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Warband construction questions

Started by mcjomar, February 29, 2016, 09:41:33 AM

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mcjomar

My currently actually built and painted warband is still missing two figures (yet to be painted and sheeted up, but the models are ready).

However, a third is soon to be in the offing - a Tau "Alien Commander 2.0" from Papah models.
A 54mm Tau? And when you bear in mind I really enjoyed the Fire Warrior PC game when I played through it (more than a few times).
How could I not?

However...
This does leave me in a bit of a spot - what possible way could a fully armoured and armed Tau Fire Warrior appar in games?
I know at least one of our number has managed this before (I've been reading backwards through the history of the "In the Field" section of the boards).

I would like to add the character to the warband alongside two other models (if I ever complete and sheet them to my satisfaction), as the warband is basically themed around a lot of computer games I enjoyed growing up, but with an eye towards actually making them as believable characters in the 40k universe, that merely borrow the theme of those games/characters, sometimes combining several such character themes into a single character and then going at the backstory with pruning shears rather than scissors, rather than coming from wholesale cloth.

But a Tau Fire Warrior makes for a difficult one - moreso than the others.

I could say that perhaps he got left behind, and the Inquisitor managed to convince him that staying alive and with her would better serve the "greater good" than dying alone for no reason.
I could say that perhaps the Fire Warrior has been too far and too long from the Ethereals, and whatever conditioning they have/had over him has begun to break down, causing him to turn mercenary, with an eye towards hunting orks, a-la O'Shovah's lot.
Perhaps he's the last surviving bodyguard of a water caste envoy, and has been forced to swear into the Inquisitor's service in payment for delivery back to a Tau world (at whatever point suits the Inquisitor).

Perhaps he's excused as being a mutant wherever he goes, so that unsuspecting humans who know nothing of the Tau won't start a fight (they probably will anyway, let's be honest). Or a servitor/admech construction, when wearing the helmet.

These are just top of the head ideas that probably have gaping plotholes, as I don't have my Tau codices to hand, and it's been a while since I read any Tau centric books.

Gear wise, the only issue is the gun, as the armour is basically just carapace quality, and the helmet the same with autosenses (night vision, thermal, and a range finder, IIRC). The guns are rated as stronger than a bolter, but decidedly weaker than a plasma weapon - on par with a heavy bolter, ish, possibly slightly weaker.

Thoughts/help?
(I'll be painting in classic T'au colours).
"Heretics are like cockroaches - annoying to find, and even more annoying to kill." - unattrib.

MarcoSkoll

Quote from: mcjomar on February 29, 2016, 09:41:33 AMThis does leave me in a bit of a spot - what possible way could a fully armoured and armed Tau Fire Warrior appar in games?
The tau are known to try to foster relations with the Imperium (or try to get close and observe their weaknesses, depending on which interpretation you go with). This would generally be the preserve of the Water caste, but it's not impossible that a Fire caste might be deemed more suitable for certain missions (because they're higher risk or need a more military eye).

A lot of your suggestions would work.

And as you say, it's entirely possible possibility is that there was a Water caste and the Fire caste was his bodyguard, but said ambassador was slain at some point on the mission. It might not be that he's sworn into the Inquisitor's service though. If you're setting yourself in the Carthax sector, it's pretty distant from the Tau Empire (given the tau's short ranged warp capabilities, any tau that are there have almost certainly hitched a ride with the Imperium), so the chain of command is fairly thin. It may be he's still to receive new orders, or he's been told that, in the absence of an immediately available replacement for the ambassador, he needs to proceed with the mission on his own for now.

And, yes, he could also have become dangerously independent in the absence of Ethereal guidance. I suspect there probably are few, if any, Ethereals as far abroad as the Carthax sector, and they're probably pretty low ranking.

QuoteThe guns are rated as stronger than a bolter, but decidedly weaker than a plasma weapon - on par with a heavy bolter, ish, possibly slightly weaker.
Kaled wrote some rules in Firebase magazine (this particular issue is available on the Skoll archive here), but I could also dig out a draft version from my RIA. (The release version doesn't cover alien weapons yet, but my WIP copy has some of the Eldar and Tau weapons in it).

(The current RIA version makes them a bit more powerful per shot, but instead reigns them by limiting their sustained rate of fire with heat build-up).
S.Sgt Silva Birgen: "Good evening, we're here from the Adeptus Defenestratus."
Captain L. Rollin: "Nonsense. Never heard of it."
Birgen: "Pick a window. I'll demonstrate".

GW's =I= articles

greenstuff_gav

i tend to run a pair of tau (a firecaste and an air caste) with Inquisitor Jericho; the story being as she's a radical Xenos she has a selection of Xenos working for her; she had performed services in negotiating a cease-fire wit ha Tau sept so the IMperium and Tau could hold off a Tyranid incursion and she was critical in safeguarding the Ethereal so he allocated an exceptionally loyal  Fire Warrior and an Air caste to her service; plus it allows hte Tau to investigate the Imperium and their operations, travelling with the Inquisitor.
However, seperation from the Tau has begun to raise questions in the Fire Warriors mind...
i make no apologies, i warned you my ability to roll ones was infectious...

Build Your Imagination

mcjomar

Yeah I actually noticed that when I started digging backwards through the "In the Field" board.


We seem to share a similar taste in some models.
We both have an Orechiel based Inquisitor (Both named Helena?).
We both have a Kal Jericho model
And now we both have a Fire Warrior model.

My warband for that inquisitor is also padded out with a number of ex-guard and/or navy infantry types (allowing for split warbands across a scenario or two).
Not sure how much you've padded out Inquisitor Jericho's one though.
For the record I think we've simply discovered a coincidentally similar path of development, in regards our two respective groups of models in this specific instance, as mine was put together for PO's tournament in... 09? And your went together independent of that for some IGTs if I read the history of those characters correctly.

Hilarious though, if I do say so myself.

Looking at my inquisitor, she's largely of a Thorian bent, in terms of her behaviour.
It's reasonably likely, based on what I can recall of the character I wrote, that she'd pick him up as part of a diplomatic connection - he may have been the last of his particular band from the Tali'serra (sp?). It seems likely that a water caste plus bodyguard was attached to her at some point during efforts to calm the border on the eastern fringe, but her investigations have taken her further afield, and the Fire Warrior's last communication was, as you suggested, to stay with her as part of a "diplomatic" function, which is to say, watch and learn and (if possible) report back for the greater good on what these strange gue'la (gue'el in this case? An Inquisitor is still lower in rank than an Inquisitor Lord, Lord of Terra, or the Emperor) are up to.
"Heretics are like cockroaches - annoying to find, and even more annoying to kill." - unattrib.

greenstuff_gav

i must admit i tend to break the "stay away from canon" rule; i run her as Helena Jericho or Jena Orcheil or whatever name i come up with on the day :)
and Kals' her son hence his inclusion :)
i make no apologies, i warned you my ability to roll ones was infectious...

Build Your Imagination

mcjomar

I've actually dug up the character sheets for my warband, led by Inquisitor Helena Corwin.
It was the one used in York Garrison.
Full sheets with (previously) Conclave approved backstory.
Needs two more for my sniper and soldier.
I'm tempted to post up the lot, along with model pictures (one I've painted over the dinged spot in Helena's hair).

Also has two short sheets for my interrogator and Inquisitor. Those need more work (and paint on the minis).

Finally, I dug up a report on the York day - I seemed to run into a lot of AdMech bands. And the ladies in my warband had a predilection for headshots and groin shots. My Rogue Trader always went after the valkyrie if it was on the board. No pictures, sadly.
"Heretics are like cockroaches - annoying to find, and even more annoying to kill." - unattrib.

mcjomar

Okay, so this model has arrived.
I've elected to plonk it onto a proper 40mm base for use in Inquisitor

However - weapons.

Pulse rifle, or pulse carbine?

On the one hand, for my tastes, the rifle is the better of the two - more range.
On the other, i) this is Inquisitor, and ii) the carbine is on the cover of the Fire Warrior game box, and as this model will be added to a warband largely based on computer game/film characters (or amalgamations thereof) and be based on the Eastern Fringe, that makes quite a good case for the carbine.

The rules in the PDF linked earlier put the carbine as range F and the rifle as range H - but those are "spec ops" guns, rather than the standard issue guns clearly used here on this model, so no grenade launcher for the carbine, and I'm not sure the range brackets would work - though I think the damage profile is about spot on for the slightly higher ability of a pulse rifle at least.

It's a combination question of "which looks cooler?" and "which is more appropriate?".

Either way, I can't wait to get him built (and try not to foul up his painting).
"Heretics are like cockroaches - annoying to find, and even more annoying to kill." - unattrib.

MarcoSkoll

Personally, I'd suggest the pulse carbine.

Inquisitor games are often seemingly low-key operations on the surface. Although the games we play tend to escalate, most times an Inquisitor investigates some bloody runes in the underhive or has to escort a VIP, it's fairly quiet. As such, the right balance for a character's gear (if a character isn't going to have several models) is usually somewhere around what they would take on a low to medium risk mission.

The question is somewhere between whether the character would actually want to be carrying around a weighty boltgun (and its ammo isn't feather-light either) if they were expecting to spend several hours searching slums for their missing contact, and how they prepare for the possibility of something going wrong.

Unless your Tau is really likely to feel that a full-size pulse rifle is an essential part of his kit, I'd say the pulse carbine is more likely.
S.Sgt Silva Birgen: "Good evening, we're here from the Adeptus Defenestratus."
Captain L. Rollin: "Nonsense. Never heard of it."
Birgen: "Pick a window. I'll demonstrate".

GW's =I= articles

mcjomar

Yeah, that's pretty much what I was thinking as well.

So that answers the modelling question as well (and makes it easier on me as I don't have to carve the carbine in half to stick on the barrel for the rifle) which just leaves a stats question of "what does a normal non-spec ops pulse carbine look like?"

I'd say Range F is reasonable, but Range B would work too - in the 40k game a carbine reaches out to IIRC 18 inches? That's about 36 yards if we double it up for the scale.
Not counting the underslung photon grenade launcher - what does a photon grenade look like anyway? In Tau parlance is it the equivalent of a frag grenade?
"Heretics are like cockroaches - annoying to find, and even more annoying to kill." - unattrib.

Raghnall

#9
I think a carbine is probably more convenient for general use, but it's perfectly fine to make a second model for the same character with a rifle, for high-risk operations or where he is expecting combat.

Quote from: mcjomar on March 20, 2016, 07:30:47 AM
I'd say Range F is reasonable
Range F is good for mid-range carbine style weapons, so I would be inclined to agree there.

Quote from: mcjomar on March 20, 2016, 07:30:47 AM
Not counting the underslung photon grenade launcher - what does a photon grenade look like anyway? In Tau parlance is it the equivalent of a frag grenade?
Well, presumably the photon grenade is the equivalent of a photon flash grenade. The 40k wiki describes hand-held ones as "disk-like".

mcjomar

Ahh okay - so I guess the Tau don't use frags.
Just photon flash and EMP.
As that warband is largely going to be playing around the Eastern Fringe I think, I don't know if that'll make it appropriate for the Tau to be able to re-arm in terms of grenades/ammo - moreso than if he's in the Carthax sector though, right?

I'm not sure if 3d6 is appropriate damage - this is a weapon that is meant to be worse than a bolter at least, even if it isn't necessarily (in inquisitor) as bad as a heavy bolter.
I'd suggest 4d6+4 (the +4 to replicate matching the bolter's AP value in 40k I presume? In which case a +3 or +4 would be appropriate for beating at least flak armour)
"Heretics are like cockroaches - annoying to find, and even more annoying to kill." - unattrib.

MarcoSkoll

Quote from: mcjomar on March 20, 2016, 08:15:33 PMthe +4 to replicate matching the bolter's AP value in 40k I presume?
Speaking as a self-proclaimed expert on Inquisitor weapon profiles: No. The weapon profiles in WH40K are very simplistic and have no more than a passing relationship to Inquisitor weapon profiles.

To pull the Pulse Carbine out of my RIA notes:

Pulse Carbine: Basic; Range F; Sg/Sm(2); 3D10 Fused Damage; Shots 6; Rld [3]; Enc 30

Some of those numbers are open for revision, but that's where it is now. It's quite powerful, and ignores several of the drawbacks of bolters (like their recoil), but is instead limited by a thermal cut-out.
(While there are canonical ammo capacities for Pulse Weapons, I'm partially ignoring that to go for something similar to the guns in the first Mass Effect - an ammo supply high enough to be functionally inexhaustible, but the accelerator array overheats quite fast. They needed something to stop them being completely devastating in game).
S.Sgt Silva Birgen: "Good evening, we're here from the Adeptus Defenestratus."
Captain L. Rollin: "Nonsense. Never heard of it."
Birgen: "Pick a window. I'll demonstrate".

GW's =I= articles

mcjomar

Sorry, on the reload - is that 3 actions to reload, 3 shots per action, or (based on the way you worded the ammo count) a 3 turn recharge?
Fire warrior PC game had 32 in mag (it says clip but I think that's just bad translation again) for both rifle and carbine.
Depending on reload rules, I'd suggest upping the shot count, as this is the Tau version of the bolter/lasgun, albeit a shortened version - in which case I'm wondering if range F isn't nearly shortening enough - perhaps B would be better?
"Heretics are like cockroaches - annoying to find, and even more annoying to kill." - unattrib.

greenstuff_gav

for every 6 shots you need 3 actions worth of time before can be fired again
i make no apologies, i warned you my ability to roll ones was infectious...

Build Your Imagination

mcjomar

#14
Ahh okay, that's new notation for me, cheers  :)

E: so how does the underslung photon launcher work?

E2: oh here we go from the LRB
auxiliary launcher X E single -15 * 2 X +10
So as photon flash grenades.
"Heretics are like cockroaches - annoying to find, and even more annoying to kill." - unattrib.