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 p_gray99 wrote:

Lanlaorn wrote:
The drone controller does not work for missile drones and the FAQ removed the ability for Crisis suits to even take missile drones.

Only Broadsides can spam missiles on their missiles.

They've already got an FAQ out? Worse, they're already going against what's clearly written in the codex? Darn...

The FAQ corrects this one issue, which was a typo. The digital version of the codex always said they were Broadsides-only, all this does is correct the wording in the paper codex.

Fair enough. It's a shame, but I can see why they did it. Otherwise, I couldn't really see why anyone would take gun drones when they could take missile drones...

I will give credit where credit is due, with the points refund, you can make ONE of your hammerheads quite a powerful machine by including Longstrike, for about the same point level as you had originally. Which is handy, I won't lie. Your options with pathfinders and fire warriors go up quite a bit, with the addition of powerful weapon options and Darkstrider to basically be immune to getting charged. Aun'Shi's FNP == AP you're shot with rule is actually really interesting, and I see every tau player having one on hand just in case you run into a melta spam army or the like.

I'm still going to play Tau, I still enjoy Tau, but I think that tau competitiveness has really fallen off the table. No more unexpected deployments or difficult to counter with what you're already fielding lists, pretty much kill the markerlights == cripple the shooting. So if you've got the ability to deep strike or cross the field quickly, a 36" heavy range becomes our crutch. If you've got an advantage (powerful markerlight support) then all it takes is one quickly moving assault unit to tie them up and wipe them out. Even if you split them up into smaller groups, you'll find your rhythm interrupted easily. Here's to the future of our race, for the greater good.

Edit - That's pretty much the reason they limited the missile drones. Who in their right mind would choose a gun drone over a missile drone at the same point cost? I know for a fact I wouldn't. So basically it would remove gun drones entirely from the tau arsenal. They've already gone an awesome length by normalizing all drone support, allowing people to really field things that they'd never use normally.

What's the chance of seeker spam working?
With seekers dropping in price, can you get 20-30 of them on the table?

-Matt

It's just a str8/ap3 shot. Not even like you can carry very many. Unless you went full out skyray, in which case not only are you crippling your primary anti-av role, but you're also precluding yourself from being able to utilize broadsides or sniper drone teams.

I've got 6 on my broadsides, we'll see how it works later. All it costs me is a few bucks on ebay to pick up the missiles. Rigging up these missile systems is gonna be expensive. Missile pods aren't cheap.

Regarding Seeker Spam, I think it can be workable, but it's got limitations. Given that the HS slots no longer *have* to be dedicated to tank hunting (S8 Heavy Rail Rifles *are* less effective in the anti-armor role these days, and you get too few Railcannons in those slots), you do have more flexibility in what you choose to run in those slots. Triple Skyray isn't necessarily a crippling disadvantage assuming you compensate with Fusion / Missile Pods / EMP / large blasts elsewhere.

Seeker Spam only really works (IMO) when you've got plenty of Markerlights and can get Seekers on multiple platforms that can get side / rear armor shots as desired. That means in addition to your Skyrays in the HS slots, you'll need sufficient MLs in the FA slots, plus either several Devilfish or Piranhas as additional Seeker carriers. You can get a serious Turn 1 Alpha Strike in - but whether that's effective or not really depends on what you're facing. With sufficient ML support, you can quite easily take out Thunderfire Cannons and the like. Taking down Flyers should also be a lot easier with a 3x Skyray list, even after the Seekers are expended - using the Skyfiring MLs to boost the BS of ground-based Fusion that's firing Snap Shots really can ruin someone's day in a hurry.

As noted above, though, if you're wanting to run that kind of a list, ensure you get enough Fusion / EMP to take out the heavy armor, and enough large blasts via Riptides and the like to whittle down hordes.

Anbutou wrote:

I'm still going to play Tau, I still enjoy Tau, but I think that tau competitiveness has really fallen off the table. No more unexpected deployments or difficult to counter with what you're already fielding lists, pretty much kill the markerlights == cripple the shooting. So if you've got the ability to deep strike or cross the field quickly, a 36" heavy range becomes our crutch. If you've got an advantage (powerful markerlight support) then all it takes is one quickly moving assault unit to tie them up and wipe them out. Even if you split them up into smaller groups, you'll find your rhythm interrupted easily. Here's to the future of our race, for the greater good.

And then you run into a marker-free dakka-spam army where he values more guns over accurate guns, or a guy who spreads his markerlights among units with marker drones and the concept of killing marker units first gets thrown off the window.


Sure, drones are not as efficient in mark-per-point, but good luck distupting their rythem with the better armor, higher thoughness and JSJ movement on a platform that cares not about enemies having cover, and has great range.

So orks?

 BoomWolf wrote:

Anbutou wrote:

I'm still going to play Tau, I still enjoy Tau, but I think that tau competitiveness has really fallen off the table. No more unexpected deployments or difficult to counter with what you're already fielding lists, pretty much kill the markerlights == cripple the shooting. So if you've got the ability to deep strike or cross the field quickly, a 36" heavy range becomes our crutch. If you've got an advantage (powerful markerlight support) then all it takes is one quickly moving assault unit to tie them up and wipe them out. Even if you split them up into smaller groups, you'll find your rhythm interrupted easily. Here's to the future of our race, for the greater good.

And then you run into a marker-free dakka-spam army where he values more guns over accurate guns, or a guy who spreads his markerlights among units with marker drones and the concept of killing marker units first gets thrown off the window.


Sure, drones are not as efficient in mark-per-point, but good luck distupting their rythem with the better armor, higher thoughness and JSJ movement on a platform that cares not about enemies having cover, and has great range.

I kinda chuckled here. You're talking to the guy who RAN the marker-free tau army. I utilized crisis commander bodyguard squads as my crisis suits just so I could get the Shas'vre upgrade list on each one, and take the Targeting Arrays. I took Broadsides because without markerlights Hammerhead solid shots were worse than useless, they were a standing points deduction. I took Broadsides every time because I could utilize Slow and Purposeful or TA bonuses. I RARELY ever gave my fire warriors fish, because the meta didn't include much that could really make me worry too greatly (Plus, dem points man). Toss in a couple of XV-9's and a Piranha TX-42 and you've got a solid fast response setup as well.

Now I run 8 marker drones, and two 6 man squads of Pathfinders, and it's JUST enough to get me back to where I was in terms of shooting efficiency. That's the problem here. Also, you go ahead and tell me what you're bringing to the table with an additional 132 pts for the two 6 man teams, or 220 pts for two 10 man squads. How much "dakka" can you bring for 220 points that outweighs the ability to shoot at BS5 pretty much around your entire army? I'll let you tell me. My current list is R'alai who'll go first with his marker drones, followed up by my command squad, they'll use one to hit bs4, fire their marker drones, commander has drone controller, so bs5 there. That's pretty much 3 hits on average, but most likely 4. You then toss two to pathfinder squad one, two to pathfinder squad two, and that's pretty much a full list of hits. Now everything fires at bs5, basically. Three more drones on the XV8 squad in the elites section, just in case things go awry. It really doesn't matter what strategy you utilize, you're pretty much GOING to be bringing pathfinders, and that creates the weakness of the army. You've got a 36" immobile force that you rely on to ensure your victory. You really don't think that's a bit of a night and day difference from what Tau was capable of with their previous codex?

Going from the ability to constantly shift battle lines down to being every other shooting army, just with different effects comprising your shooting, it's pretty jarring. That JSJ wasn't just something that kept you out of LOS. You used that to add another 12-18 inches to your deployment. Starting on one corner and ending on the other was a powerful force with the Tau. Now we just have to hope we can end you before you reach our lines. Every single army has some method of deep strike available to them, if they can utilize it and get into close combat, or even send in their expensive high invuln save troops up to the front to buy their faster attacking troops a turn or two to get in, it's all the same result. You've got an immobile backbone of your force that you're required to have to be as effective as you were a week ago.

Edit - and this of course is just random BS. Obviously your turn won't go anything like what I just said. You'll initiate with BS5 markers on 2-3 different targets, utilize pathfinders against other priority targets and the overall effectiveness of your markerlights will be dropped 50% easily. Markerlights are powerful, but without them you're just another guardsman squad trying to get kills. This is the problem. We've been given no opportunity to succeed without them, and now we can't drop them if we want to.

Id have to agree the removal of Targeting Array is total bs and hurt tau a lot. I like the idea of marker lights but as the above posted said (in a nutshell) theyre a liability and a pointsink. Targeting array may have been a per model upgrade before, but it was always there with 0 chance to fail. Now it can fail or worse can be focused fired out and screw your army over hardcore.

Yes, there's no more way to to get BS4 on suits, but the whole list is riddled with ways to improve your shooting without markerlights. Command and control node, multispectral sensor, built in multitrackers, twin-linked weapons everywhere, drone controllers, high RoF weapons, Etherials, Fireblades, and Longstrike, are the ones that come to mind. Maybe it's because I'm also a Guard player, but I never look at BS when determining shooting quality, I look at expected wounds. I don't care if they're coming off of a BS2 model as long as wounds happen.

They "fixed" missile drones but didn't do anything about burst cannons on Hammerheads? Talk about useless options; why would you ever take a burst cannon when the SMS is the same price (free)?

 agnosto wrote:
They "fixed" missile drones but didn't do anything about burst cannons on Hammerheads? Talk about useless options; why would you ever take a burst cannon when the SMS is the same price (free)?

Again, they fixed missile drones because it was a TYPO. The digital version of the codex always had them as Broadsides-only, the FAQ was just rushed out to fix the typo in the paper version before people started building armies based on it.

Anbutou wrote:

 BoomWolf wrote:

Anbutou wrote:

I'm still going to play Tau, I still enjoy Tau, but I think that tau competitiveness has really fallen off the table. No more unexpected deployments or difficult to counter with what you're already fielding lists, pretty much kill the markerlights == cripple the shooting. So if you've got the ability to deep strike or cross the field quickly, a 36" heavy range becomes our crutch. If you've got an advantage (powerful markerlight support) then all it takes is one quickly moving assault unit to tie them up and wipe them out. Even if you split them up into smaller groups, you'll find your rhythm interrupted easily. Here's to the future of our race, for the greater good.

And then you run into a marker-free dakka-spam army where he values more guns over accurate guns, or a guy who spreads his markerlights among units with marker drones and the concept of killing marker units first gets thrown off the window.


Sure, drones are not as efficient in mark-per-point, but good luck distupting their rythem with the better armor, higher thoughness and JSJ movement on a platform that cares not about enemies having cover, and has great range.

I kinda chuckled here. You're talking to the guy who RAN the marker-free tau army. I utilized crisis commander bodyguard squads as my crisis suits just so I could get the Shas'vre upgrade list on each one, and take the Targeting Arrays. I took Broadsides because without markerlights Hammerhead solid shots were worse than useless, they were a standing points deduction. I took Broadsides every time because I could utilize Slow and Purposeful or TA bonuses. I RARELY ever gave my fire warriors fish, because the meta didn't include much that could really make me worry too greatly (Plus, dem points man). Toss in a couple of XV-9's and a Piranha TX-42 and you've got a solid fast response setup as well.

Now I run 8 marker drones, and two 6 man squads of Pathfinders, and it's JUST enough to get me back to where I was in terms of shooting efficiency. That's the problem here. Also, you go ahead and tell me what you're bringing to the table with an additional 132 pts for the two 6 man teams, or 220 pts for two 10 man squads. How much "dakka" can you bring for 220 points that outweighs the ability to shoot at BS5 pretty much around your entire army? I'll let you tell me. My current list is R'alai who'll go first with his marker drones, followed up by my command squad, they'll use one to hit bs4, fire their marker drones, commander has drone controller, so bs5 there. That's pretty much 3 hits on average, but most likely 4. You then toss two to pathfinder squad one, two to pathfinder squad two, and that's pretty much a full list of hits. Now everything fires at bs5, basically. Three more drones on the XV8 squad in the elites section, just in case things go awry. It really doesn't matter what strategy you utilize, you're pretty much GOING to be bringing pathfinders, and that creates the weakness of the army. You've got a 36" immobile force that you rely on to ensure your victory. You really don't think that's a bit of a night and day difference from what Tau was capable of with their previous codex?

Going from the ability to constantly shift battle lines down to being every other shooting army, just with different effects comprising your shooting, it's pretty jarring. That JSJ wasn't just something that kept you out of LOS. You used that to add another 12-18 inches to your deployment. Starting on one corner and ending on the other was a powerful force with the Tau. Now we just have to hope we can end you before you reach our lines. Every single army has some method of deep strike available to them, if they can utilize it and get into close combat, or even send in their expensive high invuln save troops up to the front to buy their faster attacking troops a turn or two to get in, it's all the same result. You've got an immobile backbone of your force that you're required to have to be as effective as you were a week ago.

Edit - and this of course is just random BS. Obviously your turn won't go anything like what I just said. You'll initiate with BS5 markers on 2-3 different targets, utilize pathfinders against other priority targets and the overall effectiveness of your markerlights will be dropped 50% easily. Markerlights are powerful, but without them you're just another guardsman squad trying to get kills. This is the problem. We've been given no opportunity to succeed without them, and now we can't drop them if we want to.

I totally agree with all of this. I ran the same list in 6th with the old codex, I didn't even use TA, just had a farseer with Divination making my 4 man suit squad TL with everything. who needed markerlights with the exception of my two tetras which only used them to remove coversaves from priority targets.

No my army has two 8 man pathfinders and 2 markers on the cmdr, just to get by. Lost another FA slot and roughly 80pts just to get back to where I was pre-codex. Sigh

What is dakka's opinion on taking two of the same weapon on a crisis suit rather than the TL version? For example: a Helios suit with two single plasma rifles and a single fusion blaster rather than a TL PR and single FC. Yes you can't fire them all, but is not the extra shot and option worth it?

XLIMil wrote:
What is dakka's opinion on taking two of the same weapon on a crisis suit rather than the TL version? For example: a Helios suit with two single plasma rifles and a single fusion blaster rather than a TL PR and single FC. Yes you can't fire them all, but is not the extra shot and option worth it?

Well i know opinion is divided between you can take 2 of the same weapons as a standard single version vs twinlinked, and till FAQ settles it probably best not to take em as singles and even then its a waste of points every turn that or just magnets and try it out.

Fair enough. I have tried two single missile pods and they certainly worked out better than one TL version.

I am not sure though where the ambiguity is in the RAW when it concerns taking two singles: "Where a weapon has two points costs, the first is for a standard, single version, and the second is for two weapons (counting as a twin-linked weapon of that type). A twin-linked weapon counts as two choice from this list." Yes it says that the second point option is a choice for a TL version that counts as two hard points. No it does not say that two choices of the first points option equates to choosing the second points option (as that wouldn't make sense).

I do see the point of the argument though if you say that nowhere does it explicitiely say you can choose the same list entry twice. I would counter with asking if you think a commander then cannot take, for example, two TL PR as his four options. If the answer to that is that it is fine for a commander to take a pair of the same TL weaponry then it would certainly be fine for a regular suit to take a pair of non TL weapons. That said, yeah a FAQ on this would be nice.

XLIMil wrote:
I am not sure though where the ambiguity is in the RAW when it concerns taking two singles:

There isn't any ambiguity RAW, the rules are perfectly clear that you can take two single weapons. The concern is that GW thinks it's not fluffy and will "FAQ" it back to how it worked in the old codex, so you should wait until the first real FAQ is published to commit to building dual single-weapon suits.

 Peregrine wrote:
There isn't any ambiguity RAW, the rules are perfectly clear that you can take two single weapons. The concern is that GW thinks it's not fluffy and will "FAQ" it back to how it worked in the old codex, so you should wait until the first real FAQ is published to commit to building dual single-weapon suits.

That makes sense thank you for clearing that up! On topic: anyone try the MSSS and C&CN commander loadout? If so then with what and was it useful?

 Peregrine wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
They "fixed" missile drones but didn't do anything about burst cannons on Hammerheads? Talk about useless options; why would you ever take a burst cannon when the SMS is the same price (free)?

Again, they fixed missile drones because it was a TYPO. The digital version of the codex always had them as Broadsides-only, the FAQ was just rushed out to fix the typo in the paper version before people started building armies based on it.

So the burst cannon sucking so much when compared the same cost SMS could be a typo too.

Relax, some people just want to have fun with...a game. I know a novel concept. Not everything typed needs to be met with an attitude of infinite sufferance.

 agnosto wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:

 agnosto wrote:
They "fixed" missile drones but didn't do anything about burst cannons on Hammerheads? Talk about useless options; why would you ever take a burst cannon when the SMS is the same price (free)?

Again, they fixed missile drones because it was a TYPO. The digital version of the codex always had them as Broadsides-only, the FAQ was just rushed out to fix the typo in the paper version before people started building armies based on it.

So the burst cannon sucking so much when compared the same cost SMS could be a typo too.

Relax, some people just want to have fun with...a game. I know a novel concept. Not everything typed needs to be met with an attitude of infinite sufferance.

A typo on both the Digital and the hardcopy?

I suppose its possible. Lets just hope they realize their error.

XLIMil wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
There isn't any ambiguity RAW, the rules are perfectly clear that you can take two single weapons. The concern is that GW thinks it's not fluffy and will "FAQ" it back to how it worked in the old codex, so you should wait until the first real FAQ is published to commit to building dual single-weapon suits.

That makes sense thank you for clearing that up!

It is true that there is no ambiguity. Two weapons are twin-linked, and Peregrine is wrong.

Here is a thread where this matter if fruitlessly discussed ad nauseam. Please direct any further debate on this matter to that thread.

I really feel that tau is not strong enough to make a change to the meta directly, the way that necrons, IG and CSM can. But Tau has some very good tools to combat a meta. If flyer spam is big in your group then tau can counter it. If sv2's are common tau can counter it. We We do not have raw power but we have almost unmatched adaptability. So we are able to react and change which is good and bad. This means our fine tuned lists will have a clear advantage while our general lists will be a little underpowered. This also means that we can sweep the top decks but may not have the tools to deal with something different. For example we can destroy small elite units and deathstars but doing so leaves us with little volume of fire to take out horde armies. So depending on how similar strategies are we might be very competitive.

On a non-tournament scene level I think our book is fine, it was okay before the update (I know I won most games unless fighting necrons and IG) and our book only made us stronger. so I am pretty happy.

As for actual tactics, I think our HQ choices is really the thing that will open us up and depending on what HQ you pick will determine what tactics you are going to be deploying.

Quick question: with all drone types now costing the same will there ever be any reason to take Gun Drones over Shield or even Marker Drones?

 Ferrum_Sanguinis wrote:
Quick question: with all drone types now costing the same will there ever be any reason to take Gun Drones over Shield or even Marker Drones?

I think for me it will depend on the size battle I am fighting.

At low point values, I would probably attach a marker drone squad to my commander since I won't have as many options for marker lights in other units.

At a higher point value, I think I have a fair amount of marker lights elsewhere in squads that I think I would attach a gun drone squad with him and just spam pulse carbine shots all over the place.

Just have to play it and see which one serves me better.

hokieseas wrote:

 Ferrum_Sanguinis wrote:
Quick question: with all drone types now costing the same will there ever be any reason to take Gun Drones over Shield or even Marker Drones?

I think for me it will depend on the size battle I am fighting.

At low point values, I would probably attach a marker drone squad to my commander since I won't have as many options for marker lights in other units.

At a higher point value, I think I have a fair amount of marker lights elsewhere in squads that I think I would attach a gun drone squad with him and just spam pulse carbine shots all over the place.

Just have to play it and see which one serves me better.

Would Shield Drones Serve you better in both cases, since it low points games you're commander is likely your only HQ so you want to keep him alive, and in high points games they will be plenty of things that could ID him?

 Ferrum_Sanguinis wrote:


Would Shield Drones Serve you better in both cases, since it low points games you're commander is likely your only HQ so you want to keep him alive, and in high points games they will be plenty of things that could ID him?

I would still take 2 shield drones as the two drones I can from his codex entry. The other drones I was talking about, marker or gun, would be a fast attack drone squad for my commander to join. Yes, I have been splattered too easily from the Dark Eldar and Chaos players I typically play that my Commander does not leave the house without some shield drones anymore.

 Ferrum_Sanguinis wrote:
Quick question: with all drone types now costing the same will there ever be any reason to take Gun Drones over Shield or even Marker Drones?

Depends on the load out of the suits. If you have missile pods and are planing on staying 36" away then shield and marker dones are the best you can get. If are up close then adding a few s5 shots won't be the worst thing and if you are lucky you might get a pin. You probably aren't going to see that many gun drones compared to marker drones but they do have a purpose.

 Crimson wrote:

XLIMil wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
There isn't any ambiguity RAW, the rules are perfectly clear that you can take two single weapons. The concern is that GW thinks it's not fluffy and will "FAQ" it back to how it worked in the old codex, so you should wait until the first real FAQ is published to commit to building dual single-weapon suits.

That makes sense thank you for clearing that up!

It is true that there is no ambiguity. Two weapons are twin-linked, and Peregrine is wrong.

Here is a thread where this matter if fruitlessly discussed ad nauseam. Please direct any further debate on this matter to that thread.

Nope.

The Crisis suit may take up to three items from the ranged weapons, signature systems, or support systems.

The top of page 95 reads "These lists detail the points values of various items..."

Each weapon is an item. I can have three. A twin-linked version is two.

Running two of the same weapon I'm pretty sure is still out, but there's NOTHING to say you can't twin link one system and run another of the same weapon. I'm planning on still running a lot of PR/MP suits, but I've got every weapons combination under the sun magnetized, so we'll see what becomes amazing. I'm still used to the playing style that says if I've closed into rapid fire range with my PR then I'm just mocking you - but who knows, 18 inch fusion blasters could be just what I need to ever bring Shadowsun - Also, really REALLY digging the new Cyclic Ion Blaster. I used to have that available for when nids or swarmy crap showed up, but man, now it's on a whole other level.