Does the strategic deployment rule allow you to hold the entire fireteam as your reserve? If so that changes the value of it a lot.
No. That came about from people misunderstanding what Bostria said in a video. If I recall correctly he said it let's the fireteam deploy with him. Given the rule text that obviously meant official deployment location, not timing.
Yeah, naah. @Bostria either made a small error, or just didn't describe it very well, because all it does is: » During the Deployment Phase, the owner of this Special Skill first, and then the rest of the Fireteam, can be deployed as if they have the Forward Deployment Level 1 Special Skill. » In those scenarios or when applying tournament rules which provide the Forward Deployment Level 1 Special Skill to any member of the Fireteam, the owner of Strategic Deployment, and the rest of the Fireteam, can be deployed as if they have the Forward Deployment Level 2 Special Skill.
How can you then first deploy hannibal (with FD2), if you have a bolt that has FD1 giving the whole team FD2?
It's implied that he can deploy with FD2, even 'though he goes down first. Which is a little strange, but ok.
So if you hold Hannibal as your reserve you lose the benefit of the ability? It (and the whole army) seems rather lackluster...
You do. And I love it for entirely setting and background reasons, but can see few mechanical reasons to prefer it over other armies.