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I have been playing around with the idea of creating a small Tau force... maybe 1500 pts.

I had a Tau army years ago, when it first came out, but I ended up selling it off to pay for my WARMACHINE interest.

Anyway... I remember that in the older version of the codex, if a unit had gun-drones with it, the Tau player could "sacrifice" those drones first as if they were taking the hits for their squad. I was reading through the new codex and I don't remember seeing that. Also with the new "Look out sir!!!" rules in place... has anybody heard what the status of this is now?

Also.... I have read a number of rumors pages and I don't seem to be able to find a reliable date for the release of new stuff. June seems to be the one I hear the most.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

The way 6th works now, you can still do something similar. Just make sure your drones are closer to the enemy than whatever you are trying to keep alive. No fancy rule needed. Casualties are taken from the front nowadays.

There isn't a set month that I'm aware of. I haven't used my Tau at all in 6th but I imagine that the staples are all still good to go. Firewarriors,Devilfish and magnitized Crisis suits are not going anywhere me thinks. I'd start there.

You can indeed lookout sir! wounds onto the drones if they are the closest models. Howver the more reliable use of them would be to place then in front of the unit towards the expected direction of fire so all hits from that direction will strike the drones first.

Tau have been "about to get a new codex in a few months" for a while now.

And as Gifblaur said, you can use the drones as meat(metal?) shields by putting them in the front, or getting Shield drones to act like an additional wound, I believe. I'm not an expert at space commie shenanigans, though.

Edit: Also, Look Out, Sir! only applies to characters, so you shouldn't rely on drone meatshields if you stick them with Firewarriors or Pathfinders.

Drones can take hits for the unit just like before, only now you can only do it with positioning or using LOS rolls.

As for the codex, look for a may-june release

I think it may have to do with i believe 5th or 4th edition 40k where people could pull whatever model they wanted when allocating wounds. but now it is allocated from the front back (which makes more sense). but you can pull the same effect as others have stated by using them as forward meat shields.

also i believe i heard tau in April but ya know the nature of rumors :/ .