Anyone else find it ironic we get the waiting detachment, but have to wait for the don't wait detachment?

Can't believe they made an army rule specifically to stop Nick from split firing

Nick's personality and playstyle with the Tau got me to play them as my first army at the beginning of 9th, having only played a very few games due to covid I am still excited to try the new support shooting system of 10th!

The reduction of range on fusion blasters hurts me more than it should, having lost assault in suit weapons is the most hurtful thing ever.

If this is positive I call shenanigans

I bet Mon'Ka gives your whole army the assault keyword

6:15 "...tearing into ANYTHING WE WANT TO" - Yeah, like Grotz & Guardsmen?? S5...

"high tech long range tactical shooting" 18 inch range guns: let us introduce ourselves

I think there are overall a lot of things to discuss with tau- a big part being the "why". Like why do certain units do things or no longer do things. Especially from a lore perspective. Why are riptides so weak? Why is fusion, a well known armor killer depicted as such in all the novels no longer really good against tanks? A big one for my is why did etherials no longer have their version of litanies, or why don't they have more leadership buffs considering their the leadership caste? Overall I don't think our index is necessarily bad......but it feels incredibly bland. Every army besides tau seem to have a plethora of keywords while we really don't. I think with ghost keels and broadsides, we got a good amount of anti armor. However melee is what worries me the most. WIth the overall lethality of the game going down, alot of the other indexes still have great mobility and melee. Top it off, some serious psychic powers to contend with. We have nothing to contend psychers, and outside of farsight, nothing to deal with melee, though kroot if they manage to kill a unit, can at least survive decently with a 4/5 fnp. I dunno, really seems like the Tau have been relegated to a discount/shittier version of the Imperial Guard but less interactive in multiple phases. Really gutted the image the Tau had going into this edition portrayed in the books.

The guided system fells at odds with battlesuits. With all the different weapons they can have splitting fire was always a valid option. Now its gone by the wayside

Man, compared to most of the other "first impressions" videos, it sounds like the T'au have had more taken away than added. The Spotter/Guided system sounds conceptually interesting, but fiddly in being able to remember who's paired with who and making sure the units compliment each other, so you can't really have one squad per assignment with them. Still, a spotter with markerlights giving someone improved accuracy and ignoring cover does sounds like a nice swing and accuracy and damage output if you can get into a rhythm of getting those bonuses to surgically strike parts of the opposing army. I'm interested to see how they play now, as it really sounds like how the army plays has been reworked from the ground up. An impression I'm getting so far with 10th is that the "Objective Secure" score and Battle Shock will potentially play huge factors in games in determining and undermining who controls what objectives, as some units/squads with higher scores will have an easier time claiming objectives and potentially be harder to shift, while being able to inflict Battle Shock outside of the normal times can potentially deny your opponent an objective and the accompanying points.

The sheer amount of shield drones you can use in 10th is bananas, and there's absolutely no reason to not take a ton of them.

Not gonna lie, feel frustrated that I spent money making and army that now plays very different

Thank you Nick for inspiring me to take on the Tau as my second Warhammer 40k army

7:37 except for Eldar, cuz they can just "fate" the rolles to trigger all of their anti-tank ability keywords and then "fate" the damage rolls to always cause maximum damage, then boom goodbye mbt on turn 1.

The way they done drones is abit dirty can’t lie

We are gonna smacked around by space Marines.

Super excited to play 10th, got my tau army almost done. These new rules make it very possible for many Tau units to have BS 2+, also happy with how quick our models are. I would have liked to see Mont'ka rules though, and I hoping the onager gauntlet makes a return in the codex :(

I'm thinking GW needs to give us some more new Tau Units/Models!!!!!!! Because we need some more Models and also to deal with these higher tougher models! And also updated / refreshed range as what's the point of special drones that come with some Models then!!!!

Well done, and very solid initial analysis from Nick. Been a Tau player since their first Codex. This sounds like one of the biggest deviations yet -- and shuttling us down a pretty narrow road. Like Nick, hope that the Codex offers more options. The good news? I'll stop working on adding more specialty drones...which I just bought more of 2 months ago...

Feels like we lost a LOT of the fun stuff from 9e. Way to optimize the fun out of the faction.... again

Thanks for this Nick. My best mate bought me Farsight for my birthday - I’ve adored the Tau for as long as I can remember but always held off from collecting them due to - well, due to a huge pile of shame blocking the way! I’ve played more 40K in the past 3 months compared to the last 17+ years. Loving 10th edition - and that’s from a DG player! Looking forward to finally starting Tau.

Really disappointed in the Pulse Rifles losing their AP -1... We had it for such a short time, feels rude to pull it out this quickly. And Carbines losing the Assault keyword just makes zero sense to me. Also, just feel like GW is pushing Breacher teams more than anything else for the Tau, why no love for the longer range Tau infantry??

I feel ya regarding the Tactical Drones & the Kroot Hounds. GW have definitely nerfed them/ radically changed how you're meant to use them now. I've played 3 games with them in the new mission deck from the Leviathan box, i.e. the thing GW wants everyone to use in Matched play now. Apologies in advance for the wall of text but I hope you'll find my ideas useful :) All of those missions have secondary objectives that basically say "Throw a cheap ineffective squad onto a random part of the battlefield, force that squad to do nothing this turn except set up a Teleport Homer/ Investigate a Signal/ etc, etc. Do this over and over again because you keep drawing mission cards that tell you to do something like this, but each time you do it you'll get 5 victory Points" If you're using Crisis Suits and Fire Warriors to complete these Secondary Objectives, then you're giving up a whole lot of Shooting, since units can't shoot while they do these objectives. In 9th Edition there were rules that said "you have to use INFANTRY units like Fire Warriors and Crisis Suits to do these objectives - you can't use Hounds and Drones to complete them ... ... ... but in 10th those rules are gone. Probably because GW realised how limiting that was/ how badly it effected all TAU armies - i.e. the only Army in the game that only wins by shooting. :)P So for example, the 'Area Denial' mission should basically say "Throw 4 Kroot Hounds into the centre of the board, make sure your opponent doesn't have anything left in the centre of the board by the end of your turn, get 5 Victory Points." The Hounds having an OC of Zero and them being beasts doesn't prevent them from completing a Secondary Objective like it would have in 9th Edition. Having OC 0 only stops them from scoring 'Primary' points/ Holding 'Primary' Objectives. They can still score all secondary objectives. The Hounds also get a pre-game 'scout' move of 9 inches, so they can reach the centre of the board very quickly. You can also hide them behind walls easily due to their low profile/ their models being low to the ground. You can Hide them behind a building in your deployment zone so your opponent can't see them, wait until you draw this Secondary Mission Card, then send 'em out. Same thing with the 'Investigate Signals' Secondary Mission - it should basically say "Throw Units of Kroot Hounds &/or Tactical Drones into as many corners of the battlefield as you can, make them give up on shooting and fighting for the turn - score 2 Victory Points for each corner you control". Again, the Drones and Hounds being OC Zero doesn't prevent them from doing Secondary Missions, it only stops them doing Primary. Hide these units behind buildings until you draw this Mission card, keep them out of line of sight of the enemy until you draw this card, and keep moving them every turn from building to building toward the corners until you draw this card. The best use for Drones? Wait until you draw the 'Deploy Teleport Homers' card. That Mission Card should basically say = "wait until turn 3/ turn 4 when your opponent's army has moved out of their deployment zone/ has been shot off the board by all of your guns, deepstrike 2 Units of Tactical Drones into your opponent's Deployment Zone, make those drones do nothing except deploy Teleport Homers for a turn, get 5 Victory Points." The Tactical Drones have the Deepstrike Keyword for a reason. The Drones cost as much as they do 'because' they can Deep Strike/ because they have it built in. So use it :)P At this point we practically need them to score other Secondaries as well like 'Engage on All Fronts''/ do anything that doesn't rely on them Holding Primary Objectives but needs a unit that can pop onto the battlefield to score more Victory Points at any time. At this point I've stopped seeing the Drones and Hounds as units that fight/ engage in battle. I see them as plucky little under-dogs running around a scary battlefield doing story related missions while guns and explosions go off all around them. I like to imagine the hounds as well trained police dogs with Go-Pro Cameras strapped to their heads and sensory equipment strapped to their backs. They're actually on a mission to look for wounded soldiers and sniff out bomb sites (just like real world earthquake rescue dogs and bomb disposal sniffer dogs). The Drones aren't actually Gun Drones at all - they're basically bomb disposal units, or maybe they're HAZOP radiation and chemical spill detectors. Or maybe they're, well, just mobile Teleport Homers. (Again, just like how drones are used in the real world today... except for the teleport homing thing of course... we haven't got there as a species yet :)P Thank you for reading my TED talk - hope you found it useful :)P

Would have been nice to get a defensive buff (+1 to save roll or -1 to hit for ennemies) turn 1 and 2 (to survive until turn 3) then get it replaced by the actual sustain hit Kauyon buff

I think Broadsides got a good number of buffs, with the drone changes you can get 10W each and the Rail rifle is pretty good for anti-tank

Nick yelling splitfire is the same energy as Cyril(archer) yelling covering fire

nicks enthousiasm is what got me into 40k in general, and is the single reason i play the t'au. splitfire!

Tau-much planning to work as teams. Blood angels-run in at full speed and wipe the board.

Guided unit gets plus 1 ballistic skill not to hit. So can add plus 1 to hit on top of it.

Im new to 40k, joining with 10th and i really like the theme and aesthetics to T'au and could see myself building and army for them.

don't underestimate our Broadsides, it is 2 shots at 60" S14, -4, d6+1 damage, sure beats our fusion now. Correction: S12

Hate how so many armies have built in shoot then move, but Tau, the OG's of it in 3rd ed, get relegated to a strat

Tau variates between High risk High reward and Tactical camper. However, I did encounter a mixed combo, where overwhelming firepower was used as the bait for Hiigh callibre precise weaponry. Bait had just enough firepower to stand on it's own and draw attention to itself. That was a fun match

2:22 pathfinders can be only assigned darkstrider as a leader and since he's an "epic hero" he cannot be given any enhacements, no lethal hits for anyone

I personally feel particularly uninspired. The lack of much S10+ shooting, only 2 instances of the Anti-X keyword in the entire index (or low density of many of the other weapon keywords, for that matter), drones, low Toughness compared to other armies, few Assault weapons, and everything just feels like they kinda just...gave up trying after a certain point? Tau are my favorite army, will continue to be, and I'm not a doomsayer, but I just don't feel motivated by what I've seen.

I'm...less impressed than I would like, but there are still bright spots. We can take multiple Commanders now, so Crisis Teams will still be a large part of armies. Fireblades look useful again, and the Stormsurge looks properly terrifying, even gaining a buff when targeting things its own size. Ghostkeels look better, although it looks like the range definitely favors ion over fusion, and Stealth Suits getting a nudge to be spotters is nice, how I wanna play them anyways. Droneports look surprisingly decent to deny area, and the amount of possible BS2+ has risen dramatically so I'm very happy. I guess we'll just wait and see how it all shakes out

Slight correction, the guided unit gets better BS value, so technically they can still be boosted by a +1 to hit. Stormsurge heavy weapons to hit on 2+? Thats nice! :)

3 Ghostkeels 3 stealth suit teams, and shadowsun seems like a really fun combo. Re roll 1s to hit and wound on the ghostkeels. Also all our anti tank can hit on 2s now which is nice. Also Also kauyon is insane. Double exploding 6s is a HUGE power spike

Looks like FE squads buffed with ethereal for the CP and cadre flame blade in breachers may be good. The ghostkeel also got a glow up with the stealth drones. Odd these are the same units in the combat patrol. Really disappointed in reduction in movement and gun ranges. This edition will not be crisis heavy as before.

In his excitement I think he forgot Breacher Pulse Blasters are Str6, not 5.

The spotter/observer rule seemed really cool and fun to potentially use with vespids Fly into reserve then deep strike onto a building or back/sideline and get lethal hits no cover for your vespids

Farsight leading a unit can Tank Shock at strength 10... Lol it's a thing

I played a game against a buddy of mine , 1000 points, 2 squads of breachers each with a cadre fireblade, 2 devilfish, 1 stealth suit team, and a storm surge. Tabled him playing world eaters turn 3, both of us had a blast. Storm surge feels so much more reliable with 20w and the weapons it can take and being able to get it hitting on 2s

But Nick! One of the enhancements for your army is Exemplar of Kayoun, which grants the detachment rule on turn 2! So you SHOULD still have a majority of your army to get those sustained hits one turn earlier And you can take Longstrike in addition to 3 Hammerheads, so we have an extra railgun to use.

prevideo, my ideas are strong shooters in the back like broadsides and stormsurges, with Ghostkeel and stealth suits in deep to set up spotting for the shooters and be decoys, hoping to get as many shots as possible sent there way, a couple of fire teams for objective control, and a 6 squad of crisis units with a coldstar to wreak havoc or ready to deep strike wherever they are needed. Id really like my septs back so I can have my Melee Tau though

GW looked directly at Nick and said, no more splitting fire for you

Nick, just wana say that is a fine looking Manta, it looks great, and while i'm just starting out in the table top I hope to one day play one of you guys. Hope ya have a great day, bro.

It seams to be a fairly dissapointing release. Lack of ways to activate those sustained hits semi consistently sucks and having to wait for it isn't fantastic either. Suppose pathfinder spam to guide multiple units to maximise guided units with a stealth suit frontline to use the -1 to hit to tank hits with a broadside/hammerhead backline waiting for turn 3 could work? Unless the points costs are low accross the board i don't see much success in the future sadly. Worst of all arguably is that entrenched gunline is likely going to be the order of the day as opposed to manuver warfare.

I think this is a good way to start up the Tau. I used to play Farsight Enclave in 9th and man was it fun, but with the style of 10th edition which is more points based Haaving an army that an take and hold positions with tremendous fire power should be interesting. Who better to castle up with than with Tau on 3rd battle round. Plus having Pathfinders spot for two untis. Death from a far. the only thing is know to think what teams will fit well to take objectives and help defend them. Booyah

id love a video where nick explains tau for newbies like me, love his energy lol

You can kinda tell nick is not thrilled to see the direction tau have gone. But what I will say I'm glad tank's and monsters are tougher for infantry to kill. 9th eddition was usually a game of what units were just flat out better. 10th seems to have been made to actually force you have dedicated anti tank and anti infantry weaponry. No more everything proof guns. I might actually try 10th if I can paint up some models to replace the ones I lost from my car roof. The exorcist tank idls actually playable now soat least I have that.

I can understand why some changes in 10th might be dissapppinting to some, but as someone who only consumes 40k content as a viewer, I can't wait to see how people adjust their army strats bases on the new strengths and weaknesses introduced.

It feels like they have made good AoS-esque choices for the general rules, but the indexes are *extremely* weak in terms of balance. Certainly I won’t be moving over until the six month / one year revised ‘indexes’ are out.

Stealth Suits and Pathfinders being spotters for my Snipers will be fun for flanking targets from a far range. Currently building a Coldstar to take charge with a Shadow Sun going for flanks.

i rlly wish GW would bring back many of the aircraft units for Tau as in a vehicle based 10th edition it would really help in taking out big targets

Just sounds like the tau have been nerfed hard to see more of other factions this edition..

Theres a lot of choices for anti tank weapons. Broadside is insanely strong at destroying them, where with the right enhancement, on round 2, 1 broadside battlesuit (1 model) with the greater good feature and heavy rail rifle can one shot Astra Militarum tanks!

Maybe GW is trying to say that T'au shouldn't be in combat at all now.... Sad face i loved running the that set up

My issue is Farsight seems underwhelming, he doesn't seem to be anything more than a "melee commander" but with the index as it is there isn't alot to work with him Also since he can't equip drones isn't he squishier than the lesser Crisis suits he commands since they can gain a wound or two if needed. While i'm new to WH40k i worry the faction will just get zergged down before getting a chance to bring the fury in the late game and it's star commander just doesn't seem to have the impact that he's fellow stars of the 'Arks of Omen' line seem to have.

I'm really excited to get some games in of the new Tau, been playing double of breachers with fireblades in devilfish since last edition so it's great to see how good they are now. Sad to see the melee colstar go but we can hope that's only a temporary thing.

Tau have always been hard to balance. Depending on the edition, they either shred or sit on the shelf and watch every other army play.

Assault being attached to cold star crisis suits fixes the entire suit issue. To the point i think there are over sights and under costs in the Tau indexs. changing to move 12, with a 6inch auto advance you just made all suit weapons into a massive alpha strike or counter hit in either case.

Put the puretide negram chip on a fireblade, then use the Coordinated to Engage strat on a group of pathfinders and on a strike/breach team that the fireblade is attached to. Minimum 4 units getting greater good bonus. Plus pathfinders and strike are markerlight so everyone is ignoring cover. I think it can be a killer combo

I'm happy to see mechanized T'au back. Fish of Fury time!

Feel like we kind of went back in time. Tau just feel boring now. We lost a lot of stuff that made us different and cool. Coldstar flying off the board gone, riptides charging their reactors gone, onager gauntlets, our special prototype weapons, special gear like baegel plate & solid image. Was drones annoying to deal with yes but that’s what drones do they protect the unit and take damage for them. I once had a shield drone tank an entire unit of fire to keep me on the point and win a game, I gave him a special paint job for that. Our big hammerhead guns are useless when an enemy can just roll an invuln for 1 shot. Idk man tau just ain’t it for me this edition. Maybe I’ll come back when the codex comes out but until then this army is a hard pass for me.

I want to get into playing 40k and id really like to stary with T'au. Is there a starter box for them of some sort thats kind of like the ones from the beginner series videos? Something i can open, build/paint and have an army ready for battle. Im assuming id have to buy whatever other books or rules separately?

Seeker missiles on Piranhas seem to be a nice cheap to deal dmg to high Toughness units

I'm no tabletop player - just a spectator, but did they basically nerf the Tau? Or is it that every team is weaker?

Can we shoot with the guiding unit in our shooting phase or is it they just guide

"Nobody knows what's the best thing" Its eldar, we all know its eldar.

Thank you for another great video!

Not happy about a lot of it.. the riptide is blah now… but ghostkeel and stormesurge look fun… and am I reading that correctly on the drone port? The drones can fire on EVERY eligible unit?! Granted BS 5+.. and nothing game breaking.. but still caught me by surprise..

Played 10th yesterday with my Tau army, personally I’m not really impressed, the Stormsurge losing its deploy anchors got me big time. I agree with Nick’s statement about having a tough time taking out anti-tank models, I got absolutely wiped out from that. Will have to wait for all the rules to come out to properly gauge Tau’s playability.

Please do more video's like this 😄

Nice thoughts. How does it work out now that you've played more games in 10th edition? Looking to begin a 40k army and T'au is on top of my list.

i cant believe the ion accelerator on the Riptide is s8.. overcharged.. like at that point what is even supposed to be the anti-tank of Tau? I think Ion, and others, needs a strength boost for sure

That Manta is so sick

I just think that Farsight Enclaves should become an independent army with their own codex

Firing overwatch with sustained hits is very good

I believe a combo might rise: Darkstrider+Trough Unity, Devastation+Pathfinders -> Spot for two unit giving them Lethal Hits!!!

Missile sides are twin linked now, they are pretty decent anti tank for our codex.

So it feels that kauyon was definitely designed to mimic a trap being set, where you wanted to try and use a few key units to bait out mistakes and such, and just delay delay delay until your bonuses start on turn three, at which point volume of fire will be the name of the game. I'm willing to guess that mont'ka, when it comes out, will probably give more aggressive strategems and bonuses as well, as I've noticed that the stategems now are more defensive and responsive rather than active and controlling. I'll be playing them, i like gundams and such, so i have to play them.

stealth suits went from "okay" to "useless crap" :'D But i think we overall got a pretty good setup here, a lot of units feel like they have a solid ground now

Now we need JTs take on drukhari!

Piranha with 2 free seekers plus the only melta 4 fusion gun looks great at 55 points a model.

At least Ghostkeels won't collect dust on the shelf anymore.

Hold your head high and march forward for the greater good (not to fast because Kauyon) my fellow Tau players!

Orks get sustained hits all game, well done GW.

One of my best friends who is a diehard Tau player, is in full doomer mode about the breachers losing a single AP. Army is dead to him smh

For the greater GOOOOOOD!!!!!!!!

I love your optimism Nick but as another T’au player I feel like they really nuked the feel of the army with this edition by taking away the drones and battlesuit systems. It’s a real shame.

What is the name of the BIG suite on the Left?

The army rule is really good, very reminiscent of real-life marksmen. Only being able to pick Kauyon is really annoying. I know the edition’s just started but I don’t think it’s too much to ask for more than just one at the start. I also just think it was a really poor decision on GW’s part to pick Kauyon. Farsight JUST got a new model and they’re alienating basically everyone who bought it. I’m sure people who like Kauyon are having a great time rn but it just seems like a slap in the face from GW.

Where is all this info coming from? Is the index up for download?

T'au might be relying on their units with lone operative a reasonable amount especially to survive against with some of the units that have indirect fire.

1:59 so can the observer get to shoot too or do they give up their shooting?

First? No it’s not my first comment. Love your content. Getting back into tabletop and binging your content. Keep it up fellas 🖤

I just started the tau any tips

Can't wait for JT to make a comment about Nick's reluctance to split fire due to Greater Good rule!