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Thanks! It is annoying. Crazy unlikely, but that you could theoretically kill your own multi-wound model with your own shooting attack.

Every design decision I would make is to increase diversity.

 pumaman1 wrote:


The reason I am less worried about 3+ armor, in the era of grav spam, it actually makes them more survivable.

Not everyone plays Spess Muhrinz.

 pumaman1 wrote:
1.) codex balance should be better at large, the wide variety in army viability is not ok, but needs a total re-write from BRB through codecies.

2.) saying that orks have a hard time versus the riptide/tau is like saying the kid with 1 leg stumpy arms and stage 4 cancer has a hard time versus a healthy experienced navy seal. Orks have a hard time versus mid-tier codices and up. You have my sympathy, your faction should be better. But it's not fair to say "my cripple can't reasonably beat your seal, therefore seal OP" when they would struggle versus essentially the same points in guardsmen with a priest as well

But that's the point. Us Spikey Boys, Orks, 'Nids, Imperial Guard etc. have zero chance against the Goddamn Wing. If it's so far up and above most things we can bring, that means it probably should be taken down several notches.

 ChazSexington wrote:

 pumaman1 wrote:
1.) codex balance should be better at large, the wide variety in army viability is not ok, but needs a total re-write from BRB through codecies.

2.) saying that orks have a hard time versus the riptide/tau is like saying the kid with 1 leg stumpy arms and stage 4 cancer has a hard time versus a healthy experienced navy seal. Orks have a hard time versus mid-tier codices and up. You have my sympathy, your faction should be better. But it's not fair to say "my cripple can't reasonably beat your seal, therefore seal OP" when they would struggle versus essentially the same points in guardsmen with a priest as well

But that's the point. Us Spikey Boys, Orks, 'Nids, Imperial Guard etc. have zero chance against the Goddamn Wing. If it's so far up and above most things we can bring, that means it probably should be taken down several notches.

I can bring my Shadowsword and hope to hell that I get the first turn, manage to hit one or two with the blast and '6' on the result to kill off at least two of them. Because if I do not get the first turn and I fail to kill at least one of them I will lose.

My proposed stats for the Riptide are thus:

180 points
WS 2, BS 3, S6, AV F 12, S 12, R 12, I 2, A 1, HP 5.

Equipment: exactly as it is now.

Special rules: Nova Generator; You may choose to use the Nova Generator at the start of your turn to boost one aspect of the riptide. Roll a D6, on a 3+ choose an ability from the following list and apply it until your next turn, on a 1 or 2 the Riptide suffers a glancing hit.

Ion Accelerator: The Ion Cannon gains 12" of range and becomes Heavy/7, Blast, gets hot

Burst Cannon overdrive: The Heavy Burst Cannon becomes Heavy/16, Rending

Thruster Burst: The Riptide may move an extra 2D6" every time it uses its Jump Pack This may be used to move it out of assault.

Shield Overcharge: The Riptide gains a 4+ invulnerable save

At my FLGS, we like to do a lot of playtesting and re-balancing. The riptide was a hotly debated topic. Everyone, including the other tau player and myself, agreed that it was overpowered/undercosted. After much consideration (and bickering), then finally some playtesting a general consensus was reached. Ultimately, the prevailing opinion was that the simplest solutions were the best, and that there was no reason to "re-invent the wheel". We had 2 possible solutions. The riptide wing was removed for both. They are as follows:

Solution 1: Points redistribution.

The basic riptide was raised to 200 points base (the heavy burst cannon lost gets hot on the nova roll), the ion accelerator was raised to a 20 points upgrade, the early warning override (interceptor) was raised to a 30 point upgrade, and stimulant injectors (feel no pain) was raised to a 50 point upgrade.

The typical ion, EWO, and stim riptide would end up costing a flat 300 points with these changes, which our playtesting determined left the riptide as useful without being to unfair. Generally considered "autotake" options like the stim injectors, ion, and EWO became actual options you would have to heavily consider whether to take or not.

Solution 2: Toning down.

The invulnerable save was reduced to 6+ and 4+ when NOVA'd, the ion accelerator no longer has the overcharge option (just the 3 shot and the novacharge-which no longer counted as ordnance), May no longer take early warning override or stimulant injectors. Also gets hot was removed from the NOVA profile of the heavy burst cannon.

The reduction of the invulnerable save and lack of feel no pain makes this version far easier to take down, furthermore removing the overcharge option from the ion accelerator means ion toting riptides really have to consider whether they need to NOVA for offense or for defense like the heavy burst cannon variant. Removing EWO was a subject of much consternation but was ultimately agreed that every other suit can take it, so it wasn't a huge deal (Tau would still have the most access to interceptor by far.)

Cheers!

It seems this discussion is rather pointless because there are two kinds of directions: The people who say the riptide is fine (which it is when playing against all codices since necrons), and the people who want to nerf it to Ork/AM/DE level.

However, if you want to argue the second point, I can give you a looong laundry list of stuff that is just as broken against older codices, if not worse - starting with the Decurion just rolling over every older codex, to scatterbikes to various space marine lists that absolutely trash those factions. The riptide is usually singled out because it was among the first units with a distinctly higher powerlevel, but it is no longer the worst offender by far. Hell, an optimized stealth cadre can probably wipe an orc army all by itself within 2-3 turns.
Either the older codices need to be brought up to speed, or the next edition must reset the powerlevel on a fundamental level. Or you can try nerfing almost every unit and formation in the post-necron codices until SOB are competitive again.

@chalkobob These changes sound fine against some codices. On the other hand, if you encounter e.g. a Skyhammer with full grav loadout, EWO is the only thing that prevents you from packing your army turn 1. I played against a skyhammer just last week, and even after EWO from 5 charged riptides there was enough grav left to kill 2.5 of them (and a third one was swept in CC by the assault marines).

Ushtarador wrote:

@chalkobob These changes sound fine against some codices. On the other hand, if you encounter e.g. a Skyhammer with full grav loadout, EWO is the only thing that prevents you from packing your army turn 1. I played against a skyhammer just last week, and even after EWO from 5 charged riptides there was enough grav left to kill 2.5 of them (and a third one was swept in CC by the assault marines).

Pretty much this, if space marines played anything besides a Skyhammer/Gladius/soon to be Strike Force Ultima style set up, and if space marines weren't over 1/2 the played armies, it would make sense to take things other than EWO. But that's not the case, and the lower tiered factions would be stomped on by fundamental flaws in larger game balance. Balancing the riptide to whatever just means we'll take other stuff, but your codex is just worse. That shouldn't be the case, but it is.

For spiky boys, you've got access to demon princes, summoning to make me waste shooting/intercept on free units, and raptors/talons can assault out of deepstrike, so with some clever positioning, you should still be ok. You are not sitting well overall, and massively uphill as a few formations doesn't change weak foundation, but you have more answers now than before.

 pumaman1 wrote:

Ushtarador wrote:

@chalkobob These changes sound fine against some codices. On the other hand, if you encounter e.g. a Skyhammer with full grav loadout, EWO is the only thing that prevents you from packing your army turn 1. I played against a skyhammer just last week, and even after EWO from 5 charged riptides there was enough grav left to kill 2.5 of them (and a third one was swept in CC by the assault marines).

Pretty much this, if space marines played anything besides a Skyhammer/Gladius/soon to be Strike Force Ultima style set up, and if space marines weren't over 1/2 the played armies, it would make sense to take things other than EWO. But that's not the case, and the lower tiered factions would be stomped on by fundamental flaws in larger game balance. Balancing the riptide to whatever just means we'll take other stuff, but your codex is just worse. That shouldn't be the case, but it is.

For spiky boys, you've got access to demon princes, summoning to make me waste shooting/intercept on free units, and raptors/talons can assault out of deepstrike, so with some clever positioning, you should still be ok. You are not sitting well overall, and massively uphill as a few formations doesn't change weak foundation, but you have more answers now than before.

To be fair, we've done fairly comprehensive balance changing across the factions and the core rules themselves. Not just the riptide.

Which is a serious problem in threads like these. It's impossible to properly balance anything in a vacuum. You see this in threads about how to balance other things (like grav) and one of the common answers is that you shouldn't nerf a faction's overpowered stuff so long as other factions possess equally (or even more) overpowered stuff, and to be fair this is a valid point in a way, but where does this leave the have-not factions? Maybe they should all be buffed to Eldar levels, but should we really take everything to that extreme to balance the game or should we tone down overpowered stuff to a lower tier? I suppose that's a matter of taste since there's no objectively right or wrong answer.

So long as there exists such a huge gap between the power of various factions and even various units within these factions, it becomes impossible to get several people to agree on where the balance bar is to be set. Until we all agree as a community what the standard for balance is these threads will never be fruitful.

Don't nerf riptides because grav and scat bikes exist. Don't nerf wraithknights because deathstars and decurions exist. Don't nerf grav because wraithknights and riptides exist. Nerf everything because wyches and rough riders exist... etc. It's an endless cycle, and the only way to break it is "the dream." The one where GW reboots the entire game 3rd edition style and updates everything simultaneously... only this time with perfect internal and external balance. Maybe 8th edition will do this. I seriously doubt it.

My 2 cents. YMMV.

 pumaman1 wrote:

Ushtarador wrote:

@chalkobob These changes sound fine against some codices. On the other hand, if you encounter e.g. a Skyhammer with full grav loadout, EWO is the only thing that prevents you from packing your army turn 1. I played against a skyhammer just last week, and even after EWO from 5 charged riptides there was enough grav left to kill 2.5 of them (and a third one was swept in CC by the assault marines).

Pretty much this, if space marines played anything besides a Skyhammer/Gladius/soon to be Strike Force Ultima style set up, and if space marines weren't over 1/2 the played armies, it would make sense to take things other than EWO. But that's not the case, and the lower tiered factions would be stomped on by fundamental flaws in larger game balance. Balancing the riptide to whatever just means we'll take other stuff, but your codex is just worse. That shouldn't be the case, but it is.

The complaint about EWO has never been strictly that Tau have access to it.
It's the ridiculously low points cost coupled with the widespread availability and how hard counter it makes Tau to virtually any army that relies upon not walking across the board.

You can whine all you want about Skyhammer or Gladius, but once again:
Not every Space Marine army has access to those things as part of their unique Detachments. Tau hardcounter the crap out of the Raven Guard detachment strictly because of EWO and SMS.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

Ushtarador wrote:
It seems this discussion is rather pointless because there are two kinds of directions: The people who say the riptide is fine (which it is when playing against all codices since necrons), and the people who want to nerf it to Ork/AM/DE level.

However, if you want to argue the second point, I can give you a looong laundry list of stuff that is just as broken against older codices, if not worse - starting with the Decurion just rolling over every older codex, to scatterbikes to various space marine lists that absolutely trash those factions. The riptide is usually singled out because it was among the first units with a distinctly higher powerlevel, but it is no longer the worst offender by far. Hell, an optimized stealth cadre can probably wipe an orc army all by itself within 2-3 turns.
Either the older codices need to be brought up to speed, or the next edition must reset the powerlevel on a fundamental level. Or you can try nerfing almost every unit and formation in the post-necron codices until SOB are competitive again.

The Riptide is singled out because, like the Wraithknight, it was a distinctly powerful unit to begin with. Both have seen buffs with no real drawbacks.

That's why Riptides are singled out. There is virtually nothing that the Riptide can't do.

@chalkobob These changes sound fine against some codices. On the other hand, if you encounter e.g. a Skyhammer with full grav loadout, EWO is the only thing that prevents you from packing your army turn 1. I played against a skyhammer just last week, and even after EWO from 5 charged riptides there was enough grav left to kill 2.5 of them (and a third one was swept in CC by the assault marines).

You had 5 Riptides on the field?

You deserved to be Skyhammered.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 pumaman1 wrote:

@chalkobob These changes sound fine against some codices. On the other hand, if you encounter e.g. a Skyhammer with full grav loadout, EWO is the only thing that prevents you from packing your army turn 1. I played against a skyhammer just last week, and even after EWO from 5 charged riptides there was enough grav left to kill 2.5 of them (and a third one was swept in CC by the assault marines).

You had 5 Riptides on the field?

You deserved to be Skyhammered.

You know, this is the evidence that the game is out of control. And is all our fault.

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

 pumaman1 wrote:

@chalkobob These changes sound fine against some codices. On the other hand, if you encounter e.g. a Skyhammer with full grav loadout, EWO is the only thing that prevents you from packing your army turn 1. I played against a skyhammer just last week, and even after EWO from 5 charged riptides there was enough grav left to kill 2.5 of them (and a third one was swept in CC by the assault marines).

You had 5 Riptides on the field?

You deserved to be Skyhammered.

You know, this is the evidence that the game is out of control. And is all our fault.

No, it is GWs fault for writing rules which allowed the game to get this out of control.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Kaiyanwang wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

 pumaman1 wrote:

@chalkobob These changes sound fine against some codices. On the other hand, if you encounter e.g. a Skyhammer with full grav loadout, EWO is the only thing that prevents you from packing your army turn 1. I played against a skyhammer just last week, and even after EWO from 5 charged riptides there was enough grav left to kill 2.5 of them (and a third one was swept in CC by the assault marines).

You had 5 Riptides on the field?

You deserved to be Skyhammered.

You know, this is the evidence that the game is out of control. And is all our fault.

No, it is GWs fault for writing rules which allowed the game to get this out of control.

It really isn't.

Players don't have to take 5 IA equipped Riptides. Nothing is forcing them to.
Same can be said for Skyhammer with full Grav.

 Kanluwen wrote:


The complaint about EWO has never been strictly that Tau have access to it.
It's the ridiculously low points cost coupled with the widespread availability and how hard counter it makes Tau to virtually any army that relies upon not walking across the board.

You can whine all you want about Skyhammer or Gladius, but once again:
Not every Space Marine army has access to those things as part of their unique Detachments. Tau hardcounter the crap out of the Raven Guard detachment strictly because of EWO and SMS.

can you be specific which raven guard formations you are running that interceptor is a major factor for you? Do you normally play with any LOS blocking terrain? And maybe its time to devise a new plan of attack, other than deep striking in on tau? For raven guard, you have army wide scout... so instead of deepstriking in, maybe utilize scout to get you into workable positions.

 Kanluwen wrote:

It really isn't.

Players don't have to take 5 IA equipped Riptides. Nothing is forcing them to.
Same can be said for Skyhammer with full Grav.

Nothing forced GW to write rules allowing players to take 5 Riptides or Skyhammer with full Grav.

 pumaman1 wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:


The complaint about EWO has never been strictly that Tau have access to it.
It's the ridiculously low points cost coupled with the widespread availability and how hard counter it makes Tau to virtually any army that relies upon not walking across the board.

You can whine all you want about Skyhammer or Gladius, but once again:
Not every Space Marine army has access to those things as part of their unique Detachments. Tau hardcounter the crap out of the Raven Guard detachment strictly because of EWO and SMS.

can you be specific which raven guard formations you are running that interceptor is a major factor for you?

Pinion Demi-Company(Outflanking for units as long as a Scout unit is held back as well)

Do you normally play with any LOS blocking terrain?

Read what I wrote.

Tau hardcounter the crap out of the Raven Guard detachment strictly because of EWO and SMS.

You do know what "Homing" does, right?

LOS blocking doesn't mean crap if someone goes SMS heavy.

And maybe its time to devise a new plan of attack, other than deep striking in on tau?

Maybe it's time for Tau to lose army wide protection against non-standard deployment measures or having to pay more than 5 flipping points for Interceptor.

For raven guard, you have army wide scout... so instead of deepstriking in, maybe utilize scout to get you into workable positions.

Actually, you do not have army wide Scout for Raven Guard.

Chapter Tactics:
Strike from the Shadows: Non-vehicle Raven Guard models that do not begin the game in a Transport vehicle have the Shrouded special rule until the start of the second game turn. When rolling to see whether the Night Fighting mission special rule is in effect during game turn 1, you may add 1 to the result if your army contains at least one Raven Guard unit.

You have army wide Shrouded if you meet the criteria I stated. You cannot be in a Transport and have to begin the game on the table. So by doing the Pinion Demi-Company's "Wayfinders"(Scout Squads kept in Reserve to Outflank can be accompanied by a unit from the Pinion and the accompanying unit can Outflank as well), you actually lose one of your army's Chapter Tactics. Sure you can argue that "Well Wayfinders still gives the accompanying units Stealth!"...but it's Stealth for the turn you arrive and requires you to be within a fixed distance of the Scouts.
The same goes with the Shadowstrike Kill Team(2-4 Scout Squads and 1-3 Vanguard Veteran Squads) utilizing its "On Time..." and "...On Target" special rules for the Vanguard, the Skyhammer Orbital Strike Force(not to be confused with THE Skyhammer. This is 3 Tactical Squads and 1-3 units of Land Speeders) or the Ravenhawk Assault Group(Sternguard Veteran Squad, a Dreadnought[any Codex legal type], and a Stormraven Gunship).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

It really isn't.

Players don't have to take 5 IA equipped Riptides. Nothing is forcing them to.
Same can be said for Skyhammer with full Grav.

Nothing forced GW to write rules allowing players to take 5 Riptides or Skyhammer with full Grav.

You can keep attempting to force this onto GW but in the end, the fault does tend to lie with the players when we're talking about their communities.

GW doesn't come into your community and tell you that you need to take 5 Riptides or Skyhammer with full Grav.

 Kanluwen wrote:


can you be specific which raven guard formations you are running that interceptor is a major factor for you?

Pinion Demi-Company(Outflanking for units as long as a Scout unit is held back as well)

Do you normally play with any LOS blocking terrain?

Read what I wrote.

 pumaman1 wrote:

pumaman wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:


can you be specific which raven guard formations you are running that interceptor is a major factor for you?

Pinion Demi-Company(Outflanking for units as long as a Scout unit is held back as well)

Do you normally play with any LOS blocking terrain?

Read what I wrote.

Bold for emphasis of question you didn't answer? you never wrote about general terrain conditions you play with. + or - terrian or LOS blocking terrian.

I shouldn't have had to answer it. Specifically pointing out that EWO with SMS hardcounters the crap out of the Raven Guard detachment should have been all the answer you needed.

But since you have to know...
It's about 75% terrain coverage with ruins and buildings all over the place. There's a few fire lanes, but for the most part LOS requires careful maneuvering.

Tau hardcounter the crap out of the Raven Guard detachment strictly because of EWO and SMS.

You do know what "Homing" does, right?

LOS blocking doesn't mean crap if someone goes SMS heavy.

yes i do know what homing does. ap 5 is so scary to 3+ armor..

S5 AP5 with a 30" range and 4 shots.

Yes, you can most likely make some of the saves.
But how many points do SMS cost? How many units in the Tau army can take SMS AND EWO?

And maybe its time to devise a new plan of attack, other than deep striking in on tau?

Maybe it's time for Tau to lose army wide protection against non-standard deployment measures or having to pay more than 5 flipping points for Interceptor.

Incentivize other play, to encourage non-EWO. its a chicken and egg paradox (i need interceptor because you deepstrike everything, because i have interceptor, because you deep strike everything...). its only waste if you start on the board, or are a flyer.

It's FIVE POINTS.

You do NOT get to complain about "wasted" points when it costs you FIVE FLIPPING POINTS to give ON DEMANDInterceptor to any of your Battlesuit chassis. It would be an entirely different story if it made the weapons Skyfire, where you actually are penalized(not really since Tau can just Markerlight their BS back up to normal levels but...) for paying the points (a REAL penalty, not this made up penalty of "Oh I spent 5 points and you walked across the board! Oh man! I wasted 5 points!").

Anyway.. Martel actually agreed with 1 proposed version of a riptide, so I will count that as a reasonable suggestion. Again, anything walker profile (even giving me 7 shots of s7 ap2 at 72") pretty much instantly no, over nerf.

I don't really care what Martel said.

The Riptide needs to be T5 with 3 Wounds, tops, to justify the current pricing.
I pay 145 points for 3 Bullgryn in my IG force. That nets me 9 wounds at T5 with a 4+ save, spread across three models that are also S5. My Bullgryn cannot Overwatch(Grenadier Gauntlets are blast items), they do not have access to cheap FNP, they do not get an Invulnerable Save nor anything like Nova Reactor.
A Tau player pays 180 points for a Riptide, with 5W at T6, S6, and the MC attribute.

If you cannot see that yes, the issue is that the Riptide is way too powerful for what it is(it SHOULD be a glass cannon)? I can't help you.
If you also cannot see that the points costs for Battlesuit Systems are way too stupidly low? Also cannot help you.

 Kanluwen wrote:
[
But how many points do SMS cost? How many units in the Tau army can take SMS AND EWO?

Only 2 units in the Tau army can take SMS and EWO (except for a single Commander only Crisis suit variant from Forge World), Riptides and Broadsides.

As for how many points SMS cost, that is harder to work out. On the Riptide you can switch your twin-linked SMS to twin-linked plasma or fusion for free, which would make it worth 20 points. On the broadsides you can switch it for twin-linked plasma for 5 points, which makes it worth 15 points. On Hammerhead and Skyray you can switch 2 gun drones for one twin-linked SMS which makes it cost ~24-28 points (though some of that is costing in the increase from BS2 to BS4). On a Devilfish it costs 10 points to switch your gun drones for an SMS, making it cost ~14-18 points (including getting BS3 as opposed to BS2).

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
[
But how many points do SMS cost? How many units in the Tau army can take SMS AND EWO?

Only 2 units in the Tau army can take SMS and EWO (except for a single Commander only Crisis suit variant from Forge World), Riptides and Broadsides.

Three.

Stormsurges have a twin-linked Smart Missile System base and can take EWO.

In any regards, the point should have been brutally clear.
SMS is something that should be paid for, yet it is the "basic" option for Riptides, Broadsides, and Stormsurges.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
[
But how many points do SMS cost? How many units in the Tau army can take SMS AND EWO?

Only 2 units in the Tau army can take SMS and EWO (except for a single Commander only Crisis suit variant from Forge World), Riptides and Broadsides.

Three.

Stormsurges have a twin-linked Smart Missile System base and can take EWO.

In any regards, the point should have been brutally clear.
SMS is something that should be paid for, yet it is the "basic" option for Riptides, Broadsides, and Stormsurges.

And has been since Broadsides were introduced. These units are paying for SMS in their base cost.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:
[
But how many points do SMS cost? How many units in the Tau army can take SMS AND EWO?

Only 2 units in the Tau army can take SMS and EWO (except for a single Commander only Crisis suit variant from Forge World), Riptides and Broadsides.

Three.

Stormsurges have a twin-linked Smart Missile System base and can take EWO.

In any regards, the point should have been brutally clear.
SMS is something that should be paid for, yet it is the "basic" option for Riptides, Broadsides, and Stormsurges.

And has been since Broadsides were introduced. These units are paying for SMS in their base cost.

Yeah...that's not even remotely true. SMS upon first introduction did not have anything like the rules they have now, nor did Markerlights function the way they do now. So while maybe that argument would hold water if this were 4th edition and Tau were still a relatively new army...but it doesn't hold water now.

Re-read those rules. When first introduced (and all the way through 4th) SMS ignored LOS and intervening cover (you only got a cover save for actually being in area terrain or touching terrain between you and the firer), no markerlights needed.

So SMS is basically the same.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:

It really isn't.

Players don't have to take 5 IA equipped Riptides. Nothing is forcing them to.
Same can be said for Skyhammer with full Grav.

Nothing forced GW to write rules allowing players to take 5 Riptides or Skyhammer with full Grav.

I blame the greed of GW, and those hack frauds of the "designers" every other day. Still, if GW put us in condition to limit ourselves or spam-to-win, we always choose the dark side.

I remember this happening in WHFB, with the last tournament my friends and I tried to attempt was 45% Daemons 45% Vampire counts. All new and grey, of course.

 Kanluwen wrote:

 pumaman1 wrote:

pumaman wrote:

 Kanluwen wrote:


can you be specific which raven guard formations you are running that interceptor is a major factor for you?

Pinion Demi-Company(Outflanking for units as long as a Scout unit is held back as well)

Do you normally play with any LOS blocking terrain?

Read what I wrote.

Bold for emphasis of question you didn't answer? you never wrote about general terrain conditions you play with. + or - terrian or LOS blocking terrian.

I shouldn't have had to answer it. Specifically pointing out that EWO with SMS hardcounters the crap out of the Raven Guard detachment should have been all the answer you needed.

But since you have to know...
It's about 75% terrain coverage with ruins and buildings all over the place. There's a few fire lanes, but for the most part LOS requires careful maneuvering.

Tau hardcounter the crap out of the Raven Guard detachment strictly because of EWO and SMS.

You do know what "Homing" does, right?

LOS blocking doesn't mean crap if someone goes SMS heavy.

yes i do know what homing does. ap 5 is so scary to 3+ armor..

S5 AP5 with a 30" range and 4 shots.

Yes, you can most likely make some of the saves.
But how many points do SMS cost? How many units in the Tau army can take SMS AND EWO?

And maybe its time to devise a new plan of attack, other than deep striking in on tau?

Maybe it's time for Tau to lose army wide protection against non-standard deployment measures or having to pay more than 5 flipping points for Interceptor.

Incentivize other play, to encourage non-EWO. its a chicken and egg paradox (i need interceptor because you deepstrike everything, because i have interceptor, because you deep strike everything...). its only waste if you start on the board, or are a flyer.

It's FIVE POINTS.

You do NOT get to complain about "wasted" points when it costs you FIVE FLIPPING POINTS to give ON DEMANDInterceptor to any of your Battlesuit chassis. It would be an entirely different story if it made the weapons Skyfire, where you actually are penalized(not really since Tau can just Markerlight their BS back up to normal levels but...) for paying the points (a REAL penalty, not this made up penalty of "Oh I spent 5 points and you walked across the board! Oh man! I wasted 5 points!").

Anyway.. Martel actually agreed with 1 proposed version of a riptide, so I will count that as a reasonable suggestion. Again, anything walker profile (even giving me 7 shots of s7 ap2 at 72") pretty much instantly no, over nerf.

I don't really care what Martel said.

The Riptide needs to be T5 with 3 Wounds, tops, to justify the current pricing.
I pay 145 points for 3 Bullgryn in my IG force. That nets me 9 wounds at T5 with a 4+ save, spread across three models that are also S5. My Bullgryn cannot Overwatch(Grenadier Gauntlets are blast items), they do not have access to cheap FNP, they do not get an Invulnerable Save nor anything like Nova Reactor.
A Tau player pays 180 points for a Riptide, with 5W at T6, S6, and the MC attribute.

If you cannot see that yes, the issue is that the Riptide is way too powerful for what it is(it SHOULD be a glass cannon)? I can't help you.
If you also cannot see that the points costs for Battlesuit Systems are way too stupidly low? Also cannot help you.

Calm down. and 5 points wasted over 15 suits instead of other more applicable upgrades is waste. Also, there is nothing constructive in this.

We can see it is powerful, which is why we are talking about ways to balance it, without going overboard. Going after "revenge" is a sure fire way to ruin the discussion.

Using bullgryns as a balancing point seems silly to me.

 pumaman1 wrote:

Calm down. and 5 points wasted over 15 suits instead of other more applicable upgrades is waste. Also, there is nothing constructive in this.
We can see it is powerful, which is why we are talking about ways to balance it, without going overboard. Going after "revenge" is a sure fire way to ruin the discussion.

Unfortunately for you, going after "revenge" is not what's happening.

Realistically? The Riptide is overpowered and always has been.
Pretending that it is not is what ruins these discussions when posters like yourself bring up nonsense like "but Early Warning Override can be 5 points wasted across >insert random number of suits here<".

The fact that you don't see that the simple fact that you can get that much Interceptor is part of the problem beggars belief. I would kill to be able to put Interceptor on my Sentinels or Dreadnoughts.

Tau players though?
"If they don't null deploy I wasted those points!"


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Martel732 wrote:
Using bullgryns as a balancing point seems silly to me.

It is, but it was the first thing that came to mind for Guard. They're both Elites, they're both fluffwise supposed to be "Linebreaker" units, etc.

Back toward my original point - the Riptide is not intended to be a glass cannon. Crisis Suits are the glass cannon, the Riptide is meant to be a fire soak. Almost certainly less firepower per point than a Crisis Suit, but more durability per point. Making it squishy but deadly seems to me to defeat the purpose. (The Stormsurge, OTOH, probably should be squishy but deadly. It's also OP.)

I will agree that Interceptor is part of the problem. Tau should have it, but probably not quite so profligately as now.

 Kanluwen wrote:


Realistically? The Riptide is overpowered and always has been.
Pretending that it is not is what ruins these discussions when posters like yourself bring up nonsense like "but Early Warning Override can be 5 points wasted across >insert random number of suits here<".

The fact that you don't see that the simple fact that you can get that much Interceptor is part of the problem beggars belief. I would kill to be able to put Interceptor on my Sentinels or Dreadnoughts.

No one is pretending that are not overwhelmingly powerful (particularly in the Riptide wing), hence why there have been 8 pages of discussion of bringing them down, without ruining them. But you are stating page 1/2 complaints at this point.

How much interceptor is an acceptable amount of interceptor? 2 interceptor units? 3? 11?





Automatically Appended Next Post:

jade_angel wrote:
Back toward my original point - the Riptide is not intended to be a glass cannon. Crisis Suits are the glass cannon, the Riptide is meant to be a fire soak. Almost certainly less firepower per point than a Crisis Suit, but more durability per point. Making it squishy but deadly seems to me to defeat the purpose. (The Stormsurge, OTOH, probably should be squishy but deadly. It's also OP.)

I will agree that Interceptor is part of the problem. Tau should have it, but probably not quite so profligately as now.

Who does interceptor hurt the most? Space marines and their deep-strike heavy formations. Interceptor hurts lower tiers lists significantly less, as they don't depend on deep-strike deployment. Possibly a summon spam chaos? but then its hurting "free" units, as the summoning ones aren't deep-striking in.

I think it effects lower tier lists less because orks/nids/guard dont have access to deep strike like other armies. They are forced to run at the tau gunline with gak armor saves. Its definitely a problem with the skyhammer formation for sure, but either way the riptide gets to sit in the back of the deployment zone with great survivability and long range weapons. If this is supposed to be a linebreaker unit instead of artillery maybe shorter range weapons? I mean if you cut all its gun ranges by 12" would it really be that bad? especially when all tau suits have jet packs.