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Have had an ongoing discussion with another Tau player recently about when you are supposed to declare overcharge.

Granted we have had no conflict on when to declare riptide nova overcharge as that is clearly defined to be done in the movement phase but he states that all ion weapons must be declared to be overcharging in the movement phase and I can't find any mention of this before moves have been made.

Traditionally, I've only done the riptide nova charge that way, but I still declared if I was firing in nova mode on the shooting phase.
Similarly I've also declared if I was shooting Ion Accelerator or other ion weapons in their overcharge mode in the shooting phase.

Who's playing it right?

Also incidentally:

1) can seeker missles be fired manually from a plane without marker light support and if so, what is their arc of fire? Can it shoot backwards at something? Is the burst cannon on devilfish and the razorshark strike fighter turret mounted?

2) If a skyray got 2 markerlight hits, do you have to shoot the missles with the markerlights at BS 5 ignore cover or can you shoot it at what is essentially bs 6 if the skyray buffs its own shooting?

3) how are you supposed to play target lock? Do you have to declare what's firing at what before you roll or do you just roll one guy at a time (seeing what the previous model just did)

In regards to overcharging non-ritide ion weapons - when do you declare if you are firing a Krak or Frag Missile? It is exactly the same thing, 1 weapon 2 profiles.

For the rest, I'm not sure.

With multiple modes of fire you declare when making the shooting attack. Nova charge is different because it says it is over charging is essentially the same as firing a combi weapon or Psycannon etc you choose when you fire.

1) yes seekers can now be fired as a normal weapon. They are hull mounted so have the usual fire arc.

2) essentially see above the answer is yes.

3) with TL you have to declare before firing as all rolls to hit should be simultaneous no seeing what you've done before choosing where to fire the next guy.

I would say declare when shooting, can't imagine why it would need to be done at another time.

The Devilfish burst cannon is hull mount, not turret.

The burst cannons on devilfish are not hull mounted. They have nearly 180 degrees of rotation .

maceria wrote:
The Devilfish burst cannon is hull mount, not turret.

Nope, it is on a nose turret just with a limited fire arc of abit over 90.

 sudojoe wrote:
3) how are you supposed to play target lock? Do you have to declare what's firing at what before you roll or do you just roll one guy at a time (seeing what the previous model just did)

The whole unit declares they're shooting, then you use target locks for anyone who has them to during the usuall pick a target part of the shooting attacks, after that you move on to resolve the rest of the steps for a unit's shooting.

 BarBoBot wrote:
The burst cannons on devilfish are not hull mounted. They have nearly 180 degrees of rotation .

Looks like it but the actual travel is less than 180.

Yea it goes less to the right than it does left due to the sensors blocking movement by hitting the hull on that side.