Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

So I have been playing around with some ideas for the Tau and how they could have a flyer. Mostly I was just wanting to see what you guys thought of my flyer. I have attached it to this post as a pdf.

Also what do you think about this rule?

Adamantium Penetrator for Railgun

Draw line from barrel to maximum range. Every model under line can be hit. For every model under the line in a unit, resolve that many shooting attacks against that unit containing those models. If the line crosses a terrain piece with a cover save of 4+ or lower, on a succesful save, the shot stops there. On hitting a vehicle, if the shot is a glancing shot, the shot stops there. For every vehicle that is penetrated or UNIT hit, the shot loses 2 Str and 1 Ap.

Should be in purposed rules.

The rumor was that the shot lost 1 strength per model it passed through.

That gunship is seriously OP but I like it!

splinox wrote:

Also what do you think about this rule?

It's a bit wordy but I get what you're trying to accomplish. Sounds like the Eldar Vibrocannon but has the potential to hit more targets and can actually penetrate a vehicle. Also, with this wording you still have to roll to hit against each model. This makes using the weapon/round tedious. Here is a suggestion to make it quicker, somewhat clearer, account for most instances and also add a bit of balance.

****
Adamantium Penetrator Round Range: (same as firing weapon) Strength: (same as firing weapon) AP: (same as firing weapon) Heavy 1, Blast, *

* - Place the blast marker anywhere within the weapon's maximum range and scatter as normal. After determining scatter, draw a straight line extending from the firing model (or the firing model's Railgun in the case of vehicles) to the center of the blast marker. All models intersected by the line are automatically hit and only the models intersected by the line are hit. Resolve wounds and saves, one unit at a time, starting from the firing model to the blast template. If any Cover Save granted by terrain, Invulnerable save or Armor save is made, remaining hits against other models are discarded. Unsaved wounds are applied against only models hit by this weapon and otherwise using normal wound allocation rules. Against vehicles, if the hit is glancing, remaining wounds are discarded. If the hit against a vehicle is penetrating, reduce the strength of the weapon by 2 and the AP by 1 (AP reduces from 1 to 2 to 3, etc. . .) and continue to resolve wounds and saves.
****

This way you can roll against entire units instead of against each individual model. The scatter also keeps ballistic skill in play and removes having to roll to hit against each individual model. As you are implying that as the weapon passes through items it loses momentum, armor would also become inhibiting as well once the shot passes through a few vehicles. As for the Invul saves, the shield would either ping the round off course or be penetrated and wound/kill the model. I understand you don't want normal cover to inhibit the weapon, but the weaker the cover the less chance it has of being effective anyways. In the event it does get stopped one can assume the rounds happened along a slightly denser/thicker spot. This also introduces a foil against the weapon (cover/invul saves). The Armor is not much of an issue as the round would have to penetrate 2-3 vehicles before it actually comes in play and its range is quite fantastic. As always, the only real way to check for balance is to play-test.

EDIT: i know I made the rules for it longer but it is also more concise.

Thanks for the awesome help. My local group of friends and I have been throwing around the penetrator rule for awhile and it seems to be working ok. In some instances it can be a bit OP, like when I popped two land raiders in one shot, but mostly it works out ok.

So I am curious, what makes this flyer OP? What could I do to make it more balanced? Because I am seriously considering making this thing if I can get a good rule set on it. My initial thought was to make the rules in the spirit of the AC-130 gunships.

Thanks for all the feedback. This is my first time posting.

I would pretty much just write the super-penetrating railgun as per the Beam subclass of Witchfre abilities. Use an existing rule and re-task it to what you want rather than create new.

http://www.forgeworld.co.uk/Warhammer-40000/Tau/TAU-AIRCRAFT?filter_reset=1

There. Fixed the "Tau need a flyer" problem.

I am not saying the Tau need a flyer. I am just saying mine is better. I in fact like the remoras quite a lot. The Barracuda is a little weak for how much it cost in points. I was just wondering if you guys think the Narwhal is a decent idea.

splinox wrote:
I am not saying the Tau need a flyer. I am just saying mine is better. I in fact like the remoras quite a lot. The Barracuda is a little weak for how much it cost in points. I was just wondering if you guys think the Narwhal is a decent idea.

If you think the Barracuda is weak you need to read IA:Aeronautica again. If you haven't, it got a significant boost and is now an awesome unit.

As for yours, the question remains: what is the point? Even ignoring the fact that the Orca you based it on is a massive superheavy vehicle it looks like fanboy "MOAR GUNS OMG" nonsense. It doesn't fill any real purpose in the Tau army (other than TAU NEED MORE FLYERS), and it's not a very good concept. It has way too many weapons, too many special rules, and is a weird combination of too powerful (if you don't face effective AA) and laughably bad (if you run into effective AA and it becomes a 300 point crater in one shot). Plus the model is just going to look stupid, once you scale it down to a standard flyer size hull it's going to look like a ball of guns glued to a token airplane in the center.

 Peregrine wrote:

splinox wrote:
I am not saying the Tau need a flyer. I am just saying mine is better. I in fact like the remoras quite a lot. The Barracuda is a little weak for how much it cost in points. I was just wondering if you guys think the Narwhal is a decent idea.

If you think the Barracuda is weak you need to read IA:Aeronautica again. If you haven't, it got a significant boost and is now an awesome unit.

What? Where? It is easily the worst flyer in the whole book. No wonder they costed it to 'Vendetta', but hell, anything can blast it off from the skies while it only has the damage output of an Ionhead. It can harass stuff, but 130 points and a FA slot is way to steep for a random annoyance.

What I would like from the tau, isn't a super speedy flyer. I would love to see what amount's to a kind of slow-flying gun battery, think something like this, but with the asthetic of the Tau.

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_M_k0HoOPLbw/TZWoSG1xuMI/AAAAAAAAASs/8f2BIWM7_c0/sky%20fortress%201%5B5%5D.jpg

Obviously, the aesthetic of this being blimps and stuff is completely wrong, but the idea is solid. A kind of sky-hovering flying gun array, that just rains death down on people from above, floating along above the battlefield rather than being a dogfighter like the others.

I think it would just be so fun to see, if the flyer's of other armies are like jetbikes, but in the sky, this would be more like a flying monolith or something, floating along and raining down death. Would make their flyer so much different from the other's, which would be perfect. Give it special rules on it's movement, and make it tougher to bring down, but slower. Perhaps (Though I may be going too far) It could be like a flying platform, on which to house some fire warrior's on top, to shoot. Kind of like a slow moving, open topped flyer xD

Oh, and put some speaker's on it so they can yell "Surrender for the greater good, resistance is futile, surrender for the greater good!"

But that's not how tau work mate. It's spelled out pretty clearly in the codices and IA:3.

They're all about mobility and long ranged firepower.
That's exactly why they do not have giant mechas / titans - or flying fortresses for that matter.

For titan killing and air-to-ground dominance they have the Tigershark AX-1 and the Manta respectively.

Those are their main two things yes. But that doesn't mean every single unit needs both of these things. It would still have long range firepower, but I imagine the tau would figure that it wouldn't need to move quickly if it can't be chased down by infantry. It would be a floating behemoth of shooty death.

Yes, that makes it vulnerable to flying chaos dragon thingies, but they are not exactly common, in the lore of the game.

Just because the general idea of the tau army is long ranged shooty maneuverability, doesn't mean they have to be bottled into that. I mean, they have broadsides, for instance, which are very much similar in design, get them into position, then rain down death. This would simply be a version of that that is unassaultable by normal means

Evileyes wrote:
Those are their main two things yes. But that doesn't mean every single unit needs both of these things. It would still have long range firepower, but I imagine the tau would figure that it wouldn't need to move quickly if it can't be chased down by infantry. It would be a floating behemoth of shooty death.

Yes, that makes it vulnerable to flying chaos dragon thingies, but they are not exactly common, in the lore of the game.

Just because the general idea of the tau army is long ranged shooty maneuverability, doesn't mean they have to be bottled into that. I mean, they have broadsides, for instance, which are very much similar in design, get them into position, then rain down death. This would simply be a version of that that is unassaultable by normal means

Correction: This would be an expensive version, that cannot bunker down in explosive resistant battle suits, behind cover, but rather float in the air, for EVERY LASCANNON AND MISSLE TO FIRE AT. There is a reason ground troops are on the ground, just as aircraft are in the sky. Why would the Tau invest more resources building something so vulnerable?

 AtoMaki wrote:
What? Where? It is easily the worst flyer in the whole book. No wonder they costed it to 'Vendetta', but hell, anything can blast it off from the skies while it only has the damage output of an Ionhead. It can harass stuff, but 130 points and a FA slot is way to steep for a random annoyance.

Err, lol? Even if it only has the firepower of an ionhead (better, actually, with the TL MP) you're still talking about moving a heavy support unit into fast attack AND giving it flyer rules so it can take the AA role as well. It's not as good as a Vendetta (but then nothing is, since the Vendetta is utterly broken), but it's still a very good unit.

Also, if you think it's the worst flyer in the book you clearly didn't read the book.

 Lord Magnus wrote:
Correction: This would be an expensive version, that cannot bunker down in explosive resistant battle suits, behind cover, but rather float in the air, for EVERY LASCANNON AND MISSLE TO FIRE AT. There is a reason ground troops are on the ground, just as aircraft are in the sky. Why would the Tau invest more resources building something so vulnerable?

Exactly this.

If you want to fly above cover you need to be fast or you just have a vehicle that's easier to hit than a tank but doesn't have the armor. Or you need to be absurdly huge like a Manta and just laugh at mere lascannons because you have shields designed to stop starship weapons. The proposed flyer is neither.

 Lord Magnus wrote:

Evileyes wrote:
Those are their main two things yes. But that doesn't mean every single unit needs both of these things. It would still have long range firepower, but I imagine the tau would figure that it wouldn't need to move quickly if it can't be chased down by infantry. It would be a floating behemoth of shooty death.

Yes, that makes it vulnerable to flying chaos dragon thingies, but they are not exactly common, in the lore of the game.

Just because the general idea of the tau army is long ranged shooty maneuverability, doesn't mean they have to be bottled into that. I mean, they have broadsides, for instance, which are very much similar in design, get them into position, then rain down death. This would simply be a version of that that is unassaultable by normal means

Correction: This would be an expensive version, that cannot bunker down in explosive resistant battle suits, behind cover, but rather float in the air, for EVERY LASCANNON AND MISSLE TO FIRE AT. There is a reason ground troops are on the ground, just as aircraft are in the sky. Why would the Tau invest more resources building something so vulnerable?

Because in terms of actual games mechanics, the flyer's are not only 10 feet above the battlefield. They are up in the sky, raining down fire. Thats why they can be only hit on 6's. Or even, that would explain why this one could only be hit on 6's, or by flyer's.

Because in terms of storyline, they actually -would- be firing from a great distance away. Just a vertical distance.

So, less this, like other flyers:

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-XVip6zAW-B0/TeyuYjs4svI/AAAAAAAABI8/YhzU_QBTjRo/s1600/82dChopper.jpeg

And more, this:

http://farm5.staticflickr.com/4020/4700866599_19334f673f_b.jpg

Evileyes wrote:
Because in terms of actual games mechanics, the flyer's are not only 10 feet above the battlefield. They are up in the sky, raining down fire. Thats why they can be only hit on 6's. Or even, that would explain why this one could only be hit on 6's, or by flyer's.

And that is why god gave us MANPADs.

Also, the reason flyers are only hit on 6s is because of their speed, not their altitude. For example, the Manta is a huge and relatively slow target and is hit on normal BS, it just has enough durability that it doesn't care. Since your platform isn't a superheavy flyer it wouldn't have this, and would immediately be shot down.

 Peregrine wrote:
[
Err, lol? Even if it only has the firepower of an ionhead (better, actually, with the TL MP) you're still talking about moving a heavy support unit into fast attack AND giving it flyer rules so it can take the AA role as well. It's not as good as a Vendetta (but then nothing is, since the Vendetta is utterly broken), but it's still a very good unit.

Doh, actually, the Barracuda has worse firepower than the Ionhead (hello BS3), it has worse durability (less armour, less HP, no Shrouded) and it has worse mobility (18" minimal movement distance and turning restrictions). And in the FA slot, this poor fella faces with a real powerhouse: the Tetra. So yes, it is the worst flyer (with the Raven as a close second).

I actually agree with AtoMaki in this, from hours of playing with the damn things. Tetras are simply too darn important to the rest of your army to be replaced in any manner, at any time, by anything else. There is literally nothing that multiplies your force like tetras. You brought 72 fire warriors? Tetras make them useful.

The only things that come close are the drone towers, which take up elite and HS slots, both of which can be used better for your heavy-hitters.

This is a problem with the army and army requirements, more than anything to do with the barracuda itself, mind you. It's a "contextually bad" pick. If you slapped 4 independent networked markerlights on it and popped it up 50 points, it would suddenly be an autoinclude!

 AtoMaki wrote:
Doh, actually, the Barracuda has worse firepower than the Ionhead (hello BS3), it has worse durability (less armour, less HP, no Shrouded) and it has worse mobility (18" minimal movement distance and turning restrictions).

And skyfire. Remember that little detail? You know, since the Barracuda is the only skyfire unit that Tau get? Everything else is secondary to that ability, above all else it's an AA unit, and the fact that it's also a source of efficient firepower in a less-used FOC slot is just a nice bonus.

So yes, it is the worst flyer (with the Raven as a close second).

Raven, the ork fighter (2x TL big shootas! massive firepower!). It isn't even the worst Tau flyer in the book, an honor that goes to the Remora.

 chrisrawr wrote:
I actually agree with AtoMaki in this, from hours of playing with the damn things. Tetras are simply too darn important to the rest of your army to be replaced in any manner, at any time, by anything else. There is literally nothing that multiplies your force like tetras. You brought 72 fire warriors? Tetras make them useful.

Tetras are awesome (I used them with the old single-shot markerlights and they were still good), but they're definitely a unit with diminishing returns. You can take them in squadrons of up to four, and with target locks you can shoot their markerlights at different targets (completely negating every drawback of the squadron rules and turning into a pure benefit). So while a single Tetra squadron is pretty much mandatory (replacing Pathfinders) you're rarely going to want two, and I can't imagine a situation where you'd want to bring the full three. That's just too much spent on markerlights and not enough spent on things to use those markerlights.

So, in short, 1x Tetra squadron, 2x Barracuda.

3 groups of 2 tetras is 6 targets getting 3 markerlight hits each. This is the most efficient use of the fast attack slot you can possible imagine, as it lets 3 units of crisis suits and 3 units of broadsides all receive a 95% hit rate while ignoring night fighting.

So to renumerate: for a fast attack slot to be a viable replacement for tetras, it has to make up the entire firepower of ~4 crisis suits or ~4 broadsides, while costing less than 120 points.

 chrisrawr wrote:
3 groups of 2 tetras is 6 targets getting 3 markerlight hits each. This is the most efficient use of the fast attack slot you can possible imagine, as it lets 3 units of crisis suits and 3 units of broadsides all receive a 95% hit rate while ignoring night fighting.

Why don't we instead make it two groups of three (same total number, and the squadron rule has no disadvantages when you have target locks) and one Barracuda? Same Tetras, just more efficiently organized so that they free up a heavy support slot for something else.

So to renumerate: for a fast attack slot to be a viable replacement for tetras, it has to make up the entire firepower of ~4 crisis suits or ~4 broadsides, while costing less than 120 points.

Err, what? Where are you getting those numbers from? Broadsides already have a 75% hit rate, so even boosting them to BS 5 is only a 20% increase in firepower. For your 120 points of Tetras to add four Broadsides worth of firepower you'd have to boost 20 Broadsides to BS 5, which obviously doesn't happen. Even if you increase it to an 80% increase by negating 5+ cover in addition to adding BS 5 you still need to boost five Broadsides. And since you'd need to give four markerlight hits to each of two Broadside squads with your pair of Tetras you can only do this if you hit with every single markerlight shot, which isn't going to happen reliably.

And of course you're still ignoring the point about the Barracuda's AA role. I'm glad you have all these markerlights to make your Broadsides awesome, too bad they don't help at all against flyers?

In short, this just proves my point: Tetra squadrons are so efficient at bringing markerlights that you run out of useful markerlight users before you run out of Tetra slots. You almost always want to bring Tetras, but you're always going to have 1-2 fast attack slots free.

I've put no more than 2 Tetras on the board and usually have more tokens than I need.

 Peregrine wrote:

And skyfire. Remember that little detail? You know, since the Barracuda is the only skyfire unit that Tau get? Everything else is secondary to that ability, above all else it's an AA unit, and the fact that it's also a source of efficient firepower in a less-used FOC slot is just a nice bonus.

Sure, because it can totally kill anything... And it just shrugs off the fire of the enemy flyers... Oh wait, it doesn't! Even the Ork Attak Fighta (what is a decent flyer, since it also has 2 Bomms and can be squadroned) can give him a run for his money. For the AA role, the Barracude is just simply overmatched by everything. And yes, it is pretty ironic from an "Air Superiority Fighter" ..

 AtoMaki wrote:
Sure, because it can totally kill anything... And it just shrugs off the fire of the enemy flyers... Oh wait, it doesn't! Even the Ork Attak Fighta (what is a decent flyer, since it also has 2 Bomms and can be squadroned) can give him a run for his money. For the AA role, the Barracude is just simply overmatched by everything. And yes, it is pretty ironic from an "Air Superiority Fighter" ..

I guess you've never actually done the math on it? The Barracuda isn't as good as a Vendetta (but thankfully nothing else is, the Vendetta is just overpowered), but it's actually a decent AA fighter. If you compare it to things besides the Vendetta it gets the job done, and with a reasonable point and FOC slot cost.

In any case, if you don't like the Barracuda, the solution is to write better rules for it, not come up with some weird floating Orca-with-guns-glued-on platform to replace it.

 Peregrine wrote:

I guess you've never actually done the math on it? The Barracuda isn't as good as a Vendetta (but thankfully nothing else is, the Vendetta is just overpowered), but it's actually a decent AA fighter. If you compare it to things besides the Vendetta it gets the job done, and with a reasonable point and FOC slot cost.

I did the math (it can do like what... 2 HP damage against AV10?) but more importantly, I was foolish enough to field it. The barracuda was absolutely worthless in all 3 battles, did 0 damage, and was wiped out immediaetly as soon as my opponent decided to shoot it. Even when I fielded 3 of them ...

I would say that the Barracuda needs Strafing Run and/or Vector Dancer and a point drop to 100-115 points.

 AtoMaki wrote:
(it can do like what... 2 HP damage against AV10?)

3 actually. Against low-AV targets the Barracuda outguns pretty much everything but a punisher cannon Vulture.