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Hello! I started playing warhammer 40k a few months ago. Have not played too much of it but enough to where I know what I am doing in the game so far.
Elder are kicking my butt. I have never beaten them once and I have tried pretty hard. I only won a single game out of about 20 and that is only because the person I played against was using
a weak ork army and he was using them wrong and trying to do other stuff that was just wrong to use them.

Elder has stupid gay ass psychic abilities that APPARENTLY (not making this an argument but just laying it out there.) they own tau and sheer number of ranged attacks. Not to mention hits and saves is a real pain in the ass making them almost invincible.

Orks or anything like them might die easily but I cannot kill them all before they get to me even with the full use of markerlights.

It just seems to me that every other race has half its army with something better then most of the tau force that I have read through. Sure I got long range but with the crap that I have seen from the other players I play with its useless right now.

How good are tau and how can I fix my problem?

As a new tau player I understand the frustration with Eldar. Post what units you have and what units you have been facing and this forum will help.

What I got

I have a shas-o with the Cyclic Ion Cannon and that Fragmentation thing. Lots of gun drones I only use as marker drones.
An almost full kroot army, Just missing 4 hounds and 3 krutox riders. I got one ethereal and a veteran squad to go with him which I usually put him inside of a devil fish. They
are my only squad of fire warriors with Pulse carbines. Then I got two full troops fire warriors with pulse rifles. I got a full troop of stealth team XV25's. Two have fusion blasters.
A battlesuit with flamer and missile pod and I originally have him a multitracker but its been switched out for my new favorite toy the targeting array. Another with plasma rifle,fusion blaster and
a multitracker. One with Positional replay and a missile pod and burst cannon. ( I like to keep all my battle suit guys different from each other) Finally I got just one Broadside battlesuit.

I am thinking sniper drone teams, and pathfinders next.


Some of the stuff I have been facing/

Warlocks on jetbikes and witchblades
Shuriken cannons
Two of those transports and Harloquins or however you spell it.
Firedragons
Stricking scorpions
Rangers X10
Swooping hawks...did you know you can deep strick...large blast template someone with a powerful weapon and not even come in with them? Its like a FREE large blast attack anywhere on the board you want without even putting your guys on the board...its f90809 GAY

He wants a army with x60 rangers as his troop choices....and it will be done.





Automatically Appended Next Post:
Apologies for second post and Apologies for not reading what you wrote better...I thought you said what I have been facing with not what the elders are.

Its a investment money wise but you need devilfish. If you are on a budget I would suggest purchasing a skyray and some small magnets with work you can have both. The same with the Hammerhead

Sounds like a good idea. I have been wanting the skyray for a while. What do you think of Vespids. I keep reading them but they do not interest me.

Alright, I think you are using to much kroot, unless you have a heavy forest board they are useless, no save, not fast across the board, and no long range. They are good in CC but you have to get them there first. I would say you need more firewarriors, perferably in Devilfish. Oh and the swooping hawks can only use their template attack when they deepstrike onto the board.

I have a shas-o with the Cyclic Ion Cannon and that Fragmentation thing. Lots of gun drones I only use as marker drones.

Shas'el with targeting array is cheaper and just as effective as a Shas-O
Marker drones are way too expensive for what they do. Pathfinders are superior.

An almost full kroot army, Just missing 4 hounds and 3 krutox riders. I got one ethereal and a veteran squad to go with him which I usually put him inside of a devil fish. They
are my only squad of fire warriors with Pulse carbines.

I think I may vomit. Hounds and Krootoxen are terrible. Kroot are good.
Ethereals are terrible. Pulse Carbines are terrible. The veteran squad is ok, but only with rifles.

Then I got two full troops fire warriors with pulse rifles.

In devilfish. If they are not in devilfish I will strangle you.

I got a full troop of stealth team XV25's. Two have fusion blasters.

Decent. Be sure to deepstrike them.

A battlesuit with flamer and missile pod and I originally have him a multitracker but its been switched out for my new favorite toy the targeting array.

Battlesuit with a super-short range weapon, a long-range weapon, and a targeting array.
Excuse me, I think I will vomit.
...
ok back.

Another with plasma rifle,fusion blaster and a multitracker.

Decent.

One with Positional replay and a missile pod and burst cannon. ( I like to keep all my battle suit guys different from each other) Finally I got just one Broadside battlesuit.

Missile pod and burst cann... *blarf*
Oh god you owe me a new keyboard.

If you want them diversified, I suggest the following:
Plasma/fusion
Plasma/Missile pod
Fusion/Missile pod.

Get 2 more broadsides and run them with shield drones.

I am thinking sniper drone teams next.

Oh god I think you just gave me a tumor.
No sniper drones. ever.

Warlocks on jetbikes and witchblades

That is mean, but beatable.

Shuriken cannons

That is a weapon. What is it mounted on?

Two of those transports and Harloquins or however you spell it.

Wave serpents are super-surviveable against shooting from the front, but shatter like glass if you even look at their rear armor.
Harlequins are kind of mean, try to just ignore them until you are in rapid-fire range with 2-3 squads.

Firedragons

Are awesome, but beatable. Don't put tanks near them, if you do that they fall to about everything once they disembark.

Stricking scorpions

Beat them with your kroot. You could use those kroot hounds if you REALLY want to, otherwise just hit them with a full squad of 20 after shooting them up.

Rangers X10

Are almost useless against tau.

Swooping hawks...did you know you can deep strick...large blast template someone with a powerful weapon and not even come in with them? Its like a FREE large blast attack anywhere on the board you want without even putting your guys on the board...its f90809 GAY

1.) S4 AP5 is not a powerful weapon. It has less than a 40% of killing a single fire warrior. Guess what happens when that template is gone? You get some T3 sv4+ models on the board with weapons that have a less than 25% of killing a fire warrior. That blast template is all they have going for them.
2.) there are much better ways to describe something than "gay", what are you, 13?
Consider:
Overpowered, Difficult to deal with, aggravating, infuriating, rage-inducing, powerful, ridiculous, preposterous, or deadly.

Welcome to Tau. In answer to your question of how good Tau are....they're freakin' awesome.

Tau have just gotten a MASSIVE boost. 5th edition has shifted the meta-game into much more mechanization, and Tau are hands down the best tank killing army in existence. The second thing that Tau have at their disposal is the unique ability to influence a battle in interesting ways. You have LOTS of pinning weapons, the ability to pretty much force-pin units, wound allocation goodness to increase suit survivability, and the best troop weapon (the pulse rifle) in 40k.

How you use it all determines how you do. Personally, I find kroot distasteful. If I want a close combat element in my army, I play a 2v2 and have my wife join me with her orks. Tau are meant to shoot, shoot more, and lay down such a withering fusillade of firepower that enemy armies simply evaporate under your firepower. You'll see some interesting ideas for tau army lists floating around, and some incredibly dumb ideas too. I've been incredibly successful with a pure Tau gunline (using some tactical deployment to avoid being flanked and annihilated). Here's my advice:

1. Tau firewarriors: Take groups of 12 of them, with a shas'ui who has a handheld markerlight (10 points). Give the squad 2 gundrones, or 2 marker drones if you can afford it pointwise. I deploy these guys almost 2" apart, in a line where possible, and always in cover. 4+ armor save doesn't impress anyone, but 4+ armor save in addition to 4+ cover save does wonders for keeping firewarriors alive.

2. Broadsides. In 5th edition, Broadsides rule supreme. You should have six of them. Two teams of three. If you're playing 1,000 points or less then two teams of two. Team leader with a target lock, and both teams need two shield drones each. You've got 2+ armor saves, and your drones have 2+ armor saves and 4+ invulnerable saves. These puppies ALSO need to be deployed in cover. Preferably on top of a building somewhere that counts as ruins, so that climbing is required if people are going to try outflanking and assaulting you. Putting them in cover gives you 4+ cover saves in case you run into AP2 weaponry. Those six broadsides should form the backbone, the core, the heart, and the basis of your army. The rest of your army is really just support for your broadsides, ESPECIALLY today where everyone is running such heavily mechanized lists. Depending on mood, sometimes I'll take a Railgun hammerhead as a third heavy support for its large blast template; as anti-tank its next to useless.

3. Snipers! A heavy support choice that can consist of three individual teams of snipers. Each of them STR6 AP3, and able to headshot an MEQ without a save, and each able to pin a unit. One of my favorite, FAVORITE tactics in 40k is to have a broadside team blow up a transport, have a firewarrior team drop 1-3 markerlights (2 drones + shas'ui) on the disembarked unit, or have a pathfinder unit drop 5-8 markerlights on them, then pin them using a rail rifle and markerlight modifiers. You play against Eldar often, and those pesky wave serpents turbo-boost around the board getting cover saves, right? Drop a couple of markerlights on it, reduce its cover save to nothing, and introduce it to a whole team of broadsides. 4+ rerollable to hit, depending on facing, you need 3 or less to glance, and if they're turbo-boosting, 3+ destroys it. AP1 gives +1 on the penetration table, and if a turbo-boosting vehicle is immobilized, it counts as destroyed. Hey! Free pinning test on the guys inside!

4. Speaking of rail rifles....if you have a team of pathfinders with rail rifles+target locks, and 3 sniper teams, you can cause 9 seperate pinning tests across an enemy army. If you toss a bunch of markerlights into the fray, you can go a loooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooong way towards immobilizing an entire enemy army.

5. Crisis suits: Crisis suits exist to fill holes in your army strategy; this includes your HQs. With broadsides levelling every tank on the field, sniper drones and pathfinders forcing pinning tests on anything with a leadership value, and multiple firewarrior squads laying down ridiculous numbers of STR5 shots at anything willing to step 30" into range, you've got your anti-tank answer, some anti-MEQ, and the first step towards anti-horde. The gaps in your army are reliable MEQ and terminator killers, and more anti-horde. My favorite suit combination is plasma/fusion with multi-tracker, team leader giving me two gun or shield drones (depending on points). Drop 2 markerlights on a terminator squad, and you've got BS5 needing 2+ to hit, and at the 12" mark, you've got 6 plasma shots and 3 fusion shots. Thats 6x STR6 AP2 and 3x STR8 AP1. 2+ to hit, 2+ to wound. No saves, no feel no pain. Insta-killed anything you like. In larger games, I also take a team of "deathrain" crisis suits, which is twin-linked missile pod suits in my back, working on killing light transports or geting side armor shots on anything they can. That saves the broadsides for the big guns. Give your Shas'el Iridium armor and two shield drones, and you've got three 2+ armor save models; I think the fragmentation airburst launcher (large blast, ignores cover) is pretty much mandatory, and I give him a flamer too. Perfect anti-horde! Suits range across the field dealing death to anything that isn't being pinned or destroyed by your longer range firepower.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Strategy: You now have a static gunline capable of destroying ANYTHING and EVERYTHING that can be thrown against you. The weakness: You're static. You're not moving across the board to take objectives. Believe it or not...there's a simple solution for this one too. In capture and control, you have one objective, and your enemy has one objective. In Seize ground, you're going to have one, and possible two objectives to control. You don't NEED to go take the enemy objectives. All you have to do is destroy their troop choices. With the vast amount of firepower and long range dakka....its pretty easy. Don't forget all those pinning weapons either. Pinned units can't hold an objective.

You'll need to learn and understand enemy lists, and a VERY important question you need to ask EVERY game is "What are you keeping in reserve?" You need to know what's in reserve and if its outflanking or deep-striking. If your flanks are going to be threatened, then deploy in the middle so that flanking units can't get to you. You'll also learn the magic of spreading across terrain to prevent lictor entrances, and using firewarriors to wall off access to broadsides.

That's basically it. This type of list and this strategy has pretty much won me almost every Tau game I've played in the last year. I've been playing Orks heavily for the last six months because I've decided I prefer assaulting over shooting. If you go first, the game is practically over; you can level 1/3 of the enemy army in turn 1, take out most of its mobility, and probably pin a unit or two. If you go second, you'll have to be a bit more tactical about target priorities and threat analysis, but either way, between your broadsides, markerlights, and pinning weaponry, your enemy is not doing much moving the entire game.

If you could imagine what I just described in a movie or a video game, its basically a defensive fortress. Firepower would be flying across the screen so heavily that you'd feel like getting underneath your computer desk to keep your head down. And now the metagame has shifted even more in your favor; more vehicles means less troops, and Tau anti-tank is unrivaled. Don't worry about objectives; you can deny objectives to an opponent by tabling them or killing their troops easier than you can use your own troops to hold them.

Honestly, I don't think Kroot are worth using. If you wanted to play a sneaky, outflanking army you should pick something besides Tau. Dark Eldar, or Orks. Every point you waste on a kroot (who is a subpar model in every respect; its melee usefulness is solely in its ability to tie up an enemy unit for a turn before dying) is a point that you didn't put into the overwhelming firepower that will win you games.

That's my....much more than two cents.

I have a shas-o with the Cyclic Ion Cannon and that Fragmentation thing. Lots of gun drones I only use as marker drones.

Shas'el with targeting array is cheaper and just as effective as a Shas-O
Marker drones are way too expensive for what they do. Pathfinders are superior.

Listen to Dashofpepper

Also I don't understand how anyone could hate on sniper drones you get 3 rail rifles and a NETWORKED markerlight for 80 points in order to get that somewhere else in your army you'd have to buy pathfinders. Now pathfinders with rail rifles are 22 points each and the only other source of networked markerlights are markerdrones at 30 points each but require a 10 point shas'ui upgrade making a comparably equipped pathfinder team cost 106 points vs the 80 for a sniper team oh and the sniper team gets stealth fields for free, tell me whats not to like here? With marines running around out of cover, demon princes, and dakkafexes galore these guys will make their points back many times over.

Sure some people complain about it taking a heavy slot but if you run 6 broadsides with a team leader rocking a target lock you have all the rail gun support you need.

easy. a drone team is 80 points gives you 3 shots at str 6 at 36 inches. a broad side is 95 points and gives you 1 twin linked Str 10 shot at 72 inches and 4 strenght 5 shots at 24 inches and can move and fire and fire the st 5 shots without line of sight and can move and fire. broad side wins in my opinion.

Even if your drone team makes its 66% chance of hitting with the marker light that only gives your rails a 66% chance of hitting. Broad sides have a 75% chance of hitting every round.

How good is Shadow sun? Can I play her in a non- Apocolypse game?

Vasarto wrote:What I got

I have a shas-o with the Cyclic Ion Cannon and that Fragmentation thing. Lots of gun drones I only use as marker drones.
An almost full kroot army, Just missing 4 hounds and 3 krutox riders. I got one ethereal and a veteran squad to go with him which I usually put him inside of a devil fish. They
are my only squad of fire warriors with Pulse carbines. Then I got two full troops fire warriors with pulse rifles. I got a full troop of stealth team XV25's. Two have fusion blasters.
A battlesuit with flamer and missile pod and I originally have him a multitracker but its been switched out for my new favorite toy the targeting array. Another with plasma rifle,fusion blaster and
a multitracker. One with Positional replay and a missile pod and burst cannon. ( I like to keep all my battle suit guys different from each other) Finally I got just one Broadside battlesuit.

What points level you have been playing at?

IMHO, you don't have enough long-range firepower. If I read it right, you have two suits with Missile pods and one Broadside. Not good enough at any points level. Either add Hammerhead(s), Broadsides or put more Missile pods to your suits. Twin-linked Missile pods are great at popping transports. If you are using Positional Relay, put it on your Commander, as you can buy him Multi-tracker as a wargear.

Ah....I forgot to address ICs.

Ethereal: Never worth taking. Having your entire army take a L7 or L8 leadership test else run off the board is absolutely not worth it. Don't ever take an ethereal.

Ethereal IC: Also not worth it:

Shadowsun: Completely not worth it. Please, for the love of all holiness, don't use her.

Farsight: He's the bomb diggity. Granted, he's not all that you could want in an IC compared to OTHER armies, but he's the best Tau have to offer.

Pro: Lets you bring a 7 suit bodyguard. This spawns the Farsight bomb, which is an 8 suit, independently firing, 8-16 drone (shield, marker, gun), uniquely equipped for wound allocation goodness nightmare that can deep strike onto the field. With pathfinders, you can reroll that deep strike. Farsight also has the only power weapon in all of the Tau empire. He also confers preferred enemy when you fight Orks.

Con: He restricts you to 0-1 of some things like Broadsides. You can only take one team. No kroot or vespids (not a real loss). Having preferred enemy against Orks is laughable because rerolling missed "to hit" rolls in close combat doesn't mean much when you're going to get boned in close combat no matter what you do.

The farsight bomb is the only saving grace for him. Imagine this suit configuration:
Farsight
Bodyguard 1: Twin-linked Plasma guns, drone controller, 2 shield drones
Bodyguard 2: Plasma gun, Fusion blaster, drone controller, hard wired target lock, markerlight drone, shield drone
Bodyguard 3: Plasma gun, Fusion blaster, multi-tracker, hard wired target lock
Bodyguard 4: Plasma gun, Fusion blaster, multi-tracker, hard wired drone controller, 2 gun drones
Bodyguard 5: Fusion blaster, Flamer, multi-tracker, hard wired target lock
Bodyguard 6: Fusion blaster, flamer, multi-tracker, hard wired target lock, hard wired drone controller, 2 shield drones
Bodyguard 7: Fusion blaster, cyclic ion cannon, multi-tracker, hard wired drone controller, markerlight drone, shield drone

You've got 8 suits capable of killing 6 different vehicles in one shooting round; deep striking in the rear of a mechanized IG army would be really funny. I've used these guys to level MEQ armies time and again.

Most of your HQs though should be Shas'o or Shas'el. I use my HQs and suits to fill those critical MEQ killing holes.

Shas'el, Fusion/Plasma, multi-tracker, iridium armor, HW drone controller, 2 shield drones. Remember that bodyguard units are +10 points over regular elites somply to gain access to wargear, so I prefer using regular elites and attaching my HQ. Do the same with an elite unit, give the shas'ui two shield drones, and give them markerlight support while attaching the Shas'el.

You've now got 4 suits with terminator killing weapons, that can insta-kill most of the marine HQs with the Fusion blasters, or with a railgun shot. I use these guys to move along my skirmish line / screening across the front taking down MEQs and terminators. My firewarriors do just fine on smaller infantry. With markerlight support, you need 2+ to hit, 2+ to kill, and if you're doing JSJ to get inside 12" and back out of assault range, you've got 12 instant kill shots against MEQs and TEQs as long as you don't roll any 1s.

There's a lot you can do with a Tau army; find something you like.

DoP:

I keep seeing you talk about using pinning weapons + markerlight leadership reduction to force armies to be pinned. While its a great tactic, how viable is it really?

The reason I ask is because nearly every unit I face is either fearless or they are space marines (who can choose to pass or fail morale). Seeing as how pinning doesn't work on fearless stuff and almost all of 40k is fearless, how is this strategy still viable?

I think I smell a troll here.

It's a legitimate question.

Around here, I don't use any leadership based attacks with my DE, because the majority of players are either fearless(Cult Marines/Demon Codex/Ork Mobs, or very likley to pass the test(Marines/Stubborn stuff).

Pinning weapons don't do much against stubborn armies or fully mechanized foes (besides arn't you usually using markerlights to negate cover saves the vehicles are getting anyways?)

They do even less against fearless armies such as CSM, Deamons, Nids, and orks.

There is a reason Tau don't get a lot of love, while they have some great guns they have nearly no assault defence and TLOS has really hurt the effectivness of suits.

I spent 6 months trying to win with Tau, no matter how I built them they had major holes. If you know what kind of army you will be facing they work alright, however if you are in a tournament with a take all commers list chances are you'll be in the bottom half of the bracket.

Tau do need some lovin. Unfortunatly only SM and IG seem to get lovin. They should stop churning out these expantions every couple months and work on some of the older codex's like Tau and Nid and Necrons. Of course why would you put out a book that you can only market to a small percentage of gamers when you can put out a expansion that you can market to all your gamers?

VoxDei wrote:Tau do need some lovin. Unfortunatly only SM and IG seem to get lovin. They should stop churning out these expantions every couple months and work on some of the older codex's like Tau and Nid and Necrons. Of course why would you put out a book that you can only market to a small percentage of gamers when you can put out a expansion that you can market to all your gamers?

I thought that Tau are/were actually amongst best selling armies?

I can get sniper drone teams and farsight. You think that would be a decent next start on my army?

ObiFett wrote:DoP:

I keep seeing you talk about using pinning weapons + markerlight leadership reduction to force armies to be pinned. While its a great tactic, how viable is it really?

The reason I ask is because nearly every unit I face is either fearless or they are space marines (who can choose to pass or fail morale). Seeing as how pinning doesn't work on fearless stuff and almost all of 40k is fearless, how is this strategy still viable?

I actually just addressed this over in the army list forums, and so am going to copy and paste below. Space marines can choose to pass or fail a leadership test, which is different than a pinning test. They don't get to choose to pass that, only fearless units do. Against fearless units....you have other weaponry. If they're space marines, so what if they can't be pinned? All those pinning weapons are STR6 AP3 FREAKIN' SNIPER RIFLES!!! You insta-kill several MEQs per sniper team or pathfinder rail rifle. Getting all those pinning checks is just a huge bonus for non-fearless enemies.

Vasarto, in answer to you getting drone teams and farsight next: You can make Farsight out of a regular suit. Give him a plasma gun, a shield generator, and find a nice looking sword in someone's bitz box. My farsight is using a chainsword with the bloody stump of a space marine arm still attached. If that isn't scary, I don't know what is. I think sniper drone teams should be further down on your list. My advice:

You need 24 firewarriors; you can combine them in different ways.
After that, you need broadsides. Six of them. An army consisting of 2 squads of 12 firewarriors in cover + 6 broadside battlesuits = win!
After that, you need crisis suits.
After that, you need 24 more firewarriors
After that, you need more crisis suits.
After that, you need to decide if you want your third heavy support to be 3 sniper teams or a railgun equipped hammerhead.

Below, I've posted what I wrote in the other thread for further insight.

Milquetoast Thug wrote:You know, I didn't mind when you posted this nonsense before... but come on! "eliminate his troop choices"? what if he's running plague marines? what if he's running mobs of boyz? what if he's running 5 wave serpents or if he's using necron squads hidden in reserve?

and I know you're not on the ball because you claim that a "you need 3 or less to glance" one with a railgun. except that the serpent's special rules make it so you actually need a 4 to glance, since hey treat all guns above s8 as, well s8. including railguns. so yeah.
And you also have this weird fixation on pinning, which I honestly don’t understand. Don’t you play any armies with fearless units? It’s nice when it happens, but it’s not really something to rely on.

Other than that, your analysis is ok. But still, I don’t understand where a lot of your advice is coming from. I mean, you knocked kroot, who are far and away a far better objective taker than FCW's ever will be. What the hell.

1. What if he's running plague marines? I addressed that already. The plethora of Fusion/Plasma combo suits in a good Tau army list laughs at their toughness and they don't get FNP. Plague marines don't scare me.

2. What if he's running mobs of boyz? Are you kidding? Between a fragmentation airburst launcher, flamers, and scything swarms of pulse beams cutting down boyz (and potentially a single Railgun throwing submunition rounds) boyz don't scare anyone. Trukk boyz get pinned really easily when you kill a few, and green tide evaporates when you play a static gunline of pure firepower.

3. What if he's running 5 wave serpents? I addressed this too. Did you read my post? AP1 railguns that reach across the entire battlefield, markerlights that remove coversaves, a 3+ is going to pretty much kill the wave serpent (remember that immobilizing a skimmer that turbo-boosted causes a destroyed result).

4. What if he's using necron squads hidden in reserve? So? They're gonna what? Come out from a monolith that deep strikes into the middle of your gunline? Been there, done that: you need only move 1" away from the monolith, which means that you can still block the port on it. Nothing is coming out of a monolith entrance if they can't deploy 1" away, and even better...if they roll for reserves and GET it, then they must come out, and if they can't...the unit is destroyed. I've played plenty of necrons in my day; monoliths wither underneath 6 twin-linked broadside shots.

Besides, why are you asking for tactical advice? If you're a half decent player...even remotely decent, all the situations you listed are easily dealt with; laughable even.

5. As for Wave serpents reducing weaponry to STR8...yep, they can do that. There's a lot of wargear in every army that can do all sorts of things. You might even have to roll 2D6 on the penetration table and take the lowest. However, I'm not trying to forecast every possible match against every possible player who could take every possible different set of wargear. I'm providing some general rules that make a kick-ass army.

6. Pinning: Yes, a lot of things are fearless. Even if you can't pin something, fortunately those markerlights still aren't wasted because they can be used for even cooler things; giving you +1 BS for example, or taking away a cover save! And the railrifles aren't wasted either: STR6 AP3 kills....everything except TEQs.

7. Kroot are better objective takers than fire-warriors: Erm...yeah they are. That's completely not the point. Tau are a shooting army. They are a wtfbbqpwnage why is half my army dead turn 1 army. Kroot are the "assault" element and "outflanking" element of Tau, but Tau shouldn't be TRYING to do that stuff. If you want to assault and outflank, play space marines. Play orks. Get some genestealers and play Tyranid. If you want to wtfbbqpwn some people, put every point into firepower.

Ever heard the phrase, "If you're going to do something, do it right?" It applies to 40k. If you're going to play a shooting army, play a freakin' shooty army. Don't mix in sub-par assault elements. Kroot don't scare anyone. Make a shooty army and go for it with gusto.
---------------------------------------------
Now....now that we've addressed your false dilemmas about things that a Tau list composed in the manner I'm suggesting could have trouble with, I'll challenge you back:

There is no...there is NO....*NONE* and no...balanced list out there that a good Tau army can't level, unless it is specifically designed to kill a static tau gunline. An outflanking genestealer army with lictors.....its going to mess with the Tau gunline. You can minimize the losses by tactically deploying in terrain such that none of the terrain around you has room for the lictor to come in 1" away from an enemy model. You can minimize the hurt of outflanking genestealers by deploying tightly in the center, away from the flanks, and moving up to the middle of the board to minimize exposure, and you can have firewarriors flank your broadsides and suits to act as disposable shields in case the genestealers get 18" movement and get to you (because of poor deployment).

But there is no balanced list out there that can compete with a good Tau list. There used to be one (deep striking catachans with heavy flamers), but there are no more catachan drop troops.

I have some fire warriors. I got three teams of 12. Two teams I have with Pulse Rifles and one team with Pulse carbines which I decieded to use for the pinning. I ussually put them into a vetrean squad and their use for me thus far is to get them out into the middle of action as fodder and PIN or strategically pin down or strike an enemy squad out there somewhere. I like the idea of them having a 4 BS instead of their ussualy really crappy as hell 3.

Also...Can I have 12 fire warriors and two marker drones in the group and still have it legal to play. An army builder keeps telling me about some transport but I do not take transports with the fire warrior teams with the pulse rifles. I like to keep them stationary and just shoot with them.


Finally I would like to ask if the upgrade...I forget name right now. The one that allows my broadsides to move and shoot their heavy weapons. Is that a good idea or should I just stick with shield generators?

I'd take the pulse carbines away. Either that, or put 4 carbines in each squad leaving you with 8 rifles and 4 carbines and 3 units who can cause 3 pinning tests instead of one unit causing 1 pinning test.

Here's a picture of awesome twin-linked, twin-linked, rapid fire, barrage missile pods: Link!


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Yes, you can attach markerlight drones to a firewarrior squad. You need a shas'ui who gains access to infantry wargear; he takes a hard wired drone controller and 2 markerlight drones.

As for the broadsides....I'd recommend taking Advanced Stabilization Systems so that they can move and shoot. You won't get to fire both their railguns and their smart missiles, but...so what? You have plenty of other STR5 AP5 weaponry, and if you're needing to fire those at troops and don't have something else to deal with it, you're doing something wrong.

I don't think you need to take shield generators on your broadsides. Put them in area terrain, and give them two shield drones. You now have 2+ armor, 4+ cover, and if you get hit with AP1 or 2, you have 4+ invulnerable saves. Your broadsides aren't going to take enough fire to justify invulnerable saves....almost all the things that CAN dish out blast STR8 AP2 or less stuff is on a vehicle, and those vehicles will all be smoking wrecks on turn 1.

OK I see. Well I can start by getting some more Broadsides and cisis suits. I think three teams of firewarriors is ok so far until I need more. I feel I should focus more on heavy and getting the crisis suits I need which won't be much of a problem. After that I think I will get a skyray and more firewarriors.

Hrm...

A Skyray takes up a valuable heavy support slot to give you a limited number of Skyray missiles, which are STR8. You have PLENTY of STR8 available elsewhere in your army....I'd find another choice there honestly.

Dashofpepper wrote:Hrm...

A Skyray takes up a valuable heavy support slot to give you a limited number of Skyray missiles, which are STR8. You have PLENTY of STR8 available elsewhere in your army....I'd find another choice there honestly.

I agree with this 110%.

I have over 5k points of Tau and not a Skyray in the bunch. They don't stack up to Broadsides, Hammerheads or even Sniper Teams. There is never a reason to use a skyray.

I've got about 10k worth of Tau and I have 1 Skyray. Its sealed in the box, and I got it from store credit for winning a tournament. I got it because I couldn't think of anything else to get because I already had enough of everything else to do anything I wanted. =p

Yep....avoid the Skyray.

OK! I am also thinking of getting the Broadside Battlesuit XV88 2 that forge world sells. I know they are the same as normal XV88 but the 88 2 looks cooler.

I work "volenteer" for Dragons Roost In Eagle Point Oregon and I run the Magic the gathering events. So I am sure I can get them soon. I think I will just use a little of what I have earned to pick up a set of the sniper teams and get them out of the way for now. Add them to my army at a later point when I can figure out a good list I think would be fun. I know I want the sniper team (At least one)

so I think I will get one today and pick up the broadsides when we are able to order something from Forge world.

Dashofpepper wrote:Hrm...

A Skyray takes up a valuable heavy support slot to give you a limited number of Skyray missiles, which are STR8. You have PLENTY of STR8 available elsewhere in your army....I'd find another choice there honestly.

I take a Skyray for the nigh-indestructible markerlight platform it brings, not the seeker missiles. Your enemies, who think "pfff, skyray" ignore it, leaving it free to light up whatever you need it to. Basically, I bring it to ensure that I'll have markerlight support, since I find that my Pathfinders like to find ways to die and scamper away in Turn 1. Also, those seekers punch nice holes in the sides of transports and vehicles with weak side armor, like Predators, while it sits somewhere far, far away. At first I avoided Skyrays like the plague, now in higher point games I try and bring them whenever possible. Under 1500 though, you should leave it at home. Just my humble opinion.

By the way, OP, even if you don't want the Skyray, get the Skyray box; All the hammerhead bits are in the box with it, so you basically get the Skyray parts for free and it's the same price as the Hammerhead.