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While driving into work this morning I had the idea that you could really make a cool command group for a Tau Commander to leverage some of the neat toys he gets. The idea was to kit him around a drone controller and group him with a unit of 3 broadsides with max missile drones. Unfortunately when I started pricing it out, it got expensive really quickly. Here is what I have:

1 Tau Commander, 212 pts
Missile Pod
Missile Pod
Drone Controller
Puretide Engram NeuroChip
Multi-Spectrum Sensor Suite
XV8-02 Crisis 'Iridium' Battle Suit
Target Lock
Marker Drone
Marker Drone

Broadside Team (351 Pts, 3x117 pts each)

3x

Broadside
Seeker Missile
Velocity Tracker
Missile Drone
Missile Drone

This gives you the following:

2 BS 5 Marker Lights
8 BS 5 Missile Pods (16 total shots @ 36" range)
3 Twin-linked Heavy Rail Rifles
3 Twin-linked Smart Missile Systems
3 seeker missiles for extra firepower against AV 13 or 14

The Entire Unit gets Tank Hunter or Monster Hunter which makes it much more likely those Str 7 missiles will get a glance on AV 12-13 or wound a Wraith Knight.

And you have the option to sacrifice 2 Missile Pods each round to give the entire unit "Ignores Cover".

I am trying to decide if this unit is worth it the high cost. It clocks in at 563 points, which is over a quarter of your army, but it puts out some really good anti-armor/anti-heavy infantry. The squad should be able to delete anything under AV 14 in a round of fire assuming it is within 36". The problem with that is at 563 points it would take ~ 4 turns to make up it's cost, and that is plenty of time for a close combat squad to assault it. (Calculating the average cost of an AV12-13 vehicle at 150 points)

I also wonder about the mix of armor saves. With that many drones, won't you be saving always on a 4+ reducing the staying power of the unit, and with almost everything except the commander at Toughness 4, they seem vulnerable to instant death.

A cheaper option would be to drop the following and save 90 points:

Commander:

Remove the Target Lock and Crisis Iridium Battle Suit

Broadsides:

Remove the Velocity Trackers

The target lock on the commander is 5 points, but is really a nice to have not need to have option. Any turn they fire at fliers he won't be shooting to remove the flyer's jink save so it would only come into play if the unit is say firing at AV 14 (So he can fire at something he can actually damage), which should hopefully be a rare occurrence since if I am having to fire the squad at AV 14 I am in a world of hurt.

With the mixed saves in the unit already and all toughness 4 the Iridium battlesuit may not really see it's effectiveness due to the way rolling to wound and armor saves work. (This may be me getting mixed up on my rules, I am not sure)

For the broadsides, the velocity trackers really put them at odds with their drones since the drones don't have them. It might be better to save the 60 points and use say a few marker lights from a few sky rays to pump up the BS of the unit if they want to take down a flier.


So....thoughts?

Is the unit a points sink? Can it be made to work? The original thought was to find a way to get a better BS to missile pod drones since Missile Pods seem like good weapons and the drone's big failing is it's abysmal BS. You can't get Missile Drones on any other unit (Save the shielded ones from the riptide) so if you want to leverage it you have to do it from broadsides.

Edit: In case someone else thought of this first and mentioned it elsewhere, I am in no way laying claim to being the originator of the idea. I just thought it up while I was driving to work this morning.

Your premise has 1 glaring fault: Re-read the drone controller entry in the wargear section. Hint: Only Marker, Gun, and Sniper drones benefit from a Drone Controller. Missile drones will always be BS2.

Now, to expand on your thought, what you can do instead is a really useful back-support team. Buy Marker Drones for the broadsides (3-4 should be plenty) plus 2 for the commander. Give all the suits (including the commander) target locks. A puretide chip works well here too, as tank-hunter can really optimize each suit's damage output when you split fire. you end up with over 400 points in 1 unit, but it really does the work of about 3 and can focus in on an enemy unit for an UN GODLY amount of firepower.

The bs5 markerlights will light up something for the rest of your army, while the twin-linked high yield missiles and BS5 missile pods on the commander/broadsides open up transports. Once the occupants of the transports are on the ground, you can fling 28 shots at them per turn, daring them to take usually 15-20 armor saves. It works well, I've used it many times.

Edit to add: Your wound allocation logic is flawed as well - saves are taken from the closest enemy model to the shooting unit (or the hole in a barrage template). you seem to be of the assumption that the majority save in the unit is used - that is not true. The best part is, being jet packs, drones can move up and fire, then use their thrust move to rank up behind the broadsides for so the unit has some 2+ tanks in front of it when the enemy shoots back.

Ahh...I knew there was something I was missing. Lots of BS 5 missile pods seemed too good to be true, even at the horrendous cost.


For Multiple Armor saves, how does that work exactly? If I have a broadside and two marker drones. The drones move forward, fire and then jump back (incidentally, since marker lights are heavy, wouldn't that make them snap fire, negating a drone controller's effectiveness?). In the following shooting phase I take 4 str 8 AP3 shots. How does that work? Do I save them all at 2+? Or do I have to roll individually until I fail one, instant death and then remove drones from there as their armor is ignored?


If the Commander and Each Broadside all have a target lock, can they potentially each target a different unit? If so, how does that play into the shooting rules? I.E. when I choose to shoot with the unit, do I nominate all my targets before shooting or do I treat them as independent units and fire in order? (Potentially allowing me to focus fire something with the unit until that target is destroyed and then move onto another target?)

archamedius wrote:
Ahh...I knew there was something I was missing. Lots of BS 5 missile pods seemed too good to be true, even at the horrendous cost.


For Multiple Armor saves, how does that work exactly? If I have a broadside and two marker drones. The drones move forward, fire and then jump back (incidentally, since marker lights are heavy, wouldn't that make them snap fire, negating a drone controller's effectiveness?).

Drones, being jet pack infantry, are relentless. Movement does not effect their BS when firing heavy weapons.

archamedius wrote: In the following shooting phase I take 4 str 8 AP3 shots. How does that work? Do I save them all at 2+? Or do I have to roll individually until I fail one, instant death and then remove drones from there as their armor is ignored?

You save them one at a time, based on the closest model to the firing unit. In this case, it would be your 2+ save broadsides. Once the closest model dies, saves are then taken on the next closest model.

archamedius wrote:If the Commander and Each Broadside all have a target lock, can they potentially each target a different unit? If so, how does that play into the shooting rules? I.E. when I choose to shoot with the unit, do I nominate all my targets before shooting or do I treat them as independent units and fire in order? (Potentially allowing me to focus fire something with the unit until that target is destroyed and then move onto another target?)

Yes - Each target lock equipped model may fire at a different target than the rest of his unit. In this case, the Marker Drones would select a "primary" target and each suit would be allowed to shoot at either the same target, or any other within range. You must declare which suit is shooting where before any dice are rolled, however, because all shooting takes place simultaneously for the unit. In other words, you cannot shoot a rhino with 1 broadside, fail to destroy it, and then opt to shoot another broadside at the same rhino. Also the markerlights given out by the drones cannot be used by the broadsides for the same reason, and they're not networked. If you want your broadsides to be able to ignore cover or shoot better you should add an extra unit of pathfinders or tetras to your army that they can siphon off markerlights from.

Although you roll to wound on majority toughness, wouldn't you determine Instant Death on a models individual toughness? If that's the case then just leave the commander with Iridium at the front, drones behind him (missile then markers) and then Broadsides.

The commander has a 2+ save and can only be ID'd by S10 as the suit makes him T5. If any S10 comes your way, you LOS to the drones. This'll keep your firepower intact for the longest amount of time as long as the Commander makes their 2+ LOS rolls.

Okay, so you can't get a load of BS5 missile pod drones. That doesn't mean the Commander can't help out big time. I generally don't like the support commander (I'd rather have the support systems on a Shas'vre), because you're paying for BS5 that you can't use to shoot weapons. The Broadside team might be an exception, though, because they have a lot of force to multiply. Say the Commander has the M3S, C&C node, and PEN. The Broadsides have your weapon of choice, with 6 missile drones as backup.

The Broadsides get to ignore cover and get tank-hunters (or monster hunters as needed). Target lock lets them split their very effective fire. This might be the time to upgrade to plasma guns for point defense, as the SMS loses the ignoring cover advantage in this unit.

The Missile Drones get to re-roll BS2 (not as good as BS5, but not bad), ignore cover, get tank hunters, etc.

The Commander gets to soak S8+ hits.

You've got a huge array of weapons that can get optimal bonuses from turn to turn, and are effective against a huge number of targets.

The drones alone will put out about 7 hits with missiles, and those hits stick thanks to re-rolls and no cover. That's probably one AV12 tank thanks to tankhunter re-rolls. It'll put 2 hull points on a AV13 with average rolls. They also put 3-4 snapshot hits per turn against flyers (with no jinking). That's a dead AV11 flyer, with probably two hull points off a AV12 flyer.

The Broadsides can take target locks to further split fire, although you could certainly equip one with Skyfire to help the drones if flyers are big in your meta. Ignoring cover and re-rolling armor penetration is good no matter what, especially if you're packing AP2 plasma. Another little bonus, is that by selecting plasma, of all the guns in the squad, the Broadside main gun is the only one not firing to full effect while moving, and they're still not terrible thanks to twin-linked weapons.

Hand the broadside unit 3 markerlight tokens and you have BS5 Missile Pod drones. You might be better off throwing him with a marker drone team. 6-8 BS5 markerlights that can JSJ and have a 4+. A lot better then pathfinders. Something to think about. Also if you go that route keep him in front and LOS to drones if you get low on wounds. Best of luck!!

That's how I roll my commander, in a group of about 4-6 marker drones, and he buys 2 marker drones of his own because they're cheaper. incredibly good at getting lots of markerlight counters on that one thing you really need lit up (and if you roll the one use warlord trait that gives your commander and his squad skyfire, well I'll let you imagine how that would go...)

I usually do something like:

commander:
- system jammer (just in case, it's 2 points. If you kill anything with it then you've paid for the upgrade)
- 2x marker drones
- drone controller
- target lock
- early warning override
- fusion blaster (change weapon to fit your preferred flavor of interceptor)

He just hangs back by my deployment zone and helps discourage trespassers.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Can't wait until I get the forgeworld Tau book so I can give my commander a networked markerlight baked in!

Xv-84 upgrade is 20 pts. Networked Markerlight & target lock, signature system.

Spend your money on the actual suit and get the taros book later.

@OP, I'm running a very similar group with my Tau. The Commander is running a C3/ECM suit with all the bells and whistles, and he is attached to a squad of three Broadsides. Two Broadsides have Target Lock, and the third has Skyfire. Each Broadside has two Missile Drones. To say that it has been successful is a massive understatement. Between Target Lock, the Puretide Chip (usually Tank Hunters) and the C&C Node, I'm usually wrecking between 2-3 AV 12 tanks per turn. Plus the Target Lock gives me the flexibility to focus fire on a hard target or spread out my fire to hit multiple soft targets. Typically, my Skyfire Broadside will attack the same target as the drones (vs a flier if possible), and the rest will focus on targets of opportunity. With the C&C node, shooting down a flier isn't that hard.