Piranhas don’t have a lot of rules- they can Explode (dealing one mortal wound to each unit within 3″) when they die; awkwardly, this means they will damage any other members of their squad when they do so. They also follow the usual rules for embarked drones, namely that they must start the game onboard the Piranha and the vehicle can use their weapons as long as they remain so, but once they disembark they can never re-enter it. Note that unlike in previous editions, the drones from each Piranha disembark as a separate unit and are not automatically removed as casualties when it is destroyed (instead rolling as one would for passengers in the usual fashion.) Piranhas also do not have any sort of special “hover vehicle” rule or any such, which means that distances will always be measured to the model’s base and never to the model itself; as the base is significantly smaller than the Piranha, this is often a bit weird.

Vrekais: I’m Mont’ka all the way here, I was running Sophisticated Command Nets before and Hardened Warheads and this philosophie embodies both of those benefits, re-rolling 1s to wound and increasing AP but for my whole army rather than just vehicles. Yes the models need to move in such a way to get to the closest target but Mont’ka provides with it’s awesome movement buffs. The Piranha is superficially similar to many other vehicles of the same style such as the Vyper, Land Speeder, etc; however, what sets it apart from these units and gives it a much more distinct role are its role in the army as well as the unique features of Tau as a whole. As a result, while it may be numerically similar to these other units (which tend to be somewhat mediocre themselves) the Tau Piranha is actually a very solid addition to their arsenal. XV02 Pilot Battlesuit • XV8 Crisis Battlesuit ( XV8-02 Crisis Iridium Battlesuit • XV81 Crisis Battlesuit • XV84 Crisis Battlesuit • XV85 Enforcer Battlesuit • XV86 Coldstar Battlesuit • XV89 Crisis Battlesuit • XV88 Broadside Battlesuit) • Stealthsuits ( XV15 Stealthsuit • XV22 Stealthsuit • XV25 Stealthsuit • XV95 Ghostkeel Battlesuit) • XV46 Vanguard Void Battlesuit • XV9 Hazard Battlesuit • Class 10 Battlesuits ( XV104 Riptide Battlesuit • XV107 R'varna Battlesuit • XV109 Y'vahra Battlesuit) • KV128 Stormsurge • KX139 Ta'unar Supremacy Armour Fire Markerlights (Action): One or more MARKERLIGHT units from your army can start to perform this action at the start of your Movement phase. AIRCRAFT MARKERLIGHT units can perform this action. The action is completed at the start of your next Shooting phase. If this action is successfully completed, for each model in that unit that is equipped with one or more markerlights, for each markerlight that model is equipped with, select one enemy unit within 36" of that model that would be an eligible target for that model if its unit had been selected to shoot, and roll one D6: on a 3+, that enemy unit gains one Markerlight token.’Having said that, I will confess that my heart belongs to Mont’ka, and my expectation is that once players get to grip with the codex, this will be the dominant choice. Mobility wins games, and as well as that the output buff from this is just as impactful on all three of the active turns if you’re willing to go for it, whereas Kauyon doesn’t reach full power until turn five when your army is likely pretty bashed up. I particularly like the impact it has on various flavours of vehicle, plus on Fire Warriors – if the opponent overcommits against a list in Mont’ka, they are going to find themselves absolutely buried under a hail of mid-strength AP-2 firepower before they can really figure out what’s going on. First off, I wanna talk about Examplar of the Kauyon. As any aspiring Farseer will tell you, being able to redeploy 3 units after you know who is going first can be very game changing. When Wings was talking about Kauyon above and was making it clear that survival is the key to a good Kauyon strategy, minimising the damage you take from Alpha strikes is paramount. If you end up going first, setting up good firing lanes for your Broadsides or moving a Crisis team from a defensive deployment spot to an offense one, can be game changing. Piranhas are Av 11 on the front. Also, it is probably a good idea to only take enough disruption pods to give half the squad cover; as the likelihood of enough damage rolls being forced outnumber your non-disruption pod equipped Piranhas, and then taking out more Disruption Pod equipped than non Disruption Pod equipped Piranha eliminating your majority cover save, is very low. This can save a few points. The plasma rifle gets a re-work, and boy what a re-work – it’s a single shot, but it’s 30” range, S8 AP-4 D3, an enormously powerful profile, and very effective when paired up with missile pods for longer ranged Crisis teams.

Since the Taros Campaign, the Piranha has been upgraded in terms of armour and armament, and has proved notably successful as a support asset for Pathfinder Teams. Piranha's have been a favourite of the Fire Caste since their introduction during the Second Sphere Expansion, swiftly proving worthy of the praise being heaped on it. Places within Fire Caste Piranha training programs are highly contested, and those who successfully graduate enjoy enhanced status amongst their comrades.

The Piranha’s statline is nothing to get terribly excited about, although it’s far from bad. Front Armor 11 means that it can shrug off Boltguns under most circumstances and is at least reasonably resilient to the various anti-tank weapons. Side/Rear 10 is obviously less helpful, and having only two Hull Points is a distinct disadvantage. It has the same middling Ballistic Skill as nearly all Tau, which will do the job well enough. Of these, we’ve already mentioned the Onager Gauntlet, which is now hilarious– it’s basically a free melee weapon for a BATTLESUIT model, granting a mighty S12 AP4 profile with damage 3. That is a profile that is genuinely dangerous, especially combined with Precision of the Hunter. An excellent upgrade. Three secondaries on offer for Tau here, and they’re… interesting. Aerospace Targeting Relays is a Shadow Operations objective which requires you to place an Aerospace Designation marker halfway along each battlefield edge, and lets your INFANTRY units do an action at the end of the Movement phase which completes at the start of your next Command phase or the end of the battle. Like similar objectives, your goal here is to scan each point once, and you get a scaling number of VPs depending on how many you achieve – a paltry 2 if you only manage one, all the way up to the maximum 15 for hitting all 4. Sa’cea ends up pretty middle of the road overall – you’re going to feel like it’s doing good stuff for you, and if it’s your favourite Sept you’re going to have a great time in narrative play, but it’s probably not quite where the top competitive builds will come from. Dal’yth I get that non-interactivity can be really grating, but that doesn’t in any way explain your rationale on the “at full strength” issue. And, as I already said, the _drones_ (which are what’s doing the actual work in the formation) are still perfectly interactable.