When it comes to shooting hordes however, the rail rifle hits the 7W breakpoint about as reliably as the hot ion rifle, so you can skip the chance at hot biting you in the ass without losing much reliability. In the end this is a hotly contested topic, and to each their own. My personal roster has 2 of each so that I can switch weapons based on my opponents. Drones The T’au Empire is a relatively young contender for power in the galaxy in the grim dark future of Warhammer 40,000, and they rely on extremely advanced technology and a civilization-wide commitment to the Greater Good to make up for their relatively brittle physique. They’re master tacticians who have a plan for any situation, and they’re pragmatic enough to change their plans as soon as the situation requires it, unlike some of the more dogmatically inclined zealots of, say, the Imperium and the Traitor Legions. Once per battle, friendly operatives close to your Leader can benefit from the Art of War ability he triggered in the previous Turning Point (if he did so). Tactical Ploys A Worthy Cause Meanwhile, the T’au Pathfinders build upon their existing kit with an upgrade sprue full of advanced technology. Prototype weapons, advanced bionics, and sophisticated drone control systems ensure they always have the right tool for any job.

An important note about ceaseless and overwatch against 7w, 5+ save models: The Ceaseless abilty on the gun means you’ll normally end up chipping in 3-4 damage. Mv1 Gun Drone These operatives are especially frightening at the controls of a Recon Drone, whose burst cannon can reap a bloody toll against enemy kill teams. Frankly, you want to be shooting with it as often as you possibly can.Grenades have the Indirect rule, allowing you to target a Concealed enemy. The ASSAULT GRENADIER PATHFINDER is great for this, as they come with multiple grenades for free and can use them all twice. Tac op 1: Mark Enemy Movements – If your game plan is to eliminate scary opposing game pieces, then this will end up much harder than it looks at the outset. However, if you are able to drop 2 MLs on the entire enemy team, then this should be theoretically easy to score. Probably best used against elites, where 12 MLs on turn 1 is more easily doable. I don’t often take this, but on certain boards it can be easier to set up. Landing 5 hits with an Overcharged Ion Rifle means potentially dealing 15 damage outright to any operative. While that sounds outlandish, setting up 3 or more markerlights on a target while bonded means you are thorwing 7 dice that hit on a 3+, while your opponent needs to roll their saves naturally. Against elites this is where you want to put your effort, so you can fire at a target and then forget about them. The Ion Rifle gives you two profiles to choose from, both of which get 5 shots – standard does 4/5 damage with AP1 on crits, while overcharge does 5/6 damage at AP1 and the Hot rule. The annoyance operator, which ignores obscuring and comes with markerlight on a pulse carbine. These operatives come with special sensors that allow them to treat enemy targets as not Obscured, and they come with the System Jam action that lets them reduce the APL of a visible enemy operative by 1.

Overall the rail rifle seems like the better option here from a damage out standpoint, giving you good odds to push through mortal wounds while not having a chance of hurting your operatives. It also gives you the second best markerlight target on the team (next to fusion stealth suits). Lets you heal a nearby drone as an action. The amount healed is potentially higher if the bearer is a Drone Controller operative. EMP Grenade Fusion Grenades and EMP Grenades are here, and both are pretty nasty. The former cost a whopping 4 EP, making that grenadier operative incredibly valuable, and can just put out an insane amount of damage while EMP grenades gain Lethal X, where X is the target’s unmodified Save characteristics, making them particularly nasty against Custodes (though note that they only do 2/3 damage). The BS5+ on the drones seems bad but due to auto hits on 6s it basically means drones only suffer at most one penalty. So they could have 2 flesh wounds, be at 17” range, advanced, and the target could be obscured, and their own team broken and they are just as effective as if the game has just started and the drone was at max range. Basically, drones remain at almost full effectiveness regardless of what they did and how damaged they are. They also have 2 different guns meaning they can potentially roll twice on the injury chart against the same foe. I roll four dice in two different colors when I shoot with one.T’au haven’t been released yet, but they’ve been shown for AI. When they’re eventually released, we’ll add a link to playing their fleets here. The Marksman Pathfinder gives you an additional rail rifle; they come with a special Marksman Rail Rifle that hits on a 3+ and can either fire the standard rounds or Dart Rounds, which trade Lethal 5+ for Silent, turning them into deadly snipers. Their Inertial Dampener ability lets them make Overwatch shots at full BS.

Drone Repair Kit [2ep] – Medic kit for drones. This works better with the drone controller, but even then isn’t likely to be something you’ll want to bother with. There is some play here with the shield drone and the drone controller in a shooting castle so that you can keep the drone healthy with the repair kit. However, I’ve never seen that level of defensive play pay off yet. Perhaps against a very shooty opponent with poor starting cover where you need to create your own safe spots it could be good. Another cute combo if you don’t pop Art of War on the first turning point is to pass an APL to an activated model, so that on the Mont’ka turn you can dash, markerlight, shoot, then normal move. Medical Technician Pathfinder

Requisitions

Synergy: The real key to the list (and I think any Tau list) is you have to play your units together and to support each other. Your movement phase is critical. It is often desirable to ready, but make sure you’re in a safe position to do so. You should be mostly concerned with where your models are positioned relative to each other, to support each other, and to the opponent, to deny your opponent an optimal route to the gunners and try to funnel them such that they must eat several turns of shooting to get at you.

Gives the bearer an action that can apply a Markerlight to each enemy within triangle/2 inches range of the bearer. Drone Repair Kit The Pathfinder kill team performs better when its operatives are working together for the Greater Good, and so a lot of the tips for the Veteran Guardsman kill team will also apply here. Pathfinders are still T’au though, with a very strong preference for ranged warfare, so here are some ways you can ensure they always fight on their terms. Add some depth here by doing the base coat, wash, then building up highlights from the base coat again. At the end I use my 000 brush with the thinned Pink Flesh to do some stippling to add a bit of texture. Similar to what we’ve seen for other team updates, Pathfinder teams get some new ploys and some returning ones. Strategic Ploys Fusion Grenade [4ep] – a small melta grenade. Again, taking the grenadier precludes paying 4ep for this one. In the past people loathed the triple fusion rush, but even then markerlights were better. Why spend an operative throwing a grenade when you could shoot them down with superior ranged firepower?Taking an Fire Warrior & DS8 turret: was interesting and not needing LoS I can see being situationally very powerful: e.g. assassinate. Overall it’s more expensive than a rail rifle and only 1 point cheaper than a pair of gun drones. Put it in your roster but don’t always take it. Martial Philosopher: When a friendly SHAS’UI PATHFINDER operative uses its Art of War ability, you can select which Art of War this operative benefits from (it can be a different Art of War to what other friendly operatives benefit from). Beanith has gone the extra mile to give us 6 different Septs done with contrast paint; there’s something for everyone here! In open play I get the sense that you’d be better off never taking this. However, in a post-Into the Dark world, there may be uses for auto-retaining a couple hits while you have the Bonded Strategic Ploy active. If you have fewer chances to set up markerlights, guaranteeing a hit while keeping bonded might make up the difference. Additionally, you’ll get savior protocols to keep your primary guns around a bit longer. Mv33 Grav-Inhibitor Drone