Hot T'au Pic

 

But it's all safe for work, I hasten to assure you. 

T'au are returning with a new codex early next year, says GW. Better guns (longer range and more AP), more interesting tactical philosophies (now it's harder to forget Mont'ka and Kau'yon), and therefore: newly painted models for the T'Pau Sept!

Nice detailed cockpits, as usual for T'au models. I broke the Tetras (gently) in half to paint these. 

Kas has been hunting Tetras for years. Fast skimmers that throw out multiple markerlights, they're going to be a cheap and irritating thorn in the side of an opponent. Obviously you want to bring them down, markerlights are too powerful to ignore. But the skimmers themselves are puff pastry around the sausage roll of a T'au gunline - easy to pick off without hurting the main meal. I really enjoyed painting these. Not too big to be a nuisance, enough detail to be interesting and ages since I painted dazzle pattern camo. Fun!

A Firesight Marksman boosts the effectiveness of drones, which is always bad news. Not much, it has to be said - plus one to hit makes them about as good as guardsmen - but he just has to see the same target as his bin lids to give them the bonus. Line of sight is not a bad aura range, I'd say. I think I painted one of these for Kas before, but the original may have gone AWOL. Ah well - he's back now. 

Finally, this rather lovely Ethereal. Both Kas and I overlooked this wannabe psyker back in the day, but it turns out his abilities can be pretty tasty. Versatile too, switching rerolls of 1 to hit for a 6++ save for example. Plus he can ride a hover drone, which makes him the M'rtym C'fly of the T'au universe. I like his massive secateurs, very handy.

I couldn't help it - I had to paint another winged maw somewhere on this batch. Crypt Angels flag under him, also done by prising the model apart for ease of access.

And that's the commission work done! As it wings its way to rejoin the mothership, I can crack on with the juicy juicy rewards...