New flyers trend

In seeing some of the rules for the upcoming new Tau flyers, my opinion on the Nephilim and Dark Talon may be changing. The Dark Talon, of course, already had some viability thanks to the Standard of Devastation and its potentially awesome Stasis Bomb. At 160 points it clocked in at the same price as a Ravenwing Attack Squadron with 6 bikes and dealt slightly more damage while bringing some other tools and utility.

On the other hand, the Nephilim has always been disappointing. It boasts decent mid-strength firepower or a single TL lascannon for 180.  Thanks to strafing run and unrelenting hunter it's excellent at crippling light vehicles especially transports since even if it doesn't get a kill, it's never going to merely blow the storm bolter off a rhino, instead upping to immobilized. It's also excellent at shooting enemy flyers that are AV11 or less since immobilized results are crippling to most flyers. The problem is when you compare it to Vendettas and Heldrakes. Both are cheaper and bring much more to the table.

Now, the new tau flyers are rumored to be AV11/10/10 HP3. The fighter can supposedly have 6 S7 shots at 150. Dependent on the other special rules and most importantly the BS, this means it may be roughly on par with the Nephilim. They have similar firepower 7 S6 shots vs 6 S7 shots. The tau is less durable since side shots will be fairly common. If only BS3, the Tau is less accurate. Combined with the Nephilim's strafing run and unrelenting hunter, this makes the Nephilim a bit more reliable at killing light vehicles.  However, the tau flyer has two seeker missiles as well, giving it slightly more punch for 1 round.

Once the full codex is in hand, I plan to revisit this and see how they ultimately stack up. So far, though, it's looking like the Nephilim will become relatively stronger as more 6th edition books come out.