 1 blast gets hot - range for both 30"
3. No new aliens although there is a new character called aun'shi the master of the blade. I5 ws 5 with 4 attacks. Has a special rule in challenge where he can re-roll hits or give himself rending

Hope it helps

Aun'shi is an old-school character, that I like quite a bit. Glad he's back.

Any word on Honour Guard, or taking Firewarrior squads outside of the standard 6xTroops?

 gr1m_dan wrote:

 Oaka wrote:
At least now I know I can start ordering parts for some more count-as stuff in the Dark Eldar codex! I've always pictured Kroot as being the equivalent of Eldar in close combat, just without the technology.

To be fair Kroot have NEVER been awesome/good in combat against anything other than Guardsmen (and that's at a push) but now our weapons are AP5 I may field them more for some anti-Guard anti-Dark Eldar Warrior killing.

True, but I'm more worried about the neutering of the base Kroot statline. The Kroot Mercenary army list was only viable because they had S 4, they were a type of reverse-Ork, with the extra strength instead of toughness. Now that the Tau codex has cemented the Kroot statline, it makes it much more unlikely that Kroot in a rumored Allies Supplement can be that good in close combat. Anyone that has models for a Kroot Mercenary army has them modeled and equipped for close combat, not the new cheap sniper role they have been given, so it isn't easily translated into their new role in the Tau Codex. Hence, I have to use my models as something else now. If the new Ork codex has Squiggoths, then I'll be set, but until then, I guess it has to be Dark Eldar...

 Ovion wrote:

Lovepug13 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Lovepug13 wrote:
I have read the codex cover to cover and I can say that I am very happy with it.

Only problem is that elites and fast attack seem a little crowded when writing lists. You seem to get a lot of infantry for little points, devilfish still seems expensive IMO

Fighter and riptide seem good. All in all a great codex and certainly the best since necrons IMO

You have the dex? Prepare to be asked many questions by people on this thread

I'll start...

Are pulse rifles still 30"?

What do ion rifles do?

Any new aliens?

1. Yes
2. Standard - str 7 ap 4 rapid fire / overcharged - str 8 ap4 heavy 1 blast gets hot - range for both 30"
3. No new aliens although there is a new character called aun'shi the master of the blade. I5 ws 5 with 4 attacks. Has a special rule in challenge where he can re-roll hits or give himself rending

Hope it helps

Aun'shi is an old-school character, that I like quite a bit. Glad he's back.

Any word on Honour Guard, or taking Firewarrior squads outside of the standard 6xTroops?

No honour guard, looking at the book now it suggests that aun'va still has 2 x two wound ethereal guards. Fire warriors can be six men and you can go up to twelve in team.

I was disappointed to note that if you buy sky fire for broadsides and suits etc it cannot be passed on to drones.....

Are Ethereals actually useful this time?

And does the Space Pope give your opponent an easy victory like he did the last time.

 Oaka wrote:

 gr1m_dan wrote:

 Oaka wrote:
At least now I know I can start ordering parts for some more count-as stuff in the Dark Eldar codex! I've always pictured Kroot as being the equivalent of Eldar in close combat, just without the technology.

To be fair Kroot have NEVER been awesome/good in combat against anything other than Guardsmen (and that's at a push) but now our weapons are AP5 I may field them more for some anti-Guard anti-Dark Eldar Warrior killing.

True, but I'm more worried about the neutering of the base Kroot statline. The Kroot Mercenary army list was only viable because they had S 4, they were a type of reverse-Ork, with the extra strength instead of toughness. Now that the Tau codex has cemented the Kroot statline, it makes it much more unlikely that Kroot in a rumored Allies Supplement can be that good in close combat. Anyone that has models for a Kroot Mercenary army has them modeled and equipped for close combat, not the new cheap sniper role they have been given, so it isn't easily translated into their new role in the Tau Codex. Hence, I have to use my models as something else now. If the new Ork codex has Squiggoths, then I'll be set, but until then, I guess it has to be Dark Eldar...

Ah in that case it is quite a bad turn for you. Mine are modelled as standard Kroot and in 5th they were ace but 6th killed them off with most cover saves being toss and woods being horrible. Now being cheap snipers could see them back in my list.

Did no one else notice on the pics that the markerlights didn't seem to be limited to increasing bs to a maximum of 5, or that there doesn't seem to be a restriction on using a markerlight for more markerlights? Or did I somehow skip a sentence somewhere?

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Are Ethereals actually useful this time?

And does the Space Pope give your opponent an easy victory like he did the last time.

Etherals give failure not an option.......use e thermals leadership 10 for all leadership type tests for units within 12 inches. However if killed in vp game then gives away an additional vp

Also gives invocation of elements.......4 elemental powers. Use one per turn. All friendly non vehicle units within 12"affected....

Calm of tides: all affected models stubborn

Storm of fire: pulse weapons fire extra shot - only works on one unit

Sense of stone: affected models get 6+ feel no pain

Zephyrs grace. Can snap shot after running

Lovepug13 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Are Ethereals actually useful this time?

And does the Space Pope give your opponent an easy victory like he did the last time.

Etherals give failure not an option.......use e thermals leadership 10 for all leadership type tests for units within 12 inches. However if killed in vp game then gives away an additional vp

Also gives invocation of elements.......4 elemental powers. Use one per turn. All friendly non vehicle units within 12"affected....

Calm of tides: all affected models stubborn

Storm of fire: pulse weapons fire extra shot - only works on one unit

Sense of stone: affected models get 6+ feel no pain

Zephyrs grace. Can snap shot after running

I think they are army wide, not 12".

Space pope is now better. He can invoke two ethereal powers a turn and has the exemplar warlord trait which allows units that go to ground to act normally next turn.

He also has a signature system where the ap of the weapon shooting him is his save.

He seems ok but not an auto take imo


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ashikenshin wrote:

Lovepug13 wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Are Ethereals actually useful this time?

And does the Space Pope give your opponent an easy victory like he did the last time.

Etherals give failure not an option.......use e thermals leadership 10 for all leadership type tests for units within 12 inches. However if killed in vp game then gives away an additional vp

Also gives invocation of elements.......4 elemental powers. Use one per turn. All friendly non vehicle units within 12"affected....

Calm of tides: all affected models stubborn

Storm of fire: pulse weapons fire extra shot - only works on one unit

Sense of stone: affected models get 6+ feel no pain

Zephyrs grace. Can snap shot after running

I think they are army wide, not 12".

I have the book with me......12" matey

I don't get the ethereals powers.
Do you want to be stubborn or lose and fall back/get wiped out. Also why even bother, if you're using an ethereal then you get to reroll LD8, which isn't too bad.

Storm of Fire I think only works well on the one, so it's like a dakka banner except terrible. It's nice on one unit hiding behind the ADL, but can't see it for much else.

6+ FNP? Um... I'll pass. Thanks for trying.

Snap shooting after running is actually pretty good. It actually gives us a reason to move up aggressively and still be able to fire. Best of all the snap shooting is boosted by markerlights now so you can still get some decent shooting while making a run. This is probably the only reason I'd take one, and I can't see the use of paying extra points for another one.

Overall I give it a 2/10, would not engage in battle with.

 gr1m_dan wrote:

 Oaka wrote:
At least now I know I can start ordering parts for some more count-as stuff in the Dark Eldar codex! I've always pictured Kroot as being the equivalent of Eldar in close combat, just without the technology.

To be fair Kroot have NEVER been awesome/good in combat against anything other than Guardsmen (and that's at a push) but now our weapons are AP5 I may field them more for some anti-Guard anti-Dark Eldar Warrior killing.

Only problem is Dark Eldar will kill you. Kroot have only 1 attack now, S3. Kroot would usually eat Guardsmen alive, but now it's pretty even.

In fact Kroot are no better than Fire Warriors in combat now.

 Savageconvoy wrote:
I don't get the ethereals powers.
Do you want to be stubborn or lose and fall back/get wiped out. Also why even bother, if you're using an ethereal then you get to reroll LD8, which isn't too bad..

You can use etherals ld10 which is ok I guess. Failure not an option special rule

Do kroot still have that forest special rule?

If so, does that mean they are more like guerilla fighters/ snipers?

 Savageconvoy wrote:
I don't get the ethereals powers.
Do you want to be stubborn or lose and fall back/get wiped out. Also why even bother, if you're using an ethereal then you get to reroll LD8, which isn't too bad..

You can use etherals ld10 which is ok I guess. Failure not an option special rule

 Savageconvoy wrote:
I don't get the ethereals powers.
Do you want to be stubborn or lose and fall back/get wiped out. Also why even bother, if you're using an ethereal then you get to reroll LD8, which isn't too bad.

Storm of Fire I think only works well on the one, so it's like a dakka banner except terrible. It's nice on one unit hiding behind the ADL, but can't see it for much else.

6+ FNP? Um... I'll pass. Thanks for trying.

Snap shooting after running is actually pretty good. It actually gives us a reason to move up aggressively and still be able to fire. Best of all the snap shooting is boosted by markerlights now so you can still get some decent shooting while making a run. This is probably the only reason I'd take one, and I can't see the use of paying extra points for another one.

Overall I give it a 2/10, would not engage in battle with.

I have been very impressed with what's been released so far and I will probably try these out but to be honest it would mostly be for the LD10 we can use for LD checks of any type. Aun' is apparently really cheap?

Kroot get stealth (woods)

Space pope is 100 points
Aun'shi is 110 points

Phew - glad I bought woods for a reason...

What is an honor blade exactly?

Carried by etherals, +2 strength ap4 melee

Lovepug13 wrote:
Carried by etherals, +2 strength ap4 melee

Huh, so a bit better than before.

Bad for my orks, manageable for my necrons

AP4?! Urgh. Still, we are not meant to be CC monsters, and I guess Aun dude can choose to go Rending. Good for last ditch stuff I guess.

 gr1m_dan wrote:
AP4?! Urgh. Still, we are not meant to be CC monsters, and I guess Aun dude can choose to go Rending. Good for last ditch stuff I guess.

Before it was +1 strength and AP-, iirc, so its an improvement, imo.

Any other questions before I go to bed lol?

Oh no definitely an improvement just thought it would be AP3 but like I say we are not meant to be CC Monsters so it's nothing I will loose sleep over

Lol, a tau with an AP3 melee weapon who is not in a suit.

As if that would happen.

Looks like a lot of questions flying around. You can find most of the leaked pics here: (not taking credit, this has been posted before on pg 105)

http://forofreakfactory.mforos.com/1035375/11167664-rumores-tau/

It starts in spanish, but if you scroll to the newer posts found at the bottom you can see the english leaked pages. Probably answer a lot of questions.

Lovepug13 wrote:
Carried by etherals, +2 strength ap4 melee

You sure? Spanish entry seems to say +2S AP-. But that might be a typo, Spanish edition seems to have bunch of them.

He does have the book...

Backfire wrote:

Lovepug13 wrote:
Carried by etherals, +2 strength ap4 melee

You sure? Spanish entry seems to say +2S AP-. But that might be a typo, Spanish edition seems to have bunch of them.

Yer sorry, I wrote down the stat for an equaliser. The correct stat is ap dash. Sorry boys lol it's also two handed

Well, that's certainly not that useful.

Anyone know what bonding knives do? They are only 1 pt but is it per model or does only one model need them now?

What is this Fireblade I keep hearing of?

Must fight urge to start Tau army

 lambsandlions wrote:
Anyone know what bonding knives do? They are only 1 pt but is it per model or does only one model need them now?

They are purchased unit wide, like grenades. Gives the unit heroic morale - always rest to regroup on full ld even when below 25%.

 ShatteredBlade wrote:
Must fight urge to start Tau army

Ditto. Fortunately, I have a tiny wallet.

 lambsandlions wrote:
Anyone know what bonding knives do? They are only 1 pt but is it per model or does only one model need them now?

Bonding knife ritual is first special rule in book....,,always tests on unmodified leadership

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
What is this Fireblade I keep hearing of?

New warrior sized hq with some good stats and nifty special rules.

Is the codex released yet? I have seen many people writing stats and fluff posts.

 tetrisphreak wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
What is this Fireblade I keep hearing of?

New warrior sized hq with some good stats and nifty special rules.

What sort of special rules? How many can you take?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Brother Captain Alexander wrote:
Is the codex released yet? I have seen many people writing stats and fluff posts.

It seems that some people have received their preorders. I don't think it's in the stores yet.

They are a hq option with bs5 has a marker light, 3 wounds, 60 points, volley fire which means if you are stationary you can fire an additional shot with rifles and carbines. Seems good but is a hq slot which is a downside imo

the weasel king wrote:
Did no one else notice on the pics that the markerlights didn't seem to be limited to increasing bs to a maximum of 5, or that there doesn't seem to be a restriction on using a markerlight for more markerlights? Or did I somehow skip a sentence somewhere?

Yeah, but going over 5 isn't actually good. Each point added over 5 only adds 1/36 chance to hit per shot and if you are already twin-linked, you have to take it at BS5 anyway as you can't reroll twice.

So while it's possible to boost above 5, it will almost never be worth it.

 Rented Tritium wrote:

the weasel king wrote:
Did no one else notice on the pics that the markerlights didn't seem to be limited to increasing bs to a maximum of 5, or that there doesn't seem to be a restriction on using a markerlight for more markerlights? Or did I somehow skip a sentence somewhere?

Yeah, but going over 5 isn't actually good. Each point added over 5 only adds 1/36 chance to hit per shot and if you are already twin-linked, you have to take it at BS5 anyway as you can't reroll twice.

So while it's possible to boost above 5, it will almost never be worth it.

But it's great for those Gets hot! overcharged weapons, no? Also BS5+ is big deal for Blasts.

 Rented Tritium wrote:

the weasel king wrote:
Did no one else notice on the pics that the markerlights didn't seem to be limited to increasing bs to a maximum of 5, or that there doesn't seem to be a restriction on using a markerlight for more markerlights? Or did I somehow skip a sentence somewhere?

Yeah, but going over 5 isn't actually good. Each point added over 5 only adds 1/36 chance to hit per shot and if you are already twin-linked, you have to take it at BS5 anyway as you can't reroll twice.

So while it's possible to boost above 5, it will almost never be worth it.

Boosting the riptide to bs6 allows him to re roll gets hot with his nova charge weapons and the ion overcharge.

Lovepug13 wrote:
They are a hq option with bs5 has a marker light, 3 wounds, 60 points, volley fire which means if you are stationary you can fire an additional shot with rifles and carbines. Seems good but is a hq slot which is a downside imo

What kind of gear options he has?

 Crimson wrote:

Lovepug13 wrote:
They are a hq option with bs5 has a marker light, 3 wounds, 60 points, volley fire which means if you are stationary you can fire an additional shot with rifles and carbines. Seems good but is a hq slot which is a downside imo

What kind of gear options he has?

He can take 2 drones from the drone list.

^^^^^^^^^^this^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Keep in mind that when the ethereal dies, the whole army doesn't have to make a moral check anymore with chances to flee. Instead, the opponent gets a VP if VPs are used. So it got better, even when competition in the HQ slot is hard.

BTW here the upcoming daft punk bundle:
(this Apocalypse formation gets favored enemy Justin Bieber )
Lead DJ


DJ assistants


Lead Vocals:


Background Vocals:


Lead Guitar


Drums


Keyboards

Lovepug13 wrote:
^^^^^^^^^^this^^^^^^^^^^^^^

No fancy weapons? Only pulse carbine or rifle, right? And is that overtly complex armour just for show?

 Crimson wrote:

Lovepug13 wrote:
^^^^^^^^^^this^^^^^^^^^^^^^

No fancy weapons? Only pulse carbine or rifle, right? And is that overtly complex armour just for show?

He's got the 4+ save for that fancy armour, so no better than regular FWs. He's got a pulse rifle with a markerlight, allows his squad to fire 1 more shot if it remains still... That's 60 pts
(He doesn't get the option to swap his rifle for a carbine) He's also got the "split fire" USR which would allow him, if you pass a ld check, to shoot another target instead, maybe to get a missile off on a vehicle?

 B0B MaRlEy wrote:

He's got the 4+ save for that fancy armour, so no better than regular FWs. He's got a pulse rifle with a markerlight, allows his squad to fire 1 more shot if it remains still... That's 60 pts
(He doesn't get the option to swap his rifle for a carbine) He's also got the "split fire" USR which would allow him, if you pass a ld check, to shoot another target instead, maybe to get a missile off on a vehicle?

Ah, OK. Somehow I was expecting more options... Characters usually get to at least choose from few different weapons. Oh well, It's still a nice addition.

To those who bemoan the loss of targeting arrays -

Old suit with TA/plasma/missiles was 67 pts, could only fire 1 weapon system and hit 67% of the time.

New suit with twin linked plasma/regular missiles (or vice versa) is 57 points, hits 75% of the time with the twin linked system PLUS 50% of the time with the auxiliary gun.

How is that worse? It's a buff across the board - even vehicle SMS are twin linked now. Mobility of skimmers aside, suits are definitely more efficient now.

Until I get my codex tomorrow night, I can't say for sure but these are the first impressions that I got.

A lot of things that I have advocated for the Tau made it into the new codex. (Yay!) Just in ways that are overly conservative(read to much balancing that may keep the Tau mediocre.

Seriously, some really good things in this dex and some really?? WTF were they thinking ones too.


The Good:
Markerlights became better(Looks like the limit of the BS to only 5 improvement is gone.) They streamlined the system a little but maybe not enough.

Drones- Increase in variety and uses. Missile Drones(YES!), Marker Drone price drop, Looks like Toughness is now a flat 4 for most drones. Drones gain a Turbo-boost type ability???(Haven't seen confirmation on this one), Orphaned drones are no longer auto destroyed, Etc., Etc....
Only thing that would have made me happier would be if they had made more drone units so that we could run a drone army.

SC's are useful in a synergistic way rather than being stand alone superheroes. Only complaint could be that they seem to push the Tau into being a xenos version of IG.

Fire Warriors are perfect at 9 points WITH photons, 11 points with EMP's

EMP's now straight Haywire

Battlesuits- Price drop, cheap Twin-linked Plasma and new/better options to make them more survivable

Fusion blaster now 18"

Supporting Fire rule


The Bad
No improvement in innate shooting ability with experience. Never wanted BS4 FW's but battlesuits and non-fast vehicles should have been BS 4.

Over reliance on one piece of wargear. Looking at you Markerlights. Where the lists may be more varied, it will still be fire markerlight and then focus fire on the marked target. In old book you had ability to have better BS without the markerlight system and as such you could build lists that played using different synergies. Seems like Markerlights will be a must take in this 'dex. This will make the Tau predictable and easy to neutralize. Tau without markers just seem like they will not be effective.

S9+ weapon scarcity. Not a complaint about the B-sides but about a shooting based army that doesn't get any outside of Heavy support. Wouldn't be bad if we had S8 Lance or rending weapons but I feel that this move may excessively limit viable build options.

Hammerhead and D-fish losing Fire as if Fast hurts. Yes, Markers can now compensate for this but this again just forces a predictable over reliance on one mechanic.

D-fish not getting a price reduction. Yes, their weapons got marginally better but I feel that they lost too much in wargear options. Will have to see if Missle drones can be bought for them and whether that will make them viable.

No new transport option, If any army needs a well armed/shooty transport, it is the Tau...yet no luck. This combined with no heavy weapons in troops will force the Tau into a predictable build strategy
(The last three Make it seem that Mech-Tau mayt not be viable.)

Kroot- Nerfed stats and still only stealth in Woods??WTF? There was no need to nerf the kroot stats just because the can buy Sniper Rounds. The stealth only in the wood thing is idiotic,(Yeah, I am an intelligent species that are stealthy hunters and highly adaptable, but I suddenly forget to walk quietly and to use shadows just because I am in a field/city/ruins. Just chalk it up GW needlessly limiting options for non-Imperial factions



& The Meh
Targeting arrays going away. wouldn't even miss them if GW had even considered that ability improves over time(Vets get better BS)

Pathfinders- Armour reduction was expected and fits the look of the model. Pathfinders not getting stealth sucks. Not having to take transport is good.
The Tau new over-reliance upon markerlights will make them high priority targets that are a little too squishy.

Vespids, Yes they are improved but it sounds like not enough. As full members of the Tau empire, they should have access to Tau wargear.(Grenades anyone?)

XV104- Very meh, It does provide another elite option, question is will it be worth it for the points. Many Tau players run xv8 crisis teams of 92-145pts. Buying a 165pt base that will probably be 200+ fielded for a unit with less shots just sounds very *meh*

Fighter and Bomber- Both more expensive than a Vendetta with lower av, weaker guns, no transport ability and limited to 3 fliers per FOC(Unless bomber is a HS choice). Yes they will be useful, just not as useful as an Imperial ally's fliers will be.

Cadre Fireblade- Sacrifice mobility to get extra pulse weapon shot for squad. As is, This guy and our now slower vehicles just do not fit in a game where they spent the past six years making everything faster and mobile.


To sum up
Yes there is more than what I typed but these were the pertinent things. As to how we Tau players adapt????

Shadowsun in a Drone Squadron of Marker Drones would be a solid start or maybe with a stealth fusion team and some marker drones.

2Crisis Teams of Plas Fusion will almost be a must. Weapon ranges now compliment and we can now get missiles elsewhere. We will need those fusion guns on the board.

Third Elite???Pick any of the 3.

4 x 8-9 man teams of EMP Fire warriors at 11pts ea, FTW. In 5th ed I popped about as many LR's and Monoliths with EMP grenades as with railguns. In this edition, assaulting vehicles is so easy that even Tau can do it. Just remember to find a way to block all of the access points that won't put all of your scoring units at risk if the vehicle explodes.

Maybe a Kroot sniper squad in a Bastion? Or, maybe stretch an ADL through some woods?

1 Gun/Marker drone squad for shadowsun

Pick 2 of either Flier or 2 PF squads


Take one Hammerhead with the Ace in it

Take either 2 skyrays , 2 IonHeads or 2 teams of 2 Broadsides. Unless the Bomber is a HS and then it would be an option also.



This is what the codex suggests to me so far trying to play the Tau.

Thing is, what the codex seems to suggest overall is that the Tau were not designed to be played as an army unto themselves but rather were designed to have to take allies or to provide units for other armies.

Just orderd the limited edition codex before they run out.

Can someone explain the rumor that markerlights can boost overwatch? I'm not seeing how this is possible. You can't have a unit fire the overwatched marker, then use the token to boost the rest of the unit, as the markerlight rules explicitly say a unit cannot benefit from its own lights. Also, unused tokens get removed at the end of the shooting phase, so you can't use spares from there either.

Maybe I missed something?

Samurai_Eduh wrote:
Can someone explain the rumor that markerlights can boost overwatch? I'm not seeing how this is possible. You can't have a unit fire the overwatched marker, then use the token to boost the rest of the unit, as the markerlight rules explicitly say a unit cannot benefit from its own lights. Also, unused tokens get removed at the end of the shooting phase, so you can't use spares from there either.

Maybe I missed something?

Nope, I don't think they can.

The tau do apparently get a rule called supporting fire, which allows squads in a certain radius to make overwatch shots as well, and there is a piece of gear that resolves overwatch at BS2

Samurai_Eduh wrote:
Can someone explain the rumor that markerlights can boost overwatch? I'm not seeing how this is possible. You can't have a unit fire the overwatched marker, then use the token to boost the rest of the unit, as the markerlight rules explicitly say a unit cannot benefit from its own lights. Also, unused tokens get removed at the end of the shooting phase, so you can't use spares from there either.

Maybe I missed something?

Using the supporting fire rule, a unit with MLs can snap fire at a charging unit if they are the target or near the target. Then other supporting fire units (those within 6") can burn any ML hits and use them to boost their over watch.

 tetrisphreak wrote:

Samurai_Eduh wrote:
Can someone explain the rumor that markerlights can boost overwatch? I'm not seeing how this is possible. You can't have a unit fire the overwatched marker, then use the token to boost the rest of the unit, as the markerlight rules explicitly say a unit cannot benefit from its own lights. Also, unused tokens get removed at the end of the shooting phase, so you can't use spares from there either.

Maybe I missed something?

Using the supporting fire rule, a unit with MLs can snap fire at a charging unit if they are the target or near the target. Then other supporting fire units (those within 6") can burn any ML hits and use them to boost their over watch.

Huh, that makes sense. A bit of a risky tactic though. Those MLs are hitting on 6s after all.

Hold on, there's a thought. Can markerlights improve the chances of more markerlights hitting?

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Huh, that makes sense. A bit of a risky tactic though. Those MLs are hitting on 6s after all.

Hold on, there's a thought. Can markerlights improve the chances of more markerlights hitting?

Apparently yes. At least I haven't seen anything to contrary.

Anyone else thinking of using a riptide for their AA needs? Heavy burst cannon, TW fusion blaster, skyfire and interceptor? ^^

 tetrisphreak wrote:
Old suit with TA/plasma/missiles was 67 pts, could only fire 1 weapon system and hit 67% of the time.

Except nobody ever took that setup. It was either MP/PR/MT or MP/PR/TA on a suit with HWMT. So 77 points for shooting both weapons with a 67% chance to hit. Now you save 20 points, but you have one weapon at 75% and one at 50%. In theory that's not a bad trade, but it makes markerlight use really inefficient since the TL gun isn't getting much benefit if you use markerlights to boost the single gun.

How is that worse?

Besides the math reasons it's worse for fluff as well. We're the dedicated shoot-only army with advanced technology and only a handful of HQ models can shoot better than a basic guardsman. This is incredibly stupid, and it's really frustrating that now you can't even compensate for it with TAs on your crisis suits and vehicles.

 Peregrine wrote:

 tetrisphreak wrote:
Old suit with TA/plasma/missiles was 67 pts, could only fire 1 weapon system and hit 67% of the time.

Except nobody ever took that setup. It was either MP/PR/MT or MP/PR/TA on a suit with HWMT. So 77 points for shooting both weapons with a 67% chance to hit. Now you save 20 points, but you have one weapon at 75% and one at 50%. In theory that's not a bad trade, but it makes markerlight use really inefficient since the TL gun isn't getting much benefit if you use markerlights to boost the single gun.

How is that worse?

Besides the math reasons it's worse for fluff as well. We're the dedicated shoot-only army with advanced technology and only a handful of HQ models can shoot better than a basic guardsman. This is incredibly stupid, and it's really frustrating that now you can't even compensate for it with TAs on your crisis suits and vehicles.

Let me be frank - I think 'vre ranked tau should be bs4 due to their 8+ years of military service and familiarity with their weapon systems. It makes excellent sense from a fluff standpoint.

We didn't get that, however, unless the codex is RIFE with typos.

So I still love my tau and I do like the direction the codex seems to take *overall*. Now is the time to field it for a few months and dig out the combos and gold nuggets that separate a mediocre player from a fantastic one.

 Akaraut wrote:
Anyone else thinking of using a riptide for their AA needs? Heavy burst cannon, TW fusion blaster, skyfire and interceptor? ^^

What's the range on the heavy burst cannon? To have a reasonable 'interceptor bubble' you'd want 24" atleast but preferably 36" or more. If the interceptor rule costs only 5 points for the Riptide it's a no brainer though even if you'd almost never use it.

 Therion wrote:

 Akaraut wrote:
Anyone else thinking of using a riptide for their AA needs? Heavy burst cannon, TW fusion blaster, skyfire and interceptor? ^^

What's the range on the heavy burst cannon? To have a reasonable 'interceptor bubble' you'd want 24" atleast but preferably 36" or more. If the interceptor rule costs only 5 points for the Riptide it's a no brainer even if you'd almost never use it.

Unless it takes up a hardpoint that could be used for something else... dunno what yet though.

One thing to remember is that you can't power the Nova reactor during the enemy's turn for the upgraded Heavy Burst Cannon profile, and if you already shot during the enemy's turn you won't fire on your own turn so you'd be down to taking the 3+ invulnerable save I guess.

 tetrisphreak wrote:

Samurai_Eduh wrote:
Can someone explain the rumor that markerlights can boost overwatch? I'm not seeing how this is possible. You can't have a unit fire the overwatched marker, then use the token to boost the rest of the unit, as the markerlight rules explicitly say a unit cannot benefit from its own lights. Also, unused tokens get removed at the end of the shooting phase, so you can't use spares from there either.

Maybe I missed something?

Using the supporting fire rule, a unit with MLs can snap fire at a charging unit if they are the target or near the target. Then other supporting fire units (those within 6") can burn any ML hits and use them to boost their over watch.

I had though the same initially, but the order in which you apply modifiers screws it up as it's multiply/divide, then add/subtract, then set modifiers. Let's say you have two markerlights on a unit. You have to first add the markerlights, raising the BS from 3 to 5, then you apply the snap shot rule which is a set modifier. This ignores your +2 from the markerlights and sets the BS at 1.

An interceptor/skyfire riptide would have no access to FNP and forgo shooting with any weapons he used to intercept with in a previous phase. Sometimes countering the alpha strike is worth it if it saves some suits or pathfinders from a heldrakes bale flamer. Sometimes it isn't but its nice to have the option.

Personally i would use the ion weapon for it'd higher strength and blast functionality.

Heavy Burst Cannon is 36".

 Peregrine wrote:

Besides the math reasons it's worse for fluff as well. We're the dedicated shoot-only army with advanced technology and only a handful of HQ models can shoot better than a basic guardsman. This is incredibly stupid, and it's really frustrating that now you can't even compensate for it with TAs on your crisis suits and vehicles.

Yeah, besides, BS progression is really weird. Apparently an experienced Shas'vre with most modern Battlesuit in use still can't shoot higher than BS3, but suddenly HQ's have it jump to BS5?? At least old system had logical progression - up until Shas'vre you were BS3, Shas'El BS4, Shas'O BS5. Talking about that, why there is now only one generic Battlesuit commander?

It's obvious that the basic idea of the new Codex is to make you use Markerlights, since you can't hit anything without them, nor move & shoot with your vehicles. But this just makes the Tau look like one-trick pony who can't do anything without their Magic Lazerpens pointing stuff out to them.

 Maelstrom808 wrote:

 tetrisphreak wrote:

Samurai_Eduh wrote:
Can someone explain the rumor that markerlights can boost overwatch? I'm not seeing how this is possible. You can't have a unit fire the overwatched marker, then use the token to boost the rest of the unit, as the markerlight rules explicitly say a unit cannot benefit from its own lights. Also, unused tokens get removed at the end of the shooting phase, so you can't use spares from there either.

Maybe I missed something?

Using the supporting fire rule, a unit with MLs can snap fire at a charging unit if they are the target or near the target. Then other supporting fire units (those within 6") can burn any ML hits and use them to boost their over watch.

I had though the same initially, but the order in which you apply modifiers screws it up as it's multiply/divide, then add/subtract, then set modifiers. Let's say you have two markerlights on a unit. You have to first add the markerlights, raising the BS from 3 to 5, then you apply the snap shot rule which is a set modifier. This ignores your +2 from the markerlights and sets the BS at 1.

Markerlight entry specifically mentions raising BS for both over watch and snap fire purposes. I know, shocking they actually explained how a rule contradicts the BRB without waiting 2 months for a FAQ.

Lovepug13 wrote:
Carried by etherals, +2 strength ap4 melee

Not AP4, AP-.

The paired blades are AP4.

And now I want to do a double detachment so I can have the TMNT as ethereals.


Seriously though, I have Aun'shi, but I will probably use him as a normal ethereal. Unless challenges get to be a real issue.

 tetrisphreak wrote:

 Maelstrom808 wrote:

 tetrisphreak wrote:

Samurai_Eduh wrote:
Can someone explain the rumor that markerlights can boost overwatch? I'm not seeing how this is possible. You can't have a unit fire the overwatched marker, then use the token to boost the rest of the unit, as the markerlight rules explicitly say a unit cannot benefit from its own lights. Also, unused tokens get removed at the end of the shooting phase, so you can't use spares from there either.

Maybe I missed something?

Using the supporting fire rule, a unit with MLs can snap fire at a charging unit if they are the target or near the target. Then other supporting fire units (those within 6") can burn any ML hits and use them to boost their over watch.

I had though the same initially, but the order in which you apply modifiers screws it up as it's multiply/divide, then add/subtract, then set modifiers. Let's say you have two markerlights on a unit. You have to first add the markerlights, raising the BS from 3 to 5, then you apply the snap shot rule which is a set modifier. This ignores your +2 from the markerlights and sets the BS at 1.

Markerlight entry specifically mentions raising BS for both over watch and snap fire purposes. I know, shocking they actually explained how a rule contradicts the BRB without waiting 2 months for a FAQ.

Again, I do not see this in any of the Spanish or English scans. The "Target Acquired" Special rules for markerlights don't mention overwatch or snapfire at all.

EDIT: OK nevermind, found it.

Samurai_Eduh wrote:

Again, I do not see this in any of the Spanish or English scans. The "Target Acquired" Special rules for markerlights don't mention overwatch or snapfire at all.

Look at the "Pinpoint".

Well, if they specifically make allowances for it to work with overwatch/snapfire, it's a great tactic. If not....meh

 tetrisphreak wrote:
An interceptor/skyfire riptide would have no access to FNP and forgo shooting with any weapons he used to intercept with in a previous phase. Sometimes countering the alpha strike is worth it if it saves some suits or pathfinders from a heldrakes bale flamer. Sometimes it isn't but its nice to have the option.

Personally i would use the ion weapon for it'd higher strength and blast functionality.

Which is why i was thinking of having two riptides, leaving the last elite slot for a fusion suit unit. One riptide as the burst cannon/fusion blaster skyfire/interceptor unit, taking those two drones of his to make up for no FNP and providing at least some shooting if he intercepts. While the second riptide takes the ion accelerator, FNP, some other support and maybe no drones to make points for other units.

Bear in mind i'm theory crafting this atm, don't know what i'll actually take until i get my copy of the codex. I just know that i'll base my list as crisis focused as possible, like my current tau are. No vehicles in my list other than tetras! Although as pathfinders are now more point efficient than tetras for markerlights, i'll be likely to swap them out (tetras however have much better mobility, same thing again, need my own codex ^^). It's just that as riptides can have both skyfire/interceptor, unlike broadsides, i feel that they'll make better AA units.

Thanks CleverAntics for the HBC range, 36" is great.

Tetras keeping their disruption pod in their base cost make them still the competitor to pathfinders. Loss of target array in the codex armory makes it a closer choice when picking between the two however.

Edit to add: stealth marker teams are 19 points cheaper (for 2 marker drones plus a ml/TL on the shas'ui). I love mobile markerlights. Going all out with a mark'o unit is viable as well but perhaps overkill.

 tetrisphreak wrote:
Tetras keeping their disruption pod in their base cost make them still the competitor to pathfinders. Loss of target array in the codex armory makes it a closer choice when picking between the two however.

Exactly what i was thinking of when comparing them, the 110 point, BS4, 8 shots are what made the tetras so good, they were quality WITH quantity. At BS3 i honestly think that going for a greater amount of markerlight shots at cheaper cost will be better. Guess we'll have to wait and see how FW updates their rules.

As you said though, they are still the competitor, just earlier today using their mobility and survivability, my teras scored a battle wagon kill flying to it's rear armour and using their TW pulse rifles!

Edit: Missing words, more reading what i've typed before pressing submit!

I love how everyone keeps naysaying the ML doing anything to snapfire and overwatch. Obviously they should have in the last dex as well through the FAQ but didnt. Way to go GW you did at least 1 thing right that is un-disputable for us

However......ANY and ALL ML tokens should be able to be used on any seeker missle by anyone from any platform.....that was the only great about them. They were like special air support.....not just some other weapon....one time use weapon.....lamesauce to the highest degree for sure if this is truly NOT how they work,

I think for marker lights two pathfinder teams will be the way to go. I ran 8 pathfinder and a devil fish last edition and now two teams of 8 cost the same amount to it is pretty good. Sash'O with drone controller might be good, we will have to see. The Sash'O is more expensive, cost a HQ and Fast attack slot, but you can get bs5, skyfire mobile markerlights that can jump in the assault phase.

 tetrisphreak wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 tetrisphreak wrote:
Old suit with TA/plasma/missiles was 67 pts, could only fire 1 weapon system and hit 67% of the time.

Except nobody ever took that setup. It was either MP/PR/MT or MP/PR/TA on a suit with HWMT. So 77 points for shooting both weapons with a 67% chance to hit. Now you save 20 points, but you have one weapon at 75% and one at 50%. In theory that's not a bad trade, but it makes markerlight use really inefficient since the TL gun isn't getting much benefit if you use markerlights to boost the single gun.

How is that worse?

Besides the math reasons it's worse for fluff as well. We're the dedicated shoot-only army with advanced technology and only a handful of HQ models can shoot better than a basic guardsman. This is incredibly stupid, and it's reallky frustrating that now you can't even compensate for it with TAs on your crisis suits and vehicles.

Let me be frank - I think 'vre ranked tau should be bs4 due to their 8+ years of military service and familiarity with their weapon systems. It makes excellent sense from a fluff standpoint.

We didn't get that, however, unless the codex is RIFE with typos.

So I still love my tau and I do like the direction the codex seems to take *overall*. Now is the time to field it for a few months and dig out the combos and gold nuggets that separate a mediocre player from a fantastic one.

Personally I think anything 'ui or higher should be BS 4. Team leaders for Tau should improve in BS and leadership for the most part. Now, with networked Marker lights a firewarrior 'ui makes a lot of sense, as he can direct fire for his squad like you might think the Tau would. It keeps the Marker light idea going, makes crisis suits effective, and doesn't make every army rely on pathfinders or drone hordes.

Soon as codex comes out check for faqed stuff from gamesworkshop all the broken bits will be magically fixed.

I hope they come out with a missile drone pack and a marker light drone pack because I am going to want a ton of them.

Just for those wondering how the Seeker Missiles works. You can use them with a ML token as we have always did, or shoot them with your base BS on the unit its equipped without ignoring cover, and without the need to use ML or such. Also, the Flyers carrys 2 of them, and they can shoot them at will, with the ways i already said.

The codex is just plain awesome, tons of options, sadly, the cibersystems are gone :( and now we must choose only 3 options for the Crisis suits, the Signature armory is just 1 per army too D: at least, VRT are just a Support system, but Iridum armor is 25 pts for 1 unit... Anyway i read it, the codex is VERY balanced, and by VERY i mean that yes, you can pick a realy cheesy unit full powered and ready to smash, but, its not going to be cheap. Riptide (aka Cataclysm on the Spanish Codex) with FNP Drone Controller, Ion Accelerator and support weapon, with the Artillery Drones stan for 278 points, and the Broadside (Aka Apocalypse) full team ready to kill anything that flies is... 279, we at least have the luck that they dont need to pick up the Interceptor, since they CANT if the y pick the Antiair system, but dont panic, we can choose if we shoot to the air, when were going to shoot. Also, only the plasma option needs points, the other weaponry is free.

Theres something i want to know also... Does FNP stacks? I mean, can i pick the stymulant injector to gain FNP 5+, and stack it with the Ethereal ability of FNP 6+ to gain FNP 4+?

I decided, im going into Tau blackout until i get my codex.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
I decided, im going into Tau blackout until i get my codex.

Indeed, with less that 36 hours until I get mine, the discussion and arguements of the approx 70% of the crunch just isn't worth it. I'm too close to have heated discussions on maybes and "I dunno, we'll see, lol!"

No more until I get my hands on that shiny hardcover.