Charlie here from 40kDiceRolls, here again to discuss a subspecies of Kroot, the Krootox Rider. As always, for more tactics articles, check out the Tactics Corner!
A hulking creature often found alongside Kroot Carnivores, Krootox’s broad back provide an suitable mobile weapon platform. By mounting a heavy cannon-like gun onto their shoulders and back, an agile Kroot Carnivore can climb atop the Krootox to operate the gun. They’re fiercely loyal and defend their comrades, whom they refer to as “herd brothers”, and protect them to the death.
On the tabletop, Krootox Riders units consist of anywhere from 1 to 3 models, each model being a Krootox and its rider.
Krootox Rider
| M | WS | BS | S | T | W | A | Ld | Sv |
| 7″ | 3+ | 4+ | 6 | 5 | 4 | 2 | 6 | 6+ |
Wargear
Each Krootox Rider fires with a Kroot gun (48″ Rapid Fire 1 S7 AP-1 D[D3]) and the Krootox attacks with its fists (melee S[user] AP0 D2).
Special Rules
- Agile Brute
- Automatically advance 6″, don’t roll a D6.
Tactics
If you’ve read the Kroot Carnivores article then you know there’s something that draws me to Kroot models. Whether it’s the stark contrast in look and feel to the main T’au models, the awesome conversions people have done with them, or something else entirely, I really dig Kroot. But much like we saw in the Carnivores article, the Krootox suffers from many of the same issues – namely a clunky and minimalist set of special rules with limited weapon loadouts that ultimately leave it in a bad place.
Most comparable to an autocannon, the Kroot Gun is nice in the fact that it’s 48″ Rapid Fire 1, so even on the first turn with typical deployment separation, you’ll almost always be in rapid fire range. Two shots is great when you consider that the BS4+ will mean that on average, one will miss. Lacking significant AP, the Kroot Gun will probably struggle to take out even light vehicles. Infantry will be a more efficient target in general, with the D[D3] coming in useful against multi-wound models (Primaris, looking at you).
With 7″ movement and auto-advancing 6″ thanks to Agile Brute, the Krootox can easily cover significant ground each turn, which just may be one of its best qualities. A turn two charge would be well-within the realm of possibility. Should the Krootox get in close combat, you’ll find it tolerable, but not much better than that. With just two attacks, even though it has BS3+, you will struggle to make much of a dent in things. Yes, the S6 is great against chaff or screening units (because you should never try and run the Krootox into anything that even remotely looks like a dedicated combat unit), but with no AP, and D2, you’ll need weight of dice to accomplish much. But again, two attacks hardly allow you to accomplish this. At best, the Krootox could slightly inconvenience a group of guardsmen while in close combat.
Going back to that guaranteed 13″ movement by Advancing, the Agile Brute special rule makes that seem like an attractive choice. Unfortunately, the Rapid Fire Kroot Gun that it is will no longer be able to shoot. It’s almost as if its rule set promotes both agility and some sort of shooting or fighting prowess, attempting to give you a hard choice when choosing which route to take. Unfortunately, this is far from the case. Its shooting/fighting is mediocre at best so when it is hampered or completely negated by advancing, you’re left with a unit that seems largely ineffective.
I could possibly stomach all this and still convince myself to put Krootox on the board every now and then as some sort of mid-field speed bump or distraction, if it weren’t for the fact that they die so easily. Toughness 5 is nice, but the fact that they have a save of 6+ means that virtually anything that does successfully wound them will probably cause damage. With just 4 wounds, it won’t take long before the Krootox is just dead.
Again, it seems like the Krootox was not given much thought. It would be a much stronger choice and more thematic for it to have more attacks, have special rules that allowed for some sort of innate FnP, gain special abilities when in a unit size above X amount or near so many carnivores (referencing its herd mentality), etc. What it does have just can’t compete.
Counters
As mentioned earlier, the Krootox is easy to kill. No inherent FnP means that it will be relying on its Sv6+ to stop any and all damage. Against any type of shooting at all, this will sooner or later crumble (most likely sooner). Make sure that you’re not allowing a unit of Krootox to make their way up the board turn one to set up a turn two charge into anything important of yours. With their middling Kroot Gun plus BS4+, that’s about the most threatening thing it can do.
Summary
Overall, the Krootox doesn’t bring enough to the table to recommend. With no way to actually be defensive, it doesn’t make for an effective backline objective holder. A unit of 5 Fire Warriors would have more wounds and a better save, thus making it a better/cheaper backline objective holder. With largely ineffective or minimal shooting/close combat attacks, the Krootox won’t be putting a large dent in your enemies frontlines, nor will it excel at being a disruption. A unit of three stealth suits would be more resilient and disruptive as a mid-field speed bump.
What would need to change about Krootox to convince you to take them?
And remember, Frontline Gaming sells gaming products at a discount, every day in their webcart!
Krootox need an actual save, an assault gun, and/or the ability to charge after advancing to become even remotely usable. Either that, or fold them back into the carnivore pack as optional models like infantry squads taking heavy weapons teams or guardians taking heavy weapon platforms.
Completely agree. The community has no shortage of good/decent ideas about how to make Kroot better, it just seems like they’re not a priority at the moment.
I feel like the Krootox are one of the Models that really suffered from GW’s decision to split basically any Models with a different Profile off into their own separate Units. Being able to add (essentially) an Autocannon and a couple of S6 Attacks to a Carnivore Squad would be cool, but on their own, there just isn’t enough there to make them work.
It’s unlikely in the extreme, but I’d like to see them get some options, too (along with plastic Models). Have two different general varieties, one with guns strapped to their backs (with at least a couple of different possible guns, ideally) like the current ones, and one that would take advantage of the factors like Agile Brute, with some blades strapped onto its claws for some AP, another Attack or two, and the rider having something similar to a Shotgun, a decent CCW, and maybe let them Advance and Charge with a Stratagem or something. Bigger max Unit size, too.
That would be badass! Right now they just seem like a clumsy implementation.
I was really disappointed the T’au Codex didn’t replace some of the finecast models with new plastic ones (Vespit, Krootox, Kroot hounds).
The almost complete sidelining of auxiliaries is one of my bigfest gripes with the codex, honestly. It’s like they put in the barest possible effort they could.
Out of curiosity, are you and AP gonna alternate for these reviews?
I agree with your take. My optimism makes me think they might have something big in the works for auxiliaries. My realism makes me think that’s foolish.
Yeah we each have chosen a few to write. I ended up starting a few while he was finishing up other articles, but now we’re both writing them concurrently.
Kroot should definitely have the option to include hounds and the Krootox into the carnivor pack like mentioned earlier however if they do then it would be cool to have them operate as Tau drones. Deploy as a unit, then act as separate units.
Sense of Stone does not work on Krootox because they are neither Infantry nor Battlesuits. They were increased to 4W in the codex but they still evaporate when attacked with their 6+ save and inability to benefit from cover except in fringe cases.
I have a whole bunch of Krootox which I used in my 7th edition tournament list. Now they are so poor that they hardly even get a casual game. Rather sad really. They compete with Shapers as most pointless auxiliary unit in 8th edition.
My personal opinion is that Krootox needed an Outflank stratagem even more than regular Kroot. Why Kroot got that near-useless Hunting Hounds stratagem instead of an ability to ambush is a mystery that probably only a crippling hangover or serious man-flu can explain.
Correct, thanks for keeping me honest.
Yeah man, it’s really hard to justify taking any Kroot in most situations, and I’ve still done it in friendly games to not much effect. There’s no shortage of really cool ideas the community has about ways to make them great. There is a shortage of proof that GW is implementing any of them or even sees the same problem we all see, which is unfortunate.
Kroot have some value and a unit or two are a fine addition to many lists. Kroot hounds are actually quite cool if rather fragile and too much of an easy kill point in ITC scenarios.
Krootox and Shapers are just in a bad place right now.
In the immortal words of AbusePuppy’s IA Aeronautica review: “Worth less than the electrons used to display this sentence”.