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this is basicaly as the name describes, what do you want in the next tau codex? it could be anything from slight fix's in the rules, to new units and weapons of your own invention, you can be as creative as you want.

I posted up a big list of mods I thought might work under the previous "what would you change in your codex?" thread. For the sake of sanity I'll just link to it:

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/150/271577.page#1308355

Fundamentally I think Tau just need three things:

1. Update for 5th edition; fix the broken rules and adjust the points costs as per all other 5th edition codices.
2. Greater flexibility of weapons choices (particularly for Stealth Suits and Broadsides)
3. A greater choice of forces. IMHO this should be through more auxiliaries, as this is one of the unique features of the Tau. Human volunteers and Kroot Knarloc riders are two obvious choices I'd like to see included, all for the greater good!

Here is my opinions:
1. All Crisis squads have BS-4....they are Elite Troops with Battlesuits....I dont see why Veteran Troops in Powered Armor suits wouldnt have a Built in TA in all of them.
2. A St4 Defensive weapon on vehicles....the inclusion of that rule in the 5th ed. BRB seemed to hit the Tau specifically.
3. the option of using Flechette Dischargers on Crisis Suits.....as one of the three hard points.
4. Plasma Carbines as Assault 2 - 18in range
5. Human Auxiliaries as a Troop Choice (i have a squad and love them.....more for fluff reasons)
6. Crisis Suit Etherial......or at least a Crisis Bodyguard unit....
7. Drones should NOT count as unit when refering to pinning, leadership rolls for losses....they are drones, they were created to take bullets and not risk Tau lives.....(also the idea of a 2 gun drone squad as 1KP is seriously broken....2 Drones should not be equal to a Tactical Squad of SM)
8. Add more Drone Types....Medic (FNP special rule), Repair (like a techpriest) , Command (boost leadership), Heavy Weapon (Burst cannon/missilepods)
9. Make the Special issues items Standard items.
10. Remove the 1 FW squad requirement for Tau armies.....if you dont want to take them you shouldnt have to.............

1. Characters that are worth taking.
2. More troop choices.
3. All markerlights are networked
4. Give the commander a orbital strike like ability but have it inflict 1d6 markers on target.
5. Interceptor drone (drone that disengages from a unit that is charged and takes the charge itself, saving the unit from entering combat.)
6. Something that can melee worth a darn
7. Access to power weapons
8. Ion cannon made heavy 4 or 5


I am sure I can think of more

(Note! These are ideas, I am not saying Tau need all of these.)

I like that interceptor drone idea....but it should be a one time event and it should be a small blast. St 5 AP4 they should be attached to FW Squads with Drone controllers.

Other than what everyone else has already said...

Demolition Drones - Use a markerlight to land a demo drone on a squade (small blast marker, S5 AP5).

A new tank.

Ion-head shoots heavy 3 but uses small blast marker (like the executioner).

Pulse Carbines, Assault 2.

New abilities like this..
Move and shoot, trained to be extremely mobile infantry, Tau may move 6" (or d6?) in the assault phase but may not assault if they fired anything other than an assault weapon.

Kroot hounds and ox should have rending.
ox should be able to fire and move.
kroot rifles should be assault or an option to buy pulse carbines.
shaper should be able to access a power weapon or power fist.

to continue from my previous responses.

9. Broadsides can fire submunition rounds
10. Heavy drones
11. Overwatch like ability. (Old rule where you could forgo shooting to shoot in enemies movement phase when they moved into your LOS)
12. Ability to take same weapon twice on a crisis suit.
13. At least one new suit varient

Flechette drone:
When the unit this drone is attached to is charged by an enemy unit, the flechette drone activates. The charging unit takes a number of S3 hits equal to the number of models in the unit.

Heavy weapon drone:
Burst cannon or missile pod only.

---

Really need a 5th edition update for points costs, rules, etc.

Crisis suit should be BS4. Stealth Suits prolly should remain BS3, they're not necessarily as veteran as a crisis pilot.

More Troop choices. Maybe make drone squadrons troops choices- but can't capture or contest objectives because of drone AI.

Allow drones that detach from a vehicle able to join another drone squadron or to other gun drones- their AI is hive-based, so they should be trying to flock together when they need to. Stop the extra KP madness!

SkyRay needs to be better.

Ethereal needs to be worth a damn.

I I think vespids could do with either having assault 2 weapons, or just a lower points cost. Possibly better CC stats or rending claws, or anything to make them more than just a waste of points.

1.) Drop in Fire warrior cost.
2.) Fix all wargear relating to target priority test.
3.) Give kroot a shaper for free or reduce his cost (No way in hell he's worth 28 points (7 + the 21 to upgrade)) While I'm at it reduce the FW Shas'ui, 10 points for 1 ld, an attack and the option to PAY for more gear, kinda silly
4.) Make vespids useful, as they stand they tend to run up, shoot a couple S5 AP3 (which is decent) shots then assault or get assaulted & die.
5.) Make gun drones that come with the vehicle only count for a kill point if you MANUALLY detach them. (I.E. if you don't detach them when the vehicle is destroyed they are destroyed with it & do not count for an extra kill point
6.) Make ethereals useful
7.) Battle suits at BS 4 (idc if they up the cost to do this)
8.) Make sniper drone teams more useful. As it stands they're decent it's just that a broadside is so much better for very few extra points.
9.) Give FW at least Defensive grenades standard (Marines now come with both frag & krak)
10.) Give kroot a base armor save, even if it's only a 5+ or 6+ (Hell increase the cost by 1 point, it'd be worth it if I didn't have to pay for the shaper to get it)

Anyway there's my wish list atm.

Melchiour wrote:1
4. Give the commander a orbital strike like ability but have it inflict 1d6 markers on target.
6. Something that can melee worth a darn

4. Really good idea IMO. Maybe like, a flyer swoops down and paints a target in markerlights? Or drops some sensors or something that blanket an area, providing x number of markerlight hits; therefor it could still be subject to the template and scatter rules.

6. Come on now...

Sacred Chao wrote:

Melchiour wrote:1
4. Give the commander a orbital strike like ability but have it inflict 1d6 markers on target.
6. Something that can melee worth a darn

4. Really good idea IMO. Maybe like, a flyer swoops down and paints a target in markerlights? Or drops some sensors or something that blanket an area, providing x number of markerlight hits; therefor it could still be subject to the template and scatter rules.

6. Come on now...

well, i agree with 6. but i would suggest some kind of a battle suit varient that is designed for close combat, it would be like king tigers against sherman tanks, skill v numbers, the battle suit being the king tigers.

shas'o vera wrote:

well, i agree with 6. but i would suggest some kind of a battle suit varient that is designed for close combat, it would be like king tigers against sherman tanks, skill v numbers, the battle suit being the king tigers.

The ONLY way I could see this being plausible in keeping with the Tau concept of warfare would be to implement some sort of CC ability as you want, and then allow the team to utilize Forgeworlds idea behind the VRT. That way they can hop in, chop some gak up, and then pop some drones to auto pass the initiative test to fly away. Maybe not give them a power weapon per say, but maybe some sort of Pistol weapon with multiple shots. That way they can hop forward, shoot x number of times, and then charge in getting their regular A value plus the bonus for the "pistols."

Like that gun jitsu junk.

Melchiour wrote:
6. Something that can melee worth a darn
7. Access to power weapons

6.) Kroot can melee very wel. The only problem is it's too expensive to give them a save. I just park them on cover & use them as a counter-charge should my FW get smacked.

7.) No. Tau are not a melee army. You should use tactics to avoid melee. If you want an army that can shoot & melee with power weapons just play MEQ

Shas'O Dorian wrote:

Melchiour wrote:
6. Something that can melee worth a darn
7. Access to power weapons

6.) Kroot can melee very wel. The only problem is it's too expensive to give them a save. I just park them on cover & use them as a counter-charge should my FW get smacked.

7.) No. Tau are not a melee army. You should use tactics to avoid melee. If you want an army that can shoot & melee with power weapons just play MEQ

Considering the size of a standard gaming table it's simply impossible to avoid melee; by turn 2 or 3 (if not turn 1) most of your units will have been assaulted by a close combat centered army as all of the 5th edition codicies have options to move into close combat that fast. Meching up will only get you so far and when your troop choices, you know the units that are supposed to be the ones doing most of the shooting, have rapid fire weapons, you can't avoid close combat and still shoot anything.

I guess my point is, the Tau screening troops, the Kroot, need to be a little better able to do their jobs and a bit more survivable so that the extremely squishy FWs are able to do anything. At least give them a 5+ save when you buy a shaper (without paying extra per model) and furious charge or counter charge. Personally, I'd do that and make the shaper a bit cheaper with access to a power weapon (he's the equivalent to a mystic after all).

Alternatively, maybe Kroot shapers could have minor psychic powers; the Tau don't have psykers but maybe their allies can.

Hre's what I want:

1) A piece of wargear that will give FWs +1 BS if their squad size is over 6

2) Pulse rifles to rapid fire 15"

3) Pulse carbines to be 15" range assault 2 pinning.

4) Vespid gun to be assault 2

5) FW squad to be 60 points including Sha'ui and 5 member each additional member is 8 points (same max squad size).

6) Devilfish to be 65 points and able to upgrade Drone to burstcannons for free and SMS for 10 points.

7) Ethereals to have weaker stats but a 4++ save. They allow you to upgrade one FW squad to honour guard for 2 points as before but they stay as a troops choice. Any squad the Ethereal joins can choose to flee if assaulted. Initiative test if passed they auto falback but the assault does not charge.

8) Shas'vre have Bs4

9) MLs can incrrease Bs up to 10.

10) Crisis teams have T5

11) Stealth teams are 25 points each and can have unlimited fusion blasters.

12) Gun Drones on vehicles are not extra KPs.

13) TA are available through HW as are shield generators. But are slightly more expensivewhen HW (12pts and 25pts).

14) Hazard suites are available.

15) Kroot shapers can take power weapons, Kroot rifles are assault 1.

16) Hammerheads can come in squads

17) Skyrays are 100 points standard

18) Special Characters that are actually good at shooting.

19) Aun Va to cost -100 points (yes he gives you army an extra 100 points to spend) and otherwise remains the same (though I still probably wouldn't use him).

20) Kroot get stealth and move through cover.

21) MLs on pathfinder become assault 1 and range 18" same on FW shas'ui. Lets get our scouts actuaklly scouting rather than being the most removed part of our army! Though give them (and their fish) infiltrate. Their fish stays at 80 points as it has infiltrate and the DS special rule.

22) Networked marker lights stay heavy 1 and 36" range but marker drones come down to 20 pts.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
forgot 2 stupidly:

23) Defensive weapons are S5 for all Tau vehicles. Our basic side arm is S5 so it makes perfect sense.

24) Human aux as Troops choices, squad size up to 25, lasguns but untrained human stats (so not proper IG, but conscripts).

agnosto wrote:
Considering the size of a standard gaming table it's simply impossible to avoid melee; by turn 2 or 3 (if not turn 1)

Meh, I've never had trouble with this. I usually group 2 full squads of FW together & bounce my suits between them. Broadsides ping transports and the amount of S5 shots (plus markerlight bonus) allows me to kill any unit before it gets to me. Only trouble I tend to have is orks (fearless if above 10 models) & the Trygon / Mawloc coupled with gaunts (I can only reliably kill one). Beside that I don't have too much trouble.

@flingitnow

1. Not a bad idea, but it would make markerlights less necessary.

2 & 3. yes and yes

4. most definitely yes.

5. They'll probably wind up doing something like this anyway to be similar to other codicies.

6. I'd say 60pts.

7. Not a bad idea. I would also allow a kroot bg as an option.

8. Yes

9. Don't agree here, there's really no point in having a BS greater than 5. Maybe allow markerlights to increase WS...imagine a FW with a 5 WS, how's that for defence?

10. Not sure about this one, maybe make the wargear/weapons cheaper and increase squad size.

11. I've always thought they should have rail-rifles, the close weapons they use are pointless considering their stealthfields. Maybe give them stealth, scout, infiltrate, up the squad size with 'ui and 'ui has option of wargear and squad can replace burst cannons for rail rifles at x cost.

12. I'd go further and say drones are no kps and their wounds/deaths don't figure into combat/morale.

13. ok

14. variety is never a bad thing.

15. yep.

16. instead of this, I would like to see more variation; maybe different turrets like the forge world ones (t/l railgun, plasma cannon,etc).

17. bring back alpha-strike and allow them to fire without a marker light.

18. or good at anything.

19. LOL, axe him altogether IMO.

20. yep.

21. meh. I don't mind heavy1 and long range; infiltrate is a good idea though.

22. I think all markerlights should be networked.

agnosto wrote:
9. Don't agree here, there's really no point in having a BS greater than 5. Maybe allow markerlights to increase WS...imagine a FW with a 5 WS, how's that for defence?

IIRC if you have a BS <5 and you roll a one you get to reroll & check against your BS (6 needs a 6, 7 needs a 5, 8 needs a 4, 9 needs a 3, & 10 needs another 2) So with BS 10 you need to roll double ones to miss & it would help on scatter imensley. Though spending 5+ markerlights to get this would have to mean it's a very high priority target.

Unless Tau get more blast marker type weapons, it's still not that useful. There are much better things to use marklights on, like you mentioned there's not single target in an army worth 5 markerlights when they could be used to reduce cover and etc...

Maybe for ML you could expend more than one ML to give some sort of even better effect to the shooting unit. Such as, expend 2 ML tokens to allow the unit to re-roll dice for penetration.

9. Well it is for top priority targets and for blast weapons I also think we should get more blast weapons and that crisis teams should get more weapon options. Like the railrifle maybe? Or some new weapon? It is a minor change.

10. Just reduces their risk to ID but as mentioned above other things could help them too. T5 might make them too good in CC too thinking about it.

11. Stealth teams rae supposed to be close in fighters. Maybe give them hit and run as standard (like the hazard suites)?

16. Yeah that would help I still want squads though.

17. Anything to help make it a viable option to Hammerheads. Allowing Hammerheads to squad would also improve the chances of you taking a Skyray...

21. It is not that I mind heavy marker lights. It is just that pathfinders are supposed to be scouts and at the moment they are used as the exact opposite. It is a fluff change rather than an improvement.

22. See above

1. Crisis Suits and Broadsides should have BS 4 standard; get rid of targeting arrays as battlesuit wargear.
2. Increase the squad size max for Crisis Suits to 5.
3. Kroot should have the 6+ save automatically, with option to buy 5+.
4. Slight army-wide rules variations for the different Septs (not going to happen, I know, but a guy can dream). Example: Farsight Enclave Fire Warriors can buy close combat weapons; Vior'la, since they're highly trained, can have veteran FW squads, etc.)
5. Give Farsight a Stimulant Injector, and allow his bodyguards to buy power weapons.
6. More blast weapons.

Lots. But first, the big one:

Make Fire Warriors better. The fact that most competitive lists take only a requisite minimum squad of 6 that ideally never gets out of a 'Fish makes it pretty plain how weak they are. Costs don't have to go up necessarily, but they need something. Baseline grenades, bundled Shas'ui and free Bonding Knives would be a start, but the truth is they really just need to just be better at their job. Troops are the heart and soul of an army. If the new 'Dex is going to reflect that then FWs need to be your go-to choice for Pulse fire in quantity, and that means they need to be genuinely good at it, especially since by design they aren't good at anything else. They're not tough, they're not fast, they don't get special wackiness or alternative deployment rules, and they are bar-none point for point the worst basic infantry in the game in CC. Assault 2 Carbines needs to happen to make mechanized infantry viable. Heavy 2 Rifles might possibly be a big too strong, but should be at least considered. Tau infantry gunline needs something pretty dramatic to put it on a competitive footing with IG and BS4 isn't it. More shots for the points is a better solution - make them cheaper or make the guns better. I favor the latter option simply because conscript-spam is what the IG do. Given the choice between arming their soldiers better and simply feeding more into the meat grinder, however, Tau prefer the former. It's more civilized.

Other suggestions:

1. Reworked costs for 5th Edition, particularly on vehicles. For that matter, just get rid of the multitracker "shoots as fast" rule entirely and make all the skimmers actually Fast. It's just weird that they aren't. Even BA gets Fast tanks now, and they're still trundling over the ground instead of flying. Seriously.
2. S5 Defensive weapons on the tanks. Going from 6 -> 5 would've been fine, 4 gutted the mobility of the entire armored stable. Especially bad now that Skimmers have to move farther and faster to protect themselves. The idea of a race with better tech and better guns is undermined when those guns actually make your tank worse.
3. Gun Drone squadrons should be Troops. Drones dismounted from vehicles shouldn't be scoring, but they also shouldn't be worth Kill Points. Clarify that they are considered part of the vehicle for these purposes.
4. Streamline Markerlights. It's a great idea with really poor execution. Make them cheaper and more fully integrated into the army, to better reflect an actual combined arms philosophy of war. If there's a way to do this that doesn't require rolling dice, that would be great.
5. Do away with the hard-point system on Suits. The new 'Dexes simply aren't written with wide-open Armories anymore, so this is almost certain to happen anyway. While you're at it, get rid of Twinlinking and Multi-trackers - just make Suits baseline capable of carrying and firing two independent weapon systems. TL and hardpoints are clunky, outdated and unnecessary mechanics.
6. Revisit vehicle wargear. Make Decoys work, increase the cost of Disruption Pods, clarify Flechettes, etc. This is really just housekeeping.
7. Shapers should allow the purchase of USRs for Kroot units. Things like Furious Charge and Counter-Attack and whatnot. Make them mean something, and help to counter the fact that Kroot pillbox lost a step when Assault Grenades got better. Also, let Shapers carry Eviscerators, it would add some welcome punch to the only CC unit in the list.
8. Make the Shas'vre rank meaningful by attaching BS4 to it, and remove the 1-per-army limitation on Special Issue wargear, just make it available to any Suit at Shas'vre rank or above (we're past the field-testing phase).
9. Give Shas'vre Ld9 and Shas'el Ld10 so that there's more of a sliding scale associated with the ranks. Tau morale is some of the worst in the game, and almost every army out there has special rules that let them largely manipulate or even outright ignore Ld when they want to. We don't need that, just a little bump so we're not the only kids on the playground still playing by the teacher's rules. They're supposed to be a warrior-caste with an all-consuming ideology that subordinates the individual to the collective, you'd think they'd have a little more backbone!
9. Remove the generic Shas'o - they should be named characters, and there should be an array of good ones to choose from (I'm looking at you Aun'va - you suck). Farsight, Longknife, Aun'shi, and some new ones. Make them beastly. Options to expand scoring to non-Troop units should be included in the HQ section, too - alternative FOC for characters, and maybe steal a page from the Orks and let generic Shas'el Crisis Commanders enable a single XV8 squad to be taken as a Troop. A Stealth Commander option with something similar for XV15/25s would also be a good addition. Speaking of which...
10. Stealth Suits need to get a) cheaper, and b) more useful. Lower point cost to 25 and include some additional weapon options, preferably short ranged. Flamers would be very neat.
11. Hazard Suits. And give them the option of purchasing Heavy Flamers. Let that be the Tau response to fast-moving assault units.
12. Unhook Pathfinders from their Devilfish and give them Stealth and Infiltrate instead of Scout - Scout never made any sense for a static unit. Also make Rail Rifles cheaper and more available, they're an awesome gun that no one uses because it's too expensive and you're forced into a unit with weapons that aren't complementary. Having the option to make Pathfinders either spotters or snipers would be really nice. Sniper Drone Teams can go away entirely for all I care, they're bad.
12. Rehabilitate the Sky Ray. Remove the ammunition limits and allow Seekers to be fired in a secondary frag mode. Also consider reassigning the Pathfinder 'Fish Deep Strike re-roll to the Sky Ray - it's supposed to be a support platform after all.
13. Some alternative turrets for the Hammerhead would be good, provided that they are actually competitive with the existing ones.
14. Some new stuff. I dunno what, surprise me.

I wouldn't expect to see all of this change - in fact if even half of it did, the army would probably be fine. There's a lot of room for improvement though, the Tau had the rug pulled out from under them pretty extensively with the 5th Edition rules changes.

M'Kraik

First I hate the idea of defensive grenades on tau they make your army worse. Please don't give them to us unless we have an option to remove them.

On making FWs better how do you like my ideas of making the basic squad 60 including bonded Ui and then 8 points per model. Having a peice of wargear that gives +1 Bs if the unit size is 6 or over. Changing rifles to rapidfire 15" and making carbine 15" assault 2 (so you choose pinning or one shot at 30" neither effects your core firepower so both options are viable).

Now to your numbered points:

1. Agreed
2. Spot on, it makes no sense for S5 not to be defensive weapons for an army where the standard side arm is S5!
3. Agreed
4. In my suggestions they all became move and fire weapons, standard ones lost their range though. Also I think the PF Devilfish should have 8 firepoints for MLs only that would really improve pathfinders and make them function as they should (i.e. as scouts rather than last line of defence).
5. Good idea I also had the idea of being able to by standard layouts. You pay say 60 points and then before the game but after mission and deployment had been determined you could choose loadout from standard fits - Deathrain, Brightwind, TL fusion blasters. Obviously the fits would be cheaper if you bought them pre-game but then you'd be stuck with that weapons load out, using Helios against a green tide is not great... Also fits in with the fluffy of arming their suits for the specific mission. And it would give us something genuinely unique .
6. Yeah good housekeeping.
7. Good ideas.
8. Agreed
9a. Good idea to you increase it by making the O stubborn but also having combat tactics. So you get again an improved morale from going up to the top.
9b. OK well that trumps my above, another good idea. Tau desperately need some special characters that don't suck hard.
10. Yeah great idea and for me fusions should be able to go team wide it just makes no sense otherwise.
11. loving it.
12a. I had other ideas about changing pathfinders though Infiltrate was on the list. Having them static means they won't ever be used as scouts hence why I want to unlock the MLs by making them assault and firable from within the fish. Then move the sniper drone teams to troops to get snipers into the army and as a viable option .
12b. Yeah it needs drastic work.
13. Yeah thuogh I feel also squading them would unlock HS slots to include the other options. Everyone wants at least 2 Railheads and 2-3 Broadsides (dependant on points values) and then that is your HS gone. Maybe also increase unit size of Broadsides to 5? Or have a Broadside Spec character that can take a unit of 5 (6 including him) and allow them all to fire on seperate targets all have ASS and any firing on the same target as him fire at BS4?
14. Yeah we are desperately short on options.
13.

Ugh, my numbering was screwy. Sorry about that.

I'll preface this by saying that it's late and so this will probably be a little meandering, so if you're not interested in reading some game philosophy you may want to skip it.

Lowering FW cost would work mechanically, I just don't like it because thematically it makes them more like IG: throw more men at the problem. The Tau don't really think like that. I'd rather make the standard Fire Warrior stronger for his points cost instead. If we want expendable bodies, we should be buying Drones (and honestly, the profiles between Carbine Warriors and Gun Drones right now are just too similar - they need to be differentiated more so that it's clear that they are meant for separate purposes). I don't really like the idea of increasing Ballistics for a few reasons. It's boring, for one, and if we really want to be more accurate we should be using Markerlights to do so (i.e. there is already a mechanic for us to do this, and it's more interesting). I'd rather increase volume of fire instead. It achieves something similar - increased killing power for the points - and it scales with Markerlights, which makes them more valuable. I like that. It might be hard to balance, though, because the integers are low.

Carbines being Pinning just doesn't do anything for me - it's not a terribly useful quality to begin with, and it makes sense to limit it to psychologically terrifying weapons like sniper rifles and artillery barrages. Carbines don't really fit the bill. I think they should stay 18" simply because that way they are very comparable to a unit of Dire Avengers in a Serpent: mechanized infantry in a skimmer, dismount to double-tap at 18 inches. Dire Avengers can Bladestorm, Carbine Warriors can benefit from ML support. Nobody complains about DAs in a Serpent, so it's not like the Assault 2 18" FW is going to be unbalanced either. All it really does is resurrect the FoF, which was a fine idea but never worked all that well in practice because the ranges were so unforgiving. Carbines at 18" makes it work.

I'm not really a fan of Rapid Fire in general because it's, well....it's so bad. That, and the difference between Assault 2 15 and Rapid Fire @ 15 is almost negligible, it's hard to imagine anyone taking the Carbine (since Pinning is really pretty bad) and then we're back to nobody using Carbines. I think the Rifle and the Carbine should be different, specialized to different purposes. Rifle for gunline, Carbine for mobile infantry. But I'll be the first to admit, this is opinion. Your solution would also work fine, I'd just rather the choice between the two was clearer and their purposes more different.

As for Defensive Grenades, I hear you, but I don't think GW likes the idea of deliberately making a unit as fragile as possible. From a strictly utilitarian point of view, yes, it makes sense that we want to either avoid CC entirely or have it end immediately so that we can light up the opposing squad instead of letting them hide in assault, but I think a lot of that stems from the fact that due to the nature of Sweep tests, we know that as soon as we get into CC every Fire Warrior is almost certainly dead already, it's just a matter of time. So we tend to look at any attempt to save them as both futile, and counterproductive if it increases the chances of shielding the enemy from return fire. If there was a chance of letting the unit escape to shoot again later, however (and of preserving a Scoring unit), I think a lot of players would take it. We just don't have so many scoring units that we can afford to write them off so easily. IMO I'd like to see Photon Grenades changed to do the following: when the unit loses CC, it falls back as normal. Instead of a Sweep test, however, the unit suffers additional Wounds equal to the number by which it lost the CC, just like with the No Retreat! rule. The difference is, the unit still falls back. We're no more likely to win CC than before, and if we get routed really badly we'll still probably lose the unit...but if it's a marginal loss we might hang on to the rest of it. The unit might just fall back and regroup and might just be able to return fire on its next turn, or be picked up by a transport, or what-have-you. It would be in keeping with Fire Caste military doctrine (i.e. don't engage in barbaric melee combat, give ground instead) and it would mean that if opponents want to wipe out a unit of our infantry they'd want to send something that can do some real damage on the charge, not just something with a decent armor save and an initiative of 4. GW made assaults deadlier because they wanted CC to be definitive, and that's fine...but the Tau don't play that game.

Markerlights as move-and-shoot weapons would be an improvement, but given the choice I'd go beyond that to something even more elegant. I'm just not positive what that would be. It always baffled me that a markerlight was a Heavy 1 weapon when as far as I can tell, it's little more than a range-finder. The Tau can invent weaponized handheld plasma conductor technology but can't duct-tape a laser-pointer to it? I'd rather make MLs something that is used in concert with existing weapons, not in place of them. I'm not exactly sure how that would work, but for the sake of argument consider a model in which a ML is a piece of wargear that simply puts a Marker token on the targeted unit if the model holding it hits with at least one of their shots - I aim, I shoot. Did I hit? Great, I was on the mark and the ML hooked into my gun (or suit, or hardwired targeting array, or whatever) relays that information to the rest of the Cadre. It would set up a cascade effect: every unit that fires on a given target is made progressively more deadly by the fact that they are acting in concert with other members of the army, and no extra dice would have to be rolled since the effect piggybacks off of existing shooting. Obviously, this particular example would run into problems in units where each model has more than one shot (since every model would have to roll their shots separately, ugh), but the idea appeals to me more than the existing design.

I never really liked the Scout special rule on Pathfinders because (and this is going to sound weird, I know), Pathfinders are scouts. Bear with me. The fluff has them ranging ahead of the army, relaying information back to the Cadre about geography, enemy forces, deployment, etc. They do this because they're bloody invisible. When the rest of the army shows up, the Pathfinders have already staked out the best ground, the best positions for precision shots. They've been there all along and the enemy never even knew it. Once the battle is joined, they're not zipping around like flies because they don't need to be - they're already exactly where they want to be. The Scout USR doesn't actually reflect that well at all. Infiltrate and Stealth do. Scout is a misnomer; it's better used to reflect shock troopers and the vanguard of an army than its actual scouts. It would be more appropriate to, say, Piranhas and Vespid (both of which could use a little love of their own). But Pathfinders? Nah. They should be snipers, and the Rail Rifle should really be their preferred weapon, not an overpriced afterthought. All of which serves to make them more appropriate to the Elite FOC slot than the Fast Attack one (where I think Stealth Suits belong). A lot of people would no doubt want to string me up for saying that - how dare our beloved Crisis Suits compete with Pathfinders for army slots? - but if Pathfinders were made better and our FA options improved, I think it would be healthier for the army as a whole if there were some more competition in those parts of the FOC. It might lead to new army comps, which wouldn't be at all a bad thing. In fact, it might be nice to see decent lists that didn't lean on a dozen or more XV8s to shore up the weaknesses of our other choices.

I can see why you'd want to make SDTs Troops (where else to put them? most other slots have options that are just better), but snipers of any kind as Troops just doesn't make a lot of sense. I'd rather make Sniper Drones a new type of wargear option, alongside Gun/Shield/Marker drones. The option of adding 1-2 Sniper Drones to a Fireknife Team is pretty attractive.

I agree that Stealth Suits should be able to take alternative weapons for the whole team. The limit of three is stupid for the same reason that it's stupid for Pathfinder RRs - it makes the option simply worse, since you wind up with a unit that has split its focus. That might work for Marines but not for Tau - our units need to be designed around a particular role and they need to be clear and efficient in performing that role. I'd honestly rather see Stealth Suits trade Infiltrate for Scout and gain access to a choice of Burst Cannons, Fusion Blasters and Flamers. You can't give them long-range weapons like Rail Rifles because then they become JSJ invisible snipers and that's just not good for the game. Even Plasma Rifles would be iffy, since an effective 30" range would still make them largely immune to retaliation. It's more interesting to think of them as using the stealth fields to force small-scale confrontations between the XV25 unit and its prey, and giving them powerful short-range weapons supports that. It also makes them a unit you have to use carefully instead of being the kind that plays itself.

The truth is though, most of the above is the kind of thing you talk about when the glaring problems are already fixed and I'd be surprised if GW got this far. There are a lot of (I think) really clear and easy fixes that the 'Dex needs first. If all they did was fix the broken stuff and make the majority of the units playable, I'd be satisfied. Maybe not happy, but satisfied. If by chance they decided to go past that, I'd like them to revisit the core ideas of what makes Tau military doctrine different from the rest of the 40k armies and write the 'Dex in a way that reflects that mechanically. One of my favorite parts about playing Tau, honestly, is that I feel like the Movement phase is the one where I win or lose because maneuver actually matters. Other armies just run forward as fast as they can so they can start hurling fistfuls of dice at you sooner. I like something a little more nuanced, and it'd be nice to see a 'Dex that recognizes this.

M'Kraik I'll try to be shorter in response (for the sake of other readers ).

Yeah I know we don't want cheap firewarriors because they become IG mark 2. The basic squad would still be 60 points and a full squad of 12 would be only 12 points cheaper (but come with 'ui and bonding) so were nto talking mega cheap here.

Pinning has it's uses not many people will ever shoot to 30" either as they'll keep their FWs mobile. I don't want Carbine warriors to become DA mark 2. If you want genuinely diffent rolls then another look is needed. The idea is that both options are of comparable use and both can be used to FoF if needed.

Love you idea on Def grenades. I also think this would be a way to make Ethereal's work. Say take your idea but if the squad has an Ethereal in it then if they pass their LD test they still fall back but don't take the extra wounds.

I think Snipers as troops would solve their problems (maybe restrict to 2 choices) and make sense the Tau "troops" are supposed to be specialist hunters after all with auxillaries making up tthe bulk formations.

Yeah love your stealth ideas.

Finally agreed. I imagine they'll fix some issues give us some good new options and leave other broken units to still be fail. I still don't think we'll get a decent spec character that actually fits in with the army...

Another way to handle close combat, and I'm sorry if someone already mentioned this, is to allow shooting into close combat at the expense of a markerlight token. It fits the fluff of accurate fire supported by superior technology and would solve the problem of being owned in close combat being a problem.

Opponent assaults a unit of screening kroot and is then vaporized the following turn by two rapid firing squads of fire warriors.

I'd like to see a Kroot special character that does something nice for any kroot in the army...make him an upgrade option when you take a kroot squad...

wow, this is probably the first topic in which no one has actually crticized me in any way, shape or form.

FlingitNow wrote:Yeah I know we don't want cheap firewarriors because they become IG mark 2. The basic squad would still be 60 points and a full squad of 12 would be only 12 points cheaper (but come with 'ui and bonding) so were nto talking mega cheap here.

I know. The trouble is that they're not very good for their points right now. If we make them cheaper, they end up being too much like IG man-spam. If we make them tougher, they start to look too much like Marines. If we make them better in CC...well, that's just not going to happen at all. So it seems like they just need to be shootier. :-\

FlingitNow wrote:Pinning has it's uses not many people will ever shoot to 30" either as they'll keep their FWs mobile. I don't want Carbine warriors to become DA mark 2. If you want genuinely diffent rolls then another look is needed. The idea is that both options are of comparable use and both can be used to FoF if needed.

Yeah, the problem with Pinning isn't that it's not good. It's great if you can make it work. The problem is that almost anything you'd want to pin is functionally immune to it. Put it another way: I wouldn't kick Pinning out of bed, but I wouldn't pay for it either.

I don't really want to turn Carbine warriors into DA mark 2 (they wouldn't be anyway, since DA can easily follow up a Bladestorm with an assault). I just think it's a useful comparison. If A is roughly equivalent to B and nobody complains about B, then logically A would be okay too. Really, the problem is that Rifles/Carbines/Burst Cannons/Gun Drones are just too similar to each other right now. That needs to change, but I'm not sure how.

FlingitNow wrote:I think Snipers as troops would solve their problems (maybe restrict to 2 choices) and make sense the Tau "troops" are supposed to be specialist hunters after all with auxillaries making up tthe bulk formations.

Interesting point. It matches with the fluff, but the problem is that it doesn't seem to line up with how GW is positioning Troops in the actual game, which is as the backbone workhorse of any army. I don't see them making Troops more specialized. Rather the opposite, actually. I do agree that we can expect more auxiliaries to make an appearance in the updated 'Dex (whenever it comes out). The nature of 5th edition is such that Troops in CC is part of the game, and since they've essentially closed that off for FWs, we'll probably see expanded rules and units for Kroot and Gue'la and others.