Alright we’ll kick it off with Tau as I’ve still been playing them a lot. What I’m going to try and do in these series is look at significant impacts the rules had on previously run builds and what the rule changes mean for units that may not have been used too much previously. And roll from there…

Implications

The most obvious is easy – no more Battle Bros with Space Marines and Eldar. This is a pretty big hit but a lot of people seem to be forgetting that Tau were a good army without Allies. They did well before Eldar and Space Marines appeared and continued to do well after they appeared when they were by themselves, allied with more Tau or some other army. A quick look at Torrent of Fire from June 2013 onwards and you don’t see a dip in winning percentage for Tau not allied with Eldar or Space Marines. That being said, it’s still a loss. Cheap access to psychic powers to improve shooting sucks but importantly, you can still take these allies and get other bonuses (i.e. Objective Secured Jetbikes). And now I can take the Solitaire I’ve always wanted and not feel terribly guilty for not having a Farseer…

Next is the removal of characters joining MCs. No more O’Vesa star – thank the frick. O’Vesa can still join characters (like a Buffmander) but I always found that an expensive unit for what it did anyway. The Buffmander can no longer join Riptides though – same thing as before; I thought it was too expensive for what it did and the Buffmander was better buffing you know, lots of guns… Not a real big issue but again like the Allies, it’s a lost tool in your arsenal for if you needed it.

These are the two main things people have been focusing on for Tau and I think it’s really missing a lot of the point when they say Tau are now worse. Tau didn’t need either of those options to be good. They were good without it so what has actually impacted on the normal Tau armies?

Objective Secured. This is massive as Tau were never great at scoring anyway (and this is where losing Imperials as Battle Brothers or Allies of Convenience hurts as they shored this up nicely). Tau get Kroot and Fire Warriors (or Crisis Suits with Farsight). Kroot are a solid shooting unit with Sniper rounds, harassment unit with Outflank and cheap speed bumps. Fire Warriors are an okay shooting unit which can bring an Objective Secured Devilfish. Expect to see these more except the biggest issue of Tau Fire Warriors rears its head again (which wasn’t seen in 6th) – no special weapons. Given the increasing number of vehicles, having a unit which effectively does nothing against them is poor army construction. When do those experimental weapons from Pathfinders get moved over again?

Tau are a great example for the Objective Secured debate – a small 54 point Fire Warrior squad in the backfield will stop a 800 point Jetcouncil from scoring an objective but Tau don’t invest a lot of points in their Troops because they generally aren’t efficient compared to other options and don’t have any durability. Compared to other options, Tau struggle here. There are some answers through Allies (can still get Objective Secured Jetbikes; perhaps some Ghost Arks?) and their Troops aren’t 100% shit but it’s an even bigger weakness than before. However, with new scoring rules everything scores bar Drones. So your Broadsides, Riptides, Commander and Crisis Suits are now scoring models – just don’t have them try to score against an opposing Objective Secured unit.

Double edged sword – go for more shooting which scores? or grab less shooting but score better? I think the former wins out here, particularly dependent on what you’re allying in but the classic Crisis + Broadside combination benefits from this and Riptides aren’t exactly upset by it either.

Vehicle damage tables and the increase in vehicle durability impacts Tau on both sides. Piranhas, Devilfish, Hammerheads and Skyrays become more attractive, particularly since they don’t need to move to Jink now and Disruption Pods provide Stealth (so you can quite easily get some 3+ cover saves). In reverse the need to bring more AP1 to drop heavier AVs which are becoming more popular is problematic as we will go into more in the army building section but basically your S7 spam doesn’t cut it against masses of AV13+ vehicles, particularly if some of those have six Hull Points. With AP1 being even less effective than before, these high AV vehicle numbers will increase for a myriad of reasons and this will force Tau to be able to deal with them and bring more anti-tank options to the table. Riptides are really unhappy with the changes to Smash attacks and as above, it impacts on ones ability to deal with heavy AV (throwing three S10 Riptide punches into vehicles with Armourbane was a good way to deal with them in a pinch).

Removal of Focus Fire hurts everyone but Tau… well both yes and no. No as Markerlights are still the prime way to deal with units and cover. Yes because Tau are a shooting army and have lost a shooting option.

Psychic Phase… well, this is where it gets particularly annoying as Tau have no way of generating extra Warp Charges except through Allies and their only Ally of Convenience that has this is Eldar who, unless you build a mini Jetcouncil, aren’t going to have a lot of good targets for their Psychic powers given they are no longer Battle Brothers. Moloch Talisman from Farsight is a solid defensive addition but doesn’t solve the issue if you get 1 Warp Charge. A lot of powers aren’t offensive these days either so stopping blessings and conjurations going off is near impossible with Tau. Something they will need to live with but that’s something they are quite familiar with already.

FMCs can no longer land and charge but are harder to kill in flight. Tau are probably the best army at killing FMCs in flight which is a good thing as after you wound a FMC you don’t want them falling to the ground when you’ve run out of guns (i.e. the end of the shooting phase) to charge the next turn. Throw some Markerlights at them and they become your bog standard MC (same with flyers and bog standard vehicles but nothing really changed there either – Tau still have an advantage as Velocity Trackers allow you to choose to have Skyfire or not and you can still pair with Interceptor on certain models). Not having to fear 5 FMCs running at you and then charging is also a huge boon and perhaps one of the most frustrating match-ups for Tau has been made less so in some ways and more so in others (Psychic powers).

Remember as well, you cannot Overwatch if you are in the dirt now as well. This is pretty important with Supporting Fire so keep this in mind. Charging through terrain is also less of an advantage so expect to see longer charges from opponent’s and terrain to be less useful in slowing these down. It’s great that it’s consistent now but those odds are less skewed as well (waiting for someone to do the math for me :)).

With one of the strongest and most flexible Warlord charts, getting a re-roll on it is actually a good thing for a Combined Arms Tau army.

The changes to who has first turn after deployment has been decided can be a really good thing for Tau when often armies will look to deploy just out of your range. Make them go first now and either waste a turn or move into range, though remember, they will likely get to shoot you so deployment is even more important now. If you do this, don’t try and Seize.

Night Fighting is not as big as it used to be so having Blacksun Filters everywhere isn’t the advantage it once was. It’s also not used in most missions so go figure.

Challenge wounds overflow into normal combat – this wasn’t a big thing a most Tau units didn’t have a character soaking wounds anyway but it’s good to remember. Tau get turned into a red mist in combat normally so really nothing has changed…

So what does 7th mean for some of the less used units of Tau?

Not much really. The Tau codex is probably one of the most well put together books Games Workshop has ever made and there’s very little dead weight but the “lesser” units or choices aren’t going to see increased playing time I feel. None of the uncommon Relics are going to come out, the flyers are still blah, the Vespid / Stealth Suits still outdone by other choices, etc.

From an army building perspective however; some changes will be necessary and I think we were starting to see this move anyway at the tail end of 6th. More armor busting. Not S7 – something more potent and this is where the changes to Railguns are coming into play finally. Remember everyone whining and bleating over S8 AP1 Broadsides and how Tau were screwed and no one would play them, etc. etc. etc.? Ya Internets be stupid but ironically with the improvement of vehicles in 7th edition and higher AV vehicles in particular trending to be more common and problematic, suddenly that’s an issue. It can certainly be solved by Allies but there are still solid internal options. Fusion Crisis Suits and Piranhas are both good choices and with some tinkering can have some reliable delivery systems. Riptides commonly sported Fusion before so expect that to remain the same but in light of that, double Iontide might become less popular as the need to clear larger swathes of infantry decreases… Time will tell here.

From an Allies perspective I see Tau + Farsight become more popular. Moloch is still a great Psy defense with a +2 Deny 12″ radius although Tau won’t have a lot of Deny dice to begin with… Objective Secured Crisis Suits are solid options though whether protecting the backfield or grabbing them in annoying places with their second jump. They’re not Jetbikes but still good. Otherwise the age old standby of Eldar are still a strong bet with Objective Secured Jetbikes – and I want that damn Solitaire. Otherwise adding Wave Serpents to a Hybrid Tau force for some solid Objective Secured transports also works and there’s always Fire Dragons for more anti-tank assistance… Necrons are still an option as well but with Night Scythes never being able to score and only grabbing one Command Barge, I see Tau more being the Ally for Necrons than the other way around.

Conclusion

I don’t see 7th edition hurting Tau at its core though the need to potentially score objectives mid-game should put different pressures on Tau lists so you see less and less of those gunlines and more mobile forces (which were the better armies in 6th anyway). Even more though, I think these lists will begin to look different and either move to a more mechanised or fluid approach. Tau made lots of really good balanced builds in 6th edition and that really doesn’t change though some of the options have been reduced with allies but the more gimmicky lists like O’Vesastar are less of an issue or non-existent which is good gamewise.

What will support the primary Tau army though will be a lot different I think as people adjust to their reduced number of options and look at the best way to grapple with the two key issues looming above the Tau army currently – lots of high AV and scoring objectives throughout a game (throw in Objective Secured for good measure).