Kasrkin Rhodes' Imperial Guard. Check our forums for more information.

"You ask why I still support O'Shovah? You would never understand... I do not admire him for the choices he made, for turning his back on the Empire, I acknowledge his dedication, his commitment to uphold what he feels is right. I believe he follows the Tau'va, and there is more to that than obeying the instructions of those who know nothing of war..."

- Shas'La Vior'La Xesyn

"One day, the gamers of 40K shall learn that AP is not the most important thing on a stat-line. ... and on that day, I shall be the owner of Games Workshop."

- Wargamer, "Stealths", Tau board

To make our newsletter as best as possible, it would be helpful if you could answer our new monthly poll.

You can find the poll here. We're looking at intergrating the poll into the newsletter, however in the mean-time we'll use MisterPoll for our monthly poll.

Recent News

A "Search Site" function has now been added. This allows you to search the website or forums for what you're looking for. You can now view the past newsletters that have been released, these contain many quotes and pieces of fluff not seen elsewhere.

Two new global moderators have been appointed - Wargamer and MalVeauX. A new board has also been added to the message boards - 40K Universe; a place to discuss the fluff side of 40K.

As you may see from the forum statistics bar below on the left, the forums received over 1,000,000 page views this month. This works out at 1,350 page views per hour, and 22 per minute! Please remember that this is only from the forums, the website's page views are not taken into account here. This is a great growth for us, thanks to all our members!

Top Five Tau Topics this Month

• Codex Clarifications | Tau Empires FAQ Thread by [maCe]
• Bonding (Codex v2.0) :: Victory Points & You by MalVeauX
• Special Issue, or Under Appreciated by MalVeauX
• Why take the Cyclic Ion Blaster? by Thamor
• The Three Teachings and the One Path by Calmsword

Top Five non-Tau Topics this Month

• Reorganizing the Imperial Guard Tactica by AfterCrecent
• Ordo Xenos: Codex Prediction by Wargamer
• Know Thy Army List by Master Engineer Seto
• It ate my Cheesy-Poofs! by Alcibiates
• Wraithsight: "Warhammer 40K and Football? Pass me a beer and a hotdog by Yriel of Iyanden

Review of the New Tau Codex Units

Well the New Tau Codex has just been released in the UK, and already has been out in some other countries. New units, new weapons, a new way of war possibly for Tau!

Managing to have gotten the rules a little earlier, I have formed my opinions of all the new units and changes - here I will run down briefly what each new unit has in stores and its possible uses....

The highly anticipated Vespid allies for me aren't quite worth the hype or the fuss. They are expensive and not very well armoured, crucially they are denied there save by the weapons of their prey - power armoured marines. There guns are in fact very effective at downing marines, however to get close enough (which they can do fast) will mean a certain retaliation, either by shooting, or assault - either would be equally dangerous.

To be most effective if you want to use Vespid - use markerlights to improve accuracy or lower leadership to pin the troops you are firing at. With large squads concentrating on one unit the Vespid can be very good at striking well armoured troops down. Just make sure which ever unit you target, you wipe out completely because the Vespid cannot handle as much fire as they can pump out.

The other new Fast Attack slot is the speedy Piranha, which can be made a little more potent with seeker missiles and a fusion blaster. The fusion blaster upgrade is cheap and to be honest the skimmer will not have a great use without it - harassing, scaring, and anti-vehicle duties. With a potential 24" move the piranha has the capabilites to get behind vehicles before unloading seeker missiles right into the rear armour. Alternatively their fusion blaster can be used to create havoc too, oh and we all know how frustrating for the opponent the two gun drones can be when de-attatched.

The piranha does come at a cost, especially when kitted out with a few useful upgrades such as a targetting array, however a good tactician will almost always find a great use for the Piranha as a unit they can play around with and frustrate the enemy with. If you have the points its worth a try.

The skyray is fairly cheap in points for the weapons it carries. Not just a whole array of seeker missiles, but the two networked markerlights could also be used for other weapons. Another bonus is that they count as defensive weapons, and the missiles can of course be fired no matter how far the skyray has moved. If you want to use this tank as the ultimate hidden fire dispenser, equip with a Smart Missile System and find yourself some cover! Unleashing 6, strength 8 shots, potentially all in the first turn can give a crippling blow to the enemy before he can even target what has hit him.

If you are taking a Skyray you need not extra markerlight bearers which is a positive, and also you have the potential here to take out most tanks and highly armoured characters/troops. The key to making the Skyray work is to make a plan as to what you will use the missile for a stick to it - seeing as you don't need line of sight, don't give your opponents it and protect yourself by staying hidden. (Of course, even if stunned, remember you can still fire those missiles!).

Sniper drone units are inexpensive, frustratingly effective and annoyingly hard to hit. With their stealth fields they can afford to sit out in the open with nice clean firing lines and the fact they have to remain static shouldn't be a problem. Best taken in teams of two (or three if you can really afford it) so that the effects of the markerlights can possibly be increased. In my opinion these are better at taking out marines than plasma, cheaper and safer. Seeing as all of the drones have BS3 now, the markerlights can be used to enhance the pinning ability of the snipers. Seeing as most things won't be able to fire at this unit to start off with, to keep units pinned in their place and unable to get any closed is possibly even more valuable then ensuring a couple of extra hits.

Sniper drones aren't resilient but they really aren't meant to be fired at in the first place. Choose good place to deploy so that they can work together to create 'firing alleys' or 'chokepoints' where enemies can be pinned or picked off - then just sit back and enjoy the power of those guided Strength 6, AP3 shots! You have to love Tau technology eh!?

Good luck with the new toys everyone,
For the greater good!

-- 42

Fluff: Toasty by MalVeauX

The trio of Shas’ui jetted towards the top of the charred hill, as pathfinder team Cha’Elan relayed information that a herd of Gaunts were being lead by only two Warrior class creatures of the Tyranid across a bleak plain between their patrol lines. The team leader was issued command to engage the head of the pack, by annihilating their leadership in an effect to scatter the herd. The mighty crisis suits touched down and took a steady lock on the two walking beasts, and vapors filled the air as the missiles fired, curing through the ash filled air, causing the massive creatures to implode.

The herd instantly broke, scattering in all directions, mostly towards rocks and areas of dark cover. As they scampered about, looking for hiding places, a large mob of them were breaking towards the Crisis’ location. Relaying the information, they were informed that their present speed and course would have them in an intersection path. The team leader instructed his team to remain as they were on special orders to test a new configuration of their suits and that the number of Gaunts approaching were minimal enough to have reasonable safety in the test.

As the Gaunts raced down the hillside to the charred ridge where the Crisis suits stood, they become fixated on the machines and instantly charged forward. As they leapt over each other towards the Crisis, they each engaged the torches under their missile pod holsters, spraying the entire area with jets of flame. As the flaming waves passed over the same area more than once, each Gaunt melted after multiple passes of the fire simply vaporized them in mid-leap.

“Test affirmative.”

Please Vote for Tau Online

This takes less than a minute. Tau Online is part of two top-sites that helps Tau Online get more visitors, resulting in more members.

All you have to do is click on the "Vote for us" link towards the top of all website pages.  That link takes you to this page. There will be two links called "Warvault" and "The Warp's Wabbithole" - please click these links and then follow the instructions to vote for us. (Clicking enter for the second link counts your vote).

Tau Online has given countless hours of his time, to make the Tau Online website for all of us to enjoy.  Please show your appreciation by giving seconds of your time to vote every time you log on or off to Tau Online. Thank you.