Tau suddenly became a power army in 6th ed thanks to a new codex, and many tears were shed and teeth were gnashed as missilesides and riptides covered the land in the flaming wreckage of previously invincible deathstars and flying circuses. Cries of "OP! OP!" were raised to the heavens, as blue cheese ran amok upon the war-ravaged fields of the far future.

Well, it's been a couple of years now, a new edition has come out, and a veritable tidal wave of codices has washed across the galaxy. Crucially, Tau and Eldar are no longer battle brothers, which didn't so much nerf the more exploitative lists as take them out behind the shed and put a bullet in them, Old Yeller style. And there was much rejoicing. It's a new age; Knights bestride the battlefield, stomping all beneath their feet. Strength D is creeping into codices. Gorka/Morkanauts have made their appearance.

So the first question is: has the meta finally caught up to the tau in general and the riptide in particular? A powerful unit it remains, but is it unreasonably so for its points cost compared to what's now out there? Do missilesides and crisis suits still give people apoplexy, or is there enough to counter these things floating around out there to make them more reasonable?

The second question is this: why do my opponents always hate playing against my Tau? I show up with a monster of an Ork list and everyone is happy even when they get ground into the dirt. I tabled a dude turn 3 and he had a blast. It seems that the orks are always popular when they show up, and despite the possibility for some absolutely killer lists and combos they don't get much hate. I bring Tau, and everyone rolls their eyes, and win or lose nobody seems to have fun fighting them. My Tau list is hardly cheese. Some FWs in devilfish, pathfinders, crisis suits, broadsides, and a lone riptide, led by an ethereal. I play a maneuver game for the most part, it's not like I park my gunline and just roll dice. It's not that they think it's cheese, they just don't think it's fun.

Is this a common view? Are the Tau really just anti-fun?

It might be that they see Tau and think that its just going to be a game of rolling dice and removing models no matter what they do. Then because they started with this attitude they stay that way throughout the game regardless of what actually happens.

Just my thoughts.

Tau are certainly very strong, but not OP.

They have many advantages. This is an edition focused on shooting, which plays into their strength and away from their weakness. They have mechanics which negate the only universal counter to shooting(markerlights).

The Riptide is the strongest MC in the game because it is one of the few MCs which applies its damage from a safe distance, has very good damage output, and its very durable on top of it. It can be 2+/3++ with FnP to boot. Its still killable, and its costed fairly except for its undercosted big gun. Its just easier to get work out of it, unlike other MCs who have to expose themselves to do their job.

Not OP, just very very strong.

Tau break most of the rules in the game.

'Cover save? Oh that's cute.'
'But you have no weapons! Yeah so this unit now has all these special rules.'
'I'll charge! Overwatch. Ok! And this unit. What? And this one. Huh?!'

Not limited to these things, but you get the jist. Just not really fun to play against.

That said, there may be a bit of bias in my opinion. I play DE, Nids and now Orks, so cover is kind of a important thing for me

Yeah, I'd say that the Tau simply developed a reputation that the "power"- and eventually all- lists are stationary gunlines.

Stationary gunlines are boring to play, both against and as, IMO, for exactly the reasons that are stated: gunlines turn the game into "roll dice, remove models", which is boring and unfun.

WRT Riptides in particular... it's still a T6/2+ armor, 5 Wound (!) monster. Riptides are why things like Grav exist- because killing a Riptide with more traditional/conventional weapons is very difficult.

Dreadknights are somewhat similar... but have the decency to want to get in your face (IE, close to all your short-range AP2/AP1 weapons), and into combat, where AP2 melee weapons are relatively common, as compared to long-range AP2/AP1 guns.

TBH though I think I might rate Dreadknights and Riptides as about the same in terms of relative "brokenness"; DKs want to close the gap, and are very good at doing so, while a 'Tide wants to be as far as possible... and it's pretty good at that too.

This being said, I rarely see much complaint about HBC Riptides- it's almost invariably the IA, often combined with EWO. I think the problem with Riptides isn't actually their ability to kill things- it's the ability to be passably killy, and nearly impossible to kill thanks to T6/5W/2+, and the Jetpack for the Assault-phase Thrust move, and the long-range guns that let it sit back and shoot things to death.

It's the fact that Riptides are very rarely equipped to close the gap- they generally leverage their mobility to stay at a (long) distance, where it's difficult to kill them.

I think the big fix to to the Riptide is to just drop a wound. The thing is still good, just not quite as absurdly difficult to remove.

I think riptides are still massively undercosted for having that much durability. More because MC rules + a good armor save is ridiculously better than vehicles. They can beat dreadnoughts in melee fairly often. It takes more melta for me to down a tide than a land raider or monolith. Hell even an obelisk.

IA tides can also deal with literally anything, even nova charging to take out AV 14 with s9 ordnance. (Which happened to me at a recent tourney, incidentally with the tank hunting formation, but he didn't need it.)

I also personally hate it's rules for single-handedly making meq's scared to stand on the field at all for fear of a no-save no-fnp ignore cover template landing on their heads and wiping 160ish points of marines from a mile away.

Maybe if they had some rule like "independent systems: may not benefit from marker lights" along with a durability decrease/price increase, I might be okay with them. Also I think that to tone down the ap2+3 surplus in the game, the IA should at least become a small blast.

Riptides are powerful and tough, I think there's no disputing that. But with all the other stuff that's floating around out there, like Imperial Knights, Wraithknights, Stompas, Gork/Morkanauts, the Lord of Skulls, and so on, is there not a reasonable answer to the riptide available to just about anyone? Aside from its toughness, it's got a pretty modest statline; WS2, BS3, I2, and A3 isn't exactly scary on its own.

I guess I'm just surprised by the difference between its reputation and my own experience of its tabletop performance. I was expecting a nightmare, but I've yet to be blown away by it either against it as the Orks or fielding it as the Tau. I'd be much more worried seeing an Imperial Knight show up.

The Riptide's virtues are it's durability- mostly "over time", wherein it's unlikely to be killed throughout the course of the game- and the fact that the Riptide can more-or-less invalidate large swaths of Marine armies- or others which similarly rely on 3+ armor to protect them.

When you have a unit that can drop an S8/AP2 5" Blast on anything from 0-60", and even throw Interceptor onto it, you not only have one of the best "MEQ killers" in the game, you also have one of the best anti-DS units.

Against Orks, the Riptide's virtues are of little use- at least, using the Ion Accelerator. An HBC-'Tide might actually find great use against Orks, in fact.

Also, WS/I 2 and A3 isn't important for the Riptide, since it doesn't want to be in combat- in fact, it wants to leverage it's JSJ ability to actively stay out of combat. Season with some Markerlight support- though it's really only useful for getting Ignores Cover onto the IA- and you've got something very killy from a distance.

Part of what makes Riptides powerful is that there isn't much to using one- you put it on the table, have it shoot things, and those things generally die very quickly. It's not quite at the level of, say, GravCents doing a "point-and-delete"... but it's pretty damn close.

There's also the fact that most of the other units listed are either:

1) LOW (Lord of Skulls, Stompas, superheavies in general)
2) not actually very good (Gork/Morkanauts)
3) overshadowed by the cheese of Wave Serpent spam (WKs)
4) acknowledged as being super-dangerous, but also very vulnerable to Haywire/Gauss effects, which some armies (mostly DE, Necrons, and the upcoming Skitarii) can bring in spades.

It's also worth noting that a fair amount of the things you listed do best at very short range or even in combat- IKs have their applications as fire support units, while Wraithknights are rarely given their combat weapon, and instead kept either stock or given the Suncannon option.

niv-mizzet wrote:

I also personally hate it's rules for single-handedly making meq's scared to stand on the field at all for fear of a no-save no-fnp ignore cover template landing on their heads and wiping 160ish points of marines from a mile away.

Maybe if they had some rule like "independent systems: may not benefit from marker lights" along with a durability decrease/price increase, I might be okay with them. Also I think that to tone down the ap2+3 surplus in the game, the IA should at least become a small blast.

Cry me a river. Clearly you were not around when 4th ed. SM librarians made entire Tau armies afraid to just show up, Stupid "Fear the Darkness". I say turn a bout is fair play. Every army always had Tau's number until this last codex came out. I think the turn about is fully justified.

Also there are lots of things that other armies get that Tau cant. Namely psychic powers. So we have a buffmander with no guns that enhances our other units. Its no worse than a psycher casting invisibility or iron arm on a choice unit of their own. No deny the witch possible on friendly buffs. Yeah there is a chance of failure/perils, but I don't know a single player who doesn't think its worth it.

Also there is now so much ignores cover from several different armies and its all in response to the short sightedness of the jinking rule and other +1 stackable cover modifiers. Getting a 3+ cover save is almost as criminal as the other guy not letting you have one in the first place. Also at least the Tau player has to pay for the chance to remove your cover in models with no guns where as Inferno cannons, baleflamers, etc do it all on their own in a nice little package.

People who complain about Tau (especially in this edition) either are newish to the game or have very short memories of what we had to trudge through for the longest time.

office_waaagh wrote:
So the first question is: has the meta finally caught up to the tau in general and the riptide in particular? A powerful unit it remains, but is it unreasonably so for its points cost compared to what's now out there? Do missilesides and crisis suits still give people apoplexy, or is there enough to counter these things floating around out there to make them more reasonable?

The second question is this: why do my opponents always hate playing against my Tau? I show up with a monster of an Ork list and everyone is happy even when they get ground into the dirt. I tabled a dude turn 3 and he had a blast. It seems that the orks are always popular when they show up, and despite the possibility for some absolutely killer lists and combos they don't get much hate. I bring Tau, and everyone rolls their eyes, and win or lose nobody seems to have fun fighting them. My Tau list is hardly cheese. Some FWs in devilfish, pathfinders, crisis suits, broadsides, and a lone riptide, led by an ethereal. I play a maneuver game for the most part, it's not like I park my gunline and just roll dice. It's not that they think it's cheese, they just don't think it's fun.

Is this a common view? Are the Tau really just anti-fun?

In tournaments? Yes. Tau are still strong, but not the face-roll they were previously. Keep in mind that this is vs the most broken things you can field (serpents, cent star, AdLance etc)

In a casual setting? They are still tremendouly strong, and easily fall into the OP category.

When you play against orks, at the very least you can both kill stuff, and therefore it's (generally) fun. When you play against tau, especially a good maneuverable tau in a casual setting, JSJ and long range means that sometimes you just roll saves (if you're lucky) and remove models. I've watched a tau player table a marine player while losing one single fire warrior (to a scattered overcharged IA) and not once did the marine player actually get to fire a shot in anger.

I personally find it difficult to make a "fun" tau army, and am yet to face one, due to the fact that anything "good" is also incredibly annoying/frustrating to play against. Riptides with EWO and IA delete anything DS'ing or podding in, Broadsides generally do the same while causing fits for fliers despite not buying skyfire. Crisis with JSJ can ensure they never get shot at with any resonable amount of terrain on the board. Skyrays can make life hell for FMC's with hitting on 2's, wounding on 2's, no saves while being able to jink (on a 3+ no less) with virtual impunity. If you're taking anything else, you're almost intentionally crippling your list. Even something as simple as firewarriors having 30" Str 5 rapidfire guns spell death to anything moving less than 12" a turn and T5/6 or AV12. When you're throwing insane amounts of dice, saves don't really matter much, as, to butcher an old saying, if we can wound it, it will die.

I regurlary play against a Tau army and while it's always a hard fight (that I've only won once ), I do enjoy playing against the army and the chap, who not only knows the strengths and weaknesses of his army perfectly, but also knows what to bring or not to keep the game fun for both sides.

You're the first to call orkanaughts cheezy.

Tau are extremely strong, and if one knows how to build to their strengths, they can very easily make OP armies. They have more weaknesses than Eldar or Necrons now, but the "meta" has by no means caught up, especially the spade of very bland codexes since the Tau/Eldar/Daemon triarchy of cheese. These armies have competitive builds which can fight Tau, but are very limited; Flyrants, Centstar, etc, but I'd wager most people don't want to play that way, especially in a casual, pickup game sort of setting. A Tau player will still have their most powerful tools in even the fluffiest of lists.

That being said, its the Riptide - Crisis Suits - HYMP Broadsides with backup of your choice combo which is really frustrating for people to try and fight. Oldschool Fish of Fury; devilfish, hammerheads, skyrays and the like is very good, but nowhere near as challenging for most armies to fight. While they benefit from the clear rules bias in favour of skimmers, their power and points cost is much more in line than Eldar options. A gunline Tau army is not a reasonable thing for many armies to fight, an army which embraces mobility is much more likely to create a decent game for your opponent.

The Riptide is strong, but it's equal to Dreadknights, Wraithknights and Imperial Knights so it's fine.

People who claim that Tau are 'unfun' in 7th are mostly just Tau haters since gunlines died in 7th due to Maelstrom and Tau lost their cheesy combos (whilst everyone else kept or gained theirs like Draigo, Tiggy and Grav Centurions).

Tau just have perfect internal balance (except for Vespid) whilst others do not, hence why it is hard to make a 'bad' Tau list, but they cannot make a broken list (which is the opposite for basically every other army).

Tau are far more enjoyable to play against than alpha strikes (drop pods and Gey Knights).

Interestingly the Maelstrom mission with their random objectives (and the house rule that impossible missions are discarded) actually helped me enjoying playing against Tau.

As has been said, Tau are strongest when forming some kind of Gunline; random objectives force lists to be more mobile and mitigate this somewhat.

I feel a lot of the issue with Tau is hangover from being top dog, after coming from the bottom.
Tau used to be pretty awful and subsequently Tau players were already playing 'well' to eek out a win.
When they jumped up the rankings two things happened, the tau players got a more capable toolset and loads of people jumped on the bandwagon. This saturated the game with tau armies touting 2-3 Riptides and/or other things which are considered powerful
To compound issues the Riptide was added (the first big model made for 6th). If Tau had come after Eldar I believe things would have been different.

I don't think its possible to make Tau fun because of their reputation, mostly nothing to do with the codex. They're still very powerful too as they're not dedicating any points to melee and have the firepower to overcome a lot of things.
Tau have all the advantages in 40k simply because they don't do melee. Melee is so non-sensical in every regards. You're trying to cross the battlefield to stab someone (bringing a knife to a gun fight). Because Tau actively avoid this they're in a stronger position.

Equally they can make a good army by throwing anything together.

Just my 2 pence.

This is clearly the case of the divide between friendly and competitive play. In the former, young players, and players predominantly concerned with rule #1 are going to have a tough time playing against Tau. Within the tournament circuit, Tau are now the army that's amusing to bring to see if you can win with it. It's amusing, because sans Nid or Necron allies, you can't.

There will always be a divide between what your average gamer thinks is OP and what tournament gamers think is OP. In fact, the whole concept is rarely used. A tournament player (a good one anyway) doesn't say things like, "Oh that's just OP, I hate that." They say things like, "What stupid combination of stuff am I going to concoct to troll this 'OP' thing off the table?"

DrunkPhilisoph wrote:
Interestingly the Maelstrom mission with their random objectives (and the house rule that impossible missions are discarded) actually helped me enjoying playing against Tau.

As has been said, Tau are strongest when forming some kind of Gunline; random objectives force lists to be more mobile and mitigate this somewhat.

This.

If you make Tau play Maelstrom missions, then the game really opens up as both players are forced to move around and aim for grabbing their various objective over simply castling up and blowing the living crap out of everything.
If you only play the old bog standard, "line up and fight" KP's style of game, then Tau are never going to be any fun due to the fact they only play in 2 phases of the game, and have the range + shenanigans that allow them to mostly ignore the Movement phase.

Castled up gunline Tau, which is pretty much all they were in 6th is no fun at for the Tau's opponent, as it's just an exercise in removing 'X' models each turn and packing them back in their case.

I don't use riptides, so I wouldn't know, but fun tau lists are easy. I play mobile tau (devilfish FWs, suit heavy, pirahnas), and it's fun to play with and my freinds seem to enjoy playing against it.

Still havent seen Tau with riptides lose once.... Or even lose a single riptide.. so yes!

 Waaghboss Grobnub wrote:
Still havent seen Tau with riptides lose once.... Or even lose a single riptide.. so yes!

the one game in seventh I've played, with tau and one riptide (by prior agreement), I lost, by one VP. it was a Maelstrom game against DE, so yes, it can\does happen. It was entertaining though, actually using all 4 nova options in a game (the ECPA was useful, though I never rolled a one (except failed armor saves)), and my opponent DID manage to kill it in the 5th turn.

The Riptide is not even remotely fairly costed afaic, but they can be beaten. Quite easily with certain armies, too.

The only battlesuit that really worries me is the currently experimental Y'vahra, which I hope doesn't go through in it's current incarnation, as it's broken beyond measure if played correctly.

The Riptide is powerful alone, but as with almost everything Tau you need Markerlights to buff it to "OP". And the MLs are usually on squishy units that can be wiped out by angry Grots. A gunline also needs an open board for LOS - play with more terrain and the Tau can't concentrate everything on one unit at a time.

When fighting Tau you just might have different target priorities than against many other armies. If he's relying on ML-boosted attacks, take out the MLs. Rushing my mate's Firewarriors and other infantry with flamer-weilding SoB makes for a high casualty count, but also a high chance of victory. Without ML support his remaining suits usually lack the firepower to wipe me out before the game ends, especially if they don't want to stand in the open eating Exorcist missiles.

Yeah, pathfinders die like guard, and if you can't kill cover camping guard, then you might want to take a look at your army.

 Jayden63 wrote:

niv-mizzet wrote:

I also personally hate it's rules for single-handedly making meq's scared to stand on the field at all for fear of a no-save no-fnp ignore cover template landing on their heads and wiping 160ish points of marines from a mile away.

Maybe if they had some rule like "independent systems: may not benefit from marker lights" along with a durability decrease/price increase, I might be okay with them. Also I think that to tone down the ap2+3 surplus in the game, the IA should at least become a small blast.

Cry me a river. Clearly you were not around when 4th ed. SM librarians made entire Tau armies afraid to just show up, Stupid "Fear the Darkness". I say turn a bout is fair play. Every army always had Tau's number until this last codex came out. I think the turn about is fully justified.

Also there are lots of things that other armies get that Tau cant. Namely psychic powers. So we have a buffmander with no guns that enhances our other units. Its no worse than a psycher casting invisibility or iron arm on a choice unit of their own. No deny the witch possible on friendly buffs. Yeah there is a chance of failure/perils, but I don't know a single player who doesn't think its worth it.

Also there is now so much ignores cover from several different armies and its all in response to the short sightedness of the jinking rule and other +1 stackable cover modifiers. Getting a 3+ cover save is almost as criminal as the other guy not letting you have one in the first place. Also at least the Tau player has to pay for the chance to remove your cover in models with no guns where as Inferno cannons, baleflamers, etc do it all on their own in a nice little package.

People who complain about Tau (especially in this edition) either are newish to the game or have very short memories of what we had to trudge through for the longest time.

Come roll with the BA codex against the Tau sometime, and you WILL be crying. With no grav cents and no smashbane, the BA are up dung creek against Riptides.

"TBH though I think I might rate Dreadknights and Riptides as about the same in terms of relative "brokenness"; DKs want to close the gap, and are very good at doing so, while a 'Tide wants to be as far as possible... and it's pretty good at that too. "

That's the very definition of Riptide >>>>>>> Dreadnight, which is the case. Dreadknights, to me, are almost a bad joke compared to the Riptide. It's the difference between shooty and punchy. I love the moment when the GK player realized he just moved within range of ten plasma guns. Conversely the Riptide is in the corner bouncing every lascannon shot you can send at it, and nothing else reaches and/or penetrates 2+.

I think the following list would not be competitive at all, but would be fun as hell (and thematic).

Guerrilla Fighters -- Auxiliaries with Tau Support (requires 2 CADs)

CAD 1 -- Auxiliaries

HQ

Aun'shi

--

Troops

Kroot, Kroot Hounds (outflanking; Aun'Shi goes here)
Kroot, sniper rifles
+ however many Kroot you want -- lots

--

Fast Attack (all Deep Striking)

Vespids, strain leader
Vespids, strain leaer
Vespids, strain leaer


CAD 2

HQ

Dark Strider

--

Troops

Kroot, sniper rifles, maybe Krootox
Kroot, sniper rifles

--

Elites (hunter-killer cadres -- all infilitrate)

Stealth Suits, Shas'ui, fusion blaster, advanced targeting system, markerlight, 2 x marker drones
Stealth Suits, Shas'ui, fusion blaster, advanced targeting system, markerlight, 2 x marker drones
Stealth Suits, Shas'ui, fusion blaster, advanced targeting system, markerlight, 2 x marker drones

--

Fast Attack -- Special Weapons Teams (all outflank) --Dark Strider goes in one of these)

4x Pathfinders, 2x Ion Rifle, 1x Rail Rifle
4x Pathfinders, 2x Ion Rifle, 1x Rail Rifle
4x Pathfinders, 2x Ion Rifle, 1x Rail Rifle

---

Heavy Support

Sniper drone team
Sniper drone team
Sniper drone team

"Come roll with the BA codex against the Tau sometime, and you WILL be crying. With no grav cents and no smashbane, the BA are up dung creek against Riptides."

Yes, but you have the best drop pod army so you'll destroy everything other than the Riptide in one or two turns which will make the Tau player lose.

How I wish Tau could ignore as many rules as Blood Angels (assaulting after deep strike and the usual Space Marine shenanigans).

Also, you can charge and tie up a Riptide in combat (charging after deep strike) but you cannot do that to the Dreadknight as it is godly in all four phases.

If you're trying to rely to me, Pozy, you're on ignore. You might as well put me on ignore as well.

Martel732 wrote:
If you're trying to rely to me, Pozy, you're on ignore. You might as well put me on ignore as well.

Why can't I reply to you? Is it because you know that I'm right and you want people to just agree with your incorrect views?

Boniface wrote:
I feel a lot of the issue with Tau is hangover from being top dog, after coming from the bottom.
Tau used to be pretty awful and subsequently Tau players were already playing 'well' to eek out a win.
When they jumped up the rankings two things happened, the tau players got a more capable toolset and loads of people jumped on the bandwagon. This saturated the game with tau armies touting 2-3 Riptides and/or other things which are considered powerful
To compound issues the Riptide was added (the first big model made for 6th). If Tau had come after Eldar I believe things would have been different.

I don't think its possible to make Tau fun because of their reputation, mostly nothing to do with the codex. They're still very powerful too as they're not dedicating any points to melee and have the firepower to overcome a lot of things.
Tau have all the advantages in 40k simply because they don't do melee. Melee is so non-sensical in every regards. You're trying to cross the battlefield to stab someone (bringing a knife to a gun fight). Because Tau actively avoid this they're in a stronger position.

Equally they can make a good army by throwing anything together.

Just my 2 pence.

Totally agree. People sufferd in the hands of Tau players after June 2013 (Eldar) and even more after September (SM). And it was basically a year with that going on until 7th kicked in.So there's a sour taste on their tongues that will take a while to remove (Necrons are already helping with that, hehe)

The Necrons, while frustrating, STILL can't vaporize my list from 60" away with large blasts that ignore cover.

Martel732 wrote:
The Necrons, while frustrating, STILL can't vaporize my list from 60" away with large blasts that ignore cover.

neither can Tau. Markerlights have a 36" range. if your opponent says he can target stuff 60" away, then it isn't the Tau Codex's fault that your opponent is cheating.

 carldooley wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
The Necrons, while frustrating, STILL can't vaporize my list from 60" away with large blasts that ignore cover.

neither can Tau. Markerlights have a 36" range. if your opponent says he can target stuff 60" away, then it isn't the Tau Codex's fault that your opponent is cheating.

The Tau have fast forward marker light application. They have marker drones and Tetras and Pathfinders. All of which play well forward of the riptide.

Drones are BS2, and not hard to kill. Pathfinders are expensive guardsmen, and they can't fire while moving. The only sicking point is tetra, which pay for it.

All still get used except the drones, which means 60" ignoring cover is not only possible but probable.

But easy to get rid of. If you just ignore the riptide and focus on the squishy guys, you'll do better. It's what the riptide is best at, being a huge target. I agree it's OP (although that has more to do with the dirt cheap IA then the chassis it'self), but people over-value it. Just position yourself to be out of line of site when at all possible, and annihilate the pathfinders.

Out of los doesn't really work as it can jump-shoot-jump.

Umm, if it can move 6" and see you, JSJ doesn't matter at all.

You must play with a ton of LoS blocking terrain if avoiding its LoS is a valid tactic. Most tables only have enough to grant cover, not completely block los.

I might have a different view on this, because I play with mostly city boards. It seems everybody else in existence fights on flat plains with the occasional tree.

SGTPozy wrote:
Tau just have perfect internal balance (except for Vespid) whilst others do not, hence why it is hard to make a 'bad' Tau list, but they cannot make a broken list (which is the opposite for basically every other army).

Then what is all this that I hear about broadsides, hammerheads, and stealth suits?

Yeah, stealth suits don't really have a good place for them go, elite they fight with crisis, FA they fight with pathfinders, and troops don't really fit with them. They are also pretty overpriced.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
But easy to get rid of. If you just ignore the riptide and focus on the squishy guys, you'll do better. It's what the riptide is best at, being a huge target. I agree it's OP (although that has more to do with the dirt cheap IA then the chassis it'self), but people over-value it. Just position yourself to be out of line of site when at all possible, and annihilate the pathfinders.

It's hard to kill Tau when Tau kill you first, outside your range.

Yeah, I have a very hard time believing that you can't get withing range of pathfinders and kill them. Especially as a riptide is one large blast. Spread your guys out, and it can only take out two or three.

Again, the riptide is overpowered, because the IA is overpowered for the cost. Otherwise the tau are just strong.

They are also overpowered because MCs are overpowered in general. The Ritpides just happens to be a long range MC, which makes it several fold harder to kill.

Taurdar are now gone.

Dual riptides with a buffbander are gone.

New objective based games are here.

Increase in heavy AV13+ armour in games.

All these things helped to take tau down a peg.

Now they are decent but not overpowered. They can certainly be fun, and have a few options that keep the army maneuverable and away from the standard tau static gunline myth.

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
But easy to get rid of. If you just ignore the riptide and focus on the squishy guys, you'll do better. It's what the riptide is best at, being a huge target. I agree it's OP (although that has more to do with the dirt cheap IA then the chassis it'self), but people over-value it. Just position yourself to be out of line of site when at all possible, and annihilate the pathfinders.

It's hard to kill Tau when Tau kill you first, outside your range.

Yet again; deep strike using your drop pods!

 Big Blind Bill wrote:
Taurdar are now gone.

Dual riptides with a buffbander are gone.

New objective based games are here.

Increase in heavy AV13+ armour in games.

All these things helped to take tau down a peg.

Now they are decent but not overpowered. They can certainly be fun, and have a few options that keep the army maneuverable and away from the standard tau static gunline myth.

This. People who think Tau are OP must be playing a lot of DoW deployment kill point missions. When using objective based missions (maelstrom or otherwise) on varied deployment tables, Tau must remain mobile. Especially on Hammer and Anvil and Vanguard, with plenty of terrain, things like Broadsides lose a lot of their luster.

Anyway, I fully expect Riptides to be nerfed in some way in the new codex. Not that they really need to be. At best, Ion Accelerators will be made a 10-15p upgrade and Early Warning Override probably 20-25.

The base chassis of the Riptide can take too much abuse for its cost. It's durability needs a nerf or the base cost needs to be higher.

So can the Dreadknight as the only difference is the Riptide has one more wound...

I wound't mind if they just got rid of the riptide in favor for a buff to HRR (and maybe even the base railgun) and just correctly priced everything. I don't use them anyway. They are cool, but I prefr them coming from FW, who do stupid powerful in experimental rules, but generally get it right eventually.

SGTPozy wrote:
So can the Dreadknight as the only difference is the Riptide has one more wound...

Realistically, the Riptide's durability exceeds the Dreadknight's. A 'Tide can get FNP, easily boost to a 3++, and is generally out of range of 90%+ of the weapons that can reliably hurt it. A Dreadknight may have a 30" shunt move... but it has to stand around to be shot in the face after using said shunt move- right where it's in that perfect sweet spot of being in range of the majority of AP2/AP1 weapons.

If you forgo the shunt move and just move as a Jump MC you're getting 12" a turn- which is good, but it's nowhere near a "ohmahgerditsinmuhfacekillinmuhdoods" level of mobility. Riptides don't even need that level of mobility anyway- with the two specialty weapons that it carries being 36" or more of range, it can comfortably sit in a corner of the board and kill things very dead.

Consider a deployment on the long edges of the board- It's easily possible to get the 36" range HBC to potentially be in range of almost the entire enemy deployment zone (barring LoS-blocking terrain, admittedly). Even deploying on the short edge, it's easy to get an IA-Tide to be able to hit almost anything on the board with that 60" range.

Riptides have a spare wound, yes*. They also have access to FNP period, and easy access to high-end invulnerable saves, and very long ranged weapons that keep them away from the guns that can reliably hurt/kill them.

*I find it incredibly stupid that a Riptide has more wounds than a Dreadknight... or really any combat-oriented MC. Riptides should not have more wounds- or really a better armor save either- than dedicated close combat MC, who will actually need the durability since they will take damage when closing with the enemy.

I dislike the situation with Tau as an army because discussions always get stuck on the Riptide, but it really is the elephant in the room. HYMP are stupid good, but Broadsides can actually die.

I've only played a couple different Tau players, and none of them played more than one riptide. But while they were always a pain to kill primarily because of their ridiculous jump-jet move, they never seemed particularly devastating on offense.

The Tau are tough, but not unbeatable. My problem is that they're not terribly fun to play against. They're a shooty army, so naturally one thinks "I'll avoid their shooting by using cover and stealth" except they can easily ignore cover all the time. Then one thinks "I'll stay out of sight until it's the time to strike" except the Tau also have plenty of heavy hitting weapons that don't need line of sight and are twin-linked. Then you think "I'll isolate their units and take them down in close combat" except every unit within 24" lends a hand in overwatch. So an opponent isn't really rewarded for acting tactically. The way to beat them is list building around them, which is hard if you're not planning for only the Tau.

The Eldar are still the only really over-powered race in my opinion. I can fight and sometimes beat the Tau, I can not fight and beat Eldar.

 TheSilo wrote:
I've only played a couple different Tau players, and none of them played more than one riptide. But while they were always a pain to kill primarily because of their ridiculous jump-jet move, they never seemed particularly devastating on offense.

The Tau are tough, but not unbeatable. My problem is that they're not terribly fun to play against. They're a shooty army, so naturally one thinks "I'll avoid their shooting by using cover and stealth" except they can easily ignore cover all the time. Then one thinks "I'll stay out of sight until it's the time to strike" except the Tau also have plenty of heavy hitting weapons that don't need line of sight and are twin-linked. Then you think "I'll isolate their units and take them down in close combat" except every unit within 24" lends a hand in overwatch. So an opponent isn't really rewarded for acting tactically. The way to beat them is list building around them, which is hard if you're not planning for only the Tau.

The Eldar are still the only really over-powered race in my opinion. I can fight and sometimes beat the Tau, I can not fight and beat Eldar.

Shocking that they both have S6/7 spam in common. /sarcasm

Whiskey144 wrote:
Riptides have a spare wound, yes*. They also have access to FNP period, and easy access to high-end invulnerable saves, and very long ranged weapons that keep them away from the guns that can reliably hurt/kill them.

*I find it incredibly stupid that a Riptide has more wounds than a Dreadknight... or really any combat-oriented MC. Riptides should not have more wounds- or really a better armor save either- than dedicated close combat MC, who will actually need the durability since they will take damage when closing with the enemy.

FNP at 35 points, so it's not always a 'period'. I no longer run FNP on my Riptides in <2000 point lists because the points have not been worth it (in my experience). The 5 wounds is probably tied to the downsides of overcharging the nova reactor, which, without fail, have caused 1-2 wounds on my Riptide per game. You also must remember that the s8ap2 large template is tied to a 'Get's hot!' roll, and I average about one 'Get's hot!' roll a game per Riptide.

Most of the time my Nova Reactor rolls have gone to the 4d6" jump move, or to ripple fire the fusion blaster. The 3++ only comes up when I'm bracing for some Grav pain.

I cannot say how OP or 'not-fun' the Tau army is in casual play these days, as I generally play in tournaments and expectations are different - but Tau haven't been too hot in the 'big' tournament scene for 7th and I've yet to steamroll or table my opponents with my Triptide list - with the exception of drop pod armies. Intercepting Riptides are very dangerous. Otherwise, on average, 2 of my 3 riptides will be dead by the end of the game - due to my opponents target priority and my own purposeful positioning/sponging.

Yes, it's overpowered. And yes, with less than 3 Riptides, the Tau are still fun to play against.

andbreak wrote:
FNP at 35 points, so it's not always a 'period'. I no longer run FNP on my Riptides in <2000 point lists because the points have not been worth it (in my experience). The 5 wounds is probably tied to the downsides of overcharging the nova reactor, which, without fail, have caused 1-2 wounds on my Riptide per game. You also must remember that the s8ap2 large template is tied to a 'Get's hot!' roll, and I average about one 'Get's hot!' roll a game per Riptide.

Most of the time my Nova Reactor rolls have gone to the 4d6" jump move, or to ripple fire the fusion blaster. The 3++ only comes up when I'm bracing for some Grav pain.

I cannot say how OP or 'not-fun' the Tau army is in casual play these days, as I generally play in tournaments and expectations are different - but Tau haven't been too hot in the 'big' tournament scene for 7th and I've yet to steamroll or table my opponents with my Triptide list - with the exception of drop pod armies. Intercepting Riptides are very dangerous. Otherwise, on average, 2 of my 3 riptides will be dead by the end of the game - due to my opponents target priority and my own purposeful positioning/sponging.

It is, however, still the case that you can- if you so choose- guarantee FNP on a Riptide. It's not reliably possible to do the same for the Dreadknight.

I also do not accept your explanation for a Riptide having 5 Wounds- if anything, I could turn it around and say that Dreadknights, Carnifexes, and other close-combat/short-range shooting oriented MCs need an extra wound because they will be in the enemy's face very quickly, and in order to actually contribute firepower/capability they have to be within range of almost every single AP2/AP1 weapon in the entire game.

A Riptide can easily sit back and be out of range of everything but Lascannons, which are an expensive and these days fairly uncommon heavy weapon to put on the field.

Further, are you trying to say that it's not possible to just boost a Riptide to BS6 and give it Ignores Cover? Because that solves Gets Hot quite nicely. If you don't buy that particular interpretation of the BS rules, then I'm sure that there's some way that you could easily and cheaply twin-link that Ion Accelerator so that you can ignore Gets Hot effects.

Also, the comment about the 4D6" Nova'd Thrust Move? Yeah, that plays into the whole "Riptides are annoying and unfun because they are practically unkillable". IA Riptides have been one of the biggest reasons that power armored models are becoming more and more invalidated- said T4/3+ (or T3/3+) models have increasingly difficult times actually surviving- even in cover (not that it matters against Tau...). There used to be a time when Marines wanted to be in cover because it was an advantageous position and provided a nice insurance policy against AP3/AP2/AP1 weapons. These days the Marines are more likely to not be on the board- either they're in a metahl bawkse of some kind, or they're simply not taken in a list, because they're far more likely to die against the enormous amount of AP2/AP1 weapons- especially said weapons that sport 5" Blast templates- than do anything remotely useful.

I'd also like to point out that statlines like that of the Riptide do not help the issue- T6/2+ needs some kind of way to be countered, and unfortunately it seems that the best counters are also really good at killing masses of T4/2+ and T4/3+ infantry models.

Whiskey144 wrote:

andbreak wrote:
FNP at 35 points, so it's not always a 'period'. I no longer run FNP on my Riptides in <2000 point lists because the points have not been worth it (in my experience). The 5 wounds is probably tied to the downsides of overcharging the nova reactor, which, without fail, have caused 1-2 wounds on my Riptide per game. You also must remember that the s8ap2 large template is tied to a 'Get's hot!' roll, and I average about one 'Get's hot!' roll a game per Riptide.

Most of the time my Nova Reactor rolls have gone to the 4d6" jump move, or to ripple fire the fusion blaster. The 3++ only comes up when I'm bracing for some Grav pain.

I cannot say how OP or 'not-fun' the Tau army is in casual play these days, as I generally play in tournaments and expectations are different - but Tau haven't been too hot in the 'big' tournament scene for 7th and I've yet to steamroll or table my opponents with my Triptide list - with the exception of drop pod armies. Intercepting Riptides are very dangerous. Otherwise, on average, 2 of my 3 riptides will be dead by the end of the game - due to my opponents target priority and my own purposeful positioning/sponging.

It is, however, still the case that you can- if you so choose- guarantee FNP on a Riptide. It's not reliably possible to do the same for the Dreadknight.

I also do not accept your explanation for a Riptide having 5 Wounds- if anything, I could turn it around and say that Dreadknights, Carnifexes, and other close-combat/short-range shooting oriented MCs need an extra wound because they will be in the enemy's face very quickly, and in order to actually contribute firepower/capability they have to be within range of almost every single AP2/AP1 weapon in the entire game.

A Riptide can easily sit back and be out of range of everything but Lascannons, which are an expensive and these days fairly uncommon heavy weapon to put on the field.

Further, are you trying to say that it's not possible to just boost a Riptide to BS6 and give it Ignores Cover? Because that solves Gets Hot quite nicely. If you don't buy that particular interpretation of the BS rules, then I'm sure that there's some way that you could easily and cheaply twin-link that Ion Accelerator so that you can ignore Gets Hot effects.

Also, the comment about the 4D6" Nova'd Thrust Move? Yeah, that plays into the whole "Riptides are annoying and unfun because they are practically unkillable". IA Riptides have been one of the biggest reasons that power armored models are becoming more and more invalidated- said T4/3+ (or T3/3+) models have increasingly difficult times actually surviving- even in cover (not that it matters against Tau...). There used to be a time when Marines wanted to be in cover because it was an advantageous position and provided a nice insurance policy against AP3/AP2/AP1 weapons. These days the Marines are more likely to not be on the board- either they're in a metahl bawkse of some kind, or they're simply not taken in a list, because they're far more likely to die against the enormous amount of AP2/AP1 weapons- especially said weapons that sport 5" Blast templates- than do anything remotely useful.

I'd also like to point out that statlines like that of the Riptide do not help the issue- T6/2+ needs some kind of way to be countered, and unfortunately it seems that the best counters are also really good at killing masses of T4/2+ and T4/3+ infantry models.

Pretty much this. I don't think Riptide proponents have played many army swaps. The last Tau guy I switched with asked why I even owned BA. That basically sums it up.

Play FE, use all crisis suits.

Martel732 wrote:
They are also overpowered because MCs are overpowered in general. The Ritpides just happens to be a long range MC, which makes it several fold harder to kill.

If MCs are overpowered 'in general', what is your idea of a balancedunit then? Since stuff can only be iverpowered/underpowered by comparison.

LordBlades wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
They are also overpowered because MCs are overpowered in general. The Ritpides just happens to be a long range MC, which makes it several fold harder to kill.

If MCs are overpowered 'in general', what is your idea of a balancedunit then? Since stuff can only be iverpowered/underpowered by comparison.

Compared to walkers, they are incredibly overpowered. Compared to infantry, they are overpowered. They fight at 100% efficacy no matter how many W are missing. That's incredibly powerful right there.

What IS balanced? It's hard to say at this point. Most 7th ed codices are agreed by most people to be "balanced" except Necrons.

Re: the riptide, let me ask this question. You show up to a pick-up game. Your opponent deploys his army. Would you rather see him put down on the table: a riptide, a flyrant with devourers, an imperial knight, or a dreadknight? How about at a tournament?

There's a lot of hate for the ignores cover ability, but IG have an ignores cover order that I don't often hear people complain about. And they can issue orders from out of sight, while markerlights at least have to make themselves vulnerable in order to work.

Martel732 wrote:

LordBlades wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
They are also overpowered because MCs are overpowered in general. The Ritpides just happens to be a long range MC, which makes it several fold harder to kill.

If MCs are overpowered 'in general', what is your idea of a balancedunit then? Since stuff can only be iverpowered/underpowered by comparison.

Compared to walkers, they are incredibly overpowered. Compared to infantry, they are overpowered. They fight at 100% efficacy no matter how many W are missing. That's incredibly powerful right there.

What IS balanced? It's hard to say at this point. Most 7th ed codices are agreed by most people to be "balanced" except Necrons.

Have you thought that Maybewalkers are UP then?. Apart.from knights and maybe the new Skitarii walkers, ypu can remove MCs completely and they stiillwouldn't be worth fielding.

Also, OP in regard to what infantry? Simgle wound cheap infantry, or the likes of Broadsides or Grav Cents?

It's also denatable that 7th codexes are balanced. Personally, I see Cidex Flyrants quite a bit ahead of the pack, while orks and maybe BA a bit behind.

Whiskey144 wrote:

andbreak wrote:
FNP at 35 points, so it's not always a 'period'. I no longer run FNP on my Riptides in <2000 point lists because the points have not been worth it (in my experience). The 5 wounds is probably tied to the downsides of overcharging the nova reactor, which, without fail, have caused 1-2 wounds on my Riptide per game. You also must remember that the s8ap2 large template is tied to a 'Get's hot!' roll, and I average about one 'Get's hot!' roll a game per Riptide.

Most of the time my Nova Reactor rolls have gone to the 4d6" jump move, or to ripple fire the fusion blaster. The 3++ only comes up when I'm bracing for some Grav pain.

I cannot say how OP or 'not-fun' the Tau army is in casual play these days, as I generally play in tournaments and expectations are different - but Tau haven't been too hot in the 'big' tournament scene for 7th and I've yet to steamroll or table my opponents with my Triptide list - with the exception of drop pod armies. Intercepting Riptides are very dangerous. Otherwise, on average, 2 of my 3 riptides will be dead by the end of the game - due to my opponents target priority and my own purposeful positioning/sponging.

It is, however, still the case that you can- if you so choose- guarantee FNP on a Riptide. It's not reliably possible to do the same for the Dreadknight.

I also do not accept your explanation for a Riptide having 5 Wounds- if anything, I could turn it around and say that Dreadknights, Carnifexes, and other close-combat/short-range shooting oriented MCs need an extra wound because they will be in the enemy's face very quickly, and in order to actually contribute firepower/capability they have to be within range of almost every single AP2/AP1 weapon in the entire game.

A Riptide can easily sit back and be out of range of everything but Lascannons, which are an expensive and these days fairly uncommon heavy weapon to put on the field.

Further, are you trying to say that it's not possible to just boost a Riptide to BS6 and give it Ignores Cover? Because that solves Gets Hot quite nicely. If you don't buy that particular interpretation of the BS rules, then I'm sure that there's some way that you could easily and cheaply twin-link that Ion Accelerator so that you can ignore Gets Hot effects.

Also, the comment about the 4D6" Nova'd Thrust Move? Yeah, that plays into the whole "Riptides are annoying and unfun because they are practically unkillable". IA Riptides have been one of the biggest reasons that power armored models are becoming more and more invalidated- said T4/3+ (or T3/3+) models have increasingly difficult times actually surviving- even in cover (not that it matters against Tau...). There used to be a time when Marines wanted to be in cover because it was an advantageous position and provided a nice insurance policy against AP3/AP2/AP1 weapons. These days the Marines are more likely to not be on the board- either they're in a metahl bawkse of some kind, or they're simply not taken in a list, because they're far more likely to die against the enormous amount of AP2/AP1 weapons- especially said weapons that sport 5" Blast templates- than do anything remotely useful.

I'd also like to point out that statlines like that of the Riptide do not help the issue- T6/2+ needs some kind of way to be countered, and unfortunately it seems that the best counters are also really good at killing masses of T4/2+ and T4/3+ infantry models.

I'm not arguing, nor provided any sort of argument, to any of your points - only a personal explanation/thoughts from my own experiences (with the exception of FNP on Riptides being a period, when it's not). It's easy to surmise that the Riptide's 5 wounds is directly correlated to the chances of wounding itself from a GW rules standpoint. We can agree to disagree here.

I don't believe I mentioned anything about boosting a Riptide's BS to 6 or Ignoring Cover. Only that it has a chance to 'Get's hot!' when firing it's s8ap2 large blast (regardless of modifiers that can avoid this, because marker lights are not present 100% of the time). You're extrapolating.

I also made no comparisons between the Riptide and the Dreadknight, because I don't feel as if there's one. The Riptide is better, but they both have their places in their respective army lists. I'll point out that their have been more Dreadknights in Top 10 lists than Riptides in Top 10 lists in the last two big tournaments of 2015 (LVO, Adepticon). There were also 4 Space Marines in the Top 8 LVO, and 5 Space Marines in the top 10 of the Adepticon; but no Tau in those standings. In fact, the highest ranked Tau at Adepticon used a Leviathan detachment with Flyrants.

So once more, in the competitive scene - both national and local - I feel as though Tau (and by extension, the Riptide), through experience and recorded results, are no longer as OP as they were in sixth. My 'tides have died to many different sources, in many different ways, many different times. Anti-proponents of the Riptide should borrow a friend's army and take three to their next competitive tournament. You'll find their weaknesses super quick.

Casual play? I wouldn't know.

office_waaagh wrote:
Re: the riptide, let me ask this question. You show up to a pick-up game. Your opponent deploys his army. Would you rather see him put down on the table: a riptide, a flyrant with devourers, an imperial knight, or a dreadknight? How about at a tournament?

There's a lot of hate for the ignores cover ability, but IG have an ignores cover order that I don't often hear people complain about. And they can issue orders from out of sight, while markerlights at least have to make themselves vulnerable in order to work.

Because the IG orders can only be given to infantry within 12" they cannot confer ignore cover to vehicles or embarked units. If command squads could give ignore cover to leman russ demolishers we'd certainly be hearing about it.

LordBlades wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

LordBlades wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
They are also overpowered because MCs are overpowered in general. The Ritpides just happens to be a long range MC, which makes it several fold harder to kill.

If MCs are overpowered 'in general', what is your idea of a balancedunit then? Since stuff can only be iverpowered/underpowered by comparison.

Compared to walkers, they are incredibly overpowered. Compared to infantry, they are overpowered. They fight at 100% efficacy no matter how many W are missing. That's incredibly powerful right there.

What IS balanced? It's hard to say at this point. Most 7th ed codices are agreed by most people to be "balanced" except Necrons.

Have you thought that Maybewalkers are UP then?. Apart.from knights and maybe the new Skitarii walkers, ypu can remove MCs completely and they stiillwouldn't be worth fielding.

Also, OP in regard to what infantry? Simgle wound cheap infantry, or the likes of Broadsides or Grav Cents?

It's also denatable that 7th codexes are balanced. Personally, I see Cidex Flyrants quite a bit ahead of the pack, while orks and maybe BA a bit behind.

Flyrants are from 6th. Before we got to necrons in 7th, the only unit that I could ever complain about power wise was anything good armed with da lucky stikk. And one OP melee model is pretty easy to deal with, as well as has some answers in the form of heavy flamers or better for the bike version, or ap2 for the mega version.

Most things in the game take 3 or more turns to pay for themselves. IK for example. There's no way they're causing 370 points of damage on t1, especially without ignore cover. Even getting lucky with the melta cannon and 1 shotting a land raider still hasn't paid for the knight. If a model stays alive to turn 6 and keeps doing its job, I expect it to pay for itself roughly 1.5 to 2 times. Even the reaver Titan, a 1450 point model with ranged str d and devastating missile barrages, typically takes 3-4 turns to actually inflict 1450 points of damage to the enemy. If it ever gets stopped from shooting by say, melee, it's efficacy drops sharply.

A riptide can and does pay for itself on turn 1-2 most times I see it played. By turn 6 I usually see them pay for themselves in triplicate if not more.

In all honesty they should have been walkers, complete with vehicle damage chart, along with the other big knights.

A point of hilarity is that a knight paladin vs one riptide at long range (like say, the deployment zone spread,) will actually lose the shooting war with the single riptide with no marker light support, and the tide is literally half it's cost. An even match of 2 tides would be able to get on 2 facings and tear it apart, as long as they use their average 13" movement to stay away from the knight's 12".

The worst thing is that the Riptide breaks with the Tau's whole fish theme. This inconsistency cannot stand, I say! Down with tidal phenomena naming conventions, up with vehicles named after fish!

niv-mizzet wrote:

LordBlades wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

LordBlades wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
They are also overpowered because MCs are overpowered in general. The Ritpides just happens to be a long range MC, which makes it several fold harder to kill.

If MCs are overpowered 'in general', what is your idea of a balancedunit then? Since stuff can only be iverpowered/underpowered by comparison.

Compared to walkers, they are incredibly overpowered. Compared to infantry, they are overpowered. They fight at 100% efficacy no matter how many W are missing. That's incredibly powerful right there.

What IS balanced? It's hard to say at this point. Most 7th ed codices are agreed by most people to be "balanced" except Necrons.

Have you thought that Maybewalkers are UP then?. Apart.from knights and maybe the new Skitarii walkers, ypu can remove MCs completely and they stiillwouldn't be worth fielding.

Also, OP in regard to what infantry? Simgle wound cheap infantry, or the likes of Broadsides or Grav Cents?

It's also denatable that 7th codexes are balanced. Personally, I see Cidex Flyrants quite a bit ahead of the pack, while orks and maybe BA a bit behind.

Flyrants are from 6th. Before we got to necrons in 7th, the only unit that I could ever complain about power wise was anything good armed with da lucky stikk. And one OP melee model is pretty easy to deal with, as well as has some answers in the form of heavy flamers or better for the bike version, or ap2 for the mega version.

Most things in the game take 3 or more turns to pay for themselves. IK for example. There's no way they're causing 370 points of damage on t1, especially without ignore cover. Even getting lucky with the melta cannon and 1 shotting a land raider still hasn't paid for the knight. If a model stays alive to turn 6 and keeps doing its job, I expect it to pay for itself roughly 1.5 to 2 times. Even the reaver Titan, a 1450 point model with ranged str d and devastating missile barrages, typically takes 3-4 turns to actually inflict 1450 points of damage to the enemy. If it ever gets stopped from shooting by say, melee, it's efficacy drops sharply.

A riptide can and does pay for itself on turn 1-2 most times I see it played. By turn 6 I usually see them pay for themselves in triplicate if not more.

In all honesty they should have been walkers, complete with vehicle damage chart, along with the other big knights.

A point of hilarity is that a knight paladin vs one riptide at long range (like say, the deployment zone spread,) will actually lose the shooting war with the single riptide with no marker light support, and the tide is literally half it's cost. An even match of 2 tides would be able to get on 2 facings and tear it apart, as long as they use their average 13" movement to stay away from the knight's 12".

You're (deliberately or not) picking scenarios that favor the Riptide:

-Riptides are pure shooting units. As such their first turns are the most effective, with their efficiency either remaining constant through the game, or dropping off if they get engaged in melee (argument you bring up in relation to titans but not the Riptide). Knights on the other hand are a ranged+melee unit. They start off decent and greatly increase in performance by turn 2-3 when they get into melee. By using 'what turn has the unit paid for itself', you're in fact comparing the Riptide's strongest turns with the knight's weakest.
-You claim Riptide pays for itself in 1-2 turns. The only way it's going to pay for itself in turn 1 is if you have a dumb oponent (who clusters expensive units in a nice blast-shape in a place where you can reach with Markerlights turn 1) and the stars align (no scatter, no gets hot, alldailed invul saves or cover if applicable).
-Knight moves 12 and charges 2d6. This means his threat range is 19 on average, 24 max. How do you plan to indefinitely stay out of a 50" bubble (knight's own base size included) centered on the knight on a 6 ft. by 4ft. table?


EDIT: Personally I feel the MC type should go and die in a fire. I really see nothing that can't be actually reproduced by either infantry or vehicles. As long as MCs exist however, I think having Riptides be MC is the best way to represent the superior construction and mobility they have in fluff compared to Imperial walkers like Dreadnoughts.

The fact that a riptide diminishes effectiveness in melee is fairly well obvious. I would hope on a 40k board that I don't have to state that explicitly. While people play against titans MUCH MUCH less, and I have run into several people that didn't even know they could be locked in melee, and further, that they SUCK in melee, beyond just not dying and fishing for good stomps.

Tides are also super hard to catch. 6" move ignoring terrain, shoot at you, then 2d6" move. If you really need to book it, you can nova for 4d6" and run d6 also for say, turn 7 objective grabs or escaping from a corner. That's an average of 23.5 inches of movement, or as fast as an FMC crosses the table. You could roll hot and leave swooping FMC's in the dust with a 30-36" move. You don't have to stay away from a knight indefinitely. You have to stay away until it dies, which is a lot sooner than "indefinitely."

Thanks to the short sighted weaponskill chart, tides aren't bad in melee, which is supposed to be their weakness. They can easily fight a large selection of independent character badasses like Mephiston, and melee oriented hq's that cost almost as much as the tide itself, only really being scared of the top tier guys with eternal warrior and ap2 weapons like Lysander, abba, Dante etc. I even had an opponent forget about a death co dreadnought (Cassor the damned to be precise) that podded in, he shot at other stuff and didn't boost away. I charged in with Cassor, dealt a couple wounds, then got owned by a smash. True it was a little lucky to blow him up on the first smash, but the fact that the thing even stands a chance against a melee focused dread IN MELEE is just stupid.

And it doesn't take a dumb opponent to make a tide's points back on t1. Have some broadsides glance out a rhino with robotech missile spam, squad has to emergency disembark within THREE inches, put two lights on the 10 man squad, boom, squad dies, sans maybe 1 or 2 guys. 140+ a heavy weapon, a special weapon, and a power weapon/fist on vet sarge. Obviously you should put the weapons and sarge in the back, but they're not going to make it anywhere or be of any use with no more bullet sponges. A few fire warriors or crisis suits can finish them as an after-thought.
And I recently had an enemy tide from the tank hunting formation nova charge to get ordnance and blow my land raider in one shot during a tourney. Are you calling me a dumb player just because a tide rolled a 6 and lighted to negate my ruins cover? I guess you are.

That gun is one of the reasons I don't do marines in rhino/razorbacks. That and serpent shields. They're just too easy to kill for those weapons. And sure enough, they sometimes show up in the same list. I also don't run sanguinary guard almost solely because of the IA. I wish I could run them, but I only do tac lists with zero tailoring, and I don't want to start a game against tau down 200 points on his first shot.

The most fun tau list I ever played against used devil fishes with squads of fire warriors with the pinning assault gun zipping around the field and pinning squads, in addition to backfield support.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

office_waaagh wrote:
Re: the riptide, let me ask this question. You show up to a pick-up game. Your opponent deploys his army. Would you rather see him put down on the table: a riptide, a flyrant with devourers, an imperial knight, or a dreadknight? How about at a tournament?

There's a lot of hate for the ignores cover ability, but IG have an ignores cover order that I don't often hear people complain about. And they can issue orders from out of sight, while markerlights at least have to make themselves vulnerable in order to work.

Casual game? Dreadknight or flyrant. Dread is nice and hops right up to me to die. I just ignore flyrants and get objectives. They're annoying though, mainly because you can't get away from their shots like you can with flying vehicles.

Tournament? Dreadknight, flyrant, or IK. Any of them other than a tide please. I once again ignore flyrants and focus on mission and their ground forces, dread still hops right to me and dies, and IK, well my tourney lists usually involve a lot of melta. Unfortunately melta just sort of annoys riptides. Takes an average of 14 melta shots to down a riptide that hasn't nova shielded and did not buy fnp, whereas I've taken down an obelisk with 3, and a knight with 6. (3 in two different arcs.)

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
I might have a different view on this, because I play with mostly city boards. It seems everybody else in existence fights on flat plains with the occasional tree.

Pretty much, yeah. Flat green tables with felt "terrain" is how the vast majority of 40k games are played, which is why from 5th onward people have been bitching harder and harder about how powerful shooting is and subsequently how OP Tau are.

And you can't just tell people to play with more terrain, they either flat out tell you "No" or give you a thousand excuses as to why their groups won't "let" them or they otherwise just can't. No, the only solution to the problem is either nerfing Tau so hard that the army is literally unplayable on anything but a flat table with no terrain, or just going the "easy" route and removing them from the game entirely, because 1) feth people who like stuff I don't like and 2) everyone has just plain given up on GW knowing how or even wanting to re-balance the game.

Hilariously though they keep buying more Space Marines and sending GW the message that they're doing everything right, despite all the bitching and moaning they do online which is falling on deaf ears.

Anyway, I think it's pretty telling that pretty much every single Tau discussion focuses almost solely on the riptide. It's pretty obvious to me where the problem lies, so I'm not sure why people are still pretending that JSJ'ing crisis suits and pathfinders with markerlights or the god-damned pulse rifle are the most broken thing from any game in the entire history of gaming. Tau were trash before the riptide, and they would still be trash without it.

Martel732 wrote:
They are also overpowered because MCs are overpowered in general. The Ritpides just happens to be a long range MC, which makes it several fold harder to kill.

Man, I must have missed all those Carnifexes ripping up the competitive meta.

No, MCs are not over powered. Their base rules are fine. Some MCs are very very good for their point costs, but that's them and not the fact they're MCs.

 Grey Templar wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
They are also overpowered because MCs are overpowered in general. The Ritpides just happens to be a long range MC, which makes it several fold harder to kill.

Man, I must have missed all those Carnifexes ripping up the competitive meta.

No, MCs are not over powered. Their base rules are fine. Some MCs are very very good for their point costs, but that's them and not the fact they're MCs.

Mediocre MC's DO exist. As a whole though, MC's get a ton of bonuses that some of them shouldn't have. All of them having ap2 melee and a backup land raider-wrecker/character killer ap2 melee attack by default, for example. High numbers of wounds with high toughness and generally good saves and no penalty whatsoever for taking damage until the last wound comes off. Even a super heavy has a random chance of losing extra "wounds" from single shots.

If they had made a tide an AV 14 all-around walker with special jump pack rules, it would still be good, and definitely underpriced compared to monoliths and land raiders, but I would fear them less. T6 2+/5++ 5w is just absolutely intense to try and get through. That's like primarch levels of defense right there. And if it WERE a vehicle, a single pen would knock it out for a round, at the very least, or possibly blow off the IA and neuter it.

I'd be OK with that if vehicles weren't so fragile. They haven't yet figured out the sweet spot for vehicles yet.

Alcibiades wrote:
The worst thing is that the Riptide breaks with the Tau's whole fish theme. This inconsistency cannot stand, I say! Down with tidal phenomena naming conventions, up with vehicles named after fish!

This is by far the most useful addition to this (useless) thread. You got exalted for that.

Here's the deal:

If you're not a tournament player, that's fine. There's no "right" way to play the game. But, if that's your milieu, just agree not to play each other with things you collectively deem "OP." Isn't the whole point of playing friendly games to keep it friendly? If I showed up to my local FLGS with a list and someone's face turned sour reading it, I'd just bring something else. The point is to have fun...isn't it? (Personally I think the point is to have fun at tournaments too; but you have to like the idea of getting your butt kicked sometimes to get better)

What I don't understand about this whole sentiment about Riptides (or Knights, or Flyrants or entire armies!) is that if you don't play in tournaments, you can choose your opponents!

Complaining is pointless. Making "OP" units is actually great for GW's business model. Some players are attracted to them for the rules, and then others are forced to compensate by either ALSO buying one or buying an equivalent unit to respond in kind.

It will never change. Either adapt and overcome, or find some opponents who share your 40k worldview.

 The Shrike wrote:

Alcibiades wrote:
The worst thing is that the Riptide breaks with the Tau's whole fish theme. This inconsistency cannot stand, I say! Down with tidal phenomena naming conventions, up with vehicles named after fish!

This is by far the most useful addition to this (useless) thread. You got exalted for that.

Here's the deal:

If you're not a tournament player, that's fine. There's no "right" way to play the game. But, if that's your milieu, just agree not to play each other with things you collectively deem "OP." Isn't the whole point of playing friendly games to keep it friendly? If I showed up to my local FLGS with a list and someone's face turned sour reading it, I'd just bring something else. The point is to have fun...isn't it? (Personally I think the point is to have fun at tournaments too; but you have to like the idea of getting your butt kicked sometimes to get better)

What I don't understand about this whole sentiment about Riptides (or Knights, or Flyrants or entire armies!) is that if you don't play in tournaments, you can choose your opponents!

Complaining is pointless. Making "OP" units is actually great for GW's business model. Some players are attracted to them for the rules, and then others are forced to compensate by either ALSO buying one or buying an equivalent unit to respond in kind.

It will never change. Either adapt and overcome, or find some opponents who share your 40k worldview.

I suppose the heart of the issue is twofold. One of my concerns is that my opponents don't seem to like playing against my army. Again, I don't think my lists are terribly cheesy and I rarely play a straight gunline, but people just don't have fun when crisis suits are raining down on their backfield and fire warriors are firing 30+ S5 shots at BS5 with ignores cover. It's not that there aren't ways to counter it, it just seems to frustrate people rather than give them a fun challenge. So my question for people that feel that way is, why? Why is a green tide of a hundred fearless, FnP Boyz bubble-wrapping a bunch of klaw nobz that can run and charge on the same turn a jolly good game and Tau anything seems to be a chore. How can I make a list that would be fun AND challenging to play against.

As for the riptide, I guess the question is a) am I going to get raged at for using it in a pick-up game, and b) when I play league games/mini-tournaments is it still going to be competitive against all the other stuff that people can bring. I've been playing orks mostly the last year or so, and I'd like to bring my Tau back out for a change of pace, but the meta's shifted in the meantime in ways that seem not terribly kind to the servants of the greater good in general and the riptide in particular. My riptide has been a bit of a disappointment relative to what I'd hoped he'd do, so I'm wondering if building a list around the broadside/riptide combo is still as much of an auto-win/auto-get-stabbed-in-the-parking-lot-afterwards as it once was.

Seriously, mobile tau is the answer to all that. The problem is that tau are incentivized away from that, because of the cost of the devilfish.

Their base rules might be fine, but their point values, in general, are NOT fine.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

office_waaagh wrote:
Re: the riptide, let me ask this question. You show up to a pick-up game. Your opponent deploys his army. Would you rather see him put down on the table: a riptide, a flyrant with devourers, an imperial knight, or a dreadknight? How about at a tournament?

There's a lot of hate for the ignores cover ability, but IG have an ignores cover order that I don't often hear people complain about. And they can issue orders from out of sight, while markerlights at least have to make themselves vulnerable in order to work.

I'll fight the dreadknight over any of those others all day every day.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Sidstyler wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
I might have a different view on this, because I play with mostly city boards. It seems everybody else in existence fights on flat plains with the occasional tree.

Pretty much, yeah. Flat green tables with felt "terrain" is how the vast majority of 40k games are played, which is why from 5th onward people have been bitching harder and harder about how powerful shooting is and subsequently how OP Tau are.

And you can't just tell people to play with more terrain, they either flat out tell you "No" or give you a thousand excuses as to why their groups won't "let" them or they otherwise just can't. No, the only solution to the problem is either nerfing Tau so hard that the army is literally unplayable on anything but a flat table with no terrain, or just going the "easy" route and removing them from the game entirely, because 1) feth people who like stuff I don't like and 2) everyone has just plain given up on GW knowing how or even wanting to re-balance the game.

Hilariously though they keep buying more Space Marines and sending GW the message that they're doing everything right, despite all the bitching and moaning they do online which is falling on deaf ears.

Anyway, I think it's pretty telling that pretty much every single Tau discussion focuses almost solely on the riptide. It's pretty obvious to me where the problem lies, so I'm not sure why people are still pretending that JSJ'ing crisis suits and pathfinders with markerlights or the god-damned pulse rifle are the most broken thing from any game in the entire history of gaming. Tau were trash before the riptide, and they would still be trash without it.

They would still have S7 spam, which ALSO kills marine armies like they are going out of style. Or really anything that's not a 2+ save MC or AV 14.

I have never lost a game against tau with my spacewolves, not once. Drop pod full of blood claws with a flamer and a rune priest using tempestus with the helm of durfast. Sky claws, swift claws, and thunder wolves rushing upfield, infiltrating wolf scouts in a razorback with twinlinked heavy bolters. The gun line doesn't hold, period. Blood claws main failing is lack of ws4, they hit almost all tau units on 3s, then wound on the same. Hitting someone with ignores cover, twinlinked Tesla cannons in the psychic phase puts out a world of hurt. And the heavy bolters just chew through fire warriors. Hit units behind other units and eliminate the supporting fire option altogether.

To answer the op's query, they are far from overpowered, and can be a lot of fun. Just remember to not try to beat them at shooting, beat them at everything else!

SW are usually a great match up for Tau, because they completely turn off their chapter tactic. High quality Tau lists will eat those infiltrators. If heavy bolters were any kind of a solution for anything, people would actually use them.

A properly built wolfstar is very difficult for Tau to beat. If you can manage to get invisibility, it's even better. Either way, you force the Tau player to play to the objectives. And that's if they're a mobile army with reserves drop in behind the star. If it's a gunline, they're cooked.

As for BA, you have the best Stormraven variant. In fact, they're perfect for killing Riptides. In addition, they can carry things you can kick off the ramp to charge on subsequent turns. Even if they never make it, they force the Tau player to shoot at them while your backfield assault squads in rhinos take objectives.

I'm sick of this thread. Tau had barely above 50 percent win shares at LVO and NOVA. I can't speak for Adepticon, I haven't seen the numbers but I highly suspect it's the same. They are a middling army people.

Find something else to complain about or get better at the game.

The Riptide is NOT overpowered in any way shape or form, the only thing that needs to be changed is the cost of the Ion Accelerator, increase its points cost. Other then that there is nothing wrong if it. This is from experience playing both with it AND against it. Also to everyone complaining about the JSJ and markerlights also need to cool their jets, almost every army has the ability to ignore rules like that in some way its not solely the Tau. Markerlights though good are not hard to kill (a T3 or T4 model with only a 4+ or 5+ save) and the JSJ is something that makes the Tau unique. Overall Tau hate and Riptide hate is completely overdone and exaggerated to ridiculous levels more often then not.

Also yes it is very possible to build a competitive Tau list without Riptides, the best Tau player at my FLGS refuses to take a Riptide because he feels they are garbage compared to other things in the army and has done very well without them. He runs a Fish of Fury style list with lots of Devilfish, Piranhas and Skyrays.

 The Shrike wrote:
A properly built wolfstar is very difficult for Tau to beat. If you can manage to get invisibility, it's even better. Either way, you force the Tau player to play to the objectives. And that's if they're a mobile army with reserves drop in behind the star. If it's a gunline, they're cooked.

As for BA, you have the best Stormraven variant. In fact, they're perfect for killing Riptides. In addition, they can carry things you can kick off the ramp to charge on subsequent turns. Even if they never make it, they force the Tau player to shoot at them while your backfield assault squads in rhinos take objectives.

I'm sick of this thread. Tau had barely above 50 percent win shares at LVO and NOVA. I can't speak for Adepticon, I haven't seen the numbers but I highly suspect it's the same. They are a middling army people.

Find something else to complain about or get better at the game.

Stormravens are terrible against Riptides. What are you talking about? Overcosted firepower is not a solution. Also, your army gets blasted apart while you wait for the stupid things to arrive from reserves.

Martel732 wrote:
Stormravens are terrible against Riptides. What are you talking about? Overcosted firepower is not a solution. Also, your army gets blasted apart while you wait for the stupid things to arrive from reserves.

S8 AP2 Missiles and being armor 12 all around allow you to damage a Riptide pretty well and make it hard for it to take you out.

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Stormravens are terrible against Riptides. What are you talking about? Overcosted firepower is not a solution. Also, your army gets blasted apart while you wait for the stupid things to arrive from reserves.

S8 AP2 Missiles and being armor 12 all around allow you to damage a Riptide pretty well and make it hard for it to take you out.

You need many more AP 2 shots than the Stormraven can generate to engage a Riptide effectively.

Its actually not a bad investment at all especially if it only makes up part of your army, and if your army is getting blasted apart maybe change up your tactics? No offense man in our past debates regarding it you clearly wont be okay with the Riptide until it is nerfed into the ground so badly that your army could walk all over it it seems....

 gmaleron wrote:
Its actually not a bad investment at all especially if it only makes up part of your army, and if your army is getting blasted apart maybe change up your tactics? No offense man in our past debates regarding it you clearly wont be okay with the Riptide until it is nerfed into the ground so badly that your army could walk all over it it seems....

No, I just want it costed appropriately for its firepower and durability. Durability that every Tau player seems to play down. The BA, for example, have nothing even close. Not even our Lord of War.

Ah yes, the magic "tactic" argument. Where's the tactics against 60" pie plates of doom on a platform that takes dozens of AP 2 shots to bring down? I can space my models and pray they roll bad. Some tactic.

The Dreadknight is a damn joke compared to the Riptide. It often shunts itself to it's own doom. Not exactly fearsome. Being close sucks. Being 60" away is good.

Martel732 wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:
Its actually not a bad investment at all especially if it only makes up part of your army, and if your army is getting blasted apart maybe change up your tactics? No offense man in our past debates regarding it you clearly wont be okay with the Riptide until it is nerfed into the ground so badly that your army could walk all over it it seems....

No, I just want it costed appropriately for its firepower and durability. Durability that every Tau player seems to play down. The BA, for example, have nothing even close. Not even our Lord of War.

Ah yes, the magic "tactic" argument. Where's the tactics against 60" pie plates of doom on a platform that takes dozens of AP 2 shots to bring down? I can space my models and pray they roll bad. Some tactic.

Drop Pods? BA have access to a very powerful Drop Pod army and again you bring this up. You must play on the largest tables in exsitence because for some reason you never are in range of a Riptide. Looking at the base Riptide you tell me what makes it undercosted because when compared to other MC's especially the Dreadkinght it is PERFECTLY costed and unlike the Dreadknight it cant hurt itself 1/3 of the time. And again that is where tactics come in with the Dreadknight, generally you run them in pairs and jump them both on one flank and decimate that flank. If you are jumping your Dreadknight into positions where it will get obliterated with shooting the following turn then that is poor tactical decision making.

Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Correction: I'm within range of them with lascannons. Do you know how many lascannons it takes to kill a Riptide? It's insane.

Two dreadknights shooting can't decimate my flanks in one turn. Then they die. But five rounds of Riptide shooting sure can wreck an entire list. I don't give GK players a choice. The shunt into kill zones or shunt too far away to hurt me. Either way, they are eating a crap ton of grav and plasma that the Riptide never has to worry about.

As a BA player, I can tell you first hand how much it SUCKS to have to come to your opponent in this game.

Martel732 wrote:
Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Calling bull on that man, I have seen many Drop Pod armies in both local tournaments and others abroad that have done pretty well, saying "its not TAC" is not an excuse especially outside the tournament setting.

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Calling bull on that man, I have seen many Drop Pod armies in both local tournaments and others abroad that have done pretty well, saying "its not TAC" is not an excuse especially outside the tournament setting.

Okay. But I'd much rather face pods than Riptides. And I can't image what these pod lists are doing vs Orks, Nids, or Demons. Drop in and get their faces torn off?

Martel732 wrote:
Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Correction: I'm within range of them with lascannons. Do you know how many lascannons it takes to kill a Riptide? It's insane.

Two dreadknights shooting can't decimate my flanks in one turn. Then they die. But five rounds of Riptide shooting sure can wreck an entire list. I don't give GK players a choice. The shunt into kill zones or shunt too far away to hurt me. Either way, they are eating a crap ton of grav and plasma that the Riptide never has to worry about.

As a BA player, I can tell you first hand how much it SUCKS to have to come to your opponent in this game.

-Refuse to believe you are only EVER within 48 inches range of a Riptide during the whole game

-You are basing this off if they are playing against another Marine player, I have SEEN Dreadknights obliterate armies by themselves, just because in your experience you havent does not mean you are automatically right. In most cases against Xenos forces especially the Dreadknights do a very good job when they shunt forward SMARTLY and take care of things.

 The Shrike wrote:

Stormravens are terrible against Riptides. What are you talking about? Overcosted firepower is not a solution. Also, your army gets blasted apart while you wait for the stupid things to arrive from reserves.

Martel732 wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Calling bull on that man, I have seen many Drop Pod armies in both local tournaments and others abroad that have done pretty well, saying "its not TAC" is not an excuse especially outside the tournament setting.

Okay. But I'd much rather face pods than Riptides. And I can't image what these pod lists are doing vs Orks, Nids, or Demons. Drop in and get their faces torn off?

I've seen Calgar pod lists troll Orks, Nids and Daemons right off the table; ask the #1 ranked player on Torrent of Fire, Matt Defranza. He'll tell you all about the effectiveness of drop marines, including in GT settings.

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Correction: I'm within range of them with lascannons. Do you know how many lascannons it takes to kill a Riptide? It's insane.

Two dreadknights shooting can't decimate my flanks in one turn. Then they die. But five rounds of Riptide shooting sure can wreck an entire list. I don't give GK players a choice. The shunt into kill zones or shunt too far away to hurt me. Either way, they are eating a crap ton of grav and plasma that the Riptide never has to worry about.

As a BA player, I can tell you first hand how much it SUCKS to have to come to your opponent in this game.

-Refuse to believe you are only EVER within 48 inches range of a Riptide during the whole game

-You are basing this off if they are playing against another Marine player, I have SEEN Dreadknights obliterate armies by themselves, just because in your experience you havent does not mean you are automatically right. In most cases against Xenos forces especially the Dreadknights do a very good job when they shunt forward SMARTLY and take care of things.

Xeno players need to do a better job of setting up kill zones then. The Dreadknight is so much easier to game against than the Riptide it's pathetic.

Martel732 wrote:
Okay. But I'd much rather face pods than Riptides. And I can't image what these pod lists are doing vs Orks, Nids, or Demons. Drop in and get their faces torn off?

Heard of Heavy Flamers? Also just because you are a Drop Pod army does not mean you have to play aggresively, I have seen the "Wall" tactic work really well especially against Tyranid MC spam. You form a wall of Drop Pods back from the enemy and use them as cover to punish the advancing forces. Drop Pods coming in the second and later waves take advantage of mistakes made by the advancing army or exploit openings made my forces on the tables fire.

Martel732 wrote:
Xeno players need to do a better job of setting up kill zones then. The Dreadknight is so much easier to game against than the Riptide it's pathetic.

And there you have it, TACTICS.

The magic tactic argument. Love it.

Your comment just made my point "xenos players should set up better killzones" IS a tactic. And just like they have ways to effectively handle a Dreadknight there are effective ways to handle a Riptide wether you choose to use them or not is up to you. It seems like every month you start a rant about the Riptide and if your going to ignore all the advice given to you then its not our fault.

 gmaleron wrote:
Your comment just made my point "xenos players should set up better killzones" IS a tactic. And just like they have ways to effectively handle a Dreadknight there are effective ways to handle a Riptide wether you choose to use them or not is up to you. It seems like every month you start a rant about the Riptide and if your going to ignore all the advice given to you then its not our fault.

So use drop pods in a desperate attempt to try to put wounds on the thing and then have the Tau list blow me apart on turn two?

Oh the drama, stop being a negative nancy Drop Pods are quite EFFECTIVE against Tau, if you were paying attention.

I never really thought Tau were OP as a whole, but the thread is about the Riptide. And it is certainly still OP. Basically, I see games against Tau as a race to kill their normal units before the invici-Tides kill everything.

Speaking of tactics, I don't really understand why people don't set up to minimize alpha strike damage against pod lists. The pods do start getting in each other's way.

Martel732 wrote:
I never really thought Tau were OP, but the thread is about the Riptide. And it is certainly still OP. Basically, I see games against Tau as a race to kill their normal units before the invici-Tides kill everything.

Speaking of tactics, I don't really understand why people don't set up to minimize alpha strike damage against pod lists. The pods do start getting in each other's way.

And im telling you you're wrong, the base Riptide is fine but the Ion Accelerator does need a points increase. And people do, its just more often then not that the Firepower coming out of said disembarking units break up your defense.

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I never really thought Tau were OP, but the thread is about the Riptide. And it is certainly still OP. Basically, I see games against Tau as a race to kill their normal units before the invici-Tides kill everything.

Speaking of tactics, I don't really understand why people don't set up to minimize alpha strike damage against pod lists. The pods do start getting in each other's way.

And im telling you you're wrong, the base Riptide is fine but the Ion Accelerator does need a points increase. And people do, its just more often then not that the Firepower coming out of said disembarking units break up your defense.

I don't think I'm wrong. The base Riptide is WAY too durable for its cost.

The base Riptide has the same exact stats as a Dreadkinght except only having 1 more wound and it is 50pts. more expensive base. So taking that into account it means for 50pts. we get our Nova generator which hurts us 1/3 of the time (a statistic that is OFTEN overlooked by non Tau players, 1/3 chance to fail is not great) and an additional wound which is a fair points cost

 gmaleron wrote:
The base Riptide has the same exact stats as a Dreadkinght except only having 1 more wound and it is 50pts. more expensive base. So taking that into account it means for 50pts. we get our Nova generator which hurts us 1/3 of the time (a statistic that is OFTEN overlooked by non Tau players, 1/3 chance to fail is not great) and an additional wound which is a fair points cost

Whoa that is not true, RIPTIDE comes with a gun, jetpack movement, and a goddamn choice to nova.

Dreadknight comes with nothing except terminator armor and two fists, everything has to be bought.

 Quickjager wrote:
Whoa that is not true, RIPTIDE comes with a gun, jetpack movement, and a goddamn choice to nova.

Dreadknight comes with nothing except terminator armor and two fists, everything has to be bought.

... and the Aegis special rule, PE: Demons, a psyker level/warp charge, and +3 WS, +1BS, +1LD over the Riptide.

Martel732 wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I never really thought Tau were OP, but the thread is about the Riptide. And it is certainly still OP. Basically, I see games against Tau as a race to kill their normal units before the invici-Tides kill everything.

Speaking of tactics, I don't really understand why people don't set up to minimize alpha strike damage against pod lists. The pods do start getting in each other's way.

And im telling you you're wrong, the base Riptide is fine but the Ion Accelerator does need a points increase. And people do, its just more often then not that the Firepower coming out of said disembarking units break up your defense.

I don't think I'm wrong. The base Riptide is WAY too durable for its cost.

Only if you don't take the 1w it will on average inflict to itself every 3 turns with Nova Charge.

The Riptide is still pretty good. I dusted off my Tau today (at the request of someone at the store) and played against his Space-Wolves. The game was not even remotely even. I almost feel dirty. Time to put them back into their box again..

Bleh.

Not sure about how they fare in competitive 40k nowadays (against things like Knights and Super-heavies) but casually they are rock solid.

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Stormravens are terrible against Riptides. What are you talking about? Overcosted firepower is not a solution. Also, your army gets blasted apart while you wait for the stupid things to arrive from reserves.

S8 AP2 Missiles and being armor 12 all around allow you to damage a Riptide pretty well and make it hard for it to take you out.

What? Have you even played against tau? A stormraven lasts 1 turn before being high yield missile podded to death, costs more than the riptide, and will get lucky to stick 3 wounds on a tide that is in the open, not nova shielding, and is lacking fnp.

I also saw the same old "loses a wound every 3rd turn" comment somewhere. It's silly tactics to nova charge every turn. Don't do it unless you really need it for something that nothing else in your army can handle. You will be amazed at how much longer your tides last. The nova charge is generally a newbie trap, and only worth risking in very specific situations.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gmaleron wrote:
The base Riptide has the same exact stats as a Dreadkinght except only having 1 more wound and it is 50pts. more expensive base. So taking that into account it means for 50pts. we get our Nova generator which hurts us 1/3 of the time (a statistic that is OFTEN overlooked by non Tau players, 1/3 chance to fail is not great) and an additional wound which is a fair points cost

...oh here it was. Yeah don't nova charge every turn just because it's a big shiny red button. It IS a pure upside, because you don't HAVE to use it, but it's there if things go south and you need the tide to pull even more weight than usual in an emergency.

And the dreadknight isn't as bad because it has to come right up to you to work some magic, and that means that it must purchase an upgrade bringing it to just 20 under a tide or it's foot slogging. And then it needs guns, or it's just going to pop over and wave at the enemy while they shoot it to death. The cheapest one alone brings it right up to equal with a tide. (Sans the 5 point IA.)

The tide however gets to hide like a coward and still have significant output all game from 10 miles down the road.

So yeah, I agree with Martel and the other hundreds of people that have been saying the same thing since the tide showed up: it is too damn durable for its cost, AND the IA is undercosted.

niv-mizzet wrote:
I also saw the same old "loses a wound every 3rd turn" comment somewhere. It's silly tactics to nova charge every turn. Don't do it unless you really need it for something that nothing else in your army can handle. You will be amazed at how much longer your tides last. The nova charge is generally a newbie trap, and only worth risking in very specific situations.

It's only brought up when the omnipresent "4d6 jump/3++" is brought up. Apparently, it never turns off.

Another point to consider with the Dreadknight, is that most people forget you're paying for a level one psyker. This means you're getting an extra warp charge. I've yet to run into a Gray Knight army that did not have a Librarian in it. And truthfully, the only Gray Knight army I've seen in the competitive circuit is the DraigoStar. The synergy of 2-3 jump monstrous creatures that also add warp charges with that list is amazing.

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Calling bull on that man, I have seen many Drop Pod armies in both local tournaments and others abroad that have done pretty well, saying "its not TAC" is not an excuse especially outside the tournament setting.

Matchups are important bro. With pods especially. If you just get matched against a natural counter, you can't decide to not have pods come in. You just come in and die. I did well at a recent ITC tourney with a half-pod army, but I was really lucky with both matchups and mission types. I ended up ranking over several lists that would have crushed me hard without ever playing them.

niv-mizzet wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Calling bull on that man, I have seen many Drop Pod armies in both local tournaments and others abroad that have done pretty well, saying "its not TAC" is not an excuse especially outside the tournament setting.

Matchups are important bro. With pods especially. If you just get matched against a natural counter, you can't decide to not have pods come in. You just come in and die. I did well at a recent ITC tourney with a half-pod army, but I was really lucky with both matchups and mission types. I ended up ranking over several lists that would have crushed me hard without ever playing them.

You can however decide all/some come in empty. Depending what ypu are up against, droping empty pods to.use as roadblocks/claim Objectives is a valid tactic.

Also, the fact that you get good offense withput Nova Charge is an IA flaw. A HBC Riptide hits like a wet rag without Nova Charge.

Martel732 wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Calling bull on that man, I have seen many Drop Pod armies in both local tournaments and others abroad that have done pretty well, saying "its not TAC" is not an excuse especially outside the tournament setting.

Okay. But I'd much rather face pods than Riptides. And I can't image what these pod lists are doing vs Orks, Nids, or Demons. Drop in and get their faces torn off?

Drop in and dakka the feth out of a flyrant before it takes to the air, because you got first turn? Or drop in at the correct angle to murder some of their venom / malanthropes (sp) which are critical to their army?

Drop in and dakka the feth out of the back of some ork Battlewagons / other vehicles so that a large chunk of their army can't close.. Or cripple a scary unit they want to bring to your largely unharmed, like Nobz. Or murderize their big-guns, which are extraordinarily important?

Demons.. Basically the same as nids. Drop in and dakka the feth out of something.

At the end of the day, even if there is literally not a single viable way to drop into their lines.. You can still use the drop pods to make a wall and bottle neck the feth out of those armies you mentioned. Buying yourself at least one more turn of shooting in 90% of cases. For just over 100 points, three drop-pods can stop a green tide dead in its tracks for a single turn if positioned correctly. That's pretty fething powerful.

Drop in and dakka the feth out of a flyrant before it takes to the air, because you got first turn?
Don't they always stand in circle blocking LoS to a venom and jink to get +2cover, to avoid incoming fire in case of stolen turn 1?

The problem I have with Riptides and Tau in general is that it's an army that makes me not want to field most of my army.

Anything that has not got an invulnerable save is screwed. If stuff survives it's not because I 'strategically placed it in cover' or 'kept it out of range', it's either because of bad dice rolls or because it's that one model in the unit with an invuln save.

They say 40K is all about list building and has 0 tactics, I don't think that's true but Tau are very close to making it true.

DaPino wrote:
The problem I have with Riptides and Tau in general is that it's an army that makes me not want to field most of my army.

Anything that has not got an invulnerable save is screwed. If stuff survives it's not because I 'strategically placed it in cover' or 'kept it out of range', it's either because of bad dice rolls or because it's that one model in the unit with an invuln save.

They say 40K is all about list building and has 0 tactics, I don't think that's true but Tau are very close to making it true.

I find that's the mark of a real design problem; do you still feel like you as the player are contributing to the success or failure of your army? The way Tau fight; line up, shoot a lot, ignore most of the rules which protect one from shooting is really bad design used so heavily. They should be the army where certain units can bend the rules, that's their kitsch, but when the opponent will see half their army blown off the table a turn with no saves allowed? Eldar do much the same, but also basically ignore most attempts to damage them.

Beyond balance, however, consider Daemons. They can do some insane broken bs, but from a design standpoint, when one fights them, you either have enough shooting to grind through their invulns, or they will close and mulch you. What you do in-game doesn't matter all that much, more did you bring enough firepower or volume of attacks to kill or not. It's a combination of high power codexes who are designed in such a way that reduce tactical significance of your choices which weaken the game enormously.

Wow, Martel is the biggest troll ever...

Also, why do people always forget that Space Marines (in particular Blood Angels) ignore the most rules which is why they're favoured by young children.

I'm sorry, but I am fething SICK of this thread.

Every godamn time it comes up the "riptide so OP" people use arguments that are either:

1-"Schrodinger's riptide", who is someone activating NOVA every turn, never failing and getting every damn buff on the list at once, while also equipping all the possible useful upgrades (despite being limited to 2 of the list) and for free.

2-Mathematically false, or simple assuming a chain of rolls that depend on each other happens without a single fail, while the enemy player fails every single thing he could fail.

3-Scenarios that are absurdly set up in favor of the tau considering terrain, enemy units and placement.

4-Assuming the opponent is doing multiple mistakes at once as the "plausible" scenario. sometimes mistakes at listbuilding level, sometimes at deployment level and sometimes at reaction level, but usually multiple of them, and mistakes that even a noob should not make.

5-A combination of the above.


And I'll demonstrate:

niv-mizzet wrote:

And it doesn't take a dumb opponent to make a tide's points back on t1. Have some broadsides glance out a rhino with robotech missile spam, squad has to emergency disembark within THREE inches, put two lights on the 10 man squad, boom, squad dies, sans maybe 1 or 2 guys. 140+ a heavy weapon, a special weapon, and a power weapon/fist on vet sarge. Obviously you should put the weapons and sarge in the back, but they're not going to make it anywhere or be of any use with no more bullet sponges. A few fire warriors or crisis suits can finish them as an after-thought.

Every single note of what is silly in the scenario is in ()

So, you "not dumb" marine player has placed a 10-man unit of marines in a rhino with both a special and a heavy (subpar unit) placed his rhino outside cover, let alone LOS blocking (deployment) in range of the missile suits AND the markerlights (deployment again), and did NOT combat squad them (will be relevant later, but who does not combat squad with heavy and special?)

Then the at least two broadsides, as one will not kill a rhino, opened fire (free broadsides apparently) to force the emergency disembark, the marines either disembarked all at one direction (not squadded, if they were the two would SPLIT UP), not used the rhino to block LOS to at least some guys (reaction mistake to save some dudes), the markerlights hit (free pathfinders too apparently) netting lets say 3 marks from 6 pathfinders, to keep it chap yet believable, so riptide gets +1BS and ignore cover, he then proceed to shoot (1/6 to get hot ignored) his large blast, do not scatter (about 33% to scatter completely off when a unit is that crowded), and not a single "1" is rolled on to-wound (silly rolls)


So that "riptide easily kills his point T1" scenario assumed the riptide has no upgrades that make him cost more (and does not come into play in this scenario), shooting at an already bad unit, having 200 points worth of free support units, the marine player making 4 different mistakes, and that there was not a fail on any of the following five dice events: broadsides kill rhino, pathfinders mark, gets hot, scatter, wound.

Oh, but he DID say some will survive, the heavy, special and sarge naturally are the likely, but they are "not going to survive to get anywhere". I assume the unit that kills the remaining (and most important) squad members is also free?
A bunch of fire warriors or crisis suits will cost about 100 more in order to take them out before they do any damage themselves, as the scenario claims.

Yea, I'd say that taking 5 dice events that range from 1/6 to 1/3 chance to fail EACH in order for a combination of dedicated shooters to kill less than half their cost of SUBPAR units that made multiple mistakes not being really overpowering.


I'd say the fact tau do not take any top spots in turnies would make it obvoius that they are NOT op, but apparently people regard the top turny players as idiots who do not know their stuff.





Moving on, as someone here mentioned, NOVAing every turn is a mistake, and without it you ARE durable.
Not wrong, just ignoring the bigger picture-without NOVAing every turn you have both your defense and offensive powers down. NOVA is required to turn on the very things you complain about, and a riptide that does not NOVA, is not a threat.

The ONLY reason NOVA is not mandatory for riptide, is the fact the Ion Accelerator has the non-NOVA blast profile. that tiny "fix" or removing that part of its profile will turn the riptide into a docile machine, that either NOVA to be a tank, NOVA to be a cannon, or do neither and does not much damage, while not being too hard to kill, as I've proven in about 15 different threats about the subject so far.

The HBC for example, the "bare bones" version of the tide, never was a turny top-dog, even in the days of taudar. because it DOES need the NOVA, and needing the NOVA makes it a problem not only because it wounds you, but because it can fizzle unexpectedly and ruin your plans. its introducing a random element into your army in an army who is all about negating as many random elements as possible, and in return you get flexibility.
Have you SEEN the LVO top 8?
The "bad" CSM was up there, "OP tau" was not.



And anyone who calls it as a "well, I cant really respond to it" problem deserves a slapping, especially if he is a marine player-as their drop pod lists for YEARS have all been about ruining your opponents army without ever giving him a chance to respond.
Every single alpha-strike list ever introduced is about that. and tau were never top of the alpha-strike lists.


I won't even get started on how pathetic half the tables people play on are, and how absurdly in favor of gunlines they are, but when you use less than half the recommended terrain as per rulebook, do not wonder why things get absurd with gunlines!

But the claims that "assault is dead and therefor tau are too good as a shooting army" are the top of silliness, as even my tau will, on nearly every game, INITIATE and assault. and if my tau can pull that off, I'm sure that every unit that is actually DESIGENED to do so will pull it off by any competent player.
Lets go back to LVO, because on the top 8 we had a white scars assault bikers list. again noting-zero tau present.

You the man, Boomwolf! Say it how it is!

Well said Boomwolf I totally agree that the Riptide and Tau hate overall is completely overblown and unnecessary most of the time. I'm also quite tired of hearing people complain about a unit that apparently by itself will wipe out entire armies, never is in range of enemy guns and is just invincible! I wouldn't get so annoyed by it except when they ignore all of the perks their particular book gets, and this especially goes for Imperial armies who have the best advantage in the game with being battle brothers with every other single Imperial Army out there for the most part. Is the Riptide durable? You bet I hope it's durable especially if I'm paying anywhere between 200 to 240 points for one. Is it the invincible behemoth several players make it out to be? Not even close and I apologize to the OP because it seems that no matter what Tau thread comes up it always turns into Riptide hate, especially somebody to the people who despite me another player stating several tactics to do with them choose to ignore it and complain especially the people who despite me another players stating several tactics to deal with them choose to ignore them and complain.

Trying to get this thread back on topic one of the nastiest lists ive seen is a mechanized Tau army. The best Tau player I've seen never runs Riptides due to the fact that he feels that there a point sink and has had a lot of success not utilizing the Gunline or Riptide spam. Not only is this list durable because you can give the entire army a 3+ jink save but you also have lots of smart missiles to handle infantry, EMP grenade Fire Warriors to deal with vehicles along with a few deep striking Crisis Suit teams, Sky Rays for marker light and anti vehicle / air support and squadrons of piranhas to lay down lots of fire.

". I'm also quite tired of hearing people complain about a unit that apparently by itself will wipe out entire armies, never is in range of enemy guns and is just invincible"

Sorry. Not really.

" if I'm paying anywhere between 200 to 240 points for one."

Go look at the gak 200-240 buys me in the BA codex.

I don't think you tactics mathematically work out. That's why I don't stop complaining.

" it seems that no matter what Tau thread comes up it always turns into Riptide hate"

The Riptide is in the SUBJECT of the thread! If OP didn't want to hear about the Riptide, maybe they shouldn't have asked about the Riptide.

"I won't even get started on how pathetic half the tables people play on are, and how absurdly in favor of gunlines they are, but when you use less than half the recommended terrain as per rulebook, do not wonder why things get absurd with gunlines! "

This recommendation no longer exists.

Martel732 wrote:


"I won't even get started on how pathetic half the tables people play on are, and how absurdly in favor of gunlines they are, but when you use less than half the recommended terrain as per rulebook, do not wonder why things get absurd with gunlines! "

This recommendation no longer exists.

Fine, I'll give you that they no longer have a NUMBERICAL terrain reccomendation, but they DO state that "the more scenery you can place on the battlefield, the better the game will be." this means more than a single ruin in the middle and two little bushes that some people play with (and than complain about lack of LOS blocking, as if its not up to them)

There are entire sections about forests, water bodies, ruins, craters, buildings and even vertical movement, does ANYONE look at them and says "well, this is not actually part of the game"
The rulebook obliviously EXPECTS at least SOME of these to be there,


And do you really need to have everything spelled out to you? look at any of the "in-game" pictures scattered across the books, these tables are FLOWING with terrain.

The table is not defined as a 6x4 either, but everyone seems to take THAT for granted. (seriously, look it up. there is no defined overall size, just defined distance between deploymet zones. the side is defined as "any size from 2' by 2' upwards", its not even has to be rectangular, the rulebook itself says so.)

If people can make the 6x4 assumption on their own without people throwing fits (many armies will enjoy bigger, many will enjoy smaller.), they should be able to get the "use freaking terrain" assumption properly.

Martel732 wrote:


" if I'm paying anywhere between 200 to 240 points for one."

Go look at the gak 200-240 buys me in the BA codex.

Even assuming BA codex is complete garbage (and the fact the LVO 2th place had a flesh tearers strike force in his army, I doubt it) it does not mean that by definition tau are getting too much, but that BA are getting too little.

Though in reality, the BA are pretty damn good because they got a gakload of formations that allows you crazy creations, some saving you hundreds of points of free equipment, other gives you insane rules and many FOC charts each with his ower relics, advantages and selections-giving you tons of choice.
BA are doing fine for themselves and can easily build powerful armies.
And when in doubt-they are BB with HALF THE ARMIES IN THE GAME.

Wow calm down dude. I'd respond, but you seem to be raving like a lunatic instead of here on the thread for any kind of real discussion, (you also seem like it would be pointless to talk to you, you've made your mind into a closed steel box on the issue,) so I think I'm just gonna hit that little ignore button instead.

Please keep it polite in here, or else the thread will have to be locked... thanks.

niv-mizzet wrote:
Wow calm down dude. I'd respond, but you seem to be raving like a lunatic instead of here on the thread for any kind of real discussion, (you also seem like it would be pointless to talk to you, you've made your mind into a closed steel box on the issue,) so I think I'm just gonna hit that little ignore button instead.

Who are you talking about? Is it Martel?

Probably me. The Tau haters are uncomfortable with facts.

Yeah probably. I don't get why people hate Tau so much though and how it's okay for some people to go off on rants (Martel) but not Tau players.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
@ niv+-mizzet, why are you accusing BoomWolf of being closed minded when you're not willing to listen to people's explanations of how the Riptide isn't as OP as most claim it to be?

SGTPozy wrote:
Yeah probably. I don't get why people hate Tau so much though and how it's okay for some people to go off on rants (Martel) but not Tau players.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
@ niv+-mizzet, why are you accusing BoomWolf of being closed minded when you're not willing to listen to people's explanations of how the Riptide isn't as OP as most claim it to be?

The riptide in and of itself isn't super broken. It's quite strong, but there's nothing innately wrong with simply having units which are strong.

The problem comes into play when you factor the riptide into the whole of a Tau list. It starts becoming silly when you factor in how easily you can up the Tide's BS and remove cover from the enemy, making it super lethal. JSJ is also infuriating for most people because it makes striking back against an already durable model all the more difficult.

Tau are a great idea in theory. An army of fairly decent / dangerous shooty units which are held back by their mid-range BS and how easily they fold in CC. They're beefed up by the coordinated application of marker lights, allowing you to flag priority targets and apply overwhelming force to a couple of things that need to die each turn. However this starts to fall apart in practice due to how easily they can mitigate these strengths, how quite a few armies live-and-die by cover, as well as the sheer stopping power of quite a few of their unbuffed guns (combination of blasts, low AP, high strength, huge range).

To be honest many armies can do something like that, for example Orks:
Green Tide with a Painboy and Lucky Still Mega Boss is a problem together as the Warboss can tank saves, allowing 100 boys to charge you.

Then for IoM:
Tiggy, Draigo and Grav Centurions.

Etc.

Back on topic.

Imagine it's back in the days of 5th/ early 6th pre-tau

I walk into a tournament and, between rounds, pitch an idea for a new unit for a tau fan dex.

"Ok, so to start off, I want this thing to be tougher than a hive tyrant with extended carapace, and with an actual invuln save...so a tyrant in terminator armor. Oh, and with an extra wound. I want him to be able to hit hard enough to kill characters and smash vehicles and ignore saves, but not be melee focused. I want him to not care about terrain at all when moving, and be really quick, like more movement than a jump pack. And I want to be able to still shoot at that speed, and have part of the movement after shooting. I want him to be able to shoot anywhere on the board with an awesome ap2 gun that insta kills most models with a large blast, but I don't like this new "snapfire-can't fire blasts" thing, so I want an alternate mode where it fires a few direct shots instead. And he also needs a second weapon (twin-linked, of course) and a whole slew of options so you can kit him out in a million different ways. Oh, and I also want him to have these cool "emergency abilities" where he can move really fast, or have an awesome invuln save, or fire a better version of his main gun, or shoot his other gun multiple times, with the downside of maybe taking a wound on the emergency mode, and I want all this in an army that has good shooting synergy so he can easily get higher BS and ignores cover, and I want him to be costed really competitively, and be a normal unit for normal size games so you can take multiples."

I bet I woulda been laughed out of the room.

This seriously sounds like a unit from an 8 year old's (completely unbalanced) fan dex. If someone explained the IA tide to me before it came out, and asked me to point-price it, I'd put it at just shy of 300 before adding options, and tell them maybe they should just make the jump to super-heavy and call it an apoc unit instead.

I don't even see how people can defend it being less than the cost of a land raider or wraithknight. My only hope is that the rumored tau codex from later this year speeds right along, and has someone working on it that has more sense than the guy who made this monstrosity.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

SGTPozy wrote:
Yeah probably. I don't get why people hate Tau so much though and how it's okay for some people to go off on rants (Martel) but not Tau players.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
@ niv+-mizzet, why are you accusing BoomWolf of being closed minded when you're not willing to listen to people's explanations of how the Riptide isn't as OP as most claim it to be?

I'm perfectly willing to listen. I've been listening for two years now, and seeing it in action for two years. What I have heard from MOST of my listening, and seen from the table itself, is absolutely not jiving with what you or that guy said. I only stopped listening to him because he ceased to be civil.

And I never said Martel doesn't go on rants. I also cease listening to him at times when the argument goes circular, but I've never had a problem with feeling outright insulted from his rant.

 Frozocrone wrote:
Tau break most of the rules in the game.

'Cover save? Oh that's cute.'
'But you have no weapons! Yeah so this unit now has all these special rules.'
'I'll charge! Overwatch. Ok! And this unit. What? And this one. Huh?!'

Not limited to these things, but you get the jist. Just not really fun to play against.

That said, there may be a bit of bias in my opinion. I play DE, Nids and now Orks, so cover is kind of a important thing for me

One of the dirtiest tactics they have that is totally legit is buffmander and the missile sides behind an aegis. They go to ground and get the 2+ cover save and snap fire, meanwhile 2 units of marker drones brings them back up to full Bs like nothing happened. Drives people nuts.

Martel732 wrote:
Drop pods again? Drop pods can not be used in a TAC environment because there a large number of lists where drop pods are pure suicide.

Drop Pods work in a TAC enviroment just fine, as evidenced by the large volume of Drop Podding lists in practically every big tournament. BA might not be the strongest Codex around as mono, but who plays IoM without allies and combinations in a competitive enviroment anyway.

I just played a Blood Angels list with 2 Sicarans, Void Shield Generator and a Whirlwind Scorpius, cheap assault squad Melta drop pods, and a command squad + Mephiston + Chaplain and beat a Tau player with 2 riptides, we played a standard 5 objective mission with Dawn of War deployment.

Martel732 wrote:
Okay. But I'd much rather face pods than Riptides. And I can't image what these pod lists are doing vs Orks, Nids, or Demons. Drop in and get their faces torn off?

Try a Furioso with a Heavy Flamer + Frag Cannon sometime. It's not even unlikely to delete 30 Boyz/Gaunts the turn you arrive depending on your opponents coherency. Fire the Heavy Flamer first. Just try it sometime.

My problem with the Riptide is that it is better in everyway than TMCs. Hear me out on this, I feel like TMC's are a little overpriced as they are but are at an appropriate level of durability. T6 4W 3+ is as hardy as I want a MC to be without it being something special and costing about as much to reflect that. The Riptide is more durable than any TMC on top of dealing more damage than any of them. Same goes for Dreadknights and Wraith Knights. Even Chaos Daemon MCs aren't as bad on their own until the start pulling out some rather unbalanced psychic powers and artifacts.

2+ with a 5++ should be restricted to HQ MCs like the Hive Tyrant and even a Hive Tyrant CAN NOT get to that level. I am more okay with the Wraith Knight being T8 3+ because he can not get an invulnerable without sacrificing damage. The only thing I do not like about the Wraith Knight is how fast the damn thing is. These three MCs are just so much better than the other MCs in the game and that is why they are seen as OP, the Riptide gets the most hate because let's face it, Tau are completely FOTM and a lot of people picked them up just as they became extremely powerful while claiming that they always loved the Tau...Yeah, sure. I know some people really do love Tau and that is fine, the Tau army is a good army even WITHOUT the Riptide though.

The short of the long is, if I am paying close to the same points for a Riptide as I am for many of the TMC then they should be roughly the same. They are most certainly not even in the same league as one another. The Riptide, Dreadknight, and Wraith Knight are too good in my eyes and need to be brought down a little. Constant escalation in power hasn't done this game any favors and really needs to be reigned in.

I think that the Riptide was designed purely by comparisons to Crisis! Stealth and Broadside suits.

Its S and T:
A stealth suit is S4 T3
A Crisis suit is S5 T4
So a Riptide should really be S6 T5 OR S7 T6.
I believe that it should really be S7 T6 to keep with the pattern as Broadsides should really be S6 T5 due to how big it is compared to Crisis Suits.

Its A:
A stealth suit has 1A
A Crisis suit has 2A
A Riptide has 3A
No problems here.

Its Armour Save:
It has a 2+ since it is supposed to be a monster rather than an efficient and mass producable suit, so they'd use Broadside materials.
No problem here.

Its Invulnerable Save:
I don't believe that it should be a 5++ as why would the Tau create a worse version of the shield generator for the Riptide to use?
This makes no sense; it should either come base with no invulnerable save and have to buy one or it should be a 4++.

Its IA:
An ion rifle is ap4
An ion cannon is ap3
An ion accelerator is ap2
No problem here (and all three can overcharge too, so still no problem).

Its Nova Reactor:

The 3++:
This makes sense since it is experimental so it likely uses the same shield as Shadowsun's prototype shield drone which is a 3++.

The Nova Charge:
It uses the energy to improve the gun so no problem here.

Ripple Fire:
The energy goes to the secondary gun so no problem here.

4D6 thrust:
The energy goes into the jet pack so no problem here.

Having a Jet Pack:
All of the other suits (except Broadsides) have one so it makes sense.


Have I missed anything? These points show that it does largely make sense that the Riptide is how it is.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
@Arbiter_Shade, I think that most people are fine with the Riptide being nerfed so long as the other two do too, but quite often people dismiss the Dreaknight claiming that it isn't as bad (even though the reason is most likely that it is IoM so there's a different standard for IoM players and Xenos) as the other two.

There's data on this. Tau, including a lot of Riptides I'm sure, barely win 50% of their games on the tournament circuit, and even including allies aren't making it into top 10s.

It's a mediocre army and the Riptide is nothing special; even in multiples.

The IoM people can complain all they want. You're just not taking the right units if you want to compete. Now, if you want live by rule #1, believe me, I salute you. But you don't get to complain that your list with 3 rhinos, 2 predators, 2 dreadnoughts, devastators and a librarian gets trolled off the table by a triptide list. Your list sucks, not your army.

niv-mizzet wrote:
Back on topic.

Imagine it's back in the days of 5th/ early 6th pre-tau

I walk into a tournament and, between rounds, pitch an idea for a new unit for a tau fan dex.

"Ok, so to start off, I want this thing to be tougher than a hive tyrant with extended carapace, and with an actual invuln save...so a tyrant in terminator armor. Oh, and with an extra wound. I want him to be able to hit hard enough to kill characters and smash vehicles and ignore saves, but not be melee focused. I want him to not care about terrain at all when moving, and be really quick, like more movement than a jump pack. And I want to be able to still shoot at that speed, and have part of the movement after shooting. I want him to be able to shoot anywhere on the board with an awesome ap2 gun that insta kills most models with a large blast, but I don't like this new "snapfire-can't fire blasts" thing, so I want an alternate mode where it fires a few direct shots instead. And he also needs a second weapon (twin-linked, of course) and a whole slew of options so you can kit him out in a million different ways. Oh, and I also want him to have these cool "emergency abilities" where he can move really fast, or have an awesome invuln save, or fire a better version of his main gun, or shoot his other gun multiple times, with the downside of maybe taking a wound on the emergency mode, and I want all this in an army that has good shooting synergy so he can easily get higher BS and ignores cover, and I want him to be costed really competitively, and be a normal unit for normal size games so you can take multiples."

I bet I woulda been laughed out of the room.

This seriously sounds like a unit from an 8 year old's (completely unbalanced) fan dex. If someone explained the IA tide to me before it came out, and asked me to point-price it, I'd put it at just shy of 300 before adding options, and tell them maybe they should just make the jump to super-heavy and call it an apoc unit instead.

I don't even see how people can defend it being less than the cost of a land raider or wraithknight. My only hope is that the rumored tau codex from later this year speeds right along, and has someone working on it that has more sense than the guy who made this monstrosity.

You'd price a riptide at 300 points?
Congrats, you just made a unit completely unplayable. even then when the price for everything was higher. (I do believe every single unit in the game got price dropped from that age, or got heavy buffs.)
Not to mention that in your description of the riptide you comfortably forgot he actually hurts himself quite often (and when he does-no emergency ability), can fail to shoot at all when he wants to blast, has the worst CC abilities in the game for an MC, got medicore LD with no improving rules, unlike any other "superunit" in the game, his movement is not completely predictable, etc, etc.

Yea, riptides sure are absurd when you neglect every single issue they has and only focus on their advantages. too bad reality does not work this way.
Heck, the Ld issue alone is a killer. how often do you hear on many units that people say "not fearless/ATSKNF=useless"? quite often. its not true, but for some reason the people who think that seem to forget it when it comes to riptides.

Math proved multiple times, a riptide's firepower compared to cost is negligible when he is not supported, and most armies can match it in their shooting, even classic assault armies. without the NOVA powers or the ability to be supported its not even a very good unit, let alone OP.

You think it should be an apoc unit? have you missed the train that there are NO apoc units any more?
Or the fact the riptide is dwarfed in both size and power compared to ANY superheavy?
Heck, you want to put the riptide in the same table with 10" blast throwers, AoE D attacks and helfire templates? you seriusly fail to see the gap in strength?



You don't see how people can defend it compared to wraithknight or land raiders?
How about the fact most weapons in the game cant even hurt land raiders? lets show you how.

Wraithknights cost more than riptides, but are among the strongest CC units in the game, on top of shooting powers that rival the riptide's, as are his mobility and durability. unlike the riptide he dose not need to keep distance, because when you get to CC, he's just getting even more lethal. Also, fearless with ld10, a riptide is not. ld attacks are some of the best anti-MC weapons in the game, and eldar has even more support than tau has because of cheap and powerful psykers. riptides might have few weaknesses and many synergies, wraithknights have no weaknesses beyond cost, and even more synergies.

Land raiders are a transport that is completely immune to most weapons in the game. anything under S8 cant even scratch it, and even S10 is rather useless without any special anti-tank rules.
Sure it can be "1 shotted", but the odds are low, and it requires hard work to pull off, and realistically can only be done by weapons that require you to get super-close.
And given that it's main purpose is a transport, and he still packs a punch that is worthy of a main battle tank, I'd say they are doing well.
But that's besides the point, becase nobody compares riptides to land raiders-its silly given the fact there are ZERO lines of semblance between the two.


Naturally though, you won't read any of it as you chose to ignore me, but ho well. that's the only way you can "win' this discussion anyhow. I've been through it dozens of times and it ended the same every time-the other guy realizing his "points" are not actually anchored with reality and either fading away, shifting to my stance or claiming I never understood him to begin with and he was not complaining of riptides at all and only dislikes the ion accelerator (who, if you even bothered reading, I have already noted as the source of the riptide issue, and also said how to fix it with a sentence: "there is no overcharge profile for the ion accelerator, only normal and NOVA.")

It's not necessarily what equipment/rules go into the Riptide- though such things do play a very large part (60" range on T6/2+/5W is very difficult to kill).

A substantial amount of it comes from how much Riptides cost; which is to say, they cost too little.

Arguments about the base price of the Dreadknight end up being empty- in order to get comparable mobility, you must spend points. In order to improve it in combat, you must spend points. In order to actually give it a gun, you must spend points.

A Riptide comes with two guns- one twin-linked- standard. It can take a 5 point upgrade for its primary weapon to get the 60" range deathmachine that it is most commonly deployed with.

Synergy-wise, the Riptide synergizes incredibly well with the Tau army- the only difference, realistically, between "Riptide synergy" and "Dreadknight synergy" is which way the synergy goes; a Riptide gains benefit from the synergy it gets from the rest of the list, while a DK gives benefit.

It's also worth noting that, from a high-level view, it's actually the case that a Riptide gets more benefit than a DK gives to their respective armies. GKs can already get lots of Warp Charge into a list; Tau get to have BS bonuses and Ignores Cover, which are quite frankly more powerful for a shooting focused army.

A lot of people don't necessarily realize that Grey Knights are, as a tabletop army, designed as mid-range shooting that's pretty prickly against assault units, with assault elements in support.

The Tau are designed as a mobile shooting army with primarily shooting oriented support. Again, at a high-level view, the Tau are much more synergistic- innately, in fact- than most armies are at all!

It may make fluff sense. (Although, being experimental, shouldn't there only be like...one or two prototypes? Similar to shadowsun's awesome shield drones?)
But I can't see it making game sense. I just recently had to explain how the thing worked to a new guy that wanted to play tau. Most of the rest of the army was easy to go over since we had done a "basics" practice game already. The riptide I had to sit him down and give a damn presentation for that one unit!

But I'm less worried about fluff on the table (I play marines, if I worried about fluff on the table, I'd go insane anytime a marine died to one lasgun shot,) and more worried about crunch. All those things combined, to me, should cost waaay above 185. That's what it comes down to.

As another example, for most of my troops, I would prefer they get hit by a str D large blast rather than an IA blast. At least with the D, I know the unit firing it costs a ton of points, and unless he rolls a 6 on the chart, I could still drop to the ground or be in some ruins and save some dudes.

I have literally seen an IA tide go "I can see that guy's foot behind that wall. Direct hit. Squad dies no cover."

I think one major thing that makes tau unfun to play against is that you (the non-tau player) don't get to roll dice. You just hope his rolls suck and then you either get a turn or he tells you your stuff is dead and he wins. The only guys you reliably get to roll dice for are like the one or two invuln save hq's you might have.

Daemons would probably enjoy the game a bit more since they ALWAYS get a save, and I know from personal trial that tau mirror matches can be kind of sweet, but for the rest of the armies, on the tau turn you just sit back and wait for him to tell you how many guys to pick up with no rolls to defend yourself.


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 The Shrike wrote:
There's data on this. Tau, including a lot of Riptides I'm sure, barely win 50% of their games on the tournament circuit, and even including allies aren't making it into top 10s.

It's a mediocre army and the Riptide is nothing special; even in multiples.

The IoM people can complain all they want. You're just not taking the right units if you want to compete. Now, if you want live by rule #1, believe me, I salute you. But you don't get to complain that your list with 3 rhinos, 2 predators, 2 dreadnoughts, devastators and a librarian gets trolled off the table by a triptide list. Your list sucks, not your army.

Win %'s without context are meaningless. We have no idea how many of those tau lists lost to other tau lists, for example. It IS a popular army, after all, and every time two tau play each other, they just bring the tau % closer to 50 with 1 win and 1 loss. Some of them may have had their primary detachment be smaller than the tau detachment, (for some wl trait or something,) but technically not be a tau army. And yet another variable, how many of them were well-piloted by good generals or were well-made lists? I know several people that like to go to tourneys just to play around and rarely win more than they lose.

Unless you have data that specifically handles those particulars, it's just a general figure and not anything to swear by.

And even the highest %'s at LVO were only in the low 60's, so 50's is pretty good. I know the low armies were in the 30's. That's quite a bit worse.


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Also you seem to make the claim that it's specifically IoM players that think the tide is broken-good.

I personally know at least one person from every single xeno army including the tau itself that thinks the tide is over the top ridiculous for its cost.

It's just like against alpha strikes (in particular Grey Knights) all you do is let them drop in your deployment zone and destroy loads of your army as they drop, but I don't hear people complaining about Grey Knights being unfun to play against (or at least not as often).

"I have literally seen an IA tide go "I can see that guy's foot behind that wall. Direct hit. Squad dies no cover.""

How? You cannot kill what you cannot see, so he could have only killed that one guy whose foot could be seen... That guy was a cheater; it has nothing to do with being Tau.

Most armies either have deep strikers or fast units that can get close to Tau T1 so how are you not doing anything? This is utter hyperbolation just because you lost a couple games.

I'll say the same about Orks; I once faced a green tide and I found it impossible to kill as I didn't have enough shots, therefore all Ork armies are unfun to play against and all that I was able to do is watch him move his 100+ models 6", then run d6" and then charge 2d6"... How fun that was /sarcasm.



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The Riptide IS ridiculous, but there are loads of equally ridiculous units out there so it isn't alone and therefore should stay how it is.

SGTPozy wrote:
It's just like against alpha strikes (in particular Grey Knights) all you do is let them drop in your deployment zone and destroy loads of your army as they drop, but I don't hear people complaining about Grey Knights being unfun to play against (or at least not as often).

"I have literally seen an IA tide go "I can see that guy's foot behind that wall. Direct hit. Squad dies no cover.""

How? You cannot kill what you cannot see, so he could have only killed that one guy whose foot could be seen... That guy was a cheater; it has nothing to do with being Tau.

Most armies either have deep strikers or fast units that can get close to Tau T1 so how are you not doing anything? This is utter hyperbolation just because you lost a couple games.

I'll say the same about Orks; I once faced a green tide and I found it impossible to kill as I didn't have enough shots, therefore all Ork armies are unfun to play against and all that I was able to do is watch him move his 100+ models 6", then run d6" and then charge 2d6"... How fun that was /sarcasm.



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The Riptide IS ridiculous, but there are loads of equally ridiculous units out there so it isn't alone and therefore should stay how it is.

The foot behind the wall thing is totally legal. The way it works is you can see one guy, you can fire at the squad. Because it's a blast you center it somewhere else. The wounds aren't lost because you can still see one model, so the wound pool exists and models drop like flies until that one guy you have TLOS dies, at which point the wound pool is lost.

The only true thing that needs to be changed about the Riptide is the cost of the ion accelerator, raise it to about 15 to 20 points and call it good. The Riptide is durable but when compared to things such as Imperial Knights, Dread Knights ect. The base Riptide is clearly not under costed.

Yeah the wound pool exists (so let's say 4 guys), but you can only kill what's in LoS so you have 4 chances to kill that one guy.

So no, it's not legal.

"Win %'s without context are meaningless. We have no idea how many of those tau lists lost to other tau lists, for example. It IS a popular army, after all, and every time two tau play each other, they just bring the tau % closer to 50 with 1 win and 1 loss. Some of them may have had their primary detachment be smaller than the tau detachment, (for some wl trait or something,) but technically not be a tau army. And yet another variable, how many of them were well-piloted by good generals or were well-made lists? I know several people that like to go to tourneys just to play around and rarely win more than they lose.

Unless you have data that specifically handles those particulars, it's just a general figure and not anything to swear by.

And even the highest %'s at LVO were only in the low 60's, so 50's is pretty good. I know the low armies were in the 30's. That's quite a bit worse."

Win % without context? "some of these players might have been beaten by other Tau players?" Are you serious? Are all statistics meaningless because we can't know which armies played which others? How large does a tournament have to be for its data to be relevant to you? Your argument is patently absurd.

According to Torrent of Fire, Tau made up 8% of the field at LVO. So there goes your popularity argument. Counting ALL ToF ranked tournaments on ToF, Tau have won <50% of their games since 2013.

We also know they weren't in the top 10 at either LVO or Adepticon, Riptides or no. So that would seem to include Tau players beating each other EL OH EL.

Calm down sir, you're starting to get as rude as the last person I ignored. It's just a forum about toy soldiers. No need to get enraged.

What would I consider a good statistic? If someone ran a large tournament (say lvo size with 200+) where each faction was equally represented in number of players, and a faction was never allowed to play against itself.
It still wouldn't get rid of the player skill variable or the list build variable, but I would consider it a lot closer.

8% when there are close to 20 factions is more than their fair share of players.

Who's actually in top x ranking means very little to me, data-wise. It says a lot more about which army managed to not get bad matchups and were piloted well, not which army is the better book to begin with. I took 3rd in a 30 man 6 round where draigostar, flyrants, super heavies, daemons and taudar were present, and I did it with a pure BA list with two land raiders and no flyers. How? I got really lucky with matchups and game end rolls. 4 of my 5 wins would've been losses if the game had ended sooner OR later than it did. The game-end roll is ridiculously powerful, and gambling on it at the right time can turn a loss into a win. (For reference, 1st place was a taudar with riptide and serpents, who literally had 5 perfect full-points games and one draw to a necron decurion that came in 2nd. They were a full 30 points ahead of me in 3rd with my "barely win" strat getting me half-ish points each game.)

 gmaleron wrote:
The only true thing that needs to be changed about the Riptide is the cost of the ion accelerator, raise it to about 15 to 20 points and call it good. The Riptide is durable but when compared to things such as Imperial Knights, Dread Knights ect. The base Riptide is clearly not under costed.

Nope, nope, nope and a hundrend more nopes.

Nothing is wrong with the COST of the ion accelerator, the error is in the DESIGN. no cost change will fix the obvious flaw of a gun without a weakness without either spinning out of reasonable cost ranges for the platform, or feeling cheap (and at some point levels, it will do both at once, making it both bad to have, and bad to face, being the worst possible outcome)

It needs to drop the overcharge (non-NOVA blast) profile, that way you bring the IA riptides the "I need to NOVA to be effective" problem the HBC is facing, therefor reducing both its durability and its reliability and making it work properly.
That way it has a weakness, you blast is not assured, and it needs to be set up in advance for pieplate interceptions.


Back to the LoS problem-you CANNOT wound what you can't see, on a per-model base. if he only sees the foot of a single dude, no omre than a single dude can die.
A common sight that the tau-hater actually got the rules that make him angry wrong. happens every thread.

niv-mizzet wrote:I'm perfectly willing to listen. I've been listening for two years now, and seeing it in action for two years. What I have heard from MOST of my listening, and seen from the table itself, is absolutely not jiving with what you or that guy said. I only stopped listening to him because he ceased to be civil.

The Shrike offers you accurate, numerical statistics from one of the biggest 40k tournament/circuits/leagues/whatever in the US, run by one of the few committed 40k tracker websites, in a gaming field where statistics are rare ... and you dismiss these stats as substandard, and offer instead your own first hand accounts as your own stance/argument (without data).

I think it needs to be repeated that if the Riptide were as powerful and broken as some of the people here seem to believe, then they would have at least made the top 10/top 8 at the LVO or the Adepticon.

Fourth place at LVO was a Drop Pod army, btw.

2nd at LVO drop-podded some scouts (flesh tearer pods with SoT scouts inside ?_?) if we want to add to the madness.

And first was a flyrant circus backed by lictors and mawlocs of all things.

Third was eldar, and had WS spam, and a lynx

Forth was as mentioned a drop pod army with SW and IG

5th was a calssic deamon summoning army, with an attached inquis because the servo skulls ARE OP.

6th was a brass scorpion follower by some summoners and with helblades air support (practically)

7th was white scars bike spam

8th was GK telegrav centurionstar with attached dreadknights.


What I DO see in this list are many units and factions people are often refering to as "poor", and saying needs to be buffed.
What I'm NOT seeing, is riptides, or tau in general. not even as allies. not even as the edge-of-tau-power that is the firebase support cadre (an abomination that should not exist in my eyes BTW)

I disagree that a flat "win %" is actually USEFUL, due to many variables. If they had a statistic for "Army win percentage without mirror matches," I would find that statistic a lot more useful. (Although there would still be the same old player skill/list quality/dice luck/matchup luck variables.)

Some people seem to believe that if the lvo were literally "redone"- same lists same players, that the results would be the same. I say that they would be different. Draigo star was regaining control of the quarterfinal lvo match against the marines/BA list, until he scattered from a gate, mishapped, and the entire star died on a single roll.

As I've said, I like my findings scientific. "What did happen" and "what would happen more often" are not always the same.

Also, I am not Martel. I think drop pod armies are awesome and quite competitive, but not without their share of weaknesses.

IIRC the Flyrant list never got the chance to face WS spam, but was designed to hard-counter Serpent spam.

The Pod list was built around a null deploy setup.

Serpent spam is self-explanory.

Space Wolves in Pods are actually one of the best options for the most common scale of games (~1500-2000 points, AFAIK), and IG can bring some useful tools/objective sitters.

Bikerspam is good because it's a bunch of T5 dudes, who are Relentless, and thus a good platform for grav-weapons.

The Grav Centstar with some Dreadknights is really just taking the stellar units of an overall very limited/overcosted book, and then combining them. If you look over the GK book in any depth, you'll notice that the viable options are very few, which also leads to monobuild problems... because there happens to be only one viable build.

Marines at this point are reduced to Bikerspam or Centstars; both options are powerful... but they're almost the only competitive options that Marines have.

 gmaleron wrote:
The only true thing that needs to be changed about the Riptide is the cost of the ion accelerator, raise it to about 15 to 20 points and call it good.

That, and drop it to +3 Sv and 4 Wounds or preferably, make it a Walker.

As it is, Riptide simply breaks how the fiction is modelled on-game.

niv-mizzet wrote:
Calm down sir, you're starting to get as rude as the last person I ignored. It's just a forum about toy soldiers. No need to get enraged.

Constantly telling everyone to "calm down" is more likely going to have the opposite effect. Not only that but I don't see where all this rage is supposedly coming from.

niv-mizzet wrote:
What would I consider a good statistic? If someone ran a large tournament (say lvo size with 200+) where each faction was equally represented in number of players, and a faction was never allowed to play against itself.

So in other words then it's literally impossible to get a good statistic, what with the vast majority of players fielding an IoM army of some kind and not being able to fight against other IoM armies. That and managing to get equal representation for every faction would be very difficult indeed, not every faction appeals to everyone and obviously the ones seen as being less competitive aren't going to be played as much in a competitive environment.

...like Tau, apparently, but we simply can't accept that as a fact because Tau are totes broken OP and ruined the game.

 Sidstyler wrote:

niv-mizzet wrote:
Calm down sir, you're starting to get as rude as the last person I ignored. It's just a forum about toy soldiers. No need to get enraged.

Constantly telling everyone to "calm down" is more likely going to have the opposite effect. Not only that but I don't see where all this rage is supposedly coming from.

niv-mizzet wrote:
What would I consider a good statistic? If someone ran a large tournament (say lvo size with 200+) where each faction was equally represented in number of players, and a faction was never allowed to play against itself.

So in other words then it's literally impossible to get a good statistic, what with the vast majority of players fielding an IoM army of some kind and not being able to fight against other IoM armies. That and managing to get equal representation for every faction would be very difficult indeed, not every faction appeals to everyone and obviously the ones seen as being less competitive aren't going to be played as much in a competitive environment.

What is civil and what isn't is another opinionated matter. I happen to think that ridicule over an opinion crosses that line. I'm not perfect, I've done it too, but when my head's on straight, I refrain from that.

Not literally impossible, but practically impossible, perhaps. And yes, I never said it would be easy. If you've ever done any complicated statistic research, you know that lots of variables make it very very very very very tricky to get good usable data. It's not something you get in an afternoon. And 40k has hundreds of 1-6 RNG rolls of varying importance and weight. That data is neat to look at, but for faction v faction comparisons, mirror matches will skew the numbers of more-played armies closer to 50%.

It's another tough resilient unit (like Wraiths) that doesn't particularly care about incoming fire.

In general it seems like these units give players fits.

 BoomWolf wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:
The only true thing that needs to be changed about the Riptide is the cost of the ion accelerator, raise it to about 15 to 20 points and call it good. The Riptide is durable but when compared to things such as Imperial Knights, Dread Knights ect. The base Riptide is clearly not under costed.

Nope, nope, nope and a hundrend more nopes.

Nothing is wrong with the COST of the ion accelerator, the error is in the DESIGN. no cost change will fix the obvious flaw of a gun without a weakness without either spinning out of reasonable cost ranges for the platform, or feeling cheap (and at some point levels, it will do both at once, making it both bad to have, and bad to face, being the worst possible outcome)

It needs to drop the overcharge (non-NOVA blast) profile, that way you bring the IA riptides the "I need to NOVA to be effective" problem the HBC is facing, therefor reducing both its durability and its reliability and making it work properly.
That way it has a weakness, you blast is not assured, and it needs to be set up in advance for pieplate interceptions.

I get what your saying man and would agree with that, keep it the same points cost but get rid of the large blast capability would work great!

Backfire wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:
The only true thing that needs to be changed about the Riptide is the cost of the ion accelerator, raise it to about 15 to 20 points and call it good.

That, and drop it to +3 Sv and 4 Wounds or preferably, make it a Walker.

As it is, Riptide simply breaks how the fiction is modelled on-game.

To much of a nerf, WAY to much of a nerf. It is perfectly fine with the Wounds and Save it has. If it got hit that hard I would expect it to go down in points, like Dreadknight base level.

Whiskey144 wrote:
The Riptide's virtues are it's durability- mostly "over time", wherein it's unlikely to be killed throughout the course of the game- and the fact that the Riptide can more-or-less invalidate large swaths of Marine armies- or others which similarly rely on 3+ armor to protect them.

Bottom line.

The Riptide is overpowered because most people play Space Marines and SM players expect point prices to be catered SOLELY to them.

Whiskey144 wrote:
Marines at this point are reduced to Bikerspam or Centstars; both options are powerful... but they're almost the only competitive options that Marines have.

Ultramarines Pod list also did quite well, recently. IIRC the #1 player on the ITC runs this list.

But the above rule certainly applies to almost any army that wishes to be competitive - Demons are reduced to Fateweaver/Belakor + screamerstar/dronestar. Tyranids are reduced to taking a minimum of 3 flyrants. Elder are reduced to WS spam. Tau are reduced to TripTide (despite not placing with said TripTide in quite some time). Etcetera and etcetera.

I'd also point out that the #2 list at LVO was an Imperial Fists/Blood Angels Scout list which did utilize two mini deathstars (one of them being Centurion) - but the fact is that it was a pretty unique list.

There is a bit of 'Woe is Me' sentiment from a minority of Marine players, and yet Space Marines were 4/Top 8 at LVO, and 5/Top 10 at Adepticon. It is very difficult to take such criticism as something other than personal grudges against the Tau for whatever reason, when the results of 40k's toughest environments (arguably) clearly prove otherwise.

 EmpNortonII wrote:
Bottom line.

The Riptide is overpowered because most people play Space Marines and SM players expect point prices to be catered SOLELY to them.

So you don't find it broken that one unit can invalidate 99% of Marine infantry units, regardless of whether or not those units are in cover?

andbreak wrote:

Whiskey144 wrote:
Marines at this point are reduced to Bikerspam or Centstars; both options are powerful... but they're almost the only competitive options that Marines have.

Ultramarines Pod list also did quite well, recently. IIRC the #1 player on the ITC runs this list.

But the above rule certainly applies to almost any army that wishes to be competitive - Demons are reduced to Fateweaver/Belakor + screamerstar/dronestar. Tyranids are reduced to taking a minimum of 3 flyrants. Elder are reduced to WS spam. Tau are reduced to TripTide (despite not placing with said TripTide in quite some time). Etcetera and etcetera.

I'd also point out that the #2 list at LVO was an Imperial Fists/Blood Angels Scout list which did utilize two mini deathstars (one of them being Centurion) - but the fact is that it was a pretty unique list.

There is a bit of 'Woe is Me' sentiment from a minority of Marine players, and yet Space Marines were 4/Top 8 at LVO, and 5/Top 10 at Adepticon. It is very difficult to take such criticism as something other than personal grudges against the Tau for whatever reason, when the results of 40k's toughest environments (arguably) clearly prove otherwise.

I commented on how the #2 list was, when boiled down, a null deploy list. It's a very clever setup- and one that I admit to not understanding at first- but it leverages multiple threats (like said "mini-stars") as well as the ability to control deployment more-or-less perfectly.

I would say that it is a result of that particular player simply having an absolutely superb grasp of how to apply the current mechanics. However... it would seem that the vast majority of players- competitive or otherwise- seem to lack such a super grasp. Moreover, it would seem that such a list has not been seen in quite a while, and was likely a surprise to many people that played against it.

Going against the meta can work... but it requires some exceptional player skill, IMO.

A lot of the problem with most Marine units really just comes down to the fact that they pay for a lot of kit that they rarely have the opportunity to use- frag and krak grenades are a really good example of this. A lot of it just stems from the fact that "good" basic grunt run-of-the-mill infantry models basically require some kind of ability to "scale". Sure, Tacs get a special weapon and a heavy... but how does that compare to pseudo-Rending (Bladestorm) or wannabe-Haywire (Gauss)?

As far as why Tau have "fallen out of favor", as it were, in the tournament scene... no idea. I don't really follow the tournament scene- I really only learned about the 1/2 spot LVO players' lists because it came up in a roundabout way in, IIRC, the Terminator thread in Proposed Rules. But considering that the Riptide has remained a vehemently hated unit- and with good reason it seems- I would surmise that there is some kind of mechanics-related reason.

And insofar as Eldar being reduced to Serpent Spam... I'm kind of doubtful about that. It seems that that is the best- and certainly one of the top-placing- builds, but I rather doubt that the Eldar book is limited to only Serpent Spam.

I've also not heard anything about TripTide- on these boards at least.

I realize that drop pod curb stomp many popular builds, I just don't think they are as great as many Xeno players make them out to be.

The above post about how crazy the Riptide sounds in the context of even 5th ed is a good summary of why this unit's pricing is absurd. The Tau's actual overall efficacy in tournaments is not necessarily correlated to how stupid good Riptides are.

"BA are doing fine for themselves and can easily build powerful armies. "

I guess I missed that memo, because they still play like a bottom 25% codex.

Whiskey144 wrote:

So you don't find it broken that one unit can invalidate 99% of Marine infantry units, regardless of whether or not those units are in cover?

Again, not one unit. You need marker lights to remove cover saves. Specifically, you need two. To Remove Cover and make a Riptide BS5, you need a total of four marker light tokens.

So let's look at markerlights.

Units with Markerlights cost points. Units with Markerlights must also be in range of said unit. Markerlights are Heavy 1. No move and shooting without snapfiring. IIRC, there are nine models in the base codex that can take said marker lights - 5 of them are characters with Markerlight upgrades: Ethereal with Markerlight. Fire Cadre with Markerlight. Fire warrior Team Leader with Markerlight. Stealth Team leader with Markerlight. Sniper Drone Controller with Markerlight. Let's be honest, those choices are pretty unspectacular with their BS3, One Shot a turn ML (exception barring SDC with BS5). Marker light Drones. Pathfinders. Skyray. With the exception of the Skyray (which can only put out 2ML a turn at BS4), the other sources are insanely easy to kill.

Whiskey144 wrote:
But considering that the Riptide has remained a vehemently hated unit- and with good reason it seems- I would surmise that there is some kind of mechanics-related reason.

I can (and have) agree to this. As it stands, I do believe the Riptide to be a very, very strong unit and one of the playmakers of the Tau codex, and I haven't stated otherwise. However, my contention comes in when the Riptide's 'OP' nature (a spillover from the 6th Edition days of O'vesaStars and Farseer+Riptides) is still hailed as gamebreaking and metachanging. Powerful? Yes. Unstoppable machine of death and war and pieplates? Not so much.

Much of the complaints I've seen are unfounded and based in, in my opinion, grudges and resentfulness. I'd feel it be more conduitive to see healthy threads titled 'How to deal with Riptides' in the tactics section rather than ... well, threads like these.

Martel732 wrote:
I guess I missed that memo, because they still play like a bottom 25% codex.

Let's not derail this into yet another 'Martel Laments the State of Blood Angels Thread'. I still remember the BA 18" overcharged-rhinos-i-can-assault-out-of Edition. Everyone's been at the bottom (even Tau), it's nothing interesting.

I didn't bring it up. I just dare you to find something the cost of Riptide that's remotely as good in the BA codex. It's also of interest that the two marquis BA units, DC and SG, are completely raped by the Riptide.

Eldar have never been at the bottom. Just sayin'.

Martel732 wrote:
I didn't bring it up. I just dare you to find something the cost of Riptide that's remotely as good in the BA codex.

Mephiston.

andbreak wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
I didn't bring it up. I just dare you to find something the cost of Riptide that's remotely as good in the BA codex.

Mephiston.

Maybe in 5th ed.

Ok seriously this is getting absolutely ridiculous.

This exact same conversation is had literally every single month and the exact same people say the exact same thing every month.

I don't post very often but I feel the need now.

Tau are no longer OP. Base Riptides are not OP. If you don't understand this now you never will.

Everyone concurs it is the Ion accelerator that makes the unit to strong because it is way underpriced. Every single person who complains about the riptide complains about the IA and EWO but seem to always forget that a player pays for these things and they don't come base.

Yes we all agree that these things need a point increase and or rules changes (e.g. get rid of overcharge IA and/or increase cost) but the second you increase the BASE cost of the BASE riptide you kill it. It will literally no longer be at all worth it. Look at the competitive scene where the best players are playing. Tau are not OP and riptides are not very good.

I am so sick of this conversation and I don't want to single someone out but seriously Martel. Every single time you say the same thing about how bad your BA are and no matter what people say you can't seem to get it through your head that you are wrong. Come on man, stop kidding yourself and stop kidding us.

I'm not sure you understand the mechanics behind why a Riptide with an IA+EWO is so amazingly awesome, if that's what you think.

Because even though the IA and EWO don't come stock... they're 5 points apiece. So for a 10 point upgrade you can get a 5" S8 AP2 blast, with a 60" range, that can use Interceptor... which means that you can:

-Annihilate DS'ers
-Murder anything with an armor save and realistically T5 or down, along with any T4 multi-wound model
-Potentially instakill entire squads, thanks to leveraging synergistic army effects
-Be nearly uncatchable by combat units, thanks to JSJ and the option to get a 4D6" thrust move
-Be nearly unkillable by shooting thanks to being out at 60", IE out of range of 90% of AP2/AP1 weaponry

Face it man- Riptides are broken. The fact that they're even halfway passable in combat just makes it even worse.

Incidentally, I think that the following changes would make a good fix:

Riptides are now AV12/12/10 Walkers with 3 HPs (I could be convinced to make it 4HPs), and have movement like Jet Pack Infantry. Nova Charging is similar to now, however instead of taking an automatic Wound (which vehicles cannot) or losing a Hull Point, if a Riptide fails its Nova Charge roll it suffers a Crew Shaken result, which also reduces its Thrust move to 2D3", instead of 2D6".

Incidentally, if Riptides remain MCs, my recommendation would be:

-Lose 1 Wound
-Lose 1 Attack
-Lose 1 point of Strength (IE, becomes S5)
-Lose Smash (why would a Riptide want to smash crap?)
-Drop Armor to 3+ save
-DECREASE the cost of FNP for the 'Tide
-Tweak Nova Charge to be less damaging, but still risky (I'm not quite sure how this could be done)
-Rework both the Ion Accelerator and the HBC to be viable weapons without the Nova Charge, but not brokenly powerful with the Nova Charge; the IA is potentially too powerful when Nova'd, while the HBC is nearly dead weight without being Nova'd.

You literally just missed the idea point of my post. Congratulations. Read it again and then come back to me. Seriously what you want to do the Riptide will make it totally unusable. Lets be honest all you and Martel "really" want is for the Riptide to be completely removed from the game and that's your opinion but your only proving my point.

Smash isn't very useful for the Riptide anyway, no need to remove an ability it will almost never use. And if it is its almost certainly dead already, smash or not. And no matter what way you slice it, its still a very large thing more than capable of stomping stuff to death, but at WS2 its not very good at it.

Greggy wrote:
Ok seriously this is getting absolutely ridiculous.

This exact same conversation is had literally every single month and the exact same people say the exact same thing every month.

I don't post very often but I feel the need now.

Tau are no longer OP. Base Riptides are not OP. If you don't understand this now you never will.

Everyone concurs it is the Ion accelerator that makes the unit to strong because it is way underpriced. Every single person who complains about the riptide complains about the IA and EWO but seem to always forget that a player pays for these things and they don't come base.

Yes we all agree that these things need a point increase and or rules changes (e.g. get rid of overcharge IA and/or increase cost) but the second you increase the BASE cost of the BASE riptide you kill it. It will literally no longer be at all worth it. Look at the competitive scene where the best players are playing. Tau are not OP and riptides are not very good.

I am so sick of this conversation and I don't want to single someone out but seriously Martel. Every single time you say the same thing about how bad your BA are and no matter what people say you can't seem to get it through your head that you are wrong. Come on man, stop kidding yourself and stop kidding us.

Generally speaking, they don't present convincing arguments. You can single me out, but I kind of don't care. Berating me isn't very convincing, either. Your post is a bunch of statements not backed up by convincing arguments as well. I can go into gross detail of why the BA aren't a very good list if you like.

Martel the problem is you never listen to any of the arguments presented into any of these threads. There is literally no point in me wasting my time trying to tell you what has been told to you 100+ times. You have no idea.

Greggy wrote:

Everyone concurs it is the Ion accelerator that makes the unit to strong because it is way underpriced. Every single person who complains about the riptide complains about the IA and EWO but seem to always forget that a player pays for these things and they don't come base.

At the cost those upgrades are, they might as well be built into the base cost. 5 points is nothing. Look at the Dreadknight. The sword is 10 points, the psycannon is 35, and the Teleporter is 30. And the Dreadknight is horrible if you don't purchase this 75 point package. The Riptide is far from useless if it doesn't purchase those two upgrades, but you'll always take them regardless.

The Riptide can objectively be called broken at face value, and even more when you consider all the internal synergy it gets from the army. Its not so broken as to make the entire codex OP, but its definitely way too good.

Greggy wrote:
Martel the problem is you never listen to any of the arguments presented into any of these threads. There is literally no point in me wasting my time trying to tell you what has been told to you 100+ times. You have no idea.

Actually, I have quite a good idea. I listen to all arguments. I just reject a lot of them. I'm willing to bet I could thrash most of the people on here talking up the BA in an army swap.

I personally dont care what results are of any tourniment. Simply because every single one ramps up the level of competition and ego and cutthroatness. It isn't anything like what show up in B&Ms and basements everywhere. So those results don't actually show what is fun in a game. And I can tell you I personally wouldn't enjoy playing against any of the top 20 armies.

So yeah, if your Tau army functions on the premise of making a Riptide this ultimate killing machine, then yeah, it could be OP. But if you want to use you markerlights to help your missile sides, or maybe launch several seeker missiles then suddenly you have nothing to expend on a Riptide.

I still personally don't see what is so damaging about 5-7 large blast templates per game. Which is all its ever going to do. Against most MEQ armies, squadrons of Russes will do more damage. Hell, even SOB exorsists will have more hits over the course of the game because they cant get screwed on the scatter.

What I love about the riptide and its become very clear in all these same threads is the psychological effect that this unit has. People fear it far more for the damage that it could do rather than the damage it really is going to do.

This thread again? Tau aren't top dogs anymore because IK's exist. That one model that anyone can take (and most can cast invis on) invalidates the Tau codex.

 Mulletdude wrote:
This thread again? Tau aren't top dogs anymore because IK's exist. That one model that anyone can take (and most can cast invis on) invalidates the Tau codex.

Last I checked, Knights are very vulnerable to suicide melta. Something Tau do very well.

Don't attach non wargaming posts to Dakka.
Reds8n

Just like every other time this is come up it has dissolved into Tau hate and unfortunately it's being spearheaded by Imperial players who feel that the game should cater to their needs. Not calling out every single Imperial player with that, but it's definitely a few who feel that the Riptide should be nerfed to the point where it is absolutely useless. But it's the end of the world if we even mention that the Dreadknight should be raised in points cost or any other precious Imperial unit. This thread has become a complete joke.

 gmaleron wrote:
Just like every other time this is come up it has dissolved into Tau hate and unfortunately it's being spearheaded by Imperial players who feel that the game should cater to their needs. Not calling out every single Imperial player with that, but it's definitely a few who feel that the Riptide should be nerfed to the point where it is absolutely useless. But it's the end of the world if we even mention that the Dreadknight should be raised in points cost or any other precious Imperial unit. This thread has become a complete joke.

Riptides wouldn't be useless if they had to pay 20-30 points for the IA. They'd be fairly costed, just like the Dreadknight is(within the context of its codex)

Dude. Templar. That's exactly what we have been saying. Increase the IA. Its all this other crap that is ridiculous. Do you even read these comments or just post? my god.

Greggy wrote:
Ok seriously this is getting absolutely ridiculous.

This exact same conversation is had literally every single month and the exact same people say the exact same thing every month.

I don't post very often but I feel the need now.

Tau are no longer OP. Base Riptides are not OP. If you don't understand this now you never will.

Everyone concurs it is the Ion accelerator that makes the unit to strong because it is way underpriced. Every single person who complains about the riptide complains about the IA and EWO but seem to always forget that a player pays for these things and they don't come base.

Yes we all agree that these things need a point increase and or rules changes (e.g. get rid of overcharge IA and/or increase cost) but the second you increase the BASE cost of the BASE riptide you kill it. It will literally no longer be at all worth it. Look at the competitive scene where the best players are playing. Tau are not OP and riptides are not very good.

I am so sick of this conversation and I don't want to single someone out but seriously Martel. Every single time you say the same thing about how bad your BA are and no matter what people say you can't seem to get it through your head that you are wrong. Come on man, stop kidding yourself and stop kidding us.

In your opinion*

Mizzett of course its my opinion what are you on about? Have you read any of this thread or any of the 100+ that have come before it??? It's a pretty common opinion...

Chill dude. No need to take it so personal.

Greggy wrote:
Dude. Templar. That's exactly what we have been saying. Increase the IA. Its all this other crap that is ridiculous. Do you even read these comments or just post? my god.

Sorry, got some posts mixed up. I usually go by avatars and several people don't have any.

No worries. But you should know who's saying what before commenting on it (Y)

When the conversation gets going fast its tough to sort out who said what exactly earlier. Especially when people are just trading barbs and not actually holding a proper conversation.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:
Just like every other time this is come up it has dissolved into Tau hate and unfortunately it's being spearheaded by Imperial players who feel that the game should cater to their needs. Not calling out every single Imperial player with that, but it's definitely a few who feel that the Riptide should be nerfed to the point where it is absolutely useless. But it's the end of the world if we even mention that the Dreadknight should be raised in points cost or any other precious Imperial unit. This thread has become a complete joke.

Riptides wouldn't be useless if they had to pay 20-30 points for the IA. They'd be fairly costed, just like the Dreadknight is(within the context of its codex)

This is what most Tau players have been asking for ages: price the IA fairly.

It's not however what many IoM players seem to be asking, IMO at least.
If IA Riptides were costed fairly, I don't think that would make most Tau players field less of them, and frankly I'm not sure the average guy that comes in this thread to complain will care that they get destroyed by 3 properly costed IA RiptRiptides instead of 3 undercosted ones. What I feel these guys want is for Riptides to be nerfed and/or overcosted to the point Tau players are actually 'encouraged' to field less.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Smash isn't very useful for the Riptide anyway, no need to remove an ability it will almost never use. And if it is its almost certainly dead already, smash or not. And no matter what way you slice it, its still a very large thing more than capable of stomping stuff to death, but at WS2 its not very good at it.

Actually smash is quite effective against melee walkers like dreadnoughts. There's no way for even a death company dread on the charge with rage and blood talons to one round the tide, so it WILL get at least 1 4+ to hit with a reroll on an easy roll to penetrate. It will at worst take out 1/3 of a melee focused death machine's health, or better, nix a weapon or chop it's legs off, or best, blow it right up, which I have seen happen a few times now. My own poor Cassor the damned has been punched out by my buddy's tide twice now. The first time he forgot about the black painted dreadnought behind a ruin. The second he just wanted to give poor Cassor a rematch for fun.

A shooting focused VERY competitively costed unit has no business being able to stand up to a death co. Dreadnought in melee on the charge.

^this

The changes you guys want will make the riptide totally useless. Tau players have been saying the IA is undercosted since the codex came out and the complaining began. We want the IA to be priced fairly. It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided. It barely sees use as it is (because the other options are so cheap and make it so much better). Make the riptide a better multi-platform unit where it is viable to use a hbc or and IA but don't kill the thing out of a personal hatred.

If your charging a Riptide with a dread your doing something wrong. The idea is to tie it up with a cheap unit of bodies...

Greggy wrote:
Mizzett of course its my opinion what are you on about? Have you read any of this thread or any of the 100+ that have come before it??? It's a pretty common opinion...

You specifically said "everyone concurs" and "yes we all agree" on a couple specific points. I don't agree with those points. I guess I'm not valid enough to be included in "everyone" then?

I feel like I'm going to get lynched in here just because I think a 185 point model that has a lot of things going for it should be able to actually die a good bit easier than say...a primarch from 30k.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Greggy wrote:


If your charging a Riptide with a dread your doing something wrong. The idea is to tie it up with a cheap unit of bodies...

My army doesn't have a cheap unit of bodies. They're all expensive guys who died like gretchin to the IA shot on turn 1.

I said "everyone concurs" and I said "yes we all agree" on one point about how the IA should have a point increase because it was too strong as it is? Are you disagreeing with this? Cause I think you might be the only one.

In your own comment you both agree and disagree with me on the same point.

Come the feth on mate

niv-mizzet wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Smash isn't very useful for the Riptide anyway, no need to remove an ability it will almost never use. And if it is its almost certainly dead already, smash or not. And no matter what way you slice it, its still a very large thing more than capable of stomping stuff to death, but at WS2 its not very good at it.

Actually smash is quite effective against melee walkers like dreadnoughts. There's no way for even a death company dread on the charge with rage and blood talons to one round the tide, so it WILL get at least 1 4+ to hit with a reroll on an easy roll to penetrate. It will at worst take out 1/3 of a melee focused death machine's health, or better, nix a weapon or chop it's legs off, or best, blow it right up, which I have seen happen a few times now. My own poor Cassor the damned has been punched out by my buddy's tide twice now. The first time he forgot about the black painted dreadnought behind a ruin. The second he just wanted to give poor Cassor a rematch for fun.

A shooting focused VERY competitively costed unit has no business being able to stand up to a death co. Dreadnought in melee on the charge.

That says more about how walkers suck terribly than that the Riptide is effective in melee. Dreadnoughts have been mediocre melee units for many editions at this point.

And of course a model with an AP3 melee weapon isn't going to do squat against 2+ armor save model with multiple wounds(and FnP)

Greggy wrote:


Everyone concurs...

Did too.

Edit: ah, nice ninja edit you did. Shoulda quoted your old post before you fixed it.

text removed.

Reds8n

 Grey Templar wrote:

niv-mizzet wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Smash isn't very useful for the Riptide anyway, no need to remove an ability it will almost never use. And if it is its almost certainly dead already, smash or not. And no matter what way you slice it, its still a very large thing more than capable of stomping stuff to death, but at WS2 its not very good at it.

Actually smash is quite effective against melee walkers like dreadnoughts. There's no way for even a death company dread on the charge with rage and blood talons to one round the tide, so it WILL get at least 1 4+ to hit with a reroll on an easy roll to penetrate. It will at worst take out 1/3 of a melee focused death machine's health, or better, nix a weapon or chop it's legs off, or best, blow it right up, which I have seen happen a few times now. My own poor Cassor the damned has been punched out by my buddy's tide twice now. The first time he forgot about the black painted dreadnought behind a ruin. The second he just wanted to give poor Cassor a rematch for fun.

A shooting focused VERY competitively costed unit has no business being able to stand up to a death co. Dreadnought in melee on the charge.

That says more about how walkers suck terribly than that the Riptide is effective in melee. Dreadnoughts have been mediocre melee units for many editions at this point.

And of course a model with an AP3 melee weapon isn't going to do squat against 2+ armor save model with multiple wounds(and FnP)

Blood talons aren't ap3. They're standard dccw's now with s10 ap2. All they do is give rerolls to wound. I would never charge the thing if I was fishing for 1's on his saves in addition to all the other disadvantages.

And yes, part of the situation is that walkers suck ATM. But melee dreads are meant for taking on single heavy targets or small numbers of elites that hopefully don't have anti vehicle melee weapons. In a perfect world, the DC dread would run over the tide like a steamroller.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Greggy wrote:
DUDE READ MY POST HOLY gak

I am done. These forumns are just full of idiots.

You, Mizzet and Martel are just...... omg

It's amazing how many people I've had to tell to calm down in this thread. It's toy soldiers. Not the end of the world just because someone doesn't agree with you.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Mulletdude wrote:
This thread again? Tau aren't top dogs anymore because IK's exist. That one model that anyone can take (and most can cast invis on) invalidates the Tau codex.

Last I checked, Knights are very vulnerable to suicide melta. Something Tau do very well.

Tau suicide melta comes in turn 2 at the earliest, and needs markerlight support just to get hit with a 4++ from the ion shield. Not something they 'do best'.

While the IA certainly feels a bit cheap for what it gives you, one sort of should be careful to examine a unit in a vacuum. The riptide is a good unit. It is also one of the few good things Tau have. I am all for opening up so there are new ways to build their lists, but right now there are quite a few awful, overpriced and awful and overpriced units in the Tau codex. Trashing the Riptide and marker lights with no other changes would make the codex nigh unplayable as it already is struggling to some degree. Especielly in a maelstrom setting since the stronger Tau builds rely on gunlining. Fire warriors are not super cheap if one is to bring every squad a Devilfish of their own.

There are codexes worse off than Tau, but they really are not the powerhouse they used to be. I think that while a bit unwarranted, most of the hate against Tau stems from how they play. When Tau works, they basically shoot their opponent off the table from superior range. When they do not, they simply get outmanouvered and crushed due to their fragile nature. Ideally, perhaps the whole codex needs to be reimagined to some degree.

 Mulletdude wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Mulletdude wrote:
This thread again? Tau aren't top dogs anymore because IK's exist. That one model that anyone can take (and most can cast invis on) invalidates the Tau codex.

Last I checked, Knights are very vulnerable to suicide melta. Something Tau do very well.

Tau suicide melta comes in turn 2 at the earliest, and needs markerlight support just to get hit with a 4++ from the ion shield. Not something they 'do best'.

Turn 2 suicide melta is fine against a IK, they will only get the charge off T2, if you're pushing forward.

 gmaleron wrote:

Backfire wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:
The only true thing that needs to be changed about the Riptide is the cost of the ion accelerator, raise it to about 15 to 20 points and call it good.

That, and drop it to +3 Sv and 4 Wounds or preferably, make it a Walker.

As it is, Riptide simply breaks how the fiction is modelled on-game.

To much of a nerf, WAY to much of a nerf. It is perfectly fine with the Wounds and Save it has. If it got hit that hard I would expect it to go down in points, like Dreadknight base level.

No it's not, and I wouldn't have a problem with a points cost drop if its stats made sense in the game.

Compare Riptide with Ionhead. Why is Riptide, which is a battlesuit, much more durable AND mobile AND has better firepower than Ionhead which is a goddamn TANK? That makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. It is exact same thing if Dreadnaught was chanced to AV14 and Transport Capacity 12 and given better weapons than a Land Raider.

Backfire wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:

Backfire wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:
The only true thing that needs to be changed about the Riptide is the cost of the ion accelerator, raise it to about 15 to 20 points and call it good.

That, and drop it to +3 Sv and 4 Wounds or preferably, make it a Walker.

As it is, Riptide simply breaks how the fiction is modelled on-game.

To much of a nerf, WAY to much of a nerf. It is perfectly fine with the Wounds and Save it has. If it got hit that hard I would expect it to go down in points, like Dreadknight base level.

No it's not, and I wouldn't have a problem with a points cost drop if its stats made sense in the game.

Compare Riptide with Ionhead. Why is Riptide, which is a battlesuit, much more durable AND mobile AND has better firepower than Ionhead which is a goddamn TANK? That makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. It is exact same thing if Dreadnaught was chanced to AV14 and Transport Capacity 12 and given better weapons than a Land Raider.

Because the hammerhead is an"old" weapon platform (in the tau sense of age) and of their lesser techs, and the riptide is the peak of their technology?
Its the same thing as comparing the dreadknight to the predator. the dreadknight is flat out BETTER.
And 40k has this whole "humanoid shape is better war machine" mere going in it, in case you haven't noticed knights, titans and stuff.

As for the nerf-it will make it unplayable at that point cost.
And if you drop the defense, and than drop the cost, what did you get there?
You just shifted the balance from high-durability low-firepower to high-firepower low-durability. tau does not need 2 elite battlesuit glass cannon type units with our low selections as it is.

Backfire wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:

Backfire wrote:

 gmaleron wrote:
The only true thing that needs to be changed about the Riptide is the cost of the ion accelerator, raise it to about 15 to 20 points and call it good.

That, and drop it to +3 Sv and 4 Wounds or preferably, make it a Walker.

As it is, Riptide simply breaks how the fiction is modelled on-game.

To much of a nerf, WAY to much of a nerf. It is perfectly fine with the Wounds and Save it has. If it got hit that hard I would expect it to go down in points, like Dreadknight base level.

No it's not, and I wouldn't have a problem with a points cost drop if its stats made sense in the game.

Compare Riptide with Ionhead. Why is Riptide, which is a battlesuit, much more durable AND mobile AND has better firepower than Ionhead which is a goddamn TANK? That makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. It is exact same thing if Dreadnaught was chanced to AV14 and Transport Capacity 12 and given better weapons than a Land Raider.

Yes it is. See? Everyone can do that.

Crunch-wise, Riptide is better because as it stands right now MC is simply a better type than Vehicle (doubly so since MCs often get Inv saves)

Fluff-wise, it's better because it's the cutting edge of Tau tech, coupled with an experimental reactor with a built-in chance of fryimg its pilot alive..

Ratflinger wrote:
Ideally, perhaps the whole codex needs to be reimagined to some degree.

It really does, yeah. As much as I love Tau, they've always been very frustrating to either play with or against, and the new codex has only made it worse in both cases. Playing with Tau you're kinda locked into playing a static gunline or spamming riptides if you want to win, and playing against them is no more fun now than it was before.

 Sidstyler wrote:

Ratflinger wrote:
Ideally, perhaps the whole codex needs to be reimagined to some degree.

It really does, yeah. As much as I love Tau, they've always been very frustrating to either play with or against, and the new codex has only made it worse in both cases. Playing with Tau you're kinda locked into playing a static gunline or spamming riptides if you want to win, and playing against them is no more fun now than it was before.

100% false.

Niether me, nor any tau player I know do either of these things.

Most tau players prefer mobile playstyle, either suit heavy via enclaves, or fished warriors.

Its not winning any turnies, but triptide won't either, so its not an issue.

Gunlines are the choice of the tau bandwagoners that jumped on during the "golden age of taudar" and didnt quite advance from that time (because they did not invest in their tau once it stopped being uber), and triptide is the choice of tryhards who did not get the memo that the reason it worked was the ovesastar, and the fact people were not geared to deal with superunits at the time. but now that even bigger and nastier superunits are running around in mass, triptide just gets nuked by all the heavy guns people take these days.

Smaller targets are the way to go for most tau players. make you waste your precious gravturion stars, imperial knights and brass scorpions by the fact any target they charge/shoot at is too cheap and meaningless for the kills to matter.

Riptides are beyond excellent, being amazingly tough, very shooty and has way too much synergy with markerlights as well. It also has a lot of utility and can adapt to any situation. Incoming grav bikers? Either pop 3++ or nova charge IA and nuke them to tiny bits with your cover-ignoring high-BS AP2 pieplate.

Deleting foot marines who pay very dearly for their T4 3+ without even granting them the mercy of cover is evil.

T6 W5 2+/5++/5+++ on a JSJ platform is also evil.

The Riptide is not the only thing in 40K that is way too strong. Far from it. But it still deserves the nerfhammer, and deserves it hard.

To the person suggesting that the Riptide becomes an AV 12 walker... You serious?

Did you not see my explanation on how the Riptide's stats make sense (or should really be buffed, like 4++ and S7).

This thread needs to be closed as IoM players are being too idiotic.

I think that the Dreadknight needs to be S and T2 with 1W and cost 1000 points because I don't like the unit; that's pretty much what this thread is.

Honestly, the Riptide should be a walker.

As should the Dreadknight. And the Wraithknight (or it should just be nerfed).

Many things are OP in 40k, but that does not excuse the Riptide at all.

 Ashiraya wrote:
Riptides are beyond excellent, being amazingly tough, very shooty and has way too much synergy with markerlights as well. It also has a lot of utility and can adapt to any situation. Incoming grav bikers? Either pop 3++ or nova charge IA and nuke them to tiny bits with your cover-ignoring high-BS AP2 pieplate.

Deleting foot marines who pay very dearly for their T4 3+ without even granting them the mercy of cover is evil.

T6 W5 2+/5++/5+++ on a JSJ platform is also evil.

The Riptide is not the only thing in 40K that is way too strong. Far from it. But it still deserves the nerfhammer, and deserves it hard.

if you would go back a couple pages we have mentioned multiple tactics that are pretty good counters against this, sorry if the Riptide base point cost deserves to go up based on a logic you guys have presented the Dreadknight better as well. Marker Lights are something that make the Tau unique and if you guys are having issues killing toughness 3 or toughness 4 models with a 4+ save at best then there's something wrong with your list, quit blaming the Tau players for your lack of tactics and again the Nova Charge is not it automatic thing, you guys need to stop treating it like it is.

If marker lights are so evil than I expect Grey Knights for example to lose as much work charges as they do or for Imperial Knights to lose that ridiculous Adamantium Lance formation again based on the logic Imperial players have been bringing. Every book has something that other armies hate to go against and Marker Lights even the worst.

The Riptide is no more evil than the Dreadknight or the Wraithknight and is perfectly costed when it comes to its base point value, breaking it down:

T6: same toughness as a Dreadknight and other MC's why should it be the only one that goes down a toughness?

5 Wounds: It has one more wound than a Dreadknight, it's also 50 points more expensive then a base cost 1 which when taking into accountthat extra wound, Nova generator and JSJ.

2+ & 5++: There is no double invulnerable save, we can improve our save but at a risk of hurting ourselves with no saves of any kind of allowed unless we take a very expensive FNP upgrade. 1/3 of a chance to failis not a great statistic, up one that is always overlooked.

JSJ: Wow so you're telling me a random 2d6 movement on such a giant model is that big of an issue? Not buying that for a second that's like me complaining about the Dreadknights 30 inch shunt move it can do.

Actually walker would make sense, specifically super-heavy walker LOW. Essentially a tau knight.

gmaleron wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:
Riptides are beyond excellent, being amazingly tough, very shooty and has way too much synergy with markerlights as well. It also has a lot of utility and can adapt to any situation. Incoming grav bikers? Either pop 3++ or nova charge IA and nuke them to tiny bits with your cover-ignoring high-BS AP2 pieplate.

Deleting foot marines who pay very dearly for their T4 3+ without even granting them the mercy of cover is evil.

T6 W5 2+/5++/5+++ on a JSJ platform is also evil.

The Riptide is not the only thing in 40K that is way too strong. Far from it. But it still deserves the nerfhammer, and deserves it hard.

if you would go back a couple pages we have mentioned multiple tactics that are pretty good counters against this, sorry if the Riptide base point cost deserves to go up based on a logic you guys have presented the Dreadknight better as well. Marker Lights are something that make the Tau unique and if you guys are having issues killing toughness 3 or toughness 4 models with a 4+ save at best then there's something wrong with your list, quit blaming the Tau players for your lack of tactics and again the Nova Charge is not it automatic thing, you guys need to stop treating it like it is.

If marker lights are so evil than I expect Grey Knights for example to lose as much work charges as they do or for Imperial Knights to lose that ridiculous Adamantium Lance formation again based on the logic Imperial players have been bringing. Every book has something that other armies hate to go against and Marker Lights even the worst.

The Riptide is no more evil than the Dreadknight or the Wraithknight and is perfectly costed when it comes to its base point value, breaking it down:

T6: same toughness as a Dreadknight and other MC's why should it be the only one that goes down a toughness?

5 Wounds: It has one more wound than a Dreadknight, it's also 50 points more expensive then a base cost 1 which when taking into accountthat extra wound, Nova generator and JSJ.

2+ & 5++: There is no double invulnerable save, we can improve our save but at a risk of hurting ourselves with no saves of any kind of allowed unless we take a very expensive FNP upgrade. 1/3 of a chance to failis not a great statistic, up one that is always overlooked.

JSJ: Wow so you're telling me a random 2d6 movement on such a giant model is that big of an issue? Not buying that for a second that's like me complaining about the Dreadknights 30 inch shunt move it can do.

I never compared it to the Dreadknight or the Wraithknight (which are OP too fwiw). They need nerfs too, arguably, although the thread is not about them so I won't adress them. Adlance being too strong does not prevent the Riptide being too strong.

While the really OP unit points at the super-OP unit as an excuse, all the other units who are neither don't really care - they'd just want both nerfed.

No need to be defensive.

Co'tor Shas wrote:Actually walker would make sense, specifically super-heavy walker LOW. Essentially a tau knight.

I thought the idea of Tau was that they don't want big stompy walkers and that the Riptide already was straining their theme?

 Ashiraya wrote:
Riptides are beyond excellent, being amazingly tough, very shooty and has way too much synergy with markerlights as well. It also has a lot of utility and can adapt to any situation. Incoming grav bikers? Either pop 3++ or nova charge IA and nuke them to tiny bits with your cover-ignoring high-BS AP2 pieplate.

Deleting foot marines who pay very dearly for their T4 3+ without even granting them the mercy of cover is evil.

T6 W5 2+/5++/5+++ on a JSJ platform is also evil.

The Riptide is not the only thing in 40K that is way too strong. Far from it. But it still deserves the nerfhammer, and deserves it hard.

How does the bike squad example work in practice, assuming by 'grav bikers' you mean Command squad and not the bike squad with their lone grav gun:
You shoot, you pass Gets Hot!, blast doesn't scatter,so you hit let's say 4 bikers ( realistically it will most often be 3 with proper spacing). The guy up front with the Storm Shield (captain or Chapter Master)takes the let's say 4 wounds (again we assume no 1 was rolled for to Wound, blocks 2/3 on his 3++. Congrats! You have just done 1.25 wounds to a grav bike squad. If he has no Apothecary that is.

Next round your Riptide us eating 12 grav shots, possibly with Perfect Timing if he allied in a Rune Priest like most bikestars seem.to do nowadays.

Also, the facr that Tac Squads pay 'very dearly' for 3+ and t4 is one of the reasons they're terrible troops.

 Ashiraya wrote:

Co'tor Shas wrote:Actually walker would make sense, specifically super-heavy walker LOW. Essentially a tau knight.

I thought the idea of Tau was that they don't want big stompy walkers and that the Riptide already was straining their theme?

Yes, but as long as we have one, lets make it that way.

I would be perfectly fine if it was just removed altogether. Or just discontinue it and give it to FW. Considering FW mostly does rare or specialized stuff, it would fit, and the model, judging from their two, would be amazing.

There are so many points in this thread where i'm just like 'Did they really just say that?'
The riptide seems to be the single most hated unit in the game at this point.

Some questions:
Why can't Tau have access to a long range AP2 blast? Other armies have it.
Why can't Tau have a single unit over T4 in their army? It is the only option over T4 in the book and other armies have units of higher T.
Why can't Tau have a unit with a 2+ save? There is only 2 units in the book with a 2+ save.
Why can't Tau have a 3++ save? There are no units with a native 3++ save in the book.

Thing i will agree should be addressed.
Cost of the IA
Maybe remove the 5++ (it doesn't make much too sense anyway)
Maybe drop a wound

As mentioned earlier in the thread it's a scaled up suit so it does make sense.
S6/7 T6 as Crisis suits are S5 T4 and they're 2 stages bigger.
2+ armour makes sense.
the IA can't really change because then it's inconsistent with Ion Weapons.

Tau natively have access to Ignores Cover and BS+ so you can't do much about this.

It actually works perfectly. XV8s are T4, XV9s are T5, and XV10s are T6.

And XV88 are someone still T4, despite having the bodymass of a dreadnaut.

If anything, tau statlines are often UNDER what they should be fluffwise, not over it.
A freaking giant robot made of superior materials SHOULD be though as nails. if you cant justify a T6 W5 Sv2+/5++ on something of that scale, there is no way in hell you can justify half the things the IoM is packing.

I'm not really stating anything that hasn't been said before. Are Riptides OP? Yes. Are IK, and FMC also OP? Yes. Is invisibility OP? Yes. Are serps OP? Yes.

There isn't an army list out there that doesn't have access to these things...cept orks...So I can really feel for the orks here - though Orks really aren't weak to any of those things listed above except knights but really...what isn't weak to 5 knights?

 BoomWolf wrote:
And XV88 are someone still T4, despite having the bodymass of a dreadnaut.

If anything, tau statlines are often UNDER what they should be fluffwise, not over it.
A freaking giant robot made of superior materials SHOULD be though as nails. if you cant justify a T6 W5 Sv2+/5++ on something of that scale, there is no way in hell you can justify half the things the IoM is packing.

That's fine, just pay the appropriate points for it. Which they don't.

 BoomWolf wrote:

A freaking giant robot made of superior materials SHOULD be though as nails. if you cant justify a T6 W5 Sv2+/5++ on something of that scale, there is no way in hell you can justify half the things the IoM is packing.

I can faintly remember random Space Marines cutting up those high-tech robots in the Democles novels. Didn't one almost bite the dust from a lasgun volley too? Man, I must re-read those books...

" It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided"

No, it's really not. The stats are crazy for a long range unit.

Martel732 wrote:
" It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided"

No, it's really not. The stats are crazy for a long range unit.

But it's not a long ranged unit at base. At base it's range is 36"

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
" It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided"

No, it's really not. The stats are crazy for a long range unit.

But it's not a long ranged unit at base. At base it's range is 36"

36" is a lot longer ranged than the Dreadknight that it is being compared to. 36" is out of the range of all grav weapons, plasma guns, and all melta weapons. I'd say that's a pretty long range.

 BoomWolf wrote:
And XV88 are someone still T4, despite having the bodymass of a dreadnaut.

If anything, tau statlines are often UNDER what they should be fluffwise, not over it.
A freaking giant robot made of superior materials SHOULD be though as nails. if you cant justify a T6 W5 Sv2+/5++ on something of that scale, there is no way in hell you can justify half the things the IoM is packing.

Fluff is often a poor measure. I mean every book talks their army up to be unstoppable. In reality we are playing a game that balances power with a point based system. I'm perfectly okay with a riptide being that tough. It should probably cost about 30- 40 points more points in it's popular load outs though if it's going to be that tough. It's also a unit that covers all your armies weaknesses. It gives first strike capability vs drop pods and It's a pretty strong CC unit - I've seen one tie up a thunder wolf squad for 4 rounds of combat - forgive people for finding this a little bit OP.

MCs are OP in assault in general. It's just that many of them have trouble getting there. The Riptide makes YOU come to IT.

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
" It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided"

No, it's really not. The stats are crazy for a long range unit.

But it's not a long ranged unit at base. At base it's range is 36"

36" is a lot longer ranged than the Dreadknight that it is being compared to. 36" is out of the range of all grav weapons, plasma guns, and all melta weapons. I'd say that's a pretty long range.

36" is medium-ranged. You really have to be at least 48" to be long ranged. And that 36" does piddly amounts of damage. Unsupported it does 4 strength 6 hits at AP4.

 Xenomancers wrote:

 BoomWolf wrote:
And XV88 are someone still T4, despite having the bodymass of a dreadnaut.

If anything, tau statlines are often UNDER what they should be fluffwise, not over it.
A freaking giant robot made of superior materials SHOULD be though as nails. if you cant justify a T6 W5 Sv2+/5++ on something of that scale, there is no way in hell you can justify half the things the IoM is packing.

Fluff is often a poor measure. I mean every book talks their army up to be unstoppable. In reality we are playing a game that balances power with a point based system. I'm perfectly okay with a riptide being that tough. It should probably cost about 30- 40 points more points in it's popular load outs though if it's going to be that tough. It's also a unit that covers all your armies weaknesses. It gives first strike capability vs drop pods and It's a pretty strong CC unit - I've seen one tie up a thunder wolf squad for 4 rounds of combat - forgive people for finding this a little bit OP.

On this topic, there is no forgiveness. Never mind that I think several Tau units should be buffed to make the army more competitive internally. The Riptide is so good that it's a mega-no brainer. That's another huge red flag.

Martel732 wrote:
" It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided"

No, it's really not. The stats are crazy for a long range unit.

Your opinion. Not a fact.

IMO base stats are fine considerimg part of it's Wounds are Nova Charge fuel.

IA stats are the issue.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
" It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided"

No, it's really not. The stats are crazy for a long range unit.

But it's not a long ranged unit at base. At base it's range is 36"

36" is a lot longer ranged than the Dreadknight that it is being compared to. 36" is out of the range of all grav weapons, plasma guns, and all melta weapons. I'd say that's a pretty long range.

36" is medium-ranged. You really have to be at least 48" to be long ranged. And that 36" does piddly amounts of damage. Unsupported it does 4 strength 6 hits at AP4.

You are just arguing semantics. I consider 36" to be the start of long range. This changes nothing, however. Everything I said about a 36" range is true. And still leaves it more effective than a base Dreadknight. And much, much harder to kill.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

LordBlades wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
" It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided"

No, it's really not. The stats are crazy for a long range unit.

Your opinion. Not a fact.

There are no "facts" in subjective comparisons in units. Quit stating the obvious.

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
" It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided"

No, it's really not. The stats are crazy for a long range unit.

But it's not a long ranged unit at base. At base it's range is 36"

36" is a lot longer ranged than the Dreadknight that it is being compared to. 36" is out of the range of all grav weapons, plasma guns, and all melta weapons. I'd say that's a pretty long range.

36" is medium-ranged. You really have to be at least 48" to be long ranged. And that 36" does piddly amounts of damage. Unsupported it does 4 strength 6 hits at AP4.

You are just arguing semantics. I consider 36" to be the start of long range. This changes nothing, however. Everything I said about a 36" range is true. And still leaves it more effective than a base Dreadknight. And much, much harder to kill.

The start of long ranged (or 150% of basic weapon) is still not very effective, especially when you actually look at the gun. In a round of shooting it will kill 1.1 marines,

How many marines does a base Dreadknight kill from 36"?

LordBlades wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
" It's the increase of the base riptide which is wrong and misguided"

No, it's really not. The stats are crazy for a long range unit.

Your opinion. Not a fact.

IMO base stats are fine considerimg part of it's Wounds are Nova Charge fuel.

IA stats are the issue.

3 str 7 ap2 shots is often better than overcharging...Large blast has trouble hitting more than 3 units anyways.

Dread knights don't receive perils wound fuel. Nether do librarians...you can even save the wound with your 5+ FNP where as wounds from perils table are non savable. It's a pretty terrible argument.

 BoomWolf wrote:

Backfire wrote:

Compare Riptide with Ionhead. Why is Riptide, which is a battlesuit, much more durable AND mobile AND has better firepower than Ionhead which is a goddamn TANK? That makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. It is exact same thing if Dreadnaught was chanced to AV14 and Transport Capacity 12 and given better weapons than a Land Raider.

Because the hammerhead is an"old" weapon platform (in the tau sense of age) and of their lesser techs, and the riptide is the peak of their technology?
Its the same thing as comparing the dreadknight to the predator. the dreadknight is flat out BETTER.

Great, you use the other ill-conceived MC which really should be a walker too, to make your point.

So lets say Riptide has new super-duper armour and Nova-reactor to make it more powerful than previous generation tanks.
Why don't the Tau apply this technology to tanks?

After all, Hammerhead has much more internal space than Riptide. Shielding, cooling etc. must be much easier in a tank compared to a suit. In a tank the crew probably would not be in risk from Nova reactor. It has better shaped armour, the mobility is better as the tank floats whilst Riptide's airborne abilities are limited to small hops.

Again, no matter how you put it, the whole thing doesn't make a lick of sense.

 BoomWolf wrote:

And 40k has this whole "humanoid shape is better war machine" mere going in it, in case you haven't noticed knights, titans and stuff.

What about Baneblade and Battle Fortresses?
Why do Eldar have really advanced, powerful tanks since they clearly possess the knowledge to make advanced walkers AND MC's?

 BoomWolf wrote:

As for the nerf-it will make it unplayable at that point cost.

Interesting, given that still it would be clearly superior to for example, Carnifex. I guess that one of the most common MC's in the game is then utterly unplayable?

 BoomWolf wrote:

And if you drop the defense, and than drop the cost, what did you get there?

An unit whichs abilities are balanced within both the Codex itself, and compared to how similar units are modelled in other books and which doesn't force the metagame to change around it.

Yeah, I can see why that would be a bad thing.

 BoomWolf wrote:

You just shifted the balance from high-durability low-firepower to high-firepower low-durability. tau does not need 2 elite battlesuit glass cannon type units with our low selections as it is.

Funny how T6 4W 3+ 5++ is "low-durability".

But here's another crazy idea: maybe the Tau shouldn't be "low selection" army? Maybe if the stuff like tanks, Piranhas, Stealth suits, flyers etc. were actually worth taking instead of/ in addition to battlesuits, the army wouldn't be so damn dependent from couple of lynchpin units to provide the necessary durability and/or firepower?