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Christ - I didn't even realise it was issue 400 of WD.

I have 100, 200 and 300.

They usually make more of a deal about the big centenary issues.

I thought WD didn't have issue numbers since the redesign?

 lord_blackfang wrote:

 kronk wrote:
That flier keeps getting better looking every time I see it.

Indeed, although I'm still not sold on the I-beams between the wings.

The Broadside actually looks a bit awkward, I think.

IMO its the opposite. I dont like the flyer at all, but the suit is cool. Some new battlesuits might end up in my mecha model collection.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I thought WD didn't have issue numbers since the redesign?

SURPRISE!

Hah, got you guys this time.

Any pics of the Tau Commander?

Puscifer wrote:
Any pics of the Tau Commander?

That dude?

The fire caste character looks dumb*, but everything else is either OK or great.

* But I like that there actually are such characters in the codex; then I get to build my own. I hope they've got a lot of interesting gear options.

 pretre wrote:

Puscifer wrote:
Any pics of the Tau Commander?

That dude?

Nope - There's actually a Finecast XV8 suit released, but I can't find a clear pic of it.

 Crimson wrote:
The fire caste character looks dumb*, but everything else is either OK or great.

* But I like that there actually are such characters in the codex; then I get to build my own. I hope they've got a lot of interesting gear options.

I don't think that he's so much a "character" but rather an 'officer" upgrade or something to that effect for the Fire Warrior squads.

this release is looking great.......really looking forward to it

Something about the Cadre fireblade looks off, either his torso is to large or he has little dwarf legs...hmm will likely have to just convert some firewarriors for that one..unless it turns out a bit better in other pics, the porportions just seem a bit off.

Tank commander is cool, I may have to get a couple of those.

The quad Ion gun thingy on the flyer looks kinda promising, wonder how many shots that thing will put out .

 Kanluwen wrote:

I don't think that he's so much a "character" but rather an 'officer" upgrade or something to that effect for the Fire Warrior squads.

So they're just veteran sergeants? Tau did had those before, I thought these guys were something different...

Puscifer wrote:

 pretre wrote:

Puscifer wrote:
Any pics of the Tau Commander?

That dude?

Nope - There's actually a Finecast XV8 suit released, but I can't find a clear pic of it.

That's kind of a bad sculpt compared to the other ones. Very awkwardly proportioned.

Soo'Vah'Cha wrote: Something about the Cadre fireblade looks off, either his torso is to large or he has little dwarf legs...hmm will likely have to just convert some firewarriors for that one..unless it turns out a bit better in other pics, the porportions just seem a bit off.

I actually was kind of confused by his proportions as well.

What it looks like, to me at least, is that he has a bit of heavier armor on top of the standard Fire Caste armor. If you look at his legs, you can see there is a bit heavier armor plating there. If you look at his chest armor in the larger shots you can see that the armor almost looks like what a Stealth Suit or Shadowsun are wearing.

Crimson wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

I don't think that he's so much a "character" but rather an 'officer" upgrade or something to that effect for the Fire Warrior squads.

So they're just veteran sergeants? Tau did had those before, I thought these guys were something different...

I imagine they'll be a bit more like Commissars or the like, where you can buy multiples of them and then allocate them to units in addition to the Shas'ui sergeants.

The more I look at this, the less I am convinced that it is a good model. I understand what they were going for regarding the aesthetics but I don't think they pulled it off. The front end still looks like the FW Ork Bomba before it was orkified and that ruins the overall look. Also, Tau seem to have been swept wing or delta wing design where this is obvious modern earth tech design.



I'd love to see what FW can do to "fix" this like they did the chibihawk but then I remember that the Storm Eagle is one of the most aggravating kits to assemble in a long time.

So March 30th is merely the pre-order date, yes?

I actually like it......and I have hated pretty much everything that GW have done lately lol

I like it as well, if they'd remove the beams that is.

Where's someone like MajorTom to do a quick 'shop to remove the beams?

Lovepug13 wrote:
I actually like it......and I have hated pretty much everything that GW have done lately lol

I can understand where you're coming from but for me not being as bad as Chaos isn't enough. I was hoping to be inspired to finish my Tau but I think I'll be selling them on eBay instead. Thankfully I got rid of my Crisis Suits & Broadsides a while back so it's only infantry and a couple of Hammerheads I have to deal with. I suppose I should look at 1000 points of allies in case I need to give one of my other armies a boost.

I'm okay with the Cadre Fireblade except that I remember reading that the Tau aren't big on unnecessary decoration of their military leaders. In the book Firewarrior, Kais remarks on how utterly ridiculous high ranking humans look with all their gaudy, useless decorations.
The Fireblade looks like he's wearing a bit too much nonsense. Like he's a SM wannabe.
I might get one, but mostly I will be converting my own Fireblades, since I do plan to use them. I even have a plan for fitting markerlights onto their pulse rifles if need be.

I find it odd the number of people speculating "Oooh! 'Our Conquest is Inevitable', does this mean the Tau are becoming darker???"
This is always the way that I pictured Tau. I never saw them as naive.
They've been pounded by the Imperium, including SMs and fought to a standstill.
They've been pounded by Tyranids, and managed to do what the Ultramarines could not.
They have Chaos attacking them from the Perdus Rift Anomaly, which is like their very own Eye of Terror.
They learned the hard way to shoot first when dealing with Necrons and DE.
Their military caste is naturally aggressive and they begin training at an early age.

I'm going to quote my own P&M blog: (Which needs to be reorganized a bit.)

This is the Caste of "diplomacy has failed and you are of no further use to us."
The Caste of the "Give-Us-All-Your-Weapons-Or-We'll-Blow-Your-Freakin'-Heads-Off" peace treaty.

This is why I'm trying to make my Tau look more aggressive and a little badass.

I-I did my best s-sempai!

Fireblade looks horrible. One of the main reasons I play Tau is to avoid the insane kibble overload most other armies inflict on their characters. Also get the feeling he'll be single-pose like the Herald of Nurgle when doing a multipose with simpler armor would have been much more in keeping with the army.

Pathfinder guy looks nice but is finecast.

Quad-gun looks kind of goofy, like the Tau should be better than that.

I don't see why they're bothering with a finecast release of the tank commander when everyone will just proxy with the one on the Devilfish sprue anyways.

Broadside looks nice, but I'm not buying one until I see some rules.


I guess I have to order a skyray before they jump up in price.

I actually have been thinking more and more about why the Fireblade looks like he does.

I've come to the conclusion that there's two options:
1) He's part of an Ethereal's bodyguard and gets detached to the rest of the army. The decorative bits are a visual tie to the Ethereal Caste.
2) The Fireblades are jealous of how pimp the Imperial and Traitor command echelon look with their fancy stuff.

The Tau was my fifth largest army. 4000 points. I could care less about the new models. I'm just hoping for a decent codex that merges neatly with the rule system.

Otherwise it will stay in storage.

 Kanluwen wrote:
I actually have been thinking more and more about why the Fireblade looks like he does.

I've come to the conclusion that there's two options:
1) He's part of an Ethereal's bodyguard and gets detached to the rest of the army. The decorative bits are a visual tie to the Ethereal Caste.
2) The Fireblades are jealous of how pimp the Imperial and Traitor command echelon look with their fancy stuff.

I bet its number 2

also the flyer without the struts look much better imo i will probably be modeling it that way.

Larger pic of Dark Strider (all by zhongzzw over at ATT):


Larger pic of Pathfinders:


I hope this suit is just the reboxes one, not the new Commander:

I also hope they don't draigo the tau background, as these are the original designer notes:

In contrast to other races, we wanted the Tau to be altruistic and idealistic, believing heartily in unification as the way forward. This meant that they would happily incorporate other races into their empire without subjugating them, instead enticing them in with the benefits of mutual protection, trade and technology.

Concerning the anatomy of Fireblade, Tau usually are more stocky with shorter legs than average humans, but fitting the stocky look of samurai, esp. copying the blocky shoulder and hip armour.


I am more concerned that every sculptor has different ideas of how Tau feet look. And that all tau faces show extreme emotions (unfluffy).
Alternative Fireblades are easily done with the Kroot sprue for veteran gubbins.

Standard procedure to improve the flyer:
Remove the rods between the wings, add a rudder (or change the back to an upward V-tail), remove the tail guns/missiles and put them under the main wings left and right, possibly remove all the junk below the tail (can't see it well, but it probably destroys the sleek and rational tau design).

Just for the record: I just read "For the Greater Good". If you are searching for a book on Tau, look elsewhere: It's only about Cain fighting Tyranids, with no Tau involvement except a few pages at the beginning. Quite a disappointment.

I was wondering if there was any sort of plastic samurais that could be meshed with Tau bitz out there? That drawing really drives that vibe, imho.

Wargames Factory? Anyone else?

 Archonate wrote:

They've been pounded by Tyranids, and managed to do what the Ultramarines could not.

I'll just not comment on the other stuff, but what? Did you miss the part where Hive Fleet Leviathan isn't around as a Hive Fleet anymore?

If you want to put a bit of work into converting you can make due with robed dark angel legs and a lot of cutting to get hakama style pants.




Or if you have some Infinty Yu Jing troops or Musashi, a jewerly saw and dremmel tool you can pieces together other Hakama style pants.

 Adam LongWalker wrote:
I could care less about the new models.

How much less?