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Alright, I'll try my hand at a special character for this then.

Through out the Tau Empire during the Third Sphere expansion the name Shadowsun was amongst the most widely known, but there were new stories added for a plethora of Tau Fire Caste members. Perhaps least notable amongst them was Commander Darkstrike. As a young Shas'vre he witnessed first hand the ability of the Catachan XXXVII on the deathworld of Vardellan, the ability to engage in hard fast strikes, and melt away into the forest once again. During this time Aloh'Kais was assigned to a pathfinder Unit at his own request, instead of being mounted into a battlesuit. Aloh'kais learned far faster than his squad how to read the motile trees, and even the kroot assigned to the Cadre learned awe at his skills.

It took several months in that jungle before the Tau were finally able to strike telling blows against the Catachan, and in each of those blows it was Darkstrike that lead the recon units. At the end of his time in the jungles, he chose to join the stealthsuit teams so that he could apply all that he had learned in their use. Within a year of fighting in several warzones, commander Shadowsun took note of this still young Shas'vre and elevated him to a Shas'el under her direct command. Commander Darkstrike took the promotion in stride, and instead of leading units into the field immediately, began to train numerous Pathfinder and Stealthsuit units in the way of Voltkra, the Ghost War.

The way of Voltkra that he taught them combines elements of both the Mont'ka (Killing blow) and Kauyon (Patient Hunter) approach that the Tau utilize. Darkstrike has trained many stealthsuit teams on how to operate independant of the main force, allowing them to strike hard without warning and leave the enemy throwing volleys of random fire out in what they guess to be the proper direction. After they have stung the enemy those stealthsuits will strike once more in a more visible manner pulling the enemy from their formation into prepared areas with more stealthsuits waiting in ambush.

Shas'el T'au Mont'yr Aloh'Kais (Commander Darkstrike)

170 points

WS3 BS5 S4 T4 W3 I3 A2 LD9 Sv3+/4++

Unit Type- Jump Infantry
Wargear- Barracuda Missile Pod, Burst cannon, XV28 stealth suit, 2 Shadow Drones, Shield Generator
Special Rules- Independant Character, Stealth, Silent Hunter, Covert Assault, Behind Enemy Lines, Young Protege

XV28 Stealth Suit- The XV-28 stealth suit is amongst the newest Tau battlesuits to be allowed for field testing. Given specifically to Commander Darkstrike to use because of his fame as a shadow warrior, the suit incorporates several new features never before seen on Tau battlesuits. The stealthsuit is equipped with jetpack, Barracuda Missile Pod and a Shadow Drone controller. Additionally any unit targetting an XV28 stealthsuit must roll a night vision test to see if they can shoot at it.

Barracuda Missile Pod- With the incredible success in the field of the ubiquitous missile pod, the Earth caste weapons' engineers felt that they could produce a weapon of even greater flexibility than the normal missile pod or smart missile system. The missile system allows the unit to lay down a withering hail of anti-infantry firepower, or give a faster firing standard anti-tank capable shot because of improved reloading speeds. There is first of the new missiles designed were the micro-missile clusters, which launch a volley of pen-sized micromissiles that are exceedingly short ranged, but explode into frangible shards that make a mockery of cover.
Barracuda Missile Pod S7 AP4 36" Assault 4, Gets Hot!
Barracuda Missile Pod Micro Missiles S4 AP5 18" Assault 1, Large Blast, Ignores Cover*

Shadow Drone Controller- The newest drone types that have been rolled out by the Tau are called Shadow drones. These drones have no weapons to speak of, but instead flood the area around them with a colloidal gas that can create mirror image holograms of the stealthsuit. When a unit containing shadow drones gets shot at, the owning player may roll a D3 and allocate that many wounds to the holograms before allocating to the unit. This has no effects in assault as it works only against shooting attacks.

Silent Hunter- Ever since learning how to disappear into the terrain by watching the Catachan, Commander Darkstrike has managed to mimic their abilities. Commander Darkstrike may be held in reserves even in missions that don't use that rule. When the unit is available, they may be placed anywhere on the table that is outside of 1" from an enemy model. The unit can fire all available weapons, but may not make an assault move, even with the jetpack rule, for that turn. In addition once per game during the owning player's assault phase he may be removed from the table as he has melded back into the terrain, and placed in the following turn's movement phase using his deployment rules.

Covert Assault- As Darkstrike has spend so much time away from a Hunter Cadre proper, he has learned to make due with nothing but stealth suits which he uses to sting his opponents time and again. When Commander Darkstrike is chosen Stealthsuit Squads may be chosen as a troop choice.

Behind Enemy Lines- Ever since he has spent so much time training new Stealthsuit pilots on how to operate in an ambush capacity, those same pilots have time and again proven they are capable of working in a proficient fireteam from an ambush. Any stealthsuit in an army using Commander Darkstrike may upgrade to have a hard-wired target lock for +5 points per model to represent the unit choosing their targets independent of one another to inflict maximum damage before melding back into the shadows.

Young Protege- As Commander Darkstrike has spent time training and fighting alongside various stealthsuit Shas'vre, they have come to trust him and are always willing to work alongside the venerable master of Voltkra. Darkstrike may have up to 3 Stealthsuit Shas'vre attached to him as a retinue, each Shas'vre costs 35 points, and may upgrade their burst cannons to Fusion blasters for +5 points or Plasma Rifles for +10 points.

I think thats really cool.

I was think about how the way i have been defeated may times is for my opponent to deep strike his units right next to my guys. no time to take them out before they get me.

It would be good if there was some kind of way to stop deep striking. I was thinking that an extention on the seeker missile rules could be made that ment that when there was a unit deep striking one missile could be fired. on a 4+, the deep striking unit would count as if there had been a deep striking mishap with -2 on the mishap table.
This represents the ability for defensive missiles to shoot down incoming units.

like some of your ideas KK. Good to see someone thinking about Tau.

Anyway, on to my suggestion. It involves Sniper Drone Teams

Take the Teams out of HS slots. Instead, write something like

If a Firecaste Warrior Squad numbers 12 models, they may purchase a single Sniper Drone Team for XX points. This team acts as a separate unit in all respects with the exception that the teams may not capture objectives and do not give up a kill point if destroyed.

Now you have dedicated support fire from the FCW squads without the teams competing for railgun slots (they'll always lose out). I like the idea of dedicated snipers covering the advance of the FCW

Like others have said "Evade! Evade!" is just too powerful.

It'd be better to involve a leadership test to pull off and should result in the unit losing either its movement or shooting phase. It is also something that shouldn't be able to be done every turn.

Alternatively, if you want the dice to decide, you could use a rule like "Unit falls back 2d6 (take the highest) and assaulting unit assaults an additional d6" You may be able to get away, and maybe you can't. You could also use this style to kite assualt units into an ambush.

Really, it depends on which you think would work better. With the first way, you're either sacrificing an attack to get away, or risking getting torn to pieces after stopping to shoot. The second way, you may be able to make a safe get away, and maybe you won't. Seems unreliable in a game where strategy is key.

I really like the freedom with making drone squadrons. One of the main things i'd like to see in their next update is the option to take units of shield drones to block fire and tie up units.

I'm not a fan of the stealth suit changes. I always got the impression they were meant to be short range suits, so railguns doesn't work IMO. I would prefer to see them get a BS upgrade and moved to FA.

I think the fusion blaster shouldn't become heavy. FB suits can be very useful but making them heavy kills this tactic.

I was trying to come up with something for the tech leader guy or possably the suit guy. designed to be multi-perpose.

Because he is awesome, he hooked himself up with an super big suit, it’s a bit bigger than a dreadnaught. It is designed to take out large targets before they become too dangerous.

Commander Shas’o F’roihi

Walker
Ws 3
BS 6
F 13
S 12
R 12
I 2
A 3
Ld 10

He has the acute senses, relentless, heavy jet pack, evade evade! and tank hunter special rules.

Heavy jet pack: the unit gains the deep strike universal rules. During the assault phase, if the unit involved in a assault, the unit my move 1 d6. Counts as having a jet pack and counts as jump infantry.

Evade evade!: you tell me what people have decided for this thing.

He is equipped with twin-linked railguns, twin-linked phased ion guns, Shield generator and a hard-wired drone controller. He must take 1 or 2 drones.

I have no idea what the phased ion guns do but if they have the gets hot rules, it doesn’t blow the guy up straight away. Instead, the suit is unable to fire any weapons in the shooting phase the following turn as the weapons are cooling off.

I dont have will power to write background.

There's lots to think about there!

Keep them coming, please.

i cant think of a cool designation for the suit. it would have to be cool like crisis or hazard.

maybe prohibit or something. any ideas???

I do like the Evade Rule but if people thinks its to powerful perhaps some sort of defensive fire moments before the assault. I do think The tau Firewarrirors honor guard should be fearless. I mean they do every thing for the ethereal's. They love and respect them they are just about sacrilegious to them. And I do think the firewarriors would stand any ground willing to die to protect them ( If your including some fluff into rules) Imho

I think that there are a lot of ideas out there for the drones and for the Fire warriors, but i think the biggest thing left is the suits and the allies. Here is my stab at the suits.


Elite: Crisis suit Stats: Shas-ui
WS BS S T A W I LD SV
.2....4..4.5..2.2..3.8...3+
35 pts each. 1-3 in the unit
1 Shas-vre (+1A and +1 LD) +10 pts.

Special rules:
Jetpack: (confers relentless)
Deep Strike
Acute Senses
XV-8 Battlesuit: can always fire 2 weapons, may use Evade, Evade! (whatever it ends up being), and bonding knives.

Wargear:
Burst Canon
Photon Grenades
EMP Grenades
Shas-vre has a drone controller

All Shas-ui of the unit are armed the same.
Trade the Bust Canon for:
Flamer: Free
Fusion blaster: +5 pts
Rail Rifle: +5 pts
Plasma Rifle: +10 pts
TL-Bust canon: +3 pts
TL-Fusion: +7
TL-Plasma: +15
Cyclic Ion: +10 (Shas-vre only)

May take a second weapon from this list:
Burst Canon: +5 pts.
Smart Missile System: +10 pts
Missile Pod: +10 pts
Plasma Rifle: +15 pts
Airburster: +15 (Shas-vre only)

Notes: I tried to make them more of a 5th edition style, which means that there is no more open wargear section and they come with all of their special rules instead of buying them. They come with a lot more as standard for 35 pts. (targeting Array, Muti-tracker, Drone Controller, Burst Canon). I wanted them to be T5 because otherwise they are just Crack Missile bait. To compensate I gave them only 2 wounds. With BS 4 as standard they do not need to have as many TL weapon options. You can but anti-infantry, anti- transport, or anti-tank versions.






Fast Attack: Stealth Suits
Statline: Shas-ui
WS BS S T A I W LD SV
.2....4..3.4..1.2.1..8...3+
Shas-vre +1A and +1 LD
unit of 1 shas-vre and 2 Shas-ui for 85 pts.
may add up to 7 more shas-ui for 25 pts each.

Special rules:
Jet Pack (Confers Relentless)
Acute Senses
Infiltrate
Stealth Armor: Stealth, skilled flyer, always roll for night fighting distance to be shot at, Evade Evade!,
May move an additional 6" in Either the movement or Assault phase in addition to the 6" allowed for the jet pack rule.

Wargear:
Burst Cannon
Photon Grenades
EMP Grenades
Shas-vre has a drone controller

All suits are armed the same, may trade the Burst Canon for
Flamer: Free
Fusion Blaster: +5 pts
Plasma Rifle: +10 pts.


Notes: The Tau hate Close combat and as such they would not design a suit that only increased S. the suit is designed for protection thus added T not S. They can take a variety of different short ranged weapons. Most importantly they no longer compete with the crisis suits. Crisis is durable and slower, while Steath is faster. Removed Deep Strike, Added Stealth and Skilled flyer, so you can actually get into cover and not take too much damage, especially since they may move 2 times a turn and take 2 dangerous terrain tests.


FINAL NOTE: I was basing my weapon prices around the Burst Canon being R"18 S6 AP5 A3 since I want the Pulse Carbine to be R18" S5 AP5 A2. The burst Canon should be a bit better than just another Pule shot.

I was just thinking how it would be expected for there to be suits in every FOC. we have Crisis in elite, shadow in fast attack and broadsides in HS. HQ gets upgraded versions of these. that would leave a troop choise. XV1 seem on the horizon, or even a bigger bigger suit for HS. The suits would be the XV1 'caution' battlesuit and the XV10 'Prohibiter' battlesuit. we al know that they only have eight numbers but these are the IoM desegnations.


like the XV8 and XV2/5 thing you got. watch out cos you called the fusion blaster the fusion gun, and what happed to all the cool little gagets. the multi is includend but there is still use for shields, target locks, targeting arrays. if the Targeting array is not included, they would be BS 5 standed elites. In refrence to the tread about XV9s by me, there were comments about how the standed teams should be made of multapules of 4, as this is the number of fingers in each hand. This would mean that you could have 4 XV8s in a team and maybe 4 or 8 stelths. this putting the shas'vre and three shas'ui as standed at 100pts and can add up to 4 shas'ui for 25 each.

I really hope that GW looks at this some time

I was saving some of the more cool and interesting upgrades for the HQ suits. I think that most other 5th edition books have any special rules standard on a squad and then you can upgrade with some USR's. I think that Tau can be very hard to play against as you have a huge wargear section that can be modeled or "Hard Wired" and it is easy to forget exactly what is on the suits. I kinda wanted to redesign the suits such that their special rules would be standard, except for the HQ who would be more customizable.

Fixed the gun names. What do people think of them being T5 W2? Should Stealth teams be able to take Markerlights?


I think that there should be s special character for Stealth/Crisis suits that allows one unit of said suits to become troops, I do not theink that we need another "standard" troops entry as long as the HQ's open some options.

What races should be included in the allies?
Kroot (Troops)
Vespids (Fast)
Demurig (Elite)
Humans (Heavy)


I also feel like the book is a little empty. Right now, it seem slike the only thing in the elite slot is Crisis suits. What if Pathfinders were Elite, and were a little better (BS4?).


What should Markerlights do? I am not sure the old system is what it should be. I think that there should be a chart as to what penalties a unit has depending on the number of markerlight hits. All units can take advantage of the markerlight. Tokens last one turn. All results are cumulative. For Example
1 hit: -1 cover save
2 hits: All hits count a pinning
3 hits: -1 cover save
4 hits: Re-roll to hit in the shooting phase against this unit.
.......and so on

I think that the seeker missiles should just fire on their own. I think that the Skyray needs some work, as in I do not like it just as a big rack for seekers. What about changing it into an anti-skimmer vehicle, similar to the Hydra.

svendrex wrote:

I also feel like the book is a little empty. Right now, it seem slike the only thing in the elite slot is Crisis suits. What if Pathfinders were Elite, and were a little better (BS4?).


What should Markerlights do? I am not sure the old system is what it should be. I think that there should be a chart as to what penalties a unit has depending on the number of markerlight hits. All units can take advantage of the markerlight. Tokens last one turn. All results are cumulative. For Example
1 hit: -1 cover save
2 hits: All hits count a pinning
3 hits: -1 cover save
4 hits: Re-roll to hit in the shooting phase against this unit.
.......and so on

I think that the seeker missiles should just fire on their own. I think that the Skyray needs some work, as in I do not like it just as a big rack for seekers. What about changing it into an anti-skimmer vehicle, similar to the Hydra.

I would like it if the seeker had some power over deep striking. See above.
-1 to cover is ok because of the large amount of cover out there isn 5th but what about these.

all units shooting at the marked unit get these bonuses.
1 hit: +1 to BS can go above 5.
2 hits: marked unit gets -1 to cover save
3 hits: all shots fired count as pinning
4 hits: Re-roll to hit in the shooting phase against this unit.
more hits count as -1 to cover save for the marked unit.
1 markerlight can be removed to fire a seeker missile at the marked unit. the blast template must be centerd on a unit in the unit that had a hit removed
the markerlight hits last only during the shooting phase they were fired in.

about the seeking missiles.
new rules for them could be.
one time, S8,AP3,barrage or ordanance or something. small blast
they are computer controled so count as having BS 5 for the template drifting
they would cost 20pts each and count as one weapon each. this way it would be much harder to destroy a skyray by taking out all its weapons, giving it a total of 12 at the most weapons. mwa ha ha.

for one, i dont play tau, but i would like to see more auxilaries (renegade guardsmen?) just my $0.02

So here is what I think I have in mind for an FOC So far


HQ
Shas-o
Shas-el (able to be in Stealth/Crisis armor)

Ethereal (Morale Benefits, Actually Good!)

Kroot Shaper (psyker/defence upgrade kroot more)

Special Characters TBD (farsight, Shadowsun, Pope, Kroot, Vespid?)

Elite
Crisis
Pathfinders
Demmurig (Furious Counterattack?)

Troops
Fire Warriors (Carbine better for trasports, cheeper)
Kroot (come with armor save, regular stealth)

Special
Drones

Fast Attack
Stealth Suit
Piranha
Vespid

Heavy Support
Broadside (lots of railguns, all get submunitions?)
Hammerhead (Stronger Railgun, goes through targets?)
Gueves'a (Similar to guard Heavy Weapon Teams)



So far it is Balaced with 2 troops and then in Elite, Fast, and Heavy there is a choice of a Tau unit, a Tau Battle Suit, and an Allied unit.

maybe drone squads could be conciderd non scoring troops

Up in my long post about drones, I made them count as Non-scoring, and even non-contesting units. You pay for them all as one unit, but then you can deploy them either embarked on vehicles, attached to squads with a drone controller or as separate squadrons. I did not want them using an FOC slot, but maybe a unit of only drones counts as troops.

I needed to say what happens to drones when they are in a unit and the drone controller dies. Easy.

When a unit looses a model equiped with a drone controller, If there are now too many drones attached to that unit, designate which drones are no longer part of the unit, all drones forced out of a unit on the same turn count as a single unit of only drones.

So here is what I think I have in mind for an FOC So far


HQ
Shas-o
Shas-el (able to be in Stealth/Crisis armor)

Ethereal (Morale Benefits, Actually Good!)

Kroot Shaper (psyker/defence upgrade kroot more)

Special Characters TBD (farsight, Shadowsun, Pope, Kroot, Vespid?)

Elite
Crisis
Pathfinders
Demmurig (Furious Counterattack?)

Troops
Fire Warriors (Carbine better for trasports, cheeper)
Kroot (come with armor save, regular stealth)

Special
Drones

Fast Attack
Stealth Suit
Piranha
Vespid

Heavy Support
Broadside (lots of railguns, all get submunitions?)
Hammerhead (Stronger Railgun, goes through targets?)
Gueves'a (Similar to guard Heavy Weapon Teams)

I really feel that Gueves'a should be troops not heavy support. It makes no sense to me, I don't think they employ the Guevea do do any thing else but be foot soldiers. So I think they should be A troops choice. Now I could see the squad having access to a heavy weapon in its own squad! And also if they did have some sort of heavy weapon for heavy support It better be good enough to compete with the broadsides or hammerhead other wise IMO its a waste of an entry in the book. Time could be spent on another unit,Other then that I wouldn't mind more races in the army. I wouldn't mind vespid if they became like 10 points with an ap4 gun, at the moment I do not like that they cost more then a space marine and are no where as good.

I Kinda wanted there to an option for some type of allied unit in each FOC slot. I was thinking that the humans wound be a cheaper option for lower levels and would carry some of the medium Strength weapons. As in you could get a few S10 shots with the broadsides for heavy stuff, or a bunch of S6-7-8 shots for lighter stuff with saves. That being said, I can see humans as troops with a weapon platform option.

What about a krootox unit as Heavy Support?

Ledabot wrote:I was just thinking how it would be expected for there to be suits in every FOC. we have Crisis in elite, shadow in fast attack and broadsides in HS. HQ gets upgraded versions of these. that would leave a troop choise. XV1 seem on the horizon, or even a bigger bigger suit for HS. The suits would be the XV1 'caution' battlesuit and the XV10 'Prohibiter' battlesuit. we al know that they only have eight numbers but these are the IoM desegnations.


like the XV8 and XV2/5 thing you got. watch out cos you called the fusion blaster the fusion gun, and what happed to all the cool little gagets. the multi is includend but there is still use for shields, target locks, targeting arrays. if the Targeting array is not included, they would be BS 5 standed elites. In refrence to the tread about XV9s by me, there were comments about how the standed teams should be made of multapules of 4, as this is the number of fingers in each hand. This would mean that you could have 4 XV8s in a team and maybe 4 or 8 stelths. this putting the shas'vre and three shas'ui as standed at 100pts and can add up to 4 shas'ui for 25 each.

I really hope that GW looks at this some time

I called it the fusion gun because I think fusion blaster is stupid.

A lot of wargear is not included because I'm not trying to change every single thing in the codex, and I don't want to write out everything in the codex.

It doesn't mean I think the wargear should be dropped.

Kilkrazy wrote:

Ledabot wrote:I was just thinking how it would be expected for there to be suits in every FOC. we have Crisis in elite, shadow in fast attack and broadsides in HS. HQ gets upgraded versions of these. that would leave a troop choise. XV1 seem on the horizon, or even a bigger bigger suit for HS. The suits would be the XV1 'caution' battlesuit and the XV10 'Prohibiter' battlesuit. we al know that they only have eight numbers but these are the IoM desegnations.


like the XV8 and XV2/5 thing you got. watch out cos you called the fusion blaster the fusion gun, and what happed to all the cool little gagets. the multi is includend but there is still use for shields, target locks, targeting arrays. if the Targeting array is not included, they would be BS 5 standed elites. In refrence to the tread about XV9s by me, there were comments about how the standed teams should be made of multapules of 4, as this is the number of fingers in each hand. This would mean that you could have 4 XV8s in a team and maybe 4 or 8 stelths. this putting the shas'vre and three shas'ui as standed at 100pts and can add up to 4 shas'ui for 25 each.

I really hope that GW looks at this some time

I called it the fusion gun because I think fusion blaster is stupid.

A lot of wargear is not included because I'm not trying to change every single thing in the codex, and I don't want to write out everything in the codex.

It doesn't mean I think the wargear should be dropped.

thats reasonable

there are rumers that there will be another suit type. What do you think it will be. halfway between the XV8 and XV25, or will it be bigger you think. If it is bigger it might be a walker instead of jump inf

LoneCoon wrote:Like others have said "Evade! Evade!" is just too powerful.

Now I'm not singling you out, just too lazy to pop over to the first page and get quotes lol. That being said, I have to say that Evade! Evade! isn't as overpowered as people think it is. When you look at it from a rules creation standpoint, it's really not much different than the Combat Tactics used by Space Marines. In Killkrazy's wording it just has the added bonus of keeping a large amount of FW out of combat, but that only hurts the FW because they don't get attacks back. The way I had wrote it, they can fall back without even needing to have an LD test put on them, but they cannot strike in the ensuing combat if they are caught by an enemy unit the turn they use E!E!. Either way, if anyone is saying that Evade! Evade! is overpowered, then by that very definition the Space marines codex should be outlawed because Combat tactics is absolutely broken.

oh dear. now im going to have to find out what combat tactics is. uh

Combat tactics in a nutshell; When a marine squad with this rule is forced to take a Leadership test, they may chose to automatically fail the test and fall back.

That's all it is, but coupled with the Space Marines having the rule, ATSKNF, they make the squads interesting. So what that means, I'm punishing you for shooting at me before you charge into assault! Basically Evade! Evade! mimics that, but makes it so you don't have to be made to take a LD test only have an opponent attempting to assault you. It does not mean you will automatically be taken out of their range. On the other hand any players worth their salt will overcome the fact that you can fall back instead of fighting in assault, and make you regret doing that most times.

Thats nasty. But how often will they need a Ld test. ont often vs Tau.
Evade evade is good at 2d6 because it means that there is a chance for them, to be caught, but not much. the only things that are going to be really troubled by this is orcs. space marienes can still shoot.

You can check my post earlier for the percentages. Even a 1D6 Fall back move makes it very hard to get in assault with the tau as you have to launch assaults from about 3" instead of 6" and even then you have to roll well.

Right now, the one thing I do not like about the tau codex is that you do not want to deal damage to them in close combat. You want to deal as little damage as possible so that way you stay locked in combat and avoid damage. To me, that feels very wrong in terms of fluff. I think that the Tau will have enough ways to block assaults if their transports become viable, and drone become expendable.

My Evade Evade rule:
At the end of any assault phase, if the unit has won combat, or if the unit has lost combat but passed their leadership test, Roll a D6. On a 3+ the unit may make a consolidation move of 2d6. If this move is made, the unit must take wounds equal to the amount they lost close combat by (only if the unit lost combat). Any enemy units that are no longer locked in combat may make a consolidation move of 1D6.

What this rule does for the Tau:
1) Right now Tau players HATE having defensive grenades, as they are not helpful. That tau player will WANT to lose combat and either be wiped out or flee so that way they can bring their shooting to bear. This will allow the tau player to not be locked in combat and they will want defensive grenades to help them take fewer wounds from Evade, Evade!

2) Enemy players will want to damage the tau on the charge, instead to trickling into assault. The tau will probably escape at the end of combat, so the charging player will want to do damage, and will want to win combat to either wipe the squad or to force wounds on the unit.

3) It keeps the tau from being locked in combat, which is worse then them losing units in combat at all. With a decently priced transport, the tau will have all of the options they will need to block assaults for several turns. you can block the assaults with single drones forcing the enemy to go around or waste a turn fighting drones. You can Fish of Fury, and use the transport, and the drones in the transport to make a wall you can shoot under. This is of course after you Alpha strike away all of the enemy's mobility with your heavy firepower.

Those are my opinions on that.

I noticed that Above i put something like pay 100pts and you get 3 shas'ui and one shas'vre stealth suit. After some thought i think it would be good to make a system were you can have unlimited shas'vre in a squad. each costing 10 more pts.

this means that you could put a basic 4 man squad of stealth suits at 90pts.
you can add 0-4 shas'ui at 25pts each.
You can upgrade a shas'ui to a shas'vre for 10pts.

keep all the other stuf the same.

crisis suit would be something like....

1-4 man squads
35pts each
upgrade from shas'ui to shas'vre for 10pts.

all other things stay the same.

I am thinking about making a list of stuff in this thread to see how it works. Btw. dont really like the pathfinders in the elites foc. tw important units types in the same place makes it hard to really take advantage of them both. I think that the stealth suits and pathfinders should stay were they are. This keeps the substutes for these choises together. Even put them in troops, since they kinda are just troops. there even the same level as the fire warrors. Shas'la and shas'ui

you know how you want an allied race in every slot. well the demerang were the ones that gave the tau the ion cannon and ion tech. they could be used as some kind of anti troop/elite heavy support unit with some kind of attilery type unit that uses the ion cannon.

The humans, well they proberly will end up as guards with pulse rifles and a 4+ armor. they would be 0-1 thou i think.


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I cant think what you would also put in the elite slot that would be good enough that people would take them over XV8s


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If you do put the pathfinder into troops, then XV2/5s would be great in quick attack.

Hmm... Yeah I think the biggest problem is that people play tau for the XV-8's and not for the fire warriors.

I could see the pathfinders as being an "upgrade" from firewarriors. For +7 pts you gain infiltrate and add a markerlight to your pulse carbine maybe?

I just do not know what to put in elites either. Demurig as heavy with anti-troop ion weapons sounds good and I like the Stealth Suits as Fast Attack.


Other ideas for elite slots:
1) some sort of more elite fire warrior, carries heavier weapons and is BS4. Has other special rules.
2) Some sort of close combat troop, more so than the Kroot. Some thing that can fight well, maybe another ally...What were those shadowy dog soldiers called again?
3) Krootox unit, fast counter charge unit with some guns, like Rough Riders kinda
4) ??

thinking about t now, I do not know how to compete with XV-8 as they are everyone's favorite at the moment.


Another un-related Idea. The Skyray. What if it could take different missiles? Like it could trade the seekers for different missile types, just like the new Dark Eldar Fliers. Large Blast anti-horde no cover, Small Blast AP2, some thing else cool? other missiles still fired like seekers, just a different effect.

well there is the idea for the anti deep strikers. they could be 10 points and are fired when a enemy unit attempts a deepstrike. see above for rest. There could be a missile that makes a blast to take out GEQ and the current seeker takes out MEQ and transports. done.

they all cost 10pts each.

list is almost done. its 2k