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Kroot must be popular as GW keep putting out more models for them. If they sell well what do you think about the steady growth of the model range into a full blown faction in their own right?

mrFickle wrote:
Kroot must be popular as GW keep putting out more models for them. If they sell well what do you think about the steady growth of the model range into a full blown faction in their own right?

Minor correction that they don't keep putting models out for them as the kill team last year was their first kit in 22 years. That said they seem to be getting more love and support than many entire factions despite being a subset inside of a larger army, so maybe we could see them jumping into an allied faction next edition I agree.

Dudeface wrote:

mrFickle wrote:
Kroot must be popular as GW keep putting out more models for them. If they sell well what do you think about the steady growth of the model range into a full blown faction in their own right?

Minor correction that they don't keep putting models out for them as the kill team last year was their first kit in 22 years. That said they seem to be getting more love and support than many entire factions despite being a subset inside of a larger army, so maybe we could see them jumping into an allied faction next edition I agree.

Sure I was a bit clumsy in the way I worded that but what k was getting at was they got a kill team which appears to have done so well we have 2 more units release for them in fault short order in the context of GW releases.

It could just be that someone in GW HQ has a soft spot for them

Isn't the time between these releases a bit too short to say the second wave is due to good sales numbers?

I think it is more likely somebody in charge (was) remembered Tau consist of more than just battlesuits prior to the KT release and they readied a bunch of models now.

I don't think they will become their own faction, but I think they will stay playable without any actual Tau in the future.

You never know what GW decides as we had Harlequins return to Eldar at the same time as World Eaters got a Codex with 5 units or so.
Honestly it would be better for Kroot to stay with Tau considering how wonky GWs allies rules have been during the last couple of years.

From what we know, Kroot will have a single detachment which can be exclusively Kroot, but is not REQUIRED to be exclusively Kroot.

Kroot are also likely to be usable in all of the other detachments as well- just not without Tau.

I like the idea of fighting a campaign where Tau are fighting a battle (Orks are good candidates), and struggling, so they make contact with the Kroot and ally against the common foe. Sort of a history of the Tau/ Kroot alliance.

Allied forces are narrative by nature- there's always a story to an alliance.

The Kroot are so back, in fact, that they even have their own dedicated Detachment in the new Codex: T’au Empire. The Kroot Hunting Pack allows you to deploy an all-Kroot force, replete with thematic Enhancements and Stratagems. The galaxy won’t know what ate ‘em.

I think it's worth mentioning that this seems similar to the Skitarii themed detachment AdMech got.

@Dudeface - And the single, individual Shaper in Blackstone Fortress

PenitentJake wrote:

I like the idea of fighting a campaign where Tau are fighting a battle (Orks are good candidates), and struggling, so they make contact with the Kroot and ally against the common foe. Sort of a history of the Tau/ Kroot alliance.

IIRC, the first contact between tau and kroot kind of went the other way around. Orks were threatening the kroot homeworld, and the tau effectively saved them.

Glad to see kroot get some love. I'm hoping that we might see some similar attention given to other alien auxiliaries in the future. Bring out the flat bears, rave shrooms, and some expanded vespid!

I really hope the Kroot do NOT become their own faction. The Tau have the opportunity to become the "federation" of 40k, one army of weaker races.
I'm not sure if I'd love to see a detachment of vespid rounding out the army. I wish they'd make an auxiliary detachment or something with vespid, demiurge, and others.

GW seem to be moving away from spamming out mini-factions now, like they were in 7th edition.

 Dominar_Jameson_V wrote:
I really hope the Kroot do NOT become their own faction. The Tau have the opportunity to become the "federation" of 40k, one army of weaker races.
I'm not sure if I'd love to see a detachment of vespid rounding out the army. I wish they'd make an auxiliary detachment or something with vespid, demiurge, and others.

The whole "conglomeration of multiple species" thing was one of the main things that appealed to me about tau initially. It would be such an easy way for GW to flesh out the species of the setting and to put weird models that don't fit the aesthetics of other factions.

I don't want a full *detachment* for vespid, etc. I just want a new kit or two to showcase each species. Vespid being "guns with wings" has made it difficult for them to stand out against crisis suits in a lot of editions. Expanding their wargear options (possibly including different vespid body types?) would give GW a chance to both show off more lore about them and give them more of a niche to make them attractive to players.

And then a flat bear psyker character and single kit of rave shrooms or some other alien would be cool additions.

 Flinty wrote:
@Dudeface - And the single, individual Shaper in Blackstone Fortress

Yup, I thought about mentioning him but it seemed tantamount to saying dark Mech had a release with it as well.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Flinty wrote:
@Dudeface - And the single, individual Shaper in Blackstone Fortress

I doubt they'll be their own faction, and definitely not by 11th. If we see any sort of dogman type faction, it'll likely be its own, new and have more depth based on a real life society from history. We already have Necrons so Egyptian-ish is already taken. Potentially a fantasy cross over with werewolves or some such - they haven't even done those in Fantasy much just Vampires. They might do well in a Samurai base.

Certainly sub-factions with less have been spun off, so anything is possible.

I think the best course of action would be a harlequin-esque solution. Still under the aegis of a main faction codex, but with additional rules support. So people can still play a full kroot army, and have it be viable, but without bloating the already oversaturated faction list.

From a gameplay/theme space would they offer something new? What are Kroot? Fast moving skirmishers, probably with (re)deployment shenanigans, Moderate/light ranged firepower with a focus on CC. Almost exclusively infantry, with some mounts/monsters. You could probably make something that plays like that with orcs or nids, maybe even guard. (Bit of theme overlap with Catachan Jungle FIghters). Movement, deployment, fieldcraft is good for table control and objective games. But is it enough to core an army around? Would the army just get shot off the table without support? Would the army feel redundant compared to others? The orks have the beastsnagges/savage/snakebites subfaction that hits a lot of the same buttons as the kroot.

Hmm. With 10th moving away from the FoC and detachment slots I’m going to have to think of a new benchmark for what I think should be required to be a faction. If you couldn’t come up with at least one option for each FoC slot, you probably shouldn’t be a full faction. And should really have 2+ for all but one of them. Basically, you should be able to make a well rounded TAC list from a faction.

Which honestly, with the new reveals, the kroot should be able to do. So I wouldn’t begrudge them their own book. I’m just a little bitter from the 6/7th edition era of spinning single units off into their own codex. But that’s just me and my baggage.

Yeah, I'll never understand why they though a codex for IG Stormtroopers was a good idea.

 Dysartes wrote:
Yeah, I'll never understand why they though a codex for IG Stormtroopers was a good idea.

Bite your tongue! C: Scions was actually a well-thought out book.

It just unfortunately had the wrong unit entries. Remember that at the same time Scions got a book, Guard somehow got to field Platoons of them while the Scions book only had squads.

That simple change(C: Scions fielding their Scions in Platoons, Guard getting Squads) would have made for an interesting dynamic.

Then again, I personally like the minidexes. It actually let thematic armies exist in their own space.

 Dysartes wrote:
Yeah, I'll never understand why they though a codex for IG Stormtroopers was a good idea.

Because it sold well for tabletop shenanigans. It moved a lot of kits. It was a pretty savvy business decision.


We'll see what happens with kroot. I like the models and the concept, but they need to be more than 'flimsier orks' to have any real sales power, whether as their own faction or a big chunk of the tau book.

 Dominar_Jameson_V wrote:
I really hope the Kroot do NOT become their own faction. The Tau have the opportunity to become the "federation" of 40k, one army of weaker races.
I'm not sure if I'd love to see a detachment of vespid rounding out the army. I wish they'd make an auxiliary detachment or something with vespid, demiurge, and others.

definitely agree with this. T'au are a better faction for having a bunch of Kroot in their army, and Kroot are better for being attached to the T'au. if nothing else, it makes them a more well-rounded army, since Kroot can fill the niche of melee units that the army is otherwise lacking

and if they ever make more auxiliary for T'au, i'd want it to be more like that. let the T'au themselves be big mechs and guns, and let every other unit be their specializations

 Kanluwen wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:
Yeah, I'll never understand why they though a codex for IG Stormtroopers was a good idea.

Bite your tongue! C: Scions was actually a well-thought out book.

It just unfortunately had the wrong unit entries. Remember that at the same time Scions got a book, Guard somehow got to field Platoons of them while the Scions book only had squads.

That simple change(C: Scions fielding their Scions in Platoons, Guard getting Squads) would have made for an interesting dynamic.

Would platoons really have helped them?

Scions seem better suited for either a mechanised force or for some sort of deep-striking force (or a mixture), rather than slogging it out like guardsmen.

Surely they'd have been too expensive for a platoon-type force?

(I'm open to being wrong about this. Just scratching my head as to how it would play out.)

 Kanluwen wrote:
Then again, I personally like the minidexes. It actually let thematic armies exist in their own space.

Late 9th and early 10th certainly haven't given me much faith when it comes to integrating them back into main books.

Personally I've felt that Kroot should splinter off partly as their own faction in the same way that Genestealer Cults did for Tyranids.


If they did that then GW can keep the core of Tau focused on the mechs and firewarrirors which are very popular.

Allowing Kroot to splinter off means that you've a whole new army, which means a lot more unit slots to fill. So instead of a Tau army that steadily gets bloated with too many models; too many choices and such - you have two armies that followed different battle and creative pathways.
I've long said that a Tau Auxiliaries force would be awesome. Letting GW add Kroot as a core backbone and then have lots of other alien races appearing in the force (including humans) to represent the motley of races that make up the Tau Empire.

Right now the issue with doing that for Tau is that you can't really add too many before they are duplicating roles already covered by mech Tau.




It's the same as Genestealer Cults. If they were part of the Imperial Guard/Tyranids army then they'd be a few models but would never have got the variety and range they have now.
By making them their own distinct thing they've enjoyed a wealth of creative models and characters and a unique design style that lets them stand apart.



The problem with armies like the Inquisition and Harlies is that they never really got a unique model range of their own that was "army size" in scope and variety. They stayed really small and limited.

It didn't help that lore wise both are designed to be super elite forces that bolt onto other armies (esp for the Inquisition).


You can argue that Knights as an army would be in the same spot if it weren't that they are so large and expensive points wise that you don't need many to make an army.



So yes Tau and Kroot could split with a core of Kroot remaining in Tau and then a separate army that went its own way design wise. It could be done; but requires GW to give them at least two big model wave releases to really bulk them out as their own thing. Otherwise if it takes too long or never happens then theyd' just splinter off and merge back later.

Been playing Tau for a while, would love to see the Kroot range expanded, but I just don't think they'd work as their own army. They've always been way too squishy to hold their own, I get the impression that running a whole army would just not work. They're run in Guardsmen-number squads, but die even easier usually. They're not exactly a proper horde army either IMO.

 Overread wrote:
Personally I've felt that Kroot should splinter off partly as their own faction in the same way that Genestealer Cults did for Tyranids.

If they did that then GW can keep the core of Tau focused on the mechs and firewarrirors which are very popular.

Counter-offer - we splinter the Kroot off into their own faction... and then just get rid of the Tau?