Spoilered for size.

So, according to Warhammer Community, they hardcapped Commanders at one per detachment.

Mixed feelings, personally, as a non-Tau player, but was going to start when their codex got released (and I finished my current armies).

On one hand, it's largely removed the quad fusion Commander that was prevalent.

On the other, it's an incredibly lazy move, that doesn't really go any way to helping the rest of the faction, which was struggling without the quad fusion. From what I've seen, there hasn't been much to replace that. It's effectively rendered entire detachments useless (Supreme Command), and I can almost guarentee that no other faction will have this kind of rule, despite Tau Commanders from a Sept being more plentiful than Space Marine Captains from their Chapter, yet they'll be more plentiful than Tau ones.

A fix, but a lazy one.
Your views?

Imagine having an illness, and that illness had only one medication that didn't fix your symptoms, but just made them tolerable. This medication has a nasty side-effect when taken that you experience. So, the doctor yanks your prescription and tells you to eat well as he drives off with the payment your insurance company sent.

That's what this is. The illness is the lack of viable units and the medicine was commander spam. So now GW sees that as a bad side-effect and removes it. Now you get some generally good life advice (more balanced riptides, some relics, etc.) but you're still stuck with that original illness.

Totally fine with this, Guard had such a rule for Command Squads in the Codex and NOBODY complained.

MATCHED PLAY RULE:
COMMAND SQUADS
If you are playing a matched play
game, then in a Battle-forged army,
you can include a maximum of one
<REGIMENT> Command Squad (pg 96)
in a Detachment for each <REGIMENT>
OFFICER in that Detachment. Similarly,
if you are playing a matched play game,
then in a Battle-forged army, you can
include a maximum of one Militarum
Tempestus Command Squad (pg 98) in
a Detachment for each Tempestor Prime
(pg 91) in that Detachment.

KurtAngle2 wrote:
Totally fine with this, Guard had such a rule for Command Squads in the Codex and NOBODY complained.

MATCHED PLAY RULE:
COMMAND SQUADS
If you are playing a matched play
game, then in a Battle-forged army,
you can include a maximum of one
<REGIMENT> Command Squad (pg 96)
in a Detachment for each <REGIMENT>
OFFICER in that Detachment. Similarly,
if you are playing a matched play game,
then in a Battle-forged army, you can
include a maximum of one Militarum
Tempestus Command Squad (pg 98) in
a Detachment for each Tempestor Prime
(pg 91) in that Detachment.

I do think you missed both of the prior posts point on "no other legitimately viable units." AM has a number of other viable units that don't even need company commanders..

HuskyWarhammer wrote:
Imagine having an illness, and that illness had only one medication that didn't fix your symptoms, but just made them tolerable. This medication has a nasty side-effect when taken that you experience. So, the doctor yanks your prescription and tells you to eat well as he drives off with the payment your insurance company sent.

That's what this is. The illness is the lack of viable units and the medicine was commander spam. So now GW sees that as a bad side-effect and removes it. Now you get some generally good life advice (more balanced riptides, some relics, etc.) but you're still stuck with that original illness.

.... Do we know if the other units are not viable still? its hard to say without seeing the book.

Tau seem to have recieived huge point drops, powerful now strats and relics plus other stuff.

It would seem that this rule would therefore be fine.

As I said in the rumor thread, I don't really know what else you do with a unit like the Commander. He's a non-targetable Character with good shooting. If you can take a lot of them you're risking Malefic Lord type lists, where all of the stuff you actually want to shoot can't be targeted because it's behind a wall of durable trash. Most characters don't present an issue this way because they're either mostly valuable for their buffing or mostly valuable for CC, and so are either inherently non-spammable or else can be picked out and killed much more easily.

Sure, this was the only thing keeping index Tau in the running, and possibly what they've done with other things in the new codex won't be enough. But it seems to me that they've hit on probably the only realistic solution to Tau Commander spam that leaves them as desirable shooting units, and what they should do going forward if the overall codex is weak is buff other things.

KurtAngle2 wrote:
Totally fine with this, Guard had such a rule for Command Squads in the Codex and NOBODY complained.

MATCHED PLAY RULE:
COMMAND SQUADS
If you are playing a matched play
game, then in a Battle-forged army,
you can include a maximum of one
<REGIMENT> Command Squad (pg 96)
in a Detachment for each <REGIMENT>
OFFICER in that Detachment. Similarly,
if you are playing a matched play game,
then in a Battle-forged army, you can
include a maximum of one Militarum
Tempestus Command Squad (pg 98) in
a Detachment for each Tempestor Prime
(pg 91) in that Detachment.

Because you could never take Command Squads without their Commanders before. That was normal, and considering that Command Squads had similar style units throughout the army (Veterans, Special Weapon Teams etc etc), it wasn't a massive issue.

Commanders are, to my knowledge and excluding Unique units or Relic FW units, the ONLY units which are limited in such a way. Even the more fluffily "rare" Custodes Shield Captains aren't restricted in such a way. Instead of upping the points of the Commander, fixing it so it couldn't do THAT kind of damage, or something else, they hardcapped it completely. Why haven't other "spammed" units seen such a hardcap?

To me, this feels like a massive cop-out, personally. I had no issue with them nerfing the Commander, but I'd actually want to be able to not take a Fireblade or Ethereal, and have a chance of having a decent amount of CP.

There is no point in arguing the balance or not of the effect in a vacuum. Wait for the codex.

If all the rumors are right, it looks like Tau may actually end up closer to nids then anything else with lots and lots of viable options and builds that require synergy and work to be effective. The absolute best place their codex could be.

The problem with comparing commander-spam to HQ units in other armies is that a Tau Commander is just about the only HQ in the game that's a more efficient replacement for a unit in your army. Space Marine characters tend to get the most mileage out of being support elements rather than running around stabbing things on their own, I can get an Autarch with a Reaper Launcher but he's not better than just getting Dark Reapers, Guard tank commanders and Tyranid Hive Tyrants are strong but they don't make good straight-up replacements for other tanks/MCs because of the cost...

The problem with the Tau commander is that he's BS2+ when the rest of your Crisis suits are BS4+ because GW doesn't want to give you BS3+ and Markerlights at the same time. Which ends up meaning that the Commander is the battlesuit I can't cripple without touching it by torching your Markerlights, which makes him better than just taking XV-8s.

To my mind there were three solutions: lose BS2+, lose four guns, or the 0-1 rule. I'd rather have seen Commanders restricted to two guns and given more interesting support for other units on the logic that they're supposed to be Commanders and the Tau are supposed to be the more sensible army where that means they command other forces rather than run around bonking things over the head with great big swords themselves, but I don't think the 0-1 rule is unwarranted.

Its a fix. But its lazy. Atleast it has removed commander spam from the equation.
The issue with it as already stated is that it kills the supreme command detachment, but not only that, it also means tau HAVE to take one of the weaker squishy foot hqs for any detachment that gives more than 1 cp.
Persinally I would have added anothee commander profile, the shas'el (junior commander) with 1 less wound, leadership, weapon hardpoint, bs, and ws. Make this option unlimited as an hq choice.
Then take the current commander profile, rename to shas'o, and make 0-1 per detachment.

I did say allow the shas'o to make an extra master of war declaration but that probably isnt a good idea

We won't have any idea whether this move is a fair one until we see the the full Tau codex.

Not much point speculating since it's so close now.

it desperately needed an exemption for named HQ choices like shadow sun and far sight.

over all though tau has vastly far too few HQ choices for non-tau sept for this change to have gone through.

of the hq choices we have, 4 are commanders, long strike and dark strider are tau sept, 3 of them are varying shades of an ethreal and the last one is fire blade.

as such if the detachment forces 3 hq choices(battalion, and supreme) and you are't playing tau sept, you have no other choice but to run an ethereal and a fire blade, I'm not a fan of being forced to take things, what's worse is you want to take a battalion because we need tons of CP to compete. I'm seriously hoping they made 2 of the ethereal more expensive because they made them actually good >.>

I heard a rumor they will be doing this with Daemon Princes as well in the March FAQ. Might have been someone wishlisting it, but I wouldn't be opposed to the change. Right now Daemon Princes' are just flat out better to take than other options in both Daemons and CSM lists because they can't be shot at. Limiting this would go a long way to making more diverse lists.

its ok they sold all their commander kits when the index dropped they don't need to many more sales on commanders and have excess stock of other kits. lets nerf how many commanders you can use and buff other kits...thats how this works.

ballzonya wrote:
its ok they sold all their commander kits when the index dropped they don't need to many more sales on commanders and have excess stock of other kits. lets nerf how many commanders you can use and buff other kits...thats how this works.

Because nobody will allow you to play Commanders as normal Crisis suits. And nobody allowed you to play crisis suits as commanders in the first place, right.

I like the change and I think some other armies might benefit from this too (looking at you Daemon Prince). It's a neat way to keep the Commander powerful while preventing mindless spam, and isn't that what people always complain about around here?

KurtAngle2 wrote:
Totally fine with this, Guard had such a rule for Command Squads in the Codex and NOBODY complained.

MATCHED PLAY RULE:
COMMAND SQUADS
If you are playing a matched play
game, then in a Battle-forged army,
you can include a maximum of one
<REGIMENT> Command Squad (pg 96)
in a Detachment for each <REGIMENT>
OFFICER in that Detachment. Similarly,
if you are playing a matched play game,
then in a Battle-forged army, you can
include a maximum of one Militarum
Tempestus Command Squad (pg 98) in
a Detachment for each Tempestor Prime
(pg 91) in that Detachment.

The difference is that Command Squads are Elite choices. You don't need them to make an army, and there's other good things without them.

The Tau have 3 HQ options:
Commander
Ethereal
Cadre Fireblade

This wouldn't be a big deal if armies didn't have to have 3-5 HQ's in them, and detachments that actually give CP's require many HQ's.

Ushtarador wrote:

ballzonya wrote:
its ok they sold all their commander kits when the index dropped they don't need to many more sales on commanders and have excess stock of other kits. lets nerf how many commanders you can use and buff other kits...thats how this works.

Because nobody will allow you to play Commanders as normal Crisis suits. And nobody allowed you to play crisis suits as commanders in the first place, right.

I like the change and I think some other armies might benefit from this too (looking at you Daemon Prince). It's a neat way to keep the Commander powerful while preventing mindless spam, and isn't that what people always complain about around here?

There needs to be a conspiracy orkmoticon for when we get these.

lol I doubt there is a conspiracy I have played Tau since they got released and I don't buy lots of models cause I know GW does this I buy the models I like the look of and how I can model them. I wasn't the guy buying 6 commanders when the index popped. I own 0 commanders. there is no reason to make a unit so OP one edition and then either nerf them hard or limit them. to me its one of two things, they either are the worst play testers in existence or they are basing models off sales.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
you you bought models in 4th edition and never bought another model you will have seen your models go from OP to completely useless since then, why is that?

0-1 seems insane and I can understand why - with what the Commander is now. But there were so many other ways to deal with this. Give the commander WS3+, reduce the weapon hardpoints (and maybe even add commander only support systems), increase the points on them or decrease the points for standard suits to make them a more viable take.

It just feels like a lazy "there you go everyone not Tau - problem solved!"

ballzonya wrote:
lol I doubt there is a conspiracy I have played Tau since they got released and I don't buy lots of models cause I know GW does this I buy the models I like the look of and how I can model them. I wasn't the guy buying 6 commanders when the index popped. I own 0 commanders. there is no reason to make a unit so OP one edition and then either nerf them hard or limit them. to me its one of two things, they either are the worst play testers in existence or they are basing models off sales.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
you you bought models in 4th edition and never bought another model you will have seen your models go from OP to completely useless since then, why is that?

meh I have 3, I had 3 from back in 4th edition, I still have 3 now, I still don't like being forced to play an ethreal and fire blade just because I don't want to play tau sept but want a brigade.

limiting commanders is fine with me, but they didn't limit just commanders, they limited our named hq's, our cold stars, and more, then locked off most of the other decent hq choices in a single sept.

it's like if they put all of the named space marines in primaris and left nothing but librarians for the other chapters.....then limited them to 1 >.>

What I'm curious about is how/if they're going to limit Farsight Enclaves from using Ethereals. Previously there's been no limits on Legion/Chapter/Craftworld/etc. traits and all units in the codex can be used by everything, and the solution to divergent lists is to split DA/BA/TS/DG off into their own books.

There's a first time for everything, of course, but this will break the trend. Or suddenly Farsight's cool with some Ethereals but not all...

All I ever did was take 3 commanders anyways - I'll still be able to do that. Plus the commanders will be even cheaper!

What I really want to know is their ability still 1 time use. It just seems silly that tau gets these restrictions.

Can only take 1 commander per detechment
but you can take a whole army of grand master dreadknights?

Tau reroll ability is 1 use only and nothing can move to utilize it.
Calgar rerolls all hits all the time in 6 inch bubble with no restrictions

KurtAngle2 wrote:
Totally fine with this, Guard had such a rule for Command Squads in the Codex and NOBODY complained.

Of course those rules aren't exactly same in effect...AM is lot less restrictive and is actually restricting you far less often than tau one.

I like the change and hope it gets applied to more armies, I hate seeing lists with multiple Hive Tyrants.

Can't see a problem with it either, it's not like the Fireblade is a bad choice and since Fire Warriors look pretty good why wouldn't you want multiple Fireblades to keep them all buffed.

 frightnight wrote:
What I'm curious about is how/if they're going to limit Farsight Enclaves from using Ethereals. Previously there's been no limits on Legion/Chapter/Craftworld/etc. traits and all units in the codex can be used by everything, and the solution to divergent lists is to split DA/BA/TS/DG off into their own books.

There's a first time for everything, of course, but this will break the trend. Or suddenly Farsight's cool with some Ethereals but not all...

It wouldn't be the first time, Black Templars are noted as being unable to use Psykers in the Space Marine codex.

My thoughts on this are that I want to run some Crisis suits. I don't really care if they're a Crisis Team, Crisis Bodyguards, a Commander, a Shas'el, whatever.

I'm not really sold on Crisis suits that aren't Commanders in 8th edition. Maybe if you're running a team with 3 Flamers, I guess.

I hope the codex will make Crisis teams more attractive for all Tau septs.

On the broader point of the 1 per detachment rule itself, well, I think it's dumb. But I don't think GW is going to extend that rule to other units so it's just a dumb thing Tau players have to work around.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Commanders are, to my knowledge and excluding Unique units or Relic FW units, the ONLY units which are limited in such a way.

Wrong. Chapter Master, direct SM equivalent, is limited to one and costs 3 CP or lots of extra points for these few Chapters with named one.

That on top of SM traits applying only to light units, not everything like in Tau book, including titans, worse relics, weapons, traits, support, etc, etc. Wanna swap?

it desperately needed an exemption for named HQ choices like shadow sun and far sight.

Shrike, Calgar and the rest of CM don't get one, sooo...

you have no other choice but to run an ethereal and a fire blade

So a force remotely resembling what Tau army should look like? *gasp* The horror!

Wanna take a look at the compulsory HQs of a lot other armies, compare their cost to cheapness of the option above, and see how many of these would give a lot for such cheap filler HQs?

This seems like a lazy fix. My inner conspiracy theorist says that it’s a sign that Tau are getting a new HQ to make up for it, but my inner cynic says that GW isn’t organized enough to plan that kind of move without more preparation.

 Irbis wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
Commanders are, to my knowledge and excluding Unique units or Relic FW units, the ONLY units which are limited in such a way.

Wrong. Chapter Master, direct SM equivalent, is limited to one and costs 3 CP or lots of extra points for these few Chapters with named one.

That on top of SM traits applying only to light units, not everything like in Tau book, including titans, worse relics, weapons, traits, support, etc, etc. Wanna swap?

it desperately needed an exemption for named HQ choices like shadow sun and far sight.

Shrike, Calgar and the rest of CM don't get one, sooo...

you have no other choice but to run an ethereal and a fire blade

So a force remotely resembling what Tau army should look like? *gasp* The horror!

Wanna take a look at the compulsory HQs of a lot other armies, compare their cost to cheapness of the option above, and see how many of these would give a lot for such cheap filler HQs?

the general issue with your complaint is you are comparing the options tau have to the options space marines/IG have, it's not 1 for 1, they split a faction that barely has a handful of hq's into 6 different septs then limited 4 of them to 1x. It's a terrible choice, but I suspect it will get flushed out in the future...just no idea how long that would take, possibly years. they could resolve it with an FAQ by giving us some generic HQ options, or they could create some named hq's for other septs. but i suspect thee earliest we could see anything would be chapter approved or if the FW campaign happens hey may add a few HQ options.

feel free, to tell me all the compulsory hq choices an by that I mean literally no other choice, i will look them over see what I think. I suspect if you are right my opinion will be that GW was a gak developer twice and think both cases should be fixed but who knows maybe it will be different.

 gnome_idea_what wrote:
This seems like a lazy fix. My inner conspiracy theorist says that it’s a sign that Tau are getting a new HQ to make up for it, but my inner cynic says that GW isn’t organized enough to plan that kind of move without more preparation.

Tau are getting no new models, which so far this edition means no new units.

If you were getting a new model/unit it would have been previewed on Monday.

Given that they are going through the pattern of faction spotlights it means that you will be made codex comparable through rules, stratagems, and warlord traits.

You will have a gimmick, perhaps two if you're lucky, and then you will be done until they decide to make new models for you.

But hey, check me after the codex drops, perhaps my read on the situation is not accurate.

 Imateria wrote:
I like the change and hope it gets applied to more armies, I hate seeing lists with multiple Hive Tyrants.

Can't see a problem with it either, it's not like the Fireblade is a bad choice and since Fire Warriors look pretty good why wouldn't you want multiple Fireblades to keep them all buffed.

This will be a thing with 36" firewarriors from the +6 inch range to all non assault weapons sept.

 gnome_idea_what wrote:
This seems like a lazy fix. My inner conspiracy theorist says that it’s a sign that Tau are getting a new HQ to make up for it, but my inner cynic says that GW isn’t organized enough to plan that kind of move without more preparation.

So, Tau are getting a new HQ unit. Two, in fact. From today's post:

You’ll even be able to decide whether you want to equip yours with the XV8 Crisis battlesuit (or even XV8-02 Crisis Iridium armour, which is now an upgrade rather than a Signature System) or opt to spend more points and gain an extra Wound with the XV85 Enforcer battlesuit.

Both of these new units are likely keyword COMMANDER.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 gnome_idea_what wrote:
This seems like a lazy fix. My inner conspiracy theorist says that it’s a sign that Tau are getting a new HQ to make up for it, but my inner cynic says that GW isn’t organized enough to plan that kind of move without more preparation.

Tau are getting no new models, which so far this edition means no new units.

If you were getting a new model/unit it would have been previewed on Monday.

Given that they are going through the pattern of faction spotlights it means that you will be made codex comparable through rules, stratagems, and warlord traits.

You will have a gimmick, perhaps two if you're lucky, and then you will be done until they decide to make new models for you.

But hey, check me after the codex drops, perhaps my read on the situation is not accurate.

Thought I saw some enforcer suit advertised for the commander. Not familiar with it. Thought it must mean a new commander box set.

 Xenomancers wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 gnome_idea_what wrote:
This seems like a lazy fix. My inner conspiracy theorist says that it’s a sign that Tau are getting a new HQ to make up for it, but my inner cynic says that GW isn’t organized enough to plan that kind of move without more preparation.

Tau are getting no new models, which so far this edition means no new units.

If you were getting a new model/unit it would have been previewed on Monday.

Given that they are going through the pattern of faction spotlights it means that you will be made codex comparable through rules, stratagems, and warlord traits.

You will have a gimmick, perhaps two if you're lucky, and then you will be done until they decide to make new models for you.

But hey, check me after the codex drops, perhaps my read on the situation is not accurate.

Thought I saw some enforcer suit advertised for the commander. Not familiar with it. Thought it must mean a new commander box set.

The Enforcer suit is the newish Commander boxed set. The original commanders, in a standard XV8/Crisis suit, are going to be a new unit. It's most likely that the Index Commander will be the Enforcer entry, so you can no longer run that unit with an XV8 model.

 gnome_idea_what wrote:
This seems like a lazy fix. My inner conspiracy theorist says that it’s a sign that Tau are getting a new HQ to make up for it, but my inner cynic says that GW isn’t organized enough to plan that kind of move without more preparation.

I'm ALMOST certain the ethreals are getting changed to possible have some uniqueness to them and maybe be a little useful....if not well they made 2 useless ethreals more useless i guess...end of the day the cheapest one is still cheap

The main reason for why Tau Commanders get this hardcap while other HQ's don't is probably because they are, afaik (correct me if I'm wrong) the only extremely shooty, non-targetable HQ in the game.

Other HQ's either don't reach the same amount of Dakka as a Tau Commander, or they do, but can be targeted.

You can hide a shooty Autarch or a shooty SM Captain behind units, but they're not gonna delete units on their own with their ranged weapons.

Dakka-Tyrants can delete units on their own with their ranged weapons, but can't hide behind the rest of their army, so you can actually shoot back at it.

Daemon Princes don't need a hardcap because they don't really shoot, and in order to be effective they need to be in close combat, where they can be targeted, and after said combat they will probably be much closer to your army, so being able to target it shouldn't be hard.

However, spammable Tau Commanders who hide behind a wall of cheap Firewarriors or Kroots, who can't be targeted by ranged weapons and who are either fast enough to avoid combat, or because they're so much chaff in the way that they can't be killed in close combat would literally break the game.

A solution for this would be to allow the Commander to be targeted by ranged attacks even if it's not the closest model, but players would probably have issues with that as well, so GW decided to go with the Hardcap instead.

 MinscS2 wrote:
The main reason for why Tau Commanders get this hardcap while other HQ's don't is probably because they are, afaik (correct me if I'm wrong) the only extremely shooty, non-targetable HQ in the game.

Custodes Shield-Captains (hurricane bolter hitting on 2s rerolling 1s) come to mind immediately.

 meleti wrote:

 MinscS2 wrote:
The main reason for why Tau Commanders get this hardcap while other HQ's don't is probably because they are, afaik (correct me if I'm wrong) the only extremely shooty, non-targetable HQ in the game.

Custodes Shield-Captains (hurricane bolter hitting on 2s rerolling 1s) come to mind immediately.

At least try to be sincere.
You're not seriously comparing a Custodes Shield-Captain with hurricane bolters to a Tau Commander are you?

A Hurricane Bolter within Rapid Fire-range does less than 3 wounds on average to a squad of Firewarriors.
Hardly what I'd consider "extremely shooty", let alone "removing units on it's own".

 MinscS2 wrote:

 meleti wrote:

 MinscS2 wrote:
The main reason for why Tau Commanders get this hardcap while other HQ's don't is probably because they are, afaik (correct me if I'm wrong) the only extremely shooty, non-targetable HQ in the game.

Custodes Shield-Captains (hurricane bolter hitting on 2s rerolling 1s) come to mind immediately.

At least try to be sincere.
You're not seriously comparing a Custodes Shield-Captain with hurricane bolters to a Tau Commander are you?

I'm just pointing out it's an untargettable HQ with good shooting. Obviously they're not identical units.

Although I did think of a few more: Sammael, Dark Angels Talonmasters, Bjorn the Fell-Handed, and Venerable Chaplain Dreadnoughts. As it's apparently necessary, I'll also point out these units are also not identical to Tau Commanders. They are, however, untargettable characters with good shooting.

 meleti wrote:

I'm just pointing out it's an untargettable HQ with good shooting. Obviously they're not identical units.

Your bar for what qualifies as "good shooting" is clearly very different from mine.

Worth mentioning that Sammael and Bjorn are unique, so regardless of how good their shooting is, they'd be in the exact same seat as a Tau Commander come the codex.

As it's apparently necessary, I'll also point out

Drop the attitude. Being snide won't get you anywhere on these forums.

 Xenomancers wrote:
Thought I saw some enforcer suit advertised for the commander. Not familiar with it. Thought it must mean a new commander box set.

Pretty sure it's re-purposing an old model at best.

 MinscS2 wrote:

 meleti wrote:

I'm just pointing out it's an untargettable HQ with good shooting. Obviously they're not identical units.

Your bar for what qualifies as "good shooting" is clearly very different from mine.

Yeah, clearly. Do consider anything less shooty than a Tau Commander to have bad shooting?

They added the Lieutenant to the Space Marine codex. Maybe we'll see a Subcommander for the T'au codex

 Ghaz wrote:
They added the Lieutenant to the Space Marine codex. Maybe we'll see a Subcommander for the T'au codex

I'm guessing that the XV8 Commander is going to fill that role, but it's still possible there will be another unit.

 meleti wrote:

 MinscS2 wrote:

 meleti wrote:

I'm just pointing out it's an untargettable HQ with good shooting. Obviously they're not identical units.

Your bar for what qualifies as "good shooting" is clearly very different from mine.

Yeah, clearly. Do consider anything less shooty than a Tau Commander to have bad shooting?

Talk was about non-targeatable guys with extreme shooting capable of wiping entire units on their own. Not ones that kill 3 chaff guys. That kind of firepower isn't game breaking.

tneva82 wrote:

 meleti wrote:

 MinscS2 wrote:

 meleti wrote:

I'm just pointing out it's an untargettable HQ with good shooting. Obviously they're not identical units.

Your bar for what qualifies as "good shooting" is clearly very different from mine.

Yeah, clearly. Do consider anything less shooty than a Tau Commander to have bad shooting?

Talk was about non-targeatable guys with extreme shooting capable of wiping entire units on their own. Not ones that kill 3 chaff guys. That kind of firepower isn't game breaking.

Tau Commanders are great shooting units, but if they were game breaking wouldn't they have had better tournament results in 8th edition?

 meleti wrote:

I'm just pointing out it's an untargettable HQ with good shooting. Obviously they're not identical units.

Although I did think of a few more: Sammael, Dark Angels Talonmasters, Bjorn the Fell-Handed, and Venerable Chaplain Dreadnoughts. As it's apparently necessary, I'll also point out these units are also not identical to Tau Commanders. They are, however, untargettable characters with good shooting.

All of these provide significantly less efficient shooting than you can find elsewhere -- you would not take these just because you want them to shoot at things while hiding behind a screen. Also note that two of them are already 0-1 per army, not just 0-1 per detachment.

Like, sure, an alternate "fix" to Commanders would have been to increase their price so much that nobody wanted to bring them just in order to shoot at things anymore. People bring the Ravenwing characters in large part for their powerful auras or Sammael's CC ability, which Commanders lack. Redesigning Commanders to mostly be about buffing other Tau units was also a possible fix, but GW seems to have wanted Commanders to be able to function as shooty hero units in the same way that most other factions get an individually-scary HQ -- Tau already have Ethereals and Fireblades as buffing HQs.

 meleti wrote:

tneva82 wrote:

 meleti wrote:

 MinscS2 wrote:

 meleti wrote:

I'm just pointing out it's an untargettable HQ with good shooting. Obviously they're not identical units.

Your bar for what qualifies as "good shooting" is clearly very different from mine.

Yeah, clearly. Do consider anything less shooty than a Tau Commander to have bad shooting?

Talk was about non-targeatable guys with extreme shooting capable of wiping entire units on their own. Not ones that kill 3 chaff guys. That kind of firepower isn't game breaking.

Tau Commanders are great shooting units, but if they were game breaking wouldn't they have had better tournament results in 8th edition?

While they may not be the top dogs per faction

its pretty telling when most of the tourney tau lists had nothing but taumanders running around

And just because they are not consistently top whatever doesnt make it ok.

Dionysodorus wrote:

 meleti wrote:

I'm just pointing out it's an untargettable HQ with good shooting. Obviously they're not identical units.

Although I did think of a few more: Sammael, Dark Angels Talonmasters, Bjorn the Fell-Handed, and Venerable Chaplain Dreadnoughts. As it's apparently necessary, I'll also point out these units are also not identical to Tau Commanders. They are, however, untargettable characters with good shooting.

All of these provide significantly less efficient shooting than you can find elsewhere -- you would not take these just because you want them to shoot at things while hiding behind a screen. Also note that two of them are already 0-1 per army, not just 0-1 per detachment.

Like, sure, an alternate "fix" to Commanders would have been to increase their price so much that nobody wanted to bring them just in order to shoot at things anymore. People bring the Ravenwing characters in large part for their powerful auras or Sammael's CC ability, which Commanders lack. Redesigning Commanders to mostly be about buffing other Tau units was also a possible fix, but GW seems to have wanted Commanders to be able to function as shooty hero units in the same way that most other factions get an individually-scary HQ -- Tau already have Ethereals and Fireblades as buffing HQs.

Yeah, my point isn't that other units are as good or efficient at shooting as Tau Commanders, just that Tau Commanders aren't the only unit in the entire game that I'd consider to have good shooting on a untargettable character model. I do think the unique aspect of Tau Commanders is that they were untargettable and more efficient than other shooters in the list, which was clearly a problem. A Talonmaster still shoots pretty damn well, but maybe not as well as a Dark Talon. And that's why Commanders were a problem unit, and why something ought to have been done about them. If you go back to my original post in this thread before it turned into a discussion of what a good shooting was, my point was that I liked Commanders because they were Crisis suits that were good at shooting. Crisis suits aren't any more efficient at shooting now (as far as we know), and Commanders aren't any less, it's just impossible to fit as much shooting from Commanders into a Tau list under the codex.

 Desubot wrote:

While they may not be the top dogs per faction

its pretty telling when most of the tourney tau lists had nothing but taumanders running around

And just because they are not consistently top whatever doesnt make it ok.

Yeah, totally agree. I just think you have to consider that it's not only telling of how strong Commanders were, it's telling of how weak Commander substitutes were.

I'm waiting to see the book once it comes out so the context of the restriction can be seen.

Is this restricting the 'Commander' Keyword or the 'Commander' Datasheet?

It seems strange to restrict the Coldstar suits when the problem is the 4 fusion suits.

Cheers

Andrew

 AndrewC wrote:
I'm waiting to see the book once it comes out so the context of the restriction can be seen.

Is this restricting the 'Commander' Keyword or the 'Commander' Datasheet?

It seems strange to restrict the Coldstar suits when the problem is the 4 fusion suits.

Cheers

Andrew

I mean the language is in the OP. It says no more than one Commander per detachment which is clearly the keyword.

 AndrewC wrote:
I'm waiting to see the book once it comes out so the context of the restriction can be seen.

Is this restricting the 'Commander' Keyword or the 'Commander' Datasheet?

It seems strange to restrict the Coldstar suits when the problem is the 4 fusion suits.

Cheers

Andrew

It's the COMMANDER keyword. GW posted an image of the actual rule from the codex, and codex phrases in all-caps are keywords.

Current models with a COMMANDER keyword (models with a * are FW):

Commander
Commander in XV86 Coldstar Battlesuit
Commander Farsight
Commander Shadowsun
Shas'o R'myr*
Shas'o R'alai*
Commander in XV81 Crisis Battlesuit*
Commander in XV84 Crisis Battlesuit*

Let's break down the whole Warhammer Community post, as a long time tau player and fan

1) Farsight Enclaves get to re-roll to wound rolls of 1 when shooting within 6"
This allows you to play a very aggressive tau army, potentially shifting away from gunlines and instead storming forward and unleashing waves of S6 shots from strike teams supported by Crisis suits deep striking around them

2) Farsight's weapons are now very cool
Close combat killing machine and long ranged damage? Yes please. Also the heroic intervention means he can save units from melee doom.

3) Only one commander per detachment in matched
A, you can take multiple detachments, b, the return of signature systems means commanders might return to the super-support buffmanders of before, so you probably don't even want that many. It depends on the whole codex, if there isn't a suitable output of damage to replace the commander, it could be bad, but we don't know yet. Also the different suits actually mean something now.

4) Fusion blades
The coolest thing from the fluff that never got into the rules now has rules. Very nice. Maybe the 2 4+ to hit attacks means they aren't exactly close combat beasts, but it's pretty cool all the same. Depending on how many points it is, there may be no reason to not tack it onto your already existing triple fusion crisis suits.

5) Ongar Gauntlet makes it's return with almost the same statline, but D6 damage and instant death isn't a thing any more
It was my favourite signature system in 7th, even if it wasn't very effective. I, for one, welcome our new one-punch-Japanese-men overlords.

6) Command and Control Node.
Instead of shooting himself, buffmander allows a friendly sept unit within 6" to reroll wounds. For 1cp.
That looks pretty tasty.

To quote the end, "If bringing the fight directly to your enemy with an army of short-ranged battlesuits sounds fun, then the Farsight Enclaves are for you. Of course, the new T’au Empire codex features plenty for more subtle generals as well. Check back tomorrow, when we’ll be looking at the stealthy forces of Dal’yth and some improvements to the sneakiest of battlesuits."

After the OP Bor'kan announcement, things only seem to keep getting better. Aggressive playstyles seem potentially viable, the buffmander is coming back, and it looks like stealth suits, one of the best index units, is getting either a general buff or a Dal'yth specific buff at least.

Google "Fake Balance" and go from there. The laziness is quite amusing.

I think my main issue with the Commander thing is that this was done as a reaction to the fusion suits, but suits that were there for buffing, or didn't load up on so many weaponry are punished too.

The whole point of points is to provide balance like this. Perhaps what GW should have done is have player pay MORE points for having more ranged weapons - so one fusion is X points, two fusions is 2X points, but three fusions is 3X+Y points and four is 4X+Z points. That way, if you spec all for a fusion suit, you pay for that specialisation.

Branched nova charged borkan HBC riptide with command and control node anyone?

 MinscS2 wrote:
The main reason for why Tau Commanders get this hardcap while other HQ's don't is probably because they are, afaik (correct me if I'm wrong) the only extremely shooty, non-targetable HQ in the game.

Other HQ's either don't reach the same amount of Dakka as a Tau Commander, or they do, but can be targeted.

You can hide a shooty Autarch or a shooty SM Captain behind units, but they're not gonna delete units on their own with their ranged weapons.

Dakka-Tyrants can delete units on their own with their ranged weapons, but can't hide behind the rest of their army, so you can actually shoot back at it.

Daemon Princes don't need a hardcap because they don't really shoot, and in order to be effective they need to be in close combat, where they can be targeted, and after said combat they will probably be much closer to your army, so being able to target it shouldn't be hard.

However, spammable Tau Commanders who hide behind a wall of cheap Firewarriors or Kroots, who can't be targeted by ranged weapons and who are either fast enough to avoid combat, or because they're so much chaff in the way that they can't be killed in close combat would literally break the game.

A solution for this would be to allow the Commander to be targeted by ranged attacks even if it's not the closest model, but players would probably have issues with that as well, so GW decided to go with the Hardcap instead.

Dark Angels Sammael on Sableclaw (unique) and Dark Angels Talonmaster (fully spammable) shoot 18 times per model, ignore cover and re-reroll hits and wounds while being untargetable. They’re very competitive choices too both in soups and with Dark Talon spams.

So, you’re wrong. Dead wrong.

Tau were nerfed because one of two reasons. 1) Someone at GW has a hate boner for Tau 2) They’re planning a big HQ change in the March Big FAQ that restricts super HQs like Flyrants to one per detachment.

The only other explanation is incompetence. With GW, this one is never really out of the picture.

 Therion wrote:

Dark Angels Sammael on Sableclaw (unique) and Dark Angels Talonmaster (fully spammable) shoot 18 times per model, ignore cover and re-reroll hits and wounds while being untargetable. They’re very competitive choices too both in soups and with Dark Talon spams.

So, you’re wrong. Dead wrong.

Tau were nerfed because one of two reasons. 1) Someone at GW has a hate boner for Tau 2) They’re planning a big HQ change in the March Big FAQ that restricts super HQs like Flyrants to one per detachment.

The only other explanation is incompetence. With GW, this one is never really out of the picture.

Oh come on. At least try to understand the point the person you're replying to is making.

Like, we've all seen people spamming Tau Commanders and chaff (mostly gun drones, which have good anti-infantry shooting) and doing pretty well. It's not the toppest of top tier, but it's a pretty nasty sort of list. I've never seen someone spamming Talonmasters. Googling "talonmaster spam" turns up nothing -- I see one list with 2 talonmasters. Checking the army list subforum here for "Dark Angels" and "Ravenwing" and "Talonmaster" turns up nothing resembling Talonmaster spam. There's probably a reason for this: it doesn't work nearly as well. Or, sure, maybe this is a secret OP strategy that Dark Angels players just haven't cottoned on to yet. But either way your post is kind of ridiculous. It is deeply weird to argue that Tau Commanders did not present a unique problem in the actual game of Warhammer 40k that was being played by real people, likely having to do with their ability to efficiently handle almost all of your army's shooting needs while enjoying character protection.

We can talk about exactly why Talonmasters don't present the same problem, but you have to concede that they don't present the same problem. That's just an empirical fact. The only similar things we've seen in 8th edition are a bunch of Imperium characters hiding behind some Culexi (which is not that great of a list and is also not very shooty, and which is crushed by the experimental CA rules), and then Malefic Lord and Horror spam (which was nerfed with extreme prejudice). It's just silly to act like this is some bizarre anti-Tau agenda.

You can get an extra commander in an Aux detachment (if the tourney isnt running 3 detachment limit), just costs cp but with how cheap our battalions should have enough for other goodies.

I’m baffled I need to explain this.

Talonmasters aren’t spammed because there are EVEN MORE competitive builds available to Imperial/DA players. They are however a competitively pointed highly shooty entirely spammable and completely untargetable HQ choice. The poster’s entire premise was that Tau Commanders as shooty untargetable HQs are somehow unique in this game and that this uniqueness forced GW into restricting army composition.

Tau Commanders and Drones were spammed because everything else in the index is hysterically weak garbage.

Here’s a thought: How about approach the Commander issue with not making them so cost effective on the Dakka department, while simultaneously making more interesting army builds the more competitive and flexible choice. That way you don’t have to resort to pathetic solutions like ”Oh well you can keep this nobrainer-always-taken unit but you can’t get as many as before.” GW actually limited choice from Tau players with this change, because if you aren’t running 3 Commanders now, you’re a dork.

 Therion wrote:
I’m baffled I need to explain this.

Talonmasters aren’t spammed because there are EVEN MORE competitive builds available to Imperial/DA players. They are however a competitively pointed highly shooty entirely spammable and completely untargetable HQ choice. The poster’s entire premise was that Tau Commanders as shooty untargetable HQs are somehow unique in this game.

Here’s a though: How about approach the Commander issue with not making them so cost effective on the Dakka department, while simultaneously making more interesting army builds the more competitive and flexible choice. That way you don’t have to resort to pathetic solutions like ”Oh well you can keep this nobrainer-always-taken unit but you can’t get as many as before. GW actually limited choice from Tau players with this change, because if you aren’t running 3 Commanders now, you’re a dork.

This is perhaps the first time that anyone has ever suggested that Dark Angels Talonmaster spam is at least as competitive as Tau Commander spam. I don't think you really believe this. I mean, simply looking at the unit and asking what a Talonmaster spam list would look like should probably immediately raise questions like: what will you do for anti-tank? Talonmasters are decent at killing MEQs from 24" when they don't move, yeah. But they're hardly very efficient shooting. The Nephilim Jetfighter in the same codex is cheaper, shoots better, and is far more durable aside from character protection. And spamming either one of these will not get you anywhere near what a Guilliman list puts out -- and I think most people would agree that that's about the same tier as Commander spam (certainly this is much closer to right than a Talonmaster spam list!). And, again, we can just look at the facts. Nobody is out there complaining about cheesy Dark Angels lists, no matter that you say they have much better things available to them. They don't seem to have something that's giving people the same trouble as Tau Commander spam.

Meanwhile Commanders are incredibly efficient shooting -- a quad-fusion Commander costs only a little more than what a Tempestor Prime and a command squad with melta guns do. I think the only significantly more efficient way to deliver melta fire to a target is Fire Dragons, with a limited-use stratagem, and the Commanders are much more likely to survive to do it again next turn and have longer range to shoot past screens. Various builds involving burst cannons and CIBs and ATSs put out firepower competitive with the best assault cannon platforms available at BS2+, deep-striking into range immediately and then moving and shooting without penalty.

But sure, there are alternative ways to fix the problem. I already said in this thread that they could have instead made the Commanders relatively inefficient shooters while giving them more buffing ability -- this is more like what the Talonmasters do. But, again like I said earlier, GW seems to want to keep the Commanders as a sort of "hero" unit, which is very powerful and cool in its own right. And given that I'm not sure what they're supposed to do other than put a limit on them.

It does seem very lazy. Commander Spam was an issue (and I blame the powergamers who spammed them), but this fix like most fixes GW does are hamfisted and really not addressing any underlying issue, it's literally smashing a mallet over whatever a boogeyman is.

Dionysodorus wrote:

This is perhaps the first time that anyone has ever suggested that Dark Angels Talonmaster spam is at least as competitive as Tau Commander spam.

You completely missed his point. The other poster mentioned "shooty" and "untargettable" as reasons to limit commanders. Of course this would apply to several units that aren't restricted right now, which makes this whole nerf distasteful. Just because commanders were the most shooty doesn't change this fact. Shield-Captains on bikes have similar damage output but rely on melee, and can take melta missiles. Why aren't they limited?

Keep in mind that Tau have been running fusion commanders because all our anti-tank sucked. Here, take a 200 pt broadside with 2 S8 lascannons... Or a hammerhead with 1 S10 lascannon, How about a 300 pt fusion crisis team that only hits 4-5 times? As you can see, there were plenty of ways to limit commander spam, namely by buffing other units, especially crisis suits. For a faction with the best guns, I have trouble fitting anti-tank in at all.

Just to give some perspective: a crisis suit is currently more expensive than a custode. A missile pod is more expensive than a lascannon right now, as is a fusion blaster. tau plasma is worse than imperial plasma but more expensive. To top it off, all of these were available to two categories: a unit with BS 4+ and a unit with BS 2+. It was inevitable that commander spam would occur.

Now, I personally am for this limitation provided tau get more HQ options and other factions get the same treatment (shield captains and hive tyrants come to mind). A farsight player will need to run 2+ fireblades just to get some CP. If the rumored XV8 commander comes out, I hope he's not also limited.

To top it off, people will still run 3 commanders because the things that made them OP are still there.

Nothing GW would have done to fix what they persevered was an issue would have pleased this place. They want HQs to be super powerful, which you can see across codex releases, and Tau Commander spam was a byproduct of this in the Index. They could have made them so expensive you would be stupid to take more than one, OR they could keep them as very powerful units but limit them to one. GW understands that shooting is the meta. Tau are 100% shooting (lets not get into Farsight right now), no melee or psykers, so of course their super powerful HQs are going to dominate the shooting phase. I don't understand the game people are playing when they say this is a bad change. It is literally the only change that makes sense with the current meta and army compositions. You can't increase the points or the unit gets replaced with lower costed ones, and you can't nerf it or again it gets replaced. You can only keep it strong while limiting how many you can take.

It isn't lazy; it's the only thing that made sense.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Dandelion wrote:
To top it off, people will still run 3 commanders because the things that made them OP are still there.

Of course they will for the same reasons Chaos players jam as many Daemon Princes as they can stomach into their lists: they're amazing for what they cost.

 andysonic1 wrote:
I don't understand the game people are playing when they say this is a bad change.

It's not a game. This change just feels bad. Only 1 per detachment, and only for Tau Commanders. No other non-unique HQ is similarly restricted. I don't know that on a balance basis it ends up being a huge deal, because Tau do have some strengths in the new codex, but restricting Tau and not any other HQ in the game just feels very strange.

Dandelion wrote:

You completely missed his point. The other poster mentioned "shooty" and "untargettable" as reasons to limit commanders. Of course this would apply to several units that aren't restricted right now, which makes this whole nerf distasteful. Just because commanders were the most shooty doesn't change this fact. Shield-Captains on bikes have similar damage output but rely on melee, and can take melta missiles. Why aren't they limited?

No, I got this, it's just that this is a very silly point, and it relies on an aggressively uncharitable reading of the other side's argument. It is generally good practice to stop before replying and ask if you're actually engaging with what the other side means to be saying, vs whatever you can interpret them to be saying such that you have the easiest time knocking it down. I don't think it's much of a leap to read concerns about Tau Commanders being "shooty" and "untargetable" with being specifically concerned with just how shooty they are. Like, surely you already know exactly what someone might say in reply to your objection about Shield-Captains on bikes. The reply is really obvious, right? They're not actually nearly as capable of handling all of your shooting needs while hiding behind screens. They just do it much less efficiently -- 175 points gets you one missile. CC characters are much harder to hide behind screens because they need to be much closer to do damage, and CC is in general less scary than shooting because you can screen against it much more easily and it's harder to get into CC than it is to get into range to shoot. So, in short: they're not limited because they're not abusable enough to justify limiting. Or maybe you want to argue that Shield-Captains, specifically, are so good and that spamming them is proving to be so effective that they're showing up way too much. For all I know that's true! I haven't been keeping up that much with the meta since the Custodes codex came out. I could easily be convinced that Shield-Captains and Daemon Princes are problematic -- though probably not nearly as problematic as Commanders -- since they're pretty efficient CC units that you can hide in a sea of chaff, such that you're rewarded for spamming them in really annoying ways. But of course, that's just an argument for limiting all of these things, not for not limiting Commanders. The analogy just doesn't work to defend Commanders unless you can simultaneously convince someone that Shield-Captains are both more of a problem and that they still shouldn't be limited. I'll add that, as I understand the state of things currently, the only other HQ which has nearly the same sort of spammability concerns as the Commander is the Hive Tyrant, but here the fix seems a lot easier -- you just raise its cost. It's not getting spammed because the more of them you have the better each one is -- they have 12 wounds and so all you're getting out of that is all that any skew lists gets out of presenting only GEQs or only tanks or whatever. It's getting spammed because it's just really, really good for its cost, and you want lots of them even though that means you're not getting that much out of all their psychic or synapse ability.

It's just very tiresome when people insist on advancing arguments against straw men based on an uncharitable reading of an argument when everyone knows what the reply is going to be, and what the reply to the reply is going to be, etc. It reads like an attempt to filibuster the argument -- rather than talk about the actual reason people have for disagreeing, it's just about wasting time forcing people to get their words exactly right so that various silly and trivial objections no longer apply to the argument as stated. I mean, come on. Nobody actually thinks that Ravenwing Talonmaster spam is a problem. If you're interpreting someone's argument as implying that Talonmaster spam is just as bad as Commander spam, then you're probably not understanding what their actual problem is with Commander spam, and you should go back and try to understand better. Maybe the person actually hasn't figured out how to articulate their position. Maybe you can even improve the quality of discussion by helping them get precise about what it is they're objecting to! But then actually do this. Suggest the reasonable thing that you think they're aiming at instead of going round for 4 or 5 posts and replies arguing about something adjacent to the actual issue which no one really cares about or disagrees on.

Give me Ghostkheel and Stealth Suits Commander and you can make 1 commander for every type of armour per Detachment as much as you like.

Dionysodorus wrote:

No, I got this, it's just that this is a very silly point, and it relies on an aggressively uncharitable reading of the other side's argument. It is generally good practice to stop before replying and ask if you're actually engaging with what the other side means to be saying, vs whatever you can interpret them to be saying such that you have the easiest time knocking it down.

You say that, but that's not what I got from your previous post. Therion simply listed some units that were good and could be spammed to a similar degree as Tau commanders. His point there was that other options were just as good if not better (within those armies). It seemed that you were focusing too much on comparing Commanders with other armies, when the real point was the internal balance of tau. Fix that and there is no need for a limitation.

No one is saying the limitation is undeserved, just that it is unfair. Either give all primary HQs the same limitation or none. This should just be a game wide design decision. That way it's fair.
If Tau Commanders are a problem either adjusts points or fundamentally change how they work. That's all.


Now, as an aside, I am all for a commander limit so long as it affects everyone equally AND everyone gets a spammable secondary HQ for detachments. That way the captain/warboss/farseer etc... feels unique within their own army, especially if they are to be the warlord.

 meleti wrote:

 andysonic1 wrote:
I don't understand the game people are playing when they say this is a bad change.

It's not a game.

Yes it is.

The way I would have fixed it, was to return Commanders to how they were in previous editions. Give them two weapon points and two upgrade points. Problem solved as they are no longer better shooting than a unit of Crisis Suits.

However, they should also be given unique support system choices not available to other suits with a more supportive roll. Since GW is really on aura buffs, they could be things like one system let's you reroll hit rolls of one, another could be wound rolls of one, or ignore a single negative modifier, for units within six inches. It would require some work to figure out appropriate points, but it would give commanders flexibility and a reason to be taken aside from committing suicide to take out a tank.

However... That would have taken actual effort and creativity on GW's part, and restricting them to 1 per detachment is quick and easy.

Dandelion wrote:

The other poster mentioned "shooty" and "untargettable" as reasons to limit commanders.

No that was meleti who twisted my words. Purposefully misinterpreting what someone says and then argument against that seems to be common practice on dakka these days. Back in my days we called that a "strawman".
My exact words where "extremely shooty" to the extent that they "delete units on their own", not just "shooty".

Tau Commanders are clearly in a league of their own in that regard.
The fact that someone brought up Hurricane Bolter Shield-Captains and other 0-1 units (like named characters) as some sort of "nuh-uh" kinda just cemented my point.

With that said, I'm all for restricting problematic units in order to prevent spam.
Go ahead and make Daemon Princes 0-1 and Dark Reapers 0-2, etc. It won't affect me in the slightest because I'm not the kind of players who get affected by these kinds of restrictions. On the flipside, I'd welcome them.

 MinscS2 wrote:

Dandelion wrote:

The other poster mentioned "shooty" and "untargettable" as reasons to limit commanders.

No that was meleti who twisted my words. Purposefully misinterpreting what someone says and then argument against that seems to be common practice on dakka these days. Back in my days we called that a "strawman".
My exact words where "extremely shooty", not just "shooty". Keyword: <Extremely>

Tau Commanders are clearly in a league of their own in that regard.
The fact that somone brought up Hurricane Bolter Shield-Captains and other 0-1 units (like named characters) as some sort of "nuh-uh" kinda just cemented my point.

With that said, I'm all for restricting problematic units in order to prevent spam.
Go ahead and make Daemon Princes 0-1 and Dark Reapers 0-2, etc. It won't affect me in the slightest because I'm not the kind of players who get affected by these kinds of restrictions. On the flipside, I'd welcome them.

"Purposefully" misinterpreting is a bit strong I think. The distinction between "shooty" and "extremely shooty" is not defined, therefore many interpretations can exist for it. Where is the threshold? If the bar is only Tau commanders then you've just set a very high and specific bar that doesn't lend itself to discussion at all, because by definition you would be correct. My own definition of "extremely shooty" tends to be closer to "more than average shooty" as such many more units fall into that category despite how far ahead tau are.

Also, Shield captains aren't 0-1. In fact the only 0-1 units are named characters and tau commanders. Unless you meant something else.

The issue I have with limiting "problem" units is that the issue still exists. An OP unit will be OP no matter how many you can take. Fix the problem with points/abilites. Though a commander limit for the sake of fluff is reasonable so long as it is applied fairly across all armies.

Sigh, I'm just about done with this thread.

 MinscS2 wrote:
[...]extremely shooty, non-targetable HQ in the game.[...]

[...]You can hide a shooty Autarch or a shooty SM Captain behind units, but they're not gonna delete units on their own with their ranged weapons.[...]

I defined my take on "extremely shooty": they remove units on their own.

And I never stated that Shield Captains are 0-1. I'm well aware that they're not.
I said "Shield Captains and other (as in other than Tau Commanders) 0-1 units (like named characters)".

Saying "this named character is also extremely shooty" is not an argument for removing the hardcap on Tau Commanders.
You're essentially trying to justify removing the 0-1 hardcap on Comanders by comparing the Commander to a unit with a 0-1 hardcap...

The 1 Commander per Detachment limit isn't the most eloquent solution, and certainly not my preferred one. Most of its necessity (the only viable option) has hopefully been somewhat addressed with the new codex (are the drops enough? We'll see, but I'm hopeful) by making other options actually viable.

It would be infinitely more manageable if there was a Shas'el Sub-Commander (i.e. Not a COMMANDER) that played the role of the Space Marine Captain. Limit the number of weapons to 3, or reduce the BS to 3+, drop to 4 wounds, and allow Battlesuit-only Brigades.

Gunline/Infantry-based lists should be viable. They shouldn't be required for those who dedicated so much of their modeling to Crisis suits.

The fact of the matter is, though, that the Shas'o Commander, if they're sticking with 1 per detachment to represent the overarching stature as equal to a Space Marine Chapter Master, needs to be more of a leader and less of a beatstick. They don't need to be bad at it, per se, but focus on the Commanders role as commander and get him to command. Better aura would be huge, either choosing Mont'ka or Kauyon each turn, or giving 1 unit within 6" the benefit of one of the commander's Support Systems, or something similar.

Make Commanders commanders, don't make them beatsticks. My commander should be commanding, damnit.

 MinscS2 wrote:
Sigh, I'm just about done with this thread.

Sorry for being blunt but it's better you're done than keep not so eloquently moving the goal posts for the other people in this thread.

I'll quote you:

The main reason for why Tau Commanders get this hardcap while other HQ's don't is probably because they are, afaik (correct me if I'm wrong) the only extremely shooty, non-targetable HQ in the game.

I corrected you. You were wrong. You even asked to be corrected. Talonmasters are an extremely shooty non-targetable HQ in the game.

You then tried to say that 12 shots at S6 and 6 shots at S5, hitting on 3+, fully re-rolling hits, re-rolling 1's to wound, ignoring cover, on a mobile platform, doesn't in your bizarro world count as 'extremely shooty' only 'normal shooty' because apparently the check for this is a scientific 'if it can erase units on its own'. I'm not sure what units we're talking about here but it has to be Repulsors, Warlord Titans etc.

Dakka-Tyrants can delete units on their own with their ranged weapons, but can't hide behind the rest of their army, so you can actually shoot back at it.

So Dakka-Tyrants have sufficient firepower to satisfy your check for 'extremely shooty'. Do you want me to mathhammer you point by point a Dakka Tyrant vs the Talonmaster in the Sammael bubble? I can tell you there isn't much of a difference, but you might want to check which way it swings vs units like MEQ in cover.

And this was your entire premise for why Tau Commanders are unique and deserve army composition restrictions. You didn't say that they are overpowered or that the army needs to be more interesting compositionally. You implied they need to be restricted to 1 per detachment because they are unique in this game and therefore a unique nerf is in order. They aren't. So you're wrong, but you're trying to shift the goal posts or call out the people who called you out.

Daemon Princes don't need a hardcap because they don't really shoot, and in order to be effective they need to be in close combat, where they can be targeted, and after said combat they will probably be much closer to your army, so being able to target it shouldn't be hard.

Another, let's say, 'interesting' way to look at balancing 40K. We can easily make the argument that Nurgle DPs and AC Shield Captains are even more powerful overall than Tau Commanders. Somehow still these units don't need restrictions because 'they aren't untargetable when they assault'. You keep coming back to this issue of being untargetable. Yet, you don't actually need to be untargetable for the entire game to dominate. You just need to be alpha strike protected. Like the Shield-Captains. Yet, in your world, abusively powerful units don't need restrictions if they're not untargetable for the whole game when they pew pew from the back line, like Talonmasters and Sammael. But Talonmasters and Sammael don't count.

 AnomanderRake wrote:
The problem with comparing commander-spam to HQ units in other armies is that a Tau Commander is just about the only HQ in the game that's a more efficient replacement for a unit in your army. Space Marine characters tend to get the most mileage out of being support elements rather than running around stabbing things on their own, I can get an Autarch with a Reaper Launcher but he's not better than just getting Dark Reapers, Guard tank commanders and Tyranid Hive Tyrants are strong but they don't make good straight-up replacements for other tanks/MCs because of the cost...

The problem with the Tau commander is that he's BS2+ when the rest of your Crisis suits are BS4+ because GW doesn't want to give you BS3+ and Markerlights at the same time. Which ends up meaning that the Commander is the battlesuit I can't cripple without touching it by torching your Markerlights, which makes him better than just taking XV-8s.

To my mind there were three solutions: lose BS2+, lose four guns, or the 0-1 rule. I'd rather have seen Commanders restricted to two guns and given more interesting support for other units on the logic that they're supposed to be Commanders and the Tau are supposed to be the more sensible army where that means they command other forces rather than run around bonking things over the head with great big swords themselves, but I don't think the 0-1 rule is unwarranted.

I think one of the reasons for Commander Spam was that GW introduced a minimum squad size for Crisis suits of 3+. So if you only wanted to drop in one suit to hit a target and that would be its entire role (say, dropping in and hitting a tank with fusion blasters), you either sent a commander or had to fork out the points for 3 crisis suits who might then be in a completely useless position for the rest of the battle and who costed more than the commander.

Also, 4 guns wouldn't have been an issue if GW gave us support systems worth a damn. The amount of overlap between support systems and markerlights was incredibly bad game design as it meant if you were taking anough markerlights to get the +1 to hit, there was no point in packing many of the support systems as they were redundant.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Deadawake1347 wrote:
The way I would have fixed it, was to return Commanders to how they were in previous editions. Give them two weapon points and two upgrade points. Problem solved as they are no longer better shooting than a unit of Crisis Suits.

However, they should also be given unique support system choices not available to other suits with a more supportive roll. Since GW is really on aura buffs, they could be things like one system let's you reroll hit rolls of one, another could be wound rolls of one, or ignore a single negative modifier, for units within six inches. It would require some work to figure out appropriate points, but it would give commanders flexibility and a reason to be taken aside from committing suicide to take out a tank.

However... That would have taken actual effort and creativity on GW's part, and restricting them to 1 per detachment is quick and easy.

I don't think commanders and crisis suits have ever actually been limited in how many guns they could take on their hardpoints. They were just limited in how many they could fire each turn, making taking more than two wasteful over a support system.

I just kinda feel you are complaining. You have a pretty epic looking codex and I look on in jealousy!

 frightnight wrote:
What I'm curious about is how/if they're going to limit Farsight Enclaves from using Ethereals. Previously there's been no limits on Legion/Chapter/Craftworld/etc. traits and all units in the codex can be used by everything, and the solution to divergent lists is to split DA/BA/TS/DG off into their own books.

There's a first time for everything, of course, but this will break the trend. Or suddenly Farsight's cool with some Ethereals but not all...

Same rule as Black Templars have regarding Psykers. "ETHEREALS cannot be from from the FARSIGHT ENCLAVES Sept."

Of course unless they change the Ethereals Rule keywords it's not going to do much.

 Galas wrote:
Give me Ghostkheel and Stealth Suits Commander and you can make 1 commander for every type of armour per Detachment as much as you like.

we will find out very soon. stealth suite prev is today.

 meleti wrote:

 andysonic1 wrote:
I don't understand the game people are playing when they say this is a bad change.

It's not a game. This change just feels bad. Only 1 per detachment, and only for Tau Commanders. No other non-unique HQ is similarly restricted. I don't know that on a balance basis it ends up being a huge deal, because Tau do have some strengths in the new codex, but restricting Tau and not any other HQ in the game just feels very strange.

´

Yeah. That's my problem with the change. While the restriction isn't that bad idea BALANCE wise issue is it's tau-only. Where's restricted marine HQ's? Imperial guard company commanders? More than 1 per 2 battallion detachments would be generous fluff wise so idea of having battallion with 3 company commanders is just silly.

This kind of restrictions should have been done from the get-go rather than hamfisting it midway. Or maybe with just one codex(tau). Will dark eldars have similar? Necrons? Etc.

Im a bit disappointed with the Tau codex, played tau through a few editions and with 7th making everyone hate due to the formations they have been really toned down in 8th. Commanders didnt need the restriction, just up the points/make bs2+ weapons more points and limit the hard points so its more of a support role. I dont like how your forced to take infantry hqs in a battalion, makes a battlesuit list less effective unless you take vanguards.

Crisis suits getting no point decrease either just adds to commanders been way better and promotes spam with outriders.

-1 to hit armies/abilities hurt tau really bad too due to us needing markerlights to hit to make our units hit better which is frustrating mechanic without stratagems to increase to hit (except FSE one for crisis).

Alot of our abilities cross over too like 4 markerlights for move and fire heavy weapons but target lock is autotake on big suits as markerlights are unreliable.

I could go on but im just basing it on the leaks so far, i dont want a shoot twice stratagem or -1 to hit trait but some synergy would be nice to make us unique.

tneva82 wrote:

 meleti wrote:

 andysonic1 wrote:
I don't understand the game people are playing when they say this is a bad change.

It's not a game. This change just feels bad. Only 1 per detachment, and only for Tau Commanders. No other non-unique HQ is similarly restricted. I don't know that on a balance basis it ends up being a huge deal, because Tau do have some strengths in the new codex, but restricting Tau and not any other HQ in the game just feels very strange.

´

Yeah. That's my problem with the change. While the restriction isn't that bad idea BALANCE wise issue is it's tau-only. Where's restricted marine HQ's? Imperial guard company commanders? More than 1 per 2 battallion detachments would be generous fluff wise so idea of having battallion with 3 company commanders is just silly.

This kind of restrictions should have been done from the get-go rather than hamfisting it midway. Or maybe with just one codex(tau). Will dark eldars have similar? Necrons? Etc.

Well if the rumours/speculation are right then the March FaQ might do something similar for the already released codexes to some degree.

More than 1 per 2 battallion detachments would be generous fluff wise so idea of having battallion with 3 company commanders is just silly.

Fluff wise I thought 3 companies normally make up a battalion?

 lolman1c wrote:
I just kinda feel you are complaining. You have a pretty epic looking codex and I look on in jealousy!

The problem is, this limit is so absurd that the rest of the codex doesn't even matter to many players the moment you introduce it.

I have over 5k points worth of models. and I now can't run even a simple battalion because despite having 4 different HQ models (R'alai, shadowsun, enforcer, coldstar), only one of the four can be used in a detachment.

 BoomWolf wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:
I just kinda feel you are complaining. You have a pretty epic looking codex and I look on in jealousy!

The problem is, this limit is so absurd that the rest of the codex doesn't even matter to many players the moment you introduce it.

I have over 5k points worth of models. and I now can't run even a simple battalion because despite having 4 different HQ models (R'alai, shadowsun, enforcer, coldstar), only one of the four can be used in a detachment.

And Eldar-players complained when Wraithknights where turned into LoW's in 7th.

Adapt. Get an Ethereal or a Fireblade, or get both, and some Firewarriors. Now you'll have two cheap battalions and two commanders in your list.
(Honestly. my main issue with this 'restriction' is how easy it is to circumvent due to multiple detatchment and cheap troops. Makes me wonder why GW even bother with it in the first place.)

I doubt that Tau Commanders will be the first HQ-unit with restrictions however.

 andysonic1 wrote:
I don't understand the game people are playing when they say this is a bad change.

Kids want to have their cake and eat it too. It's that simple.

GW is clearly buffing a bunch of Tau units to make commanders less optimal and wanted to correct what they perceived as aberrant behavior within the game.

So GW is in the position of wanting to reduce commander spam, but they're not making any new Tau models.

So they put in this admittedly clumsy rule because the model range for Tau doesn't really support a new HQ unit that brings something different to the table.

It's basically this, Primaris and Nurgle got new models last year. This year, it appears we're going to get a new knight and probably some new models in the Necron range.

Everyone else will get rules enough to give their codex a gimmick or two and be relatively competitive, beyond that, you're SOL.

 MinscS2 wrote:

You're essentially trying to justify removing the 0-1 hardcap on Comanders by comparing the Commander to a unit with a 0-1 hardcap...

You can't accuse someone of making a strawman and then proceed to make your own, mate. Maybe, just maybe, it's difficult to properly convey ideas over the internet when there is a few hours of delay between replies.

Your entire premise was that Tau commanders were the only case of extremely shooty and untargettable. This premise was disputed. Your conclusion was that Tau commanders were the only units deserving of a limit. Because your premise is not proven, your conclusion is called into question.

Regardless, I would be ok with the nerf, so long as it affected everyone equally. So, shield-captains, hive tyrants... AND we got a secondary (and less shooty) HQ to help make detachments.

 Mr Morden wrote:

More than 1 per 2 battallion detachments would be generous fluff wise so idea of having battallion with 3 company commanders is just silly.

Fluff wise I thought 3 companies normally make up a battalion?

Platoon 5 squads, company 2-5 platoons, battalion 2-3 companies. Detachment can't fit that many squads. Battallion detachment is reinforced platoon


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 andysonic1 wrote:
I don't understand the game people are playing when they say this is a bad change.

Kids want to have their cake and eat it too. It's that simple.

GW is clearly buffing a bunch of Tau units to make commanders less optimal and wanted to correct what they perceived as aberrant behavior within the game.

So GW is in the position of wanting to reduce commander spam, but they're not making any new Tau models.

So they put in this admittedly clumsy rule because the model range for Tau doesn't really support a new HQ unit that brings something different to the table.

It's basically this, Primaris and Nurgle got new models last year. This year, it appears we're going to get a new knight and probably some new models in the Necron range.

Everyone else will get rules enough to give their codex a gimmick or two and be relatively competitive, beyond that, you're SOL.

Of course they could have made commander not broken thus no need for limit. If he needs limit 1 per det is autotake. If not it's silly tau only limitation

Dandelion wrote:

 MinscS2 wrote:

You're essentially trying to justify removing the 0-1 hardcap on Comanders by comparing the Commander to a unit with a 0-1 hardcap...

Your entire premise was that Tau commanders were the only case of extremely shooty and untargettable.

No. His premise was that they're the only HQ unit thats is shooty enough to be considered by WAAC players to be worth spamming.

The people arguing against that are being needlessly obtuse.

Then they accused him of "moving the goal posts" when what he was doing was clarifying his opinion because of nitpicking replies.

 Sim-Life wrote:

Dandelion wrote:

 MinscS2 wrote:

You're essentially trying to justify removing the 0-1 hardcap on Comanders by comparing the Commander to a unit with a 0-1 hardcap...

Your entire premise was that Tau commanders were the only case of extremely shooty and untargettable.

No. His premise was that they're the only HQ unit thats is shooty enough to be considered by WAAC pkayers to be worth spamming.

The people arguing against that are being needlessly obtuse.

Then they accused him of "moving the goal posts" when what he was doing was clarifying his opinion because ofnnitpicking replies.

WAAC players aren't playing Tau. The people spamming commanders and drones are Tau players using the only feasible competitive build in the index due to the obscene amount of nerfs that hit most of the rest of the mainstay Tau units.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Sim-Life wrote:

Dandelion wrote:

 MinscS2 wrote:

You're essentially trying to justify removing the 0-1 hardcap on Comanders by comparing the Commander to a unit with a 0-1 hardcap...

Your entire premise was that Tau commanders were the only case of extremely shooty and untargettable.

No. His premise was that they're the only HQ unit thats is shooty enough to be considered by WAAC pkayers to be worth spamming.

The people arguing against that are being needlessly obtuse.

Then they accused him of "moving the goal posts" when what he was doing was clarifying his opinion because ofnnitpicking replies.

WAAC players aren't playing Tau. The people spamming commanders and drones are Tau players using the only feasible competitive build in the index due to the obscene amount of nerfs that hit most of the rest of the mainstay Tau units.

I never said WAAC players are playing T'au.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
WAAC players aren't playing Tau. The people spamming commanders and drones are Tau players using the only feasible competitive build in the index due to the obscene amount of nerfs that hit most of the rest of the mainstay Tau units.

So what you're saying is that more nerfs are required, and then maybe the Tau will go away?

Sign me up!

So, when you said that WAAC players consider the Tau commander to be the only shooty HQ unit worth spamming, you weren't saying that WAAC players were the ones spamming Tau commanders.

If the Tau commander was such an issue, that it was literally the best shooting HQ unit in the game, why aren't WAAC playing Tau to spam it?

Probably because one good shooty HQ doesn't make an army OP. When you have an army with the best shooty HQ in the game and it still isn't being played by WAAC players, you should kind of ask why not. And the answer to that is that the rest of the units (drones and fire warriors excepted) are not good for their points. The solution is not, therefore, to take away one of the few good units the army has, but rather to make other units in the army worth taking instead. From what we've seen, GW has not done that.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
So, when you said that WAAC players consider the Tau commander to be the only shooty HQ unit worth spamming, you weren't saying that WAAC players were the ones spamming Tau commanders.

If the Tau commander was such an issue, that it was literally the best shooting HQ unit in the game, why aren't WAAC playing Tau to spam it?

Probably because one good shooty HQ doesn't make an army OP. When you have an army with the best shooty HQ in the game and it still isn't being played by WAAC players, you should kind of ask why not. And the answer to that is that the rest of the units (drones and fire warriors excepted) are not good for their points. The solution is not, therefore, to take away one of the few good units the army has, but rather to make other units in the army worth taking instead. From what we've seen, GW has not done that.

"From what we've seen" is almost nothing.

Until you can see the codex in it's entirety with point costs and start hammering out some builds you have no idea what your looking at. Tau are not only receiving massive point adjustments according to the rumors but the weapon profiles and special abilities are being tweaked all over the place. Nobody knows where any of it stands until over a week from now.

 lolman1c wrote:
I just kinda feel you are complaining. You have a pretty epic looking codex and I look on in jealousy!

So far we have worse Jormungandr sept which is kinda meh (don't move at all to get cover vs don't advance), Bork'an (which is good with all non assault weapons), T'au (slightly better friendly overwatch, but if you're being charged as tau it's over anyways for that unit barring a few exceptions), and Farsight, which improves shooting against units that are about to charge, or are charging you.

Riptides got improved a bit, hopefully not to 7th levels, but also hopefully they don't get a price hike to go with the improved weapons (of which I'm still not sure they're worth it TBH)

 MinscS2 wrote:

 BoomWolf wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:
I just kinda feel you are complaining. You have a pretty epic looking codex and I look on in jealousy!

The problem is, this limit is so absurd that the rest of the codex doesn't even matter to many players the moment you introduce it.

I have over 5k points worth of models. and I now can't run even a simple battalion because despite having 4 different HQ models (R'alai, shadowsun, enforcer, coldstar), only one of the four can be used in a detachment.

And Eldar-players complained when Wraithknights where turned into LoW's in 7th.

Adapt. Get an Ethereal or a Fireblade, or get both, and some Firewarriors. Now you'll have two cheap battalions and two commanders in your list.
(Honestly. my main issue with this 'restriction' is how easy it is to circumvent due to multiple detatchment and cheap troops. Makes me wonder why GW even bother with it in the first place.)

I doubt that Tau Commanders will be the first HQ-unit with restrictions however.

There's a big difference between a heavy support unit becoming a LoW and an HQ unit being 1 per detachment. The WK change didn't affect army comp out side of "split it up into more detachments using the same models" while the tau change forces a total revamp of an army if you played with anything other than a patrol/spearhead/vanguard/etc

To be fair, Tau have significantly less reason to move than nids. Their guns are WAY longer range with synergies giving them way better accuracy.

Their Jormungandr trait should actually amount to the same thing for the most part.

 Lance845 wrote:
To be fair, Tau have significantly less reason to move than nids. Their guns are WAY longer range with synergies giving them way better accuracy.

Their Jormungandr trait should actually amount to the same thing for the most part.

Unless you're moving to grab objectives. Or see past some LoS blocking terrain. Or shoot a better target, or move to hopefully make a charge harder to reach you.

 Lance845 wrote:
To be fair, Tau have significantly less reason to move than nids. Their guns are WAY longer range with synergies giving them way better accuracy.

Their Jormungandr trait should actually amount to the same thing for the most part.

Their guns are overcosted though, to the point where that is irrelevant. When compared to imperial equivalents most of their guns are just too pricy. Nids cost what they should usually when compared to tau. Tau need price slashes across the board.

 Jaxler wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
To be fair, Tau have significantly less reason to move than nids. Their guns are WAY longer range with synergies giving them way better accuracy.

Their Jormungandr trait should actually amount to the same thing for the most part.

They’re guns are overcosted though, to the point where that is irrelevant. When compared to imperial equivalents most of their guns are just too pricy. Nids cost what they should usually when compared to tau. Tau need price slashes across the board.

Which has been indicated is generally happening?

 meleti wrote:

 MinscS2 wrote:

 meleti wrote:

I'm just pointing out it's an untargettable HQ with good shooting. Obviously they're not identical units.

Your bar for what qualifies as "good shooting" is clearly very different from mine.

Yeah, clearly. Do consider anything less shooty than a Tau Commander to have bad shooting?

Pretty much. I do too for the record. To compare the custodes shield captain to the quad fusion commander or any powerful variant is laughable

 Farseer_V2 wrote:

 Jaxler wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
To be fair, Tau have significantly less reason to move than nids. Their guns are WAY longer range with synergies giving them way better accuracy.

Their Jormungandr trait should actually amount to the same thing for the most part.

They’re guns are overcosted though, to the point where that is irrelevant. When compared to imperial equivalents most of their guns are just too pricy. Nids cost what they should usually when compared to tau. Tau need price slashes across the board.

Which has been indicated is generally happening?

We will see if it is enough.

 Lance845 wrote:
To be fair, Tau have significantly less reason to move than nids. Their guns are WAY longer range with synergies giving them way better accuracy.

Their Jormungandr trait should actually amount to the same thing for the most part.

I mean.. only if i decide tabling my opponent is how I must win.. I play mostly objective games, and Crisis are too expensive to "spam" Shas'O'Fly'O only takes 1 point a time, if its uncontested.

Reality is tau need to move a lot. Maybe a cluster of 1-2 Stike teams and 1 fireblade will stay still, but if its d3 points to grab point 2, someone is trying to move to point 2

Yes, you are all doomed. GW hates you all and is finally able to bring their plot to ruin your army to fruition.

There's no point in trying to hide it from them anymore guys, they've realized the sky really is falling.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:
Yes, you are all doomed. GW hates you all and is finally able to bring their plot to ruin your army to fruition.

There's no point in trying to hide it from them anymore guys, they've realized the sky really is falling.

Validation!

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:
Yes, you are all doomed. GW hates you all and is finally able to bring their plot to ruin your army to fruition.

There's no point in trying to hide it from them anymore guys, they've realized the sky really is falling.

When did this turn into a grey Knights thread?

The Grey Knights are fairly new to whining, as apposed to the veteran Tau whiners. But both pale in comparison to the masters of the whine; the Sisters of Battle.

 Crimson Devil wrote:
The Grey Knights are fairly new to whining, as apposed to the veteran Tau whiners. But both pale in comparison to the masters of the whine; the Sisters of Battle.

The Eldar players FAR outwhine anyone else. They had a bad codex in 5th and decided to pretend 6th and 7th editions didn't exist for the benefit of complaining and now they have a good but not OP codex (except for dark reapers) and STILL whine about not being amazing.

They were mid-tier in 5th. They were downright filthy when buffing warwalkers with Eldrad. They were playing 6th/7th before anyone else

 Therion wrote:
Dark Angels Sammael on Sableclaw (unique) and Dark Angels Talonmaster (fully spammable) shoot 18 times per model, ignore cover and re-reroll hits and wounds while being untargetable. They’re very competitive choices too both in soups and with Dark Talon spams.

So, you’re wrong. Dead wrong.

Tau were nerfed because one of two reasons. 1) Someone at GW has a hate boner for Tau

In case you slept last 6 months, the guns found on DA speeders, assault cannons, were strongly nerfed.

Better Tau ones not only were not, but got a buff. Because reasons.

Tau HQ weapons, too, see that D2 plasma gun without gets hot or special snowflake melta cannons, that can (unlike say, something as unwieldy and huge as melta pistol) be used in CC as swords without downsides, even though fluff mentions it's impossible. Or Dreadnought CCW equivalent on marine sized model's arm.

Meanwhile, SM commanders forgot keys to armoury and can't even take something as stupidly common as plasma gun, never mind something effective like assault cannon or cyclone, which Tau can take in quadruples, for less, because again, reasons.

Something, something, look how glassy your house is before throwing stones.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
So, when you said that WAAC players consider the Tau commander to be the only shooty HQ unit worth spamming, you weren't saying that WAAC players were the ones spamming Tau commanders.

If the Tau commander was such an issue, that it was literally the best shooting HQ unit in the game, why aren't WAAC playing Tau to spam it?

Probably because one good shooty HQ doesn't make an army OP. When you have an army with the best shooty HQ in the game and it still isn't being played by WAAC players, you should kind of ask why not. And the answer to that is that the rest of the units (drones and fire warriors excepted) are not good for their points. The solution is not, therefore, to take away one of the few good units the army has, but rather to make other units in the army worth taking instead. From what we've seen, GW has not done that.

Big Riptide buff and price cuts, Ghostkeel buff and price cut, huge Broadside price cuts... and that's just the battlesuits (my primary focus) and not counting relics, sept tenets and stratagems. For some reason many people only focus on the fact that Commanders are restricted and that Crisis suits haven't received price cuts (would've been nice but isn't really a dealbreaker for me).

I can only speak for myself, but I am actually very excited for this codex. Most units I want got a buff so I'm very happy. That said, the commander nerf was mishandled, since it didn't target the underlying problem between commanders and crisis suits. In fact, it made it worse (relics/traits) since there is an even bigger power gap between the two. With all the other buffs, Crisis suits will no longer be mainstay units and will likely be shelved.

Since this is a thread specifically on the commander limit I haven't brought up other units because I thought they were irrelevant.

Dandelion wrote:
I can only speak for myself, but I am actually very excited for this codex.

Don't worry, you're not alone.

I'm very excited for this Codex. All the "bad" stuff are things that I don't use (Basically Crisis spam and Commanders)... and all my favourite tactics are being buffed so... yeah.

Is the time for my Devilfish+Breacher mechanized force with Stealth Suit and Vespids support commanded by Ethereals to shine.

 Irbis wrote:

 Therion wrote:
Dark Angels Sammael on Sableclaw (unique) and Dark Angels Talonmaster (fully spammable) shoot 18 times per model, ignore cover and re-reroll hits and wounds while being untargetable. They’re very competitive choices too both in soups and with Dark Talon spams.

So, you’re wrong. Dead wrong.

Tau were nerfed because one of two reasons. 1) Someone at GW has a hate boner for Tau

In case you slept last 6 months, the guns found on DA speeders, assault cannons, were strongly nerfed.

Better Tau ones not only were not, but got a buff. Because reasons.

Tau HQ weapons, too, see that D2 plasma gun without gets hot or special snowflake melta cannons, that can (unlike say, something as unwieldy and huge as melta pistol) be used in CC as swords without downsides, even though fluff mentions it's impossible. Or Dreadnought CCW equivalent on marine sized model's arm.

Meanwhile, SM commanders forgot keys to armoury and can't even take something as stupidly common as plasma gun, never mind something effective like assault cannon or cyclone, which Tau can take in quadruples, for less, because again, reasons.

Something, something, look how glassy your house is before throwing stones.

Both of those items you grabbed without looking at are unique. The D2 plasma gun is on farsight only, and the fusion blades are a relic.

 Wolfblade wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
To be fair, Tau have significantly less reason to move than nids. Their guns are WAY longer range with synergies giving them way better accuracy.

Their Jormungandr trait should actually amount to the same thing for the most part.

Unless you're moving to grab objectives. Or see past some LoS blocking terrain. Or shoot a better target, or move to hopefully make a charge harder to reach you.

Hooray, welcome to every other army that has to actually move to play the game.

For the other 4 turns of the game where more than likely most of your army won't be moving, you get a +1 to your save. Hell, if you don't get first turn, don't worry, you get army wide bonuses to +1 to your save - meanwhile marine (loyalist and chaos) vehicle drivers renounced their legion when they jumped into the drivers seat.

 NurglesR0T wrote:

 Wolfblade wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
To be fair, Tau have significantly less reason to move than nids. Their guns are WAY longer range with synergies giving them way better accuracy.

Their Jormungandr trait should actually amount to the same thing for the most part.

Unless you're moving to grab objectives. Or see past some LoS blocking terrain. Or shoot a better target, or move to hopefully make a charge harder to reach you.

Hooray, welcome to every other army that has to actually move to play the game.

For the other 4 turns of the game where more than likely most of your army won't be moving, you get a +1 to your save. Hell, if you don't get first turn, don't worry, you get army wide bonuses to +1 to your save - meanwhile marine (loyalist and chaos) vehicle drivers renounced their legion when they jumped into the drivers seat.

What army are you playing that doesn't move 80% of the game? Genuinely curious.

Yeah, everyone is acting like they went out and bought 2k points of commanders. I'm sure the avarage tau player who doesn't play competitively will love this codex! Now I'm going back to my Orks where my long range weapons are just as expensive and more than the marine and xenos counterparts.

To be fair, this thread is specifically about commanders and not the codex as a whole, which is why there are so many negative responses. So while most people will be happy with the codex (I hope) it still doesn't excuse this particular issue.

Also, I really hope Orks get good shooting, for everyone's sake.

Dandelion wrote:
To be fair, this thread is specifically about commanders and not the codex as a whole, which is why there are so many negative responses. So while most people will be happy with the codex (I hope) it still doesn't excuse this particular issue.

Neither did Commissars being sledgehammered into the ground.
Neither did Guard Command Squads each requiring an Officer.

GW's playing catch-up to metas that have already effectively been neutered. That's the problem with balancing feedback around tournaments and the like.

You cant complain about commanders in a vacuum though. We have no idea how it will balance out in the army.

This thread is a knee jerk reaction to a snippet of news about a big unknown. Im not surprised it exists. I am .... Disappointed?... Its so predictable how quickly everyone went negative about a fraction of the tau picture.

Some leaks mentioned that crisis suits would not change at all (the guy seemed to have the codex). So while most lists will do fine with other units, the commander/crisis problem was not fixed which is disappointing. That's what most of this is based on. (it could be wrong though...)

It's like when conscripts got the "raw recruits" rule and were limited to max 30 guys a squad. It solved nothing which resulted in a zealous overnerf afterwards.

So, again, GW failed to fix the actual problem. I believe they misinterpreted the modest usage of crisis suits as a sign they were good/balanced, while in actuality they were not. Right now, a crisis suit with one burst cannon (nothing else) is as expensive as a spear custode, and people wonder why commanders were spammed.

http://www.3plusplus.net/2018/03/tau-leak-stratagems-warlord-traits-signature-systems-point-values/

Wow the HBC rumor was true, ffs WHAT WAS THE POINT OF TERMINATORS GETTING 2 WOUNDS? Lots of point drops on the weapons, Through Unity Devastation warlord trait is great.


EDIT: Wow so many of these stratagems are so bad... wth.

I feel bad for Tau, and I say this as a guy who is pretty well known for hating on Tau

It feels like a lazy fix when they shouldve had their points adjusted accordingly.

If every army gets this restriction fair enough, but if it's only Tau thats a raw deal through and through.

I'd hardly call it a restriction.

If your list was 8 Commanders, then well yeah you tried to capitalise on a netlist and have been hit by the meta shifting nerf hammer. They can join the likes of triple Heldrake and Paladin spam.

If your army is a normal Tau army with several different units synergising together, then this looks like a really good codex that will have a lot of options open.

I'd argue my battalion with two commanders and a fireblade, along with fire warriors, breachers, crisis suits, devilfish, pathfinders and, and stealthsuits was "normal." Shame I need to split that off into two detachments if I want to run two commanders because GW was too lazy to fix the problem and just blanket restricted them. That's the problem for me. I've always run 2-3 commanders. Never more. So in all honesty this doesn't effect me much, as I can still run exactly the same number as I always have even with the restrictions.

But it's annoying that I'm forced to run either fireblades or ethereals. It's a lessening of options, and that's never fun. Imagine if space marine captains were restricted to cone per detachment. Or chaos lords. Or orc warbosses. Or eldar farseers. It's a completely arbitrary restriction based on laziness and that's all.

My friend that plays t’au seems to be overjoyed about new (-1 point) firewarriors. He runs 150 of the guys and has now saved 150 points, i did some math with him and using fireblades, and the drone thing with the sept to get up to 42” range on those guns sure seems good. All for a tad more that half a 2000 point list.

With markerlights and the focus fire stratagem it seems like they sure have some punch or is it just me not knowing the army that good?

So I guess my army that usually consisted of R'alai+coldstar with a bunch of fire warriors, hammerheads and varius suits is not "normal tau"?

Deadawake1347 wrote:
I'd argue my battalion with two commanders and a fireblade, along with fire warriors, breachers, crisis suits, devilfish, pathfinders and, and stealthsuits was "normal." Shame I need to split that off into two detachments if I want to run two commanders because GW was too lazy to fix the problem and just blanket restricted them. That's the problem for me. I've always run 2-3 commanders. Never more. So in all honesty this doesn't effect me much, as I can still run exactly the same number as I always have even with the restrictions.

But it's annoying that I'm forced to run either fireblades or ethereals. It's a lessening of options, and that's never fun. Imagine if space marine captains were restricted to cone per detachment. Or chaos lords. Or orc warbosses. Or eldar farseers. It's a completely arbitrary restriction based on laziness and that's all.

Fair enough point. But you'd want to split them into 2 detachments anyway to maximise on CP would you not?

I'd be all for Captains being 1 per detachment. My opinion, in fact make most of the HQ's 1 per detachment. Move the "support" HQ to Elites, similar to what DG have done with their characters.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BoomWolf wrote:
So I guess my army that usually consisted of R'alai+coldstar with a bunch of fire warriors, hammerheads and varius suits is not "normal tau"?

Break them into 2 detachments and be happy you have a decent codex again.

 NurglesR0T wrote:

Deadawake1347 wrote:
I'd argue my battalion with two commanders and a fireblade, along with fire warriors, breachers, crisis suits, devilfish, pathfinders and, and stealthsuits was "normal." Shame I need to split that off into two detachments if I want to run two commanders because GW was too lazy to fix the problem and just blanket restricted them. That's the problem for me. I've always run 2-3 commanders. Never more. So in all honesty this doesn't effect me much, as I can still run exactly the same number as I always have even with the restrictions.

But it's annoying that I'm forced to run either fireblades or ethereals. It's a lessening of options, and that's never fun. Imagine if space marine captains were restricted to cone per detachment. Or chaos lords. Or orc warbosses. Or eldar farseers. It's a completely arbitrary restriction based on laziness and that's all.

Fair enough point. But you'd want to split them into 2 detachments anyway to maximise on CP would you not?

It depends on the slots he uses. If he's only got say 4 troops, 2 fast attack, 2 elites, and 1 heavy he would need to change his list to fit the other detachment which may upset his playstyle.

 NurglesR0T wrote:

I'd be all for Captains being 1 per detachment. My opinion, in fact make most of the HQ's 1 per detachment. Move the "support" HQ to Elites, similar to what DG have done with their characters.

Stop being so reasonable. It's the internet for pete's sake... Though I would add that secondary HQs would still be needed for brigades/battalions. Just something to consider.

Dandelion wrote:

 NurglesR0T wrote:

Deadawake1347 wrote:
I'd argue my battalion with two commanders and a fireblade, along with fire warriors, breachers, crisis suits, devilfish, pathfinders and, and stealthsuits was "normal." Shame I need to split that off into two detachments if I want to run two commanders because GW was too lazy to fix the problem and just blanket restricted them. That's the problem for me. I've always run 2-3 commanders. Never more. So in all honesty this doesn't effect me much, as I can still run exactly the same number as I always have even with the restrictions.

But it's annoying that I'm forced to run either fireblades or ethereals. It's a lessening of options, and that's never fun. Imagine if space marine captains were restricted to cone per detachment. Or chaos lords. Or orc warbosses. Or eldar farseers. It's a completely arbitrary restriction based on laziness and that's all.

Fair enough point. But you'd want to split them into 2 detachments anyway to maximise on CP would you not?

It depends on the slots he uses. If he's only got say 4 troops, 2 fast attack, 2 elites, and 1 heavy he would need to change his list to fit the other detachment which may upset his playstyle.

All he'd need to do is run 2 Patrols, or if he gets another HQ 1 Patrol/1 Battalion.
Ideal? No, certainly not. But there is a way.
I does suck though. There's definitely a more elegant fix out there.

EDIT: I certainly used certainly a certain number of times that far exceeded what is certainly a normal amount. I'm certain.

Looking at these stratagems, I don't know what people are complaining about. Most of them are 1cp and really helpful. They also bring back many of the cool upgrades Tau had in the past.

 meleti wrote:

 NurglesR0T wrote:

 Wolfblade wrote:

 Lance845 wrote:
To be fair, Tau have significantly less reason to move than nids. Their guns are WAY longer range with synergies giving them way better accuracy.

Their Jormungandr trait should actually amount to the same thing for the most part.

Unless you're moving to grab objectives. Or see past some LoS blocking terrain. Or shoot a better target, or move to hopefully make a charge harder to reach you.

Hooray, welcome to every other army that has to actually move to play the game.

For the other 4 turns of the game where more than likely most of your army won't be moving, you get a +1 to your save. Hell, if you don't get first turn, don't worry, you get army wide bonuses to +1 to your save - meanwhile marine (loyalist and chaos) vehicle drivers renounced their legion when they jumped into the drivers seat.

What army are you playing that doesn't move 80% of the game? Genuinely curious.

With GW scenario's...Pretty much every army that's not pure assault army and that's bad proposition.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NurglesR0T wrote:

Deadawake1347 wrote:
I'd argue my battalion with two commanders and a fireblade, along with fire warriors, breachers, crisis suits, devilfish, pathfinders and, and stealthsuits was "normal." Shame I need to split that off into two detachments if I want to run two commanders because GW was too lazy to fix the problem and just blanket restricted them. That's the problem for me. I've always run 2-3 commanders. Never more. So in all honesty this doesn't effect me much, as I can still run exactly the same number as I always have even with the restrictions.

But it's annoying that I'm forced to run either fireblades or ethereals. It's a lessening of options, and that's never fun. Imagine if space marine captains were restricted to cone per detachment. Or chaos lords. Or orc warbosses. Or eldar farseers. It's a completely arbitrary restriction based on laziness and that's all.

Fair enough point. But you'd want to split them into 2 detachments anyway to maximise on CP would you not?

I'd be all for Captains being 1 per detachment. My opinion, in fact make most of the HQ's 1 per detachment. Move the "support" HQ to Elites, similar to what DG have done with their characters.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 BoomWolf wrote:
So I guess my army that usually consisted of R'alai+coldstar with a bunch of fire warriors, hammerheads and varius suits is not "normal tau"?

Break them into 2 detachments and be happy you have a decent codex again.

Something to keep in mind though. If GW thinks they are so broken that they needs to be restricted then this means either:

a) they are wrong and the commanders are way underpowered or got silly restriction nobody else has and that isn't needed because even if you spam the commanders it's not that good.
b) they are right, commanders are super awesome so you want to spam which means THEY ARE BROKEN! Then this limitation is only applying bandaid to limit the damage rather than fix and means every tau player is fool in competive sense to not run 3 detachments to get maximum commanders. This also leads to very unscalable system where the 3 commanders tau can(and will if they are so broken they needed this limitation) field are lot more broken in 1000-1500 games than 2000.

This is indication of point drops GW loves to give to unique models that you can have max 1 because "you can only have 1 of them". No. Unit that's worth 200 shouldn't cost 150 pts just because you can have max 1 of them.

So either it's unneeded restriction as commanders are either balanced or too weak or commanders are too good for their points.

I suspect it’ll be broadside spam with kroot screening and 3 commanders. We still will have mostly trash units, and this will spam the few ones that don’t suck, except this time we’ll be worse than in the index.

 NurglesR0T wrote:

 BoomWolf wrote:
So I guess my army that usually consisted of R'alai+coldstar with a bunch of fire warriors, hammerheads and varius suits is not "normal tau"?

Break them into 2 detachments and be happy you have a decent codex again.

Sure, I can do that,

And now I don't have any CPs, because reasons.

After thinking this through I approve of this nerf. The logic kind of makes sense

Was commander spam an issue? Yes
Has this nerf removed commander spam from the game? Yes
But has this made commanders completely useless? No
Does this create more variety in Tau army lists and reduce spam? Yes

Tau players should be grateful, they had an over performing unit and it still does really well, it just cant be spammed any more.

IG had an over performing unit (conscripts) and they got nerfed so hard they became literally unplayable. We also had commissars that got nerfed to being unusable.

 Jaxler wrote:
I suspect it’ll be broadside spam with kroot screening and 3 commanders. We still will have mostly trash units, and this will spam the few ones that don’t suck, except this time we’ll be worse than in the index.

Aren't you a jolly fella. Also quite oracle-ish.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Looking at these stratagems, I don't know what people are complaining about. Most of them are 1cp and really helpful. They also bring back many of the cool upgrades Tau had in the past.

Except now they aren't upgrades.

And the ability to JSJ, a core element of the army since its very beginning, is now a signature system.

It's akin to Space Marines, after 5 editions, going from 3+ save to 4+ except on one model who can take a 3+ relic. Or Imperial Guard losing Leman Russ tanks except for a single unique one which finctions the same as the previous ones.

Also, they didn't fix the plasma disparity between Tau and the Imperium introduced when the Imperium gained a safe shooting mode with no loss of strength. We didn't even get a points decrease, strength or range increase, overcharge profile, nothing.

 FatBoyNoSlim wrote:
After thinking this through I approve of this nerf. The logic kind of makes sense

Was commander spam an issue? Yes
Has this nerf removed commander spam from the game? Yes
But has this made commanders completely useless? No
Does this create more variety in Tau army lists and reduce spam? Yes

Tau players should be grateful, they had an over performing unit and it still does really well, it just cant be spammed any more.

IG had an over performing unit (conscripts) and they got nerfed so hard they became literally unplayable. We also had commissars that got nerfed to being unusable.

But if this was done to nerf it they did it in wrong way. If it's too good to spam it's now still underpriced model and every tau player will max detachments(even as patrol) to get max 3.

It's bandaid. But limit of # is NEVER justification for proper point values. If commander is too good then it's power or point cost needs to be limited. Not restrict #. That doesnt' weaken it. It just bandaids effect in totally non-scalable way.

Not to mention it's silly tau only has them. Where's limit on marine HQ's? IG? Tyranids? Orks? All those have HQ's that make little sense to spam in fluff terms. And as said game balance isn't reason to limit. If it's too good it's still too good even if you can only take limited numbers. If it's not too good no reason to limit spam like that.

 FatBoyNoSlim wrote:


Tau players should be grateful, they had an over performing unit and it still does really well, it just cant be spammed any more.

We should be grateful that GW didn't fix the reason Commanders were spammed and instead punish us with a limit because they can't do their job properly?

 FatBoyNoSlim wrote:
After thinking this through I approve of this nerf. The logic kind of makes sense

Was commander spam an issue? Yes
Has this nerf removed commander spam from the game? Yes
But has this made commanders completely useless? No
Does this create more variety in Tau army lists and reduce spam? Yes

Tau players should be grateful, they had an over performing unit and it still does really well, it just cant be spammed any more.

IG had an over performing unit (conscripts) and they got nerfed so hard they became literally unplayable. We also had commissars that got nerfed to being unusable.

Yes, we should be GRATEFUL that the merciful GW has decided to turn a large portion of our armies illegal despite the fact the codex changes shows they acknowledge that the index army was trash tier that was overpriced and underpowered across the board.

Commander spam was an issue FOR TAU, not for anyone else. tau was FORCED to do that because literally nothing else was remotely viable, and even that was unimpressive.
Has this nerf removed commander spam from the game? Yes, but by making it illegal is stupid. the moment the rest of tau got balanced, the commander spam would mostly go away on its own.
Has it made commanders useless? YES because I LITERALLY CANT TAKE THEM. every commander beyond the first is a freaking paperweight.
Does it create more variety? NO. it just flips the switch by enforcing infantry gunline and disabling suit centered aggressive lists.

The commander was NOT over-preforming, it was preforming, unlike the rest of the index.
And yes, it still plays very well, EXCEPT I AM NOT ALLOWED TO PLAY IT.

Actually this has kind of turned me. I kimda feel maybe they should have limited it to two in every battalion for the suit focused lists.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Looking at these stratagems, I don't know what people are complaining about. Most of them are 1cp and really helpful.

That, and people didn't stop to think for a second and realized yet they also apply to broken FW mess. Ta'unar is also a battlesuit, show me one other army that gets so cheap and powerful boosts to their titan-grade units...

But it's annoying that I'm forced to run either fireblades or ethereals. It's a lessening of options, and that's never fun. Imagine if space marine captains were restricted to cone per detachment. Or chaos lords. Or orc warbosses. Or eldar farseers. It's a completely arbitrary restriction based on laziness and that's all.

As I have already pointed out, Chapter Master, SM equivalent, is one per army. Not detachment, army. He also costs a lot of CPs and/or points, and can't juggle quadruple meltas. Hell, SM officers forgot keys to armoury and can't take even one melta or plasma gun to take advantage of their BS stat, unless you take overpriced combi-guns and even then only a few HQs have access to them.

And frankly, even if Captains were made 1 per detachment, nothing would change. Most people already take 1 and fill the rest of the slots with librarians and lieutenants. The fact you see so much salt flowing over that one small Tau change is best proof how 'balanced' the Commander is and how needed the change was...

I doubt the Ta'unar will remain a battlesuit after the FW side gets updated though.

And using the chapter master as an equvilat is pure gak, because captains exist-and you can take infinite amount of them if you want.
If Tau would have gotten some sort of "not quite commander, but still a suit HQ" (yaknow, like we used to have back in 5th), nobody would rage over this.

They could also cut on their damage output and give them an actual aura like every other "leader" in every other army in the game has to shift them from a gunship to an actual commander, and solve the spam all the same.


There are SO many ways to fix the problem (assuming there really was a problem, I'd reckon that post codex nobody would have taken more than 2-3 commanders anyway) WITHOUT screwing over anyone that wants to do something as simple as have 2 suit HQs in his battalion.
Heck, limit them to only 1 in a supreme command detachment, and you get all the benefit of stopping spam without hurting anyone who plays a plain old battalion (or any of the other detachment)

One thing that strikes me with the 0-1 Commander Limitation per detachment, and I am not sure if anyone has raised this yet, is that it completely invalidates The Eight both in terms of fluff and crunch. Taking Commanders together was actually a legitimate part of Tau fluff, at least in terms of FSE, and now we are literally prevented from taking a detachment akin to this.

 Irbis wrote:

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Looking at these stratagems, I don't know what people are complaining about. Most of them are 1cp and really helpful.

That, and people didn't stop to think for a second and realized yet they also apply to broken FW mess. Ta'unar is also a battlesuit, show me one other army that gets so cheap and powerful boosts to their titan-grade units...

But it's annoying that I'm forced to run either fireblades or ethereals. It's a lessening of options, and that's never fun. Imagine if space marine captains were restricted to cone per detachment. Or chaos lords. Or orc warbosses. Or eldar farseers. It's a completely arbitrary restriction based on laziness and that's all.

As I have already pointed out, Chapter Master, SM equivalent, is one per army. Not detachment, army. He also costs a lot of CPs and/or points, and can't juggle quadruple meltas. Hell, SM officers forgot keys to armoury and can't take even one melta or plasma gun to take advantage of their BS stat, unless you take overpriced combi-guns and even then only a few HQs have access to them.

And frankly, even if Captains were made 1 per detachment, nothing would change. Most people already take 1 and fill the rest of the slots with librarians and lieutenants. The fact you see so much salt flowing over that one small Tau change is best proof how 'balanced' the Commander is and how needed the change was...

How about if you couldn't take more than one Space Marine HQ unit in power armour in any detachment, even if they are different datasheets? That is more akin to what we're facing.

Because, as it stands, we can't even take Farsight and a generic commander, or Shadowsun and a generic commander in the same detachment.

Apparently Commander spam was so bad we couldn't even use our special characters, even Farsight who has never been overpowered, alongside a generic Commander in a detachment.

tneva82 wrote:

 Mr Morden wrote:

More than 1 per 2 battallion detachments would be generous fluff wise so idea of having battallion with 3 company commanders is just silly.

Fluff wise I thought 3 companies normally make up a battalion?

Platoon 5 squads, company 2-5 platoons, battalion 2-3 companies. Detachment can't fit that many squads. Battallion detachment is reinforced platoon

Looking at the current codex p15 - Regimental Organisation

It confirms that units are seldom anywhere near their paper strength which is also true of historical units on our world. The Infantry "regiment" detailed only contains 3 companies (!) each of 3 platoons of 3 squads each.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Irbis wrote:

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Looking at these stratagems, I don't know what people are complaining about. Most of them are 1cp and really helpful.

That, and people didn't stop to think for a second and realized yet they also apply to broken FW mess. Ta'unar is also a battlesuit, show me one other army that gets so cheap and powerful boosts to their titan-grade units...

But it's annoying that I'm forced to run either fireblades or ethereals. It's a lessening of options, and that's never fun. Imagine if space marine captains were restricted to cone per detachment. Or chaos lords. Or orc warbosses. Or eldar farseers. It's a completely arbitrary restriction based on laziness and that's all.

As I have already pointed out, Chapter Master, SM equivalent, is one per army. Not detachment, army. He also costs a lot of CPs and/or points, and can't juggle quadruple meltas. Hell, SM officers forgot keys to armoury and can't take even one melta or plasma gun to take advantage of their BS stat, unless you take overpriced combi-guns and even then only a few HQs have access to them.

And frankly, even if Captains were made 1 per detachment, nothing would change. Most people already take 1 and fill the rest of the slots with librarians and lieutenants. The fact you see so much salt flowing over that one small Tau change is best proof how 'balanced' the Commander is and how needed the change was...

How about if you couldn't take more than one Space Marine HQ unit in power armour in any detachment, even if they are different datasheets? That is more akin to what we're facing.

Because, as it stands, we can't even take Farsight and a generic commander, or Shadowsun and a generic commander in the same detachment.

Apparently Commander spam was so bad we couldn't even use our special characters, even Farsight who has never been overpowered, alongside a generic Commander in a detachment.

So then take multiple detachments?

A T'au sept battlsuit (except a commander) equipped with a CDS is more accurate in overwatch than it is in regular shooting.

Double post, sorry

tneva82 wrote:

 FatBoyNoSlim wrote:
After thinking this through I approve of this nerf. The logic kind of makes sense

Was commander spam an issue? Yes
Has this nerf removed commander spam from the game? Yes
But has this made commanders completely useless? No
Does this create more variety in Tau army lists and reduce spam? Yes

Tau players should be grateful, they had an over performing unit and it still does really well, it just cant be spammed any more.

IG had an over performing unit (conscripts) and they got nerfed so hard they became literally unplayable. We also had commissars that got nerfed to being unusable.

But if this was done to nerf it they did it in wrong way. If it's too good to spam it's now still underpriced model and every tau player will max detachments(even as patrol) to get max 3.

It's bandaid. But limit of # is NEVER justification for proper point values. If commander is too good then it's power or point cost needs to be limited. Not restrict #. That doesnt' weaken it. It just bandaids effect in totally non-scalable way.

Not to mention it's silly tau only has them. Where's limit on marine HQ's? IG? Tyranids? Orks? All those have HQ's that make little sense to spam in fluff terms. And as said game balance isn't reason to limit. If it's too good it's still too good even if you can only take limited numbers. If it's not too good no reason to limit spam like that.

Have a limit on the number of a certain unit is a very good way to balance a game. Video games do it all the time where a player is only allowed 1-2 of a certain unit type.
You say it is non-scalable, but i do not agree. If you play bigger points games then you can bring more detachments which means more commanders. If you play smaller games then you will not be able to afford as many "tax" units so you have less detachments and this get less commanders.
I could be wrong, but I dont think Space Marine, IG or Orlks are spamming a single HQ choice. Most space marine armies will take a captain /Lt combo but they dont spam a whole army of them. Orks will take big meks and pain boys to reduce causalities. IG take some officers to use orders. But Tau players took commanders to do direct damage, that is the difference. If i spammed a whole army of IG officers I would not do very well at all!
However, I actually agree with you about nids, flyrant armies should not exist and I think they should also have a limit. I think back when nids where first released they could only take 0-1 hive tyrants.
One thing to consider is that GW have indirectly increased the points costs of commanders. It is perfectly possible to still spam commanders by using patrol detachments and buying a single min fire warrior team per patrol. That is a 35 point increase per commander

A Town Called Malus wrote:

 FatBoyNoSlim wrote:


Tau players should be grateful, they had an over performing unit and it still does really well, it just cant be spammed any more.

We should be grateful that GW didn't fix the reason Commanders were spammed and instead punish us with a limit because they can't do their job properly?

I think this comment is more emotional then logical. How have GW not done their job properly? There was a unit that was being spammed and was very powerful, now it is harder to spam but still very powerful. Seems like a good job to me.
Like I said to another user, one thing to consider is that GW have indirectly increased the points costs of commanders. It is perfectly possible to still spam commanders by using patrol detachments and buying a single min fire warrior team per patrol. That is a 35 point increase per commander

BoomWolf wrote:

 FatBoyNoSlim wrote:
After thinking this through I approve of this nerf. The logic kind of makes sense

Was commander spam an issue? Yes
Has this nerf removed commander spam from the game? Yes
But has this made commanders completely useless? No
Does this create more variety in Tau army lists and reduce spam? Yes

Tau players should be grateful, they had an over performing unit and it still does really well, it just cant be spammed any more.

IG had an over performing unit (conscripts) and they got nerfed so hard they became literally unplayable. We also had commissars that got nerfed to being unusable.

Yes, we should be GRATEFUL that the merciful GW has decided to turn a large portion of our armies illegal despite the fact the codex changes shows they acknowledge that the index army was trash tier that was overpriced and underpowered across the board.

Commander spam was an issue FOR TAU, not for anyone else. tau was FORCED to do that because literally nothing else was remotely viable, and even that was unimpressive.
Has this nerf removed commander spam from the game? Yes, but by making it illegal is stupid. the moment the rest of tau got balanced, the commander spam would mostly go away on its own.
Has it made commanders useless? YES because I LITERALLY CANT TAKE THEM. every commander beyond the first is a freaking paperweight.
Does it create more variety? NO. it just flips the switch by enforcing infantry gunline and disabling suit centered aggressive lists.

The commander was NOT over-preforming, it was preforming, unlike the rest of the index.
And yes, it still plays very well, EXCEPT I AM NOT ALLOWED TO PLAY IT.

I think you might be exaggerating a little bit about large portions of your army being illegal Commanders are 1 unit and 1 unit getting nerfed in a whole codex shouldnt be making your army illegal. I mean commanders are still HQ choices right?
Saying you had no other viable choices is not true. I recently faced a very nasty combo from a tau player in a tournament, I dont know the exact combo but it was roughly fireblade, ethereal, dark strider and a single commander buffing about 20-25 fire warriors. This blob was able to delete 30-40 guardsmen a turn without breaking a sweat!
Why are you not allowed to play it? the commander still exists, it is right there in the codex and if you really want to spam them still then just take multiple patrol detachments and consider the min fire squads a 35pts increase for your commander.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Looking at these stratagems, I don't know what people are complaining about. Most of them are 1cp and really helpful. They also bring back many of the cool upgrades Tau had in the past.

Except now they aren't upgrades.

And the ability to JSJ, a core element of the army since its very beginning, is now a signature system.

It's akin to Space Marines, after 5 editions, going from 3+ save to 4+ except on one model who can take a 3+ relic. Or Imperial Guard losing Leman Russ tanks except for a single unique one which finctions the same as the previous ones.

Also, they didn't fix the plasma disparity between Tau and the Imperium introduced when the Imperium gained a safe shooting mode with no loss of strength. We didn't even get a points decrease, strength or range increase, overcharge profile, nothing.

IIRC Plasma had a safe option and a overcharge option even in the original RT book.

JSJ was an a part of unit rules not an unit so your Leman Russ comparison makes zero sense - if you said the Vanquisher gun barrel or the ability to move and fire without penalty that would make more sense.

Lots of stuff comes and goes, some cos of balance, some cos of lack of models, some cos GW can't be bothered to implement.

But it's annoying that I'm forced to run either fireblades or ethereals. It's a lessening of options, and that's never fun. Imagine if space marine captains were restricted to cone per detachment. Or chaos lords. Or orc warbosses. Or eldar farseers

All those examples probably should be - maybe they will be in the future? Same with Canoness for my SOB but of course they completely removed all other HQ options for them except the Saint so that won't currently work as we don't (unlike Ta) have lots of alts.

Honestly, the more I'm reading the more I kinda agree. I think if they only let me use 1 ork mech, and I had a list that focused on mechs and bikes, I would be upset. Overall in friendly games I would let tau players use what ever they want because I think none matched games make for some fun fluffy games (like letting my Deathwing Dark Angels Opponent put every terminator in deepstrike).

But the again... it isn't 1 per game it's 1 per formation and if you already took a mech suit army 3-6 elite and heavy choices (presumably what the mech suits are) then you simply just take 3 and move onto another formation. Am I wrong in thinking this? Wouldn't you also end up with more cp if you did this and also took 3 unit choices with 1 other hq?

 lolman1c wrote:
Honestly, the more I'm reading the more I kinda agree. I think if they only let me use 1 ork mech, and I had a list that focused on mechs and bikes, I would be upset. Overall in friendly games I would let tau players use what ever they want because I think none matched games make for some fun fluffy games (like letting my Deathwing Dark Angels Opponent put every terminator in deepstrike).

The rule is irrelevant if you're playing anything other than Matched Play.

It's a Matched Play rule.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 lolman1c wrote:
Honestly, the more I'm reading the more I kinda agree. I think if they only let me use 1 ork mech, and I had a list that focused on mechs and bikes, I would be upset. Overall in friendly games I would let tau players use what ever they want because I think none matched games make for some fun fluffy games (like letting my Deathwing Dark Angels Opponent put every terminator in deepstrike).

The rule is irrelevant if you're playing anything other than Matched Play.

It's a Matched Play rule.

I know, I'm saykng I don't play matched play so with me nothing has changed for my tau friends (if i had any).

I think a lot of people saying "just take more detachment!" Are missing the fact Tau can't take battalions anymore without taking some foot slogger HQ, and if we want more than a couple CP, we need to take battalions.

 Wolfblade wrote:
I think a lot of people saying "just take more detachment!" Are missing the fact Tau can't take battalions anymore without taking some foot slogger HQ, and if we want more than a couple CP, we need to take battalions.

When did Tau become unable to take Vanguard, Outrider, or Spearhead Detachments?

I realize that it's a bit less than great for Tau...but well, I'm excited to be able to run them as a combined arms force.

 Wolfblade wrote:
I think a lot of people saying "just take more detachment!" Are missing the fact Tau can't take battalions anymore without taking some foot slogger HQ, and if we want more than a couple CP, we need to take battalions.

You mean like everyone else?

Can I put down the encyclopedia of lists I have written that contain footslogger commanders who are there to be buff bots and hand to hand backup (nothing serious mind you, maybe capable of stopping the random mugging at most)?

Anyhow, as we've already heard the sky is falling, all is lost.

I'm not buying this codex, I barely pay attention to Tau and even I can already see some nasty combos. Fire Warrior spam with Focused Fire and Through Unity, Devastation seems pretty amazing to me. Strike Teams wounding anything in the game on a 4+ and getting -1 AP on a 5+, yep, you guys got hosed so bad, what will you do?!

You are all focused on your plasma guns and for some reason haven't come around to the realization that this edition is all about overloading the wound mechanic, which you have mechanisms for doing, in addition to amazing firepower.

Use your imagination, seriously, the meta has changed, get with the program.

 Irbis wrote:


As I have already pointed out, Chapter Master, SM equivalent, is one per army. Not detachment, army. He also costs a lot of CPs and/or points, and can't juggle quadruple meltas. Hell, SM officers forgot keys to armoury and can't take even one melta or plasma gun to take advantage of their BS stat, unless you take overpriced combi-guns and even then only a few HQs have access to them.

And frankly, even if Captains were made 1 per detachment, nothing would change. Most people already take 1 and fill the rest of the slots with librarians and lieutenants. The fact you see so much salt flowing over that one small Tau change is best proof how 'balanced' the Commander is and how needed the change was...

Tau commanders aren't chapter master equivalents and good luck convincing anyone otherwise. A commander leads a single hunter cadre of 50-100 troops. Much like a captain. The fact that chapter masters also require CP should have tipped you off on that. Secondly, this restriction affects: Commanders in XV8, XV85, XV86 and all the special suit characters. Imagine you can't take Shrike because you took a captain.

People wouldn't spam captains because there's no reason to, 'cause they're balanced. Tau commanders are STILL head and shoulders above EVERY other unit at literally everything (except aura buffs). They're still broken, and the limit changes nothing in regards to internal balance. Most players would rather force a new detachment than take a crisis team now. This is the problem. The limit will be avoided as much as possible because nothing else is as good as commanders. Had crisis suits been given a buff, or commanders were actually nerfed this wouldn't be as much of an issue. Let's not forget, Tau commanders have the worst buff aura in the game, which means people have no incentive to take buffmanders.

Here's some other ideas to fix commanders:
- Restrict loadout to 2 guns with support systems for the other two slots.
- Give their auras some usefulness. Their once per game buff should either affect the whole board OR happen every turn.
- Drop the cost of crisis suits and their weapons. How would you feel about 24 pts autocannons? Well, that's what we have now.
- Adjust points. Commanders stayed the same price so they're even better now with traits and relics.

I think everyone is missing the point that regardless of what they did people would complain. There was no win for GW in this situation.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 Wolfblade wrote:
I think a lot of people saying "just take more detachment!" Are missing the fact Tau can't take battalions anymore without taking some foot slogger HQ, and if we want more than a couple CP, we need to take battalions.

You mean like everyone else?

Can I put down the encyclopedia of lists I have written that contain footslogger commanders who are there to be buff bots and hand to hand backup (nothing serious mind you, maybe capable of stopping the random mugging at most)?

Anyhow, as we've already heard the sky is falling, all is lost.

I'm not buying this codex, I barely pay attention to Tau and even I can already see some nasty combos. Fire Warrior spam with Focused Fire and Through Unity, Devastation seems pretty amazing to me. Strike Teams wounding anything in the game on a 4+ and getting -1 AP on a 5+, yep, you guys got hosed so bad, what will you do?!

You are all focused on your plasma guns and for some reason haven't come around to the realization that this edition is all about overloading the wound mechanic, which you have mechanisms for doing, in addition to amazing firepower.

Use your imagination, seriously, the meta has changed, get with the program.

Again, this thread is specifically about the commander nerf. It is not a review of the whole codex. Overall we're better than we were before, my fire warrior spam is now scary, ion is now good (maybe too good even) and broadsides and riptides might be useful going forward. But I still disagree with how they handled commanders which happens to be the specific topic at hand. And I only have one commander right now. It's more of the principle of the thing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Sim-Life wrote:
I think everyone is missing the point that regardless of what they did people would complain. There was no win for GW in this situation.

So they picked the most controversial fix? Seriously, points adjustments would have been a minimum. The next would be to look at potential loadouts. the problem is GW wants Tau commanders to be these OP heroes without considering its affect on internal balance. This is why people are upset.

Dandelion wrote:
So they picked the most controversial fix? Seriously, points adjustments would have been a minimum. The next would be to look at potential loadouts. the problem is GW wants Tau commanders to be these OP heroes without considering its affect on internal balance. This is why people are upset.

Yeah, I don't like that I don't get Legion traits on my entire army, like Sept abilities, you know?

I don't like that Daemonic Possession is gone, after being in pretty much every edition since 2nd.

The list goes on...

Again, this thread is specifically about the commander nerf. It is not a review of the whole codex. Overall we're better than we were before, my fire warrior spam is now scary, ion is now good (maybe too good even) and broadsides and riptides might be useful going forward. But I still disagree with how they handled commanders which happens to be the specific topic at hand. And I only have one commander right now. It's more of the principle of the thing.

So not the actual rules then......well then....

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Dandelion wrote:
So they picked the most controversial fix? Seriously, points adjustments would have been a minimum. The next would be to look at potential loadouts. the problem is GW wants Tau commanders to be these OP heroes without considering its affect on internal balance. This is why people are upset.

Yeah, I don't like that I don't get Legion traits on my entire army, like Sept abilities, you know?

I don't like that Daemonic Possession is gone, after being in pretty much every edition since 2nd.

The list goes on...

And that somehow justifies the commander limit? "Stop complaining cuz other stuff sucks too." Despite the nerf I'm going to be just fine, but I still get to point out bad design when it shows up. Or at least decisions I disagree with. Since this is a topic on something I disagree with, why is there any surprise that I'm voicing my opinion?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mr Morden wrote:

Again, this thread is specifically about the commander nerf. It is not a review of the whole codex. Overall we're better than we were before, my fire warrior spam is now scary, ion is now good (maybe too good even) and broadsides and riptides might be useful going forward. But I still disagree with how they handled commanders which happens to be the specific topic at hand. And I only have one commander right now. It's more of the principle of the thing.

So not the actual rules then......well then....

I, legitimately, don't know what you're trying to say.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
So, Coldstars can now take Quad Fusion. With Vior'la they get to move 40" with no penalty (except charging). Yeah, commanders are far from being commanders.

Wait, so you're complaining that you can't take Battalions if you want to make an all-suit army, because you'll be forced to take a footslogging hq?

...have you considered that an all-suit army is already impossible to do with battalions, because of the three troops slots?

Wouldn't you already be taking Vanguards or Spearheads or something to make an all-suit army?

the_scotsman wrote:
Wait, so you're complaining that you can't take Battalions if you want to make an all-suit army, because you'll be forced to take a footslogging hq?

...have you considered that an all-suit army is already impossible to do with battalions, because of the three troops slots?

Wouldn't you already be taking Vanguards or Spearheads or something to make an all-suit army?

Stop with the logic man, it's not welcome here.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Dandelion wrote:
And that somehow justifies the commander limit? "Stop complaining cuz other stuff sucks too." Despite the nerf I'm going to be just fine, but I still get to point out bad design when it shows up. Or at least decisions I disagree with. Since this is a topic on something I disagree with, why is there any surprise that I'm voicing my opinion?

Please explain why GW has to justify anything to you. Show your work.

Things change, you won't like them all, it's kind of what change is about, adapt, imagine, make it work, or do something else. I mean if you're hating the game this much maybe it's not for you.

Honestly, my complaint is that they took the only HQ choice that actually had options and limited it to one per detachment. Every single other HQ choice for Tau are mono-build, the only options you have are drones or no drones. Commanders were the one HQ choice you could make your own. The only way you could the the highly flexible nature of the Tau.

And, again, the fact that there are so many methods to juggle detachments to get around the limit... Kind of shows the pointlessness of the limit, doesn't it? It's a non-solution "fix" that doesn't really accomplish anything in the long run, but punishes players who weren't the problem to begin with.

On top of that, it's not like commander spam was even that good. It was just the best thing in the index. It was annoying, not super powerful. It didn't win any tournaments, it never really even placed highly. It was a gimmicky annoyance and had they fixed the base problem it would have gone away anyway.

Its become - I have a awesome new Codex full of great units but this one ruling destroy's my universe

Its not like they have removed the unit - you can still have them and several of them - not like say most of the Dark Eldar characters

Deadawake1347 wrote:
On top of that, it's not like commander spam was even that good.

Please stop this argument, it's dumb and disingenuous.

You mention loving the options and customization on the unit, so they let you keep that, but the other way outside of a hard limit (which is an admittedly clumsy, but effective way of dealing with it) would be to make them SO expensive that you can't spam them, which would have produced EXACTLY the same reaction from all of you, if not worse.

Commander spam wasn't that good, in a vacuum, but you're not in a vacuum anymore are you?

I mean, the only argument here is "What was wrong with commander spam?!".

I haven't seen a single one of you propose a solution for commander spam, just whining that it shouldn't be taken away.

 Mr Morden wrote:
Its become - I have a awesome new Codex full of great units but this one ruling destroy's my universe

Its not like they have removed the unit - you can still have them and several of them - not like say most of the Dark Eldar characters

ITT: people who already ebayed their 6 riptides to buy 6 commander kits with identical 4x fusion blaster loadouts several months ago.

the_scotsman wrote:
Wait, so you're complaining that you can't take Battalions if you want to make an all-suit army, because you'll be forced to take a footslogging hq?

...have you considered that an all-suit army is already impossible to do with battalions, because of the three troops slots?

Wouldn't you already be taking Vanguards or Spearheads or something to make an all-suit army?

Is that at me? If so, I never said I wanted to make a suit only army. People that want to take a two commanders per battalion/brigade aren't thrilled is all. Besides, my complaint isn't at the existence of the limit, it's that the underlying problems weren't fixed. Commanders are still too good even with the limit.

Please explain why GW has to justify anything to you. Show your work.

Things change, you won't like them all, it's kind of what change is about, adapt, imagine, make it work, or do something else. I mean if you're hating the game this much maybe it's not for you.

Dude, I never said I hated the game nor that I hated this codex. I am indeed looking forward to getting the codex despite this one solitary issue and my complaints about it. I will reiterate, this thread is specifically about the commander limit, as such I have kept my posts on topic. I disagree with the limit for a couple reasons. Namely:

And, again, the fact that there are so many methods to juggle detachments to get around the limit... Kind of shows the pointlessness of the limit, doesn't it? It's a non-solution "fix" that doesn't really accomplish anything in the long run, but punishes players who weren't the problem to begin with.

If, however, you asked how I was going to build my list I would say: 2 battalions: 2 commanders, 2 fireblades, 8 strike teams/breachers, 2 pathfinders, 1 ghostkeel, 2 stealthteams, 3 piranha, 2 broadsides and whatever else I can cram in there (maybe a devilfish).
As you can see, this limit doesn't stop me from doing what I want. Which is why I think it's stupid. There was no tangible fix for internal balance. Had they buffed crisis I may have made room for a squad in my list but I'm not going to hold my breath.

 Wolfblade wrote:
I think a lot of people saying "just take more detachment!" Are missing the fact Tau can't take battalions anymore without taking some foot slogger HQ

Cry me a river.

My Dark Eldar - a supposedly fast army, no less - can't take a single HQ that isn't footslogging. Not even as a 0-1 choice or a special character. And because our army was designed by a pilchard, there's rarely even space for HQs in our sodding transports. And that's before we even get into their worthless auras or pathetic combat abilities.

So you'll have to forgive me not getting overly emotional over you "only" being allowed one jump-pack Commander with outstanding shooting per detachment.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Deadawake1347 wrote:
On top of that, it's not like commander spam was even that good.

Please stop this argument, it's dumb and disingenuous.

You mention loving the options and customization on the unit, so they let you keep that, but the other way outside of a hard limit (which is an admittedly clumsy, but effective way of dealing with it) would be to make them SO expensive that you can't spam them, which would have produced EXACTLY the same reaction from all of you, if not worse.

Commander spam wasn't that good, in a vacuum, but you're not in a vacuum anymore are you?

I mean, the only argument here is "What was wrong with commander spam?!".

I haven't seen a single one of you propose a solution for commander spam, just whining that it shouldn't be taken away.

I have, actually. Reduce commanders back down to how they were in six and seventh, two weapons, two support systems. I did that in this very thread actually, and it was ignored. All of a sudden commanders aren't the best shooting unit in the army, and they shouldn't be. But they need to have an actually useful buff aura to offset that. In fact, my proposal earlier in this thread was to give them unique upgrades that only commanders could take int heir support slots that would, for fair and balanced point values, allow them to give out things like rerolls of one to hit, or rerolls of one to wound, or negating a single negative modifier. You know, give them the ability to act like commanders and lead the army rather than be the army.

And if commander spam was so wonderfully powerful... Why have Tau been mid tier(which honestly is where I'd like them to stay), even when everyone and their mother was bringing some variation of commander spam as their Tau list? They weren't doing amazingly, they were doing okay, using the "hideously broken" commander spam. Which would have vanished anyway if GW fixed the actual problem. The problem was not commander spam. That was a symptom. The problem was awful internal balance and fairly poor external balance to the point where commanders we're not a option, but the option if you wanted to even remotely well.

EDIT: Here's my previous post back on page 3. Listing exactly the same proposal.

Deadawake1347 wrote:
The way I would have fixed it, was to return Commanders to how they were in previous editions. Give them two weapon points and two upgrade points. Problem solved as they are no longer better shooting than a unit of Crisis Suits.

However, they should also be given unique support system choices not available to other suits with a more supportive roll. Since GW is really on aura buffs, they could be things like one system let's you reroll hit rolls of one, another could be wound rolls of one, or ignore a single negative modifier, for units within six inches. It would require some work to figure out appropriate points, but it would give commanders flexibility and a reason to be taken aside from committing suicide to take out a tank.

However... That would have taken actual effort and creativity on GW's part, and restricting them to 1 per detachment is quick and easy.

You want to know what's really dumb?

GW is now hyping quadfusion coldstar commanders. That is a BS2+ character, armed with 4 18" range meltas, which can move up to 40" a turn. If it is Vior'la sept it doesn't even lose any accuracy when moving that far.

In the same codex where apparently a commander with 4 fusion blasters which could move a maxiimum of 14" was so overpowered it had to be limited to one per detachment.

Apparently commanders were so good at shooting that they needed to be made even better whilst also being made limited to one per detachment. Can people really justify GWs approach when they make commanders even better than before whilst also limiting them? It's like their design team is schizophrenic.

Deadawake1347 wrote:

I have, actually. Reduce commanders back down to how they were in six and seventh, two weapons, two support systems. I did that in this very thread actually, and it was ignored. All of a sudden commanders aren't the best shooting unit in the army, and they shouldn't be. But they need to have an actually useful buff aura to offset that. In fact, my proposal earlier in this thread was to give them unique upgrades that only commanders could take int heir support slots that would, for fair and balanced point values, allow them to give out things like rerolls of one to hit, or rerolls of one to wound, or negating a single negative modifier. You know, give them the ability to act like commanders and lead the army rather than be the army.

This^


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:


I haven't seen a single one of you propose a solution for commander spam, just whining that it shouldn't be taken away.

I also proposed the same fix earlier:

Here's some other ideas to fix commanders:
- Restrict loadout to 2 guns with support systems for the other two slots.
- Give their auras some usefulness. Their once per game buff should either affect the whole board OR happen every turn.
- Drop the cost of crisis suits and their weapons. How would you feel about 24 pts autocannons? Well, that's what we have now.
- Adjust points. Commanders stayed the same price so they're even better now with traits and relics.

Dandelion wrote:
Dude, I never said I hated the game nor that I hated this codex. I am indeed looking forward to getting the codex despite this one solitary issue and my complaints about it. I will reiterate, this thread is specifically about the commander limit, as such I have kept my posts on topic. I disagree with the limit for a couple reasons. Namely:

And, again, the fact that there are so many methods to juggle detachments to get around the limit... Kind of shows the pointlessness of the limit, doesn't it? It's a non-solution "fix" that doesn't really accomplish anything in the long run, but punishes players who weren't the problem to begin with.

Juggling detachments only gets you 3 of them in a 2000 point game. I know there are weirdo groups that allow people to bring as many detachments as they want, but in matched play this effectively limits it to 3 of them.

So clearly Commander spam was a problem that either showed up in tournament or in internal play testing, probably after they made adjustments to the other units in the codex.

Again, the repeated argument here comes back to "But, but, Commander spam wasn't that bad.", yet, no matter how many times you repeat that, it completely fails to take into account the rest of the changes in the codex, which change the entire context in which the unit is measured.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Dandelion wrote:
Dude, I never said I hated the game nor that I hated this codex. I am indeed looking forward to getting the codex despite this one solitary issue and my complaints about it. I will reiterate, this thread is specifically about the commander limit, as such I have kept my posts on topic. I disagree with the limit for a couple reasons. Namely:

And, again, the fact that there are so many methods to juggle detachments to get around the limit... Kind of shows the pointlessness of the limit, doesn't it? It's a non-solution "fix" that doesn't really accomplish anything in the long run, but punishes players who weren't the problem to begin with.

Juggling detachments only gets you 3 of them in a 2000 point game. I know there are weirdo groups that allow people to bring as many detachments as they want, but in matched play this effectively limits it to 3 of them.

So clearly Commander spam was a problem that either showed up in tournament or in internal play testing, probably after they made adjustments to the other units in the codex.

Again, the repeated argument here comes back to "But, but, Commander spam wasn't that bad.", yet, no matter how many times you repeat that, it completely fails to take into account the rest of the changes in the codex, which change the entire context in which the unit is measured.

I'm going to respond to this one since you are responding to his response to something I said... The argument is not that commander spam was fine. I wanted it fixed just as much as everyone else. The argument is not that commander spam was fine, it was a stupid problem caused by poor internal balance. The argument is not that commander spam was fine, it's that they took the laziest, most half-assed route to fixing it rather than actually adjusting things so that it's not a no-brainer to spam commanders in the first place.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
You want to know what's really dumb?

GW is now hyping quadfusion coldstar commanders. That is a BS2+ character, armed with 4 18" range meltas, which can move up to 40" a turn. If it is Vior'la sept it doesn't even lose any accuracy when moving that far.

In the same codex where apparently a commander with 4 fusion blasters which could move a maxiimum of 14" was so overpowered it had to be limited to one per detachment.

I feel like you just answered your own question here. I feel like you just answered the entire thread with this. I can't imagine why they would feel the need to limit this unit given those rules, truly, a mind-boggling situation, what-ever shall they do?

Reducing the number of weapons the unit can carry would be great, adding auras would be great, I think those are good solutions. However, it's also the solution in every other codex, it appears they wanted to do something different here, I'll be curious to see how it plays out, personally, I think facing codex Tau is going to be rough for a lot of armies, my own included.

Unfortunately, they already built the model kit, and repackaging costs money and time which is not being invested in this codex. Remember, you're getting a new codex, NO NEW MODELS, NO NEW KITS. Also, GW makes rules for model kits that are already out there (unlike the past), kitbashing is for artists and hobby painters now, apparently.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Juggling detachments only gets you 3 of them in a 2000 point game. I know there are weirdo groups that allow people to bring as many detachments as they want, but in matched play this effectively limits it to 3 of them.

So clearly Commander spam was a problem that either showed up in tournament or in internal play testing, probably after they made adjustments to the other units in the codex.

Again, the repeated argument here comes back to "But, but, Commander spam wasn't that bad.", yet, no matter how many times you repeat that, it completely fails to take into account the rest of the changes in the codex, which change the entire context in which the unit is measured.

I never said commander spam wasn't bad. I still think it's bad. I just think this fix missed the mark.

Anyway, the context for the codex is:
-commanders get reilcs/traits and no points or loadout change. Coldstars can now take quad fusion (that's 40" movement and you thought regular commanders were too good...)
-crisis suits are exactly the same (missile pods went up though)
-Riptides + Ion got better
-Troops +broadsides are cheaper
-Devilfish are cheaper
-We got stratagem/sept tenets

My guess is GW overvalued Crisis teams because people were taking Ion blaster teams and as such didn't want to drop their points but also didn't want to bump the cost of commanders.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
You want to know what's really dumb?

GW is now hyping quadfusion coldstar commanders. That is a BS2+ character, armed with 4 18" range meltas, which can move up to 40" a turn. If it is Vior'la sept it doesn't even lose any accuracy when moving that far.

In the same codex where apparently a commander with 4 fusion blasters which could move a maxiimum of 14" was so overpowered it had to be limited to one per detachment.

I feel like you just answered your own question here. I feel like you just answered the entire thread with this. I can't imagine why they would feel the need to limit this unit given those rules, truly, a mind-boggling situation, what-ever shall they do?

Reducing the number of weapons the unit can carry would be great, adding auras would be great, I think those are good solutions. However, it's also the solution in every other codex, it appears they wanted to do something different here, I'll be curious to see how it plays out, personally, I think facing codex Tau is going to be rough for a lot of armies, my own included.

Unfortunately, they already built the model kit, and repackaging costs money and time which is not being invested in this codex. Remember, you're getting a new codex, NO NEW MODELS, NO NEW KITS. Also, GW makes rules for model kits that are already out there (unlike the past), kitbashing is for artists and hobby painters now, apparently.

Except they could limit the Coldstar commander separately.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Unfortunately, they already built the model kit, and repackaging costs money and time which is not being invested in this codex. Remember, you're getting a new codex, NO NEW MODELS, NO NEW KITS. Also, GW makes rules for model kits that are already out there (unlike the past), kitbashing is for artists and hobby painters now, apparently.

The model kit already has all the options we'd ever need. The guns and support systems are already there, just change how you can use them.

Dandelion wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Unfortunately, they already built the model kit, and repackaging costs money and time which is not being invested in this codex. Remember, you're getting a new codex, NO NEW MODELS, NO NEW KITS. Also, GW makes rules for model kits that are already out there (unlike the past), kitbashing is for artists and hobby painters now, apparently.

The model kit already has all the options we'd ever need. The guns and support systems are already there, just change how you can use them.

Indeed. It also doesn't have four fusion blasters in the kit, so by the "You only get what is in the kit" argument, you shouldn't be able to build a quad fusion commander.

I'm just going to clearly spell out exactly my problem with the "fix".

- It didn't do enough to actually fix commanders! They're still broken and they don't feel like commanders. They're just a bunch of rambos going solo. There just won't be as many. Yay, progress...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

Dandelion wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Unfortunately, they already built the model kit, and repackaging costs money and time which is not being invested in this codex. Remember, you're getting a new codex, NO NEW MODELS, NO NEW KITS. Also, GW makes rules for model kits that are already out there (unlike the past), kitbashing is for artists and hobby painters now, apparently.

The model kit already has all the options we'd ever need. The guns and support systems are already there, just change how you can use them.

Indeed. It also doesn't have four fusion blasters in the kit, so by the "You only get what is in the kit" argument, you shouldn't be able to build a quad fusion commander.

Yeah, but it's got one so it counts according to GW I guess...

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

Dandelion wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Unfortunately, they already built the model kit, and repackaging costs money and time which is not being invested in this codex. Remember, you're getting a new codex, NO NEW MODELS, NO NEW KITS. Also, GW makes rules for model kits that are already out there (unlike the past), kitbashing is for artists and hobby painters now, apparently.

The model kit already has all the options we'd ever need. The guns and support systems are already there, just change how you can use them.

Indeed. It also doesn't have four fusion blasters in the kit, so by the "You only get what is in the kit" argument, you shouldn't be able to build a quad fusion commander.

So are we just going to pretend that people don't have bits boxes or buy multiples of things?

But...but... I want to make fun of GW

 Kanluwen wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

Dandelion wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Unfortunately, they already built the model kit, and repackaging costs money and time which is not being invested in this codex. Remember, you're getting a new codex, NO NEW MODELS, NO NEW KITS. Also, GW makes rules for model kits that are already out there (unlike the past), kitbashing is for artists and hobby painters now, apparently.

The model kit already has all the options we'd ever need. The guns and support systems are already there, just change how you can use them.

Indeed. It also doesn't have four fusion blasters in the kit, so by the "You only get what is in the kit" argument, you shouldn't be able to build a quad fusion commander.

So are we just going to pretend that people don't have bits boxes or buy multiples of things?

That same argument applies to many other units which have lost options.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

That same argument applies to many other units which have lost options.

And that same argument applies to many other units which have lost options yet still have them in kits. My Wild Riders for AoS, for example, come with shields on the sprue...but can't use them. The Sisters of the Thorn alternate build don't get them either(but they never had the option for them to begin with--so it's not a question of one having it while the other doesn't).
My Guard Sergeants for 40k have Lasguns available to them as part of the kit(it's necessary for building Whiteshield/Conscripts)--yet haven't been able to take the things for three damn editions.

I, personally, would rather have the option there and a limitation on the unit numbers than not have the option.
If you'd rather be able to spam 4x Commanders than have a Commander with 4x Fusions(PS: the Fusions from the basic Crisis Suits will fit on the Commanders)--that's on you.
I'm happy with being able to potentially throw 4 items on a Commander. I never will since I like having Shield Generators on my stuff too much, but hey that's me.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
Except they could limit the Coldstar commander separately.

Or they could limit it to one commander and fix other units in the army. Seriously, as clumsy as this solution was, it works, also, it might actually bring some other units back to the table.

Also, just looking at your HQ, you guys have amazing buffs already (that don't require passing a psychic test). The more I look, the more the arguments in this thread appear very disingenuous.

Darkstrider's ability is flat-out amazing, holy gak, I would kill for that in my army, especially at 45 points, I would do AMAZING things with the Structural Analyzer. But no, our "Structural Analyzer" comes attached to Mortarded and has a 7" range.

Or your Ethereals that can change their buff aura every turn. I mean, I know they'll die to a stiff wind in hand to hand, but if it's gotten to that point, you either fethed up or the game is going downhill fast anyways.

Am I missing something here? Is 45 points just prohibitively expensive in a Tau list for some reason?

Sorry, I'm just not getting it, how is this thread not utterly idiotic?

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Darkstrider's ability is flat-out amazing, holy gak, I would kill for that in my army, especially at 45 points, I would do AMAZING things with the Structural Analyzer. But no, our "Structural Analyzer" comes attached to Mortarded and has a 7" range.

Or your Ethereals that can change their buff aura every turn. I mean, I know they'll die to a stiff wind in hand to hand, but if it's gotten to that point, you either fethed up or the game is going downhill fast anyways.

Am I missing something here? Is 45 points just prohibitively expensive in a Tau list for some reason?

Sorry, I'm just not getting it, how is this thread not utterly idiotic?

So, to be fair:
Darkstrider isn't a "Tau Empire" character. He's a T'au Sept character; meaning you're locked into playing that specific group.
Structural Analyzer is also him granting it to one Infantry unit within a radius of him and then the effect gets placed onto an enemy unit he can see.

He's awesome, not saying he's not--just saying that he and Mortarion are two very different beasts.

I say this as someone who already has an Outrider Detachment planned of Darkstrider and 3 units of Pathfinders with 2 Broadsides. It's basically me recreating a Formation that existed in the previous edition.

 Kanluwen wrote:
So, to be fair:
Darkstrider isn't a "Tau Empire" character. He's a T'au Sept character; meaning you're locked into playing that specific group.
Structural Analyzer is also him granting it to one Infantry unit within a radius of him and then the effect gets placed onto an enemy unit he can see.

He's awesome, not saying he's not--just saying that he and Mortarion are two very different beasts.

I say this as someone who already has an Outrider Detachment planned of Darkstrider and 3 units of Pathfinders with 2 Broadsides. It's basically me recreating a Formation that existed in the previous edition.

Using this power as a lead in to Focused Fire combined with the Through Unity, Destruction Warlord trait, that Outrider detachment is nicely setting up whatever it is you've decided needs to die.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
So, to be fair:
Darkstrider isn't a "Tau Empire" character. He's a T'au Sept character; meaning you're locked into playing that specific group.
Structural Analyzer is also him granting it to one Infantry unit within a radius of him and then the effect gets placed onto an enemy unit he can see.

He's awesome, not saying he's not--just saying that he and Mortarion are two very different beasts.

I say this as someone who already has an Outrider Detachment planned of Darkstrider and 3 units of Pathfinders with 2 Broadsides. It's basically me recreating a Formation that existed in the previous edition.

Using this power as a lead in to Focused Fire combined with the Through Unity, Destruction Warlord trait, that Outrider detachment is nicely setting up whatever it is you've decided needs to die.

Well gak, I didn't even think about that. I can add a Commander or a Fireblade into the Detachment for TUD(I really don't want to type out 'Through Unity, Destruction'...but man, that acronym is going to be great ), some Rail Rifles on some of the Pathfinders, Advanced Targeting Systems onto the Broadsides and potentially get that little bit nasty.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
Except they could limit the Coldstar commander separately.

Or they could limit it to one commander and fix other units in the army. Seriously, as clumsy as this solution was, it works, also, it might actually bring some other units back to the table.

Crisis suits aren't going to come back as they are still outperformed by Commanders at killing tough targets and by fire warriors at everything else. Hammerheads with Ion Cannons might come back but Railguns won't as they're still awful. Broadsides are cheaper but railsides are still outperformed by missilesides. Skyrays are still utterly pointless.

GW has not fixed the issues which made Commanders the most point efficient shooting unit we had. So, even with the restrictions you're not going to see those other units come back as they still don't do the job they're meant to do.

If they fixed the other units, and costed the Commander appropriately, they wouldn't need to limit commanders. If they fixed it they wouldn't need their clumsy solution!

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
Except they could limit the Coldstar commander separately.

Or they could limit it to one commander and fix other units in the army. Seriously, as clumsy as this solution was, it works, also, it might actually bring some other units back to the table.

Believe it or not I am ok with an HQ limit (applied equally and fairly to everyone). I just think it wasn't enough for this case.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:

Also, just looking at your HQ, you guys have amazing buffs already (that don't require passing a psychic test). The more I look, the more the arguments in this thread appear very disingenuous.

Master of War? The commander aura? You mean the one that requires being within 6" and only works once per game regardless of the number of commanders? The one with extra restrictions? The one that is made redundant by markerlights? This one's pointless right now.

Volley fire is solid though, so no one is complaining about that.

Ethereals are ok, but farsight enclaves will likely have a restriction.

Darkstrider and Longstrike are Tau sept so that's an extra restriction (but they are good). Shadowsun and Farsight are special characters whose special ability is Master of War a second time.

Your alao all assuming GW haven't removed some of these abilities as I don't think the characters have been leaked yet.

It's not a bad codex, not great but some of the decisions make no sence.

Ice_can wrote:

It's not a bad codex, not great but some of the decisions make no sence.

That sums up my feelings.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
GW has not fixed the issues which made Commanders the most point efficient shooting unit we had. So, even with the restrictions you're not going to see those other units come back as they still don't do the job they're meant to do.

Actually, they have, you just don't like the fix.

On the other point, I think you're wrong, honestly, I felt the same way when the Chaos early on, but really, you play for awhile, you start nailing down the combos and it all comes together.

I'm barely familiar with Tau and am already seeing nasty combos that have nothing to do with Commanders.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Dandelion wrote:

Ice_can wrote:

It's not a bad codex, not great but some of the decisions make no sence.

That sums up my feelings.

This sums up everyone's feeling about damned near every codex that has come out, seriously. This is about as useful as saying "flat-earthers make no sense", no gak some choices don't make sense.

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:
I'm barely familiar with Tau and am already seeing nasty combos that have nothing to do with Commanders.

How many of them feature Crisis Suits, Railsides, Hammerheads with Railguns, Vespid, Skyrays etc. ?

Fire Warrior spam, some pathfinders and drones, alongside quadfusion Coldstar Commanders, fireblades and Yvharas, all from Borkan, will be the next Tau netlist.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 TwinPoleTheory wrote:
I'm barely familiar with Tau and am already seeing nasty combos that have nothing to do with Commanders.

How many of them feature Crisis Suits, Railsides, Hammerheads with Railguns, Vespid, Skyrays etc. ?

Fire Warrior spam alongside Coldstar Commanders and Yvharas, all from Borkan, will be the next Tau netlist.

I'm not looking too closely at specific units since your base abilities, stratagems, and warlord traits synergize well with numerous units and weapon types.

Tau ability to manipulate wound rolls, AP, toughness combined with their ability to generate long range volume of fire dovetails perfectly into the existing gunline meta.

In other words, you have the tools, even you choose not to see them.

This wasn't the best way to fix Tau commander spam. I agree. But it's also not the end of the world this 7 page thread has made it out to be. The Tau dex isn't ruined. The world isn't ending. Not everything is on fire. You have 1 stupid stipulation you will have to live with until/if it changes. In the meantime you have more units than just commanders and the sky isn't falling. Every codex has duds, and the commander isn't even a dud. It's still great. It's just limited.

Sucks? Yeah.. kind of. Dumb? For sure. Going to field 1 commander pretty much every time anyway? Yup.

Time to get over it.

As has been mentioned repeatedly, the best solution would have been to also add some non-Commander HQ options. Generic Ghostkeel or Stealth 'heroes' that didn't give benefits, a generic Pathfinder HQ with Structural Analyzer-esque abilities, etc.

But hey. At least I know a few of the folks who were telling me to "get over it" when they nerfed Commissars(a unit I don't even use but felt was setting a terrible precedent) and Conscripts are pretty salty over this.

My Tau are going to do just fine though.

 Lance845 wrote:
This wasn't the best way to fix Tau commander spam. I agree. But it's also not the end of the world this 7 page thread has made it out to be. The Tau dex isn't ruined. The world isn't ending. Not everything is on fire. You have 1 stupid stipulation you will have to live with until/if it changes. In the meantime you have more units than just commanders and the sky isn't falling. Every codex has duds, and the commander isn't even a dud. It's still great. It's just limited.

Sucks? Yeah.. kind of. Dumb? For sure. Going to field 1 commander pretty much every time anyway? Yup.

Time to get over it.

Here's the thing, I agree with you. I just disagreed with the notion that the limit was a "good" idea by itself, which it seemed that's what people were claiming. My own list isn't even affected at all. So now that we all agree it's a clumsy rule and could have been better, I'm going go splurge on a new Ghostkeel

I don't understand how this will fix commander spam, 1 per detachment only really affects regular non-spamming players. What is stopping someone from taking 9 patrol detachments with 9 QFC and 9 squads of 5 fire warriors?

I have never spammed commanders, at most I take farsight a QFC and a coldstar. But now thanks to these ridiculous rules I have extremely limited options, as Farsight counts as a commander if I take him then all other commander varients aren't allowed leaving me with cadre fireblades and ethereals to fill in remaining HQ slots, I like fluff armies so ethereals are out. so in a massive brigade detachment there is one commander and minimum 2 fireblades.

Spyder335 wrote:
I don't understand how this will fix commander spam, 1 per detachment only really affects regular non-spamming players. What is stopping someone from taking 9 patrol detachments with 9 QFC and 9 squads of 5 fire warriors?

I have never spammed commanders, at most I take farsight a QFC and a coldstar. But now thanks to these ridiculous rules I have extremely limited options, as Farsight counts as a commander if I take him then all other commander varients aren't allowed leaving me with cadre fireblades and ethereals to fill in remaining HQ slots, I like fluff armies so ethereals are out. so in a massive brigade detachment there is one commander and minimum 2 fireblades.

Because most tournaments/matched play limits you to 3 detachments.

So why don't tournements just say no more then 3 commanders?

Clumsy isn't beggining to cut it.

I'm honestly thinking I''d prefer playing with the index over the codex, not only because the commander limit-but also the sheer stupidity of the coldstar buff, and the CiB buff-two things that very much did NOT need buffs, especially not these buffs.


Whoever wrote this codex was as clueless as it gets.
Silly restrictions on one hand, absurd cheese on the other, and half the codex is left unattended in a limbo of "well, it wasn't viable for three editions now, no point fixing it now", and in a few cases nerfing things nobody even ever bothered taking because they were overpriced.


Like, seriously.
Can I NOT take a coldstar, or two, or three when I try to play competitively with this stupid ability to pack four guns with it?
No. not doing so would be idiotic from how broken it is, and how it is obviously broken on a minor glance.



This codex is a trainwreck on all levels.

Yeah I'm sure no one will have any issues with playing against the index rather the codex so I'd think you'll be fine with that decision.

I know it has been said before but it just feels so dammed lazy, they couldn't figure out a work around so this is what we get. The only people that were commander spamming were tournament players, to me it should have been the tournament organisers that set the rules to stop this from happening. Make it a blanket no more then 3 of the same unit excluding troops, but in a world where a player is fine to take 2 daemon primarchs, or 12 psychers smite spamming whole armies in to the ground is fine its the Tau commander that's the issue.

Was Tau even dominating at tournaments?

No, not even close.

But if tau could take x6 or more of the new coldstar, they would crush anything in their path.

 BoomWolf wrote:
No, not even close.

But if tau could take x6 or more of the new coldstar, they would crush anything in their path.

So its almost as if they made the decision for a reason?!

 Farseer_V2 wrote:

 BoomWolf wrote:
No, not even close.

But if tau could take x6 or more of the new coldstar, they would crush anything in their path.

So its almost as if they made the decision for a reason?!

Commanders are the only HQ in the game that can pack four mid-range "heavy" weapons and they pay BS4 prices for BS2 efficiency. I don't think there are a lot of good reasons to let that roam free.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Farseer_V2 wrote:

 BoomWolf wrote:
No, not even close.

But if tau could take x6 or more of the new coldstar, they would crush anything in their path.

So its almost as if they made the decision for a reason?!

Commanders are the only HQ in the game that can pack four mid-range "heavy" weapons and they pay BS4 prices for BS2 efficiency. I don't think there are a lot of good reasons to let that roam free.

So just make them pay more for the guns. Problem solved.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Farseer_V2 wrote:

 BoomWolf wrote:
No, not even close.

But if tau could take x6 or more of the new coldstar, they would crush anything in their path.

So its almost as if they made the decision for a reason?!

If you have to limit 5 units because one of them is ridiculously overpowered then the problem is with the overpowered one and that is what you should fix.

Why did the Coldstar suit need to gain extra hardpoints?

Just to point out something since no-one else has yet from what I've seen - limiting the Commander to 2 weapons in the Codex wouldn't actually work.
It's a suggestion I've seen thrown around in this thread a number of times as a better fix... however due to how the rules treat option discrepancies between index and codex you'd still be able to take 4 weapons using the index wargear options while using the codex datasheet.

The only ways were a hard cap or points changes, and I'm sure people would be complaining even more if Commander skyrocketed to crazy points levels.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Farseer_V2 wrote:

 BoomWolf wrote:
No, not even close.

But if tau could take x6 or more of the new coldstar, they would crush anything in their path.

So its almost as if they made the decision for a reason?!

If you have to limit 5 units because one of them is ridiculously overpowered then the problem is with the overpowered one and that is what you should fix.

Why did the Coldstar suit need to gain extra hardpoints?

Maybe they're OK with 3 and not 5? Maybe they even worked to balanced it around the idea that you could take 3.

 Farseer_V2 wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Farseer_V2 wrote:

 BoomWolf wrote:
No, not even close.

But if tau could take x6 or more of the new coldstar, they would crush anything in their path.

So its almost as if they made the decision for a reason?!

If you have to limit 5 units because one of them is ridiculously overpowered then the problem is with the overpowered one and that is what you should fix.

Why did the Coldstar suit need to gain extra hardpoints?

Maybe they're OK with 3 and not 5? Maybe they even worked to balanced it around the idea that you could take 3.

But three coldstar commanders are obviously way more powerful than three XV8 commanders.

So why are both limited to three? And why does it need to be three with each in separate detachments? If the answer is "the coldstar is more points expensive" then why couldn't they point the commander, bodyguards and crisis suits at a level where the commander was still useful but not better in every way compared to Crisis and bodyguard suits, which removes the source of the spam?

 A Town Called Malus wrote:


So just make them pay more for the guns. Problem solved.

But then you've potentially created the problem where they're so many points they are no longer viable. Especially at BS2.