Farsight Enclaves Why?

[Panxer]

I recently got a copy of the Farsight Enclaves, and other than the obvious advantages of having XV8's as troops, I'm really wondering why this type of force would be fielded as a stand alone, and can't see any practical use for the army as anything other than an allied detachment in support of a Tau main force... Why?

The Cons: Lackluster and expensive Signature Systems, mediocre Warlord Traits (though arguably some are better than the standard codex), No Onager Gauntlet or XV8-02 (unless you take IC's from the 8), inflexibility as to unit options and wargear ("the Eight"), vague and oddly worded rules as to which options and wargear you can take or can't take from which codex you're using, and the fact that if you play as Codex Tau, you can use Farsight and Aun'Va or Shadowsun, BUT if you play as Farsight enclave, you can't... Huh?

The Pro's: Playing as a Warlord Riptide HQ IC that can take Signature Systems, the Warscaper Drone, That node that makes all terrain within 36" of the warlord difficult/dangerous for the enemy, the Melta Blades (though the system short out rule was kind of jinky), wall of death overwatch rule, and XV8's being troops (obviously).

What I don't get: You can use units from Codex Tau, but signature systems (and does that include wargear *because there is none listed) can only be used from one or the other codex except for special rules XYZ as listed in the supplement. Confusing right from the start.

Solution?: Allied Detachment only?

[DarkLink]

Yup. Pretty much. Take your Tau army, use your second HQ and all your Crisis Suit teams as Farsight, and that's about it.

[SaveModifier]

its for people who want to play as the farsight enclave, with loads of suits. its not always about any mechanical advantage, its about fluff.

[DarkLink]

But that's the fluff. The actual rules provide no real benefit other than allowing you to exploit Crisis Suits as troops, similar to how the only real benefit the Black Legion supplement brings appears to be a 4th Heldrake.

[Joe TwoCrows]

So DE can take them as desperate allies, in some out of the way spot of the board, and skyfire at hellturkeys.

[SaveModifier]

But that's the fluff. The actual rules provide no real benefit other than allowing you to exploit Crisis Suits as troops, similar to how the only real benefit the Black Legion supplement brings appears to be a 4th Heldrake.

You don't have to have a benefit, it's a rules to allow you to represent fluff. Not everything has to be "better"

[Garradh]

Not everything has to be "better"


Exactly, it's supposed to be "different." Not everyone has the same playstyle for an army. Welcome to 6th Edition.

[SaveModifier]

I guess some people liked the cookie cutter armies of 5th editon, I am loving all the options GW are throwing at us now, between new codexes every few months, allies and now suppliments, there are just so many new narrative things to explore.

[D6Damager]

I recently got a copy of the Farsight Enclaves, and other than the obvious advantages of having XV8's as troops, I'm really wondering why this type of force would be fielded as a stand alone, and can't see any practical use for the army as anything other than an allied detachment in support of a Tau main force... Why?

The Cons: Lackluster and expensive Signature Systems, mediocre Warlord Traits (though arguably some are better than the standard codex), No Onager Gauntlet or XV8-02 (unless you take IC's from the 8), inflexibility as to unit options and wargear ("the Eight"), vague and oddly worded rules as to which options and wargear you can take or can't take from which codex you're using, and the fact that if you play as Codex Tau, you can use Farsight and Aun'Va or Shadowsun, BUT if you play as Farsight enclave, you can't... Huh?

The Pro's: Playing as a Warlord Riptide HQ IC that can take Signature Systems, the Warscaper Drone, That node that makes all terrain within 36" of the warlord difficult/dangerous for the enemy, the Melta Blades (though the system short out rule was kind of jinky), wall of death overwatch rule, and XV8's being troops (obviously).

What I don't get: You can use units from Codex Tau, but signature systems (and does that include wargear *because there is none listed) can only be used from one or the other codex except for special rules XYZ as listed in the supplement. Confusing right from the start.

Solution?: Allied Detachment only?

Competitvely, you're right. You will probably only see Enclaves as a detachment to a Tau primary.

That being said the crisis suit unit is one of the most flexible units in the book. Putting 18 scoring suits with bonding ritual on the table with various loadouts/drones could be competitive IMO. I doubt that many have fully explored the possibilities yet in actual gameplay.

[DarkLink]

You don't have to have a benefit, it's a rules to allow you to represent fluff. Not everything has to be "better"

I don't mean benefit as in being good enough to spam. I just mean benefit in such a way that they're worth taking in their own right. As poorly thought out as the last couple of supplements have been, the only reason their rules seem to exist is to allow you to ally with yourself to either make Crisis Suits scoring or to get a 4th Heldrake. The rules seem specifically designed to promote exactly those two netlists, and nothing more.

[Brian Wesley]

I don't mean benefit as in being good enough to spam. I just mean benefit in such a way that they're worth taking in their own right. As poorly thought out as the last couple of supplements have been, the only reason their rules seem to exist is to allow you to ally with yourself to either make Crisis Suits scoring or to get a 4th Heldrake. The rules seem specifically designed to promote exactly those two netlists, and nothing more.

You seem to be missing the point that SaveModifier said...it is about the fluff not just 'how can I break and exploit these new rules to create the next netlist'

[DarkLink]

So? There are so few actual rules that you're just as well off playing regular Tau with the appropriate paint scheme. My point is that the rules have very little actual substance.

[Eberk]

There are so few actual rules that you're just as well off playing regular Tau with the appropriate paint scheme.
And in that one sentence you capture exactly what a supplement should be.

Both are balanced and you can choose which you like more

[SaveModifier]

So? There are so few actual rules that you're just as well off playing regular Tau with the appropriate paint scheme. My point is that the rules have very little actual substance.

I don't know if you're willfully not understanding this or you're just not capable?

You're seeing everything through this ridiculous and warped viewpoint that obsesses with competitive advantage or "what units are worth taking" most people out there want cool armies, they want to use the models they like best to make the army they want. The supplements make that easier for them to make the army they want. They aren't there to make an army that can dominate opponents or even make more competitive lists that the parent codex, they're for flavor and they will all be like that, thats why they're 70 pages of fluff and only 2 pages of rules.

This is Warhammer 40,000, the fluff has and always will be more important than the rules.

[Tynskel]

I don't know if you're willfully not understanding this or you're just not capable?

You're seeing everything through this ridiculous and warped viewpoint that obsesses with competitive advantage or "what units are worth taking" most people out there want cool armies, they want to use the models they like best to make the army they want. The supplements make that easier for them to make the army they want. They aren't there to make an army that can dominate opponents or even make more competitive lists that the parent codex, they're for flavor and they will all be like that, thats why they're 70 pages of fluff and only 2 pages of rules.

This is Warhammer 40,000, the fluff has and always will be more important than the rules.

Yeah, the point of the supplements is to make a 'legal' army that you can go anywhere and just point to the rules and play. One is using the supplement because they like the fluff.

[Rev. Tiberius Jackhammer]

Yeah, the point of the supplements is to make a 'legal' army that you can go anywhere and just point to the rules and play. One is using the supplement because they like the fluff.Yeah, not so much a whole new 'dex, but just making the obvious houserules ("yo, Abaddon makes Chosen troops, mind if I do Chosen troops in my Black Legion army w/o Abaddon and offset that by buying the so-so VotLW upgrade on 'em?") official.

[DarkLink]

I don't know if you're willfully not understanding this or you're just not capable?

Cut the condescending tone. Not everyone plays for pure fluff. For the people who do, this supplement is fine, because if you're just doing stuff to be fluff, really the quality of the rules don't matter. I've found that most people want an army that is both fluffy and competitive, though. I don't disagree with you at all that the supplements allow players to create a fluffy variant army. Far from not understanding, or being incapable of understanding (seriously, dude, accusing someone of not being intelligent enough to understand something is a real dick move), I fully agree with you on that specific point.

What I am saying, and what you seem to be ignoring, is that if you consider the quality of the rules from anything other than a pure fluff viewpoint, they don't really do anything other than create a single, specific netlist. It's not something that really opens up some new, varied, unique lists that aligns really well with the fluff. Instead, in practice, and note that I am not advocating this like you seem to be accusing me of, we're going to see a bunch of bandwagon players showing up with allied Farsight contingents with one or two Crisis Suit teams as troops, and maybe even a fourth Riptide.

The Black Legion codex suffers from the same problem. The intent is exactly what you say it is, to give players a means to make a fluffier army. And you can do that.

But.

They wrote the rules in such a way that they are easy to exploit. CSM and Black Legion are a better example of this. The CSM, overall, is a pretty powerful codex, if you spam certain specific units. But the core army, basic Chaos Marines, and a lot of their units like Thousand Sons, just kind of suck, so at tournaments you never see any actual power armor CSM. You just get Cultists, Heldrakes, and Nurgle Biker Lords. The codex has some major internal balance problems.

The Black Legion book could have done something to fix that (e.g. making Veteran of the Long War Fearless instead of +1 Ld). Instead, from a competitive standpoint, it pretty much just allows you to take a 4th Heldrake. That's poor rules design. Tau suffer from a more minor version of the same problem. The actual army hasn't changed, just the Crisis Suits are troops now, but I don't think anyone will actually change their list because Crisis Suits aren't good to spam. You'll still see a couple of Firewarrior squads, a couple of Kroot squads, and the 1-2 Crisis Suit teams everyone was already taking will just be Troops instead of Elite. If I were a Tau player, I would want a supplement that actually gave me the ability to take a really different army, instead of keeping my list exactly the same and just swapping Crisis Suits over to Troops. And maybe slapping Earth Cast Piloting Array onto a Riptide, because that's a pretty good piece of wargear.

So if the intent was to open up options for a unique and varied armylist, yes, technically the option is there, and if you're strictly playing non-competitively then it's fine. But the vast majority of players still try and run halfway decent armies even if they're not trying to be super competitive, at least in my experience, and all of those players are stuck in the same boat where they might want to run an army of all Chosen, but realize that that army kind of sucks and so they either give up on it, or lose games because they decide to be fluff.

Being fluff and competitive shouldn't be contradictory. You should be able to take a fluff army that is also good enough to win games. I don't think that's too much to ask for, but so far I've been very underwhelmed with GW's delivery in this regard.

Anyways, I'd appreciate it if you actually read and addressed what I'm saying, instead of trying to brush me off as some sort of anti-fluff player. In my opinion, they could have done a better job than they have, and I've presented some arguments as to why. In your opinion, they've done a perfectly fine job, and then you dismiss everything I've said and imply that I'm too incompetent to understand that your opinion is the correct one. I know I can only expect so much out of an internet discussion, but really, can we be adults here?

[Tynskel]

Hah!
no it is too much to ask for.

Do you have even a clue how *many* armies there are from a fluff point of view? 1000s, perhaps 10s of 1000s. There is *no way* GW could even possibly make each one of those armies competitive.

SOOOoooOOOooOooOoOOOooo.

No, it is waaaaay too much to ask for.

[Rev. Tiberius Jackhammer]

No, it is waaaaay too much to ask for.Welll, it's too much to ask for under the method of "Paid rulebooks, with only minor errata until the following paid installment", which GW is pretty much stuck, riveted and nailed to.

Under the rather more palatable method of a "living" series of free pdfs, DarkLinks' point would be easier to accomplish, and a lot healthier for the game, I think.

[DarkLink]

The new digital books are a step in the right direction, at least. And so are the supplements, they just need to work on their execution.

[Rev. Tiberius Jackhammer]

The new digital books are a step in the right direction, at least. And so are the supplements, they just need to work on their execution.Agreed, while I'm unethused about these vanilla-ish supplements, I'm excited that they might lead the way to more adventurous stuff.

[DarkLink]

It's also worth keeping in mind that it takes a fairly long time to actually print a book, so the Tau and CSM supplements were probably already written and they were just waiting on the printers and the release date when the Iyanden supplement came out, so they didn't really have time to change anything with the rules. Hopefully by now they'll have heard enough calls for more content that they'll beef up the next supplement.

[CenturyChild533]

To me, the biggest lost between the supplement and the main codex was the signature systems. If I could field those in a Farsight army I'd be a happy camper, but I can't. From a mechanical standpoint this is a big loss because it takes away several very cool strategies I've seen used with the main rulebook.

On the subject of the fluff of the Enclave, the Eight and the signature systems confuse me greatly. We're not allowed to use the signature systems from the main codex, yet Farsight's Samurai Squad has them in their ranks? Am I the only one who finds it a tad hard to believe that Farsight's Earth Caste scientists aren't capable of reverse engineering or creating more of those things for the rest of his army to use? At best it makes him look incompetent, at worst criminally irresponsible.

Going back to the mechanics, I've been trying to figure this out myself for a while now. Having to pay the Bonding Knife tax on units that have it is a major detriment to the efficiency of Fire Warriors and Pathfinders, two of my favorite units pre-supplement. Has anyone found a good army comp for the Enclave yet without resorting to 4 Riptides? I've been trying for a while now but I keep coming up empty. The balance in the Troops section between Fire Warriors and Crisis Suits is where I'm struggling the most, personally.

[Popsical]

Sigh....
Gw cant win, ever.
Codex too powerful, supplement not powerful enough.
If you prefer the dex, use the dex. If you prefer supplement, use the supplement.
Its not rocket science.
To be honest the greater tau nation should be more powerful, they have afterall more resources.
On the allies front, i simply disagree with the whole matrix and it should be rewritten.
End of.

[CenturyChild533]

Actually, I'm going to attribute my problems to lack of experience as a player rather than the supplement or the rules. I'm sure the supplement is perfectly viable, as is the main book. I'm simply used to utilizing the main codex rather than the supplement, and switching over, I'm having trouble finding the right strategy to fit the right book. My problem, not the company's.

My qualms about the signature systems, now that I reread them, do sound rather whiny. Apologies.

[chicop76]

I can see a few reasons to run with the supplement. I am hopefully waiting for them to make the book, but looked at the rules on the net and friends version of the material.

It is actually better than the regular codex in several ways. Although combining farsight and the regular Tau would be far better.

My only really negative comment towards the book is I rather spend 350 points on leadership 10 firewarriors who can dish out 90 strength 5 shots with triple rapid fire than drop roughly 7 suits who can dish out 56 strength 5 shots on a regular basis which is almost half the range of fire warriors.

The allied option opens things that I would normally overlook like a fireblade. I usually don't run one since I rather a commander and an ethereal, but with the extra hq slot I can run a fireblade with my guys as well.

Here is the reasos I would go out and buy the book.

1. I can have a farsight theme list and don't take away from my current build as well.
2. I can either use either gear from farsight or tau book. Which means I can now have two sets of limited gear from the tau list or use a tau and farsight gear with each other. Plus I can run with the Ics which do not count toward the limited gear. For example with farsight alliance you can legally have 3 puretide chips in your army.
3. An IC riptide is stupid good. The fact you can attach this to any unit followed with an ic commander with irrudium armour makes it worst. For example the ic riptide can attach to broadsides and due to having 2 drones it can give the whole unit majority toughness of 6.
4. A reliable nova charging riptide means more of a chance to get plus 3 invulnerable saves and strength 9 pie plates that are ordnance, 4 shot plasma is nice, but rarely do I use this option.
5. You can have more commander s in your army. Which means you can have 3 twin linked riptides with a drone or two.

That's all that comes to mind. Although I guess you could do more wirh it. I don't think taking all suits is that great of an ideal. One suit can almost or easiky cost the same as 3 marine bikes. If you as me if I rather bikes or suits as troops I would go with bikes.

[chicop76]

To me, the biggest lost between the supplement and the main codex was the signature systems. If I could field those in a Farsight army I'd be a happy camper, but I can't. From a mechanical standpoint this is a big loss because it takes away several very cool strategies I've seen used with the main rulebook.

On the subject of the fluff of the Enclave, the Eight and the signature systems confuse me greatly. We're not allowed to use the signature systems from the main codex, yet Farsight's Samurai Squad has them in their ranks? Am I the only one who finds it a tad hard to believe that Farsight's Earth Caste scientists aren't capable of reverse engineering or creating more of those things for the rest of his army to use? At best it makes him look incompetent, at worst criminally irresponsible.

Going back to the mechanics, I've been trying to figure this out myself for a while now. Having to pay the Bonding Knife tax on units that have it is a major detriment to the efficiency of Fire Warriors and Pathfinders, two of my favorite units pre-supplement. Has anyone found a good army comp for the Enclave yet without resorting to 4 Riptides? I've been trying for a while now but I keep coming up empty. The balance in the Troops section between Fire Warriors and Crisis Suits is where I'm struggling the most, personally.

You can. The supplement gives you the choice of using the Tau systems or the oshova systems, you just can't use both systems in the O'Shova list unless you take Ics with the Tau systems.

I don't think running 5 riptides is the way to go. Remember one Riptide is an Ic that does not take a slot.

To be honest I just looked at it enough to see if I will buy it or not. It to me is worth buying even though I may use it for the Ic riptide.

[CenturyChild533]

The independent character Riptide has led to some interesting shenanigans in the games where I've used him, I'll admit, but sadly you have to bundle him along with Farsight himself. Not too big a deal, but it prevents you from taking regular bodyguards alongside Farsight. So you have a choice between the bodyguard XV8s or O'vesa and the rest of the Eight.

Sadly, it does look like an allied force is the best way to take advantage of the supplement. Which is weird considering the fluff, but I'm gonna try not to get into that again. So you think an allied detachment of Farsight including the IC Riptide alongside a standard codex Tau list is the right way to go?

[chicop76]

The independent character Riptide has led to some interesting shenanigans in the games where I've used him, I'll admit, but sadly you have to bundle him along with Farsight himself. Not too big a deal, but it prevents you from taking regular bodyguards alongside Farsight. So you have a choice between the bodyguard XV8s or O'vesa and the rest of the Eight.

Sadly, it does look like an allied force is the best way to take advantage of the supplement. Which is weird considering the fluff, but I'm gonna try not to get into that again. So you think an allied detachment of Farsight including the IC Riptide alongside a standard codex Tau list is the right way to go?



I have to relook, but laat I checked he can go off on his own. Personaly I am not pro farsight bomb. I keep my tides in the back providing cover saves to my units. Even joining a scoring unit woulx be really helpful.