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Hey all, I'm interested in starting Tau. I've noticed that no lists I've seen played have any vehicles other than Suits in them. I love the Tau vehicle aesthetic and want to include a couple Devilfish and at least 1 Skyray or Hammerhead and I was hoping to fit in a couple Piranhas and maybe some FW stuff as well.

Is there a good reason why I don't see the vehicles around? Can they take the place of Riptide and Broadsides?

Thanks for your thoughts on the subject.

I don't play Tau but I play against it frequently.

The suits are just really, really good. Riptides are very mobile, have a 2+ save and possibly a 3++ and FNP. They take a lot of work to get rid of. I've played against a hammerhead and it was... A tank. It died like tanks tend to do. The Riptide on the other hand is nuking your drop pod the moment it lands from across the table and then assault moving into ruins tomsurvive volley after volley of shots.

I'm sure a Tau player will be able to come in and give a more thorough explanation. But in my experience the suits are just a better value for the points.

The real reason you don't see the Tau Vehicles is simply that they are vehicles. Vehicles this edition just die to easily and the cheapest tank we have is 80 points. Our base transport just isn't the 35 point metal box that the Rhino is, but I agree with you the Tau Tanks were iconic to the army back in 5th edition. They are also the last source of our most amazing gun, the Rail Gun. Sadly, they just don't perform in 7th. Here's hoping we'll see something to bring vehicles off the shelf in 8th edition!

The skyray is so good it should be in any list that can fit one. Pirhana are only okay in squads of four-5, and only good if you can run 16 in the drone factory formation. Nobody owns that much pirhana and drone tho. Hammerheads need long strike to be k, and even then long strike is eh at best. Fire warriors suck unless you at least sink 60 points on a fireblade, at which point a devil fish sucks. A squad of breachers with a transport and the ethereal they need is about 240 points just to get a squad that'll die easily if focused and can give up a vp.

Play what you want. Play to have fun. If fun means winning, then I guess don't use your vehicles. If you really need to win with plastic toy soldiers that bad, but if you just want to have fun use the vehicles. It's not like you have to use them all the time and it's great to mix up your army so you are not always playing the same thing.

Go get your vehicles and have fun modelling them, have fun painting them and have fun playing with them.

As people have already said, they're overall weaker than suits, except maybe for the skyray.
However, this is not always a bad thing. If you play against a much weaker codex, that is a way to tune down your army.

The hammerhead with the ion cannon is pretty okay. Its major drawback is that a riptide fills the same role, but does everything a million times better.

A single piranha with fusion blaster in a hunter cadre is not bad, as it can flat out to get in melta range first turn (and still shoot if it started its flatout movement close enough to the commander or cadre fireblade). It will then die pretty quickly, but that's still a decent speed bump/alpha strike against armor.

A breacher team in a devilfish does a decent job against MEQ. It's a bit weaker now because of the FAQ, but it can still remove any MEQ squad off the board. I also find it pretty fun to play (it's unusual for Tau to try and get as close as possible to the enemy). They do their job, but are not very point efficient. So they're perfect for casual lists.

The tetras from FW as nice. They look amazing and provide decent markerlight support. I think they're better than pathfinders (but obviously not as good as a drone net).

The flyers are insane garbage. It's just sad.

Davor wrote:
Play what you want. Play to have fun. If fun means winning, then I guess don't use your vehicles. If you really need to win with plastic toy soldiers that bad, but if you just want to have fun use the vehicles. It's not like you have to use them all the time and it's great to mix up your army so you are not always playing the same thing.

Go get your vehicles and have fun modelling them, have fun painting them and have fun playing with them.

listen to the nice stranger.

i would propably try to mix tanks with some mc -suit(s) and either firewarriors with the extra shots and/or the commander bomb/lights. single small suits-units.
mix something you like with stuff that is scary and useful.

In low point games a pair of Piranhas are nice scoring units.

there's tanks and then there's tanks.

AV13 is required for a tank to sitll be a tank.There's just too much Str6 weaponry in the game that can chuck out volumes of shots, that will glance it down.

Ultimately, the tanks aren't bad, its just the suits are that good. Split fire, intercept, armour /invul saves. Thrust moves and better guns, for virtually the same points. Formations as well meaning they dont take up any slots, and with the main suits (riptides and LOW) taking up slots that dont give away VPs, (Elite and LOW) they are just better.

Well, ever since the 6th ed codex took a bite out of our tank upgrade options, they were less popular.

Its not that they are useless, its just that many things they do other units do better, making them too suboptimal for competitive play.

Now, I personally run at least two hammerheads every game.
I'm aware its not optimal, but its what I've got, and its what I like.


However, speaking pure efficiency, some cheap bare-bones piranha has uses, and the skyray are pretty good for AA and alpha striking. hamerheads are hard to really put to good use, and devilfish are just too darn expensive.
From forgeworld you also got Tetras who are some of the best markerlight platforms in existence.

It's a shame, because Tau vehicles are awesome models. But they are now useless in 7th, because MCs rule.

We just have to hope FW makes us that SH Tank they were discussing as a possible future Tau release.

Sweet tank cannon goodness. Also yeah I love everything about the Tau from suits, to troops, to vehicles, and auxiliaries. We need more of everything else other than suits.

My ideal wish listing of the next Tau update would be:
1. A Tau Gunship. Their answer to the Valkyrie/Vendetta. A mix of Apache gunship and Comanche stealth Gunship.
2. I would like to see a plastic Great Knarloc with good rules.
3. A new Tau ground transport that is cheaper than the devilfish and has half carry capacity and open topped.
4. A drone tank so think something like an enlarged SHIV from xcom. This would be a new generic drone chassis of a larger size and in the future would spin off dozens of variants over the next decade.
5. Demiurg tank/vehicle auxiliary. Something to show off the auxiliaries and give Tau a cool new tank. I imagine this thing having treads and heavy duty frontal armor. Demiurge specialize in Ion Cannons to mine so I expect powerful ones of those plus their own unique weapons tech. Maybe a large energy drill on the front or something.
6. Vespid close combat troops. Bigger badder and meaner. Give them more access to Tau armor and melee weaponry.
7. A new Kroot hero. He would love and embrace Tau technology. He has Tau stealth technology, wrist blades, and a shoulder mounted plasma cannon. Basically the 40k version of the Predator from the movies. He could be released on his own or with a kit of elite Kroot hunters who embrace technology.
8. Gue'vesa auxiliary troops with decent rules as opposed to the awful FW ones. I would like to see them armed with carbines standard.
9. A new Tau auxiliary race. I know this might be controversial but I think it should be a Psyker hero or unit.
10. Tau weather control vehicle/device/weapons. Something was up in the Kauyon and Mont'ka books and I want to know. It sounds like fun to paint and model.
11. Finally a new battle suit. This one would be based off of the Ghostkeel chassis. A dual kit that makes either a heavy support type of ghostkeel and one that is a full flying monstrous creature (I have ideas for both of these thanks to ATT).
12. Because it is mandatory a new Stormsurge sized suit.
13. A generic stealth suit commander.

14. Melee suits for the FSE.

Martel732 wrote:
It's a shame, because Tau vehicles are awesome models. But they are now useless in 7th, because MCs rule.

I wouldn't say useless, but the fact is that the other options you can spend points are just better than the tanks. So you see them a lot less on the tabletop.

Nah our vehicles are useless. Really bad. The Railgun is such a weak weapon now. I mean it was never good but as power creep has gone on it is nigh useless to have a single shot weapon for such high expense.

It does happen, but unfortunately, suits are just so much better than tanks it's not funny. Railguns are pretty bad as anti tank weapons go and the Ion Cannon on the hammerhead is completely and utterly outclassed by the Ion Accelerator of the Riptide in every way.

Skyrays are great, skyfire markerlights will always be good.

Devilfish are useless again with the jink nerf to passengers, since their only actual use was to get breachers in range, but now that's fairly pointless.

The issue is MC's get more wounds than vehicles get HP AND can move and fire AND get armour saves AND can get cover easier AND don't get immobilised in terrain AND can buy better wargear upgrades AND can't be shut down when taking wounds AND they don't have a damage table AND they don't have to sacrifice shooting accuracy to get a cover save AND they're not utterly destroyed in a single round of close combat with anyone who's str4 or 5 in CC.

Then you've got stuff like haywire which is basically fleshbane for vehicles that's very priminent on shooting wepaons against fleshbane for MC's which doesn't exist as a ranged option outside of a small handfull of obscure options (all of which IIRC allow armour saves). Same deal for instant death vs being exploded. Instant death is almost exclusively CC while AP0/1/2 is on every second ranged weapon, many of them with a bonus to armour pen (like melta/fusion/etc).

I wouldn't say that our vehicles are exactly bad, just that MC's do the same job far better and far easier for miinimal points increase and a huge increase in both versatiliity and survivability.

Can you spoiler the image? Thanks. It's huge. That way it doesn't immediately pop up and hog the screen space.

Edit
Oh the good old Skyray. I own two and they work wonders and look cool. I'll add a third at some point.

A shame really, the skyray is the only really -good- tank in our arsenal, and I absolutely HATE it. the whole "single shot weapons" concept just does not sit well with me.

Rail weapons as a whole need an uplift. they are simply never good, on any platform.
Heck, even the new cudda has gotten a new railgun variant, and that TOO is utterly useless compared to other guns (and costs more to boot x_x)

I love tau tanks! They give my skyfire something to shoot at

Something needs to make single shot weapons in this game a better choice. Maybe not the best but better so they are more viable.

It's simple:

Suits of any kind >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> vehicles.

Except stealth suits. I would rather put in a Skyray than stealth suit teams.

Why do you dislike stealth suits? Their homing capabilities are invaluable to a suit-based army.

 Quickjager wrote:
Why do you dislike stealth suits? Their homing capabilities are invaluable to a suit-based army.

I rather use Tetras

DaPino wrote:
It's simple:

Suits of any kind >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> vehicles.

My Tetras would like a word with you. . .

 purplkrush wrote:
Hey all, I'm interested in starting Tau. I've noticed that no lists I've seen played have any vehicles other than Suits in them. I love the Tau vehicle aesthetic and want to include a couple Devilfish and at least 1 Skyray or Hammerhead and I was hoping to fit in a couple Piranhas and maybe some FW stuff as well.

Is there a good reason why I don't see the vehicles around? Can they take the place of Riptide and Broadsides?

Thanks for your thoughts on the subject.

They won t ever be as good as them but hey, play what you like, don't go for the actual meta, Tau are boring to play against...

Wow... well this is all just too bad. Screw it though, just bought a couple Devilfish and some Pathfinders. Yeah, that pic further up just cemented the whole concept for me. I love the massed flotilla effect of the Tau. I will grab some suits but I think they'll be my FW purchases... and a couple TX-42s. LONG LIVE TANK SHOCK!!

 Vector Strike wrote:

 Quickjager wrote:
Why do you dislike stealth suits? Their homing capabilities are invaluable to a suit-based army.

I rather use Tetras

Other things to put my points into and they are just too frail for their high cost.

I dunno, breachers in Devilfish are not bad. Though, why take that when you can take suits in your troop slots?

But they Skyray isn't as good anti air as a Burst Cannon Riptide with a skyfire/interceptor systems, is it? And that Burst Cannon can be used to mulch hordes.

Hammerheads suffer from one shot syndrome, and are currently living in a world where hull pointing enemy vehicles out is more economical.

All the fliers are gak, even the new barracuda is meh for its points.

Skyray can fire all its missiles at once and then provide SMS/ML support.

It blows it away unless your opponent is bringing like half his list of flyers and they run out of missiles. If I take a Skyray I usually bring three for maximum effect and then also use them as my ML source when I can.

The riptide has other stuff to fire at. Though lately I've been toying with a Tau build that would use the ghostkeel wing with skyfire upgrades.

Yeah all flyers are gak if you play competitively, but if your only playing semi-casually they can be great. Not to mention the Barracuda AX-5-2 looks astounding.

However since my meta has never seen a flyer I can't say with any certainty. I would still always put in a few things with anti-air just in case and to tone down my list. (People still couldn't win).

If you really want to play Tau vehicles, take heart that (compared to some other factions) Tau have good options and they that fill some gaps. They also work better in formations if you do have your heart set on running multiples.

The Skysweep Formation recently got a not-so-insignificant buff in the GW Errata. The Skyray has a huge ability to Alpha Strike, and now, in the Skysweep, can move 12" to adjust Line of Sight and still dump all its Seekers at full BS. That's great First Strike capability. Combined with being part of the Dawnblade and they all get The Killing Blow, it gets even better. The Ion Hammerhead is pretty good as others have mentioned. AP3 at that range is really scarce in the Tau Codex, and both the Hammerhead and Skyray are packing it. One big tactical advantage they bring: Scatbikes can't scratch the paint on the front armor. They'll get to your side armor pretty easily, but you can make that be a costly move if you deploy with it in mind. With the range on these guys being so long, you may not have Markerlights that can reach out to give them Ignores Cover, but you'll make targets Jink quickly! Plus, you are right, those tanks look good.