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I fought a much tougher army with the list I id the Batrep on (see previous post: http://40kunorthodoxy.blogspot.com/2013/04/tau-vs-space-marine-battle-report.html

This time it was against the following:

Mephiston
4 x 10 Assault Troops (meltas and so on, usual build)


Corbulo (went with the assault Terminators in Storm Raven)

Priest with Power weapon

5 Assault Terminators

Storm Raven (usual loadout)

Furioso (goes in the Storm Raven)

Furioso in Drop Pod

So High Octane, Low KP, lots of melee, lots of meltas, moderate to low Dakka.


Quick rundown
3 objectives, Big Guns Never Tire(Again!), Dawn of War.

Round 1:
Devilfish scout moves.
Riptides Get First Blood against the DS Drop Pod using Early Warning System
Fire Warriors blow the Furioso from behind.
He moves to secure secures an objective near the Eastern edge of the board that he would hold, completely unmolested, for the rest of the game using an Assault Squad plus mephiston. 2 Assault Squads move to midboard but miss the charge on the Pathfinder Devilfish I put out as bait. The Bait moved off FLAT OUT towards the enemy deployment zone, hoping to bring kroot to the enemy deployment edge.

Round 2
Riptide Early Warning System kills 9 of 10 Assault Squad who deep strike in, leaving just the sergeant standing in front of a Devilfish I was sweeping along the flank so that the beacon could bring Kroot to the western objective.
His StormRaven comes on and shoots Riptides. The dudes inside the Storm Raven stay inside. Mephiston and his Assault Squad cronies move to the eastern objective to finalize its security and to scare Kroot away if they show up there.

Marines kill the Pathfinder Devilfish that rushed past them but are repulsed on the charge by the Repulsor Drone when they try to charge he contents.

Tau fussilade begins but he makes ridiculous saves and FnP, so damage is good, but not crippling to the Marines. Drone Swarm makes hitting his Yellow unit easy though, knocked down to 4 models. Kroot show up on the western board edge, take the objective and kill the lone sergeant there. The Devilfish the Sergeant was in front of lands on a hill in the enemy deployment zone but crashes. Seond Pathfinder unit that got popped from their Devilfish makes it all the way to the enemy deployment board edge almost, close enough to use the Recon Drone. Hooray!

Round 3:
Furioso and Corbulo+Termie Retinue get out of hovering Storm Raven. They dash up towards the Tau lines, taking cover while furioso kills entire Kroot unit. No sweat but it does take a glancing hit from Overwatching Krootox.
Storm Raven continues its Missile and gun assault on the Riptides. Yellow and White Squad start towards Tau lines also under cover of the dead pod. Walls are closing in. Next round they will all arrive. Mephiston makes his winged way towards the northern objective the Pathfinders are trying to get to.

My Tau Marker Swarm targets the Furioso and then all guns fire. Furioso is shaken. but functioning. Disappointing. Pathfinders behind him even had rear shots from the hill with AP 1 guns, but couln't finish the job.
Fire Warriors blast yellow squad to 4 models. Yellow and White quad are now weak enough that charging the Tau line may be inadvisable, as the Kroot arrive on the enemy's board edge right next to the northern objective! The Kroot helped whittle Yellow Assault Squad, so vengeance was in order.

The Crisis Team Deep Strikes and shoots the hovering Storm Raven, but glances it. Dang Ceramite plating.

Round 4:
Yellow Squad turns around to kill the Pathfinders that "summoned" the Kroot and shoot them up pretty good. The Repulsor Drone stops their charges and they are now in the open. White Assault Squad tries to kill the Crisis suits that DS'd in, killing one and sending the unit running! Ack.

Furioso tries to charge the nearest Fire Warriors, and Supporting fire kills it on a glance (Go Shielded Missile Drones!). Corbulo and Termies fail to move far enough through cover to charge but are going to likely multicharge the Firewarriors, which would stop me from getting any scoring units uncontested to an objective! Game is in the balance here.

Mephiston continues his surge towards the Northern objective and the Storm Raven continus to shoot the Riptides, desperate to silence those guns. A Riptide finally goes down.

The Tau Fire Warriors moved and ran past Corbulo, as did the marker Drone Swarm, none of them firing but instead jetting to the western objective. The Commander and the remaining Riptide then charged Corbulo. The Commander got himsefl killed (didn't realize that his Terminator Sergeant was still alive to take the challenge) but the Riptide passed morale and held, bravely sacrificing itself for the Greater good to get its Fire Warrior compadres on their way. Grave miscalculation on my part though.

The Pathfinders and Crisis Suits who regrouped shot the yellow and White Assault Squads down to three models each as they made their slow way towards the northern objective . Again ridiculous saves by the Marines. Bad news for the Pathfinders.

Round 5:
Blood Angels realize they must hold the northern objectives s o as much as they want to kill the two advancing Pathfinder squads, they are forced to move away and they proceed to kill all the kroot without them making a whimper. Twas truly sad to watch. mephiston decided to take cover in case the Riptide got free, seeing things were under control there.

Stom Raven blasted at the Fire Warriors but they held. Corbulo finally died but the Terminator kept swinging and combat with the Riptide continued, sadly.

The Fire Warriors reached their objctive and spread out with the Marker drones to stop the Storm Raven from bing ableto lnd there (Big Guns Never Tire Remember).
Pathfinders moved towards the rocks of the northern objective and killed one of the Yellow Squad leaving only the Priest and one dude in that squad. The Crisis suits regain their previous position and shake the Storm Raven.

The Riptide failed to kill the Terminator again. Locked in combat again after testing morale.

Score at this point: BA: 7 Tau: 5

Round 6
Terminator dies, freeing the Riptide to fire.
Mephiston works his way towards the Northern objective and is now quite close. he can pounce next round on the Pathfinders if he rolls for his wings.
Yellow and White Squads hold the northern objective in preparation for the Pathfinder fussilade while their buddies way over on the eastern side of the board continue to lounge on their objective, uninvolved in the happnings of this furious battle.
The Storm Raven tries to kill the Pathfinders, but cannot finish the job, killing only 2 with its shaken status.

The Crisis Suits blew up the Storm Raven, while the Riptide finished the Terminator off.

Still the game was 7-6. There was only on thing to do. The Pathfinders charged the priest and his Marine compatriots! Though they lost two Pathfinders and the last member of one Pathfinder unit in Overwatch, their morale held and the Pathfinders were able to swarm around them to contest the objective!

TAU VICTORY on a Pathfinder charge!

Final Score:

TAU: 6 BA: 4

Did he tailor his list to Tau? Because that BA list would be fething obliterated against many builds other lists field. Typical BA mistake: I don't have to participate in the shooting phase.

Thanks for the battle report! If possible can you throw in a picture or two? Even if the models and the table isn't to your liking having a visual of the battle really helps people like me who have trouble getting information out of text!

Awesome use of the pathfinders, I really liked how many times they didn't fire marker lights but instead demonstrated their superiority over markerdrones by switching to "kill on sight" mode, the assault especially was pure WIN!

Favorite part of the battle report: "Riptide Early Warning System kills 9 of 10 Assault Squad who deep strike in". It might be my imagination but I think that properly deployed the Riptides are the new Helldrakes, and I think your "Gundams" had no problem making their points back!

Martel732 wrote:
Did he tailor his list to Tau? Because that BA list would be fething obliterated against many builds other lists field. Typical BA mistake: I don't have to participate in the shooting phase.

I dont think he tyailored it to my list, no. I think thats his normal list. In any event, the Dex is so new that its hard to imagine anyone COULD tailor their force to my list just yet!

As you saw if you looked at the link, the list for my army is very, as i called it, pedestrian. It's not a Fire Warrior hedgehog, the Kroot aren't 20 strong snipers but a mixed unit instead, the Pathfinders are offensive weapons in this list, noit markerlight caddies and there are no Broadsides and only one Crisis unit. The Riptides are POWERFUL defensive weapons though. they are so much better in a defensive role than any other. I think people will catch on to that and forgive my lack of "traditional" Tau army makeup.

Or not.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grey Therion wrote:
Thanks for the battle report! If possible can you throw in a picture or two? Even if the models and the table isn't to your liking having a visual of the battle really helps people like me who have trouble getting information out of text!

Awesome use of the pathfinders, I really liked how many times they didn't fire marker lights but instead demonstrated their superiority over markerdrones by switching to "kill on sight" mode, the assault especially was pure WIN!

Favorite part of the battle report: "Riptide Early Warning System kills 9 of 10 Assault Squad who deep strike in". It might be my imagination but I think that properly deployed the Riptides are the new Helldrakes, and I think your "Gundams" had no problem making their points back!

I think I have some. I ran out of camera memory which was annoying, or id have done it as a video report. Thank you for the compliment on the Pathfinder usage.

Heldrakes have a specific job to do. At THAT job they are exceptional. They dont scatter with a BS of 3, they aren't going to run in close combat and they aren't hit easily.

Riptides are exceptional as Interceptors. it's an enormous risk to come in from reserve against such tremendous firepower (albeit much less accurate as interceptors than they are normally). Each has a role to play. But both ARE brutal when they get to do their thing.

"Riptides are exceptional as Interceptors. it's an enormous risk to come in from reserve against such tremendous firepower (albeit much less accurate as interceptors than they are normally). Each has a role to play. But both ARE brutal when they get to do their thing. "

Making deep strike and reserves suck even more than they already do. And make no mistake, they suck.

It will require you to think about positioning such attempts for sure.