New Unit Compositions and Uses

More and more of the new rules and units that the Tau are getting are leaking out, and finnally we're starting to get decent confirmation on them. This thread is not to disscuss the new rules themselves, but rather to speculate on the effect they're going to have on the tactics and unit selections we make in our lists.


Kroot

One of most important rule revamps (in my opinion) that is confirmed for Tau is that Krootox and Kroot Hounds no longer occupy different parts of the force org. chart other than the basic troop choice of the Kroot squad they are attached to. I can't help but wonder at what people are going to do with this new freedom in using Kroot.

The implications are fairly obvious, no longer are Krootox, with their big bad rapidfire gun a total waste because they take a Hvy slot and deny you another Hammerhead or Broadside. Taking hounds to make your Kroot more robust in CC is now more of an option because you wont be losing slots for Drones or Pathfinders now.

In my mind I can see Tau armies with huge Kroot contingents, perhapse something as wild as two squads of 20 with 3 krootox apiece attached to them. These could be powerhouse static firebases in woods that would now have the firepower to take down heavy troops and lighter armor and could add huge numbers of wounds to your army for minimal points.

I can also see CC squads of Kroot, 20 strong with a Sharper and max hounds. A unit with huge casualty absorbtion and a truely staggering number of CC attacks on the charge or even without the charge.

You can even imagen smaller Kroot squads with the same basic setup on a smaller scale, each tailored to do what you wanted it to do and only taking up ONE basic troop slot. I think I'm starting to drool.


Pathfinders/Markerlights

The new rules are also supposed to make significant changes to the way markerlights work. Now for every markerlight hit you can increase the BS of another shooting Tau unit or decrease the enemy units Leadership or split the hits up to do a little of both. The implications of this are truely far reaching.

Pathfinders are going to almost become a standard troop selection for any list, rather than the odity that they are now. And since markerlights are gonna be on the field it follows that we're almost certainly gonna see a lot more seeker missles in the lists.

I can see Pathfinders teamed up with two full drone squads pinning vital units for multiple turns untill the unit is anhialated. Think what that will do to marine assault squads or groups of Necron Destroyers.

I can also see FW's mounted in DF with 6 Pulse rife/6 Carbine mix, the sole intent of this unit to stop and pin any aproaching CC unit with the help of the pathfinders. Or perhapse two squads of FW's working in tandem each with a leader with HW Target lock and Markerlight, with the leaders markerlighting each others squads targets so suddenly you've got two squads of BS 4 FW's.......

I can see full squads of Helios or Fireknife or Deathrain crisis suits becoming more common due to having their BS boosted to 5, allowing them to totally anhinalate whole squads of enemy troops, no matter what their armor save. The same with Stealths, 18 St5 Ap5 shots at BS 5? Truly, the crys of CHEESE will be heard for miles around.


Vespids

Winged units capable of 12" movement and carrying St5 ap3 weponry? It makes my head spin to imagen what a full squad of these guys will do to an assault squad or a tac squad or those damn Necron warriors.

The list goes on and on, snipers with rail rifles, Commanders with rending wepons...no list is gonna survive this update intact. Well, I've said enough, I wanna hear what you think. Given what we now know, what new combinations do you think are gonna apear in Tau lists. Is what I've mentioned totally bunk? Lets hear your pie in the sky ideas for these new rules. Throw in your two cents, these changes are only a couple of months away, its time to stop talking about what were gonna get and time to start talking about what we're gonna do with it.