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Hey all, I'm helping a buddy build his first army, (Tau) and I was hoping for some clarifications.

Also I apologize if this has already been posted or covered in other topics, but I didn't find any that covered my particular questions.

Q: May tau jetpacks (and jetpacks having the relentless rule) move and fire heavy weapons without an Advanced Stabilization System?

References:

p27, C:Tau: Crisis suits are Jump Infantry, subject to the Jetpack rules...
p52, BRB: Models with jetpacks have the 'relentless' special rule.
p76, BRB: Relentless models can shoot with rapid fire and heavy weapons counting as stationary, even if they moved in the previous movement phase...
p27, C:Tau: The battlesuits are designed to compensate for the recoil of light weapons fire, so they do not count as moving when they fire Rapid Fire weapons. This ability does not extend to heavy weapons, however, and the user must be stationary to fire them.

Seems pretty cut and dry to me that RaW, Tau jetpacks cannot move and fire heavy weapons and, as such, suck. I did want to double check this.

Q: May a model equipped with a jetpack move 6" like Jump Infantry in the movement phase?

References:

p27, C:Tau: Crisis suits are Jump Infantry, subject to the Jetpack rules...
p52, BRB: (Under Jet Packs Heading) In the Movement phase, they only move 6" when using their packs, but are always allowed to move 6" in the Assault phase, even if they don't Assault. When jet packers move in the Assault phase and do not assault, they treat difficult terrain just as other jump infantry do in the Movement phase.

This would suggest to me that a jet pack equipped unit may only move normally in the Movement phase (ie. rolling 2d6, taking the higher for difficult terrain) and only being able to 'jump' in the Assault Phase. Again, it sems pretty cut and dry to me, but I have heard quite a few people refer to this as Jump, Shoot, Jump and as such, I wanted to make sure I was interpreting it correctly.

Please help.

Frostreaver wrote:Hey all, I'm helping a buddy build his first army, (Tau) and I was hoping for some clarifications.

Also I apologize if this has already been posted or covered in other topics, but I didn't find any that covered my particular questions.

Q: May tau jetpacks (and jetpacks having the relentless rule) move and fire heavy weapons without an Advanced Stabilization System?

References:

p27, C:Tau: Crisis suits are Jump Infantry, subject to the Jetpack rules...
p52, BRB: Models with jetpacks have the 'relentless' special rule.
p76, BRB: Relentless models can shoot with rapid fire and heavy weapons counting as stationary, even if they moved in the previous movement phase...
p27, C:Tau: The battlesuits are designed to compensate for the recoil of light weapons fire, so they do not count as moving when they fire Rapid Fire weapons. This ability does not extend to heavy weapons, however, and the user must be stationary to fire them.

Seems pretty cut and dry to me that RaW, Tau jetpacks cannot move and fire heavy weapons and, as such, suck. I did want to double check this.

Q: May a model equipped with a jetpack move 6" like Jump Infantry in the movement phase?

You've got it correct. Tau Battlesuits (until they update the codex) cannot move and fire heavy weapons (i.e. markerlights) while Broadsides don't even have jet packs.

References:

p27, C:Tau: Crisis suits are Jump Infantry, subject to the Jetpack rules...
p52, BRB: (Under Jet Packs Heading) In the Movement phase, they only move 6" when using their packs, but are always allowed to move 6" in the Assault phase, even if they don't Assault. When jet packers move in the Assault phase and do not assault, they treat difficult terrain just as other jump infantry do in the Movement phase.

This would suggest to me that a jet pack equipped unit may only move normally in the Movement phase (ie. rolling 2d6, taking the higher for difficult terrain) and only being able to 'jump' in the Assault Phase. Again, it sems pretty cut and dry to me, but I have heard quite a few people refer to this as Jump, Shoot, Jump and as such, I wanted to make sure I was interpreting it correctly.

Please help.

No, you missed the part on page 52 that says "Jet Packs differ from Jump Packs in the following ways."


That means they follow the rules for Jump Packs except where noted. That means although they may only move 6" in the movement phase they have the option (as do all Jump Packs) to either 'Jump' ignoring terrain but requiring a dangerous terrain roll if beginning or ending their move in terrain OR to move as infantry.

So Jet Pack models can choose to either 'jump' 6" in the movement phase or move as infantry in the movement phase.

Cool. Thanks very much for the info, I did miss that bit.

If it helps it could be preparation for a new tau codex. Not that there are any rumours yet, just saying...

Battle suits can't take heavy weapons anyway it is only the marker drones. Which by RaW can not move and fire the ML. Though many play that they now can as the BrB rules are newer, just like many play that Carbines just cause normal pinning when in fact they should cuase 1 pinning check for a unit taking any wounds from carbines and 1 pinning check per wound caused by a carbine.

It is the porblem with out of date codex referencing existing USRs and then printing old versions of it.

I'd discuss it with my opponent first (not that at 30 points I'd ever take a marker dorne anyway)...

If Drones take the characteristics of the unit they are attached to, in this case Jetpack infrantry, why wouldnt a Markerlight Drone be able to fire its markerlight? There are no heavy weapon stipulations in the Codex surrounding drones.

p27, C:Tau: The battlesuits are designed to compensate for the recoil of light weapons fire, so they do not count as moving when they fire Rapid Fire weapons. This ability does not extend to heavy weapons, however, and the user must be stationary to fire them.

--Seems to me RAW deals only with Crisis Suits, as there is no specific reference to attached drones. There is no carryover to a markerlight drone and since there is no specific mention of it in the Tau Codex then you would have to refer to the BRB rules on Jetpack infantry and the corresponding Relentless rule.

This is always about rules as written vs. rules as "intended" and if you want to play them as such. The group i play with allows the Relentless rule to be applied to Markerlight Drones, there was no argument about this or even concern.

FlingitNow wrote:Battle suits can't take heavy weapons anyway it is only the marker drones. Which by RaW can not move and fire the ML. Though many play that they now can as the BrB rules are newer, just like many play that Carbines just cause normal pinning when in fact they should cuase 1 pinning check for a unit taking any wounds from carbines and 1 pinning check per wound caused by a carbine.

It is the porblem with out of date codex referencing existing USRs and then printing old versions of it.

I'd discuss it with my opponent first (not that at 30 points I'd ever take a marker dorne anyway)...

FlingitNow is wrong, again.
Marker Drones do not follow the Crisis Suit Rules, they follow the BRB unit type rules.

Marker Drones attached to Jet Pack units can move and fire their Markerlights, while Those Attached to Infantry Cannot.

Gwar! and Dogface76 are right; there is no stipulation in the tau codex that says drones cannot move and fire heavy weapons, ergo they default to the BRB rules.

So just to clarify (sorry I dont' bring my army books to work because of the funny looks I'd get) Tau drones take on the unit type of the unit they are attached to rather than functioning like the unit they are attached to? Meaning they will become jetpack units or infantry rather than acting like tau crisis suits or fire warriors.

Cheers for clearing that up Gwar!/Dogface in which case the lack of heavy weapons fire doesn't make any difference as Crisis suits can't take any heavy weapons.

FlingitNow wrote:Cheers for clearing that up Gwar!/Dogface in which case the lack of heavy weapons fire doesn't make any difference as Crisis suits can't take any heavy weapons.

The stealth suit sgt guy can take a markerlight he can't move and shoot with.

Although he could move 6" in the assault phase afterwards

yakface wrote:

FlingitNow wrote:Cheers for clearing that up Gwar!/Dogface in which case the lack of heavy weapons fire doesn't make any difference as Crisis suits can't take any heavy weapons.

The stealth suit sgt guy can take a markerlight he can't move and shoot with.

Actually, he can, IIRC. Stealth suits do NOT have the "Cannot fire Heavy Weapons" rule that the XV8 do

That's very true. My buddy will be pleased to know that

Yeah Stealthsuits don't have the restriction only XV8s which can't take any heavy weapons anyway...

^^ Gwar is correct on this issue
For some reason crisis and stealth suits have slightly different jetpack rules, even though adding the ability for crisis suits to fire heavy weapons would not make a difference anyway as they can't have any....

hoping for marker drones to become relentless in new codex tho so they can move and fire when with infantry