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darkPrince010 wrote:Blunt is perfectly fine, as long as it's polite or at least civil.

As for the Katana, I'd say if it gives +1S AND the 6+ invul, it should probably be an Erra'ui-only piece of wargear (or at least very spendy). Also, I assume the unit as a whole is Fleet, Move Through Cover, and Infiltrators?

That is what blunt cannot be.
Blunt is completly bulldozing through established social protocol and form.
Most people feel uncomfortable being blunt for that reason.

In that case, blunt has no place here.

It kinda does and doesn't...
While it's nice to be pleasant sugar coating something can blur the message you're trying to send...
You need a balance i would imagine.

True, but you can say "I don't think this is a good idea, but you could balance it by adding X" or "This doesn't really fit into fluff very well, but you could try Y instead."

As for wargear and unit abilities, I personally would think either the entire squad getting Stealth Fields or the +1 to cover save like kroot would be needed so they don't get pie plated off the board as easily, but the 'ui could get something along the lines of a power weapon (2x S, but doesn't ignore saves and strikes at initiative perhaps?) or similar melee or melee-enhancing weapons would help.
Maybe a "Markerlight Detector" implant, that would allow the squad to use markerlights to boost BS, or to act as photon grenades on the turn the Shadow Warriors charge?

I'm slightly confused as to where all this future tech comes from, and how these "ninjaTau" are suddenly skilled at using them.

The Tau advanced rapidly in the time they were cut off from the Imperium (I believe it is suggested because of outside help). I'm not sure where a handful of proto-tau dumped onto a hostile planet managed to a) survive, b) breed to the kind of levels where they have a large or even small civilisation, c) are anything like the Tau who were (as I understand it) artificially advanced by an outside power, d) get found by the Tau when they are so good at hiding e) decide to join up with them for lolz.

Also not entirely sure where these personal power fields are coming from, because I'm pretty sure that the Tau don't have them. Or where this 4+ armour comes from that allows them to move unhindered and stealthy give the general level of protection the Tau have, and the bulk of their standard armour.

Pretty much every characteristic that you are wanting to force the Tau into, Kroot already have.

Maybe something that gives them +2 to any cover save or a 4+ if they aren't in cover for a single turn.

@Silver: A and B are good points. This is assuming that, against all odds, whatever thingy they landed in managed to keep them alive, and that they landed on a jungleish planet (like a death planet, but not wuite as unforgiving) and survived. I think the idea isn't that they suddenlly add millions of warriors to the army ranks, but rather a hundred thousand total or so over the whole Empire.
As for C, unless I seriously missed something in fluff, the Tau advanced very quickly because they simply have a much faster evolutionary pace, both physically and socially/technologically, not because of an outside power. As for D, it's that they're good at hiding in the forests against predators, not hiding themselves from stuff probing the planet. And finally, for E, they were probably "convinced" by the Ethereals and their mind-control pheromones or something similar.

Hope that helps clear some of the stuff up better

Also, for crunch and fluff, I agree they shouldn't get invul saves from the katana. The 4+ would probably be due to a different armor configuration (Perhaps new polymers that are closer to their body form, kinda like how Shadowsun's suit is a slimmer profile than stealth/crisis suits), mainly for crunch since with 5+Sv they'll get eaten alive by anything but flashlights in shooting.

We're trying to make something that's a limited CC option, but not a meat shield like Kroot. Kroot come in numbers and have cover saves to allow them to basically be a speedbump for enemy assaults, and they're usually used defensively outside of a Kroot Spam army. The Shadow Warriors are designed to be more offensive, advancing up the flanks and hitting injured or ranged-focus squads, instead of providing the breakwater that kroot are for. They would still offer similar dakka protection for the other units, as instead of getting the 4+ cover for shooting through kroot, shots are instead being directed at the Shadow Warriors (More incentive for improved survivablity from shooting, so they can adequately perform this function). We're trying to make it so they're a viable CC threat, but no so OP that they're a clearcut option (Trying our best not to make them TEQs...)


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@purplefood: Perhaps like a flashbang or smoke grenade thing? I Think that'd work better, but it'd probably work better as an additional cost to buy for the models, instead of a leader upgrade imho.

I don't see the issue with them, I think it sounds like a good idea.

Don't know who said it (and i'm too lazy too look back through) but not all tau despise CC. In fact, if you look into the Enclave fluff, it states O'Shovah trains his warriors in CC.

With that said, instead of making a new caste I would think making them an Enclave unit would work better. Something like a Chapter tactic for SM giving Farsight the ability to field them as troops.

PS. - Sorry if any of this was brough up already, i skimmed through a majority of the longer posts

That might work, except I'd be afraid it'd start to blur the differences between Tau and SM (Except Tau would have the weaker CC abilities). Perhaps allow an Enclave upgrade to the commander, and have him give a buff to the squad he joins (and only that squad), or a very minor overall army buff? (Don't know if this overlaps with SM, as I don't have the codex)

I would say either of these things- either A) Farsight has had no contact with the newly found caste, which is better fluff-wise, or B) Farsight has no restriction of how many shadow caste warrior squads he can take, which is better game-play wise. They are already troops, but are 0-2.

I am considering changing it to 0-1, but I don't know if that would diminish their effectiveness.

I would say 0-1, just so they don't overshadow kroot, and to stay true to the limited number of the caste members that probably exist, with maybe 0-3 for Farsight or something.

Sounds good. changing OP now

Also, they'll need something to count as assault grenades so they can be viable charging out of cover (No defensive grenades imo though, to keep them more fragile. On the fence about giving them ability to buy photon grenades). Perhaps a "Flare grenade" or something for a fluffy name. I do like purplefood's idea of a cover save-boosting smokescreen grenade of some sort: Once per game, they get +2 to their save in cover, or get a 4 or 5+ save if out of cover, and it's an upgrade to buy for the Erra'ui.

Kanluwen wrote:

yamgrenade wrote:

Kanluwen wrote:Tau, period,despise close combat.

That, aside from suddenly 'creating' a new Caste that was some kind of...I don't know, genetic freakshow, is what is so silly.

They developed it out of necessity. And it isn't creating, it is discovering...how is it a genetic freak show? They are pretty much normal Tau, they just took a different path evolutionarily.

Unknown to the crew of the ship, they had just indirectly created the 6'th caste of the Tau- The Shadow Caste. When the samples of the Tau were dumped, they miraculously found their way into the gravitational reach of a planet, and crashed onto the jungle world of Stolag. Luckily, they were the Hardy plains-dwellers of T'au, and became expert hunters of the jungle. They soon realized that to survive, they would have to change their tactics. They adapted to the close spaces and darkness of the jungle. They developed much more slowly than the unified castes, but at the time of their discovery, they had mastered stealth and assassination and had begun building handguns and handbows. They joined The Greater Good quickly, and have been serving The Tau Empire ever since.

Fire Warriors do not suddenly become 'ninjas', just because they were "dumped in a jungle world".

Especially considering that the Fire Caste dwells on a few swamp worlds, and hasn't become ninjas.

Basically this. I do not see A bunch of firewarriors all of sudden becoming the Punisher and being able to kill everything.

Ok, they aren't fire warriors that suddenly picked up swords and said, "Hey, I can now use this thing!" It was 3,000 years of cultural evolution that led to a different kind of warfare.


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darkPrince010 wrote:Also, they'll need something to count as assault grenades so they can be viable charging out of cover (No defensive grenades imo though, to keep them more fragile. On the fence about giving them ability to buy photon grenades). Perhaps a "Flare grenade" or something for a fluffy name. I do like purplefood's idea of a cover save-boosting smokescreen grenade of some sort: Once per game, they get +2 to their save in cover, or get a 4 or 5+ save if out of cover, and it's an upgrade to buy for the Erra'ui.

That sounds good. Smoke grenade sounds awesome but it should be a 5+ save.

Don't forget in that same time the T'au on the homewrold developed plasma weapons, spaceflight, etc. Plus, they don't kill stuff Punisher-style. They simply go after the weak/wounded stuff (Sorta like real-world pack hunters) and finish it off. One of these charging a SM assault squad or a couple terminators would get eaten alive, and rightfully so.


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Agreed. 5+ out of cover sounds good.

Flavor wise for Tau I always thought that, they should be able to shoot into assaults, as it would fit well with "The Greater Good" to sacrifice a small part for the overall gain.

But they also think that sacrificing a force is an unneccesary loss.

True, possibly only do it with drones, or kroot?

Drones definately, I don't think kroot care enough as the individual soldiers are just mercs.

Drones causing morale checks on crisis and broadside suits...

Yes, drones need to be seriously changed. I doubt that when a drone dies, the broadsides leaps from his suit to cry on the twisted metal corpse, then runs away off the edge of the world.

Mine have done that, many many times. I've lost more Broadsides from panicking over a dead drone than I have from enemy shooting or assaults. They literally grow wings and zip 12" along the board each turn...

I'll leave those changes to you in your thread

Lol, I already removed the Drones cause fleeing rule. The Winged Broadsides however are a direct result of my traitor dice (Cool conversion idea there... )

Make sure to fix the dice to always roll ones if you do that

Nonono, those are the dice set aside for when they're trying to pen a landraider. It's very important they don't get mixed up

EDIT: Added shock slings. Tell me what you guys think

Approved. Plus, I think the Smoke Grenades are perfect. Hell, maybe allow regular FW squads to buy that too, to give them a bit of surviveability should a major dakka attack hit a group outside of cover...

When I think of a "Shadow Caste" I think more of a secret Caste created to watch over the others and ''remove'' the trouble-makers in the other Castes. Secret Police kind of a thing.

Definitely not Fire-Warriors that all of a sudden decide to pick up a sword because of being stranded on a world.


Going with the name of "Shadow Warrior" why not give them the same Stealth Generator as the Stealth Suits.

Also, as others have said before, you should really make better fluff to support this rather than just "because I said so".

Farsight Enclaves attract many more of these because of his tactical philosophy, and as such get 0-3 instead

Also this, they don't focus on Close-Combat, they were just forced to once, and then broke away from the rest of the Empire and their leader found a powerful sword. They still fight a lot like the Tau Empire, just with more of a focus on elite battlesuit forces.