Games Workshop
We were thinking, the day after the advance order notification for the Tau Empire went up, about the composition of the new Tau Empire codex. Fortunately the boys and girls over at Games Workshop have been kind enough to let us know which units fall in which parts of the army. This means we can look at which units compete with each other.
Historically the Elite and Heavy Support choices in the Tau Empire codex were overloaded with good options. It looks like things aren’t going to change much!
HQ:
- Ethereals
- Characters
- Commander XV8s
- Cadre Fireblades
- Bodyguard XV8s
We’re fingers crossed that the Fireblade will be available as an HQ choice and that the 1+ restriction on XV8 commanders will have been lifted. Whether or not this happens is another thing entirely. The HQ slots seems relatively clear and the complete absence of Psykers no doubt made it much easier to keep this section slim. In White Dwarf Jeremy, the author of the new codex, points out that the Tau have a lot of kit. So fingers cross there’ll be some new toys to customise our models with. It’s also worth noting that Blacksun filters and Multitrackers come as standard in the new codex on the four XV suit variants.
We’re almost certainly going to see a lot of XV8 commanders with bodyguard units as players try to relieve the burden on the packed Elites choices!
Elite:
- XV104 Riptide (a bit of a surprise!)
- XV8 Crisis Teams
- XV25 Stealth Teams
Speaking of Elite choices, here they are! The inclusion of the Riptide means that fielding one of these monsters can reduce the number of XV8s you’ll be able to field. Let’s hope that’s a good thing! Stealth teams have always been a good unit but we suspect that they will continue to grace the benches of many players’ roster simply because they’re beaten to the field by the gorgeous Riptide and flexible XV8s. Time will tell on this one!
Troops:
- Fire Warriors
- Kroot
No real changes here, although it remains to be seen if Farsight will allow Crisis suits as troops. It could be that the Tau Empire is free of structure changing characters as per the rumours. Certainly nothing was reported in the White Dwarf battle report that promoted the idea that units would change type with certain characters.
Fast Attack:
- Sun Sharks
- Piranhas
- Pathfinders
- Gun Drones
- espid Stingwings
The addition of the Sun Shark bomber and Razorshark joint fighter are most welcome. Gun drones rarely made it onto the field as a distinct unit under the last codex and with pathfinders gaining significant ground in terms of their force multiplyer potential and losing the requirement to field a Devilfish it looks like our AI buddies will continue to sit it out!
Heavy Support:
- XV88 Broadsides
- Hammerheads
- Skyrays
- Sniper Drone Teams
- Longstrike
Competition in the Heavy Support slot remains brutal! The new broadsides are going to cause no end of controversy as many players have invested huge sums of money in max size squads of the old models which are now smaller then the new ones and significantly cheaper! Who would have thought that was possible?! With the sixth edition changes to how armour works and the rumoured reduction in power for the Broadside version of the Heavy Railgun it could be that we’ll see some changes yet. Not least as the Skyray now has Skyfire on its seeker missiles. Although if this is true of all seeker missiles then the tank itself may be something of a lame duck as it was in the last edition.
All in all exciting times for Tau players. The Tau Empire have come a long way since 2001 and we’re looking forward to getting our Codex and really getting to grips with the third expansion and what we’ll be fielding in the months to come!
Til then.
