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 Jadenim wrote:
Shield drones do still get to use their invulnerable save if you're using them as a screening unit to prevent targeting of commanders (or other characters); so effectively a nerf to using them with standard battlesuits, but not so much characters.

Shame, as in my first game I'd realised that one pair of shield drones could protect two or three units very effectively thanks to the radius effect, which I see could get a little OP. Personally I think it would have been better to reduce the area of effect rather than the effectiveness of the protocols, but oh well.

It's just 3"

 Vector Strike wrote:

 Jadenim wrote:
Shield drones do still get to use their invulnerable save if you're using them as a screening unit to prevent targeting of commanders (or other characters); so effectively a nerf to using them with standard battlesuits, but not so much characters.

Shame, as in my first game I'd realised that one pair of shield drones could protect two or three units very effectively thanks to the radius effect, which I see could get a little OP. Personally I think it would have been better to reduce the area of effect rather than the effectiveness of the protocols, but oh well.

It's just 3"

3" from any drone is potentially quite a wide area, so a big unit of drones can shield a lot of stuff. You don't have to remove the drone nearest to the target unit. The drones don't even have to be somewhere the firing unit can see, or in range of its guns.

davethepak wrote:

Droneport - loaded with four marker drones, a rail rifle pathfinder squad and a cadre fireblade. While I am almost never going to bother trying to get more than one or two markerlights (really gw?) - a single markerlight has proven its worth to me time, and time again.
The droneport gives badly needed protection to pathfinders, and the drone rules are awesome BS2+ drones. was very useful.

This is clever.

 Fueli wrote:

Bach wrote:Also, not sure if this has been pointed out but Saviour Protocols is going to be a thing this edition, especially for vehicles. Remember how you would basically always take smart missiles over attached drones? Well that is no longer an obvious choice. Sacraficing drones from wounds that would otherwise cause multiple damage, per wound, saved my Sun Shark in both games. I would say that the gun drones would be a better choice for fish and a decent choice for hammerheads.

Isn't Sunshark a vehicle? Saviour Protocols only works on infantry and battlesuits.

It's an ability in the Sunshark profile but you're right, it says only infantry or battlesuits.

davethepak wrote:

Droneport - loaded with four marker drones, a rail rifle pathfinder squad and a cadre fireblade. While I am almost never going to bother trying to get more than one or two markerlights (really gw?) - a single markerlight has proven its worth to me time, and time again.
The droneport gives badly needed protection to pathfinders, and the drone rules are awesome BS2+ drones. was very useful.

You're then paying 110 points or so before adding in the pathfinders though. You're getting 3-4 markerlights per turn for 110 on a model that is less durable than a rhino. It's probably one of the best ways to get markerlight hits, but how many different units do you really need to be marking each turn? I wonder if BS2+ HQ options like Darkstrider and a Fireblade might just be a slightly better option to provide the 1-2 markerlight hits per turn while also providing their auras to nearby units.

I was wondering if there's any way to make the Pathfinder drones usable. The maximum squad size they can take is 5 which doesn't provide much protection for the the pulse accelerator drone, which is arguably the best choice. Obviously you can't take them in a Tactical drone squad, you can't put them in transports, and you can't prevent your opponent from targetting them other than obscuring LOS. Are they just too niche and fragile to be considered?

Asura Varuna wrote:

davethepak wrote:

Droneport - loaded with four marker drones, a rail rifle pathfinder squad and a cadre fireblade. While I am almost never going to bother trying to get more than one or two markerlights (really gw?) - a single markerlight has proven its worth to me time, and time again.
The droneport gives badly needed protection to pathfinders, and the drone rules are awesome BS2+ drones. was very useful.

You're then paying 110 points or so before adding in the pathfinders though. You're getting 3-4 markerlights per turn for 110 on a model that is less durable than a rhino. It's probably one of the best ways to get markerlight hits, but how many different units do you really need to be marking each turn? I wonder if BS2+ HQ options like Darkstrider and a Fireblade might just be a slightly better option to provide the 1-2 markerlight hits per turn while also providing their auras to nearby units.

I was wondering if there's any way to make the Pathfinder drones usable. The maximum squad size they can take is 5 which doesn't provide much protection for the the pulse accelerator drone, which is arguably the best choice. Obviously you can't take them in a Tactical drone squad, you can't put them in transports, and you can't prevent your opponent from targetting them other than obscuring LOS. Are they just too niche and fragile to be considered?

You can absolutely put them in transports, though I'm not sure if they're allowed to start in them - indeed it throws up several rules queries. This seems to be the best way to use them.

I also think sticking pathfinders in tidewall things might be the way to go. Drones aren't allowed in those, so if a pathfinder squad has some I'm not sure what happens to them. I imagine they deploy outside the fortification, but since the pathfinders aren't on the board it's technically impossible for the drones to deploy in formation with them.

Anyway, the drones form their own unit, and they are allowed to embark in a devilfish. This seems a decent plan, since the recon drone can fire its burst cannon and the fish then gets to ignore cover. A pulse accelerator drone can take the other slot, if you want.

It would probably be weird for the drones to start the game in a devilfish along with a different unit. The rules simply don't cover this potential situation at all.

Anyway you can have 10 fire warriors, a fireblade, a pulse accelerator and recon drone (which takes up no space) in a devilfish.

I don't think I'd bother taking a fireblade in a droneport. He gives the drones 2+ to hit, but you have to pay for him. You may as well just buy 10 pathfinders instead of a fireblade and 4 marker drones. You can even give some of the pathfinders rail rifles and do some damage.

My thoughts on the new Mark'O;

XV9
2x Sub-munition Pulse Rifles
Drone Controller

Much cheaper than a commander with some form of long ranged weapon, leaving the commander / hq slot for other roles.

Combine with bigger swarms of gun or/and marker drones.

I'm also a huge fan of the Dual Double-Barrelled Burst Cannon with 4 drones, as a decent drop-squad. My thoughts have been that crisis squads are just too bloaty and due to the Manta Strike limitations, dropping flamers is no longer valid (/ homing beacons are a pain to make use of).

3 Suit Squad (XV8)
8 Burst Cannons
1 Drone controller (+ 6 drones) + 4.6pts per str 5 shot.

For the XV9 with its 4 drones, you get 4pts per str 5 shot and that minimum threshold is 1/2 of the XV8 squad.

Shame the XV9's aren't troops!

Asura Varuna wrote:

You're then paying 110 points or so before adding in the pathfinders though. You're getting 3-4 markerlights per turn for 110 on a model that is less durable than a rhino. It's probably one of the best ways to get markerlight hits, but how many different units do you really need to be marking each turn? I wonder if BS2+ HQ options like Darkstrider and a Fireblade might just be a slightly better option to provide the 1-2 markerlight hits per turn while also providing their auras to nearby units.

It seems like more a way to leverage extra utility out of the Droneport, which is there to provide durability to the Pathfinders. You could just take a bunch of Firesight Marksmen (BS3+ Markerlights for 24 points?), being characters and 2+ save in cover makes them difficult to remove. Or put the Firesight Marksman in the Droneport for 3+ Marker Drones.

I was wondering if there's any way to make the Pathfinder drones usable. The maximum squad size they can take is 5 which doesn't provide much protection for the the pulse accelerator drone, which is arguably the best choice. Obviously you can't take them in a Tactical drone squad, you can't put them in transports, and you can't prevent your opponent from targetting them other than obscuring LOS. Are they just too niche and fragile to be considered?

I think just taking the 8 point PA drone is fine. If you get first turn, great. If you get second and the enemy ignores the PA drone, great. If the enemy wastes a bunch of shooting to kill the PA drone, still great! Add a couple useful gun drones and it becomes more costly to kill off, Seems like a win all around. Early game, you can deploy Pathfinders behind your gun line and drones further behind the Pathfinders, keeping them safer from most infantry firepower, and bring them forward your first turn to buff firing.

Razerous wrote:
My thoughts on the new Mark'O;

XV9
2x Sub-munition Pulse Rifles
Drone Controller

Much cheaper than a commander with some form of long ranged weapon, leaving the commander / hq slot for other roles.

Combine with bigger swarms of gun or/and marker drones.

This is an interesting set up. Marker drones do seem like the best option to go around with this guy, as gun drones would be out of range. That said, I think he'd benefit a lot from an ATS. XV9s are tough enough and cheap enough not to really need drone protection. Or you could have him loiter behind a bunch of gun drones.

It seems to me that XV9s benefit a lot from the ATS. Partly, this is because they don't have the option of filling the slot with another gun. They pack a lot of shooting themselves, meaning you get good efficiency from the ATS - as it affects a lot of shots.

Razerous wrote:
I'm also a huge fan of the Dual Double-Barrelled Burst Cannon with 4 drones, as a decent drop-squad. My thoughts have been that crisis squads are just too bloaty and due to the Manta Strike limitations, dropping flamers is no longer valid (/ homing beacons are a pain to make use of).

3 Suit Squad (XV8)
8 Burst Cannons
1 Drone controller (+ 6 drones) + 4.6pts per str 5 shot.

For the XV9 with its 4 drones, you get 4pts per str 5 shot and that minimum threshold is 1/2 of the XV8 squad.

Shame the XV9's aren't troops!

Yes, though again I think I'd like to see an ATS on the XV9. 16 shots at S5 ap-1 is pretty interesting.

For XV8s I think we're back with plasma as the best weapon option. There are a few reasons for this. For one, it's something that the suits can actually do that not much else can - after all we've no real need for more S5 shooting but Ap-3 is less common. They are also cheap. Plasma rifles don't really require any support systems to make them work, and this means that you can lose the odd rifle in exchange for a DC, VT or whatever. Maybe even the occasional shield generator.

I'm starting to consider quite big units of crisis suits actually. 6 or even 9 guys, mostly armed with plasma rifles. Mix in a few guys with a couple of fusion blasters each and at least one shield generator.

I think that you are allowed to take the save from a shield generator, then bounce the wound to a drone if you fail the save. It doesn't really make sense that a drone would suffer a mortal wound unless the suits have had a chance to roll a save. Honestly neither makes sense and the logical thing would be for the drones to take it at the point when you got hit - so you rolled to wound and save against the drone that the shot had actually hit - but whatever.

So anyway my unit of 9 might feature 5 guys with triple plasma and 4 with dual fusion, and with a VT, DC and a couple of shield generators spread around. Alternatively it might be that you'd run one suit with the DC and VT. So maybe 6 triple plasma suits and 2 triple fusion, plus the unarmed Shas'vre with assorted support systems. Then 18 drones for them to pass wounds to.

The major weakness would be if the enemy attacked the drones first.

Mandragola wrote:

 Vector Strike wrote:

 Jadenim wrote:
Shield drones do still get to use their invulnerable save if you're using them as a screening unit to prevent targeting of commanders (or other characters); so effectively a nerf to using them with standard battlesuits, but not so much characters.

Shame, as in my first game I'd realised that one pair of shield drones could protect two or three units very effectively thanks to the radius effect, which I see could get a little OP. Personally I think it would have been better to reduce the area of effect rather than the effectiveness of the protocols, but oh well.

It's just 3"

3" from any drone is potentially quite a wide area, so a big unit of drones can shield a lot of stuff. You don't have to remove the drone nearest to the target unit. The drones don't even have to be somewhere the firing unit can see, or in range of its guns.

Also, unless I was playing it wrong, as it is a unit to unit ability, not model to model, you can daisy chain a long way, for example:

C-2"-C-2"-C-3"-D-2"-D

(C for Crisis, D for Drone)

Given 50mm bases on Crisis suits now, that's potentially 14" from target to the model that takes the wound.

And what range you think it should have? 2"? 1"? Only closest unit?

I don't like the prospect of spending points on Drones more than the marker ones I used to - but if I have to, at least let them be as useful as they were pre-nerf.

Mandragola wrote:

I think that you are allowed to take the save from a shield generator, then bounce the wound to a drone if you fail the save. It doesn't really make sense that a drone would suffer a mortal wound unless the suits have had a chance to roll a save. Honestly neither makes sense and the logical thing would be for the drones to take it at the point when you got hit - so you rolled to wound and save against the drone that the shot had actually hit - but whatever.

Nope. The Way Savior Protocol is worded, the Allocation of the wound to the Drone unit occurs before saves are taken, so you never test against the Shield Generator unless you're willing to suffer the damage on that Shield Generator unit.

So anyway my unit of 9 might feature 5 guys with triple plasma and 4 with dual fusion, and with a VT, DC and a couple of shield generators spread around. Alternatively it might be that you'd run one suit with the DC and VT. So maybe 6 triple plasma suits and 2 triple fusion, plus the unarmed Shas'vre with assorted support systems. Then 18 drones for them to pass wounds to.

The major weakness would be if the enemy attacked the drones first.

That's a lot of points. A lot of firepower, but a LOT of points.

I'm getting over 550 points in the Suits alone.

Its a helluva alpha strike (though you'll need a Homing Beacon if you want the full benefit of fusions), but does it really have enough firepower to not be wiped by the response due a 550+ point enemy with massive firepower and 18 Gun Drones (putting out ~36 Pulse hits a round) absorbing anti-heavy-infantry fire?

My initial thought is that I'd always rather just have a Commander and save my Elite slots for other purposes, but that sort of massive alpha strike is tempting...

Am I missing something here? Why would anyone put burst cannons on vehicles for 20pts when drones are 16ptsd. Same BS as you fire drones with vehicle BS and same weapon stats.

What about ATS on Stealth Suits with Darkstrider would that be a very effective combi? -1T to target and -1AP. Not tried it yet.

Also trying to work out 3 flamers or 2 flamers with ATS. Are there any good spreadsheets yet?

Pottsey wrote:
Am I missing something here? Why would anyone put burst cannons on vehicles for 20pts when drones are 16ptsd. Same BS as you fire drones with vehicle BS and same weapon stats.

What about ATS on Stealth Suits with Darkstrider would that be a very effective combi? -1T to target and -1AP. Not tried it yet.

Also trying to work out 3 flamers or 2 flamers with ATS. Are there any good spreadsheets yet?

Drones are another killpoint in missions that have them. They have to disembark if the vehicle is destroyed.

This combo sounds alright. Report back if you try it or I just might do it myself.

And this should provide you with some data on flamers. It's made by AenarIT of Advanced Tau Tactica:

http://imgur.com/a/k31ho

Pottsey wrote:
Am I missing something here? Why would anyone put burst cannons on vehicles for 20pts when drones are 16ptsd. Same BS as you fire drones with vehicle BS and same weapon stats.

What about ATS on Stealth Suits with Darkstrider would that be a very effective combi? -1T to target and -1AP. Not tried it yet.

Also trying to work out 3 flamers or 2 flamers with ATS. Are there any good spreadsheets yet?

Same question I had, but technically it does save you a kill point from the Drones.

That said, that's a niche area, and the Hammerhead can benefit from a Fireblade's carbine-boosting ability, so Gun Drones aren't just equal to Burst Cannons, they're strictly better in every other way.

 Vector Strike wrote:
And what range you think it should have? 2"? 1"? Only closest unit?

I don't like the prospect of spending points on Drones more than the marker ones I used to - but if I have to, at least let them be as useful as they were pre-nerf.

To be honest the easiest way would have been to leave drones as part of the unit they're bought with, rather than forcing them to form a separate unit, but given that's the route they've gone down and assuming that the original version of the rule needs to be reined in (which I don't necessarily agree with for the record) it would have been better to just say it's models within 3" (or even 6") rather than units.

 Fueli wrote:

Pottsey wrote:
Am I missing something here? Why would anyone put burst cannons on vehicles for 20pts when drones are 16ptsd. Same BS as you fire drones with vehicle BS and same weapon stats.

What about ATS on Stealth Suits with Darkstrider would that be a very effective combi? -1T to target and -1AP. Not tried it yet.

Also trying to work out 3 flamers or 2 flamers with ATS. Are there any good spreadsheets yet?

Drones are another killpoint in missions that have them. They have to disembark if the vehicle is destroyed.

This combo sounds alright. Report back if you try it or I just might do it myself.

And this should provide you with some data on flamers. It's made by AenarIT of Advanced Tau Tactica:

http://imgur.com/a/k31ho

That is something on my list to try but I have about 3 lists to and I am not sure which one to use for my next game. Once I have used it I will report back here if no one else has.
Thank you very much that spreadsheet is perfect, just what I was searching for.

Whoa, those tables are excellent. thanks for that.

Really nice table. I think I'll be using that over the one from 3++ from now on for my Tau.

EDIT: just a shame it doesn't have the option to display buffs like re-roll ones etc.

Saviour Protocols
Change this rule to read:
‘Saviour Protocols: If a <Sept> Drones unit is within 3" of a friendly <Sept> Infantry or <Sept> Battlesuit unit when an enemy attack successfully wounds it, you can allocate that wound to the Drones unit instead of the target. If you do, that Drones unit suffers a mortal wound instead of the normal damage.’

Anyone else notice that Saviour Protocols now turns all of the damage from a hit into a single mortal wound? Normally a hit that generates multiple mortal wounds will splash through a unit of models until all of the wounds are allocated, while the new Saviour Protocols converts a heavy mortal hit into a single dead drone.

SJ

Hey guys,

Tyring to get my first 2k list sorted so I can start buying models and assembling them with the right kit.

https://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/0/731489.page#9471010

Any help or suggestions would be much appreciated! Totally new to Tau only purchased the book yesterday.

Jadenim wrote:
To be honest the easiest way would have been to leave drones as part of the unit they're bought with, rather than forcing them to form a separate unit, but given that's the route they've gone down and assuming that the original version of the rule needs to be reined in (which I don't necessarily agree with for the record) it would have been better to just say it's models within 3" (or even 6") rather than units.

I don't think any other similar rule like that only targets models, so no point in doing that.
Also, drones aren't coming back to units. Now only same-T models are part of units, AFAIK.

jeffersonian000 wrote:

Saviour Protocols
Change this rule to read:
‘Saviour Protocols: If a <Sept> Drones unit is within 3" of a friendly <Sept> Infantry or <Sept> Battlesuit unit when an enemy attack successfully wounds it, you can allocate that wound to the Drones unit instead of the target. If you do, that Drones unit suffers a mortal wound instead of the normal damage.’

Anyone else notice that Saviour Protocols now turns all of the damage from a hit into a single mortal wound? Normally a hit that generates multiple mortal wounds will splash through a unit of models until all of the wounds are allocated, while the new Saviour Protocols converts a heavy mortal hit into a single dead drone.

SJ

How many multiple-MW wounds-deliverers are out there? IIRC, Smite is the main one

Asura Varuna wrote:
Really nice table. I think I'll be using that over the one from 3++ from now on for my Tau.

EDIT: just a shame it doesn't have the option to display buffs like re-roll ones etc.

I mean, it sort of does. There are tables for 1 and 5 marker lights, too. That's good enough for me.

Anyone else notice that Saviour Protocols now turns all of the damage from a hit into a single mortal wound? Normally a hit that generates multiple mortal wounds will splash through a unit of models until all of the wounds are allocated, while the new Saviour Protocols converts a heavy mortal hit into a single dead drone.

Indeed, and it's quite awesome. Most of the things you're going to pass on to drones are multi-damage heavy weapon hits, so that sounds like a win to me.

MilkmanAl wrote:

Anyone else notice that Saviour Protocols now turns all of the damage from a hit into a single mortal wound? Normally a hit that generates multiple mortal wounds will splash through a unit of models until all of the wounds are allocated, while the new Saviour Protocols converts a heavy mortal hit into a single dead drone.

Indeed, and it's quite awesome. Most of the things you're going to pass on to drones are multi-damage heavy weapon hits, so that sounds like a win to me.

But the drones already negated the damage from a multi-damage weapon before but also got to make a save. The change only benefits if you get hit by a weapon which inflicts multiple mortal wounds, for everything else it is a nerf.

I am 8-3 so far in the new edition; take that with a grain of salt as only 5 of those were tournament style games. Even those games were all at 1000 points. Anyway, just a few quick hits:

Yes, we lost JSJ, but the "FLY" keyword is even better. You have to be aggressive. Stop wishing you could run away and charge! Countless times now, I've charged a Devilfish, a Ghostkeel, Crisis suits et al into enemy units, forcing them to fall back and not shoot (unless THEY have fly). It is so frustrating for opponents; much more so than JSJ ever was. No, this will not work against dedicated assault units, but it's a shooting game and so long as they aren't meant for assault, our Devilfish and suits can usually survive.

Speaking of assault, Advanced Targeting (post-FAQ) really helps. I had one on my Ghostkeel and it helped him put some wounds on Kataphron Breachers. Yes, it wasn't many...but guess what? They only have 3 wounds each! Weaken them with shooting, charge, fall back, shoot. Rinse and repeat.

You have to abandon your attachment to anachronistic "7th" style units. Non-forgeworld Riptides are sub-optimal. Bring one if you really want to but they're not going to hack it in competitive games. Even the R'Varna, scary though it is, doesn't win at math when you add up its damage output against its point cost. The only big suit (to include the Stormsurge and Ghostkeels) that is worth taking in a competitive environment is the Y'Vahra. Those things are absolutely dirty. I brought two in a game against AdMech and we called it on turn 2. Yes, sometimes you will have to play cagey and not shoot on turn 1. Yes, you will need LOS blocking terrain for them to survive in that scenario. Yes, there should be more in tournaments if TOs follow the playtesters' advice and include more. Bottom line, they absolutely erase whatever they target. I had NO marker support. I rolled very poorly with my Ionic Discharge Cannons, I mean terribly. It didn't matter. I still killed a unit of Kataphron Breachers AND an Onager Dunecrawler.

You need to buy some new models. Why aren't you taking 60-100 Kroot Hounds? They're 4 points each. They're fast. They bite things. They screen; they can tie things up in combat (are you seeing a trend here?) You HAVE to be able to tarpit things. On that same note, I don't have any Vespid but I'm going to buy some. 15 points for a model that moves 14", can shoot 18" and fires two S5 AP-2 shots? Yes please.

My Ghostkeel performed much better than I anticipated, but not because of its shooting. Its damage output is medicore, but it is just as fast as a Devilfish and tarpits just as well. If you are playing against a shooting army, you need to be as aggressive as possible to maximize your benefit from FLY. You should be charging everything you can into anything you can. Stealth suits were better than I anticipated as well. Good objective grabbers. And I use Flamer Crisis. Stealths are essential for that unit. I get that Stealths are an expensive investment when viewed as a Flamer delivery system, but they're so much more than that. They can infiltrate and grab the relic turn 1, or score an objective on the other side of the board. You can reach out and touch pretty much anything on the board. I dropped my Flamer Crisis in with the Homing Beacon, completely erased two squads of Skitarii, took the objective they were on with the Crisis and Stealths, and threw my opponent's plan completely out of whack. Not everything is about "getting your points back." The only points that matter are the ones that are preceded by "Victory."

I can't see a purpose in taking any drones but gun drones.

I'm not getting the love for Hammerheads, even Longstrike. Meh.

I'm also not getting the hate for Tau in general in 8th. Yes, some of our stuff was nerfed. But overall I think we are very competitive. Right there in the middle of the unintelligble scrum that is the meta right now. We'll have to see in six months after a few big GTs but for now I'm hopeful. Like I said, I'm waiting to play a 2000 point, competitive event. If I compete in one and get completely curb stomped, I'll mellow my enthusiasm. But for now, I'm not scared of anything with Tau.

When I saw the stats for Vespids I pretty much immediately bought some from GW (among other things). Interestingly enough, when I was browsing their store the next day Vespids were out of stock. I wonder if I got the last box, or if they were just selling that well.

 ZergSmasher wrote:
When I saw the stats for Vespids I pretty much immediately bought some from GW (among other things). Interestingly enough, when I was browsing their store the next day Vespids were out of stock. I wonder if I got the last box, or if they were just selling that well.

They probably had a box left over from the initial release which they hadn't got rid of yet and after years of them not moving they figured they wouldn't need to make or order more

@The Shrike, that's all very well, but I think the thing that is upsetting people is that what you've described is not really a Tau army; close assault and flamer-ing everything in sight is just not in keeping with the fluff (part for maybe Farsighted Enclaves).

Tau are supposed to be a high mobility, combined arms, ranged force, where you can quickly get multiple units into position to focus fire on a target and then fade away.

Apart from the mobility bit, which 90% of our units having fly gives us, they have completely lost that feel to the army. Markelights are situational at best, Ethereal and Fireblade auras are more limited and almost all of the war gear that built unit coordination is gone.

The previous codex may have had some issues (some units being basically unusable, such as Vespid and the fliers, whilst Riptides were 10-20% under costed, and we all knew it), but it really captured that feel to the army. I'm just hoping that when we get a full codex that some of the original feel of Tau returns, but at the moment it doesn't look good; we beat the crap out of a lot of people at the start of 6th and now we must be punished, apparently.

 Unusual Suspect wrote:
Intriguingly, Longstrike now adds his +1 to hit Aura buff to himself (they removed the "other" from "other friendly TAU SEPT TX7 Hammerhead Gunships", and aura abilities are presumed to affect the aura-granting model unless stated otherwise).

That means that Longstrike can move and fire effectively without penalty.

I'm sry to ruin your day but that's not right. You getting the keyword mechanic wrong. He buffs TX7 Hammerhead Gunships and not TX7 HAMMERHEAD GUNSHIPS. That's not the same. He buffs an specific Datasheet Name, not a KEYWORD. So no +1 for himself. The "other" was removed because it was never needed.

As counterexample Darkstrider buffs friendly INFANTRY units. That work with every unit with the INFANTRY keyword. Including himself.

At first i felt really confident about the idea of taking Longstrike and a hammerhead pal, but the more i think about it im not so sure. Hammerheads seem very killable and there isnt really a way to reliably keep them alive.

T7 W13 and no invulns, its really only going to take 3 lascannons to put it down. Everyones going to target longstrike first and then your second hammerheads not looking so hot.

Im actually leaning more towards broadsides, i know theyre expensive and everyones been complaining about them, but thanks to saviour protocols they do at least have quite a bit of staying power if you park some drones next to them. Plus you can get some cheapish missile drones.

On that note, i noticed in the broadside description it says 'The unit may be accompanied by up to 2 missile drones' Does that mean you can only ever take 2 missile drones regardless of how many broadsides in the unit, or 2 drones each per broadside like how it used to be?