The best options are the 6x model Crisis unit fully buffed as described above that can punch up into most targets thanks to sheer volume. Tau is not a top 5 Index in 10th Edition, but it is an index that can compete with better armies through experience and player skill. What Are the Must-Have Units to Start This Faction? Piranhas are Av 11 on the front. Also, it is probably a good idea to only take enough disruption pods to give half the squad cover; as the likelihood of enough damage rolls being forced outnumber your non-disruption pod equipped Piranhas, and then taking out more Disruption Pod equipped than non Disruption Pod equipped Piranha eliminating your majority cover save, is very low. This can save a few points. Those aren’t your only choices here, of course, with Shadowsun and Farsight both being available as named alternatives (and both have to be your warlord if you take them, or one of them does if you take both). Farsight is the easier one to cover – he rules. He’s a souped up Crisis Commander with their (very helpful) buff, an actual melee profile from the Dawn Blade (now with a sweep option), a super plasma rifle and a minor melee buff for a nearby CORE unit. Being real – he’s 5pts more than a Crisis Commander with two plasma rifles and a shield generator, so if you’re running Enclaves, just take him.

However, the Piranha doesn’t have to be just a suicide skimmer- in matchups where controlling the enemy’s movement isn’t as critical, it can still perform a variety of useful roles. Though it’s basic armament won’t typically impress most opponents, with the addition of just one or two Markerlight hits they become a much more terrifying threat- that squadron of three Piranhas is putting fifteen wounds on a squad of Marines, which is pretty strong for its point cost. Guns: From the gigantic rail weaponry that’s been getting everyone hyped up all the way down to the humble pulse rifle, there are a massive number of upgrades to guns in this book, helping every unit with a projectile weapon really pull its weight. First off, I wanna talk about Examplar of the Kauyon. As any aspiring Farseer will tell you, being able to redeploy 3 units after you know who is going first can be very game changing. When Wings was talking about Kauyon above and was making it clear that survival is the key to a good Kauyon strategy, minimising the damage you take from Alpha strikes is paramount. If you end up going first, setting up good firing lanes for your Broadsides or moving a Crisis team from a defensive deployment spot to an offense one, can be game changing. Tau share a lot of their guns between multiple units, and also have suit support systems seen across many different battlesuits, so rather than talking about them every time they come up, it’s probably easiest to have a general chat about them first. Guns They don’t change the unit’s toughness, are completely ignored for the purposes of the Look Out Sir rule (so do note that units that only add up to three models because of Drones can’t protect Characters), don’t count for morale when they die and don’t gain the unit’s keywords. You might be wondering why the last one matters, and it’s because Drones aren’t CORE, and a lot of rules in this book are worded to account for that, providing bonuses to “CORE models in a unit” rather than a “CORE unit”. While that also means they aren’t INFANTRY when attached to squads, they have a special rule to allow them to count as such “for the purposes of interacting with terrain features”, which definitely lets them traverse them where relevant, and we assume also allows them to gain Light Cover (which is very nice). It also means that Drones in units with a character are not CHARACTER themselves meaning they don’t count for secondaries such as assassinate. There are some circumstances where Drones can become separated from their units, and if a unit is only Drones then they cannot perform any Actions other than firing Markerlights, and lose Objective Secured if they somehow have it.Each Piranha in a squadron can also be upgraded to carry up to two Seeker Missiles (S8 AP-2 DmgD6 Heavy 1), though as usual these require Markerlights to fire.

I can understand a dislike of the non-interactivity of the formation, but presuming that you are referring to the “fly on, spawn drones, fly off” aspect of it at that point what you’re interacting with is the _drones_, not the Piranhas themselves. And since Drones are not scoring when on their own, they have a finite- though hardly negligible- effect on the game. Tau in 10th Edition is an army that can choose between a control playstyle that baits opponents into difficult positions before delivering a killing blow or one that focuses on maximizing damage with as many efficient guns as possible to overwhelm armies that spend hundreds of points on mission playing tools and units. Kroot Shaper • Kroot Carnivore Squad • Kroot Hound • Krootox • Knarloc • Great Knarloc • Vespid Stingwings • Gue'vesa Early Warning Overrides let you overwatch at a cost of 0CP with the unit, and the bearer hit on 5s when doing so. Pretty scary on a Riptide. Doesn’t really play like an Ethereal should, as the buff he hands out is fairly meaningless, but acts as an incredibly durable Lone Operative to park on an objective. Firesight Team

Final Thoughts

Finally in HQs, Kroot Shapers. They lead Kroot. That’s kind of it – they’re pretty mediocre stat-wise, but they’re incredibly cheap (a mere 25pts) and help out Kroot enough with a RR1 aura that if you find yourself with some points left over, you could bring one. Aerospace Relays allowing Characters to do it helps make them a bit more appealing too – like all Kroot they get a pre-game move, so you can swing them over to a mid-table relay position very easily out of the gate, even from relative safety. The last thing to say here is that there’s a new wargear option for a grenade bandolier that’s presumably intended to represent Dahyak Grekh now that the BSF datasheets have been retired. RIP to a real one. Broadsides get some additional options (including the Advanced Targeting System, which is only for them now) which we’ll look at in their entry. It’s a strong set of traits, with some interesting choices to make. Precision of the Hunter is your obvious port of call for making a Commander into an individual powerhouse, but Exemplar of the Kauyon grants priceless redeploy capabilities, while Exemplar of the Mont’ka, Through Unity, Devastation and Through Boldness, Victory all offer useful buffs that help amp up the capabilities of your key units. Fire Markerlights (Action): One or more MARKERLIGHT units from your army can start to perform this action at the start of your Movement phase. AIRCRAFT MARKERLIGHT units can perform this action. The action is completed at the start of your next Shooting phase. If this action is successfully completed, for each model in that unit that is equipped with one or more markerlights, for each markerlight that model is equipped with, select one enemy unit within 36" of that model that would be an eligible target for that model if its unit had been selected to shoot, and roll one D6: on a 3+, that enemy unit gains one Markerlight token.’ I respect the ITC for making an impact to the tournament rules. Although I disagree with the constant pre-nerf to the rules in major tournaments before we can see what the impact will be. Coordinated fire power with buff commander rule and the Piranha formation just to name a few. I understand coordinated firepower had a wide variation of interpretations and needed to be clarified but choosing the worst interpretation out of fear is a weakness to the ITC voting system. There are many ways in the game which provide little to no interaction with your opponent, that just happens its 40k.

Note if the horde in question is toughness 3, airburst fragmentation launchers would be useful again. How Does This Faction Handle Enemy Tanks and Monsters? Although it is capable of carrying a pretty significant anti-tank loadout, for most of its history this option has actually been something of a trap- and 9E is no different in that regard. With a weak ballistic skill and extreme fragility, investing points into a Piranha for offensive output is usually a mistake; rather, the Piranha’s strength lies in its mobility, and in its ability to deny the enemy mobility.

A strong output boost for a Crisis team, and gives them a bit of melee counterpunch to draw on in an emergency. Broadsides Just as impactful, if not more so, is a keyword change – Crisis and Broadside Battlesuits plus all Commanders are now INFANTRY. For Crisis and Commanders that means they can claim Light Cover, a big survivability boost (especially on Enforcer Commanders, who can get pretty eye-wateringly tough now), while for Broadsides it provides the key ability to lurk just behind a wall till it’s time to strike, then burst through and hopefully keep one foot on the terrain’s base to augment their already juicy 2+ save (or alternatively, stand on some battlements blasting away). One other key impact this has on broadsides is that they are no longer limited to the ground floor of ruins or other terrain pieces, now being able to climb to firing positions that befit their heavy support status. Point Defence Targeting Relay - Designed to provide superior covering fire for nearby Fire Caste units, a Point Defence Targeting Relay automatically targets and engages enemies that try to assault the vehicle or nearby friendly units. Lone Operative Objective control with multiple Ghostkeels and some combination of Shadowsun, Aun’Va or Firesight Teams.

For Bork’an to properly break out competitively we probably do need to be in a world with a few less meltaguns, but as with a lot of these it’s going to feel fun to use. Farsight Enclaves Viorla is the first of two Septs that wants to go very fast, and sadly probably comes out behind Farsight for that role. Their Sept Tenet allows re-rolling of Advances and Charges and has a very unusual second part that gives all their units +2” movement on the first turn, letting them launch rapid strikes early game. This is certainly OK, but honestly suffers from the fact that the general level of support for aggressive movement in this book is really good – you don’t need these buffs. Targeting Array - Computer-aided Targeting Arrays are sophisticated targeting systems that aid the gunners' aim in firing upon enemy targets.Couple things: first off, Tau have ALREADY had “months to hit their stride,” as you say. And they haven’t- nor do I think they will. Second: I’m not sure who say that people were “overreacting” to Eldar, but I think the immediate consensus among all of the skilled players I spoke with at the time was that Eldar were crazy-broken and that Scatter Bikes, Wraithknights, and other units were all powerful and game-changing additions to the meta. Advanced Targeting System - An Advanced Targeting System assists the vehicle's gunner by identifying targets of particular value or danger, and plotting fire plans to counter them.