For Christmas, Give Your Enemies ALL the Bullets!

Games Workshop is feeling festive this December, but in its own way; rather than just giving gifts, it's decided to offer you the chance to buy them.  How generous!

But seriously.  They're doing an 'Advent Calendar' for December, with each day offering up a new digital download for purchase.  The downloads are in the $4-$5 dollar range, just right for an impulse purchase.  December 3rd's was of note for me, because it contained a new Tau Empire formation, one that just so happened to match exactly the contents of a large box set GW just recently put up for sale.

How convenient...

The Firebase Support Cadre has to contain an XV104 Riptide and two squads of three XV88 Broadsides, though the drones are optional.  It costs no additional points, and curiously, can be taken in addition to Allied forces, without requiring the player to run a core Tau force; you could, if you wanted (and could somehow find the points for it all), run a Marine army, with Inquisitor warlord, Allied with Imperial Guard, backed up by a Firebase Support Cadre.  40K is getting weird, guys.

Relics of Treasure - Week 9

Round 9: 2500 pts

Graham (Grey Knights)

Grey Knight Brother Captain

Callidus Assassin

10 x Grey Knight Strike Squad w/Psybolt, 2 x Psycannon

10 x Grey Knight Interceptor Squad w/Psybolt, 2 x Psycannon

5 x Grey Knight Terminators w/Incinerator

You may have noticed that Graham was fielding slightly less than the full 2500 points. The reason for this is because it was decided that, for the league's grand finale, my Tau would seek to disrupt the Grey Knights' hold on the orbiting space station, a tile Graham had held without interruption, under constant challenge, for three weeks in a row. The space station is a series of interlocked corridors, like a game of Space Hulk, rather than an open field, and since the internal space is so much smaller the games were likewise scaled down. For the final week, it was only a thousand points, with the further restriction of no vehicles, and nothing that couldn't physically fit inside the corridors (so no Riptides or Dreadknights or Dreadnoughts). On top of this, the peculiarities of the station had a number of effects, including prohibiting Deep Strike, Infiltrate or Outflank.

Relics of Treasure - Week 8

Round 8: 2300 points

Anton (Space Wolves)

Wolf Lord w/Thunderwolf, Artificier Armour, Power Fist, Storm Shield

5 x Wolf Guard w/5 x Thunderwolf, 5 x Storm Shield, 3 x Power Axe

Rune Priest

10 x Grey Hunters

10 x Grey Hunters w/2 x Meltagun, Drop Pod

10 x Grey Hunters w/2 x Meltagun, Drop Pod

10 x Grey Hunters w/2 x Meltagun, Drop Pod

6 x Long Fangs w/5 x Lascannon

Dreadnought w/Twin-Linked Lascannon, Missile Launcher

Land Raider

Yet again I found myself going up against the forces of the Imperium, and for the first time since week two there were wolves on the far side of the table from me. Anton's forces were drop-heavy, as is common amongst the wolves of Black Knight Games, but with three heavy support choices and a pack of wolf-riders, he had a strong on-table presence from the beginning. I expected a tough fight, though I was hoping it wouldn't be quite as tough as the last time I went up against the wolves.

Relics of Treasure - Week 7

Round 7: 2100

Hammer and Anvil

Thom Morden (Chaos Daemons/Chaos Space Marines)

Great Unclean One w/Mastery Level 3, Greater Reward, Exalted Reward

10 x Plaguebearers

10 x Plaguebearers

15 x Flesh Hounds

Soul Grinder w/Daemon of Nurgle, Phlegm Bombardment

Daemon Prince w/Mark of Nurgle, Mastery Level 3, 2 x Greater Reward, Daemonic Flight, Warp-Forged Armour

Daemon Prince w/Mark of Nurgle, Mastery Level 3, 2 x Greater Reward, Daemonic Flight, Warp-Forged Armour

Chaos Lord w/Burning Brand of Skalathrax, Mark of Nurgle

7 x Plague Marines w/2 x Plasma Pistol, Chaos Rhino, Havoc Launcher

Heldrake w/Baleflamer

Having missed out on one of the league nights owing to an unfortunate personal issue, I was lucky to get a make-up game in against Thom on the weekend. I wasn't all that eager to throw down with the daemons again, particularly that brick wall of a Great Unclean One, but beggars can't be choosers. And it's not like Thom isn't a good guy, so a game with him, even a loss, is pleasant enough. Plus, I had a certain new weapon up my sleeve...

Relics of Treasure - Week 6

Round 6: 1950

Hammer and Anvil

Mitch (Dark Eldar)

Archon w/Shadow Field, Soul Trap, 3 x Sslyth, 2 x Medusae, Lhamaean, Ur-Ghull, Raider, Night Shields, Flickerfield

Haemonculus w/5 x Incubi

Haemonculus w/4 x Wracks, Raider, Night Shields, Flickerfield

12 x Warriors w/Dark Lance

10 x Warriors w/Dark Lance, Raider, Night Shields, Flickerfield

10 x Warriors w/Dark Lance, Raider, Night Shields, Flickerfield

10 x Wyches w/Raider, Night Shields, Flickerfield

10 x Scourges w/2 x Splinter Cannon

10 x Reavers

Talos Pain Engine

Cronos Parasite Engine w/Spirit Vortex

Cronos Parasite Engine w/Spirit Vortex

Mitch had a pretty lovely Dark Eldar force, which suggested he'd been at it for a while; they might not be as numerous as Orks or IG, but getting a raiding force of Dark Eldar ready isn't like throwing together a Draigowing list, either. That further suggested that he knew what he was in for when it was announced he'd be going up against Tau. Guns, guns and more guns, guns that cut through Dark Eldar bodies and skimmers alike with contemptuous ease, with ways to ignore the former's FNP and the latter's cover saves.  In short, every Archon's nightmare.

The R'Varna - For When You Just Have To Win

So, Forge World has brought out a new Tau kit, the XV107 R'Varna battlesuit.  It's a resin upgrade kit for the Riptide model, with a wide array of chest pieces, back, front and top, two new guns, shoulder pads and shin pieces.  Here are front and back shots of the model, to show off just how much has been added to it; more can be seen at Forge World's page for it, here.

Aesthetically, I don't mind it, though I do have some qualms.  The vanes on the gun don't look particularly Tau-ish, and the 'pulse submunition cannons' don't share any real design details with any Tau pulse weapons.  Or any official Tau weapons, for that matter; more than anything, they resemble O'Ralai's pulse submunition rifle, perhaps mated with the XV9's phased ion gun.  But both of those weapons broke away from the established Tau aesthetic in their own way, and the pulse submunition cannons just take those baby steps and turn them into a full-fledged sprint.  Forge World has been constructing its own distinct Tau look for some time, best exemplified in the XV9 with its bulbous knee joints and winged jump packs, and the XV107 is perhaps the ultimate extension of that to date.  It does sort of bother me, because as nice as at hose models are, they don't entirely look like they fit with the parent line.

I'm not a huge fan of the optical piece, either; I know a lot of people have complained about the Riptide having a pinhead look, but it's already a huge model.  Giving it a 'head' in scale with the rest of its massive frame just makes for an even more absurdly unwieldy model, not to mention making it dangerously top-heavy, and from an in-universe perspective it's hard to imagine that a fixed-forward camera system was an improvement over the existing swivel-mounted hardware.

But the XV107 isn't just a model kit, it's got rules.  Experimental rules.  And I think we all know what Forge World's experimental rules mean.

It's broken as hell.

Relics of Treasure - Week 5

Round 5: 1750

Vanguard Strike

James (Space Marines – Iron Hands)

Captain w/Power Sword

5 x Terminators w/Land Raider Crusader

5 x Sternguard

10 x Tacticals w/Multimelta, Meltagun, Rhino, Hunter-Killer Missile

10 x Tacticals w/Missile Launcher, Meltagun, Rhino, Hunter-Killer Missile

5 x Scouts w/Missile Launcher, 4 x Sniper Rifles

5 x Assasult Marines w/5 x Plasma Pistols, Meltabomb

Venerable Dreadnought w/Twin-Linked Lascannon, Missile Launcher

5 x Devastators w/Lascannon, 2 x Plasma Cannon, Heavy Bolter

We were supposed to go up to 1850 this week, but my opponent was relatively new to the hobby, and couldn't quite swing it with what he had, so I agreed to drop back down to 1750. No sense trying to drive the newcomers out of the hobby, after all. As usual, it was Crusade (4 objectives), and since I still had one last unoccupied territory in my area there was a relic in the centre of the table. The last time that will happen, though; from here on out, if I want to add yet more tricks to my Commander, I'm going to have to take them from the smoking plasma-riddled corpses of my enemies.

Which I am totally comfortable doing.

Relics of Treasure - Week 4

Round 4: 1750

Deployment: Hammer of Wrath

Cam (Imperial Guard)

Company Command Squad w/Master of Ordinance, Master of the Fleet

Platoon Command Squad w/Plasmagun, Commissar

Heavy weapon Team w/3 x Lascannon

Heavy Weapon Team w/3 x Heavy Bolter

5 x Veterans w/3 x Meltagun, Chimera

Infantry Squad w/Plasmagun, Missile Launcher

Infantry Squad w/Plasmagun, Heavy Bolter

Infantrry Squad w/Plasmagun, Heavy Bolter

Hydra

Griffon

Hellhound

Leman Russ squadron w/2 x Battle Cannon, 1 x Executioner Plasma Cannon

Aegis Defence Line w/Quad Gun

I was actually getting set to fight someone else, a Grey Knights player, when a couple of late arrivals forced Matt to juggle some opponents around to keep things on the level. Given the choice between Cam, here, and Graham and his Grey Knights, I pretty quickly called dibs on facing off against Cam. I can beat Graham, it's not impossible, but that guy wields his Grey Knights like a surgeon's scalpel, and I wasn't really looking to test myself against the current number one in the league. So, instead, I traded a couple of Stormravens, a Dreadknight and a Vindicare who looks like Deadpool for heavy artillery, a Fast flamer-tank, and a squadron of Leman Russ.

It never rains, but it pours.

Tau Heavy Support – Part 2: These Guns Aren't Getting Any Smaller!

I just realized, I never actually got around to putting  up the last of my Codex: Tau Empire reviews.  Well, let's correct that little oversight, shall we?

Last time we started on the Heavy Support slot, and unexpectedly got bogged down in the infantry choices. So now here we are in part two, and it's finally time to talk about the tanks. And oh, what tanks they are!

Relics of Treasure - Week 3

Round 3: 1650

Deployment: Dawn of War

Scott (Space Marines: Iron Hands)

Captain w/Artificier Armour, Power Weapon, The Shield Eternal, Relic (Furious Charge)

10 x Sternguard w/2 x Melta, 3 x Combi-Melta, Drop Pod

5 x Legion of the Damned

10 x Tacticals w/Power Weapon, Plasma Gun, Lascannon, Rhino

10 x Tacticals w/Power Weapon, Plsama Gun, Lascannon, Rhino

5 x Devastators w/3 x Lascannon

Stalker

Stormraven

Aegis Defence Line w/Quad Gun

Coming off a defeat and a draw, I was itching to put a mark in the win column, and Scott's Marines seemed a reasonable target to hit to go get it. Only a single drop pod, no real close combat units, no major artillery and, having dropped my flyer for more suits on the ground, the Stalker wasn't going to be doing too much. On the other hand, there were no small number of lascannons on the far side of the table, and I've yet to meet the Stormraven that doesn't inspire at least one moment of heart-stopping fear when it aims its multi-melta square at one's most valuable tank. So I wasn't going into this with my eyes closed; any fight with Space Marines is a serious fight, and I was taking this seriously. Especially since, once more, there was a mysterious relic at play in the centre of the table.

Relics of Treasure - Week 2

Round 2: 1575

Deployment: Dawn of War

Thom Morden (Chaos Daemons)

Great Unclean One w/Mastery Level 3, Greater Reward, Exalted Reward, Relic (+1T)
10 x Plaguebearers of Nurgle
10 x Plaguebearers of Nurgle
15 Flesh Hounds of Khorne
Daemon Prince w/ML3, Mark of Nurgle, 2 x Greater Reward; daemonic flight; warp-forged armour
Daemon Prince w/ML3, Mark of Nurgle, 2 x Greater Reward; daemonic flight; warp-forged armour

Soul Grinder w/Mark of Nurgle, Phlegm Bombardment

Thom's a good guy, a friend of my best friend's little brother, actually. We've played in a doubles tournament together before, and are planning to do so again. In the not so distant future (read, next Saturday).  Unfortunately, I don't really have any experience fighting against him, and even just a pair of FMCs makes me a bit nervous. Not least because every one of his MCs managed to roll up Iron Arm, amongst other things, on Biomancy. Because if there's anything Nurgle daemons need, it's even more toughness!

Relics of Treasure - Intro and Week 1

The latest league has started up at Black Knight Games, my friendly local hobby shop, and it's quite the doozy.  Not only is it nine weeks long, instead of the usual six, but it's got a whole host of unique rules and restrictions in play, courtesy of the much-ignored variable terrain rules from the later part of the big rulebook.  This promises to be a campaign like none other!

There's an actual player pack for this thing; for those interested in it, there's a pdf up of it, available here. For those who don't want to go through the whole thing, let me give you the highlights. The league is a tile-based campaign, with everyone starting with a single tile and each victory seizing another one to add to your points overall. No special or named characters; every game is played under the Ice World rules (Dangerous Terrain rolls fail on a 1 and 2, and Gets Hot weapons don't); lightning storms will strike on a 1 each turn, either forcing flyers to hover or to take a S7 hit; every game is Crusade, with D3+2 objectives; any Infantry model can hold an objective.

The big thing, however, is the Relic system. Each warlord starts off with a single Relic upgrade, and gains new ones by either seizing the secondary Relic objective in each mission, or killing the enemy warlord in a challenge (or both). There's a d6+d6 table to roll on, providing a full 36 possible options, though in each of the six sections there is an Explodes result, in which you get nothing. The relic effects can be stacked, and if you get a double that doesn't (having Fear twice, for instance) you're allowed a re-roll.

From a Tau perspective, the campaign rules have a couple of obvious effects. First, the increased risk of dangerous terrain will make it more dangerous to jump crisis suits in and out of nasty pieces of cover to get a better shooting angle. At a one-in-six chance this can be an entirely reasonable risk to take to get a better shooting angle; at one-in-three, however, it means that statistically it'll happen to your three-suit squad every single turn. To me, though, that's more than offset by the fact that Gets Hot stops being a thing. Ion weapons, already good, become even better with these rules in place, to the point where I almost considered trying to find some way to make use of the cyclic ion blaster. But the ion accelerator, the ion cannon and the quad ion turret all get a significant boost from the reliability of no longer having to risk Gets Hot rolls. This is especially useful on the ion accelerator with early warning override, as it means you can reliably pull off the blast against deep striking units of 3+ and 2+ models while they're maximally clumped together. Given that two of these weapons (the cannon and accelerator) were things Tau wanted to bring along from the start, this increased reliability is immense. Honestly, I even considered trying to incorporate the cyclic ion blaster.

Briefly.

Anyway, the league starts off at 1500 points, and eventually finishes at 2000, rising by something in the area of 75-100 points per week. So, let's start from the beginning!

Tau Heavy Support – Part 1: Breaking Out the Big Guns!

The old Heavy Support slot used to be only slightly less of a no-brainer than the old Elites slot; two squads of XV88s and a Hammerhead, with the number of the former depending on the size of the game. Enough has changed, though, that it's not always so easy to decide. And, as Martha Stewart used to say, that's a good thing.

Tau Fast Attack – Part 2: The Vehicles - Furious, But Fragile

With six options available, the Fast Attack section is second only to HQ for being crowded out. Last time, we looked at the infantry models available. This time, we're going to see what the vehicles have to offer.

Tau Fast Attack – Part 1: Fighting On Foot (or Hoof, or Wing, or Anti-Grav Generator...)

Aside from the HQ section, the Tau's Fast Attack is the most heavily populated section of the new codex. And amazingly, of the six units available, the worst of them is still solid enough that you won't get laughed at for plunking it down on the table.

Tau Elites – All Suits, Great and Small

The battlesuit. Is there any more iconic unit for the Tau Empire? And of course, the reason it's so iconic is that, in the first and second codexes, it's had to do almost all the heavy lifting for the army, in terms of fielding special weapons. Oh sure, you could put a single fusion blaster on a Piranha, or a twin-linked plasma rifle on a Broadside, but if you needed anti-light vehicle or -heavy infantry firepower, the battlesuit was your choice.

Plus ca change, as the French say.

Tau Troops – The Few, the Proud, the Squishy

Unlike the HQ section, which was basically reworked from the ground up, the Troops portion of the new Tau codex is more a matter of subtle changes. That's not necessarily a bad thing. Tau Troops might not be Grey Hunters or Guard blob-squads, but they were solid choices stuck with slightly out of date points costs. And thankfully, those costs are now more in-line with the game-wide standard.

Tau HQ – Part 3: Special Snowflakes, I mean, Suits

The last two special characters in the HQ section of Codex: Tau Empire are the battlesuit commanders, Farsight and Shadowsun. As far as special characters go, these are probably the ones Tau players will be most familiar with, as one of them was taken once in a blue moon and the other was taken occasionally. For the old codex, that was actually pretty impressive.

Farsight was the more infrequently-chosen of the pair, thanks to the sharp restrictions he was burdened with; you could only use him in games of over 1500 points, and he hamstrung your ability to bring a variety of useful units, and also Vespid. Those restrictions are thankfully done away with, though it does raise the question of where the isolated Farsight Enclave is getting its four-fingered hands on XV104s and ion rifles. As a commander, Farsight is pretty well built, with a solid statline, including WS5 and I5, a good Warlord Trait (no scatter when his unit deep strikes), and the option to bring his 7-strong bodyguard team. The combination of a perfect deep strike, six bodyguards with plasma/fusion and target locks and one in support could be absolutely devastating, no matter whose backfield you're dropping into. Of course, at a minimum of 684 points (Farsight, 7 x Bodyguards with 7 x PR/FB/TL, MSS, CCN, PENchip), it had better be.

Strangely, Farsight seems to have left a slot on his commander-variant battlesuit empty, as he takes to the field with just the Dawn Blade (AP2 Armourbane), plasma rifle and shield generator. Where's your VRT, O'Shovah, or your Stims, or a second plasma rifle? Or more to the point, why is the single best challenge character in a book that otherwise has nothing to throw at close combat monsters not wearing Iridum armour standard? It seems like an oversight to me, and more it seems like something that could be justified on the table-top just as well as in the fluff. Farsight leads from the front, preferring a bold, close-in style of combat; why wouldn't the spearhead fighter wear the best armour? He's going to be taking the most firepower right in the chest, after all.

Shadowsun, in contrast, is a veritable tank on two relatively tiny legs. A 3+ save, plus a 5+ invulnerable save, plus Stealth and Shrouded, and if she brings a couple of MV52 shield drones along not only does her unit's average toughness rise to T4, but she has a couple of 3+ invulnerable saves she can pass particularly worrisome wounds off to. She also has Infiltrate, and a perfect Look Out, Sir! when she's in a squad with other stealth suits, and her Command-link drone allows a nearby unit to re-roll its To Hit rolls of 1. Oh, and she's a BS5 model with two fusion blasters that can target two different models. And her unit gets 3D6" for its Thrust move, thanks to her Warlord trait.

While Farsight is clearly designed to be the burning heart of the Farsight Bomb, it feels like Shadowsun is meant to babysit the Riptide. If she only brings the Command-link drone the three-strong unit has three different T values, meaning it sticks with the superior T6, plus the Riptide is more mobile, and it's got a constant 4+ cover save against shooting. Having Shadowsun along basically provides a slightly inferior version of two different Nova charge results at once, without having to risk rolling for the reactor in the first place. And since she's LD10, you could even bring a couple of shielded missile drones along without having to worry that the loss of one of them will send the Riptide scampering. Curiously, though, despite being the Tau character most closely associated with drones, Shadowsun does not herself come with a drone controller.

Shadowsun and Farsight can technically be fielded in the same army together, giving the Farsight Bomb Stealth and Shrouded and adding the ability to deal with yet more units. You know, just in case you weren't already reducing any clustered target to a smoking crater. If you do this, however, be prepared for anyone even passingly familiar with Tau fluff to roll their eyes at you as hard as is humanly possible. It will be the least you deserve.

Tau HQ – Part 2: Leaders on the Hoof

In the old book, there were two basic HQ choices, and you only ever took one of them because the other one was simply awful. There were also three special characters, and maybe you took one of two, because they were okay-ish, but the third one was awful. Well, brace yourselves for a shock, longtime cadre commanders; infantry HQ units don't suck!

Tau HQ – Part 1: The Commander

When a new codex comes out, you can basically count on things to either stay the same, or get cheaper. The Tau Commander bears the rather dubious honour of being the only unit in the book to actually get more expensive; 10 points more than the old Shas'O, and a whopping 35 points more than the Shas'El.

But you know what's really surprising? It was worth the cost increase.