Interesting opinions so far. I know that you are waiting for an opinion from me, but right now I have not had the time to play the list and any thoughts would be based on a first view.
I dont really have any strong objection to a lot of the decisions made by this variant, but they do seem to be stylistic changes that I just dont agree with through a preference.
I am constantly puzzled by the issue of the core Armoured Cadre and its ability to appear and then vanish.
I do think that this was added for a specific reason. In fact, it is something that I even brought up with Jervis and, to paraphrase him, his response was that even if the only reason for it would be to allow players to build the list that they want, and not get a mortgage to buy essential infantry, it was worth keeping as a core choice. Now, I do think that there are other reasons to keep it in, but it is difficult to balance.
I dont really agree that an 'all armoured' Tau force is not Tau...y (?). I admit that most of the background has focussed on the Fire Warriors and Crisis suuits, but almost without exception Tau background is written with 40K in mind. I think that there is a difference between 'the background describes mostly infantry Tau forces' and 'the Tau dont have armoured forces'. IA3 specifically gives highly armour-focussed ToE descriptions.
I think that my biggest complaint with Chromas variant list is that, on paper at least, it drops some of the flavour that I associate with the Tau. For example, Fire Warriors are similar to Guardsmen in many ways. When I look at the 40K forces, the things that I like about the tau and Fire Warriors in particular is that they dont have heavy weapons in their FW squads. This is different from most other races. I know that the variant FW stands dont have heavy weapons by name, but they do have a 30cm AP5+ weapons as well as a 'standard side arm', which (to me) feels the same.
I am also not entirely sure about the argument that the current 4.4.3 list is 'everything but the kitchen sink'. My view is that the Tau, by definition of the overall race characteristics, dont have certain options - barrage weapons, for example.
I do find myself agreeing with Honda. The reduced special rules is good. I will need to look at the ML issue closer.
As an aside, I would not expect any kind of approval from anyone at SG/GW at any time in the near future. We should now assume that this will not happen. My view that the tau should have reduced FF/CC values is not a result of JJ opinion, but I think that it works for the Tau, and makes them different from other forces in EA, and that this is an important goal.
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