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Personally... I flat out HATE Ethereals. stare They bring more trouble than good. sweatdrop When I used to have Ethereals, they were almost always the first ones to get into combat. They would be the center of attention, because they knew that if my Ethereal died, then the entire squad was more than likely to run. If they run in close combat, they get cut down. neutral I have lost 2 times to that and I don't plan on it again. So, i'm selling them along with my kroot. 3nodding

Tau get two things out of serving the Greater Good. Personal prestige of having done thier job admirably, and advancement in rank, which probably comes with an attentant increase in priviledges and such. They also get the pleasure of fulfilling the purpose they were bred for.

Keep in mind, Tau follow the Greater Good because the philosophy pulled them back from the brink of extinction. If not for the Greater Good, the four elemental castes would have annhilated each other in constant internecine warfare. If not for the Ethereals, the Tau never would have gotten past black-powder, much less spaceflight. You average Tau is not only in awe of the Ethereals, being semi-mystical beings that saved the entire race, they see the only alternative to the Greater Good as the Mon'Tau, the Terror that preceded the coming of the Ethereals. Not a pleasant alternative to a happy quasi-communist system that works.



Well, that's the difference between tabletop Ethereals and fluff Ethereals. Tabletop Ethereals suck HARD these days. Used to be that thier Morale abilities, both good and bad, had a full table of reach. So it might be dangerous to have your Ethereal die, but you could also keep him pretty safe by sticking him in the rear lines or behind some terrain. Now thier beneficial ability has been limited to LOS, but thier negative ability STILL has a full table of reach, so you are REQUIRED to put him in danger to get any use out of him. There's no reason to take an Ethereal now unless you really like the idea of BS4 Fire Warriors.

In truth, I have no idea why the hell an Ethereal would be on the field other than as an assassination target or objective. It's like throwing a Senator or Parliment member out into a battle. As for your Kroot, why toss them? I don't use them myself, but they do have thier uses, particularly in pushing back enemy Infiltrators.

Fluff Ethereals are wise political and ideological leaders. They're presence on the battlefield makes as much sense as the Pope being in Iraq, engaging terrorists in hand to hand combat with his crozier.

I think you're expecting a bit too much from your Kroot. They're only 7 points apiece. They aren't going to rock the pants of Grey Knights. They're there to hold the Grey Knights back from assaulting your gunline for a few turns. And remember, while charging the enemy might be tempting, don't unless you're sure you can at least hit him simultaneously. 30 attacks might seem like alot, but remember that every attack that wounds is a kill on your squad, so they're not likely to survive more than one round of combat. They're meant to hold up an assault and then die, so that you can shoot whoever assaulted them last turn.

Oh, by the way, that thing you did, with spreading the wounds out over the whole Command Squad? Technically illegal. In units of multi-wound creatures, you must remove whole models where possible. So if the Chaos player did three wounds, he would have killed a Crisis suit and wounded another. Also, remember that the bodyguards count as a seperate unit from the commander in close combat. Wounds don't carry and both a bodyguard and the commander need to be in BtB to get thier licks in.

Tankshocking into combat? There was an arguement on this a while ago at Warseer. Results were inconclusive, but the general consensus is no. It's too much like shooting, and how to handle the failed morale checks in combat is silly.

Removing from the back of the squad is not only easier, but if two guys die, 2 others move up to assume the rank.
You can't really attack individuals when they are squads like troops. You attack whole units.
Hmm.. it must be a pain to figure Orcs. They are all multi-wound.

Which can be translated into: Meatshields up front and the important people in the back.

what if He didnt have a sergeant....
hes a cheater too, we were playing this objective game, we had to travel a maze, and reach isolated troopers, gather them, while engaging in groupos of necrons, and then at the end fight over a building and keep it for 2 turns. I placed Necron spawn points really well on his side, cause he had to start over like 4 times cause he didnt want to lose, even though he did.
In the end, I had like 2 guys left, a couple of guys with power weapons got to my firewarriors and recked some havok, but i pinned them and killed them after wards

Orcs have 1 wound. Thousand son troopers have 2

If those two Marines at the back of the squad were in range of your gun and in LOS of the firer, then they were legitimate casualties. You don't get to choose your oppnent's casualties. Otherwise there would be no point in taking heavy weapons and powerfists, because you would just choose to kill that model first. What you CAN do however, is make judicious use of the "torrent of fire" rule. If you do as many wounds to a unit as it has models (with one unit's worth of firing), you can select one model to make his save seperately. If you're firing multiple weapon types, then your oppenent can chose which hit he saves against. (Second column, p26, BGB)