keezus wrote:We are obviously of two differing minds on how to accomplish change. My approach is to change as little as possible without adding special rules. Certainly, some fluff has to be sacrificed, but IMO, it will make for more streamlined gameplay.
1)Yes we are, but that is ok.
2)This would be an OK approach if
GW was doing the same and the Tau rules were not so poorly written(Not saying the army sucketh, just how the rules for them were written). Special Army rules are the way
GW helps to balance and define armies for a specific design philosophy. I hear people gripe about these special rules incessantly but when their armies special rules get changed significantly these same individuals Howl. I chalk this up to a "change is bad" mentallity.
3)My personal experience has been that whenever people want to casually "Sacrifice" Fluff it has been just a rationalization people use to excuse their wish to make any non-
SM army into
SMs. I.E.- Shooty army players want higher I and
ccw, Low toughness armies get T 4, Hoarde armies push for save 3+. Fluff is your window to the intended design philosophy of the army and should be used as your compass when rewriting the rules for any army.
3a)
IMO,Sacrificing fluff does nothing but fast track Codex creep and will leave us with a generic every army is identical game. Yeah, if every army is the same with the same rules game will be a little more streamlined. Also, boring as heck.
focusedfire wrote:1)Correct, but add in that it is an army that focuses on a lower model count elite troop rather than a high model count expendable troop style of army.
keezus wrote:I am not sure that the Tau list is suited for an elites only type army as it removes "volume of fire" from their arsenal. This is important, as a "shooting only" style army, having too few units is just setting up the player for failure. Think of it as a Deathwing army with superior firepower, slightly better mobility, but pitiful HTH.
1)Thing is
GW has already removed the volume of fire power with the 5th ed rules. Being pressed with assault turn 2(Sometimes first turn) as opposed to turn 3 effectivley cut Tau fire power by about a third. Instead of correcting this with a very unfluffy Tau physical abilities just suddenly got better. I am giving them Guerilla tactics(
pg 20) which returns a round or two of shooting and better explains the crisis suit developement and tactics.(Guerilla Tactics allows any Tau unit that did not move in their prior turn to voluntarily fallback in any direction if assaulted with the fallback occuring before the assaulting army is moved into base to base. Susequent turns the Unit rolls to regroup and if fails falls back towards their table edge.)
2)Yet you say I'm giving the army to many units.
Just joking, I know what you meant. They way the codex is being set up it will be up to the player to figure out their own balance. The Tau will get an increase in effective fire power to offset any model loss. I'm doing this by streamlining the markerlight system(Their rules are in dire need of being reworked). Tau fire warriors are staying
BS 3 to help stabilize the rank/promotion track but now recieve more benifit from the marker lights. Any units equipped with Tau Targeters firing at a marked unit automatically have their
BS increased by one and may ignore night fighting rules if they are ineffect, Any unit equipped with Tau Targeters firing at the marked unit may choose to do one and only one of the following:
A) Reduce marked units cover save by 1 for each hit.
B) Reduce marked units leadership by 1 for every marker hit.
C) Fire a number of Seeker Missiles equal to the number of hits
D) Deathwing? Do you support the army being Elite or not? Don't like the
SM comparrison, yes crisis suits are MEQish but the rest of the army has nothing to do with
SMs other than shooting them.
BTW, If you spam landspeeders
SM's will out shoot the Tau by sheer volume of effective fire power. They get on top of units quickly so that they don't get coversaves. a squadron of 3 with assaultcannons and heavy flamer is 270 points With multi-meltas they are 300 pts. and they deepstrike. This is another reason why I'm having to change a few things. Because
GW is forcing these changes.
When looking upon the Tau and originally trying to figure what Ideas should apply it became apparent that the Tau were a middle of the statline army with leanings to the high side. Highest base armor save for a Non-
Meq infantry, Strongst infantry weapon, Highest armor value for skimmer tank(Excluding Monolith, that thing is in its own leauge), and Strongest anti-tank gun
at range.
Through several threads this was discussed and a bit of a consensus came into being.
SM's(including
SM varient chapters, Chaos Marines), Chaos Deamons, Greyknights, Eldar,
DE, and Necrons are Elite armies originally designed for lower model count.
IG, Orks, Tyranids are the Hoarde armies designed for higher model count(Note* It seems that with some of the options being made to the hoarde armies that
GW seems to be backing off of Armies designed to be purely High model count).
Then there are the middle of the road armies which are the Sisters of Battle and the Tau. Sisters are like a cross between
SM(Power armor and Bolters),
IG(Shooty and large squads available), and Eldar(Low toughness elites with little weapon variety) while the Tau are like a cross between
IG(Shooty infantry backed by Tanks), Eldar(High mobility) and Necrons(Tough Hard to kill units).
focusedfire wrote:4) The Tau are about a balanced style of war as opposed to an overlyspecialized style. Spamming units should unbalance the army
keezus wrote:I think that making units spammable should always be a valid (if narrow) choice. However, IMO, by making units fit a certain role, without others completely outclassing them in their chosen role all units are worth taking. Having fewer underperforming units should eliminate a lot of spam.
I understand that the Tau are about oneness but they are also about everyone pitching in together. There is a difference between an effective themed army and an army running nothing but 3 unit types and dominating. I do not want the Tau to have a Nob biker list,
SM landspeer spam list, or Lash. I want them to remain a thinking mans army where victory depends upon inter unit support.
focusedfire wrote:1)Disagree, Weapon strength fine, troop survivability outside of devilfish is biggest problem. Optional shield drones new rules and Guerilla Tactics rules fix this.FW will prob be 12pt each when I'm done
keezus wrote:I am not convinced that a line trooper should be so expensive, even in the current environment. I think we are of two mindsets on how their line troops should function. In my vision, instead of being able to absorb punishment, they are designed to unleash a devestating volley of fire into their opponents either crippling them, or in the case where they are very tough - combine with pathfinder/skyray support, then pin their targets using the vehicle's burstcannon. The idea is to have resilience and firepower through strength of numbers rather than quality of attacks and individual resilience. IMO, FW should be BS4, with photon grenades and stay around 8 points.
1)What you're not seeing here is the included wargear. They are getting both grenades, the Guerilla tactics rule, and an improved markersystem that makes each unit more valuable.
2)Yes we are of differing mind about the line troops. Look at the way Tau and
SoB were designed as middle armies. The Tau were designed with weaker basic infantry but to be a lower model count army than the sisters because of the crisis suits, vehicle costs, and buyable tech made invulnerable saves much more prevalent. Sisters Basic infantry on paper beat the Tau hands down and are only 1 pt more but factor in shield drone availability and the unit becomes almost as durable. The you look at the fact that Crisis suit are tough as nails and you might see where I am in favor of increasing Fire warrior suvivability.
3)Fire warriors should be both more durable and throw a out a bit more effective fire power. This does not have to be an either or argument. It wasn't when the army was designed.
4)Yes, currently the Tau firewarriors are "slightly" over priced but copying the
IG and making everything cheaper isn't the way to go. Also, BS4 at 8pts is way overpowered and completely abandons the Tau design philosophy. You have to be very careful with a middle army like the Tau. What you are proposing would make them into just an
IG army with much better basic infantry guns. It would unbalance the overall game.
focusedfire wrote:2)Disagree again, Battlesuits survive ok(new shield drones will improve).Battlesuit Fire power crippled by wonky ranges, weaker weapon strengths, and 5th ed coversave bonanza.
keezus wrote:YMMV. IMO, the main trouble with Crisis suits is that they die very easily to S8+ weapons and powerfists once the drones have been stripped. It only takes a round of bolter fire to strip the drones.
Funny, My crisis suits do fine.
Making them T5 is way over powered. I was one of the first to propose T5 and argue for such until it got playtested. I abandoned the idea because it threw the entire army off. The cost increase for increasing their toughness kills the unit by overwieghting the points
in the elites section.
Pls don't take this as an attack but what you have been proposing comes across design-wise as a bit bi-polar. You have said troops aren't supposed to be tough but the elites are to be uber-tough, that BS5 battle-hardened Sha'Vre/Shas'
El are over powered but
BS 4 fire warrior for 8pts is fine.
focusedfire wrote:Troops-Vespid don't fit. Can't justify in any way, shape. or form. Easier and more logical to move drones to Troops
keezus wrote:I actually suggest that Vespid and Kroot fill "non force org slots".
Doing this only unbalances the army further. I can possibly see having an advisor outside of the
FOC and that is pushing it. I am currently tempted to put the Ethereal outside of the
FOC and am in a constant internal struggle over this as far as the fan-dex goes.
focusedfire wrote:Elite-Need an elite infantry unit that has transport option for infantry/mech builds
Elite-Colony Matron, Kroot Scout kindred, or new race may go here
keezus wrote:Why do you need these new units. What purpose do they serve? Why do you need an "elite" mechanized unit? You have Crisis suits as mobile short ranged gun platforms, mounted firewarriors as mobile light shooting platforms and Hammerheads as heavy mobile gun platforms? What could an elite mechanized unit achieve that the other units already can't (other than HTH... which is completely un-Tau-like). They can't score by virtue of being elite. I think one would want to avoid marginalizing an existing unit or creating a unit that has no role. You've added a pile of new units that I am not convinced are needed.
1) It is called variety of builds and themes.
2) They add depth to a shallow set of choices for the elites. The choices being made available are, to some extent, for helping underperforming units find a better fit in the Tau army.
Example: The Vespids are getting rewritten but can't go into elites because of competition issues with Crisis units in the
FOC. They work in fast attack but you only have the Crisis and Stealth available for your elites so why sacrifice the Fast attack slot if you are only needing a single squad of deepstriking Mech killers. With a greater variety of options in the elites, the Vespid become more viable in the Fast attack slots and also allow for a more effective deepstrike themed army.
3) The Elite fire warriors with transports would be the Rail Rifle equipped Pathfinders as an elite choice.They would maybe be the ones that get a special devilfish that has the Marker beacon.
IMO, This works better than the Sniper drones as a non-scoring troop choice.
focusedfire wrote:Troops- Have to strongly disagree. BS4 FireWarriors sound good, great. Problem is when you look at army as a whole. You say that BS 5 Crisis is to much but want BS 4 Fire warriors. Where is the experience progression? When do they improve? I was going to make mine BS 4 and was forced to back off simply because it messed with the rank/ability progression track.
keezus wrote:There are zero units outside HQ and squad upgrades that have BS5. There is lots of precedence for troops having BS4. If anything you can blame the game system for having rubbish granularity. I only raised BS as it was the easiest way of raising Firewarrior firepower without retooling the gun. This is an extension to my previous idea that firewarriors should rely on firepower en masse as opposed to a surgical strike style unit.
1)So the Shootiest army should have the same
BS as Everyone else? You musy have missed where I incorporated targeting arrays(Wargear) on all crisis suits now.
2)So make them a just like space marines but not any better? Even though the
SM's have viable
HtH options as well? The armies you are refering to have very little rank progession.
3) Your idea about cheap expendable high
BS base infantry would completely obviate the Tau philosophy of war and plays toward embracing attrition tactics. The Tau refusing to embrace the concept of attrition warfare as a vaible for them is a defining peice of their tactica. This represents that the Tau realise that their numbers are small when compared to other races in the Galaxy and that they need everym body for making their race grow.
focusedfire wrote:Aux Troops Vespid- Some interesting stuff here but you have made them more powerful than mine and I'm still worried about needing to tone mine down. Will discuss more later.
keezus wrote:I'm not sure I see where this is overpowered. Assault 2 at 24 (AP-) vs MEQ or against a carnifex inflicts 5/18 wounds per shooter, or four shooters to inflict one wound past SV3+. Assault 1 S5 AP3 blast (assuming 3 covers) will inflict 2 MEQ casualties and inflict 1/6 of a wound on a carnifex. We are talking completely differing roles here.
Didn't see the
AP- in the post. Like the idea of making the weapon also poisoned but not sure how to fit it in.
I thought you were the one that didn't want to chage things much.
There are people pushing for the Neutron Blaster to be a template weapon, some that Like my blast idea. and now the poisoned weapon idea. I admit that because of the Neutron Bomb I really like the Poison weapon Idea but I really want the Blast template for the Vespid weapons. It Makes them distinctive within the Tau army. How about Range12"S3 AP3 Poisoned Blast?
keezus wrote:The thing to keep in mind is that the more units and options you add, the harder it will be to maintain game balance. As I mentioned in my previous post, without any sort of an organized framework to review all the the rules changes you are suggesting, it is pretty much impossible for any through review to take place. An example is I don't have any recollection what your universal rules (Guerilla Tactics) do, and I do not have the time to slog through 30 pages of posts looking for them - clearly, without seeing the whole picture, I can't really assess your work as a whole.
1)Don't find this true.
2)I will give you the frame work then.
3)Fair enough.
keezus wrote:My gut feeling is that you are adding too many units and the codex will suffer as a result. The Space Marine codex has too many units. Many are sub-par due to many sharing the same role. Same issue with the Eldar. Adding rules to bypass restrictions in the main rules is problematic. Maybe it is time for a new post with a complete summary at the start.
Eldar aren't unbalanced but they are the specialist army and that is why they get 6 of everything.
IG has a huge variety and is not unbalanced. Orks Have sizable selection and are fine.
Now
SM's on the other hand are different because
SM's are
SM's. They have only 2 types of units outside of vehicles/dreadnoughts. Marines with 3+ save and Marines with 2+save. Everything else is just window dressing to sell more models and yet the army is doing well. I do find it funny/ironic that you point to the marines as a don't do after half of you suggestions leaned towards making the Tau Marine-like. And if not
SM then you want to make them into
IG.
I am trying to make the Tau into Tau. Not some other army. I just want them to have the same variety and depth that are available to other armies.
When I get the other thread up please keep hitting me with Ideas and keep trying to poke holes in the design. It helps me to find areas in need of attention.
I agree about setting up a new thread. Only reason I stayed here is because I was waiting for an answer about putting this up in the article section but to heck with it, I'm starting a new thread. Will post soon with its name.
Officially elevated by St. God of Yams to the rank of Scholar of the Church of the Children of the Eternal Turtle Pie at 11:42:36 PM 05/01/09 
