[Sephiroth_knight]

hey i know drones are good and for taking fire so now i hate the nix unit rule and i think that the drones is close combat would go first and die but thats it.

when there is a group of 12 firewarriors and two drones chances are a firewarrior will die

any thoughts?

[DireStrike]

Actually Fire Warriors and Drones have exactly the same toughness and armor save - their presence in the same unit will never affect which model should die. It's all the OTHER mixes where it gets problematic.

Shield drones are getting better with the new codex, but gun drones will still be problematic.

[shasomazza]

Yeah shield drones will be getting stronger in the new codex ;D

Gun Drones will stay the same

[MechTau]

Umm... I hope they fix gun drones AND Shield Drones.

If they treat both the same way this time around, the current codex will overrule the rulebook way... something that has been long coming.

[shasomazza]

No gun drone armour will stay exactly the same as firewarrior armour :

[Sephiroth_knight]

i think that the drones armour save should be lowerd to about 3 + because there metal and such

[Impulse]

If there are more FW than drones, can the drones still take the hits as per rules?

[Sephiroth_knight]

yes because you can chose the hits

[Den Käse]

The Codex says that the Drone trys to save the controler. So, would it only try to save the one with the Drone Controller? But then again... It says that in close combat, all units within 2" of the Drone must attack it...

[Calaban]

Well, in CC gun drones in a FW squad still work as intended, if I'm correct... The Drone special rules in the Tau Codex say a lot, and only Majority Armor and toughness rules in 4th edition changed any of those rules. the rest of the rules for drones in combined units remains the same.

namely, the part where it says something like "any CC attacks that can be directed at gun drones must be directed at them". What this means is that when there are 2 gun drones and 12 firewarriors locked, but only 2 gun drones and 4 firewarriors engaged in close combat (underlining implies strict 4th edition rule terminology), then attacks and assigned wounds that are assigned by the Tau player HAVE to go to the drones first. This instance isnt as juicy as the next one so lets move onto that:

An independant character in CC fights a mini side battle solo, and gets to choose his target from the ones hes physically engaged with (2"). But if there are Gun Drones in that group of engaged models, the side duel has to be fought against the drones. This isnt a sure fire defense, since the number of wounds could very well overwhelm the drone defence... but the Drones do serve their purpose as intended under the initial Tau rules.

this 3rd interpretation is iffy, but one I'd like to spell out for arguing sake. It involves multiple unit combats, where one of the units is an independant gun drone squad. Maybe, just maybe.. the above rule interpretation could mean that when an enemy unit has a choice of which unit to aim its attacks at (because hes engaged with both), they HAVE to aim them at the gun drones!!! This one is super iffy, but MAN, if official, that would make gun drone squads soooo much more desireable when facing assaulty armies!