So I have put some work on a Tau revamp ('Tis apparently is the season for those) and thought I would throw out some of my wargear and special rules ideas for review and see if there are any flaws or combinations that might be worth changing. The fluff texts are quite lame I know but they do add some colour to each item.
We start with two special rules which will apply widely through out the list:
Tactical Withdrawal
Tau combat doctrine stress the importance of not letting the enemy catch the Fire Warriors in bloody hand to hand, in some situations it is more important to withdraw than stand and take the fight.
When an enemy unit launches an assault against an unengaged Tau unit that is not falling back, before any moves are made, the Tau unit can choose to pass a leadership test, if successful it immediately falls back in a straight line away from the assaulting unit. If the enemy unit cannot reach the unit upon its new position it may still move D6” towards the retreating Tau unit. If the enemy unit still manages to reach the Tau unit the normal rules for assaulting a unit that falls back applies with the exception that the Tau unit may not make use of Photon grenades.
Advanced Weaponry
Tau tank technology is highly advanced and their weapon systems even more so.
Tau vehicles count Strength 5 weapons as defensive weapons.
Some other special rules:
Concentrated Fusillade
The pulse rifle is the Fire Warriors prime weaponry, through their exceptionally skill with it they are capable to combine the pulses of several rifles into a stronger stream making them even more effective against armour.
Fire Warrior Teams and Honour Guard that remained stationary during the Movement phase and chooses to use rapid fire resolves their shots at Strength 6. (Note: I added a change to the pulse rifle so that it can be used as either heavy 2 or rapid fire.)
Selfless Servant
During combat drones first and foremost are meant to protect their owner, if need be by their own destruction.
When allocating wounds all drones may take two wounds each before any wounds are allocated to any other model in their unit.
And here is some wargear, mostly meant for Commanders:
Command Node
The Command Node allows the Commander to direct the Fire Warriors under his command much more precisely making sure that no energy is wasted due to hesitation of friendly fire.
Tau units within 12” of the Commander will ignore the cover saves their targets gains from intervening friendly non-vehicle Tau models.
Positional Relay
By directly feeding positional data to the rest of the Cadre the Commander can make sure that the right support arrives on time.
As long as the model with the positional relay is on the table you may choose to re-roll a single reserve roll, select which one when all reserve rolls have been made.
Tactical Target Selector
Helping the team leader to process ballistic data faster than normal the Tactical Target Selector allows for much more efficient target selection.
A model equipped with a tactical target selector can forgo shooting during the shooting phase to allow its unit to split its fire and fire at two different targets instead of one. Simply declare which models will fire at each target and then carry on using the normal rules. The unit still resolves all its shots simultaneously.
Advanced Multi-Lock
A complex combined version of a multi-tracker and a target lock, the advanced multi-lock makes full effect of the Commander's arsenal.
A model equipped with an advanced multi-lock may fire all its weapon systems during the Shooting phase and may target each at a different unit.
Drone Nexus
A larger version of the drone controller the drone nexus is capable of sustaining more than twice the amount of drones to a normal controller.
The drone nexus functions exactly like a drone controller but the wearer may be accompanied by up to four drones instead of the regular two. If a model within 12” of the drone nexus with a drone controller is removed, do not remove any surviving drones but immediately move them into unit coherency with the model equipped with the drone nexus, from this point on they are part of that model's accompanying drones, the Drone Nexus carrier can be joined by any amount of drones in this way.
Strategic Coordination Server
By feeding real-time data through out the Cadre the strategic coordination server makes sure that the different airborne elements can arrive in accurate, close formations.
If the army contains a model equipped with a strategic coordination server any units in reserve with the capacity to deep strike can be grouped together with other units capable of deep striking into one or several groups during deployment. Each group will roll a single reserve roll for the whole group. When such a group becomes available they must always deploy via deep strike. Any units deployed within 6” of the first deep striking unit in the same group do not need to roll for scatter.
Drone Warhead
The missile contains a small drone intellect that guides the missile to its destination, avoiding intervening debris.
Any successful cover saves taken against missile pods and seeker missiles must be re-rolled.
Lastly, some vehicle wargear:
AI Auto-Protocols
When the vehicle crew becomes inactive due to damaged sustained the AI auto-protocols take over and searches through the battle data banks for suitable targets.
If the vehicle has suffered any Crew Shaken or Crew Stunned damage results it may still fire its weapons in the Shooting phase, following the normal rules and limits of shooting. In addition the target unit must have at least one markerlight token, remove one token for each weapon the vehicle fires at a target.
Intelligence Relay
The Pathfinder teams prime goal is intelligence and data retrieval, the intelligence relay feeds any gathered data quickly and accurately to the rest of the Cadre, making most use of the pathfinders' position.
As long as the Pathfinder unit is within 6” of their Devilfish Troop Carrier (including being transported) all enemy units within 12” of the Devilfish receive a single Markerlight token at the start of the Shooting phase, alternatively the Relay can be used to increase the information gained from the Markerlights in which case no tokens are generated at the start of the Shooting phase but the Pathfinders’ Markerlights generate two tokens instead of one so long as the Pathfinder unit is within 6” of their Devilfish Troop Carrier. However, this extra computer and tracking devices means that the Devilfish can only transport 8 models, instead of the normal 12.
Any thoughts or comments are appreciated but I'm not overly concerned with points at the moment more with the actual function and application of the ideas.