DirtyDeeds wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Stims on an HBC even in the formation are very, very crucial. HBC riptides take a lot more damage than Iontides both because of the mass of Gets Hot, required Nova tests, but also because they sit closer than Iontides.

The stims on the Iontides could be dropped to shave points, since its not AS crucial, but if you arent stressed for points i'd keep them. I usually dont even fill that 2nd support slot if i opt out of stims because nothing else really works (cant precision shot a blast and its alone so no Targetlock requirement)

It might not be as bad in the Riptide wing, but ive ran the ECPA Bursttide a few times and he still takes a ton of self-inflicted damage. Stims are so mandatory on him imo.

Or you can boost your BS to 6 which allows you to reroll 1's to hit.

Never underestimate the HBC while Nova Charged. I recommend two of them.

1) ECPA rerolls 1s as it is, and i said i still take decent self-inflicted damage with it. It helps but it isnt foolproof.
2) He's a necron player allying in a Riptide Wing - he wont have marker support

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Stims on an HBC even in the formation are very, very crucial. HBC riptides take a lot more damage than Iontides both because of the mass of Gets Hot, required Nova tests, but also because they sit closer than Iontides.

The stims on the Iontides could be dropped to shave points, since its not AS crucial, but if you arent stressed for points i'd keep them. I usually dont even fill that 2nd support slot if i opt out of stims because nothing else really works (cant precision shot a blast and its alone so no Targetlock requirement)

It might not be as bad in the Riptide wing, but ive ran the ECPA Bursttide a few times and he still takes a ton of self-inflicted damage. Stims are so mandatory on him imo.

I still think it is a waste of points in the Riptide Wing. On average, you will be getting 2 gets hot rolls from 12 shots with the HBC. Since you have a 2+ armor save, you only have a 1/3 chance of a wound. So with FnP, you having a 1/9 chance of have FnP save a wound. Throughout the course of a game, if you fire it every turn and assuming 5 turns, Stimulant injectors have a 5/9 chance of saving one single wound from gets hots wounds.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vineheart01 wrote:

DirtyDeeds wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Stims on an HBC even in the formation are very, very crucial. HBC riptides take a lot more damage than Iontides both because of the mass of Gets Hot, required Nova tests, but also because they sit closer than Iontides.

The stims on the Iontides could be dropped to shave points, since its not AS crucial, but if you arent stressed for points i'd keep them. I usually dont even fill that 2nd support slot if i opt out of stims because nothing else really works (cant precision shot a blast and its alone so no Targetlock requirement)

It might not be as bad in the Riptide wing, but ive ran the ECPA Bursttide a few times and he still takes a ton of self-inflicted damage. Stims are so mandatory on him imo.

Or you can boost your BS to 6 which allows you to reroll 1's to hit.

Never underestimate the HBC while Nova Charged. I recommend two of them.

1) ECPA rerolls 1s as it is, and i said i still take decent self-inflicted damage with it. It helps but it isnt foolproof.
2) He's a necron player allying in a Riptide Wing - he wont have marker support

ECPA all but eliminate self damage. With 12 shots you get 2 gets hot. reroll those and you have a 1/3 chance of getting 1 gets hot. 2+ armor save makes that 1/18 chance of getting 1 wound with ECPA from gets hot from HBC

Well if he is a Necron Player, he'll have many other fast and pressing threats on the board. Personally, I vote against and never use stims on my riprides. It is far too expensive and Riptides are really durable without the feel no pain.

 Vineheart01 wrote:

2) He's a necron player allying in a Riptide Wing - he wont have marker support

I know you mean for competitive play... your friend is being "that guy" now though haha

Does he even need a riptide wing with necrons? I will be honest. I have never beaten crons with tau. I have had some disgustingly brutal games. I think the closest game I had was 19-21 in maelstrom points on turn 7 and we both had <10% of our lists left on the table.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I think I should add... I have not played necrons with the new tau formations though, that in itself could be a game changer.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:

2) He's a necron player allying in a Riptide Wing - he wont have marker support

I know you mean for competitive play... your friend is being "that guy" now though haha

Does he even need a riptide wing with necrons? I will be honest. I have never beaten crons with tau. I have had some disgustingly brutal games. I think the closest game I had was 19-21 in maelstrom points on turn 7 and we both had <10% of our lists left on the table.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I think I should add... I have not played necrons with the new tau formations though, that in itself could be a game changer.

In a world where Wraithknights and Superfriends exists, I will vehemently state that using Allies of Convenience does not make me "that guy".

Necrons don't have much specialist or high strength shooting, our only option in that regard comes from Destroyers. Riptides are an alternative that have 2+/5++, longer range, Interceptor, and fun things like 3++ or the extra shooting attack from the Formation. I was considering bringing them so I could run out my midfield strength in Wraiths and durable Troops while still having good long range shooting from the 72" Riptides.

Plus, it allows me to make a cool conversion like this guy did

That's awesome!

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:

2) He's a necron player allying in a Riptide Wing - he wont have marker support

I know you mean for competitive play... your friend is being "that guy" now though haha

Does he even need a riptide wing with necrons? I will be honest. I have never beaten crons with tau. I have had some disgustingly brutal games. I think the closest game I had was 19-21 in maelstrom points on turn 7 and we both had <10% of our lists left on the table.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I think I should add... I have not played necrons with the new tau formations though, that in itself could be a game changer.

Its not my friend its the guy in this forum i was referring to.

And two of the main players i face are necrons. I can assure you, our formations help but that damn 4+ Reanimate is still stupid as hell to get through.
My last game, 2k points. I killed like 10 models until the 5th turn then i finally got lucky and ravaged most of his army in one turn - still lost due to maelstrom cards (i stand by those missions removing any and all tactic because they basically hand you points way too often, while shafting the other guy).
Wraiths with a Reanimation is impossible to get through. Think i did 1 wound on them before i managed to get rid of that spider giving them them reanimate (he was hiding behind a rock out of sight)

I didn't see it mentioned, but I feel it's somewhat important. Just got my copy of Mont'ka today, and I can't find a restriction on taking Aun'va or Shadowsun, like in the old codex.

Is the Burning Dawn box any good as a starting point? I was thinking that, some FWs, and maybe a Ghostkeel would make a good starting point.

 Lunar Centurion wrote:
Is the Burning Dawn box any good as a starting point? I was thinking that, some FWs, and maybe a Ghostkeel would make a good starting point.

Good starting models in general would be
1 commander
2 boxes of Fire Warriors (20 Firewarriors)
1 Crisis Squad box (3 crisis suits)

as that will be in "most" armies.

some of the "best" units in the codex are Ghostkeel, Riptides, and Stormsurge

Okay... how many points does that get me to? Iirc, it's 500-ish, I don't have the codex on me. To make it 750, is a Ghostkeel+Pathfinders any good?

 Lunar Centurion wrote:
Okay... how many points does that get me to? Iirc, it's 500-ish, I don't have the codex on me. To make it 750, is a Ghostkeel+Pathfinders any good?

Are you trying to just make a traditional Combined arms detachment (1 HQ and 2 troop minimum)? Or are you planning on doing one of the specific formations/detachments in the codex?

I was planning on be able to run either. In smaller games I'd probably run a CAD, in larger games or more competitive ones, I'd use either the Mont'ka or Kauyon decurions.

 Lunar Centurion wrote:
I was planning on be able to run either. In smaller games I'd probably run a CAD, in larger games or more competitive ones, I'd use either the Mont'ka or Kauyon decurions.

Commander is required for Hunter Contingent/Dawn blade contingent so Id say go with him for HQ
20 Firewarriors will be enough for either a CAD (2x10) or hunter contingent (3x5).

That fulfills the CAD requirements but not hunter contingent yet

You still need a Elite, FA, HS, and 1 Axillary formation for a hunter contingent.

Best options for each category:
Elite: 1-3 Crisis suits, Riptide, or Ghostkeel
FA: Marker Drones or pathfinders
HS: Stormsurge (Big and expensive though), 1-3 Broadsides

And then you need 1 Axilliary formation of which there are quite a few

I think I'll actually stick with the CAD. I prefer flexibility. What's the best list you can run at 750?

Maybe this:

Commander
Crisis Team
2x 10-man Fire Warriors w/ SMS turret
Ghostkeel
Pathfinders

Iirc that's 750pts, depending on upgrades. Is it any good?

 Lunar Centurion wrote:
I think I'll actually stick with the CAD. I prefer flexibility. What's the best list you can run at 750?

Maybe this:

Commander
Crisis Team
2x 10-man Fire Warriors w/ SMS turret
Ghostkeel
Pathfinders

Iirc that's 750pts, depending on upgrades. Is it any good?

That probably will be about 750 points

Commander ~150 points
Crisis Team ~160 points
2x10 Strike team w/ Turret ~200 points
Ghostkeel ~140 points
2x4 Pathfinders - 88 points

Total: ~738 points

It looks pretty good. I would just be careful against any opponents who have high armor vehicles or squads of 2+ armor saves

How would I take those out? For the 2+ armor I'm guessing massed pulse rifle fire, and for the high AV... I guess the Ghostkeel?

About there yeah. Would be very light on pathfinders (6-7 models) but not like you need more than that with low points anyway.

The gear options can easily skyrocket that to closer to 1000pts, so you pretty much cant take any shield generators or more than a couple stims (i would highly recommend stims on the ghostkeel, 35pts but hes going to use it a LOT more than the 50pt 4++ shield gen due to his cover bonuses)

Your anti 2+ armor would be the crisis suits/commander toting Plasma or Melta weapons. Ghostkeels are rate of fire, not AP. They can punch things pretty well but theyre still Tau so that tactic can easily backfire. Ghostkeel's fusion collider is the dumbest weapon we got - if it was 2-3 shots instead of a small blast, we'd love it, but its a damn blast weapon. The Cyclic Ion Raker is 6 S7 AP4 shots with an Overcharge option at S8 AP4 Large Blast Gets Hot. They pump out shots, they dont pen armor typically.
For vehicles, equip one of your crisis suits with duo fusions and targetlocks. Not many things survive 2 melta shots in doublepen range. If its not a walker, the suits can charge it regardless (unless they somehow put a landraider/monolith in a 750pt game lol)

 Lunar Centurion wrote:
How would I take those out? For the 2+ armor I'm guessing massed pulse rifle fire, and for the high AV... I guess the Ghostkeel?

Putting a TL Fusion blaster on ghostkeel with cyclic ion raker could work at that point level for vehicles. Thats 1 Str8 AP1 TL shot (melta) and 6 Str 7 AP 4 shots.

Crisis squad/commander with plasma rifles would be needed for any 2+ armor save squads.

What other upgrades are good?

 Lunar Centurion wrote:
What other upgrades are good?

For ghostkeel, TL fusion blaster upgrade is very good for 10 points. Velocity Tracker is amazing on him if anyone you play has flyers for 20 points. Early Warning Override is also amazing if anyone you play does lots of deep striking or drop pods (5 points)

Iridium armor for commander is also a must (turns t4 / 3+ save into T5/2+ save)

Requizen wrote:

In a world where Wraithknights and Superfriends exists, I will vehemently state that using Allies of Convenience does not make me "that guy".

Necrons don't have much specialist or high strength shooting, our only option in that regard comes from Destroyers. Riptides are an alternative that have 2+/5++, longer range, Interceptor, and fun things like 3++ or the extra shooting attack from the Formation. I was considering bringing them so I could run out my midfield strength in Wraiths and durable Troops while still having good long range shooting from the 72" Riptides.

Plus, it allows me to make a cool conversion like this guy did

Awesome conversion! I'm sorry if I offended. It was not my intent. I know in my area if I walked in with an allied tau formation like that I would be labled lol. Didn't one of the LVO winners run flyrants and the old fire base formation?

Not surprised.

Ironically, i originally bought my tau because my orks needed a way to deal with leman russes at a distance, since the S8 AP3 pi plates would kill everything before i even got halfway across the board. This was a couple months before the 6th codex dropped, and i didnt even know they were getting updated.

Since then ive changed my tone on allies. I hate them. They either break the fluff of the game or give imperials an unfair edge. Only way im OK with it is IG allying in a couple squads of Marines since THAT is fluffy - hoards of guardsmen and a couple ace-in-the-hole marines running around.

So I guess now that we cannot use the correct CFP in tournaments, I have been trying to play around with some other army lists other than HC.

How does this sound for 1850?
Riptide Wing
1 Riptide: HBC, TL FB, EWO, ATS

1 Riptide: HBC, TL FB, EWO, ATS

3 Riptides: IA, EWO, SMS

Optimized Stealth Cadre
3 Stealthsuits: 1 FB, 1 TL

3 Stealthsuits: 1 FB, 1 TL

Ghostkeel: CIR, TL FB, TL, EWO, BKR
Ghostkeel: CIR, TL FB, TL, EWO, BKR
Ghostkeel: CIR, TL BC, VT, EWO, BKR

Drone Net
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones

Still have 17 points to play around with

That's a lot of hate...

Dont you need a proper warlord or your list is considered unbound?

Not 100% sure on that one.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Dont you need a proper warlord or your list is considered unbound?

Not 100% sure on that one.

Nope, the Warlord only needs to be a character.

SJ

Razerous wrote:


Perhaps you've yet to meet a worthy opponent, using a reasonably designed army.

ugh. Just UGH.

notredameguy10 wrote:
So I guess now that we cannot use the correct CFP in tournaments, I have been trying to play around with some other army lists other than HC.

How does this sound for 1850?
Riptide Wing
1 Riptide: HBC, TL FB, EWO, ATS

1 Riptide: HBC, TL FB, EWO, ATS

3 Riptides: IA, EWO, SMS

Optimized Stealth Cadre
3 Stealthsuits: 1 FB, 1 TL

3 Stealthsuits: 1 FB, 1 TL

Ghostkeel: CIR, TL FB, TL, EWO, BKR
Ghostkeel: CIR, TL FB, TL, EWO, BKR
Ghostkeel: CIR, TL BC, VT, EWO, BKR

Drone Net
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones

Still have 17 points to play around with

Literally exactly what I came up with as what may be one of our strongest lists....I just don't want 5 riptides.

I'm probably going to do:

FSE CAD:

Farsight

2 smallish crisis suit squads

2 OSC, as above


Automatically Appended Next Post:

stibemies wrote:
I didn't see it mentioned, but I feel it's somewhat important. Just got my copy of Mont'ka today, and I can't find a restriction on taking Aun'va or Shadowsun, like in the old codex.

There is none. Farsight bomb is definitely a thing. They can't infiltrate, but you can take the formation that allows them to auto-turn 2 deep strike. You can also have a buffmander in the unit (who works just fine with one giant deathstar unit) AND with some careful shenanigans I believe can also make the suit unit to be from a FSE CAD so that the whole blob is obsec. If you care.

The only thing I'm still working on is getting all of that to work without any fat in a single army list (it's a little more complicated than I thought)

So now that we technically cannot share rules via CFP, I was wondering what people opinions were of the different options for Tau.

Hunter Contingent - CFP, Run and shoot, troop tax,
Dawn Blade Contingent - Army wide Doom, troop tax
Just formations - no taxes, less special bonuses
CAD

I can see the benefits of each but I am struggling to decide which one would be the most competitive.

I am planning to run a CAD with an attached OSC. I could probably run it as a Hunter Contingent, but then I'd have to leave the Skyray at home and take that hull as a Hammerhead instead (since I don't have enough Hammerheads to run the Armored cadre).

The Hunter Contingent is still incredibly powerful, and I can easily see taking it.

However, I'll probably be running an FSE with a Retaliation Cad as it's core, and if you honestly wanted the super powerful version of CFP to kill deathstars, the Mont'ka re-roll to wound should be plenty when focus firing the deathstar as you can alter most other stats already.

Additionally, I'll be running a Piranha Wing, a drone network, and if I can find the points (which is likely) I'll have a OSC too. That's a lot of very powerful fire power and super buffed units that were already very efficient.

notredameguy10 wrote:
So now that we technically cannot share rules via CFP, I was wondering what people opinions were of the different options for Tau.

Hunter Contingent - CFP, Run and shoot, troop tax,
Dawn Blade Contingent - Army wide Doom, troop tax
Just formations - no taxes, less special bonuses
CAD

I can see the benefits of each but I am struggling to decide which one would be the most competitive.

To be fair to the DBC, it doesn't really have a troop tax. If you run Retaliation core, you're getting Crisis, Broadsides, and Riptides, all of which you're gonna take regardless. All you need is auxiliaries that can survive to turn 2. Personally I'm looking at DBC with Retaliation, Drone Net, and Skysweep (4 units of BS3 marker drones, plus a D-fish and 3 units of Sky Rays can easily hold out to turn 2 and will add great support to the battlesuits DSing in). Of course, the HC also doesn't really have a tax per say, as 3 5man striker teams is not expensive and can hold objectives, while the rest of it is all stuff you would take anyway.

I'll be using a CAD with formation support. I just can't leave my Stormsurges at home.

And that Riptide Wing is so sexy...

So how would I go about converting Cyclic Ion Blasters, now that they aren't unique? Or Frag projectors, I guess.

Seems they would both be pretty good in small points Farsight lists. A way to have the crisis troops do all rounder damage.

Crisis suits with dual frag projectors is just sickeningly strong. Ive ran it against marines a few times - it was hilarious the amount of wounds i caused.

Not sure how i would kitbash them yet. Theyre basically just a tube with a canister at one end, but its all the little details im not sure how i'd do without just Greenstuffing everything (ughh....the thought of that sounds terrible)

Use insta mold. Walk through 's on YouTube. Works for me.

I played the Optimized Stealth Cadre tonight. Color me impressed.

A few things:
1. I went with the Dual Fusion threat versions and they cleaned house against enemy armor. No one was lining up to enjoy that melta blast either. And some Markerlights go a long way in making that unit nasty.
2. the Wall of Mirrors ability? GOLD. Against a Vendetta with some Markerlight help and a TL Fusion Blaster? Ho yeah.


Some not so positives:
1. It wont stand up to a dedicated melee unit.
2. The Drones caused me ot make a morale check. I had TWO of the three Ghostkeels left. I failed morale and because of the Drones I couldn't regroup! That sucked. I still did damage as I retreated thanks to Markerlights but damn. that was a bummer. The Drones are a major downside for the unit and unlike Riptides you cant choose not to take all of them.

Overall extremely pleased with the damage I did.

notredameguy10 wrote:
So I guess now that we cannot use the correct CFP in tournaments, I have been trying to play around with some other army lists other than HC.
How does this sound for 1850?
Riptide Wing
1 Riptide: HBC, TL FB, EWO, ATS

1 Riptide: HBC, TL FB, EWO, ATS

3 Riptides: IA, EWO, SMS

Optimized Stealth Cadre
3 Stealthsuits: 1 FB, 1 TL

3 Stealthsuits: 1 FB, 1 TL

Ghostkeel: CIR, TL FB, TL, EWO, BKR
Ghostkeel: CIR, TL FB, TL, EWO, BKR
Ghostkeel: CIR, TL BC, VT, EWO, BKR

Drone Net
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones

Still have 17 points to play around with

This is exactly what I am planning on doing as well, granted I only had x3 Riptides and some Crisis Suit teams in there and a Commander Suits. However I am planning eventually on getting x5 Riptides total so this idea does interest me. I am a little confused why the HBC? Honestly in every situation I have come across the IA is always better, even against enemy Flyers and FMC I have encounterd.

 Jancoran wrote:
I played the Optimized Stealth Cadre tonight. Color me impressed.

A few things:
1. I went with the Dual Fusin threat versions and they cleaned house against enemy armor. No one was lining up to enjoy that melta blast either. And some Markerlights go a long way in making that unit nasty.
2. the Wall of Mirrors ability? GOLD. Against a Vendetta with some Markerlight help and a TL Fusion Blaster? Ho yeah.


Some not so positives:
1. It wont stand up to a dedicated melee unit.
2. The Drones caused me ot make a morale check. I had TWO of the three left. I failed morale and because of the Drones I couldn't regroup! That sucked. I still did damage as I retreated thanks to Markerlights but damn. that was a bummer. The Drones are a major downside for the unit and unlike Riptides you cant choose not to take all of them.

Overall extremely pleased with the damage I did.

Ghsotkeel units with more than 1 Ghostkeel need BKR. It's pretty cheap on them anyway

 Jancoran wrote:
I played the Optimized Stealth Cadre tonight. Color me impressed.

A few things:
1. I went with the Dual Fusin threat versions and they cleaned house against enemy armor. No one was lining up to enjoy that melta blast either. And some Markerlights go a long way in making that unit nasty.
2. the Wall of Mirrors ability? GOLD. Against a Vendetta with some Markerlight help and a TL Fusion Blaster? Ho yeah.


Some not so positives:
1. It wont stand up to a dedicated melee unit.
2. The Drones caused me ot make a morale check. I had TWO of the three left. I failed morale and because of the Drones I couldn't regroup! That sucked. I still did damage as I retreated thanks to Markerlights but damn. that was a bummer. The Drones are a major downside for the unit and unlike Riptides you cant choose not to take all of them.

Overall extremely pleased with the damage I did.

Try leaving one drone out in front at a time. You only need one to benefit from the Stealth and Shrouded bonus, and one dead drone at a time won't cause a failed leadership.

Also, nothing in the Tau codex holds up against a dedicated melee unit.... It's like comparing Star Wars to Lord of the Rings and one of the reasons you didn't like LoTR was because they weren't in space...

And I'm confused by the leadership failure, fid you lose a Drone and consistently fail the Leadership 9 roll? Or were you trying for Insane Heroism?

 Jancoran wrote:
I played the Optimized Stealth Cadre tonight. Color me impressed.

A few things:
1. I went with the Dual Fusin threat versions and they cleaned house against enemy armor. No one was lining up to enjoy that melta blast either. And some Markerlights go a long way in making that unit nasty.
2. the Wall of Mirrors ability? GOLD. Against a Vendetta with some Markerlight help and a TL Fusion Blaster? Ho yeah.


Some not so positives:
1. It wont stand up to a dedicated melee unit.
2. The Drones caused me ot make a morale check. I had TWO of the three left. I failed morale and because of the Drones I couldn't regroup! That sucked. I still did damage as I retreated thanks to Markerlights but damn. that was a bummer. The Drones are a major downside for the unit and unlike Riptides you cant choose not to take all of them.

Overall extremely pleased with the damage I did.

How do you go about positioning your stealth drones? I tend to play them opposite everything else and place them safely behind the ghostkeel. And BKR would work wonders



Also, has anyone ran any lists with the new somewhat niche melee units we can run now? I tried a FSE Commander with fusion blades, threw in farsight, gave them a 3 man bodyguard team with a puretide chip against necrons,. They ate everything except Wraiths (there weren't any at the time) for breakfast.

notredameguy10 wrote:
So now that we technically cannot share rules via CFP, I was wondering what people opinions were of the different options for Tau.

Hunter Contingent - CFP, Run and shoot, troop tax,
Dawn Blade Contingent - Army wide Doom, troop tax
Just formations - no taxes, less special bonuses
CAD

I can see the benefits of each but I am struggling to decide which one would be the most competitive.

Here is my issue with the DBC.

I really want to take the retaliation core because of relentless broadsides.. that's probably the best perk. However, i'm "taxed" to take a riptide in this formation. *please be patient about the riptide* Now onto the auxiliaries.. This is unfortunate.. they are all huge.. and if I want more suits.. again i am "taxed" with a riptide. If I want pathfinders.. i'm "taxed" with 3 units of broadsides. Which basically leaves me always paying 220 points for the drone net (marker lights).

Now... The reason I called those riptides a tax.. well simply is. What if i want a riptide wing? It is not an auxiliary but is still amazing. I can't bring myself to field 4-5 riptides (nor do i have that many). After that, there really is nothing else that is phenomenal in the auxiliaries.

I wish they simplified it.. gave tau all the auxiliaries available to both contingents and changed the core and special rules.. there are some really good auxiliaries i think that would pair well with retaliation.. such as the infiltration cadre.

I have played around with lists using a DBC with hunter cadre core (the only way to bring ghost keel / stormsurge IN the contingent), and using the quick response crisis aux. Again tho, that riptide is always there making things complicated for combining other formations..

 Grizzyzz wrote:

Here is my issue with the DBC.

I really want to take the retaliation core because of relentless broadsides.. that's probably the best perk. However, i'm "taxed" to take a riptide in this formation. *please be patient about the riptide* Now onto the auxiliaries.. This is unfortunate.. they are all huge.. and if I want more suits.. again i am "taxed" with a riptide. If I want pathfinders.. i'm "taxed" with 3 units of broadsides. Which basically leaves me always paying 220 points for the drone net (marker lights).

Now... The reason I called those riptides a tax.. well simply is. What if i want a riptide wing? It is not an auxiliary but is still amazing. I can't bring myself to field 4-5 riptides (nor do i have that many). After that, there really is nothing else that is phenomenal in the auxiliaries.

I wish they simplified it.. gave tau all the auxiliaries available to both contingents and changed the core and special rules.. there are some really good auxiliaries i think that would pair well with retaliation.. such as the infiltration cadre.

I have played around with lists using a DBC with hunter cadre core (the only way to bring ghost keel / stormsurge IN the contingent), and using the quick response crisis aux. Again tho, that riptide is always there making things complicated for combining other formations..

I feel the same way with the DBC. The Riptide Wing is so powerful but you can't fit that in a standard 2k or lower list due to the massive point requirements for the auxilaries. And 4 Riptides?! Holy gak batman...

DirtyDeeds wrote:
I feel the same way with the DBC. The Riptide Wing is so powerful but you can't fit that in a standard 2k or lower list due to the massive point requirements for the auxiliaries. And 4 Riptides?! Holy gak batman...

Exactly.. One reason Eldar is good (aside from the "D" weapons) is their contingent is very flexible... they have many small auxiliaries that you can piece together to form essentially one of our normal ones..

Honestly I think the retaliation Cadre was overthought.. I think it doesn't need the riptide.. or doesn't need the broadsides. I think the crisis auxiliary, would be fine as 3 units of crisis suits. ANDDD I think similar to a wraithknight/lord/etc a riptide should be a standalone auxiliary..

/endrant




Automatically Appended Next Post:
A list I want to try..

@2000 DBC - Retaliation:
fusionblade commander
ion riptide
plasma crisis team
2x burst crisis teams (i realize CIBs are better maybe.. i like wysiwyg)
Misslesides w/ plasma

Aux:
Razershark aux: 3x fighters

Formations:
OSC - 2 IR/FB ghostkeel, homing beacon stealth teams

 Grizzyzz wrote:

DirtyDeeds wrote:
I feel the same way with the DBC. The Riptide Wing is so powerful but you can't fit that in a standard 2k or lower list due to the massive point requirements for the auxiliaries. And 4 Riptides?! Holy gak batman...

Exactly.. One reason Eldar is good (aside from the "D" weapons) is their contingent is very flexible... they have many small auxiliaries that you can piece together to form essentially one of our normal ones..

Honestly I think the retaliation Cadre was overthought.. I think it doesn't need the riptide.. or doesn't need the broadsides. I think the crisis auxiliary, would be fine as 3 units of crisis suits. ANDDD I think similar to a wraithknight/lord/etc a riptide should be a standalone auxiliary..

/endrant

I'd also do dirty, dirty things for some form of Aux that has just a unit of Skyrays.

 Jancoran wrote:
I played the Optimized Stealth Cadre tonight. Color me impressed.

A few things:
1. I went with the Dual Fusin threat versions and they cleaned house against enemy armor. No one was lining up to enjoy that melta blast either. And some Markerlights go a long way in making that unit nasty.
2. the Wall of Mirrors ability? GOLD. Against a Vendetta with some Markerlight help and a TL Fusion Blaster? Ho yeah.


Some not so positives:
1. It wont stand up to a dedicated melee unit.
2. The Drones caused me ot make a morale check. I had TWO of the three left. I failed morale and because of the Drones I couldn't regroup! That sucked. I still did damage as I retreated thanks to Markerlights but damn. that was a bummer. The Drones are a major downside for the unit and unlike Riptides you cant choose not to take all of them.

Overall extremely pleased with the damage I did.

ALWAYS take bonding knife ritual on a squad of ghost keels. ALWAYS


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gmaleron wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:
So I guess now that we cannot use the correct CFP in tournaments, I have been trying to play around with some other army lists other than HC.
How does this sound for 1850?
Riptide Wing
1 Riptide: HBC, TL FB, EWO, ATS

1 Riptide: HBC, TL FB, EWO, ATS

3 Riptides: IA, EWO, SMS

Optimized Stealth Cadre
3 Stealthsuits: 1 FB, 1 TL

3 Stealthsuits: 1 FB, 1 TL

Ghostkeel: CIR, TL FB, TL, EWO, BKR
Ghostkeel: CIR, TL FB, TL, EWO, BKR
Ghostkeel: CIR, TL BC, VT, EWO, BKR

Drone Net
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones
4 Marker Drones

Still have 17 points to play around with

This is exactly what I am planning on doing as well, granted I only had x3 Riptides and some Crisis Suit teams in there and a Commander Suits. However I am planning eventually on getting x5 Riptides total so this idea does interest me. I am a little confused why the HBC? Honestly in every situation I have come across the IA is always better, even against enemy Flyers and FMC I have encounterd.

Overcharged HBC is better in a lot of situations.Flyers? Which sounds better: 12 Str 6 AP 4 shots with rending or 3 Str 7 AP 2 shots?
anything not in a large group HBC is better.
Any high AV vehicles HBC is better

My 1500 list is a retaliation cadre + an optimised stealth cadre. No "tax units", and it even sort of synergizes, as the stealth suits can take homing beacons to bring the other suits down more safely. On the other hand, no command benefits of any kind and a pretty low model count. Just finished building and priming the models, first game maybe next week.

HBC riptides when they pass their novas almost always do more damage than IA riptides, except against maybe a blob of 2+ save units.
Problem is the nova test. IA's can basically ignore the nova test, they dont need it at all. This is what i feel needs to be nerfed if riptides ever get nerfed, not points, not the strength, but the AP without nova charge.

If the HBC doesnt get its nova, its a pretty bad gun for the cost you paid. Not to mention you just got hurt by the test.

IA = 2+/3+ armor blobs, light armor, and hordes.
HBC w/o Nova = hordes, light armor, 4+ saves
HBC w/ Nova = Everything. Literally, everything. May not WANT to fire at 2+ blobs but it still can and still do heavy damage.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
HBC riptides when they pass their novas almost always do more damage than IA riptides, except against maybe a blob of 2+ save units.
Problem is the nova test. IA's can basically ignore the nova test, they dont need it at all. This is what i feel needs to be nerfed if riptides ever get nerfed, not points, not the strength, but the AP without nova charge.

If the HBC doesnt get its nova, its a pretty bad gun for the cost you paid. Not to mention you just got hurt by the test.

IA = 2+/3+ armor blobs, light armor, and hordes.
HBC w/o Nova = hordes, light armor, 4+ saves
HBC w/ Nova = Everything. Literally, everything. May not WANT to fire at 2+ blobs but it still can and still do heavy damage.

I have yet to have a game where an IA riptide didnt roll gets hot when i needed that ap2 pie plate the most. Or completely wiff if not gets hot.

I think because of the way scatter works, and the gets hot roll.. the ion fair as is. If anything.. maybe its ap3.. and the ap2 you get when you nova charge.. but thats the only change i would think could happen without a riot XD

Need some help on Frontline Gaming here. Now they are trying to say a squad of 3 Ghostkeel can only activate its ability once per game and not 3 times (once per unit). We have already had discussions here on this topic and just about everyone agrees. 1 model activates the ability and the rest of the unit uses the ability.
https://www.frontlinegaming.org/2015/12/04/puretides-balance-tfo-takes-montka-to-road-to-lvo/#comment-455637

Thats basically my idea. It makes no sense without Nova charge to be infinitely stronger than the hammerhead's ion cannon. You cant say its powered differently without the nova charge because its still an ION weapon. That and the range is just ridiculous.

And yeah ive had several times where Gets Hot screwed me over. My last 2k game against my BA/IG friend i had 1 riptide with IA. It did nothing other than S10 Smash his jumppack guy that was pissing off my crisis suits (he had an AP4 weapon so i kept saving them, but he had a 3+ as well with a 4++). I literally Gets Hot 3 of 5 attacks, and completely scattered to nomansland with the other 2 lol.
Never had bad luck THAT bad with a riptide. Landing 1 attack the entire game, a melee one at that, is just sad.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Thats basically my idea. It makes no sense without Nova charge to be infinitely stronger than the hammerhead's ion cannon. You cant say its powered differently without the nova charge because its still an ION weapon. That and the range is just ridiculous.

And yeah ive had several times where Gets Hot screwed me over. My last 2k game against my BA/IG friend i had 1 riptide with IA. It did nothing other than S10 Smash his jumppack guy that was pissing off my crisis suits (he had an AP4 weapon so i kept saving them, but he had a 3+ as well with a 4++). I literally Gets Hot 3 of 5 attacks, and completely scattered to nomansland with the other 2 lol.
Never had bad luck THAT bad with a riptide. Landing 1 attack the entire game, a melee one at that, is just sad.

That's why I tend to not use the blast unless I have enough marker support to make him BS 6, or its a unit of T4 models with more than one wound.

But NEVER underestimate the power of a Nova Charged Heavy Burst Cannon.

As Vineheart01 said, it hurts EVERYTHING.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Thats basically my idea. It makes no sense without Nova charge to be infinitely stronger than the hammerhead's ion cannon. You cant say its powered differently without the nova charge because its still an ION weapon. That and the range is just ridiculous.

And yeah ive had several times where Gets Hot screwed me over. My last 2k game against my BA/IG friend i had 1 riptide with IA. It did nothing other than S10 Smash his jumppack guy that was pissing off my crisis suits (he had an AP4 weapon so i kept saving them, but he had a 3+ as well with a 4++). I literally Gets Hot 3 of 5 attacks, and completely scattered to nomansland with the other 2 lol.
Never had bad luck THAT bad with a riptide. Landing 1 attack the entire game, a melee one at that, is just sad.

Once GW fixes the ECPA/Riptide mistake, make a Riptide Wing Farsight Enclaves with ECPA and HBC. The ECPA was basically made for the HBC.

 Nilok wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Thats basically my idea. It makes no sense without Nova charge to be infinitely stronger than the hammerhead's ion cannon. You cant say its powered differently without the nova charge because its still an ION weapon. That and the range is just ridiculous.

And yeah ive had several times where Gets Hot screwed me over. My last 2k game against my BA/IG friend i had 1 riptide with IA. It did nothing other than S10 Smash his jumppack guy that was pissing off my crisis suits (he had an AP4 weapon so i kept saving them, but he had a 3+ as well with a 4++). I literally Gets Hot 3 of 5 attacks, and completely scattered to nomansland with the other 2 lol.
Never had bad luck THAT bad with a riptide. Landing 1 attack the entire game, a melee one at that, is just sad.

Once GW fixes the ECPA/Riptide mistake, make a Riptide Wing Farsight Enclaves with ECPA and HBC. The ECPA was basically made for the HBC.

What keep two Riptides together and the other with the ECPA can go golo?

 Nilok wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Thats basically my idea. It makes no sense without Nova charge to be infinitely stronger than the hammerhead's ion cannon. You cant say its powered differently without the nova charge because its still an ION weapon. That and the range is just ridiculous.

And yeah ive had several times where Gets Hot screwed me over. My last 2k game against my BA/IG friend i had 1 riptide with IA. It did nothing other than S10 Smash his jumppack guy that was pissing off my crisis suits (he had an AP4 weapon so i kept saving them, but he had a 3+ as well with a 4++). I literally Gets Hot 3 of 5 attacks, and completely scattered to nomansland with the other 2 lol.
Never had bad luck THAT bad with a riptide. Landing 1 attack the entire game, a melee one at that, is just sad.

Once GW fixes the ECPA/Riptide mistake, make a Riptide Wing Farsight Enclaves with ECPA and HBC. The ECPA was basically made for the HBC.

I highly doubt anyone would give you gak for running a Riptide with it even without an FAQ. It was available to the unit before and it VLEARLY only works for Riptides. Anyone who would say otherwise is an asshat and you shouldn't play against them.

notredameguy10 wrote:
Need some help on Frontline Gaming here. Now they are trying to say a squad of 3 Ghostkeel can only activate its ability once per game and not 3 times (once per unit). We have already had discussions here on this topic and just about everyone agrees. 1 model activates the ability and the rest of the unit uses the ability.
https://www.frontlinegaming.org/2015/12/04/puretides-balance-tfo-takes-montka-to-road-to-lvo/#comment-455637

I'd personally prefer it if you get one use per Keel, but the wording on it is really wonky so I can see it going either way. In the first sentence it says that a model with it can do that, but then in the second sentence it says the unit activates the ability as a whole. The issue is that the unit consists of a unit with it and two units without it at base, so they have to state the model(s) with it use it, as opposed to the unit, so it's weird they say the unit uses it later.

Oh well, the OSC and others are strong enough either way, but I don't think it would make them over the top if they could use it three time instead of once.

Holos on the ghostkeels are one per suit. I dont care if the rules are fuzzy, you are paying for a once per game use ability whether you want to or not and it does not have a stacking effect. There is NO WAY its suppose to still be once per game for the entire unit.

Now if it changed depending on the number of ghostkeels, then i'd say its once per game anyway. Such as with 3 ghostkeels it becomes straight up a free Invisibility for a turn. But it doesnt, so it makes no sense to force you to use all 3 at once.

DirtyDeeds wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
I played the Optimized Stealth Cadre tonight. Color me impressed.

A few things:
1. I went with the Dual Fusin threat versions and they cleaned house against enemy armor. No one was lining up to enjoy that melta blast either. And some Markerlights go a long way in making that unit nasty.
2. the Wall of Mirrors ability? GOLD. Against a Vendetta with some Markerlight help and a TL Fusion Blaster? Ho yeah.


Some not so positives:
1. It wont stand up to a dedicated melee unit.
2. The Drones caused me ot make a morale check. I had TWO of the three left. I failed morale and because of the Drones I couldn't regroup! That sucked. I still did damage as I retreated thanks to Markerlights but damn. that was a bummer. The Drones are a major downside for the unit and unlike Riptides you cant choose not to take all of them.

Overall extremely pleased with the damage I did.

Try leaving one drone out in front at a time. You only need one to benefit from the Stealth and Shrouded bonus, and one dead drone at a time won't cause a failed leadership.

Also, nothing in the Tau codex holds up against a dedicated melee unit.... It's like comparing Star Wars to Lord of the Rings and one of the reasons you didn't like LoTR was because they weren't in space...

And I'm confused by the leadership failure, fid you lose a Drone and consistently fail the Leadership 9 roll? Or were you trying for Insane Heroism?

Oops. So what happened is i lost two drones deep striking (it happens) and EVENTUALLY lost one Ghostkeel and the other 4 drones. So i had only 2 Ghostkeels left out of 9 total members of the unit, failed morale, and then couldn't regroup because I needed yes, insane heroism.

I will definitely "tier" the drones in the future but wanted to mention it here for the benefit of people who haven't yet found this little problem out. I learned the hard way. Still won but that on its own let him back into a game he had hopelessly lost by the end of round 2. It was a mistake on my part to even get them near the enemy once i jhad them on the ropes so that was on me.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

notredameguy10 wrote:

ALWAYS take bonding knife ritual on a squad of ghost keels. ALWAYS

Thank you, sir. And now i know. You definitely need it. It's the first time I have considered taking them in like... six years.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

notredameguy10 wrote:
Need some help on Frontline Gaming here. Now they are trying to say a squad of 3 Ghostkeel can only activate its ability once per game and not 3 times (once per unit). We have already had discussions here on this topic and just about everyone agrees. 1 model activates the ability and the rest of the unit uses the ability.
https://www.frontlinegaming.org/2015/12/04/puretides-balance-tfo-takes-montka-to-road-to-lvo/#comment-455637

Uh... What? You mean Holophoton Countermeasures? They are saying all the models use theirs up simultaneously? WHY? It even mentions a model ("not a unit that contains at least one...")

Damn it. More reason to dislike the ITC. It's getting as bad as the INAT.

Well hold on guys, before we get carried away, let's look at what the Holophoton does. In theory it gives your one Ghostkeel and its two drones a shield against shooting from one unit for one turn. That's pretty solid by itself, but when you include more Ghostkeels in that unit it doesn't grow linearly, it grows exponentially. I get it makes sense that each one should be able to use, but it does mean that each Ghostkeel basically gets three Holophotons, instead of one in that situation., which means it's either immune for three turns from one squad, or can mitigate multiple squads for one turn or more, which is a massive power increase per Ghostkeel taken.

Now consider the other aspect of this, a Holophoton field that functions once per squad, means there's a trade off for taking a unit of Ghostkeels versus individual Ghostkeels, which isn't bad because it encourages stronger list building consideration since there are so many trade offs with choosing either route.

Like I said, I can see it going either way, and even if you can't, I urge you to consider the power balance of how the ability scales with different squad compositions.

Razerous wrote:

 Nilok wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Thats basically my idea. It makes no sense without Nova charge to be infinitely stronger than the hammerhead's ion cannon. You cant say its powered differently without the nova charge because its still an ION weapon. That and the range is just ridiculous.

And yeah ive had several times where Gets Hot screwed me over. My last 2k game against my BA/IG friend i had 1 riptide with IA. It did nothing other than S10 Smash his jumppack guy that was pissing off my crisis suits (he had an AP4 weapon so i kept saving them, but he had a 3+ as well with a 4++). I literally Gets Hot 3 of 5 attacks, and completely scattered to nomansland with the other 2 lol.
Never had bad luck THAT bad with a riptide. Landing 1 attack the entire game, a melee one at that, is just sad.

Once GW fixes the ECPA/Riptide mistake, make a Riptide Wing Farsight Enclaves with ECPA and HBC. The ECPA was basically made for the HBC.

What keep two Riptides together and the other with the ECPA can go golo?

Definite, it allows you to position them on opposite sides of the board and still support each other. A great thing about the ECPA with the HBC is the ability to re-roll 1s. This basically makes the risk of an overcharged HBC nonexistent by having little risk in failing a Nova Charge or Gets Hot and increases the number of hits to rend with. At the same time, the Riptide Wing isn't limited by range for their +1 BS ability. This means that if you can't get markerlight support for your ECPA Riptide, you can have one of your IA Riptides shoot at the HBC Riptide's target (it doesn't even need to hit), and you will be hitting on 3s, re-rolling 1s. Then there is the Hailfire with a Nova Charged HBC and re-rolling 1s. The Fio'vre pilot should be called C'tl A't D'lete.

To be clear, the ITC is not saying that this is the case. One guy who wrote an article about a tournament that he took the tau to says that that is how he is playing his Tau. Doesn't mean that the ITC is endorsing that interpretation of the rules. I've emailed Reece and I'll let you know what he says.

Also, I think I've keyed in on why it has to be once per suit, not once per unit:

The rule says that we need to "declare the unit will use the holophoton countermeasures"

This can't be referring to multiple models activating it because you would need to use the word "their holophoton..." to reference plural models. An absence of the word "the" could als potentially signify the unit, but "the" is singular. Completely unambiguous in RAW and RAI if you ask me

...I just reread the Riptide Wing. None of the rules say that the prior Riptide needs to be in another unit, just that it is part of this formations.

Okay, this makes a really silly tactic you can do with the Riptide Wing making all the Riptides BS 4, even the first one that shoots.

First, you have one unit have at least two Riptides and have them equipped with different secondary weapons (SMS and Plasma for instance) and/or primary weapons. In the shooting phase, declare one of the secondary weapons as the weapon group you are firing. Now the other Riptide in the unit is BS 4. Now declare the other secondary weapon as the weapon group you are firing. The first Riptide is now BS 4. Now fire your primary weapons with both Riptides at BS 4.

This requires at least four Riptides, but aside from the first weapon fired from the first Riptide, all of the Riptides will be hitting on 3s.

This feels like MTG and abusing the stack.

 Nilok wrote:

This feels like MTG and abusing the stack.

How so?

 Tinkrr wrote:
Well hold on guys, before we get carried away, let's look at what the Holophoton does. In theory it gives your one Ghostkeel and its two drones a shield against shooting from one unit for one turn. That's pretty solid by itself, but when you include more Ghostkeels in that unit it doesn't grow linearly, it grows exponentially. I get it makes sense that each one should be able to use, but it does mean that each Ghostkeel basically gets three Holophotons, instead of one in that situation., which means it's either immune for three turns from one squad, or can mitigate multiple squads for one turn or more, which is a massive power increase per Ghostkeel taken.

Now consider the other aspect of this, a Holophoton field that functions once per squad, means there's a trade off for taking a unit of Ghostkeels versus individual Ghostkeels, which isn't bad because it encourages stronger list building consideration since there are so many trade offs with choosing either route.

Like I said, I can see it going either way, and even if you can't, I urge you to consider the power balance of how the ability scales with different squad compositions.

130 points later... Um... No. 130 points? you're paying a TON for that suit. An entire unit sucks like 400 points and you're thinking that's WORSE than an invisible assault unit for 400 points?
I'm sorry but this freaking ITC thing is just really too much.

So disgusted if true.

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
Well hold on guys, before we get carried away, let's look at what the Holophoton does. In theory it gives your one Ghostkeel and its two drones a shield against shooting from one unit for one turn. That's pretty solid by itself, but when you include more Ghostkeels in that unit it doesn't grow linearly, it grows exponentially. I get it makes sense that each one should be able to use, but it does mean that each Ghostkeel basically gets three Holophotons, instead of one in that situation., which means it's either immune for three turns from one squad, or can mitigate multiple squads for one turn or more, which is a massive power increase per Ghostkeel taken.

Now consider the other aspect of this, a Holophoton field that functions once per squad, means there's a trade off for taking a unit of Ghostkeels versus individual Ghostkeels, which isn't bad because it encourages stronger list building consideration since there are so many trade offs with choosing either route.

Like I said, I can see it going either way, and even if you can't, I urge you to consider the power balance of how the ability scales with different squad compositions.

130 points later... Um... No. 130 points? you're paying a TON for that suit. An entire unit sucks like 400 points and you're thinking that's WORSE than an invisible assault unit for 400 points?
I'm sorry but this freaking ITC thing is just really too much.

So disgusted.

First of all it's not an ITC ruling, it's just how someone in the ITC played it.

Second of all that 130 per bakes in drones and more.

Third of all, it's only wasted points if you group them, you can still have each individually and gain the same amount of benefit.

Fourth of all, how do you equate 130 points as including that ability per Ghostkeel, and then giving that ability three times to your Ghostkeels with no added increase? As in, if you think the 130 includes a one use Holophoton, because that large point cost accounts for that, what is your opinion of grouping 2-3 Ghostkeels and gaining 1-2 extra Holophotons more than you'd have for each Ghostkeel at no extra point cost? All the Ghostkeels would still gain their initial use, but they'd gain a second and third use each.

Edit: Basically think of this situation, you have two Ghostkeels, each in their own unit. If your opponent shoots with two different units they can each individually negate that for one turn, they can also negate one unit for two turns if each takes shots individual. However, in reality it will function more like they negate for a turn, then next turn they take fire and die. However, when grouped, they can still negate two units of fire in one turn, and negate fire from one unit in two turns, but the amount negated is not the same, since it's for both Keels instead of just one. In other words, if they negate two shooting phases for one unit, if they are separate the unit will shoot, get negated, and then next turn take out a Ghostkeel, while shooting the third turn at the third Keel to be negated, while in the other case both Keels negate for two turns meaning that on turn three they have more fire power by a significant margin.

Edit 2: In other words, if a unit shoots at the Keels, and you Holophoton for both Keels, both get the benefit, for each time you use it, so ultimately you can gain up to four Keels worth of Holophoton with only two Keels. With three Keels you get 9 Keels worth of Holophoton, see what I mean by exponential instead of linear?

I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just asking you to consider these questions.

Its the rule. You have read it so i assume you know the wording is clear enough. Each suit comes with it. Each one affects the unit. Its not unclear. It needs no interpretation. No one is arguing what it says.

It only works against one unit per Countermeasure! It specifies that "A MODEL" uses it and it affects one unit targeting "IT or the unit it belongs to"

So all you're doing is getting three kind of spontaneous attempts to defray fire on your unit. Three units the whole game get affected. For 400 points. That's very possibly not even enough to stop all incoming fire for a round. Its ridiculous to try and nerf it further.

 Jancoran wrote:
Its the rule. You have read it so i assume you know the wording is clear enough. Each suit comes with it. Each one affects the unit. Its not unclear. It needs no interpretation. No one is arguing what it says.

It only works against one unit per Countermeasure! It specifies that "A MODEL" uses it and it affects one unit targeting "IT or the unit it belongs to"

So all you're doing is getting three kind of spontaneous attempts to defray fire on your unit. Three units the whole game get affected. For 400 points. That's very possibly not even enough to stop all incoming fire for a round. Its ridiculous to try and nerf it further.

I agree with you on how the wording sounds, but I'm not sure about the power level of the ability with that wording.

Again, it's three enemy units in any case, but it's not as simple as you think. Again:

One Holophoton affects 3 models in your unit, two Holophotons in a unit affects 12 models in your unit, and three Holophotons affects 27 models in your unit.

More so, let's look at another aspect. If I'm the opponent, and I want your Keels dead in one turn, the typical way is to target them with one big unit in a turn, make them use the Holophoton thing, then target them with another big unit. This all of a sudden becomes impossible with multiple Keels in a unit since they can essentially negate the full turn for all the Keels, instead of just one unit worth of shooting, and that's rather massive. Maybe if there was a restriction that stated it was once per turn, it would make a lot more sense, would you be opposed to a "once per turn" limitation on the Holophoton thing?

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
Its the rule. You have read it so i assume you know the wording is clear enough. Each suit comes with it. Each one affects the unit. Its not unclear. It needs no interpretation. No one is arguing what it says.

It only works against one unit per Countermeasure! It specifies that "A MODEL" uses it and it affects one unit targeting "IT or the unit it belongs to"

So all you're doing is getting three kind of spontaneous attempts to defray fire on your unit. Three units the whole game get affected. For 400 points. That's very possibly not even enough to stop all incoming fire for a round. Its ridiculous to try and nerf it further.

I agree with you on how the wording sounds, but I'm not sure about the power level of the ability with that wording.

Again, it's three enemy units in any case, but it's not as simple as you think. Again:

One Holophoton affects 3 models in your unit, two Holophotons in a unit affects 12 models in your unit, and three Holophotons affects 27 models in your unit.

More so, let's look at another aspect. If I'm the opponent, and I want your Keels dead in one turn, the typical way is to target them with one big unit in a turn, make them use the Holophoton thing, then target them with another big unit. This all of a sudden becomes impossible with multiple Keels in a unit since they can essentially negate the full turn for all the Keels, instead of just one unit worth of shooting, and that's rather massive. Maybe if there was a restriction that stated it was once per turn, it would make a lot more sense, would you be opposed to a "once per turn" limitation on the Holophoton thing?

Seriously complaining that it may be too powerful? Compare it to invisibility which makes EVERY single unit firing at your unit snapfire FOR THE ENTIRE GAME, in addition to only being hit on 6s in CC. HPCM would be 3 units in total lol

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
Its the rule. You have read it so i assume you know the wording is clear enough. Each suit comes with it. Each one affects the unit. Its not unclear. It needs no interpretation. No one is arguing what it says.

It only works against one unit per Countermeasure! It specifies that "A MODEL" uses it and it affects one unit targeting "IT or the unit it belongs to"

So all you're doing is getting three kind of spontaneous attempts to defray fire on your unit. Three units the whole game get affected. For 400 points. That's very possibly not even enough to stop all incoming fire for a round. Its ridiculous to try and nerf it further.

I agree with you on how the wording sounds, but I'm not sure about the power level of the ability with that wording.

Again, it's three enemy units in any case, but it's not as simple as you think. Again:

One Holophoton affects 3 models in your unit, two Holophotons in a unit affects 12 models in your unit, and three Holophotons affects 27 models in your unit.

More so, let's look at another aspect. If I'm the opponent, and I want your Keels dead in one turn, the typical way is to target them with one big unit in a turn, make them use the Holophoton thing, then target them with another big unit. This all of a sudden becomes impossible with multiple Keels in a unit since they can essentially negate the full turn for all the Keels, instead of just one unit worth of shooting, and that's rather massive. Maybe if there was a restriction that stated it was once per turn, it would make a lot more sense, would you be opposed to a "once per turn" limitation on the Holophoton thing?

Seriously complaining that it may be too powerful? Compare it to invisibility which makes EVERY single unit firing at your unit snapfire FOR THE ENTIRE GAME, in addition to only being hit on 6s in CC. HPCM would be 3 units in total lol

Not complaining, simply noting.


I was going to list the differences between invisibility, and Holophoton, but that wouldn't be fair, the issue is that really you're comparing two non-comparable things. Let's put it this way a Keel is 2x the points of a Broadside, and with a CIR it has -2 shots, but it's also a lot more mobile, and has a ton of extra rules. Don't compare it to invisibility, compare it to what the Tau has, which is basically a pair of Broadsides, and in all honesty, it's better at the point value than those, and no one can argue that HYMP Broadsides are bad, are are you willing to claim a unit that's comparable to them but better is?

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
Its the rule. You have read it so i assume you know the wording is clear enough. Each suit comes with it. Each one affects the unit. Its not unclear. It needs no interpretation. No one is arguing what it says.

It only works against one unit per Countermeasure! It specifies that "A MODEL" uses it and it affects one unit targeting "IT or the unit it belongs to"

So all you're doing is getting three kind of spontaneous attempts to defray fire on your unit. Three units the whole game get affected. For 400 points. That's very possibly not even enough to stop all incoming fire for a round. Its ridiculous to try and nerf it further.

I agree with you on how the wording sounds, but I'm not sure about the power level of the ability with that wording.

Again, it's three enemy units in any case, but it's not as simple as you think. Again:

One Holophoton affects 3 models in your unit, two Holophotons in a unit affects 12 models in your unit, and three Holophotons affects 27 models in your unit.

More so, let's look at another aspect. If I'm the opponent, and I want your Keels dead in one turn, the typical way is to target them with one big unit in a turn, make them use the Holophoton thing, then target them with another big unit. This all of a sudden becomes impossible with multiple Keels in a unit since they can essentially negate the full turn for all the Keels, instead of just one unit worth of shooting, and that's rather massive. Maybe if there was a restriction that stated it was once per turn, it would make a lot more sense, would you be opposed to a "once per turn" limitation on the Holophoton thing?

It affects the unit FIRING on it...not the Ghostkeel unit itself. So you cannot look at it like that. the enemy unit can be a 40 man blob or a five man dire avenger squad and you get the same effect. So its the UNIT targetting you that is the target of this ability...not the Ghostkeels themselves!

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Nilok wrote:

This feels like MTG and abusing the stack.

How so?

It reminds me of Journey to Nowhere and blink effect shenanigans.
In the combo, you target a creature to be removed from play with Journey to Nowhere. In response, you return Journey to Nowhere to you hand before the target creature is exiled. Journey to Nowhere is returned to your hand, and then the creature is exiled. Normally when Journey to Nowhere is removed from play, the creature is returned back to play. However, since the creature was not exiled by the time Journey to Nowhere left play, and thus misses the trigger, the creature is permanently exiled.

While not as extreme, you are playing stack order with the shooting rules. You have your first weapon fire, giving the BS bonus to the other Riptide in the unit, then you switch to the second Riptide for shooting by selecting its secondary weapon and shooting. Now you have both Riptides in the unit, and any other Riptides that join in, at a buffed BS.

This really feels like shenanigans in a game like 40k.

You do need Riptides to be in separate units to stack the benefits, as it stipulates that one riptide must "already have shot" at the unit. You cannot claim stacking for a second or third riptide because once the riptide "has shot", the shooting phase is complete for the entire unit. All the shots for the unit have to be completed before the riptide can be considered to "have shot" (note the past tense).

Ghostkeel's holophotons are nowhere near broken. Heck i have yet to use it on anything other than massed troop guns just because the 2+ cover save alone deters the dangerous guns or blast weapons.

Its designed to keep the unit from being wiped out by something crazy strong for an extra turn, not be an invisibility star. If it affected the entire unit like invisibility, yeah that'd be broken as hell. But it doesnt. It makes the unit firing on them when you declare it fire snaps, the ghosts dont get any buffs.

Now as long as you have 1 left it does prevent any blasts or flamers from hitting the ghosts for the entire game. Not because of any rules, but because nobody wants to shoot it at them because they know the moment you target them with a blast weapon, SNAPFIRE! shots lost because you cant snapfire blasts or change targets.

 luke1705 wrote:
You do need Riptides to be in separate units to stack the benefits, as it stipulates that one riptide must "already have shot" at the unit. You cannot claim stacking for a second or third riptide because once the riptide "has shot", the shooting phase is complete for the entire unit. All the shots for the unit have to be completed before the riptide can be considered to "have shot" (note the past tense).

Could you point me to the rule you found? It would make me feel a lot better.

 Nilok wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Nilok wrote:

This feels like MTG and abusing the stack.

How so?

It reminds me of Journey to Nowhere and blink effect shenanigans.
In the combo, you target a creature to be removed from play with Journey to Nowhere. In response, you return Journey to Nowhere to you hand before the target creature is exiled. Journey to Nowhere is returned to your hand, and then the creature is exiled. Normally when Journey to Nowhere is removed from play, the creature is returned back to play. However, since the creature was not exiled by the time Journey to Nowhere left play, and thus misses the trigger, the creature is permanently exiled.

While not as extreme, you are playing stack order with the shooting rules. You have your first weapon fire, giving the BS bonus to the other Riptide in the unit, then you switch to the second Riptide for shooting by selecting its secondary weapon and shooting. Now you have both Riptides in the unit, and any other Riptides that join in, at a buffed BS.

This really feels like shenanigans in a game like 40k.

The Journey to Nowhere thing you mentioned isn't shenanigans, in fact it was designed with that in mind as cards like it had existed for a long time and that was a known property of the stack due to its simple and straightforward nature. The only recently changed the wording to intentionally prevent that, and it wasn't that long ago since they removed damage from the stack also, they're just trying to make the game more friendly to people who aren't programmers or mathematicians.

I see what you're getting at though.

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
Its the rule. You have read it so i assume you know the wording is clear enough. Each suit comes with it. Each one affects the unit. Its not unclear. It needs no interpretation. No one is arguing what it says.

It only works against one unit per Countermeasure! It specifies that "A MODEL" uses it and it affects one unit targeting "IT or the unit it belongs to"

So all you're doing is getting three kind of spontaneous attempts to defray fire on your unit. Three units the whole game get affected. For 400 points. That's very possibly not even enough to stop all incoming fire for a round. Its ridiculous to try and nerf it further.

I agree with you on how the wording sounds, but I'm not sure about the power level of the ability with that wording.

Again, it's three enemy units in any case, but it's not as simple as you think. Again:

One Holophoton affects 3 models in your unit, two Holophotons in a unit affects 12 models in your unit, and three Holophotons affects 27 models in your unit.

More so, let's look at another aspect. If I'm the opponent, and I want your Keels dead in one turn, the typical way is to target them with one big unit in a turn, make them use the Holophoton thing, then target them with another big unit. This all of a sudden becomes impossible with multiple Keels in a unit since they can essentially negate the full turn for all the Keels, instead of just one unit worth of shooting, and that's rather massive. Maybe if there was a restriction that stated it was once per turn, it would make a lot more sense, would you be opposed to a "once per turn" limitation on the Holophoton thing?

It affects the unit FIRING on it...not the Ghostkeel unit itself. So you cannot look at it like that. the enemy unit can be a 40 man blob or a five man dire avenger squad and you get the same effect. So its the UNIT targetting you that is the target of this ability...not the Ghostkeels themselves!

But you're discounting the amount of models that benefit from that unit being affected. For a simple example, let's say your opponent has two units of super powerful shooting attacks, if you have one Keel, they fire with one unit to eat the Holophoton, and then use the other to kill the Keel. If on the other hand you have two Keels in the squad, that Keel probably isn't dying since now both of your opponent's squads are being Holophotoned instead of one, and they can no longer use the fire power of both units to kill the Keel.

In other words, because it affects the squad, you essentially are giving your Ghostkeel two to three uses of it during the game instead of the intended one.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Ghostkeel's holophotons are nowhere near broken. Heck i have yet to use it on anything other than massed troop guns just because the 2+ cover save alone deters the dangerous guns or blast weapons.

Its designed to keep the unit from being wiped out by something crazy strong for an extra turn, not be an invisibility star. If it affected the entire unit like invisibility, yeah that'd be broken as hell. But it doesnt. It makes the unit firing on them when you declare it fire snaps, the ghosts dont get any buffs.

Now as long as you have 1 left it does prevent any blasts or flamers from hitting the ghosts for the entire game. Not because of any rules, but because nobody wants to shoot it at them because they know the moment you target them with a blast weapon, SNAPFIRE! shots lost because you cant snapfire blasts or change targets.

I'm not saying it's broken, just that it's important to consider the way the power of it amplifies when using multiple Ghostkeels, as it does grow in strength a lot faster than a lot of people assume probably.

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Nilok wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Nilok wrote:

This feels like MTG and abusing the stack.

How so?

It reminds me of Journey to Nowhere and blink effect shenanigans.
In the combo, you target a creature to be removed from play with Journey to Nowhere. In response, you return Journey to Nowhere to you hand before the target creature is exiled. Journey to Nowhere is returned to your hand, and then the creature is exiled. Normally when Journey to Nowhere is removed from play, the creature is returned back to play. However, since the creature was not exiled by the time Journey to Nowhere left play, and thus misses the trigger, the creature is permanently exiled.

While not as extreme, you are playing stack order with the shooting rules. You have your first weapon fire, giving the BS bonus to the other Riptide in the unit, then you switch to the second Riptide for shooting by selecting its secondary weapon and shooting. Now you have both Riptides in the unit, and any other Riptides that join in, at a buffed BS.

This really feels like shenanigans in a game like 40k.

The Journey to Nowhere thing you mentioned isn't shenanigans, in fact it was designed with that in mind as cards like it had existed for a long time and that was a known property of the stack due to its simple and straightforward nature. The only recently changed the wording to intentionally prevent that, and it wasn't that long ago since they removed damage from the stack also, they're just trying to make the game more friendly to people who aren't programmers or mathematicians.

I see what you're getting at though.

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
Its the rule. You have read it so i assume you know the wording is clear enough. Each suit comes with it. Each one affects the unit. Its not unclear. It needs no interpretation. No one is arguing what it says.

It only works against one unit per Countermeasure! It specifies that "A MODEL" uses it and it affects one unit targeting "IT or the unit it belongs to"

So all you're doing is getting three kind of spontaneous attempts to defray fire on your unit. Three units the whole game get affected. For 400 points. That's very possibly not even enough to stop all incoming fire for a round. Its ridiculous to try and nerf it further.

I agree with you on how the wording sounds, but I'm not sure about the power level of the ability with that wording.

Again, it's three enemy units in any case, but it's not as simple as you think. Again:

One Holophoton affects 3 models in your unit, two Holophotons in a unit affects 12 models in your unit, and three Holophotons affects 27 models in your unit.

More so, let's look at another aspect. If I'm the opponent, and I want your Keels dead in one turn, the typical way is to target them with one big unit in a turn, make them use the Holophoton thing, then target them with another big unit. This all of a sudden becomes impossible with multiple Keels in a unit since they can essentially negate the full turn for all the Keels, instead of just one unit worth of shooting, and that's rather massive. Maybe if there was a restriction that stated it was once per turn, it would make a lot more sense, would you be opposed to a "once per turn" limitation on the Holophoton thing?

It affects the unit FIRING on it...not the Ghostkeel unit itself. So you cannot look at it like that. the enemy unit can be a 40 man blob or a five man dire avenger squad and you get the same effect. So its the UNIT targetting you that is the target of this ability...not the Ghostkeels themselves!

But you're discounting the amount of models that benefit from that unit being affected. For a simple example, let's say your opponent has two units of super powerful shooting attacks, if you have one Keel, they fire with one unit to eat the Holophoton, and then use the other to kill the Keel. If on the other hand you have two Keels in the squad, that Keel probably isn't dying since now both of your opponent's squads are being Holophotoned instead of one, and they can no longer use the fire power of both units to kill the Keel.

In other words, because it affects the squad, you essentially are giving your Ghostkeel two to three uses of it during the game instead of the intended one.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Ghostkeel's holophotons are nowhere near broken. Heck i have yet to use it on anything other than massed troop guns just because the 2+ cover save alone deters the dangerous guns or blast weapons.

Its designed to keep the unit from being wiped out by something crazy strong for an extra turn, not be an invisibility star. If it affected the entire unit like invisibility, yeah that'd be broken as hell. But it doesnt. It makes the unit firing on them when you declare it fire snaps, the ghosts dont get any buffs.

Now as long as you have 1 left it does prevent any blasts or flamers from hitting the ghosts for the entire game. Not because of any rules, but because nobody wants to shoot it at them because they know the moment you target them with a blast weapon, SNAPFIRE! shots lost because you cant snapfire blasts or change targets.

I'm not saying it's broken, just that it's important to consider the way the power of it amplifies when using multiple Ghostkeels, as it does grow in strength a lot faster than a lot of people assume probably.

And that would be no different than if i had 3 ghost keels as seperate units. I would be able to use it 3 times, same as if i had 3 in 1 squad.

notredameguy10 wrote:


And that would be no different than if i had 3 ghost keels as seperate units. I would be able to use it 3 times, same as if i had 3 in 1 squad.

No, see this is what I'm trying to get across, it's not the same at all.

Re-read what I wrote there, two separate units of Ghostkeels play completely differently against shooting than one unit of two Ghostkeels. As in if your opponent has two squads of powerful shooting, and targets your single Ghostkeel with both, he can most likely kill one of the two Ghostkeels, but if your unit of two gets targeted by the same shooting, both Ghostkeels will survive. Yes, in the grand scheme you'd still soak two turns of shooting from those two squads, but in one scenario twice as many Ghostkeels survive, which is a huge difference.


The only time it's comparable is if for whatever they decide to shoot each squad at a different Ghostkeel, since then both squads get Holophotoned, and if that decision from your opponent sounds like it's insane, it should say something because that's basically what happens when you get the double Holophoton in one unit of two Ghostkeels.

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:


And that would be no different than if i had 3 ghost keels as seperate units. I would be able to use it 3 times, same as if i had 3 in 1 squad.

No, see this is what I'm trying to get across, it's not the same at all.

Re-read what I wrote there, two separate units of Ghostkeels play completely differently against shooting than one unit of two Ghostkeels. As in if your opponent has two squads of powerful shooting, and targets your single Ghostkeel with both, he can most likely kill one of the two Ghostkeels, but if your unit of two gets targeted by the same shooting, both Ghostkeels will survive. Yes, in the grand scheme you'd still soak two turns of shooting from those two squads, but in one scenario twice as many Ghostkeels survive, which is a huge difference.


The only time it's comparable is if for whatever they decide to shoot each squad at a different Ghostkeel, since then both squads get Holophotoned, and if that decision from your opponent sounds like it's insane, it should say something because that's basically what happens when you get the double Holophoton in one unit of two Ghostkeels.

You are looking it solely from one direction. There are negatives to your method as well. There are VERY few things in the game that can kill a ghost keel in 1 round of shooting. So being able to use it on 3 seperate units is much more efficient than being able to use it 1 single time on a squad of 3. aka using it 3 times on seperate units is infinitely better than using it once on a squad of 3

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:


And that would be no different than if i had 3 ghost keels as seperate units. I would be able to use it 3 times, same as if i had 3 in 1 squad.

No, see this is what I'm trying to get across, it's not the same at all.

Re-read what I wrote there, two separate units of Ghostkeels play completely differently against shooting than one unit of two Ghostkeels. As in if your opponent has two squads of powerful shooting, and targets your single Ghostkeel with both, he can most likely kill one of the two Ghostkeels, but if your unit of two gets targeted by the same shooting, both Ghostkeels will survive. Yes, in the grand scheme you'd still soak two turns of shooting from those two squads, but in one scenario twice as many Ghostkeels survive, which is a huge difference.


The only time it's comparable is if for whatever they decide to shoot each squad at a different Ghostkeel, since then both squads get Holophotoned, and if that decision from your opponent sounds like it's insane, it should say something because that's basically what happens when you get the double Holophoton in one unit of two Ghostkeels.

You are looking it solely from one direction. There are negatives to your method as well. There are VERY few things in the game that can kill a ghost keel in 1 round of shooting. So being able to use it on 3 seperate units is much more efficient than being able to use it 1 single time on a squad of 3. aka using it 3 times on seperate units is infinitely better than using it once on a squad of 3

But that's the good thing in that scenario, it makes you make that decision while list building, or if you add a once per turn clause then it still has that decision making process.

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:


And that would be no different than if i had 3 ghost keels as seperate units. I would be able to use it 3 times, same as if i had 3 in 1 squad.

No, see this is what I'm trying to get across, it's not the same at all.

Re-read what I wrote there, two separate units of Ghostkeels play completely differently against shooting than one unit of two Ghostkeels. As in if your opponent has two squads of powerful shooting, and targets your single Ghostkeel with both, he can most likely kill one of the two Ghostkeels, but if your unit of two gets targeted by the same shooting, both Ghostkeels will survive. Yes, in the grand scheme you'd still soak two turns of shooting from those two squads, but in one scenario twice as many Ghostkeels survive, which is a huge difference.


The only time it's comparable is if for whatever they decide to shoot each squad at a different Ghostkeel, since then both squads get Holophotoned, and if that decision from your opponent sounds like it's insane, it should say something because that's basically what happens when you get the double Holophoton in one unit of two Ghostkeels.

You are looking it solely from one direction. There are negatives to your method as well. There are VERY few things in the game that can kill a ghost keel in 1 round of shooting. So being able to use it on 3 seperate units is much more efficient than being able to use it 1 single time on a squad of 3. aka using it 3 times on seperate units is infinitely better than using it once on a squad of 3

But that's the good thing in that scenario, it makes you make that decision while list building, or if you add a once per turn clause then it still has that decision making process.

Lol no one is putting in clauses. Thats not how the rule works as written. If you think it is too good fine that is your prerogative. Doesn't mean thats not how it works

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:


And that would be no different than if i had 3 ghost keels as seperate units. I would be able to use it 3 times, same as if i had 3 in 1 squad.

No, see this is what I'm trying to get across, it's not the same at all.

Re-read what I wrote there, two separate units of Ghostkeels play completely differently against shooting than one unit of two Ghostkeels. As in if your opponent has two squads of powerful shooting, and targets your single Ghostkeel with both, he can most likely kill one of the two Ghostkeels, but if your unit of two gets targeted by the same shooting, both Ghostkeels will survive. Yes, in the grand scheme you'd still soak two turns of shooting from those two squads, but in one scenario twice as many Ghostkeels survive, which is a huge difference.


The only time it's comparable is if for whatever they decide to shoot each squad at a different Ghostkeel, since then both squads get Holophotoned, and if that decision from your opponent sounds like it's insane, it should say something because that's basically what happens when you get the double Holophoton in one unit of two Ghostkeels.

You are looking it solely from one direction. There are negatives to your method as well. There are VERY few things in the game that can kill a ghost keel in 1 round of shooting. So being able to use it on 3 seperate units is much more efficient than being able to use it 1 single time on a squad of 3. aka using it 3 times on seperate units is infinitely better than using it once on a squad of 3

But that's the good thing in that scenario, it makes you make that decision while list building, or if you add a once per turn clause then it still has that decision making process.

Lol no one is putting in clauses. Thats not how the rule works as written. If you think it is too good fine that is your prerogative. Doesn't mean thats not how it works

Well there's currently a discussion going on about whether or not they all use it or just one uses it, when placed in a squad, so I'm just proposing a middle ground.

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:


And that would be no different than if i had 3 ghost keels as seperate units. I would be able to use it 3 times, same as if i had 3 in 1 squad.

No, see this is what I'm trying to get across, it's not the same at all.

Re-read what I wrote there, two separate units of Ghostkeels play completely differently against shooting than one unit of two Ghostkeels. As in if your opponent has two squads of powerful shooting, and targets your single Ghostkeel with both, he can most likely kill one of the two Ghostkeels, but if your unit of two gets targeted by the same shooting, both Ghostkeels will survive. Yes, in the grand scheme you'd still soak two turns of shooting from those two squads, but in one scenario twice as many Ghostkeels survive, which is a huge difference.


The only time it's comparable is if for whatever they decide to shoot each squad at a different Ghostkeel, since then both squads get Holophotoned, and if that decision from your opponent sounds like it's insane, it should say something because that's basically what happens when you get the double Holophoton in one unit of two Ghostkeels.

You are looking it solely from one direction. There are negatives to your method as well. There are VERY few things in the game that can kill a ghost keel in 1 round of shooting. So being able to use it on 3 seperate units is much more efficient than being able to use it 1 single time on a squad of 3. aka using it 3 times on seperate units is infinitely better than using it once on a squad of 3

But that's the good thing in that scenario, it makes you make that decision while list building, or if you add a once per turn clause then it still has that decision making process.

Lol no one is putting in clauses. Thats not how the rule works as written. If you think it is too good fine that is your prerogative. Doesn't mean thats not how it works

Well there's currently a discussion going on about whether or not they all use it or just one uses it, when placed in a squad, so I'm just proposing a middle ground.

there is not a current discussion. this was already a topic in YMDC weeks ago and it was closed by a mod because every single person (except one) agreed on how the rule reads and that it is clear as to being able to use it 3 times.

Again, it is simple situation;

For those of us that believe it is 1 time per unit of models = Judge the impact based on that premise.

For those of us that believe it is 1 time per model - judge the impact based on that premise.

notredameguy10 wrote:


there is not a current discussion. this was already a topic in YMDC weeks ago and it was closed by a mod because every single person (except one) agreed on how the rule reads and that it is clear as to being able to use it 3 times.

We're literally having a current discussion about it here, right now :/.

Oh well, I made my case on the matter and I've stated that I'd prefer the more powerful version of the rule but understand why it might be an issue. Now it's just a matter of seeing if the next ITC vote includes the topic, and if it does, seeing if it passes or fails.

 Nilok wrote:

 luke1705 wrote:
You do need Riptides to be in separate units to stack the benefits, as it stipulates that one riptide must "already have shot" at the unit. You cannot claim stacking for a second or third riptide because once the riptide "has shot", the shooting phase is complete for the entire unit. All the shots for the unit have to be completed before the riptide can be considered to "have shot" (note the past tense).

Could you point me to the rule you found? It would make me feel a lot better.

Check out the shooting phase. I have the digital version so I don't know what page it's on for the print rulebook, but right after they talk about the psychic powers, there is the first page on the shooting phase, where they give you an order of operations for the shooting sequence.

The third step in particular says that all of models in a given unit that are equipped with the same type of weapon must shoot it at the same time. This is further reinforced with the "allocate wounds and remove casualties section". At the bottom of the first paragraph, there is a bold section that says that all of the wounds from a single wound pool must be allocated before moving on the the next wound pool. What constitutes a wound pool is defined in the last paragraph on the preceding page, where is says that all the wounds with the same strength, AP value and special rules are formed into the same pool. Essentially, this will mean all of the wounds caused by the same weapon profile. So if, for example, all of the ion accelerators in a unit must be shot and then resolved before a second wound pool is addressed, you can't say that you're going to shoot one ion accelerator "first" and then shoot a second one "later". They are both resolved simultaneously. This is also stated under the "select a weapon" section when you are nominating a unit to shoot. "When firing a unit, completely resolve all attacks from the same weapons at the same time before moving onto any differently named weapons."

So actually, in conclusion, I suppose if two riptides had both different primary and secondary weapons, it would work (step 6 of the shooting sequence says that the shooting attack must be completely resolved by a single type of weapon before moving on to the next type of weapon), but it just feels gamey to me. Tau have so much going for them. No need to try and rules lawyer more efficiency. That riptide wing is good enough as is. Riptides with the same weapons (primary or secondary) definitely would not work though.

 luke1705 wrote:

 Nilok wrote:

 luke1705 wrote:
You do need Riptides to be in separate units to stack the benefits, as it stipulates that one riptide must "already have shot" at the unit. You cannot claim stacking for a second or third riptide because once the riptide "has shot", the shooting phase is complete for the entire unit. All the shots for the unit have to be completed before the riptide can be considered to "have shot" (note the past tense).

Could you point me to the rule you found? It would make me feel a lot better.

Check out the shooting phase. I have the digital version so I don't know what page it's on for the print rulebook, but right after they talk about the psychic powers, there is the first page on the shooting phase, where they give you an order of operations for the shooting sequence.

The third step in particular says that all of models in a given unit that are equipped with the same type of weapon must shoot it at the same time. This is further reinforced with the "allocate wounds and remove casualties section". At the bottom of the first paragraph, there is a bold section that says that all of the wounds from a single wound pool must be allocated before moving on the the next wound pool. What constitutes a wound pool is defined in the last paragraph on the preceding page, where is says that all the wounds with the same strength, AP value and special rules are formed into the same pool. Essentially, this will mean all of the wounds caused by the same weapon profile. So if, for example, all of the ion accelerators in a unit must be shot and then resolved before a second wound pool is addressed, you can't say that you're going to shoot one ion accelerator "first" and then shoot a second one "later". They are both resolved simultaneously. This is also stated under the "select a weapon" section when you are nominating a unit to shoot. "When firing a unit, completely resolve all attacks from the same weapons at the same time before moving onto any differently named weapons."

So actually, in conclusion, I suppose if two riptides had both different primary and secondary weapons, it would work (step 6 of the shooting sequence says that the shooting attack must be completely resolved by a single type of weapon before moving on to the next type of weapon), but it just feels gamey to me. Tau have so much going for them. No need to try and rules lawyer more efficiency. That riptide wing is good enough as is. Riptides with the same weapons (primary or secondary) definitely would not work though.

Then you run into issue with the Riptides secondary weapons, as they fire "separately" than the primary weapons

If you have three Pirana in a squad with a seeker middle each, and one pirana uses one missile, do the other two have to? Do the unused missles mysteriously vanish? The only reason people are grasping desperately for things like this to Nerf taught is this: haters gonna hate. It's seriously pathetic how rule lawyery people have become with this release. Part of it is because there is a not so silent minority that hate tau, and feel they should need have been added and don't fit with the grimdark setting of the game. Some hate what they see as the nerd anime fan faction. It's classic nerd hate on other nerds, like when magic fans look down on yugio or Pokemon fans for liking things they don't like.

 Orock wrote:
If you have three Pirana in a squad with a seeker middle each, and one pirana uses one missile, do the other two have to? Do the unused missles mysteriously vanish? The only reason people are grasping desperately for things like this to Nerf taught is this: haters gonna hate. It's seriously pathetic how rule lawyery people have become with this release. Part of it is because there is a not so silent minority that hate tau, and feel they should need have been added and don't fit with the grimdark setting of the game. Some hate what they see as the nerd anime fan faction. It's classic nerd hate on other nerds, like when magic fans look down on yugio or Pokemon fans for liking things they don't like.

Wow, that's quite a bit of anger.

Though to address your Seeker comparison, the reason that doesn't work is that a Seeker is an individual weapon hit, that doesn't scale with the number in the unit. A closer comparison would be if each time you fired a Piranha's Seeker missile, it affected all three Piranhas in that they all fired their missile, but did not consume their missiles, as in each Piranha basically shot three Seekers for the price of one, since in the case of the Holophoton all of the Ghostkeels get the benefit from it, the Seeker does not.

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Orock wrote:
If you have three Pirana in a squad with a seeker middle each, and one pirana uses one missile, do the other two have to? Do the unused missles mysteriously vanish? The only reason people are grasping desperately for things like this to Nerf taught is this: haters gonna hate. It's seriously pathetic how rule lawyery people have become with this release. Part of it is because there is a not so silent minority that hate tau, and feel they should need have been added and don't fit with the grimdark setting of the game. Some hate what they see as the nerd anime fan faction. It's classic nerd hate on other nerds, like when magic fans look down on yugio or Pokemon fans for liking things they don't like.

Wow, that's quite a bit of anger.

Though to address your Seeker comparison, the reason that doesn't work is that a Seeker is an individual weapon hit, that doesn't scale with the number in the unit. A closer comparison would be if each time you fired a Piranha's Seeker missile, it affected all three Piranhas in that they all fired their missile, but did not consume their missiles, as in each Piranha basically shot three Seekers for the price of one, since in the case of the Holophoton all of the Ghostkeels get the benefit from it, the Seeker does not.

That description is irrelevant and inaccurate. The rule for HPCM says it AFFECTS THE UNIT, not model (but is activated by 1 model).

If i had 3 separate SM captains each with a 1 use ability that affects the unit they are in, if all 3 were able to be joined the ability would work 3 times, on the whole unit.
Same thing with resurrection orbs and necron lords. 3 res orbs can be used 3 times, and it affects the whole squad, or just themselves if they are not in a squad together.

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Orock wrote:
If you have three Pirana in a squad with a seeker middle each, and one pirana uses one missile, do the other two have to? Do the unused missles mysteriously vanish? The only reason people are grasping desperately for things like this to Nerf taught is this: haters gonna hate. It's seriously pathetic how rule lawyery people have become with this release. Part of it is because there is a not so silent minority that hate tau, and feel they should need have been added and don't fit with the grimdark setting of the game. Some hate what they see as the nerd anime fan faction. It's classic nerd hate on other nerds, like when magic fans look down on yugio or Pokemon fans for liking things they don't like.

Wow, that's quite a bit of anger.

Though to address your Seeker comparison, the reason that doesn't work is that a Seeker is an individual weapon hit, that doesn't scale with the number in the unit. A closer comparison would be if each time you fired a Piranha's Seeker missile, it affected all three Piranhas in that they all fired their missile, but did not consume their missiles, as in each Piranha basically shot three Seekers for the price of one, since in the case of the Holophoton all of the Ghostkeels get the benefit from it, the Seeker does not.

That comparison is irrelevant and innacurrate

That's kind of the point, that you can't compare the Holophoton to Seekers, since they do completely different things and one functions with a capped limit, while the other doesn't actually have a direct ceiling itself.

Folks - does it matter?

Specifically, does trying to convince the other, matter? We can all see there are two sides and that those sides don't agree.

I'm bored of reading a variety of same-old contextual examples of; if I had 3 seekers, each fired frag missile, sum greater than parts. But wait. Seekers can only stock krak grenades etc. etc.

How about we move on and discuss tactics.

With regards to Ghostkeels - they are either X strong or Y strong - Really easy to consider either/or (/both) when talking about tactics (this is a tactics thread).

Please do both and/or agree to disagree.

Razerous wrote:
Folks - does it matter?

At the end of the day, not really, as if there needs to be a vote there will be one and the results will dictate which way it works regardless of our individual preference. I just like discussing the rules is all.

So how about this, what tactics are you most excited for in either of the new codices? For me it's probably the Dawnblade as a whole, because of the awesome mech army it allows for, and it provides a formation that's heavy on the Skyrays as an option.

I believe our best formation is the Drone Net from Mint'ka. Intercepting markerlights ftw!

 Tinkrr wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:


And that would be no different than if i had 3 ghost keels as seperate units. I would be able to use it 3 times, same as if i had 3 in 1 squad.

No, see this is what I'm trying to get across, it's not the same at all.

Re-read what I wrote there, two separate units of Ghostkeels play completely differently against shooting than one unit of two Ghostkeels. As in if your opponent has two squads of powerful shooting, and targets your single Ghostkeel with both, he can most likely kill one of the two Ghostkeels, but if your unit of two gets targeted by the same shooting, both Ghostkeels will survive. Yes, in the grand scheme you'd still soak two turns of shooting from those two squads, but in one scenario twice as many Ghostkeels survive, which is a huge difference.


The only time it's comparable is if for whatever they decide to shoot each squad at a different Ghostkeel, since then both squads get Holophotoned, and if that decision from your opponent sounds like it's insane, it should say something because that's basically what happens when you get the double Holophoton in one unit of two Ghostkeels.

Again... it doesnt matter one bit how many are in my unit. It matters how many are in the AFFECTED unit! The AFFECTED unit is NOT the Ghostkeels!

DirtyDeeds wrote:
I believe our best formation is the Drone Net from Mint'ka. Intercepting markerlights ftw!

Yea, that formation is pretty crazy, it gives you Pathfinders that can move and shoot at full BS, have more toughness, have the assault phase move, and then a pile of extra abilities.

 Jancoran wrote:


Again... it doesnt matter one bit how many are in my unit. It matters how many are in the AFFECTED unit! The AFFECTED unit is NOT the Ghostkeels!

That's too reductionist of a view.


I think the best way to look at it, is well imagine you have two Ghostkeels, and they have two strong shooting units that could kill a single Ghostkeel each with shooting without the Holophoton stopping them. If each Ghostkeel is an individual unit they can focus fire and kill one, but if both are one unit and can double up on Holophoton those two units can't kill either Ghostkeel. Now the only time they don't kill a Ghostkeel if there are two individual Ghostkeels (outside of bad luck), is if they decide to target each Ghostkeel with one of those units, which we can both agree is probably a really bad play, so now when you combine those two Ghostkeels the only option you give them in that scenario is that bad play.

Clearly that's a theoretical situation, but it does show it's not just a matter of their units being affected, but also your units since in one case you retain 50% more Ghostkeel than the other, despite affecting the same amount of models with the ability on their end as a whole.

 Tinkrr wrote:
So how about this, what tactics are you most excited for in either of the new codices? For me it's probably the Dawnblade as a whole, because of the awesome mech army it allows for, and it provides a formation that's heavy on the Skyrays as an option.

I did miss Skyrays - I regularly played them last codex.

A question with regards to formations (and Farsight Enclaves); Could I field a standard Hunter Contingent (with the Hunter Cadre + Aux Choices etc.) as well as a single Drone Net (the special lettered one)?

FSE: What is the interaction now, may I ask. I've heard people saying a suit-for-troops CAD - Does it still require a 3-man suit squad. Are bonding knives mandatory. What about a riptide wing (assuming ECPA are fine to issue to Riptide suits), curious!

The Piranha Party, I can see the merit but personally I'm not excited by it. I like the suits, to me it feels like how heavy armour should feel (but generally, the rules for tanks suck unless they are free/spammed/filled with boys). A couple of sentinels, a few chimeras, hellfounds, bassiliks and leman russ tanks - just don't provide the same Wow factor (current limitations could simply boil down to having to get boots and no vehicle-supporting rules).

Oh, one on the Drone Network, I feel like if I go with the Piranha wing, I'll bring it, but if I want something like the Skyray formation I'd cut the Piranhas and Drone Network for the Skyray group, since both do the same thing in theory. The Devilfish is a little annoying though since I probably won't have any foot troops, which makes me wish it was a Hammerhead.

Razerous wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
So how about this, what tactics are you most excited for in either of the new codices? For me it's probably the Dawnblade as a whole, because of the awesome mech army it allows for, and it provides a formation that's heavy on the Skyrays as an option.

I did miss Skyrays - I regularly played them last codex.

A question with regards to formations (and Farsight Enclaves); Could I field a standard Hunter Contingent (with the Hunter Cadre + Aux Choices etc.) as well as a single Drone Net (the special lettered one)?

FSE: What is the interaction now, may I ask. I've heard people saying a suit-for-troops CAD - Does it still require a 3-man suit squad. Are bonding knives mandatory. What about a riptide wing (assuming ECPA are fine to issue to Riptide suits), curious!

The Piranha Party, I can see the merit but personally I'm not excited by it. I like the suits, to me it feels like how heavy armour should feel (but generally, the rules for tanks suck unless they are free/spammed/filled with boys). A couple of sentinels, a few chimeras, hellfounds, bassiliks and leman russ tanks - just don't provide the same Wow factor (current limitations could simply boil down to having to get boots and no vehicle-supporting rules).

It's weird that Skyrays got so left out, but I guess the new Piranha formation makes up for it with the new Drone Network?

As far as I know you can.

Well the Hunter Contingent style formation, which is Dawnbalde, has the clause that Crisis Suits are troops, and all units that can take Bonding Knives do so, but they no longer require the 3-man unit as far as I can tell. Now they just use either the Hunter Cad (can you take Suits in that as troops to fill the needed amount?) or the Retaliation Cadre as their core choice, which is pretty nice. Their special rule thing for the greater formation is they reroll the warlord trait if they want, and they get to mark an enemy unit each turn, and all of their units re-roll wound rolls against the marked unit, that's pretty strong.

The Piranha party for me will really depend on the ruling about how it functions, if it can do the "blink" thing where it just constantly pumps out drones each turn that's a huge amount of free points (I did the math and in three turn you're looking at like 1.2k points of free drones), but if it's every other turn like most reserves I'll probably just use them as a Seeker platform with some drone production abilities.

 Tinkrr wrote:


That's too reductionist of a view.
.

No. Its an entirely accurate portrayal is what it is. Lol. It is...in fact... not...affecting the Ghostkeels. How many are in the Ghostkeep unit? Irrelevant because the unit affected isn't the Ghostkels. that is in fact what it does. It affects a TOTAL at worst of three units once or one unit three times or whatever. I can fire a Lascannon unit, a Plasmavet unit and a group of Ogryn into them and their ability is toast. THAT"S it! Its done. All three Ghostkeels would have used up their thingee. Mountain from a mole hill.

i see no ITC ruling on this and so I will bide my time. This is really cut and dry so I dont know what to say that hasnt been said.

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:


That's too reductionist of a view.
.

No. Its an entirely accurate portrayal is what it is. Lol. It is...in fact... not...affecting the Ghostkeels. How many are in the Ghostkeep unit? Irrelevant because the unit affected isn't the Ghostkels. that is in fact what it does. It affects a TOTAL at worst of three units once or one unit three times or whatever. I can fire a Lascannon unit, a Plasmavet unit and a group of Ogryn into them and their ability is toast. THAT"S it! Its done. All three Ghostkeels would have used up their thingee. Mountain from a mole hill.

i see no ITC ruling on this and so I will bide my time. This is really cut and dry so I dont know what to say that hasnt been said.

Ok, let me ask you this, do you acknowledge the difference of power between the two scenarios I've mapped out? Nothing to do with a rule dispute, just do you see a difference of power in each case? I'll mention them again now:

Scenario 1:

Two Ghostkeels in separate units with two enemy firing squads, the two squads target one individual Ghostkeel and the first is holophotoned, the second isn't. One Ghostkeel dies, you take your turn, then they take their turn and repeat the process to kill the second Ghostkeel.

Scenario 2:

Two Ghostkeels in one unit. get targeted by the same enemy units, both enemy units get holophotoned and you go into your turn with both Ghostkeels alive, the turn after that both of those units shoot the two Ghostkeels and wipe them out.

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:


That's too reductionist of a view.
.

No. Its an entirely accurate portrayal is what it is. Lol. It is...in fact... not...affecting the Ghostkeels. How many are in the Ghostkeep unit? Irrelevant because the unit affected isn't the Ghostkels. that is in fact what it does. It affects a TOTAL at worst of three units once or one unit three times or whatever. I can fire a Lascannon unit, a Plasmavet unit and a group of Ogryn into them and their ability is toast. THAT"S it! Its done. All three Ghostkeels would have used up their thingee. Mountain from a mole hill.

i see no ITC ruling on this and so I will bide my time. This is really cut and dry so I dont know what to say that hasnt been said.

Ok, let me ask you this, do you acknowledge the difference of power between the two scenarios I've mapped out? Nothing to do with a rule dispute, just do you see a difference of power in each case? I'll mention them again now:

Scenario 1:

Two Ghostkeels in separate units with two enemy firing squads, the two squads target one individual Ghostkeel and the first is holophotoned, the second isn't. One Ghostkeel dies, you take your turn, then they take their turn and repeat the process to kill the second Ghostkeel.

Scenario 2:

Two Ghostkeels in one unit. get targeted by the same enemy units, both enemy units get holophotoned and you go into your turn with both Ghostkeels alive, the turn after that both of those units shoot the two Ghostkeels and wipe them out.

A strawman argument is one in which someone poses an argument that is other than the actual argument and seeks to gain agreement on IT as if it were equivalent to agreement on the issue at hand (which of course it is not). Can we agree?

So what we are talking about is a piece of wargear on a 130 point model (and they don't come much more expensive than that) that allows you to take less damage from one units turn per game. Less. And if you are willing to pay that cost again, one more unit. and so on. Just as, when I purchase one, i get two drones. They EACH get the drones. The unit as a whole benefits from both. That is how it works. You would no more deny two Psykers in a unit their Powers than you would the Ghostkeels gear.

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:


That's too reductionist of a view.
.

No. Its an entirely accurate portrayal is what it is. Lol. It is...in fact... not...affecting the Ghostkeels. How many are in the Ghostkeep unit? Irrelevant because the unit affected isn't the Ghostkels. that is in fact what it does. It affects a TOTAL at worst of three units once or one unit three times or whatever. I can fire a Lascannon unit, a Plasmavet unit and a group of Ogryn into them and their ability is toast. THAT"S it! Its done. All three Ghostkeels would have used up their thingee. Mountain from a mole hill.

i see no ITC ruling on this and so I will bide my time. This is really cut and dry so I dont know what to say that hasnt been said.

Ok, let me ask you this, do you acknowledge the difference of power between the two scenarios I've mapped out? Nothing to do with a rule dispute, just do you see a difference of power in each case? I'll mention them again now:

Scenario 1:

Two Ghostkeels in separate units with two enemy firing squads, the two squads target one individual Ghostkeel and the first is holophotoned, the second isn't. One Ghostkeel dies, you take your turn, then they take their turn and repeat the process to kill the second Ghostkeel.

Scenario 2:

Two Ghostkeels in one unit. get targeted by the same enemy units, both enemy units get holophotoned and you go into your turn with both Ghostkeels alive, the turn after that both of those units shoot the two Ghostkeels and wipe them out.

A strawman argument is one in which someone poses an argument that is other than the actual argument and seeks to gain agreement on IT as if it were equivalent to agreement on the issue at hand (which of course it is not). Can we agree?

So what we are talking about is a piece of wargear on a 130 point model (and they don't come much more expensive than that) that allows you to take less damage from one units turn per game. Less. And if you are willing to pay that cost again, one more unit. and so on. Just as, when I purchase one, i get two drones. They EACH get the drones. The unit as a whole benefits from both. That is how it works. You would no more deny two Psykers in a unit their Powers than you would the Ghostkeels gear.

Ok, let's go with the Psyker thing, how do two Psykers in a unit interact with one another?

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:


That's too reductionist of a view.
.

No. Its an entirely accurate portrayal is what it is. Lol. It is...in fact... not...affecting the Ghostkeels. How many are in the Ghostkeep unit? Irrelevant because the unit affected isn't the Ghostkels. that is in fact what it does. It affects a TOTAL at worst of three units once or one unit three times or whatever. I can fire a Lascannon unit, a Plasmavet unit and a group of Ogryn into them and their ability is toast. THAT"S it! Its done. All three Ghostkeels would have used up their thingee. Mountain from a mole hill.

i see no ITC ruling on this and so I will bide my time. This is really cut and dry so I dont know what to say that hasnt been said.

Ok, let me ask you this, do you acknowledge the difference of power between the two scenarios I've mapped out? Nothing to do with a rule dispute, just do you see a difference of power in each case? I'll mention them again now:

Scenario 1:

Two Ghostkeels in separate units with two enemy firing squads, the two squads target one individual Ghostkeel and the first is holophotoned, the second isn't. One Ghostkeel dies, you take your turn, then they take their turn and repeat the process to kill the second Ghostkeel.

Scenario 2:

Two Ghostkeels in one unit. get targeted by the same enemy units, both enemy units get holophotoned and you go into your turn with both Ghostkeels alive, the turn after that both of those units shoot the two Ghostkeels and wipe them out.

A strawman argument is one in which someone poses an argument that is other than the actual argument and seeks to gain agreement on IT as if it were equivalent to agreement on the issue at hand (which of course it is not). Can we agree?

So what we are talking about is a piece of wargear on a 130 point model (and they don't come much more expensive than that) that allows you to take less damage from one units turn per game. Less. And if you are willing to pay that cost again, one more unit. and so on. Just as, when I purchase one, i get two drones. They EACH get the drones. The unit as a whole benefits from both. That is how it works. You would no more deny two Psykers in a unit their Powers than you would the Ghostkeels gear.

Ok, let's go with the Psyker thing, how do two Psykers in a unit interact with one another?

They don't. they are what they are.

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:


That's too reductionist of a view.
.

No. Its an entirely accurate portrayal is what it is. Lol. It is...in fact... not...affecting the Ghostkeels. How many are in the Ghostkeep unit? Irrelevant because the unit affected isn't the Ghostkels. that is in fact what it does. It affects a TOTAL at worst of three units once or one unit three times or whatever. I can fire a Lascannon unit, a Plasmavet unit and a group of Ogryn into them and their ability is toast. THAT"S it! Its done. All three Ghostkeels would have used up their thingee. Mountain from a mole hill.

i see no ITC ruling on this and so I will bide my time. This is really cut and dry so I dont know what to say that hasnt been said.

Ok, let me ask you this, do you acknowledge the difference of power between the two scenarios I've mapped out? Nothing to do with a rule dispute, just do you see a difference of power in each case? I'll mention them again now:

Scenario 1:

Two Ghostkeels in separate units with two enemy firing squads, the two squads target one individual Ghostkeel and the first is holophotoned, the second isn't. One Ghostkeel dies, you take your turn, then they take their turn and repeat the process to kill the second Ghostkeel.

Scenario 2:

Two Ghostkeels in one unit. get targeted by the same enemy units, both enemy units get holophotoned and you go into your turn with both Ghostkeels alive, the turn after that both of those units shoot the two Ghostkeels and wipe them out.

A strawman argument is one in which someone poses an argument that is other than the actual argument and seeks to gain agreement on IT as if it were equivalent to agreement on the issue at hand (which of course it is not). Can we agree?

So what we are talking about is a piece of wargear on a 130 point model (and they don't come much more expensive than that) that allows you to take less damage from one units turn per game. Less. And if you are willing to pay that cost again, one more unit. and so on. Just as, when I purchase one, i get two drones. They EACH get the drones. The unit as a whole benefits from both. That is how it works. You would no more deny two Psykers in a unit their Powers than you would the Ghostkeels gear.

Ok, let's go with the Psyker thing, how do two Psykers in a unit interact with one another?

They don't. they are what they are.

Ok, now how do two Ghostkeels interact? See the above two scenarios I posted.

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:


That's too reductionist of a view.
.

No. Its an entirely accurate portrayal is what it is. Lol. It is...in fact... not...affecting the Ghostkeels. How many are in the Ghostkeep unit? Irrelevant because the unit affected isn't the Ghostkels. that is in fact what it does. It affects a TOTAL at worst of three units once or one unit three times or whatever. I can fire a Lascannon unit, a Plasmavet unit and a group of Ogryn into them and their ability is toast. THAT"S it! Its done. All three Ghostkeels would have used up their thingee. Mountain from a mole hill.

i see no ITC ruling on this and so I will bide my time. This is really cut and dry so I dont know what to say that hasnt been said.

Ok, let me ask you this, do you acknowledge the difference of power between the two scenarios I've mapped out? Nothing to do with a rule dispute, just do you see a difference of power in each case? I'll mention them again now:

Scenario 1:

Two Ghostkeels in separate units with two enemy firing squads, the two squads target one individual Ghostkeel and the first is holophotoned, the second isn't. One Ghostkeel dies, you take your turn, then they take their turn and repeat the process to kill the second Ghostkeel.

Scenario 2:

Two Ghostkeels in one unit. get targeted by the same enemy units, both enemy units get holophotoned and you go into your turn with both Ghostkeels alive, the turn after that both of those units shoot the two Ghostkeels and wipe them out.

A strawman argument is one in which someone poses an argument that is other than the actual argument and seeks to gain agreement on IT as if it were equivalent to agreement on the issue at hand (which of course it is not). Can we agree?

So what we are talking about is a piece of wargear on a 130 point model (and they don't come much more expensive than that) that allows you to take less damage from one units turn per game. Less. And if you are willing to pay that cost again, one more unit. and so on. Just as, when I purchase one, i get two drones. They EACH get the drones. The unit as a whole benefits from both. That is how it works. You would no more deny two Psykers in a unit their Powers than you would the Ghostkeels gear.

Ok, let's go with the Psyker thing, how do two Psykers in a unit interact with one another?

They don't. they are what they are.

Ok, now how do two Ghostkeels interact? See the above two scenarios I posted.

They dont. they are what they are. Each with its own powers, gear, etc...

...anyways

So it is the dawnblade detachment that effectively gives you Farsight Flavour things. So you couldn't have a standalone Farsight optimised stealth cadre, for example?

But you could have a standalone OSC + a standalone Riptide wing... then assuming the Riptides are characters (right?), pick one to be your Warlord and you have a Bound army list?

(Edit: So again.. Why Does It Matter? You will not agree. I could bet £££ and come out richer. This will not change. Stop trying to convince each other of any point - it is pointless AND it is derailing this thread on frankly worthless discussions)

 Jancoran wrote:


They dont. they are what they are. Each with its own powers, gear, etc...

Clearly the do :/. As I've shown there's a difference between having them in one squad or two, which means there's an interaction. How powerful the interaction is can be debated, but whether they function differently based on how many there are in a single unit isn't up for debate.

Consider two Psykers, how many powers you gain or dice you use doesn't change based on if the Psykers are individual or in a unit, but the Holophoton does.

Razerous wrote:
...anyways

So it is the dawnblade detachment that effectively gives you Farsight Flavour things. So you couldn't have a standalone Farsight optimised stealth cadre, for example?

But you could have a standalone OSC + a standalone Riptide wing... then assuming the Riptides are characters (right?), pick one to be your Warlord and you have a Bound army list?

(Edit: So again.. Why Does It Matter? You will not agree. I could bet £££ and come out richer. This will not change. Stop trying to convince each other of any point - it is pointless AND it is derailing this thread on frankly worthless discussions)

I'm not actually sure, and now that you bring it up I'd like to know how that functions with the new formations/contingents. Ideally I'd like to bring the Dawnblade force and then an OSC on the side, but I'm not sure if I can, and I'd lean towards that I can do that, but I'm simply not sure.

I think so, oddly enough. Maybe at worst you'd be required to take a basic CAD and use that, since it's not exactly possible to make a Riptide a character currently without takings a specific formation that basically eats up your whole army cost.

(It's not about convincing the other, it's about trying to understand the other's point of view, and the third parties that are on the fence that read the discussion. Basically, for me it's the old quote that essentially states that you can know your views perfectly, but if you can't understand the other side, at least from a conceptual stance, you know nothing about the topic, so I generally try to get the other sides views as concise and clear as I possibly can. As for the third party folks, well that's what most discussion is about, you will rarely convince the other side, but you can at least provide as much information as possible for bystanders to read an make an informed decision, and that's really who the discussion is about. )

Edit: Found the quote, I original thought it was Thomas Paine, but it was John Stewart Mill:

“He who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that. His reasons may be good, and no one may have been able to refute them. But if he is equally unable to refute the reasons on the opposite side, if he does not so much as know what they are, he has no ground for preferring either opinion... Nor is it enough that he should hear the opinions of adversaries from his own teachers, presented as they state them, and accompanied by what they offer as refutations. He must be able to hear them from persons who actually believe them...he must know them in their most plausible and persuasive form.”

Basically, it's important to understand the beliefs and views of others, regardless of how convinced you are of your own beliefs. The ladder half of the quote basically states that it's not just the literature itself that's important, but rather the direct people who are stating it, and their personal reasons for it.

Peeps...can we, for the love of God, please keep this thread talking about tactics? The ghostkeel argument is best had in YMDC. Why don't you start a thread over there if you need to keep hashing it out? If we want to talk about Ghostkeels, I, for one, would be interested in hearing some opinions on what is the best loadout for them, specifically a single one in an OSC.

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Peeps...can we, for the love of God, please keep this thread talking about tactics? The ghostkeel argument is best had in YMDC. Why don't you start a thread over there if you need to keep hashing it out? If we want to talk about Ghostkeels, I, for one, would be interested in hearing some opinions on what is the best loadout for them, specifically a single one in an OSC.

Personally I like the CiR and a stim injector. The shield generator might be the right call, but it's rather expensive compared to the injector, thoughts? The Fusion Blaster secondary is always a good choice, especially if you're going with the OSC since then you get that much more use out of it, I wouldn't personally go for the burst cannon, the flamer at that point is probably just as good.

If you only take one of those, instead of both, the EWO is still probably cheap enough to take, despite the short range.

So.. back on track.

Ran DBC @2k today.
Retaliation + Ranged Support + Allied OSC

Quick Recap!
Turn 1: Chaos killed 1 pathfinder, wow shrouded is awesome. He ran two mauler fiends, bloodthirster and a bike squad at my OSC ghost.. on my turn ghost with just ion wiped a mauler, did one glance on the other, a lot of whiffing broadsides.
Turn 2: Chaos charged the Ghostkeel and with bad overwatch made it in. Ufff.. mauler fiends are bad to ghostkeel.. lost 1 and 2 drones. My turn.. auto reserves awesome. Killed.. bloodthirster, 2 defilers, bike squad, bloodletters, and destroyed flamer on helldrake.. amazing montka.
Turn 3 and onto 5 was pretty much chaos Lord and Damn dogs killing everything . I failed every leadership and lost every initiative..I lost every unit to sweeping advance this game; nothing else.
Game ended in blood bath, I easily won kill points but the objectives killed me.. I constantly pulled montka cards that didn't help me.. like reserves when I had none etc.
All in all. Love the DBC, small changes and I think it will be really solid.

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Peeps...can we, for the love of God, please keep this thread talking about tactics? The ghostkeel argument is best had in YMDC. Why don't you start a thread over there if you need to keep hashing it out? If we want to talk about Ghostkeels, I, for one, would be interested in hearing some opinions on what is the best loadout for them, specifically a single one in an OSC.

There has already been a thread and locked by mods as the consensus by everyone but one person was reached.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Peeps...can we, for the love of God, please keep this thread talking about tactics? The ghostkeel argument is best had in YMDC. Why don't you start a thread over there if you need to keep hashing it out? If we want to talk about Ghostkeels, I, for one, would be interested in hearing some opinions on what is the best loadout for them, specifically a single one in an OSC.

Personally I like the CiR and a stim injector. The shield generator might be the right call, but it's rather expensive compared to the injector, thoughts? The Fusion Blaster secondary is always a good choice, especially if you're going with the OSC since then you get that much more use out of it, I wouldn't personally go for the burst cannon, the flamer at that point is probably just as good.

If you only take one of those, instead of both, the EWO is still probably cheap enough to take, despite the short range.

SG is a complete waste on Ghostkeel (50 points!!!)
Stim Inj is too expensive relative to the cost of the model (35 points)
CIR is better in most situations
Fusion Blaster is best choice for secondary, unless you take a VT in which case BC is better
Flamer is trash as you should never be that close with your ghost keel to units that the flamer could actually damage

I would like to note from the earlier discussion, that your Warlord only has to be a character if you have characters in your army. If your army lacks any character, you may select any model to be your Warlord.

The Warlord wrote:When choosing your army, you must nominate one model to be your Warlord. Unless specified otherwise, this must be a character mode. If you do not have any character models in your army, then select any other model in your army to be the Warlord. The model you choose a your Warlord also determines your Primary Detachment.

In other words, you can have an army of only Riptide, Ghostkeels, and Stealthsuits and you can select the Riptide to be the Warlord. However, if you purchase a single Stealthsuit Shas'vre character, they must be the Warlord.

notredameguy10 wrote:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Peeps...can we, for the love of God, please keep this thread talking about tactics? The ghostkeel argument is best had in YMDC. Why don't you start a thread over there if you need to keep hashing it out? If we want to talk about Ghostkeels, I, for one, would be interested in hearing some opinions on what is the best loadout for them, specifically a single one in an OSC.

There has already been a thread and locked by mods as the consensus by everyone but one person was reached.

Do you have a link to the discussion please?

More and more I keep reading about the ITC and their nerfing of the Tau its honestly turning me off and my FLGS from ever adopting their format. I honestly wouldn't mind so much but it seems to me and from what I read and looked into that there is a general consensus that they have a habit of favoring Imperial armies over xenos factions.

notredameguy10 wrote:

Overcharged HBC is better in a lot of situations.Flyers? Which sounds better: 12 Str 6 AP 4 shots with rending or 3 Str 7 AP 2 shots?
anything not in a large group HBC is better.
Any high AV vehicles HBC is better

Actually forgot the HBC got Rending at its beefed up profile, for sure can see the merit of taking x1 or x2 Riptides with HBC's.

Also remember that you don't need a "warlord" or have Troops to have a "bound" (actually called battleforged) army. You simply need to adhere to the restrictions in the detachments you are selecting. An OSC, Riptide Wing, and Drone Net are as "Battleforged" as a normal CAD.

 gmaleron wrote:
More and more I keep reading about the ITC and their nerfing of the Tau its honestly turning me off and my FLGS from ever adopting their format. I honestly wouldn't mind so much but it seems to me and from what I read and looked into that there is a general consensus that they have a habit of favoring Imperial armies over xenos factions.

notredameguy10 wrote:

Overcharged HBC is better in a lot of situations.Flyers? Which sounds better: 12 Str 6 AP 4 shots with rending or 3 Str 7 AP 2 shots?
anything not in a large group HBC is better.
Any high AV vehicles HBC is better

Actually forgot the HBC got Rending at its beefed up profile, for sure can see the merit of taking x1 or x2 Riptides with HBC's.

I regularly take at least one Riptide with a HBC and an Earth Caste Pilot Array, and I never regret it. Re-rolls to Nova reliably give me the beefed up profile, whilst re-rolling 1s makes it very unlikely that the Riptide will take any damage from Get's Hot. The ECPA really does seem like it was meant for a HBC Riptide.

Plug an EWO and a Velocity Tracker on there too and you've got yourself an excellent and durable anti-flyer platform. We don't see entire armies of flyers in my area, but people generally take two or three in our games, and I've never needed more than the Riptide to deal with them.

I've already discussed it with my group and we all agree that Riptides should be able to take the ECPA, because it doesn't make much sense otherwise.

Razerous wrote:
...anyways

So it is the dawnblade detachment that effectively gives you Farsight Flavour things. So you couldn't have a standalone Farsight optimised stealth cadre, for example?

But you could have a standalone OSC + a standalone Riptide wing... then assuming the Riptides are characters (right?), pick one to be your Warlord and you have a Bound army list?

(Edit: So again.. Why Does It Matter? You will not agree. I could bet £££ and come out richer. This will not change. Stop trying to convince each other of any point - it is pointless AND it is derailing this thread on frankly worthless discussions)

This should effectively answer your question, and explain why I feel a FSE is definitely an important component (as you only get the obsec suits from there). Thinking about how to put Farsight bomb back together now that shadowsun can do her thing with them.

Nilok wrote:I would like to note from the earlier discussion, that your Warlord only has to be a character if you have characters in your army. If your army lacks any character, you may select any model to be your Warlord.

The Warlord wrote:When choosing your army, you must nominate one model to be your Warlord. Unless specified otherwise, this must be a character mode. If you do not have any character models in your army, then select any other model in your army to be the Warlord. The model you choose a your Warlord also determines your Primary Detachment.

.

In other words, you can have an army of only Riptide, Ghostkeels, and Stealthsuits and you can select the Riptide to be the Warlord. However, if you purchase a single Stealthsuit Shas'vre character, they must be the Warlord.

Awesome point. Definitely viable

DirtyDeeds wrote:Also remember that you don't need a "warlord" or have Troops to have a "bound" (actually called battleforged) army. You simply need to adhere to the restrictions in the detachments you are selecting. An OSC, Riptide Wing, and Drone Net are as "Battleforged" as a normal CAD.

I thought you had to nominate one of your detachments to be your primary detachment & that has to include your warlord.

Right so you can field a FSE Hunter Contingent or call a OSC FSE . Might not do much besides giving PE:Orks etc but you can?

Razerous wrote:

DirtyDeeds wrote:Also remember that you don't need a "warlord" or have Troops to have a "bound" (actually called battleforged) army. You simply need to adhere to the restrictions in the detachments you are selecting. An OSC, Riptide Wing, and Drone Net are as "Battleforged" as a normal CAD.

I thought you had to nominate one of your detachments to be your primary detachment & that has to include your warlord.

Right so you can field a FSE Hunter Contingent or call a OSC FSE . Might not do much besides giving PE:Orks etc but you can?

Yes you do need to select one as your primary, but a formation can be a primary detachment in your army. So if you ran RipWing, OSC, and drone net. There are no "characters", which is fine. As someone above mentioned, in the BRB it covers this. You just select any model at this point to be your warlord.

Cheers

 gmaleron wrote:
More and more I keep reading about the ITC and their nerfing of the Tau its honestly turning me off and my FLGS from ever adopting their format. I honestly wouldn't mind so much but it seems to me and from what I read and looked into that there is a general consensus that they have a habit of favoring Imperial armies over xenos factions.

I haven't really seen favourtism from them in that regard, and their top 20 players is a mix of pretty much every army out there. Additionally they did just vote to give Orks a massive buff that only extends to Orks.

Then again, I'm probably biased as I really appreciate what the ITC is doing.

What else did they do to tau other than rule USRs dont share in the Hunter Contingent?

I dont usually pay attention to tournament rules

So far, nothing yet. Though one article mentioned the person used the Holophoton as a once per squad thing as opposed to once per Ghostkeel thing, which the previous discussion was in regards too.

They also stated they'll be looking at some of the Mont'ka stuff because there's some questionable wording there, which I fully understand as currently the Piranha wing is a little too good.

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Peeps...can we, for the love of God, please keep this thread talking about tactics? The ghostkeel argument is best had in YMDC. Why don't you start a thread over there if you need to keep hashing it out? If we want to talk about Ghostkeels, I, for one, would be interested in hearing some opinions on what is the best loadout for them, specifically a single one in an OSC.

I am fine with that. I don't see much reason for him to alter course and the text gives me none.

The singular Ghostkeep may not be as awesome. I played with three together and they did work. I again used the Fusion collider and TL Fusion Blaster. It took out 6 hull points on a super heavy in a round which was nice, and obviously could have been even more devastating. The Ion raker is better if you have a lot of anti-tank i nthe army already.

the thing about the Ghostkeels is, they fill a dominating need in the list, whether it be anti-personell or anti-TEQ and Armour. So whatever the rest of the list doesnt have enough of, give the Ghostkeel. I would magnetize the weapons because what makes them great in my mind isnt their weapons (which will be a function of need) but how doggone survivable they are. They will last a very big majority of the game if you take more than one.

Here's another consideration: I see a lot of people using 3 man Stealth suit units and one Ghostkeel. if all you're taking are 3 Stealthsuits, then a single Ghostkeel is fine. But i probably would say to take more than that. Stealthsuits are tough, they kill tanks and infantry, they are hard to shoot dead and in my case i used Shadowsun to command the force, which made it even more fun.

 Jancoran wrote:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Peeps...can we, for the love of God, please keep this thread talking about tactics? The ghostkeel argument is best had in YMDC. Why don't you start a thread over there if you need to keep hashing it out? If we want to talk about Ghostkeels, I, for one, would be interested in hearing some opinions on what is the best loadout for them, specifically a single one in an OSC.

I am fine with that. I don't see much reason for him to alter course and the text gives me none.

The singular Ghostkeep may not be as awesome. I played with three together and they did work. I again used the Fusion collider and TL Fusion Blaster. It took out 6 hull points on a super heavy in a round which was nice, and obviously could have been even more devastating. The Ion raker is better if you have a lot of anti-tank i nthe army already.

the thing about the Ghostkeels is, they fill a dominating need in the list, whether it be anti-personell or anti-TEQ and Armour. So whatever the rest of the list doesnt have enough of, give the Ghostkeel. I would magnetize the weapons because what makes them great in my mind isnt their weapons (which will be a function of need) but how doggone survivable they are. They will last a very big majority of the game if you take more than one.

Here's another consideration: I see a lot of people using 3 man Stealth suit units and one Ghostkeel. if all you're taking are 3 Stealthsuits, then a single Ghostkeel is fine. But i probably would say to take more than that. Stealthsuits are tough, they kill tanks and infantry, they are hard to shoot dead and in my case i used Shadowsun to command the force, which made it even more fun.

Best OSC lineup is 3 Ghostkeel and 2x3 stealth suits. If you only take 1 ghost keel and it dies, all that stealth suit "tax" loose all the benefits of OSC

You see stealthsuits as a tax? Thats weird. Common, but weird. The Stealthsuits are extremely useful.

 Jancoran wrote:
You see stealthsuits as a tax? Thats weird. Common, but weird. The Stealthsuits are extremely useful.

Only useful when they get all the buffs (+1 BS, Ignore cover, always hit rear of vehicles) from OSC formation. Otherwise they are just an ok unit; so a tax. The point is the formation is so good beaus of how good the ghost keels become and the buff to stealth suits. If the ghost keel dies then the stealth suits are no longer that great.

So what's the legal basing for a drone? I feel like the standard flying base puts them a bit too high off the ground for their size, and I'd like to make my basic drones about half the height of a Crisis Suit, which is just taller than a standing Fire Warrior.

If I cut the stem, and mount it on a regular troop base, will that cause issues for tournament play?

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
You see stealthsuits as a tax? Thats weird. Common, but weird. The Stealthsuits are extremely useful.

Only useful when they get all the buffs (+1 BS, Ignore cover, always hit rear of vehicles) from OSC formation. Otherwise they are just an ok unit; so a tax. The point is the formation is so good beaus of how good the ghost keels become and the buff to stealth suits. If the ghost keel dies then the stealth suits are no longer that great.

Stealthsuits hit on 2's, wound on 3's against MEQ (because Markerlights are in fact a Tau thing), they fire 24 shots, and they can fire them with Precision shot if you want them to. They can get great saves and their only real downside is they are Tough 3. That's about it.

So I took two full squads. I did switch out two with Meltas, so they had two of those and 4 Burst Cannons. I was able to kill an important Psyker with Precision shots and a Sergeant. Both were important to nerfing the enemy unit. I added a Triple-Keel unit. my big mistake was not putting a bonding knife on the Keels. Lersson learned. collectively they rolled the right flank and kept coming. Even in a game where i more or less failed every save I was given the opportunity to fail, they still gave me excellent board control.

So yeah I can't see taking just 2x3 Stealthsuits just to boost one Ghostkeel.

 Tinkrr wrote:
So what's the legal basing for a drone? I feel like the standard flying base puts them a bit too high off the ground for their size, and I'd like to make my basic drones about half the height of a Crisis Suit, which is just taller than a standing Fire Warrior.

If I cut the stem, and mount it on a regular troop base, will that cause issues for tournament play?

There should be a shorter sized flying base stem, perfect for your need.
http://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/Citadel-Flying-Stems-with-32mm-Flying-Bases

Stealth suits would be a tax if they didnt get the mirror benefit. Since they do, they are just as nasty as the Ghosts are to vehicles.

Aside from a few walkers, land raiders, or monoliths, what has higher than AV11 rear? For that matter, very few even have 11 rear. Our bursts can hurt av10/11, so each Stealthsuit adds 4 potential glances to the mix.
Only reason the stealthsuits arent on the same level is obviously less firepower (4 S5 shots vs 6 S7 + 4 S5 or 1 S8 Melta) but also the toughness.
Ive fielded a ghostkeel duo in several games without the OSC. They almost never take damage until something catches them in assult, and even then its iffy. Stealth suits on the other hand, i seldom have the buggers live more than a couple turns.

 Jancoran wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
You see stealthsuits as a tax? Thats weird. Common, but weird. The Stealthsuits are extremely useful.

Only useful when they get all the buffs (+1 BS, Ignore cover, always hit rear of vehicles) from OSC formation. Otherwise they are just an ok unit; so a tax. The point is the formation is so good beaus of how good the ghost keels become and the buff to stealth suits. If the ghost keel dies then the stealth suits are no longer that great.

Stealthsuits hit on 2's, wound on 3's against MEQ (because Markerlights are in fact a Tau thing), they fire 24 shots, and they can fire them with Precision shot if you want them to. They can get great saves and their only real downside is they are Tough 3. That's about it.

So I took two full squads. I did switch out two with Meltas, so they had two of those and 4 Burst Cannons. I was able to kill an important Psyker with Precision shots and a Sergeant. Both were important to nerfing the enemy unit. I added a Triple-Keel unit. my big mistake was not putting a bonding knife on the Keels. Lersson learned. collectively they rolled the right flank and kept coming. Even in a game where i more or less failed every save I was given the opportunity to fail, they still gave me excellent board control.

So yeah I can't see taking just 2x3 Stealthsuits just to boost one Ghostkeel.

So while I get what you're going for, I don't really think that's good. For the same 90 points as 12 shots from the Stealthsuits, you can pay 90points for 10 shots at the same strength and AP, but at almost double the range of 30", and those 10 shots turn in to 20 at a slightly shorter range of 15".

Stealthsuits aren't bad, they just don't particularly do anything special for their points and unit slot :/.

 Jancoran wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
You see stealthsuits as a tax? Thats weird. Common, but weird. The Stealthsuits are extremely useful.

Only useful when they get all the buffs (+1 BS, Ignore cover, always hit rear of vehicles) from OSC formation. Otherwise they are just an ok unit; so a tax. The point is the formation is so good beaus of how good the ghost keels become and the buff to stealth suits. If the ghost keel dies then the stealth suits are no longer that great.

Stealthsuits hit on 2's, wound on 3's against MEQ (because Markerlights are in fact a Tau thing), they fire 24 shots, and they can fire them with Precision shot if you want them to. They can get great saves and their only real downside is they are Tough 3. That's about it.

So I took two full squads. I did switch out two with Meltas, so they had two of those and 4 Burst Cannons. I was able to kill an important Psyker with Precision shots and a Sergeant. Both were important to nerfing the enemy unit. I added a Triple-Keel unit. my big mistake was not putting a bonding knife on the Keels. Lersson learned. collectively they rolled the right flank and kept coming. Even in a game where i more or less failed every save I was given the opportunity to fail, they still gave me excellent board control.

So yeah I can't see taking just 2x3 Stealthsuits just to boost one Ghostkeel.

Stealth suits normally hit on 4+ and get boosted to 3+ near ghost keels in a OSC

the other downside is they cost 30 points stock. That is extremely high if they don't have any of the boosts from OSC

 Nilok wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
So what's the legal basing for a drone? I feel like the standard flying base puts them a bit too high off the ground for their size, and I'd like to make my basic drones about half the height of a Crisis Suit, which is just taller than a standing Fire Warrior.

If I cut the stem, and mount it on a regular troop base, will that cause issues for tournament play?

There should be a shorter sized flying base stem, perfect for your need.
http://www.games-workshop.com/en-GB/Citadel-Flying-Stems-with-32mm-Flying-Bases

That's perfect

notredameguy10 wrote:

Stealth suits normally hit on 4+ and get boosted to 3+ near ghost keels in a OSC

the other downside is they cost 30 points stock. That is extremely high if they don't have any of the boosts from OSC

But. they are boosted by it. and they will be hitting on 2's. Delivering that many Burst cannons at a time with excellent saves is the relevant thing. Nothing i nthe Tau codex should be looked at entirely on its own.

and Wall of Mirrors on Stealthsuits producced ridiculous tank killing results.

I assume you're including the extra +1 BS from CF in your "hitting on 2s" assessment? I agree that Stealth Suits are probably worth 30 pts in an OSC, but T3 models are just way too fragile to invest much in, regardless of what save they have. Just ask Dark Eldar. It's too easy to down them with small arms. For that reason, I wouldn't ever take more than the 2x3 suits required for the formation, but that "tax" isn't so bad at all.

Surprising, but okay!

If unlimited Detachments were a thing in tournaments I could see it but as they arent, I'll probably keep doing it.

I agree with milkman. And so far have had decent success. I only have two ghost. But if I had three that is what the OSC is made for. BS5 ignore cover is amazing. The stealth for me are a tax or I put homing beacons on them and hide them for my reserves.


I dont see any reason to run colliders on them.. rakers handle all the armor they need to with more chances to ensure a kill. 18 shots to 3 possible explodes for max 9 (d3) hp off a super heavy...


Separate point.. ran the air superiority today in a DBC with allied OSC @2000 points. Wow. They came in killed a imperial SH bomber and a vendetta then cleaned house wiping out gaurd units and tanks. D3 free marker lights was also awesome. I didn't really need more then that honestly.

I intended to buy 3 ghosts before i even saw the OSC lol. Got 2 assembled and painted, the third im doing some mild/kinda heavy kitbashing on (kinda being its not actually the ghostkeel himself getting the kitbash).

The melta is pointless as a blast. You will never hit multiple vehicles with it except maybe 2 droppods that are right next to each other. Blasts to me have less accuracy than a single shot, since on a regular model a 2" scatter will miss the target. Moreso on vehicles, but not by much unless its a raider or some other big thing.

Still thing its dumb that glancing a vehicle to death is far more powerful of a tactic than exploding it imo. The CIR is superior against everything except the AV14 all around vehicles. Is there anything in this game including FW that has AV13 rear? I actually cant think of any higher than 12 that isnt a LR or Monolith

Not going to lie, I love the Ghostkeel model, and the Stealthsuits, so having an excuse to run the ladder with the former is always good.

I wouldn't say the Collider is pointless, although I much prefer the CIR. Sure, it will function as a Fusion Blaster against tanks, since like you said it probably won't hit more than one with a blast, but against non-tank targets it's still a S8, AP 1, blast weapon, which can have its uses against things with a 2+ save, especially when it ignore cover and functions as a blast so the to hit isn't as bad. Basically it's probably better against Invis Deathstars than tanks.

 Tinkrr wrote:
Not going to lie, I love the Ghostkeel model, and the Stealthsuits, so having an excuse to run the ladder with the former is always good.

I wouldn't say the Collider is pointless, although I much prefer the CIR. Sure, it will function as a Fusion Blaster against tanks, since like you said it probably won't hit more than one with a blast, but against non-tank targets it's still a S8, AP 1, blast weapon, which can have its uses against things with a 2+ save, especially when it ignore cover and functions as a blast so the to hit isn't as bad. Basically it's probably better against Invis Deathstars than tanks.

lol well that 100% depends if you are using ITC rules or not. Normally, you cannot even fire blast at anything invisible. With ITC rules you can.

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
Not going to lie, I love the Ghostkeel model, and the Stealthsuits, so having an excuse to run the ladder with the former is always good.

I wouldn't say the Collider is pointless, although I much prefer the CIR. Sure, it will function as a Fusion Blaster against tanks, since like you said it probably won't hit more than one with a blast, but against non-tank targets it's still a S8, AP 1, blast weapon, which can have its uses against things with a 2+ save, especially when it ignore cover and functions as a blast so the to hit isn't as bad. Basically it's probably better against Invis Deathstars than tanks.

lol well that 100% depends if you are using ITC rules or not. Normally, you cannot even fire blast at anything invisible. With ITC rules you can.

Well yea, of course, but I just generally default to ITC when considering things.

It's probably even better than regular shooting as a blast when using ITC rules.

Used an OSC today. Even the Stealth Suits killed stuff, but the Ghostkeels cleaned off important things. I deep struck them, though.

Vineheart01 wrote:Stealth suits would be a tax if they didnt get the mirror benefit. Since they do, they are just as nasty as the Ghosts are to vehicles.

Aside from a few walkers, land raiders, or monoliths, what has higher than AV11 rear?

Sicaran

Hokay folks, question time.

Hunter Contingent 1500pts with;

Marko (dual MP) +1 drone, 2 riptides, ghostkeel, stormsurge, 2 drone squads, 3 bare strikes and 2 pathfinder squads (spare points?)

Riptides have EWO and fusion, 1 has VT. Storm surge has EWO/VT/Shield/ABFP.Ghostkeel has EWO and Fusion.

Should I swap out the 2nd riptide (and the ghostkeel) for a OSC, bought as an AUX choice from the Hunter Cont.

Thoughts?

What's up with the two drone squads and two pathfinder units? I feel like those could easily make up the points for two minimal squads of Stealth Suits, since you already have a Ghostkeel.

 Tinkrr wrote:
What's up with the two drone squads and two pathfinder units? I feel like those could easily make up the points for two minimal squads of Stealth Suits, since you already have a Ghostkeel.

He needs marker light support and thats what those are for

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
What's up with the two drone squads and two pathfinder units? I feel like those could easily make up the points for two minimal squads of Stealth Suits, since you already have a Ghostkeel.

He needs marker light support and thats what those are for

That's a lot of Markerlights, especially with a Mark'o. The OSC itself offers a pseudo Markerlight source as it gives +1BS and ignores cover, as that equates to about three Markerlights against a target unit for the OSC itself.

Additionally, if those are all Markerlight platforms, why not just go with a Drone Network, as it's generally better than Pathfinders in most ways.

Edit: The VT on the Riptide is probably also an ok place to shave some points D:

It's tricky, it gets very tight @ 1500pts.

1) You need to field a 'Fast Attack' option + an Auxiliary choice, ala 2 drones squads

2) With the points I had left over, it was either one drone squad + change or two pathfinder squads. Still, not as expensive as a Drone-Net and a Drone-Net doesn't account for mandatory purchases.

I don't quite know how I've done it but the new list features an OSC with 2 ghostkeels (fusion/EWO) at the expense of 1 drone squad, 1 pathfinder squad and a riptide.

notredameguy10 wrote:

lol well that 100% depends if you are using ITC rules or not. Normally, you cannot even fire blast at anything invisible. With ITC rules you can.

How so? As I understand it blasts target everything in ITC.

,normal RAW you can target primary unit and have a blast overlap an invisible unit. And templates.

That same situation would not work as they both would be targeted in ITC. The only way you could is if a blast 100% scatters onto them.

Razerous wrote:
It's tricky, it gets very tight @ 1500pts.

1) You need to field a 'Fast Attack' option + an Auxiliary choice, ala 2 drones squads

2) With the points I had left over, it was either one drone squad + change or two pathfinder squads. Still, not as expensive as a Drone-Net and a Drone-Net doesn't account for mandatory purchases.

I don't quite know how I've done it but the new list features an OSC with 2 ghostkeels (fusion/EWO) at the expense of 1 drone squad, 1 pathfinder squad and a riptide.

With Mark'O one larger squad of drones is better than 2 smaller squads if possible.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grizzyzz wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:

lol well that 100% depends if you are using ITC rules or not. Normally, you cannot even fire blast at anything invisible. With ITC rules you can.

How so? As I understand it blasts target everything in ITC.

,normal RAW you can target primary unit and have a blast overlap an invisible unit. And templates.

That same situation would not work as they both would be targeted in ITC. The only way you could is if a blast 100% scatters onto them.

Invis is snapfire only, so you cannot target invis with blasts. ITC changed invis to BS1 instead so blasts work

Razerous wrote:
It's tricky, it gets very tight @ 1500pts.

1) You need to field a 'Fast Attack' option + an Auxiliary choice, ala 2 drones squads

2) With the points I had left over, it was either one drone squad + change or two pathfinder squads. Still, not as expensive as a Drone-Net and a Drone-Net doesn't account for mandatory purchases.

I don't quite know how I've done it but the new list features an OSC with 2 ghostkeels (fusion/EWO) at the expense of 1 drone squad, 1 pathfinder squad and a riptide.

Well you do cover the auxiliary choice with the OSC if you decide to take it, so that reduces the mandatory drone squads in theory. Additionally you can cut the drone on the Mark'O and join him with a drone squad of Marker Drones to fill the fast attack option.

That means you basically get 88 points from the pathfinder squads and 56 from the cut drone unit. That means you need only 36 more points to get the minimum OSC choice. Well, actually 24 points since you can cut the drone on the Mark'O, and without the VT you're basically there D:

Just sayin'.

Interesting.. ok that is a huge power drop... What about templates?


The only major ITC tournament near me is NOVA. Looks like they had a custom FAQ on top of normal rules for that.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:

lol well that 100% depends if you are using ITC rules or not. Normally, you cannot even fire blast at anything invisible. With ITC rules you can.

How so? As I understand it blasts target everything in ITC.

,normal RAW you can target primary unit and have a blast overlap an invisible unit. And templates.

That same situation would not work as they both would be targeted in ITC. The only way you could is if a blast 100% scatters onto them.

The ITC heavily nerfed invisibility, so you can actually target them with blasts and such, the Ghostkeel can actually completely negate a blast with the Holophoton. The ITC rules for invisibility:

For ITC format events, The Invisibility psychic power is altered to read: units shooting at the Invisible unit do so at BS1, and hit it in melee on a 5+.

Use the following clarifications for the Invisibility psychic power:
-Any attacks or special abilities that can cause damage (i.e. hits, wounds and/or vehicle damage) without rolling to hit (e.g. Codex: Chaos Daemons Warp Storm Tables, etc) affect invisible units normally.
-Nova psychic powers affect invisible units normally.
-Stomp attacks affect invisible units normally.
-If a model in close combat with an invisible unit would normally hit in close combat on a fixed value (e.g. Kharn the Betrayer), the player whose turn it is determines whether the fixed value or the Invisibility psychic power takes precedence.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grizzyzz wrote:
Interesting.. ok that is a huge power drop... What about templates?


The only major ITC tournament near me is NOVA. Looks like they had a custom FAQ on top of normal rules for that.

The NOVA Open is not ITC based, they support full on Deathstar stuff D:

 Tinkrr wrote:
Not going to lie, I love the Ghostkeel model, and the Stealthsuits, so having an excuse to run the ladder with the former is always good.

I wouldn't say the Collider is pointless, although I much prefer the CIR. Sure, it will function as a Fusion Blaster against tanks, since like you said it probably won't hit more than one with a blast, but against non-tank targets it's still a S8, AP 1, blast weapon, which can have its uses against things with a 2+ save, especially when it ignore cover and functions as a blast so the to hit isn't as bad. Basically it's probably better against Invis Deathstars than tanks.

One possible use for the Fusion Collider would be to hit some Termies as soon as they deep strike (if you have EWO on your 'keel). They will be nice and bunched up, so if the scatter gods are with you, the terminator unit in question will be neutered. Also good against Daemon/KDK summoning (that fresh unit of Flesh Hounds won't be so scary anymore ). Still, the Raker is a better choice as it is good even if your opponent's models are spread out.

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Grizzyzz wrote:
Interesting.. ok that is a huge power drop... What about templates?


The only major ITC tournament near me is NOVA. Looks like they had a custom FAQ on top of normal rules for that.

The NOVA Open is not ITC based, they support full on Deathstar stuff D:

Well I mean they use ITC as a base ruleset.. so i wouldn't say it's completely left field ha.

Anyway that's not tau tactics anyway haha. Moving on...

 ZergSmasher wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
Not going to lie, I love the Ghostkeel model, and the Stealthsuits, so having an excuse to run the ladder with the former is always good.

I wouldn't say the Collider is pointless, although I much prefer the CIR. Sure, it will function as a Fusion Blaster against tanks, since like you said it probably won't hit more than one with a blast, but against non-tank targets it's still a S8, AP 1, blast weapon, which can have its uses against things with a 2+ save, especially when it ignore cover and functions as a blast so the to hit isn't as bad. Basically it's probably better against Invis Deathstars than tanks.

One possible use for the Fusion Collider would be to hit some Termies as soon as they deep strike (if you have EWO on your 'keel). They will be nice and bunched up, so if the scatter gods are with you, the terminator unit in question will be neutered. Also good against Daemon/KDK summoning (that fresh unit of Flesh Hounds won't be so scary anymore ). Still, the Raker is a better choice as it is good even if your opponent's models are spread out.

I was thinking more along the lines of Centstars, but yea same basic idea D:. The CIR is probably the better choice as a whole, but it does do something rather redundant considering how much missile pod goodness Tau has as a whole, and the Collider is still a second melta weapon against armour at the end of the day. I'm not saying it's better, but it's not exactly bad either when used correctly as an anti termie and their equivalents weapon that has tank busting potential, as opposed to a tank buster.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Grizzyzz wrote:
Interesting.. ok that is a huge power drop... What about templates?


The only major ITC tournament near me is NOVA. Looks like they had a custom FAQ on top of normal rules for that.

The NOVA Open is not ITC based, they support full on Deathstar stuff D:

Well I mean they use ITC as a base ruleset.. so i wouldn't say it's completely left field ha.

Anyway that's not tau tactics anyway haha. Moving on...

There are a lot of similarities between the two, but I can't seem to find anything in the Nova rules that state Invisibility gives the enemy BS1 instead of Snapfire, like it does in the ITC. Which means t hey can't be targeted at all by things like a Nova Charged Ion Accelerator, or a Ghostkeel Fusion Collider, or many other things that are significantly more effective against them but have the template stats.

It would be kind of cool if the Ghostkeel was unique in that it could just devour a template weapon as it does now.

 Grizzyzz wrote:
I agree with milkman. And so far have had decent success. I only have two ghost. But if I had three that is what the OSC is made for. BS5 ignore cover is amazing. The stealth for me are a tax or I put homing beacons on them and hide them for my reserves.


I dont see any reason to run colliders on them.. rakers handle all the armor they need to with more chances to ensure a kill. 18 shots to 3 possible explodes for max 9 (d3) hp off a super heavy...


Separate point.. ran the air superiority today in a DBC with allied OSC @2000 points. Wow. They came in killed a imperial SH bomber and a vendetta then cleaned house wiping out gaurd units and tanks. D3 free marker lights was also awesome. I didn't really need more then that honestly.

My first game used a tank with rear armor 12. Fusion and Wall of Mirrors made it a complete non issue. the blast was great against masses of people after an assault 9and of course being a mobile Tau force, he got chances at me).

As for the planes: i like them. The bomber in particular. I was a tiny bit bummed that you had to take two fighters in the Air Superiority thing, but it is still good. No one seems to like Tau planes, but I find them to be pretty useful. I do have to build the force kind of around them but thats becoming true of many formations so its not that inconvenient.

Razerous wrote:
Hokay folks, question time.

Hunter Contingent 1500pts with;

Marko (dual MP) +1 drone, 2 riptides, ghostkeel, stormsurge, 2 drone squads, 3 bare strikes and 2 pathfinder squads (spare points?)

Riptides have EWO and fusion, 1 has VT. Storm surge has EWO/VT/Shield/ABFP.Ghostkeel has EWO and Fusion.

Should I swap out the 2nd riptide (and the ghostkeel) for a OSC, bought as an AUX choice from the Hunter Cont.

Thoughts?

Yes, the OSC is nasty and will threaten most vehicles in the gsme, including knights.

 Jancoran wrote:

As for the planes: i like them. The bomber in particular. I was a tiny bit bummed that you had to take two fighters in the Air Superiority thing, but it is still good. No one seems to like Tau planes, but I find them to be pretty useful. I do have to build the force kind of around them but thats becoming true of many formations so its not that inconvenient.

The strength of the DBC in general is counter to how most people want to play Tau. Every game i have either gone first or stole the initiative with the DBC it has been an uphill battle. However, allowing my opponent to spread out, I have done great.

The air superiority formation is unfortunately the only way I see our flyers being able to do what flyers first task should be; Taking out enemy flyers. the +1BS and auto reserve pass is crucial for this. Another point... Tyranids and their flyrants. They start on the board, great our planes come in immediately next turn and you can more than likely take one down (seekers are ap3 + maybe ignore cover).

Both tau formations your playing a combo game. whether your combining BS stats or buffs or working with special reserve bonuses + doom. I found my opponents at the start hate me less playing DBC, until they realize how great a free Doom is for me, then they are back to groaning.

Also to add to the conversation, Ghostkeels could very well be one of our best anti air units.

For 150 points, you could get 6 Str7 AP4 shots (Ion Raker) with Velocity Tracker? Add in +1BS for OSC? Yes please. With this set up, you get anti-air, anti light vehicle, and anti MSU with armor 4 save or less. That is really point efficient for a unit that can basically do it all. You could go 3 crisis suits with all missiles(loner range than Ion Raker) but you couldn't make velocity tracker viable for them and risk leadership checks.

I can see the Ghostkeel becoming an auto include.

 Bach wrote:
Also to add to the conversation, Ghostkeels could very well be one of our best anti air units.

For 150 points, you could get 6 Str7 AP4 shots (Ion Raker) with Velocity Tracker? Add in +1BS for OSC? Yes please. With this set up, you get anti-air, anti light vehicle, and anti MSU with armor 4 save or less. That is really point efficient for a unit that can basically do it all. You could go 3 crisis suits with all missiles(loner range than Ion Raker) but you couldn't make velocity tracker viable for them and risk leadership checks.

I can see the Ghostkeel becoming an auto include.

You are forgetting the best part. They also get ignore cover! So no jinking!

 Bach wrote:
Also to add to the conversation, Ghostkeels could very well be one of our best anti air units.

For 150 points, you could get 6 Str7 AP4 shots (Ion Raker) with Velocity Tracker? Add in +1BS for OSC? Yes please. With this set up, you get anti-air, anti light vehicle, and anti MSU with armor 4 save or less. That is really point efficient for a unit that can basically do it all. You could go 3 crisis suits with all missiles(loner range than Ion Raker) but you couldn't make velocity tracker viable for them and risk leadership checks.

I can see the Ghostkeel becoming an auto include.

The only downside to ghostkeel being your AA platform is range.. at 24" a flyer can avoid EWO if you have it (and thus you wouldnt have ignore cover +1 BS), or just kite your ghostkeel if need be.

I think a unit of broadsides is probably a better AA platform for the range. However.... I am going to be trying out the keel with velocity trackers in a few upcoming games. We will see how it works out!


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Not saying it is bad... by all means any flyer in that bubble is doomed.. literally... not the DBC bonus.

Thats pretty hard to still find viable targets for the plane's guns while avoiding a 30" threat zone.

Also i would never put EWO on OSC Ghosts. Why? Mirror is the shooting phase, not a general rule - they dont ignore cover, +1bs, or hit rear armor during interceptor phase. EWO would actually hurt your OSC.

Broadsides would be better if a unit could share the velocity tracker and also be relentless.

I figured that the range of the Ion Raker wouldn't be an issue since the Ghostkeel would probably be up the field, well within range of an opponents table edge by the time flyers came onto the board.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Thats pretty hard to still find viable targets for the plane's guns while avoiding a 30" threat zone.

Also i would never put EWO on OSC Ghosts. Why? Mirror is the shooting phase, not a general rule - they dont ignore cover, +1bs, or hit rear armor during interceptor phase. EWO would actually hurt your OSC.

Actually a really valid point. You may have just freed up 20 points in my list lol

 luke1705 wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Thats pretty hard to still find viable targets for the plane's guns while avoiding a 30" threat zone.

Also i would never put EWO on OSC Ghosts. Why? Mirror is the shooting phase, not a general rule - they dont ignore cover, +1bs, or hit rear armor during interceptor phase. EWO would actually hurt your OSC.

Actually a really valid point. You may have just freed up 20 points in my list lol

That's why I still believe Missilesides or a Nova Charged HBC Riptide with Velocity Tracker are our best AA options. Missilesides can get away with not using Velocity Tracker because of their Twin-Linked nature and Nova Charged HBC... Well that's self explanatory.

24" is half a standard table if you are center line, or pretty much the entire table if you have two to three Ghostkeels on skywatch.

SJ

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Thats pretty hard to still find viable targets for the plane's guns while avoiding a 30" threat zone.

Also i would never put EWO on OSC Ghosts. Why? Mirror is the shooting phase, not a general rule - they don't ignore cover, +1bs, or hit rear armor during interceptor phase. EWO would actually hurt your OSC.

On your second point i would argue it completely depends on your list and meta. With so many marine players and reserves coming in. And just yesterday I played guard, deepstriking veterans with ap3 ammo.. came in right in my 12" bubble. already popped both countermeasures 1 on a 20 shot twin linked punisher cannon that was within my 12" (some flyer vendetta maybe idk) and the other on a squad of wyverns... alot of dice just add up on 3+ saves.

Point is.. those 10 points allowed me to take out 10 more troops before they died that turn. For 10 points I will buy it every time. its just too good not to have as a threat to your opponent.

I think it is easy on the internet to underestimate ranges. Look at Grey Knights. "only" 24" range turns out to be a lot by the time they dominate the center of the table round 2!

The biggest issue for a Ghostkeel with a VT is that fliers aren't that common, everything else about it is good enough or better.

Yeah, fliers are so rare in my meta i can usually handle them either by broadsides or dumping some ML onto them so my hammerhead can hit'm (yes, that works. And it feels glorious lol)

So according to the ITC if you run Stormsurges you can just charge them in to great success against most armies. Has anyone tried this?

It does make sense as multiple Stormsurges stomping is probably going to kill everything it touches, and the way most people play against Tau is to try to charge them, so it does work in theory.

 Tinkrr wrote:
So according to the ITC if you run Stormsurges you can just charge them in to great success against most armies. Has anyone tried this?

It does make sense as multiple Stormsurges stomping is probably going to kill everything it touches, and the way most people play against Tau is to try to charge them, so it does work in theory.

I haven't tried it yet, but Frankie from Frontline gaming utilizes this strategy all the time. The stops totally bypass a lot of the stength of these deathstars.

DirtyDeeds wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
So according to the ITC if you run Stormsurges you can just charge them in to great success against most armies. Has anyone tried this?

It does make sense as multiple Stormsurges stomping is probably going to kill everything it touches, and the way most people play against Tau is to try to charge them, so it does work in theory.

I haven't tried it yet, but Frankie from Frontline gaming utilizes this strategy all the time. The stops totally bypass a lot of the stength of these deathstars.

Yea, in the ITC invisibility does nothing against Stomp really.

The shooting of the Stormsurge is really strong, but you can also alpha strike the D missile turn one, so you're more free to just go in and stomp it up, and it's not like their weapons outside of the D Missiles are that impressive against strong units that fail to stomp. Plus we've always wanted something that can melee, and stomping with something as resilient as the Stormsurge is pretty good.

Tough 6 and 3+ armor is still Tough 6 and 3+ armor. I lost my Stormsurge in its inaugural game after one turn of shooting. So shooting high powered stuff into it is not a terribad idea over engaging it in melee.

The thing to remember is that there are non-Stormsurges you can hide on close combat with too. Taking safe harbor there on the Tau's turn isnt a bad idea if you can pull it off and you're not too excited about engaging it in melee.

As a Tau General i just love the idea of stomping into a unit with something. That the Tau even have a unit that dares is kinda neat.

If you're taking a Stormsurge into CC, you might consider the Blastcannon instead of the Pulse Driver. Getting close to something and then hitting it with a D shot is nifty.

 ZergSmasher wrote:
If you're taking a Stormsurge into CC, you might consider the Blastcannon instead of the Pulse Driver. Getting close to something and then hitting it with a D shot is nifty.

Pretty much how I would run them.

SJ

Saw the new Tau list that the Frontline Gaming guys put together.

I believe it was...

CAD: min warriors, Mark'O and 8 marker drones, 2 Stormsurges
+ Riptide wing.

What do you guys think of this list? He said that he has won 3/3 of his test games against "good" lists.

I'm skeptical. I think the riptide wing will be an auto include at the competitive level.. but i am not sure that his list is as unbeatable as their article made it out to seem.

Cheers!

That sounds like a list that needs to table your opponent to win, since it has very few things to score. Riptide wing is technically 3 things but they have to be close enough where i'd be surprised if they cover more than 2 things, and a Mark'O without Tankmander statlines wouldnt be there the entire game. The moment they get a bad jump and dont get behind cover, all eyes on him to get rid of that drone squad.

Flipside

Damn killy. Thats a lot of firepower and durability. Until he faces a gravspam list that is.

Also im a little fuzzy on stomp rules, but its NOT considered a D attack right? That would make necrons a pain in the ass.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
That sounds like a list that needs to table your opponent to win, since it has very few things to score. Riptide wing is technically 3 things but they have to be close enough where i'd be surprised if they cover more than 2 things, and a Mark'O without Tankmander statlines wouldnt be there the entire game. The moment they get a bad jump and dont get behind cover, all eyes on him to get rid of that drone squad.

Flipside

Damn killy. Thats a lot of firepower and durability. Until he faces a gravspam list that is.

Also im a little fuzzy on stomp rules, but its NOT considered a D attack right? That would make necrons a pain in the ass.

Yeah stomp has its own table.. i believe tho that a roll of a 6 "removes the model from play" still however. I never have success with stomps.. idk if thats just me or what haha

Ive only done it once, and i rolled a 1 after getting a D1 lol

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
That sounds like a list that needs to table your opponent to win, since it has very few things to score. Riptide wing is technically 3 things but they have to be close enough where i'd be surprised if they cover more than 2 things, and a Mark'O without Tankmander statlines wouldnt be there the entire game. The moment they get a bad jump and dont get behind cover, all eyes on him to get rid of that drone squad.

Flipside

Damn killy. Thats a lot of firepower and durability. Until he faces a gravspam list that is.

Also im a little fuzzy on stomp rules, but its NOT considered a D attack right? That would make necrons a pain in the ass.

Yeah stomp has its own table.. i believe tho that a roll of a 6 "removes the model from play" still however. I never have success with stomps.. idk if thats just me or what haha

That's correct, a roll of a 6 on the stomp table days removed from play, so it's better than D. That's why 2 Stormsurges is so amazing in combat, it's literally D6 stomps, which has a 1/6 chance to remove something from play. Give them some shield generators and they'll be able to go toe to tor with all but the strongest melee contenders.

But there are units you should avoid;
Str8-10, especially if it's at initiative (most other super heavies, melee centurions, thunder hammer whatever, etc.)
Instant death enmasse, so Grey Knights.

Course i guess the old necron problem of reanimation against "removed from play" doesnt exist since now it behaves like FNP. Im used to necron players trying to reanimate after my SAG vaporizes them - which is now null and void on 2 accounts i guess lol (SAG is StrD now on boxcars and reanimate is basically FNP)

Main opponent i face is necrons, since my friend had to sell his space wolves to pay rent. Long story.
God i hate reanimation lol

Stormsurges stomping is certainly a good thing to remember. If your lines are getting overrun, you may have to stick the big fella in the trenches and let him go to work. That said, I can't think of a whole lot of other scenarios when I'd want my Stormsurge duking it out instead of tossing out 8+8d6 s5 shots and 4 pie plates (ABFP and pulse driver) per turn.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
That sounds like a list that needs to table your opponent to win, since it has very few things to score. Riptide wing is technically 3 things but they have to be close enough where i'd be surprised if they cover more than 2 things, and a Mark'O without Tankmander statlines wouldnt be there the entire game. The moment they get a bad jump and dont get behind cover, all eyes on him to get rid of that drone squad.

Flipside

Damn killy. Thats a lot of firepower and durability. Until he faces a gravspam list that is.

Also im a little fuzzy on stomp rules, but its NOT considered a D attack right? That would make necrons a pain in the ass.

Yeah stomp has its own table.. i believe tho that a roll of a 6 "removes the model from play" still however. I never have success with stomps.. idk if thats just me or what haha

Sort of. Its not on a model by model bases. You roll for the entire blast marker once. So if you roll a 6 than anything under the blast marker gets removed from play.

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
That sounds like a list that needs to table your opponent to win, since it has very few things to score. Riptide wing is technically 3 things but they have to be close enough where i'd be surprised if they cover more than 2 things, and a Mark'O without Tankmander statlines wouldnt be there the entire game. The moment they get a bad jump and dont get behind cover, all eyes on him to get rid of that drone squad.

Flipside

Damn killy. Thats a lot of firepower and durability. Until he faces a gravspam list that is.

Also im a little fuzzy on stomp rules, but its NOT considered a D attack right? That would make necrons a pain in the ass.

Yeah stomp has its own table.. i believe tho that a roll of a 6 "removes the model from play" still however. I never have success with stomps.. idk if thats just me or what haha

Sort of. Its not on a model by model bases. You roll for the entire blast marker once. So if you roll a 6 than anything under the blast marker gets removed from play.

Hmm interesting. That seems like it can swing both extremes. I think what I have seen in my group.. we just count the "hits" under all the stomps, then just roll and remove models where necessary. Maybe that is a "fast dice" approach.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

notredameguy10 wrote:

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
That sounds like a list that needs to table your opponent to win, since it has very few things to score. Riptide wing is technically 3 things but they have to be close enough where i'd be surprised if they cover more than 2 things, and a Mark'O without Tankmander statlines wouldnt be there the entire game. The moment they get a bad jump and dont get behind cover, all eyes on him to get rid of that drone squad.

Flipside

Damn killy. Thats a lot of firepower and durability. Until he faces a gravspam list that is.

Also im a little fuzzy on stomp rules, but its NOT considered a D attack right? That would make necrons a pain in the ass.

Yeah stomp has its own table.. i believe tho that a roll of a 6 "removes the model from play" still however. I never have success with stomps.. idk if thats just me or what haha

Sort of. Its not on a model by model bases. You roll for the entire blast marker once. So if you roll a 6 than anything under the blast marker gets removed from play.

Hmm interesting. That seems like it can swing both extremes. I think what I have seen in my group.. we just count the "hits" under all the stomps, then just roll and remove models where necessary. Maybe that is a "fast dice" approach.

Following BRB you do each blast (stomp) like I mentioned though. It can make a big difference

What he means is its a model by model basis under each blast.

Each blast has a separate effect, but the models under that specific blast suffer the same effect.

D3 stomps, roll a 2. One result is a total wiff, all models under the first blast are unharmed. Other blast rolls a 6, all those models under THAT blast are removed.

I've always been enamored with DE covens, for some reason, and it occurred to me that a Corpsethief Claw would mesh exceptionally well with our new book. One of Covens' huge weaknesses is that vehicles - Knights, in particular - eat them alive. Fortunately, we have things like the OSC that mow down knights like nothing. They also can't deal with flyers well, while we crush them. On the flip side, Coven units are tough as nails and can bust heads in combat with the best of them. Through multi assault and board control, they can also handle MSU pretty effectively, while Tau murder tough priority targets.

In short, you can have an OSC, a CTC, and a Riptide Wing with all appropriate upgrades in 1850 pts. You've got tools to deal with most of the competitive lists I can think of. Knights are no problem. MSU marines is probably damn close to an auto-win with the CTC churning out free VPs all game. You have enough cover ignoring to flummox Ravenwing and AdMech. You have a lot of intercepting and low-AP fire for deathstars and can probably tank them in combat with the CTC for at least a few rounds. Wraith Knights will be a pain, as always, and with that few models, grav is going to hurt if you can't wipe it off the board fast enough.

It's not a perfect list, but it does seem pretty darn strong. I'm going to borrow my friend's taloses and crush him with them.

I have to second that, in not having any real success in using Stomp. Yeah it has potential but I would prefer to stay out of CC and shoot instead.

I watched Frontline Gaming's Frankie try and use the Stormsurge 's Stomp attack which did nothing from stopping the wraiths from raping it. Nothing excites me about Stomp, especially when I have Str D missiles and a ridiculous amount of shooting. I think it is just there to add some risk in charging the unit.

I would go so far as to maybe bubble wrap the Surge with troops, especially if you're only going to run one.

I agree, stormsurge stomps are nice backup in case in get swarmed, but it's not a battle plan. Many units can end the surge in CC before he even gets to try stomping.

The important thing about stomps is the possibility of rolling a six. Some things in this game simply can't be destroyed by shooting, even by tau, but a stomp six ignores everything, even a rerollable 2+ invul save. The opponent will think twice about going near a stormsurge when it can remove his whole deathstar, even if it usually won't.

Problem is nothing that the Tau cant shoot to death is going to get stomped without bad dice luck because they are going to murder the surge before he gets to stomp.

Stormsurge isnt hard to hurt. T6 3+ 4++ FNP 8W only means he doesnt die to dumb crap, but any dedication to the cause can remove him pretty quick. He will never die to ID and can eat several plasma/grav shots before going down. But if you hit him with a ton of attacks that wound reliably, hes going down a lot faster than people think he will.

Say for instance he charges a group of wolfriders from spacewolves with their special fancy claws. They wound reliably (i think theyre S5/6), attack like crazy, reroll wounds, and are AP3. They will eat him before he can stomp, assuming the 4++ gods arent feeling merciful that is. They would also be a good candidate to stomp since they have a 3++ save. They might not be able to shave 8 wounds on their own, but if youre intending to charge something with 8 wounds thats immune to ID you are going to want to shoot it first to make sure it dies.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Problem is nothing that the Tau cant shoot to death is going to get stomped without bad dice luck because they are going to murder the surge before he gets to stomp.

Stormsurge isnt hard to hurt. T6 3+ 4++ FNP 8W only means he doesnt die to dumb crap, but any dedication to the cause can remove him pretty quick. He will never die to ID and can eat several plasma/grav shots before going down. But if you hit him with a ton of attacks that wound reliably, hes going down a lot faster than people think he will.

Say for instance he charges a group of wolfriders from spacewolves with their special fancy claws. They wound reliably (i think theyre S5/6), attack like crazy, reroll wounds, and are AP3. They will eat him before he can stomp, assuming the 4++ gods arent feeling merciful that is. They would also be a good candidate to stomp since they have a 3++ save. They might not be able to shave 8 wounds on their own, but if youre intending to charge something with 8 wounds thats immune to ID you are going to want to shoot it first to make sure it dies.

Well of course, while Stomp adds and interesting tool to the Tau aresenal, the player must be smart in when to use it. I won't charge a Wolfatar at full strength, I'll shoot it as best as I can.

The "Stompsurge" is the one with the D-shotgun, so you can Stomp whatever survived the D.

SJ

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Problem is nothing that the Tau cant shoot to death is going to get stomped without bad dice luck because they are going to murder the surge before he gets to stomp.

Stormsurge isnt hard to hurt. T6 3+ 4++ FNP 8W only means he doesnt die to dumb crap, but any dedication to the cause can remove him pretty quick. He will never die to ID and can eat several plasma/grav shots before going down. But if you hit him with a ton of attacks that wound reliably, hes going down a lot faster than people think he will.

Say for instance he charges a group of wolfriders from spacewolves with their special fancy claws. They wound reliably (i think theyre S5/6), attack like crazy, reroll wounds, and are AP3. They will eat him before he can stomp, assuming the 4++ gods arent feeling merciful that is. They would also be a good candidate to stomp since they have a 3++ save. They might not be able to shave 8 wounds on their own, but if youre intending to charge something with 8 wounds thats immune to ID you are going to want to shoot it first to make sure it dies.

Assuming you are wounding 4's and hitting on 3's (WS2?)

70 Attacks goes down to 47 hits. This would wound 24 times. 12 wounds would get past the 4++. 8 would get past FNP. Dead Stormsurge. Also I'm rounding up on each step, so its minorly favourable against the stormsurge (by like .5 wounds).

That is 70 attacks that hit on 3's (so WS4 vs WS2?), wound on 4's (str6) and are AP3.

If we assume a 5-attack model, that's 14 models. Also appreciate re-rolls to wound, to hit or a higher Str will much improve these numbers.

Seems pretty hard to kill, to me?

(However, by merely tieing the stormsurge up in CC with durable fearless units, is as-good-as).

Compare that to any other GMC, its damn easy to kill.
I never said it was impossible to kill i simply said its really hard to remove rapidly without D weapons. A stormsurge shouldnt die in 1 turn unless you dump a TON of firepower, D weapons, or ID weapons on it, but killing it in 2 turns is pretty feasible without such firepower.

Surge is killable, but still tough as nails.

Razerous wrote:

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Problem is nothing that the Tau cant shoot to death is going to get stomped without bad dice luck because they are going to murder the surge before he gets to stomp.

Stormsurge isnt hard to hurt. T6 3+ 4++ FNP 8W only means he doesnt die to dumb crap, but any dedication to the cause can remove him pretty quick. He will never die to ID and can eat several plasma/grav shots before going down. But if you hit him with a ton of attacks that wound reliably, hes going down a lot faster than people think he will.

Say for instance he charges a group of wolfriders from spacewolves with their special fancy claws. They wound reliably (i think theyre S5/6), attack like crazy, reroll wounds, and are AP3. They will eat him before he can stomp, assuming the 4++ gods arent feeling merciful that is. They would also be a good candidate to stomp since they have a 3++ save. They might not be able to shave 8 wounds on their own, but if youre intending to charge something with 8 wounds thats immune to ID you are going to want to shoot it first to make sure it dies.

Assuming you are wounding 4's and hitting on 3's (WS2?)

70 Attacks goes down to 47 hits. This would wound 24 times. 12 wounds would get past the 4++. 8 would get past FNP. Dead Stormsurge. Also I'm rounding up on each step, so its minorly favourable against the stormsurge (by like .5 wounds).

That is 70 attacks that hit on 3's (so WS4 vs WS2?), wound on 4's (str6) and are AP3.

If we assume a 5-attack model, that's 14 models. Also appreciate re-rolls to wound, to hit or a higher Str will much improve these numbers.

Seems pretty hard to kill, to me?

(However, by merely tieing the stormsurge up in CC with durable fearless units, is as-good-as).

Sure but if i was your opponent I would not charge it with something that wasn't efficient in slaying large creatures. Grey Knights.. THSS termies.. boneswords.. other melee GCs .. knights.. the list goes on about all the things that can take it out in combat.

i want to ripple fire my SMS for 16 shots!

I also *want* a Stormsurge, ghostkeel, possibly an OSC and a Hunter Contingent.

Sigh

So how many marker lights is a good idea in 1500pts? Likely to include a stormtide, then healthy measures of the other 'big' suits.

I'm actually a bit concerned with the Stormsurge's durability, honestly. A healthy dose of grav from cent star, sky hammer, kataphrons, etc. has a pretty good chance of taking one out in a single round of shooting, assuming you don't spring for a shield generator. You can't just set him up and expect him to blaze away with impunity all game. My kingdom for conveniently-placed ruins!

As for markers, my personal aim is to have enough to buff the Stormsurge for 2 turns. That should be plenty of time to get all the D missiles off at suitable targets. Any marking beyond that is gravy. It depends on what your marker source is going to be and if you're running a HC (more +BS meander less marker need), but maybe 1 unit of drones with a BS 5 drones controller, 3-4 Tetras, or 2-3 min units of Pathfinders should be plenty. You can also consider running the drone network formation, if you like. You wouldn't need all 4 units to be Marker Drones, but if you have the points, it's a good option.

MilkmanAl wrote:
I'm actually a bit concerned with the Stormsurge's durability, honestly. A healthy dose of grav from cent star, sky hammer, kataphrons, etc. has a pretty good chance of taking one out in a single round of shooting, assuming you don't spring for a shield generator. You can't just set him up and expect him to blaze away with impunity all game. My kingdom for conveniently-placed ruins!

As for markers, my personal aim is to have enough to buff the Stormsurge for 2 turns. That should be plenty of time to get all the D missiles off at suitable targets. Any marking beyond that is gravy. It depends on what your marker source is going to be and if you're running a HC (more +BS meander less marker need), but maybe 1 unit of drones with a BS 5 drones controller, 3-4 Tetras, or 2-3 min units of Pathfinders should be plenty. You can also consider running the drone network formation, if you like. You wouldn't need all 4 units to be Marker Drones, but if you have the points, it's a good option.

I think the consensus is; always spring for the shield generator. If you don't, it can be hard countered. Killing 8 marines with FNP with 3 grav-cents (re-roll to hit, re-roll to wound) is predicable. However killing 16 marines.. well takes twice as long + importantly it extends the Storm's survival past the threshold of one-turn of shooting, allowing it to annihilate the 'counter' & continue fighting.

Well worth the 50pts, when you consider what you would do against one.. and how much harder that 4++ makes it to kill.

I guess 6 drones @ BS3 will give me +1BS & ignores cover. That's your general metric of usefulness.

If you dont pay the 50pts for a shield gen, you are wasting your time on the surge.
In fact, i dont even know how you would load it out other than Shield Gens + EWO + Adv Targeting Systems. Being a GMC, it doesnt need Targetlocks even if you take them in squads since obviously if it can splitfire its own guns it ignores firing at the same unit rules, it cant take VRTs, it already has Stims built in, and it cant fire Overwatch so CF is pointless. One could argue the beacon things that literally nobody ever takes to let outflanks come in from a specific board edge, but what the heck outflanks in our dex besides kroot? lol

Gravs wound on 3s because of armor 3, so theres that perk, but its still a ton of wounds. Without the shield, you are banking on FNP luck - which isnt very reliable against so many wounds. The 4++ will on average cut the wounds in half.

Gravs are designed to murder MCs because of their high armor value by ignoring their toughness. Theyre bound to kick a surge's butt. However, they have more odds at taking out a Riptide or a Ghost (with ignores cover) than taking out a Surge because of the 4++ AND fnp. Riptides have a 5++ and i'd be surprised if anyone puts shields on a ghost for 50pts.

However if you have grav threats, your firewarriors should be bubblewrapping the surge to prevent droppods from being right next to the surge. Furthermore, the surge should always have EWO - he can easily, EASILY mess up any grav droppod and possibly two of them before they get to fire. His blast doesnt have Gets Hot unlike the Riptide, and it ID's centurions.

Also in regards to the Marker support, i would ideally intend to mark up 2 targets for the surge, dont try and fully optimize by firing all 4 missiles at 4 different targets. Remember they are NOT seekers, so 1 ML = D strength profile, but its still BS3 and doesnt ignore cover. You need 5 MLs to safely fire these D missiles to hit on 2s and ignore cover. Yes i know results of 6 ignore cover and invuls, but guess what 2-5 doesnt and still kills most targets.

Shifting gears a little, is taking Pathfinders for their heavy weapons a viable tactic? With markerlights being less important because of the bonus from the Hunter Contingent, might it be viable to take 4-man Pathfinder teams with three special weapons and use them a bit like Space Marine Devastators (only cheaper and squishier)?

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Shifting gears a little, is taking Pathfinders for their heavy weapons a viable tactic? With markerlights being less important because of the bonus from the Hunter Contingent, might it be viable to take 4-man Pathfinder teams with three special weapons and use them a bit like Space Marine Devastators (only cheaper and squishier)?

The problem is that you can get their strengths in other, more durable, and more maneuverable platforms, i.e. Crisis Suits, Riptides, etc.

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Shifting gears a little, is taking Pathfinders for their heavy weapons a viable tactic? With markerlights being less important because of the bonus from the Hunter Contingent, might it be viable to take 4-man Pathfinder teams with three special weapons and use them a bit like Space Marine Devastators (only cheaper and squishier)?

There's potentially a place for it, but it would require some very hard testing and list sculpting. The biggest problem is that they're very expensive points wise, but they are actually rather solid weapons. I feel like they might work with the Ethereal formation, since that will help a lot with their moral and give them a FNP save.

The weapons on pathfinders are fine, theyre actually pretty strong. Problem is they become very expensive and die really easy. Pathfinders are already marked for death before any other unit because of the ML threat, the guns/drones just add to that threat. I despise pathfinders in general because they die so freakin quick. Even if i hide them behind my army and in Ruins cover during nightfighting, they still tend to die first turn (or get wittled down to 1-2 models) unless i keep them out of sight entirely, which defeats the point of them since i cant ML through a rock. Ive had ONE game where they didnt in the past few months, and oddly enough that was also a game where i somehow didnt care if my ML were alive still lol

I was seriously hoping they'd allow our Firewarrior Shas'uis to take one Railrifle or Ionrifle per squad, even if it was a hyked price. They can actually use those weapons reliably, pathfinders really cant.

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Shifting gears a little, is taking Pathfinders for their heavy weapons a viable tactic? With markerlights being less important because of the bonus from the Hunter Contingent, might it be viable to take 4-man Pathfinder teams with three special weapons and use them a bit like Space Marine Devastators (only cheaper and squishier)?

This is how I play them.

 Jancoran wrote:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Shifting gears a little, is taking Pathfinders for their heavy weapons a viable tactic? With markerlights being less important because of the bonus from the Hunter Contingent, might it be viable to take 4-man Pathfinder teams with three special weapons and use them a bit like Space Marine Devastators (only cheaper and squishier)?

This is how I play them.

Is it effective? Or do they usually just die horribly on the first turn? Seriously, I am curious. I would think they might make a fine distraction unit. Just put them in cover so they get a sorta decent save. They might be a unit that is too small to want to waste shots on but too deadly to ignore.

 ZergSmasher wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Shifting gears a little, is taking Pathfinders for their heavy weapons a viable tactic? With markerlights being less important because of the bonus from the Hunter Contingent, might it be viable to take 4-man Pathfinder teams with three special weapons and use them a bit like Space Marine Devastators (only cheaper and squishier)?

This is how I play them.

Is it effective? Or do they usually just die horribly on the first turn? Seriously, I am curious. I would think they might make a fine distraction unit. Just put them in cover so they get a sorta decent save. They might be a unit that is too small to want to waste shots on but too deadly to ignore.

Well here again, i have an example of their excellent use:
Using Pathfinders as sledgehammers

As you will see, I never asked them to fire a single marker light.

1) Watched a recent MWG vid (i know grain of salt but they are enjoyable to watch). Kid mentioned the infiltration cadre allowed entire army to come in his next turn. Thus going 2nd on turn 1, it was possible to have everything come in on turn 1. Is this the actual wording of the formation? Is this a viable enough tactic (first blood mitigation) that the formation is better than it seems?

2) We are all talking about a 50pt shield generator for the SS. Would it be more viable to pay 60pts for a tau defense line? rules state any model within 1" gets the save, I assume that extends to MCs as well. Plus you get the benefit of reflecting wounds back.. and a reroll 1s platform for something else.

I'm planning on do that with an Infiltration Cadre. I want the formation to be small as possible anyway, might give them special weapons to attract even more fire

The rules of the formation does, among other things, that if any single unit of it gets destroyed, the entire ARMY enters automatically from reserves the coming turn, so yes, it's entirely possible.

Risky though, you might get tabled if careless.

 BoomWolf wrote:
The rules of the formation does, among other things, that if any single unit of it gets destroyed, the entire ARMY enters automatically from reserves the coming turn, so yes, it's entirely possible.

Risky though, you might get tabled if careless.

Well essentially you know prior to deployment whether or not you are going first turn or 2nd. Which would produce this logic:

if "going 2nd" and "do not try to steal" =>
deploy infiltration cadre aggressively
else =>
deploy as you would a normal game

In most situations I would hope for turn 2 with this style of play, giving up first blood I think would be worth a turn1 tau full reserve counter attack =D

 BoomWolf wrote:
The rules of the formation does, among other things, that if any single unit of it gets destroyed, the entire ARMY enters automatically from reserves the coming turn, so yes, it's entirely possible.

Risky though, you might get tabled if careless.

If you go second, that is impossible. Being tabled only triggers at the end of the game turn, allowing all of your reserves to enter before the end of the game turn.

Yes, but you won't necessarily go second. You might go first.

I will add a special weapon to Pathfinders if I'm close to my point limit and have run out of other reasonable upgrades on other units. My only problem with investing heavily in them is that I may realistically get one round of shooting with those weapons. Of course, my experience with this is pre SS and Ghostkeel so who knows...maybe Pathfinders get a lower target priority in the new meta?