You know... art and all... artists sometimes have no clue.
In the Rogue Trader Corebook they have this cool image of two Tau Protectors (in the Koronus Expanse? lol) attacking an Imperial vessel. All well.... but the Tau Protectors are firing laser/beams/guns/direct fire from their keel LAUNCH BAY.
Such a great image ruined by stupidity of the artist.
LOL again, don't blame that one on FFG, that was all BL's doing. FFG just recycled the art without bothering to go 'Wait a min...' (Besides, The Expanse has kroot and a warpgate to the Jericho Reach. There might very well be a handful of Tau that have snuck into the Expanse before the portal was found and fortified by the Imperium. There are kroot warspheres,why not tau?)
Ray, hate to break it to you, but FFG beat you to the punch. A 'lance strike' is defined as a star ship firing it's lance weapon at a planet in support of ground troops (and they actually have separate rules for BCs and WB fire, moving the ship into position, and how much damage the primary strike and secondary blast do to both individual targets and entire regiments.)
Eh, if it was something with a longer duration, I'd agree on the heat effect, but this would be more like a thunderclap that deals damage as a frag missile to everything for half a km.
GW licensing the right to make ship fluff to a 3rd party is going to make things odd for a long time, I think.
