OK, This will not be a popular post. Fine.

It will, however, be a post focused upon recognizing the many problems of the new codex. We Tau players need to quickly put away the rose coloured glasses and come to grips with the reality of what we were just given as an "Army".


First, The first couple of 6th ed Codices seemed *meh* but functional as stnd alone armies but really shined when paired with the right ally. Sadly, IMO, this is not the case for the Tau.

Yes, our army has been given bunch of new shineys, improved weapons and special rules. We also have received massive nerfs in the areas that were already our most critical weaknesses. As anyone who remembers the 5th ed Tyranid release knows, New Shineys, improved weapons and new rules does not necessarily make for a functioning and competitive army. If these new thing do not synergize in a manner that properly balances the weakness then the army fails.
Unfortunately, the Tau could very well be the 'Nids of 6th ed.


Here are what were the 3 biggest issues for the Tau from start of 5th ed that have carried all the way into this new codex only worse.

Not enough VoF in the long range S8-10 to effectively counter prevalent IG and Necron builds

No way to effectively get our scoring units(troops) onto our opponents rear objectives
*(Overcosted & Undergunned transport that was no faster and had less firepower than a chimera.)
*(No deep striking Troops)
*(No fast insertion vehicles)

Over dependence upon certain units and wargear.


Not enough Volume of Fire in High strength weapons to counter certain prevalent builds. The Broadside Railgun "Repurposing"/"nerf" exacerbated this. It made the Broadsides a unit more useful to other armies than it is to our own. Actually, between the Broadside nerf, making our vehicles completely dependent upon marker lights to function adequately our Heavy slots will force us to use markerlights and crisis fusion teams to handle AV13+ spam.
Now, I don't mind running such a build occasionally but detest the idea of being limited to such. Also detest the idea of having to run markerlights.


So, we did not get a means of putting scoring units effectively on our opponents rear objectives. This right here is a massive issue that was made worse by removing our vehicles ability to fire as if they were fast. Yes, markerlights can now help with snap shots but this just adds to the over reliance on certain units/wargear issue.
Tau not getting a fast troop delivery method(Fast transport, Deep Strikers or jet-pack troops) leaves the Tau at a distinct disadvantage in over half of the missions.
.

The Tau are now completely dependent upon marker lights and due to this, we will be limited to certain builds and our opponents will know how to easily neuter our effectiveness.



Next, As to getting scoring units on the back objectives??? I suggest Jet-bike Eldar or Drop Pod SM's because the Tau are "not a complete army". Instead of putting the work into developing a proper and full codex we got 2/3's of a codex at full codex price. The failure to drop the points on our transports, no new fast transport/flier transport and not to even attempt to move unused units to more fitting areas of the FOC just comes across as lazy



Finally, Is this Codex Tau or Codex Markerlights?
Seeing as we Tau are going to be dependent upon them, we might as well figure the best way to get them into our army without sacrificing to many FOS slots of shooting.

I propose the best way to get markerlight is to buy a Gun drones squadron, swap for markerlight drones for free and then join them to a BS5 iridium armour ECM commander with drone controller and 2 marker drones.
Next would be to run a battlesuit commander & body guards all with Marker drones.

The Tau will need at least a third unit to get enough markers going in enough directions to properly meet the now completely markerlight dependent needs of the Tau. I suggest the Sky Rays or on you crisis teams in order to leave the FA slots open for other things


Oh well, I'm not going to worry. This is because while I may postulate upon tactics, I think that I will drop the Tau and 40k for a while, Not really looking forward to every opponent I face having my units cough*Broadsides*Cough*cough*staring back at me. The whole allies thing is killing the flavor of the game for me.

Okay I agree completely with your statements about allies, it seems like they made us alliable with everyone so they could all get access to effective antiair and our suits. I feel like the allies degrade the game as it isn't about using your armies strengths and weaknesses against anothers, its just about patching up your armies weaknesses with anothers armies strengths, kinda removes the uniqueness of each armies ability.

I for one never really found *any* of the things you listed to be an issue, except maybe your point about high strength volume of fire... but if you didnt notice we now have access to more high strength weapons at a cheaper price than ever before, so its kind of a moot point.

I know this is an oversimplification but this is what I am hearing:

1. We can't spam S10 anymore.
2. We need markerlights.
3. Our troop transport sucks.

1 - So you can't spam railguns anymore, so what? You've got a lot of high strength shooting and you also have a commander that can no scatter deepstrike with a huge retinue of Crisis Suits. You have another HQ that can carry two damn fusion guns and fire them at separate targets, all while giving the unit at least a 4+ cover save. You can equip a generic commander to give rerolls to hit and ignores cover to an entire unit and you can still roll on the Tau Warlord table to get the no scatter deep strike on a nonspecial character.

Sorry you'll have to deal with Hammerheads being your only source of strength 10. Which for a measly 45 points you can upgrade to have BS5 and Tankhunter FFS.

2 - Didn't you already need markerlights? Now you can take more of them and in more FOC slots. So what if Crisis teams aren't BS4 anymore? They can always get twinlinked weapons and they can always be accompanied by a commander that can increase their firepower or help them in all sorts of ways. It might be a shoehorn sort of thing, but it forces you to use multiple units in concert to take on targets with effectiveness.

3. The devilfish may be expensive but it doesn't suck. It's a friggen tank that is also a skimmer. If you really want to move with that thing, you can. You're always going to get a cover save if you move, and you get a Burst cannon to boot. Don't compare it to the chimera. The chimera is far and away the best transport in the game. You can use devilfish. They are pretty damn good. The points cost just means you can't spam them.

I think Tau will be an incredibly powerful army once everyone gets over the whining stage. Sorry that the new codex made triple railsides obsolete but people will cope.

+1 Gpfunk

It seems to me that you are complaining more about allies than this new release.

Tell me again what good a squad of Str10 railguns are against a horde of daemons/orcs/foot guard? Did you miss the memo that mentioned 6th edition moving away from mech and more to infantry based combat.

Now tell me which is better, 3 Str10 railguns or 36 missiles going into 6th editions flyers?

I would rather have the option to take skyfire or interceptor and have those 36 shots than 3 TL old railgun shots.

You are mad that Tau didn't get better transports, well I also must ask what good are firewarriors in the center of the enemies lines? can they beat down tactical marines? Can they take out the big MCs brought by tyranids? No I didn't think so. So maybe TAU should have also been given good CC units and good transports to get them onto back objectives. Maybe should give them 3+ saves and BS 4 while they are at it.

Missilesides are going to change 40k especially after you have added a juiced up commander to it. Armour 14 is the only thing that can laugh off a missileside squad and how much armour 14 is there running around?

 gpfunk wrote:
1. We can't spam S10 anymore.
2. We need markerlights.
3. Our troop transport sucks.

4) Our Hammerheads suck, and our fusion Piranhas are nerfed into 'sucks but at least they're cheap'.

You've got a lot of high strength shooting

No, we really don't. We have Hammerheads (which suck) and melta guns. That's it. Otherwise we have autocannon spam in an edition where autocannon spam is a terrible strategy.

2 - Didn't you already need markerlights?

No. They were a nice bonus but you could easily build a BS 4 Tau army that doesn't depend on markerlights.

It might be a shoehorn sort of thing, but it forces you to use multiple units in concert to take on targets with effectiveness.

I'm glad that Codex:Magic Laser Pointers is the only army that has to combine units just for basic shooting, while everyone else gets to bring efficient and powerful single units that you just point at something and watch your opponent remove models from the table.

oh and can't forget that the bomber doesn't function sigh

valace2 wrote:
oh and can't forget that the bomber doesn't function sigh

At least that's a relatively straightforward "GW suck at writing clear rules" problem that everyone will play RAI until the inevitable FAQ fixes it RAW. Sadly no amount of typo fixing will change the real problem, that the bomber is a terrible unit.

 Peregrine wrote:

valace2 wrote:
oh and can't forget that the bomber doesn't function sigh

At least that's a relatively straightforward "GW suck at writing clear rules" problem that everyone will play RAI until the inevitable FAQ fixes it RAW. Sadly no amount of typo fixing will change the real problem, that the bomber is a terrible unit.

not everything can be a haldrake or scythe.

valace2 wrote:
not everything can be a haldrake or scythe.

Sure. The GW Hobby (tm) has lots of room for cool model kits that you paint and put on your display shelf and never use because you're too busy winning games with Vendettas and Helldrakes. It's just unfortunate that they had to waste both Tau flyers on that kind of kit.

I agree with nearly everything OP said. I'm bit unsure about Broadside nerf. On the other hand, being able to take entire squadrons of highly S10 AP1 guns was sorta gross, even though it was always fun to see your opponent gulp when Broadsides were put on the table. However, I fear that the loss of AT ability will have to be compensated by making the HS slot even more crowded - people gush about sniper drones, but mix of Broadsides and Hammerheads still seem like absolutely necessary. Is there room for other HS options?

Old Tau was absolutely dependent from destroying enemy transports as early as possible, because there were limited ways of dealing with the contents. In new codex, these options have greatly increased, particularly in form of powerful large blasts which Tau was lacking earlier. So in this sense the nerf might not be so serious. But I still don't understand how Tau are then going to deal with backfield tank spam, as those don't need to come closer and your Fusion blasters won't reach them.

Also, whole Railgun business just seems like bit of....forced, if you understand what I mean. It's like Tau came up with this awesome weapon and then agreed that "oh, we better not take more than 1 to 3 per Hunter Cadre. Because it wouldn't be sporting otherwise towards the other guys." Old Tau felt like they did not need equivalent of Multi-meltas or Lascannons because they could take much better stuff. Now, it feels like they are intentionally gimping themselves by not having anything more powerful than S8 save for one gun in one tank.

And of course the way the army is now dependent from Markerlights, with nearly all other shooting aids taken away, is just really horrible attempt to force us to artificial "synergy" where Markerlights are now core element of the Army. Great Vehicle Nerf is a particular example of this travesty.

 Peregrine wrote:

valace2 wrote:
not everything can be a haldrake or scythe.

Sure. The GW Hobby (tm) has lots of room for cool model kits that you paint and put on your display shelf and never use because you're too busy winning games with Vendettas and Helldrakes. It's just unfortunate that they had to waste both Tau flyers on that kind of kit.

Yes because Vendettas are as good as old broadsides at taking out horde orc/tyranids/daemons/foot guard. I seem to remember getting cover saves from lascannons. Tactical marines behind a defense line can a 4+ cover or even 2+ if they go to ground against a Vendetta. A heldrake cooks them all the same. Markerlights can negate a Vendettas jink save, while the Heldrake doesn't need it.

Heldrakes beat out Vendettas.

4) Our Hammerheads suck, and our fusion Piranhas are nerfed into 'sucks but at least they're cheap'.

I have to disagree, while I don't like the railhead swap out for the Ion Cannon and overcharge. Spam 3 of these and you can pretty much take out MEQ, add ML to remove cover and units will die. Add the Advance Targeting and remove and special characters guaranteed.

I personally will run the Riptide with the Ion Accelerator, once overcharged it turns into ordinance at strength 9 rolling 2 d6 for penetration.

I agree with above that with the ion cannon the hammerhead is basicly a cheaper leman russ.

 Peregrine wrote:

4) Our Hammerheads suck, and our fusion Piranhas are nerfed into 'sucks but at least they're cheap'.

Maybe it's perspective? In the grand scheme of the codexes it's at least dead average. It's an AV13 skimmer that has a 50/50 chance to hit with a strength 10 weapon. And your codex is also the only one that can reliably increase BS and remove cover. It's certainly better than the looted tank, arguably better or on par with a basic LRBT. Pretty good all codexes considered.

No, we really don't. We have Hammerheads (which suck) and melta guns. That's it. Otherwise we have autocannon spam in an edition where autocannon spam is a terrible strategy.

Didn't you favor autocannons over lascannons with imperial guard? Why is guard autocannon spam suddenly more effective than tau autocannon spam? Volume of shots certainly strips hull points. And your suits are pretty mobile so they can try to get favorable armor facings. And since when are meltaguns bad? Especially when you can deepstrike without scatter or just come in on the board edge you want with certain wargear.

No. They were a nice bonus but you could easily build a BS 4 Tau army that doesn't depend on markerlights.

You can still run mostly Crisis Teams, you just have to twinlink weapon systems. Less effective, but it isn't dead. The markerlight is such a great little item i'm not sure what list would really be at a disadvantage by taking a few here and there.

I'm glad that Codex:Magic Laser Pointers is the only army that has to combine units just for basic shooting, while everyone else gets to bring efficient and powerful single units that you just point at something and watch your opponent remove models from the table.

Yeah, heaven forbid any codex have a different playstyle or flavor rather than point and click A at B. You lose BS4 on a few units in exchange for reliably being able to increase BS to 5 and remove cover. Pretty good deal in my opinion.

Point for point, stat for stat, it isn't the most powerful codex. But that hardly necessitates a "Welp the new codex sucks guess i'll just kvetch and complain for another 8 years" thread.

 gpfunk wrote:

Maybe it's perspective? In the grand scheme of the codexes it's at least dead average. It's an AV13 skimmer that has a 50/50 chance to hit with a strength 10 weapon. And your codex is also the only one that can reliably increase BS and remove cover. It's certainly better than the looted tank, arguably better or on par with a basic LRBT. Pretty good all codexes considered.

Anything is better than Looted tank, and new rules nerfed LRBT. It's terrible, it used to be mobile, versatile tank, now it's only role is to put S10 shot once per turn and hope for the best.

Point for point, stat for stat, it isn't the most powerful codex. But that hardly necessitates a "Welp the new codex sucks guess i'll just kvetch and complain for another 8 years" thread.

It's not that it's weak, it doesn't offer variety. Previously good tanks were intentionally nerfed so everyone would be forced to use suits (particularly Riptide) and Markerlights. It's terrible Codex design. OP is right, Tau is the new Tyranids.

Backfire wrote:

Anything is better than Looted tank, and new rules nerfed LRBT. It's terrible, it used to be mobile, versatile tank, now it's only role is to put S10 shot once per turn and hope for the best.

At least you have a chance to pen a landraider outside of close combat. Orks only really have Power Klaws.

It's not that it's weak, it doesn't offer variety. Previously good tanks were intentionally nerfed so everyone would be forced to use suits (particularly Riptide) and Markerlights. It's terrible Codex design. OP is right, Tau is the new Tyranids.

If you want to play the codex a different way then you absolutely can. You come to terms with the fact that it isn't the most ZOMG powerful build and you play it to the best of your abilities because you enjoy it. Markerlight spam is probably going to be the competitive build. Guess what the main competitive build is for Chaos Space Marines? Triple Helldrakes. Competitive play generally streamlines things into the most powerful builds possible. For many codexes, it's only one. If you're playing semi-competitive or casual you have more options.

That's the same story for many codexes. You can complain about lack of COMPETITIVE variety, sure. But a great many other codexes currently out have the same problem.

No tyranids can win without allies because of psychic buffs - they are really not that bad. I'm not sure Tau can. However, they make a great allied detachment - as they did before the new codex. In fact they are better now in that capacity.

 gpfunk wrote:

Backfire wrote:

It's not that it's weak, it doesn't offer variety. Previously good tanks were intentionally nerfed so everyone would be forced to use suits (particularly Riptide) and Markerlights. It's terrible Codex design. OP is right, Tau is the new Tyranids.

If you want to play the codex a different way then you absolutely can. You come to terms with the fact that it isn't the most ZOMG powerful build and you play it to the best of your abilities because you enjoy it.

No I can't. It's not that it's not "competive", it's the fact that playing Tau in the old, mechanized way is quite literally impossible. Codex no longer has the tools for it. Sure I could ATTEMPT to do that, but results would be so hilariously mismatched (my army's firepower would be gimped about 50%) that it's not a proper "match".

Codex: markerlight. Is this a bad thing? Markerlights are a unique way of making tau feel different from other armies. Tau is about focusing to kill things not going one on one and hoping you have the better unites. And marker lights did not functionally change that much from the old codex to the new one, so what happened? They got cheaper, simple as that. Before you had to pay around 175 points for one team of makerlights and you were better off just spending those points on more crisis suits. Now at 88 points for 8 pathfinders or 12 points per marker drone (rather than 30) marker lights cost half as much, so they are suddenly worth taking. Does this mean we will be using one or two FoC for marker lights? Sure, is this a bad thing? No. Again it is a unique part of our army that makes us function differently. You also really don't need a ton of marker lights. I got by with 8 pathfinders in the old codex, I might double that number now because they are so cheap but 8 lets you take out those really high threat target such as devastaters before they can do much harm. You don't need markerlights when you are shooting at chaff. If you are worried about FoC how many FA slots do you need at under 2k?

Broadsides. loss of our s10 gun sucks. I am not going to lie, this is my biggest disappointment with the new codex. This does take a lot of wind from our sails. I felt at s10 broadsides had a lot of use but were not overly powerful. If the s8 was paired with another ability like lance or melta or tank hunter it would be somewhat okay but as is it just is not strong enough. The missile pods are nice for anti-air but a little weak on the ground, and lack of range (36'' is not that long when you are used to 72'') really hurts us. But we will adapt. Shadowsun with 3 crisis suits w/ fb can get the job done.

Not being able to take forward objectives is a problem, but it is a problem for most armies and none of the shooty armies are good at it because they sit back and shoot. This is just game mechanics and not targeted at tau directly. Some things that have changed though, our weapons are strong enough to reliably slay the warlord (s8 ap2 large blast with ignore cover makes it hard to hide) and if we go first we can almost always get first blood from focus firing a unit. With how cheap marker lights are now clearing out buildings will not be a problem so your opponent will have a much harder time camping objectives. Marine lists tend to run very few scoring units and we have so much anti-marine now it is not that hard to focus first those and leave the opponent unable to score.

I am not saying we don't have problems but they are not horrible.

Backfire wrote:

 gpfunk wrote:

Backfire wrote:

It's not that it's weak, it doesn't offer variety. Previously good tanks were intentionally nerfed so everyone would be forced to use suits (particularly Riptide) and Markerlights. It's terrible Codex design. OP is right, Tau is the new Tyranids.

If you want to play the codex a different way then you absolutely can. You come to terms with the fact that it isn't the most ZOMG powerful build and you play it to the best of your abilities because you enjoy it.

No I can't. It's not that it's not "competive", it's the fact that playing Tau in the old, mechanized way is quite literally impossible. Codex no longer has the tools for it. Sure I could ATTEMPT to do that, but results would be so hilariously mismatched (my army's firepower would be gimped about 50%) that it's not a proper "match".

So, because the codex isn't built in the way you want...it's a crap codex? Try your mech tau. Seriously. Try em. Post a battle report or two. See if it's really that bad off. The codex has been out for under a week. Maybe even try a hybrid build with some mech and some suits.

Just because the Chaos codex doesn't allow me to play an all infiltrating Alpha legion or a Raptors as troops Night Lords army doesnt mean it sucks. Saying that is lunacy.

"Ermahgerd! My new book sucks because every single unit didn't get buffed while keeping their old strength, costing less, and having no disadvantages whatsoever."

Wow really? How odd.

Gpfunk has it spot on.

Instead of spending the last week moaning Backfire why don't you actually get loads of games in and post the reports and how you felt units did instead of "this sucks because of this" etc.

Markerlights have always been an important part of the way Tau play. Don't like them? (For some reason) The don't use them. Try it. You will get more dakka. My regular opponents HATE that I can strip cover and make my units hit on 2s. Now I have more places to do that from?!?! Count me in.

You really need to play some games before writing off an army.

 gpfunk wrote:

Backfire wrote:

Anything is better than Looted tank, and new rules nerfed LRBT. It's terrible, it used to be mobile, versatile tank, now it's only role is to put S10 shot once per turn and hope for the best.

At least you have a chance to pen a landraider outside of close combat. Orks only really have Power Klaws.

It's not that it's weak, it doesn't offer variety. Previously good tanks were intentionally nerfed so everyone would be forced to use suits (particularly Riptide) and Markerlights. It's terrible Codex design. OP is right, Tau is the new Tyranids.

If you want to play the codex a different way then you absolutely can. You come to terms with the fact that it isn't the most ZOMG powerful build and you play it to the best of your abilities because you enjoy it. Markerlight spam is probably going to be the competitive build. Guess what the main competitive build is for Chaos Space Marines? Triple Helldrakes. Competitive play generally streamlines things into the most powerful builds possible. For many codexes, it's only one. If you're playing semi-competitive or casual you have more options.

That's the same story for many codexes. You can complain about lack of COMPETITIVE variety, sure. But a great many other codexes currently out have the same problem.

Please show me a tournament winning list that runs triple helldrakes, or even a top 10 list. Do you even list?

 gpfunk wrote:

So, because the codex isn't built in the way you want...it's a crap codex?

Yes.

 felixcat wrote:

No tyranids can win without allies because of psychic buffs - they are really not that bad. I'm not sure Tau can. However, they make a great allied detachment - as they did before the new codex. In fact they are better now in that capacity.

Tau as ally detachment? I'm hesitating here because of the low BS that Tau units have. Here you need synergy to increase the BS (markerlights). But a small ally detachment can hardly bring the markerlights to bear.

Asmodai Asmodean wrote:

Please show me a tournament winning list that runs triple helldrakes, or even a top 10 list. Do you even list?

So is this your argument about Tau being a gakky codex? Or are you just trying to troll? I can show you a list of all the CSM entrants to a major tournament. 3/4 of them run triple helldrakes. It's competitive because point for point the Helldrake offers the best value for power. Markerlights and suits offer the best point for point power in the codex, therefore they are the most competitive build.

It's list optimization. The optimized Tau list is markerlights and suits with firewarriors to support.

I'm not really seeing your point.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Backfire wrote:

 gpfunk wrote:

So, because the codex isn't built in the way you want...it's a crap codex?

Yes.

Well then, enjoy the next 8 years. There is no help for you as you choose not to adapt to your shiny new codex.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 wuestenfux wrote:

 felixcat wrote:

No tyranids can win without allies because of psychic buffs - they are really not that bad. I'm not sure Tau can. However, they make a great allied detachment - as they did before the new codex. In fact they are better now in that capacity.

Tau as ally detachment? I'm hesitating here because of the low BS that Tau units have. Here you need synergy to increase the BS (markerlights). But a small ally detachment can hardly bring the markerlights to bear.

They can bring a drone squad or a pathfinder unit. They could also take a support commander that gives rerolls to hit and ignore cover. As long as you stick to twin linking it'll be pretty good.

Actually, since the tau have alot of alpha strike power, do you think we will see tau air superiority lists? I will enjoy watching the local meta change!

 gr1m_dan wrote:
Gpfunk has it spot on.

Instead of spending the last week moaning Backfire why don't you actually get loads of games in and post the reports and how you felt units did instead of "this sucks because of this" etc.

I don't need to. I can read rules, you know. Honestly, you just don't get it: this is not about some stat nerf or price increase, this is about missing rules which were essential in playing the vehicles. It's like if Orks lost Furious charge and Mob rules. You don't NEED to take test games to realize that the army has become something totally different and does not work like the old army and if you loved playing Green Tide, then it does not matter how good Killa Kans or Big Gunz had become, the army you liked is unviable.

I have played games with the new codex and won against armies that would have whooped my ass before. Less crying and more playing IMO.

Backfire wrote:

 gr1m_dan wrote:
Gpfunk has it spot on.

Instead of spending the last week moaning Backfire why don't you actually get loads of games in and post the reports and how you felt units did instead of "this sucks because of this" etc.

I don't need to. I can read rules, you know. Honestly, you just don't get it: this is not about some stat nerf or price increase, this is about missing rules which were essential in playing the vehicles. It's like if Orks lost Furious charge and Mob rules. You don't NEED to take test games to realize that the army has become something totally different and does not work like the old army and if you loved playing Green Tide, then it does not matter how good Killa Kans or Big Gunz had become, the army you liked is unviable.

"Get over it and play the Codex" aside, what exactly was nerfed or removed that made it unplayable?

I think my tally is Tau vehicles can no longer move at full speed and fire their main gun, the loss of the networked marker light, and the nerf to disruption pods. Is it possible that you could just house rule those back in for your local group? Or did you play mech tau competitively with the last codex?

 gpfunk wrote:
and the nerf to disruption pods

The change on disruption pods is actually a +/-. Yeah, they only give +1 cover, but the loss of the 12" minimal range counterbalances it nicely.

So is this your argument about Tau being a gakky codex? Or are you just trying to troll? I can show you a list of all the CSM entrants to a major tournament. 3/4 of them run triple helldrakes. It's competitive because point for point the Helldrake offers the best value for power. Markerlights and suits offer the best point for point power in the codex, therefore they are the most competitive build.

It's list optimization. The optimized Tau list is markerlights and suits with firewarriors to support.

I'm not really seeing your point.

Sure tons of people BRING triple Helldrakes but none of them WIN. That's because it's too skewed in one direction to successfully win Tournaments, which are about objective capturing and holding, not tabling your opponent in 5 turns (which is difficult against good lists).

mono-Tau do not have strong Troops options for seizing opponents objectives and holding them, and that's why they are weak. Fire Warriors are glass cannon that die to a stiff breeze. The codex hasn't addressed any of their weaknesses... and made it worse in some areas.

Asmodai Asmodean wrote:

mono-Tau do not have strong Troops options for seizing opponents objectives and holding them, and that's why they are weak. Fire Warriors are glass cannon that die to a stiff breeze. The codex hasn't addressed any of their weaknesses... and made it worse in some areas.

I can talk about one weakness that it corrected. Weakness in assault. Ability to have multiple units overwatch and many pieces of wargear that improve your ability to inflict brutal casualties in CC do a lot to make Tau more of a prospect to assault. They'll still fold but they'll cause more loses to units that do it. Very fun, fluffy, and effective.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AtoMaki wrote:

 gpfunk wrote:
and the nerf to disruption pods

The change on disruption pods is actually a +/-. Yeah, they only give +1 cover, but the loss of the 12" minimal range counterbalances it nicely.

I didn't think it was a nerf. I think other people did.

 gpfunk wrote:

"Get over it and play the Codex" aside, what exactly was nerfed or removed that made it unplayable?

I think my tally is Tau vehicles can no longer move at full speed and fire their main gun, the loss of the networked marker light, and the nerf to disruption pods. Is it possible that you could just house rule those back in for your local group? Or did you play mech tau competitively with the last codex?

Loss of Multi-tracker and Target lock, primarily - these were simply essential when playing with Tau tanks to full effect. Loss of Targeting array hurts too. Disruption pod is not actually that big a deal - in fact balance-wise, I think the new Pod is better. I've explained my grievances to great detail in other thread, no point repeating them there.

Just one example of how little attention vehicles received in the new book: what are the Burst cannon in Hammerhead for?
-they cost same as SMS, same firepower, both are Twin-linked, but SMS has more range and better rules. So what's the point of BC?

I think we should all go and play a few games before we make any major decisions. There are things i love, there are things i questioned. I ran alot of TA builds, obviously i wont now, but i think the synergy of markerlights might be more dynamic and fun compared to the old non-markerlight builds i used to run. Sadly, the death of the overly stupidly powerful DP was obvious, i just wish i could fire as a fast vehicle, but hey i can improve my BS on snapshots for the other vehicle weapons.

The last few codex releases everyone cried about certain units and now you see people using them all the time. case in point, people actually whined that they didnt like helldrakes, people didnt like all kinds of DA units. Then they played them, then they found out they arent that bad, its all about personal play style and your local meta. Everyone tells me the DA flyers are terrible, yet it has produced nothing but trouble in our local game group. Everyone moaned about how terrible daemons were going to be with all that odd variability. Now it seems alot of people actually like it. Its fun, the new Tau seems like it will be alot of fun, and I for one will try everything to see what works for me.

So dont forget the golden rule of combat, just because something seems like a good idea on paper dosent mean it will perform on the field.

Threads like these are so cute. I see the EXACT same type of thread with every new codex release. And people wonder why GW ignores the fans? I'll give it another few weeks before people stop complaining and actually learn to make good Tau lists.

 Ferrum_Sanguinis wrote:
Threads like these are so cute. I see the EXACT same type of thread with every new codex release. And people wonder why GW ignores the fans? I'll give it another few weeks before people stop complaining and actually learn to make good Tau lists.

I agree wholeheartedly, i still think people are in the Necron/GK state of mind with all the new 6th edition codexs and they are not adapting to the idea that the new paradigm is balance over all. Ironically enough the idea of balance is what we have been asking for forever, and now that we have its all "bring back the cheese!" "we want dreadknights that can throw vendettas" I for one welcome the balance, as i have been tired of people steam rolling me with cheese builds instead of defeating me with tactical ability.

Backfire wrote:

 gr1m_dan wrote:
Gpfunk has it spot on.

Instead of spending the last week moaning Backfire why don't you actually get loads of games in and post the reports and how you felt units did instead of "this sucks because of this" etc.

I don't need to. I can read rules, you know. Honestly, you just don't get it: this is not about some stat nerf or price increase, this is about missing rules which were essential in playing the vehicles. It's like if Orks lost Furious charge and Mob rules. You don't NEED to take test games to realize that the army has become something totally different and does not work like the old army and if you loved playing Green Tide, then it does not matter how good Killa Kans or Big Gunz had become, the army you liked is unviable.

When 6th came out, I was really annoyed that my mechanized assault-based Space Wolves army wasn't going to work anymore due to the limitations on disembarking + assaulting. As a result, I lost a good deal of my early battles with the Codex because I was sticking to my old playstyle.

Around 6 months in, I began adapting more. I still run Rhinos, but I play them differently than I did before. They're now mobile cover platforms, tank shocking units, etc. And the units inside are still being used to assault, but I now have compensated to get in a turn of shooting beforehand.

Basically, what I'm saying is that if you are not beholden to a single, unbending playstyle, then you need to learn to adapt. However, if you insist on only playing Tau with fast tanks shooting at everything on the move, then unfortunately that's probably not going to work nearly as effectively as it did before. You might find something else to compensate though. Who knows. We'll see in the coming months.

Whine, whine, whine.

The codex is plenty good and before posting knee-jerk negative reactions you oughtta get some real testing under your belt.. I'd like to ask how many total games you've gotten under your belt with the new codex.

There are plenty of good units in the new dex and plenty of buffs, as well as some nerfs. I'd say with confidence that this is the most balanced 6th book to come out. I really don't see any terrible choices and aside from the Broadsides I don't see too many auto-takes. You should be happy that almost every unit is functional and be super happy that you were fortunate to get a unit as good as the Broadsides.

Markerlights are great, but from where I am sitting they aren't absolutely necessary. The best unit in the book, IMO, is the Broadside (dual purpose with ignore cover/homing Str5 and Str 7) BS3 TL isnt half bad (Vendettas anyone?). Fire Warriors are nice backfield campers and Ethereals can make them quite painful for opponents at RF range.

As for allies, Orks are amazing allies for Tau, they shore up your biggest weakness (flimsy troops) and add a nice counter-attacking element.

I doubt we will see as much complaining once people have settled in and realize that Tau/X ally, is one of the more formidable armies around.

I do think the OP has some valid criticisms of the codex. Whether those problems add up to a bad codex is another point entirely.

Especially the point about the codex being incomplete, I think is spot on. The Tau should not have to rely on allies to take far away objectives, but it appears that they will need to in a competitive environment.

I am sure that Tau players will find lots of ways to win but it will probably involve allies. Allies are the escape hatch for poor codex design as well as a mechanism to sell models, its the new reality and I expect it to persist long into the future.

I hope lots of people buy Tau as main or allied forces and shoot everything out of the sky, that would be a great contribution to 6th edition.

Allies are needed for almost all codices. SM almost always take a blob. Crons are usually seen with CSM/GK. CSM/Daemons or vice versa. GK with IG.

It is necessary in 6th to fill in your weak spots with allies. Thankfully Tau have access to almost everyone and can therefore do a great job filling in the cracks.

JWhex wrote:
I do think the OP has some valid criticisms of the codex. Whether those problems add up to a bad codex is another point entirely.

Especially the point about the codex being incomplete, I think is spot on. The Tau should not have to rely on allies to take far away objectives, but it appears that they will need to in a competitive environment.

Taking far away objectives is typically not required in this game. Contesting them or knocking your opponent off them is sufficient, and Tau have ample tools for that. Besides, if you want to take far away objectives, Devilfish carbine squads are always available (and IMO damn scary!)-- all in all, I think anyone claiming the Codex is dead in the water without testing needs to take a few deep breaths and calm down.

LVaix wrote:Allies are needed for almost all codices. SM almost always take a blob. Crons are usually seen with CSM/GK. CSM/Daemons or vice versa. GK with IG.

It is necessary in 6th to fill in your weak spots with allies. Thankfully Tau have access to almost everyone and can therefore do a great job filling in the cracks.

In my experience, that hasn't been the case. Tyranids do fine without allies. I often find that taking allies is more limiting than useful, especially in lower points games. Obviously, your mileage may vary, but allies seem far from mandatory at this stage of the game.

 gpfunk wrote:

No, we really don't. We have Hammerheads (which suck) and melta guns. That's it. Otherwise we have autocannon spam in an edition where autocannon spam is a terrible strategy.

Didn't you favor autocannons over lascannons with imperial guard? Why is guard autocannon spam suddenly more effective than tau autocannon spam? Volume of shots certainly strips hull points. And your suits are pretty mobile so they can try to get favorable armor facings. And since when are meltaguns bad? Especially when you can deepstrike without scatter or just come in on the board edge you want with certain wargear.

That was me lad, Peregrine was always in favour of lasplas IS over the AC IS. After the mathshammer the AC, in efficiency terms, is better, but the LC kills big things better. However this isn't an IG thread.

If I could find a way to reliably and cheaply increase the BS on missile drones whilst still bringing tank hunter I'll think about bringing Tau as an ally. Can't really think of much that fills those criteria.

 Blaggard wrote:

That was me lad, Peregrine was always in favour of lasplas IS over the AC IS. After the mathshammer the AC, in efficiency terms, is better, but the LC kills big things better. However this isn't an IG thread.

If I could find a way to reliably and cheaply increase the BS on missile drones whilst still bringing tank hunter I'll think about bringing Tau as an ally. Can't really think of much that fills those criteria.

Gotcha. My fault. There's always a flurry of posts in those threads so it's very hard to distinguish after the fact who said what...once it goes off into the depths of the dakka system of course.

I really think Orks and Tau can be real super buddies now. Take orks for hardy troops choices and maybe a beatstick warboss commander then take a support tau commander with some marker drones and the ignore cover wargear and puretide chip. Plop that sucker in a squad of three missile sides and you can have a pretty scary tank hunting unit.

 Kingsley wrote:

JWhex wrote:
I do think the OP has some valid criticisms of the codex. Whether those problems add up to a bad codex is another point entirely.

Especially the point about the codex being incomplete, I think is spot on. The Tau should not have to rely on allies to take far away objectives, but it appears that they will need to in a competitive environment.

Taking far away objectives is typically not required in this game. Contesting them or knocking your opponent off them is sufficient, and Tau have ample tools for that. Besides, if you want to take far away objectives, Devilfish carbine squads are always available (and IMO damn scary!)-- all in all, I think anyone claiming the Codex is dead in the water without testing needs to take a few deep breaths and calm down.

LVaix wrote:Allies are needed for almost all codices. SM almost always take a blob. Crons are usually seen with CSM/GK. CSM/Daemons or vice versa. GK with IG.

It is necessary in 6th to fill in your weak spots with allies. Thankfully Tau have access to almost everyone and can therefore do a great job filling in the cracks.

In my experience, that hasn't been the case. Tyranids do fine without allies. I often find that taking allies is more limiting than useful, especially in lower points games. Obviously, your mileage may vary, but allies seem far from mandatory at this stage of the game.

Your point is kinda moot cause Nids can't take Allies. I'm sure if they could people would be all over them in a heartbeat.

 Kingsley wrote:

JWhex wrote:
I do think the OP has some valid criticisms of the codex. Whether those problems add up to a bad codex is another point entirely.

Especially the point about the codex being incomplete, I think is spot on. The Tau should not have to rely on allies to take far away objectives, but it appears that they will need to in a competitive environment.

Taking far away objectives is typically not required in this game. Contesting them or knocking your opponent off them is sufficient, and Tau have ample tools for that. Besides, if you want to take far away objectives, Devilfish carbine squads are always available (and IMO damn scary!)-- all in all, I think anyone claiming the Codex is dead in the water without testing needs to take a few deep breaths and calm down.

LVaix wrote:Allies are needed for almost all codices. SM almost always take a blob. Crons are usually seen with CSM/GK. CSM/Daemons or vice versa. GK with IG.

It is necessary in 6th to fill in your weak spots with allies. Thankfully Tau have access to almost everyone and can therefore do a great job filling in the cracks.

In my experience, that hasn't been the case. Tyranids do fine without allies. I often find that taking allies is more limiting than useful, especially in lower points games. Obviously, your mileage may vary, but allies seem far from mandatory at this stage of the game.

Nids cannot take allies, but as a Nid player, I wouldnt mind some extra FMCs or DKs if I could have em.
At lower pts I agree because then you have to take 2 HQs, at 1750 and up I disagree completely. I think GT results will mostly support that as well. All the codices, including GK and Crons, have weak spots and Allies can usually help with them.

I'd only trust pure Crons and Nids to do well above 1750, though I think Crons are more formidable with GK/Ork/CSM buddies.

 Andilus Greatsword wrote:

Basically, what I'm saying is that if you are not beholden to a single, unbending playstyle, then you need to learn to adapt. However, if you insist on only playing Tau with fast tanks shooting at everything on the move, then unfortunately that's probably not going to work nearly as effectively as it did before. You might find something else to compensate though. Who knows. We'll see in the coming months.

But "fast tanks with shooting everything on the move" is one of the most original ways of playing Tau, and fluffy way. Tau like to be mobile, because they don't have raw numbers for static warfare, and their military culture goes around it. I liked Tau tanks because they were flexible and capable, sure they did not have as much armour as Imperial tanks, or weren't as fast as Eldar tanks. But they were unique in the game and conveyed a feel of high-tech force. Now, Tau tanks are basically just floating versions from Imperial tanks. Their mobility is gone and flexibility is gone, thus exposing their not-that-great firepower.

Why did that paradigm had to change? It's not because it was too powerful, quite the contrary. It did not preclude anyone playing Tau in some other way. The fact whether tanks stayed good, or became rubbish is completely irrelevant from the perspective of a player who cared about Tau suits or infantry. There was simply no POINT making those changes, other than force people off from that playstyle. This, folks, is poor Codex writing. It's exact same thing which was done to Tyranids. Ask Nid players whether they think 5th Edition Carnifex is awesome. Are they crybabies too? If you have read around, I'm not alone with my opinions. Plenty of Tau veterans have expressed their disappointment. New players will probably like the book, however, as they don't know what they have missed and think that Tau are supposed to be that way.

Now, this does not mean that the Codex is weak, in fact I think it's probably pretty powerful when it's played the right way. I'm also sure that other people who like other aspects of the Tau will like the book. However, I don't really care about other people, so the book blows.

To be quite honest i might be a little hypocrite about this but:

Instead of burning down cities and rage about how the tau got weaker or different, why not dicuss how their tactics are different and how they can deal with things they couldnt do before and what things they cant do now after their codex is out?...

The reason to why i call myself a hypocrite is that i wanted to start out with Tau because they were the 2nd favorite race in 40k after tyranids, but currently the tyranids is forced to go with a single build and is lackbuster at best ( in my opinion ) and to "fix " my tyranids i need to use like 2,5k NOK ( norwegian currency ) to buy the models i need to make it "viable" so instead i decided to toss those money into Tau instead, and luckily a new codex popped up as i decided to switch.

 gpfunk wrote:

 Blaggard wrote:

That was me lad, Peregrine was always in favour of lasplas IS over the AC IS. After the mathshammer the AC, in efficiency terms, is better, but the LC kills big things better. However this isn't an IG thread.

If I could find a way to reliably and cheaply increase the BS on missile drones whilst still bringing tank hunter I'll think about bringing Tau as an ally. Can't really think of much that fills those criteria.

Gotcha. My fault. There's always a flurry of posts in those threads so it's very hard to distinguish after the fact who said what...once it goes off into the depths of the dakka system of course.

I really think Orks and Tau can be real super buddies now. Take orks for hardy troops choices and maybe a beatstick warboss commander then take a support tau commander with some marker drones and the ignore cover wargear and puretide chip. Plop that sucker in a squad of three missile sides and you can have a pretty scary tank hunting unit.

Problem with the commander w/ marker drones in the missileside group is that the unit that fires the markerlights doesn't benefit from them. What else is going to shoot at the target, your mandatory 6 fire warriors?
I think the solution is either:
Have the commander with markers in a fairly decent sized firewarrior blob as additional wounds, foregoing tank hunter, or:
Have the commander with shield drones and missile pods in the missileside group and get 12 BS2 S7 shots, with 12 TL BS4 S7, 4 BS5 S7 and 12 TL BS4 S5 shots, all with tank hunter.

With the second option you can try find a way to cheaply and reliably get markerlights on an elite FOC slot, but then you're starting to pay out the nose for the S7 spam, possibly reducing efficiency.

Edit:
Or drone squads with a commander with drone controller. Overlooked that.

 Captain Avatar wrote:
OK, This will not be a popular post. Fine.

Are you sure? People sure seem to love complaining usually.

 Captain Avatar wrote:
First, The first couple of 6th ed Codices seemed *meh*

Really? I've seen a variety of whinging but then people seemed to get over it and enjoy their new codices well enough. I've thought they were all very good, covering the armies well with a variety of options in general (though some very popular options too...)


Most complaints for each codex, all of which seemed to die down really quickly once the codex had been out for a week or two, seemed to sum up as: 'They made my favourite things not as powerful anymore!'

This reminds me of the argument being made in another thread for keeping as many separate marine codices as possible.

People, have none of you realised that by reducing the power levels in general across the board (which I would claim is what is happening), we are left with more balanced and generally more fun to play armies? Armies that require more skill to win with, as they have less 'one-click' wonders? But also armies that allow you to choose options that you like to use and still have a fun game, instead of armies that might be fluffy or in some sort of character but get trounced by someone with only the slightest edge?

This is why I'm fine with the idea of many marine codices being combined into some form of big codex. It would require the differences in the characters of the various Chapters to be winnowed down to a few core rules or units, rather than pages and pages of rules that are not really necessary to define the established character.

I have quickly learned, if someone on Dakka argues that a unit has been 'nerfed', it probably means that the unit was really a bit too good for a fun, fair game and has been brought into line.

Are tau really that bad at getting stuff into the back field?

-kroot infiltrate and scrore, and (imho) got alot better.
-shadowsun can infiltrate anything she joins, and give the whole squad stealth+shrouded
-darkstrider can outflank anything he joins, which can be firewarriors.
-ethereals can let you run and shoot at the same time, combined with a marker drone squad jsj behind to keep up, can allow you to run anf still fire at BS5. Then when you get where you are going the thereal cranks up the volume of fire.

Even without devilfish, tau can get around.

Speaking of infiltrate, stealthsuits can be taking out rear parked armor on turn one with melta attacks, and with the extremely cheap marker drones can also be calling in seeker missles to hammer said armor.

Farsight and bodygaurd can also deepstrike in and wrek armor. Infact, amusingly enough, the turn after they pop in they can start assaulting armor and, between the dawnblade and the new fist, they can do pretty good job at it.

Tau flyers suck, which is disappointing. But longstrike in a hammerhead is ridiculously awesome, and piranas are more viscious than then before the codex:
-precise fusion blasters to wreck your opponent's day
-overwatching drones even if you moved all out
Devilfish got some nice toys as well:
Tankshock with fltchette dischargers and point defense relays after disembarking it's squad and get several rounds of firing in from supportive fire and overwatch before they can deal with the squad. They might be expensive, but they are also pretty powerful.

With all battlesuits gaining free multitrackers and blacksun filters, and the cheap marker drones you can fill thier squads with, crisis suits got a huge upgrade and can be purposed to fill almost any role. While the broadside's railgun might have gotten a nerf, they basically have two free extra slots to make up for it. The widespread access to intercepter that the tau army gets, infact covers a weakness I always ran into: drop pods and mycetic spores. Or for a couple points a suit you can make them all precise, allowing you to pick out enemy warlords from 60" away, first blood anyone? And a nearby ethereal can let them do that while running.

I think Backfire has a really valid point. Now, I haven't actually seen the codex yet, just read all the threads, but I don't think his complaints are necessarily about the codex itself.

From where I'm standing, it seems like in order to play the new Tau he'd have to buy all new units and ditch his old playstyle. Now think about if that happened to your favorite army: it's not just that you have to change things up, you have to essentially start a whole new army.

If they took my Eldar and made everything I use not viable/not play in a way I like anymore, I'd be pretty peeved. It'd be like they took the reason I play my army and get rid of it. So yeah, you may say the way to go is suits, but if you have a ton of tanks and have to buy an army's worth of suits, then you might as well consider starting something other than Tau, since the Tau you do have aren't much of a Tau army anymore and you have to start almost from scratch.

That sort of got away from me towards the end, but I hope you get my general point, that getting rid of old playstyles is bad for the hobby even if the book is good.

 Slaanesh-Devotee wrote:
I have quickly learned, if someone on Dakka argues that a unit has been 'nerfed', it probably means that the unit was really a bit too good for a fun, fair game and has been brought into line.

Yeah, those old-codex Hammerheads (which hardly anyone ever took in a competitive list) were just too good for a fun, fair game and needed to be brought into line...

I agree with some of whats being said on both sides but i definitely agree with the Grow up and adapt approach. I laugh every time i see a codex review and people say "new" character Aun'Shi rather than returning.

The only true gripes I have with this codex comes completely from fluff perspective mostly.

I really dont like how they screwed with the seeker missile system. Being able to fire without the ML is nice but I'd rather be able to call in my missiles from my pathfinders or FW squads that work their way into a good position....you know the way they are supposed to work? I also dont like the fact that targeting array is gone completely because of my stealthsuits which are usually in the backfield where they wont have markerlight support. Getting those fusion shots to connect is already a pain lol

The only other thing that makes me laugh and annoyed is the allies chart. Everyone keeps saying "ally with orks!" but the fluff of the entire codex says no way jose. Im gonna lose it when i see farsight and orks on the same side.....shouldnt happen...but will be hilarious when it does


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh and why is this thread in Tactics as opposed to General? A whine n complain about how you cant use a tactic is not a tactic in itself

Wolfnid420 wrote:

The only true gripes I have with this codex comes completely from fluff perspective mostly.

I really dont like how they screwed with the seeker missile system. Being able to fire without the ML is nice but I'd rather be able to call in my missiles from my pathfinders or FW squads that work their way into a good position....you know the way they are supposed to work? I also dont like the fact that targeting array is gone completely because of my stealthsuits which are usually in the backfield where they wont have markerlight support. Getting those fusion shots to connect is already a pain lol

Yeah, there are lots of little blurbs like this which to me show that Vetock really did not know, or care about, Tau "military lore" very well. In "real life" (sic), Pathfinders are actually one of the most important Seeker Missile users. They do ambushes on enemy columns with them, by sneaking up & unleashing their Markerlights and calling Seeker missile strikes on them. Mantas carry sizable battery of Seeker missiles for this very purpose.

But no infantry no longer can call Seeker Missiles. Now, in game terms, this is a small nerf, because lets face it, that ability was not really good, or often used. But the solution for that should have been to improve the mechanic to better match the actual fluff! Not to take it off completely.

Cant wait for my dex to show up in the mail. From what i have been hearing my tactic with them as allies for my orks is dead as i used them to punch what my lootas couldnt.

If i cant find an alternative w/o going Tau as main race and orks as allies, i probably wont be very happy with this new dex either. Time will tell though, i got a couple theories at least but i need the dex to test'm with actual numbers lol.

Backfire wrote:

Loss of Multi-tracker and Target lock, primarily - these were simply essential when playing with Tau tanks to full effect. Loss of Targeting array hurts too. Disruption pod is not actually that big a deal - in fact balance-wise, I think the new Pod is better. I've explained my grievances to great detail in other thread, no point repeating them there.

So your tanks will have to abide by the same movement and targeting restrictions everyone else does. QQ more.

Never mind that you have the only tanks that can fire Overwatch, can snipe specific models, ignore night fighting, and still retain the ability to fly through all terrain with no danger.

And using markerlights, you can still move and fire with Tau tanks - they just need markerlight hits to up their snap-fire BS.

newbis wrote:I have played games with the new codex and won against armies that would have whooped my ass before. Less crying and more playing IMO.

Stop. Whiners want you to listen to there anecdotal evidence, but won't acknowledge yours.

omerakk wrote:"Ermahgerd! My new book sucks because every single unit didn't get buffed while keeping their old strength, costing less, and having no disadvantages whatsoever."

Wow really? How odd.

Agreed, its like all the Tau knee-jerks only played 5th edition and somehow thought Tau were great then. Have none of them seen the normal element of change with new editions and new codices across the years? How on earth were they blind sided that GW was weakening mech and strengthening foot slogging in this edition?!

Ferrum_Sanguinis wrote:Threads like these are so cute. I see the EXACT same type of thread with every new codex release. And people wonder why GW ignores the fans? I'll give it another few weeks before people stop complaining and actually learn to make good Tau lists.

Then we get the whining about combination XYZ being TOO strong and broken.

Andilus Greatsword wrote:
Basically, what I'm saying is that if you are not beholden to a single, unbending playstyle, then you need to learn to adapt. However, if you insist on only playing Tau with fast tanks shooting at everything on the move, then unfortunately that's probably not going to work nearly as effectively as it did before. You might find something else to compensate though. Who knows. We'll see in the coming months.

Somehow, someone thought that nothing would change, except getting better. He doesn't want good advice or pointers, he want's his special little flower to be mourned and validated. Nevermind that in not moving, nothing really changes. Nevermind that the Ion Cannon is a beast and we have a l33t hammerhead. Nevermind that all his old models are still strong units... he wants the game his way

LValx wrote:
Whine, whine, whine.

The codex is plenty good and before posting knee-jerk negative reactions you oughtta get some real testing under your belt.. I'd like to ask how many total games you've gotten under your belt with the new codex.

Leave him alone and drink his tears

lord_blackfang wrote:
Never mind that you have the only tanks that can fire Overwatch, can snipe specific models, ignore night fighting, and still retain the ability to fly through all terrain with no danger.

Dang it folks! Agree with him. Everyone else has to deal with change in 6th, but he shouldn't. Leave him be!

The Railgun on the Hammerhead is still only a Heavy weapon. You can still move 6" and fire it.

Vehicles can overwatch. Heck, EVERYTHING can overwatch, even if they didn't get charged, and anything that can take support systems can Overwatch at BS2.

Flyers suck. Turret weapons, yes, but unless you only fire at the back ends of every flyer, they still suck. The Bomber is debatably useless.

The Riptide is awesome. The Shield Drones are T6 with a 4+ invuln. Oh, and you can deep strike them.

Tau are not useless, they haven't been shat on by Vetock, and they are still a really fun army with a great codex and very unique feel to them.

The codex is what you have for the next year, at the very least. Either deal or gtfo.

The amount of griping is hilarious. I don't really see how tau got "de-mech'd" I'd argue that their mech got better. Now that markerlights can completely bounce cover with only two hits...your "mech" units are putting shots on stuff with no cover save. That mean's no jinks for anything, no saves for most infantry, and 90% of the fliers in the game may as well go home. Crisis commanders with puretide chips are a huge force multiplier and I'm interested in all the combo possibilities that will entail. Piranhas got much better and cheaper. I'd like to know specifically what the OP means by his "mech" list getting boned. With cheaper markerlights spread through an entire FoC...I don't quite see it. But I guess complaining about it is easier than actually looking at the book closely.

One of the things I find remarkable is the amount of cross-unit support, even compared to the previous codeces. From the widespread availability of markerlights, to the various support systems on suits, to supporting fire during assault, to Ethereal/Fireblade local buffs, the effectiveness of each unit is highly dependent on its board position. This is neat, to me, because buffs can be directed where they're most needed, making a unit good at the time you need it to be, and then next turn power up a different unit.

I have no real problem with the tank situation. They're still powerful, but real cheap for the power that the main gun (compared to IG tanks). I also have no real problem with the cost of a Devilfish. Comparing to the undercosted Chimera, it's cheaper, has more firepower on the move with the drones, and is more resilient outside of cover. Most importantly, I think, is that it carries 12 Firewarriors instead of 12 Guardsmen. Yeah, we all know how fine and dandy Mech-Vets are, but they are throw-away units, and once a Chimera get close to the enemy, AV10 sides mean it's completely toast. The 12 Firewarriors carry very serious firepower with either Carbines or Rifles. Furthermore, thanks to cheaper and better EMP grenades, even a half size squad is an almost lethal threat to any vehicle in charge range. This matters. Fire warriors are not expensive, and they're very well armed and durable for their points.

I agree with Bio. Well said.

I think at this point there are more people saying no its not bad than there are people complaining about it, seriously I think the negatives came from the first page.

This book is awesome, getting a headache trying to figure out what to put with what there are so many stinking options. It really is "Build a Bear" Tau

valace2 wrote:
I think at this point there are more people saying no its not bad than there are people complaining about it, seriously I think the negatives came from the first page.

This book is awesome, getting a headache trying to figure out what to put with what there are so many stinking options. It really is "Build a Bear" Tau

Since when were the majority automatically correct? Personally I haven't had a game with the new tau yet and I doubt anyone has had enough games to tell whether they're truely competitive, especially with so many options available.

I reckon that in a few weeks we'll have a clear idea of whether it's usable competitively or not. Until then, just try stuff out until you find something that works.

ITT: Less QQ more PEW-PEW
The new dex is strong, not broken like Grey Knights were in 5th
GET OVER IT, GW learned something from that fiasco!

Yesterday, New Tau placed top 4 out of 20 at a tournament I attended. They handled everything pretty well, minus obviously, assault.

 gr1m_dan wrote:
Gpfunk has it spot on.

Instead of spending the last week moaning Backfire why don't you actually get loads of games in and post the reports and how you felt units did instead of "this sucks because of this" etc.

Markerlights have always been an important part of the way Tau play. Don't like them? (For some reason) The don't use them. Try it. You will get more dakka. My regular opponents HATE that I can strip cover and make my units hit on 2s. Now I have more places to do that from?!?! Count me in.

You really need to play some games before writing off an army.

Even with that I feel like the codex just has not been out long enough for people to get the feel for all of it's eccentricities. We, simply put, do no know what the competitive builds will be for this dex yet. As for that, I'd like to point out that people thought that the Hellsturkey sucked for about a month before everybody was like "Holy crap that's baleflamer is amazing!", which was before the torrent change.

One thing a lot of people miss about the hammerhead nerf is that you can't move more than 6" or it will not allow you to shoot. The Hammerhead body is 5.5", meaning that have to be right on an terrain piece that is exactly .5" thick to move over it and still shoot. So Hammerheads are reduced to shuffling from side to side to try and maintain the Jink save. Also because it is a skimmer it needs taller terrain to block it. It's also a huge vehicle (much larger profile than Leman Russ) so it is much harder to try and hide 25% of the tank body.

Only two vehicles can overwatch really, the fighter and the Longstrike Hammerhead. You can purchase the upgrade to hit with extra S5 weapons, but that's somewhat pointless. Who can really complain though, since those two are actually pretty good at support fire. Though one has to ask how you get the flyer within 6" of an assaulted ally.

One thing that really bothers me about this codex is that we are heavily reliant on markerlights. To make one unit BS4 and ignore cover you need 3 markerlights which is about 6 pathfinders. And that's only one unit. The problem most people don't realize is that you can only effectively take markerlights in one FOC slot, FA. That's pretty maxes out at three units getting hit with markerlights, and buffs to only about 3 elite and/or heavy support units depending on how you spread them out.

I'm thinking that what I'm going to run and probably end up seeing is two cheap commander suits loaded up with missiles and some various wargear and attached to markerdrone units so they can mark and move.

Crisis suits with attached drones so they can ripple the markerlights, that way they can try to refill marker tokens they use assuming the unit lives. Body guards can now be taken extra so you can always bring some extra deep striking units if needed.

My favorite trick that I've gotten to try out is Kroot swarms coming in from back table edge. Put the side of a recon devilfish up against the deployment limit, pivot and scout 12", move 12" your turn, and turbo boost 6" is just enough to get to 6" from the back edge and bring in Kroot from reserves. The Recon drone counts doesn't get wrecked like the other attached drones so it's not hard to keep alive till the start of turn 2. Turn 2 brings in Kroot to cause as much dismay as possible, with deepstriking crisis suits near the homing beacon to cement a foothold in the enemy's deployment zone.

My friend is going to try running a crisis suit commander with drone controller, 2 marker drones, MSS, C&C node, and PEN. Attach it to the Riptide with it's two shielded drones, so the unit has majority toughness 6, the riptide leads the way and taking all wounds, and the commander forgoes shooting to buff the riptide.

Now I'm as pessimistic as they come, and I agree that the nerf to the broadsides is silly and really makes the HYM variant to obviously best build. The vehicles are almost useless except for the ion head. The kroot and firewarriors are still weak and can't be heavily relied on. The codex depends on markers more than ever.

I will say this though. There are new dynamics that we get that are great. We can spam interceptor like nobody's business, and with HYMsides it's better than skyfire at a fraction of the cost. The mobile firepower we get can be more precise with homing beacons now. Bodyguards are extra suit units (more expensive I know) but can be nicely kitted out for deep striking.

My new favorite toy is the Onage gauntlet. It's actually pretty nice when teamed up with the Iridium armor. The armor makes it so most weapons that ignore the save go after. So I figure put it on the warlord and in the event you get assaulted you have one chance to challenge and take out the higher LD unit and may have a chance at winning combat.

New Tau are amazing.

S10 AP1 was nerfed hard not because it was very good, but to make AV14 worth more. You have to admit the last few editions AV14 had a habit of disappearing on turn 1.

It's the same theory behind the power weapon nerf, making 2+ saves mean something.

raverrn wrote:
New Tau are amazing.

S10 AP1 was nerfed hard not because it was very good, but to make AV14 worth more. You have to admit the last few editions AV14 had a habit of disappearing on turn 1.

It's the same theory behind the power weapon nerf, making 2+ saves mean something.

This. This is actually something I love and hope it becomes a trend. My Land Raider has been collecting dust for almost 2 years.

All I can say is the new tau whooped my dark eldar ass so hard its not even funny, the report is bellow if anyone is interested:

BR21: The Black Buzzards VS New Tau - 1500pts

Infiltrating kroot seem just fine for pressuring the opponents objectives and securing midfield objectives.

 Lobukia wrote:

Somehow, someone thought that nothing would change, except getting better. He doesn't want good advice or pointers, he want's his special little flower to be mourned and validated. Nevermind that in not moving, nothing really changes. Nevermind that the Ion Cannon is a beast and we have a l33t hammerhead. Nevermind that all his old models are still strong units... he wants the game his way

Yeah, those Tyranid players are just as silly whining about their Carnifexes. They can always buy Tervigons, what's the problem!

You have absolutely no clue what you're talking about. This is not about something broken getting nerfed, this is about an entire playstyle being made useless.

Hey, imagine if all IG tanks were made terrible. "You whine over nothing since Guardsmen are even better!" Is that what you'd say?

Oh, and hey, isn't it easy for you to make snide comments when YOUR special little toys were NOT nerfed. It's only funny when it happens to other people.


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 CaptKaruthors wrote:
The amount of griping is hilarious. I don't really see how tau got "de-mech'd" I'd argue that their mech got better. Now that markerlights can completely bounce cover with only two hits...your "mech" units are putting shots on stuff with no cover save.

Common cover save is just 5+ these days, meaning even old Markerlights removed cover with just 2 lights. Of course it's true that Stealth, Shrouded etc effect now are ignored too and this is a big buff, even bigger buff however is generally cheaper Markerlight assets compared to old book.

And no, Mech didn't "get better". It's likely that a new Tau army which may or may not contain tanks got signifantly better, but this is not because tanks got better - they got worse, way worse, it's just that everything around got better. And it doesn't matter how cheap they got (in fact, they didn't get much cheaper, when you start adding all the wargear), because it no longer has the aspects the old army had, which got me intrigued. I don't care if Hammerhead came at zero points cost which would allow me to fit in 8 Riptides in my list, if it's a boring, static tank. Can you imagine next Eldar Codex writer removing the Fast rule from their tanks? Or next Deldar Codex losing Fast rule from their skimmers? You probably can't. So why it is less preposterous when similar change is done to Tau?

Here are what were the 3 biggest issues for the Tau from start of 5th ed that have carried all the way into this new codex only worse.

Not enough VoF in the long range S8-10 to effectively counter prevalent IG and Necron builds

No way to effectively get our scoring units(troops) onto our opponents rear objectives
*(Overcosted & Undergunned transport that was no faster and had less firepower than a chimera.)
*(No deep striking Troops)
*(No fast insertion vehicles)

Over dependence upon certain units and wargear.

--Not enough VoF of S8-10 weapons? Seriously?

Name a current army that can spam S10? Would have been Tau, now no one can. Which is probably by design, as already noted above this helps make AV14 more durable metawise.

What current army can spam S9? Quality, cost-effective S9, and not compromise the list? IG via vendetta spam? That's about it. Everyone else will have a handful or two of S9 at most, not spam. Not buying this as a Tau only 'problem'.

So that brings us to S8. This is where we see multiple armies that can easily spam S8. Except all of those have notable issues in 6ed (DE lance spam), or have eschewed S8 spam for more robust anti-infantry. In other words, armies that more resemble what a Tau list is easily capable of.

--No way to effectively get our scoring units(troops) onto our opponents rear objectives.

FW Devil fish in reserve + pathfinder unit with recon drone gets within 6" of a side edge near opponent objective = profit. In other words a psudeo outflank option that no other army has.

Or just do what most every other army does and contest those objectives or blow the holders off them. Or I dunno, use the 5-7 turns you have wisely instead of relying on gimmicks like deepstrike (ohh great you got some scorers near my objectives, too bad its turn 2 and I have 3+ turns to get rid of them) or scoring deathstars (800+ points to hold one objective has issues all its own).

--Over dependence upon certain units and wargear.

This is not solely a Tau issue and to me is often times related to perception vs reality and personal quirks vs flexibility. Tyranids aren't required to take 3x Tervigons and 30 Termagants no more then Tau are required to take 9 broadsides. There's viable options beyond the 'best' if one is willing to explore them. The 6ed tau dex has more answers throughout the FOC for various issues then ever before. It is in my opinion why you see fusion getting longer range, onager fist added to the options, an MC added to the FOC and seeker missiles and markerlights cheaper and easier to add to the list -- while broadsides lose the S10. They rebalanced the codex so that HS is not overly needed for anti-tank and so that broadsides are not as much of a no brainer.

And no, Mech didn't "get better". It's likely that a new Tau army which may or may not contain tanks got signifantly better, but this is not because tanks got better - they got worse, way worse, it's just that everything around got better. And it doesn't matter how cheap they got (in fact, they didn't get much cheaper, when you start adding all the wargear), because it no longer has the aspects the old army had, which got me intrigued.

Cheaper Piranhas is definitely a huge advantage for the "no mans land" they create with their large footprint and cheap fusion blaster, which by the way got a boost to it's range. That means the piranhas have a bigger threat reach (30"). Secondly, they can detach their drones for a 2 for 1 FA slot essentially. Also, I really think that you are overlooking the usefulness of Skyrays now. Hammerheads can move 12" if you boost BS with markerlights...which means Tetras are boss. Like I said, instead of pissing and moaning about the changes to your army...learn to adapt.

I don't care if Hammerhead came at zero points cost which would allow me to fit in 8 Riptides in my list, if it's a boring, static tank. Can you imagine next Eldar Codex writer removing the Fast rule from their tanks? Or next Deldar Codex losing Fast rule from their skimmers? You probably can't. So why it is less preposterous when similar change is done to Tau?

I play both eldar and dark eldar and I've made lists work just fine without the mass use of skimmers. Mass skimmers are useless to those armies anyways..so if they lost fast from their rules...big deal. Tau tanks still have the inherent mobility of a skimmer...so they are still useful and have good weapon systems.

Cheap, rockin' guns, solid armor, almost automatic 5+ cover save. I don't have many complaints about the Hammerhead. Sure, you can't move 12" and fire your main gun at full BS, but it's cheaper, so you can spend some points on Markerlights to boost your snap shot (I know, I know, Codex: Markerlights, blah, blah, blah). The extra 6" of moving and firing is nice, but I guess it doesn't mean that much to me in the 6th edition world where skimmers live.

I think, personally, not enough attention has been given to the seeker missile change. That they can fired without a Markerlight OR with a Markerlight is a pretty big buff in some ways. That they count as a weapon fire is a nerf. Together, it's a changed role for the system. Now, you can remain stationary and fire off the main gun plus two seekers. You can fire seekers instead of the main gun to hit Marked targets behind cover. You have two extra weapon systems that can be destroyed instead of your main gun on a Weapon Destroyed result. They're just over half the (questionable) cost of a Marine hunter-killer, and on a Hammerhead or Sky Ray, have the same BS. In a world of glancing vehicles to death, putting out a wave of reasonably accurate first turn S8 is going to be a useful thing.

I think, personally, not enough attention has been given to the seeker missile change. That they can fired without a Markerlight OR with a Markerlight is a pretty big buff in some ways. That they count as a weapon fire is a nerf. Together, it's a changed role for the system. Now, you can remain stationary and fire off the main gun plus two seekers. You can fire seekers instead of the main gun to hit Marked targets behind cover. You have two extra weapon systems that can be destroyed instead of your main gun on a Weapon Destroyed result. They're just over half the (questionable) cost of a Marine hunter-killer, and on a Hammerhead or Sky Ray, have the same BS. In a world of glancing vehicles to death, putting out a wave of reasonably accurate first turn S8 is going to be a useful thing.

This +1. I think seeker missiles is the "new" tech in Tau armies now.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I still don't get the hate for markerlights. They are cheap and plentiful and the benefits they provide are amazing. Why wouldn't you take them?

valace2 wrote:
It really is "Build a Bear" Tau

From the descriptions of the codex, I think Tau might eventually bump off the Imperial Guard as favorite allies, thus making this codex the "Build-an-Ally Codex".

But on their own, it seems a number of their units took one in the jimmies. I hope my codex shows up today so I can start reading it!

I'm just happy to ally in broadsides as an additional air defense.
IIRC, my required HQ can join the unit and make them tank hunters.

-Matt

Backfire wrote:

 Lobukia wrote:

Somehow, someone thought that nothing would change, except getting better. He doesn't want good advice or pointers, he want's his special little flower to be mourned and validated. Nevermind that in not moving, nothing really changes. Nevermind that the Ion Cannon is a beast and we have a l33t hammerhead. Nevermind that all his old models are still strong units... he wants the game his way

Yeah, those Tyranid players are just as silly whining about their Carnifexes. They can always buy Tervigons, what's the problem!

You have absolutely no clue what you're talking about. This is not about something broken getting nerfed, this is about an entire playstyle being made useless.

Hey, imagine if all IG tanks were made terrible. "You whine over nothing since Guardsmen are even better!" Is that what you'd say?

Oh, and hey, isn't it easy for you to make snide comments when YOUR special little toys were NOT nerfed. It's only funny when it happens to other people.

I was looking it over, and it appears the entire range of IG tanks are ALREADY terrible, apart from the Hellhound. They all follow the same restrictions you are so upset about being applied to your Tau, whom you apparently feel are supposed to be Eldar.

Here is a 2k list based on the old school mech tau list from 4th utilizing the updated tech tau get:

HQ:
Crisis Commander, x2 Marker Drones, TL missile pods, plasma rifle, target lock, drone controller, puretide chip

Total: 172pts

HQ:
Crisis Commander, x2 Marker Drones, TL missile pods, plasma rifle, target lock, drone controller
Total: 153pts

Troops:
6 FW in Warfish, blacksun filter @ 145pts
6 FW in Warfish, blacksun filter @ 145pts
6 FW in Warfish, blacksun filter @ 145pts
6 FW in Warfish, blacksun filter @ 145pts
6 FW in Warfish, blacksun filter @ 145pts

Elites:
x3 Crisis Suit, TL Missile Pods, Plasma Rifle

Total: 171pts

Fast Attack:
3 Tetras with x2 target locks

Total: 160pts

4 piranhas with fusion guns, blacksun filters

Total: 204pts

Heavy Support:

Skyray TL SMS

Total:115pts

Hammerhead SMS, Submunitions, blacksun filter, seeker missile, disruption pod

Total: 154pts.

Hammerhead SMS, Submunitions, blacksun filter, disruption pod

Total: 146pts.

Army Total: 2000pts

This list has plenty of firepower to knock out transports, and smoke infantry in cover. This list has the capability to achieve mission objectives as well. Puretide chip command joins crisis team and gives tank hunters when needed. The other commander joins the drone squadron that the piranhas create. Tetras can each target different units with markerlights if need be. Markerlights can boost other markerlight hits now...something that couldn't be done before. This list has enough marker lights to achieve crazy combinations to allow the army to be more mobile. Additionally, seeker missiles from the skyray can pound a target right away. The rest plays just like before. With the increase to SMS range the mobility early on isn't completely necessary. Piranhas screen warfishes and create an armored wall. Pretty straight forward. I think this list can work well. Lots of AV on the table in an environment that isn't equipped to deal with this many vehicles (16 of them).

 winterman wrote:

Here are what were the 3 biggest issues for the Tau from start of 5th ed that have carried all the way into this new codex only worse.

Not enough VoF in the long range S8-10 to effectively counter prevalent IG and Necron builds

No way to effectively get our scoring units(troops) onto our opponents rear objectives
*(Overcosted & Undergunned transport that was no faster and had less firepower than a chimera.)
*(No deep striking Troops)
*(No fast insertion vehicles) "

Over dependence upon certain units and wargear.

--Not enough VoF of S8-10 weapons? Seriously?

Name a current army that can spam S10? Would have been Tau, now no one can. Which is probably by design, as already noted above this helps make AV14 more durable metawise.

What current army can spam S9? Quality, cost-effective S9, and not compromise the list? IG via vendetta spam? That's about it. Everyone else will have a handful or two of S9 at most, not spam. Not buying this as a Tau only 'problem'.

So that brings us to S8. This is where we see multiple armies that can easily spam S8. Except all of those have notable issues in 6ed (DE lance spam), or have eschewed S8 spam for more robust anti-infantry. In other words, armies that more resemble what a Tau list is easily capable of.

The problem is not only a "spamming S10 or S9" problem, it is an availability one : there is only one S10 shot in the whole Codex (Hammerhead Rail Gun), and only one S9 (Nova Charged Riptide Ion Gun), so one shot per slot, if you take all your HS and Elites slots for 6 high powered shots.

You can argue that S9 spam is not efficient for other armies, but S9 shooting is at least available for them.

---------------------------------------------------------------

I'm really sad that the Tau have now the Eldar syndrom : Everything is great if you spend 4 markerlight tokens to fire at BS5 and no cover save! (same as Eldar Guide + Doom FTW!)

Sure, Markerlight support is more widely available, but I really hoped that Networked Markerlight became the default option, not the exception.

All of this doen't mean that the new Tau is a very bad army. But they seem better as an allied force (for AA possiblities) than as a standalone force.

But I still think that something good can be made out of this codex. Unfortunately for my wallet, most of them involve Riptides!

Edit :
@CaptKaruthors : your Commanders have 5 systems each, so removing the TL from the missile pods could be a good option especialy when they have BS5!

Tau have managed to work even markerlight-free in the past, and they can do so still.

You just need to cover for lack of accuracy with more dakka, and rely on numbers to do their thing.


That being said, the only two things that really got "nerfed" in the new codex are the broadsides and hammerheads.

Broadsides lost quite a bit in the AT department, but they got vastly improved in the AI that takes place after the armor is gone, and can also be a very nice AA platform now.

Hammerhead lost in the mobility section, and in defenses with Dpod nerf, but the railhead is now much cheaper, and the ionhead got a S8AP3 large blast option, so it balances out in my book.

Now lets count the AT options that improved shall we?
Piranha-fusion range increase, costs less, backup drones greatly improved.
Stealth team-fusion range increase, burst cannons of the ret of the team improved.
EMP-costs less, became far more lethal (turned from useless to viable)
Crisis generally a bit cheaper, also more versatile.
Riptide, enough said.
Commander "railgun fist"
Shadowsun and farsight are both cheaper and stronger now, sun has 2 fusion shots, farsight can blend most tanks.

and that's before entering the S7 realm, S6AP1, etc.

So keep crying about our broadsides not being OP anymore and having to actually think a bit about AT options, I'll just move on to all these fantastic new options. (heck, will probably still use railsides too.)

 Captain Avatar wrote:
Not enough VoF in the long range S8-10 to effectively counter prevalent IG

lolwut? Since when do you need S8-10 to counter 50-man blob squads?

This sounds like a lot of complaining for complaining's sake.

 Danny Internets wrote:

 Captain Avatar wrote:
Not enough VoF in the long range S8-10 to effectively counter prevalent IG

lolwut? Since when do you need S8-10 to counter 50-man blob squads?

This sounds like a lot of complaining for complaining's sake.

He's talking about their tanks.

Still plenty of fusion to go around

Edit :
@CaptKaruthors : your Commanders have 5 systems each, so removing the TL from the missile pods could be a good option especialy when they have BS5!

Ah, yes. My bad. Well that makes them a little cheaper then and still works.

 winterman wrote:

FW Devil fish in reserve + pathfinder unit with recon drone gets within 6" of a side edge near opponent objective = profit. In other words a psudeo outflank option that no other army has.

And if I read the rules correctly, you can have your recon drone in your own corner, within six inches of one of the table sides, and bring a unit with outflank in from anywhere along that table edge, including your opponents deployment zone (provided you enter from that table side). Talk about unexpected. You'll get a lot of side armor and rear armor shots with that.

Biophysical wrote:
Cheap, rockin' guns, solid armor, almost automatic 5+ cover save. I don't have many complaints about the Hammerhead. Sure, you can't move 12" and fire your main gun at full BS, but it's cheaper, so you can spend some points on Markerlights to boost your snap shot (I know, I know, Codex: Markerlights, blah, blah, blah). The extra 6" of moving and firing is nice, but I guess it doesn't mean that much to me in the 6th edition world where skimmers live.

I think, personally, not enough attention has been given to the seeker missile change. That they can fired without a Markerlight OR with a Markerlight is a pretty big buff in some ways. That they count as a weapon fire is a nerf. Together, it's a changed role for the system. Now, you can remain stationary and fire off the main gun plus two seekers. You can fire seekers instead of the main gun to hit Marked targets behind cover. You have two extra weapon systems that can be destroyed instead of your main gun on a Weapon Destroyed result. They're just over half the (questionable) cost of a Marine hunter-killer, and on a Hammerhead or Sky Ray, have the same BS. In a world of glancing vehicles to death, putting out a wave of reasonably accurate first turn S8 is going to be a useful thing.

Please don't kid yourself, just because a markerlight is 2 pts cheaper then a hunterkiller missile doesn't make it amazing. How many imperial armies spam hunter missiles? None, because points spend on multiple one shot weapons is a waste of pts. Especially with the seeker missile change (nerf imo) if they had come down to 8pts and had the old rules I might consider it. But the inability to use any markerlight to shoot the seeker irks me. And the fact that seeker missile can shoot targets out of line of sight doesn't even work anymore, because they have to be shot at the same target as the rest of the gun, which do need line of sight. (Except SMS, so I guess thats a combo.....)

I'll openly admit, if I have extra points and just can't find anythingelse I like in the army, I'll be putting a seeker missile or two on my hammerhead, but going out of your way to plan it as a strategy is crazy and very point inefficient. So far every list I've made ends up cutting the seeker missiles, because they are so many better low point options.

milo wrote:

 winterman wrote:

FW Devil fish in reserve + pathfinder unit with recon drone gets within 6" of a side edge near opponent objective = profit. In other words a psudeo outflank option that no other army has.

And if I read the rules correctly, you can have your recon drone in your own corner, within six inches of one of the table sides, and bring a unit with outflank in from anywhere along that table edge, including your opponents deployment zone (provided you enter from that table side). Talk about unexpected. You'll get a lot of side armor and rear armor shots with that.

That's... pretty dang evil, actually. You could even chain a second recon drone through near the opponent's back edge, and get stuff coming in off the back side of the table as well. Very nice catch.

Btw people forgot that you can buy disruption pods for Hammerheads and devilfish for like 15 points?

meaning you have a auto 4+ cover save, and 3+ if you flatout.
I think thats a good way of survival for a troop transport. ( at least with 12/11/10 AV, and the hammer head have 13/12/10 IIRC )

 Captain Avatar wrote:

So, we did not get a means of putting scoring units effectively on our opponents rear objectives. This right here is a massive issue that was made worse by removing our vehicles ability to fire as if they were fast. Yes, markerlights can now help with snap shots but this just adds to the over reliance on certain units/wargear issue.
Tau not getting a fast troop delivery method(Fast transport, Deep Strikers or jet-pack troops) leaves the Tau at a distinct disadvantage in over half of the missions.

Next, As to getting scoring units on the back objectives??? I suggest Jet-bike Eldar or Drop Pod SM's because the Tau are "not a complete army". Instead of putting the work into developing a proper and full codex we got 2/3's of a codex at full codex price. The failure to drop the points on our transports, no new fast transport/flier transport and not to even attempt to move unused units to more fitting areas of the FOC just comes across as lazy

Like CSM have SOOO many options for getting their troops into the enemy deployment zone?
Devilfish are just as fast as rhinos(and a lot more suriviable)

O wait, Tau have Kroot! Infiltrating troops, my god you can have a hundred of them.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Danny Internets wrote:

 Captain Avatar wrote:
Not enough VoF in the long range S8-10 to effectively counter prevalent IG

lolwut? Since when do you need S8-10 to counter 50-man blob squads?

This sounds like a lot of complaining for complaining's sake.

He's talking about their tanks.

Still plenty of fusion to go around

You don't need to spam S10 to kill the one Leman Russ that your IG opponent probably isn't fielding anyway. I can't even remember the last time I saw someone use an IG vehicle with an armor value higher than 12.

I think what's possibly being overlooked is not the ability to kill AV14 vehicles, but the ability to take down multi-wound T5 creatures in one shot. And while massed other fire may do the trick, there's a significant difference between trusting a unit of broadsides to handle one MC and focusing the rest of the army on other incoming threats, and having to rely on the whole army to handle that one MC, letting the other stuff get close.

 Redbeard wrote:
I think what's possibly being overlooked is not the ability to kill AV14 vehicles, but the ability to take down multi-wound T5 creatures in one shot. And while massed other fire may do the trick, there's a significant difference between trusting a unit of broadsides to handle one MC and focusing the rest of the army on other incoming threats, and having to rely on the whole army to handle that one MC, letting the other stuff get close.

What multi-wound T5 creatures do you really need to instantkill though? I really dont think FMCs will threaten Tau at all. RoF will cause grounding checks and wounds and then you simply need them to fail marine saves. And T5 isnt very formidable, the average Tau gun wounds it on a 4+.

I'd be much more afraid of a list that maxed out Hounds/Seekers and brought some Crushers/Fiends than one that brought any FMCs.

LValx wrote:

What multi-wound T5 creatures do you really need to instantkill though? I really dont think FMCs will threaten Tau at all. RoF will cause grounding checks and wounds and then you simply need them to fail marine saves. And T5 isnt very formidable, the average Tau gun wounds it on a 4+.

I'd be much more afraid of a list that maxed out Hounds/Seekers and brought some Crushers/Fiends than one that brought any FMCs.

Volume of fire could be quite ineffective when you have 4-5 FMCs on the table...

LValx wrote:

What multi-wound T5 creatures do you really need to instantkill though? I really dont think FMCs will threaten Tau at all. RoF will cause grounding checks and wounds and then you simply need them to fail marine saves. And T5 isnt very formidable, the average Tau gun wounds it on a 4+.

I don't think it's necessarily about one threat, it's about losing the tool that allows you to deal with multiple threats. I've seen a lot of lists with 3 daemon princes plus a lord of change or bloodthirster. The S10 gun would let you neutralize one or two of them with one or two of your units, allowing the S5 massed fire to go to work on the T6 guy.

Other T5 multi-wound stuff might include such units as Grotesques and Claw Fiends from DE, units of plague drones, chaos spawn, ogryns, nurgle-marked obliterators, nob bikers (and warbosses on foot), most necron lords, and a couple of tyranid things. Given that the S10 not only doubles them out, it also denies their FNP, the S8 gun is considerably less efficient against these units.

Yeah, but a few single Str10 weapons aren't particularly effective at killing an FMC. It has to hit, wound and then hope an invuln fails. Those Str10 weapons are also fairly useless against many different lists being used in the meta. At most of the tournies i've been to in 6th, i've seen a big change towards masses of infantry which Str10 is incredibly ineffective against. I think RoF from new Broadsides is far more effective at killing a wide variety of targets, so i'd much rather have that.

I wouldn't even take the Str8 weapon. The Str7 missiles should provide enough weight of fire to bring down just about any targets. And that is precisely what i've experienced in testing them out.


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 AtoMaki wrote:

LValx wrote:

What multi-wound T5 creatures do you really need to instantkill though? I really dont think FMCs will threaten Tau at all. RoF will cause grounding checks and wounds and then you simply need them to fail marine saves. And T5 isnt very formidable, the average Tau gun wounds it on a 4+.

I'd be much more afraid of a list that maxed out Hounds/Seekers and brought some Crushers/Fiends than one that brought any FMCs.

Volume of fire could be quite ineffective when you have 4-5 FMCs on the table...

You don't have to kill all of them and that is what bubble wrapping units are for (Kroot or in my opinion Orks). Also, if your opponent brings 4-5 MCs he really doesnt have room for much of anything else.


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It'll take a Daemon Prince a very long time to chew through ~30 Ork Boyz. And i'll be glad to hold up a 250+ PT model with my Orks while the rest of my list can fire at troops.

I think the Flying Circus is a gimmicky list that should only fare well vs elite model armies. My Tau list brings 134 infantry models.

I dunno, a unit of 3 S10 broadsides w/ skyfire, would expect to down a 5++ FMC each turn.

3 shots * 3/4 hits * 5/6 wounds * 2/3 failed saves = 5/4.

As for the ork bubblewrap, that's a gamble that I'd take if I were playing the MC list. I'd hit the orks with all my MCs at the same time, hope to kill half of them, and keep them fearless at the end of my turn. Your turn, you're not shooting and, I kill enough more that they lose fearless and break. My turn, I'm out of combat and start charging your units. I'm sure it's slightly more complicated to get the exact numbers down, and might involve a little pre-fight shooting to make sure the odds are stacked my way.

I can ...almost... sympathize with the OP as I've seen DE players get hit hard by 6th. No assaulting out of reserves and, overwatch meant that if you built one of those Grotesque or Wych heavy assault lists with Webway portals you basically wasted several hundred dollars (if you enjoy winning).

Soo thankful I got my DE bargain private sale and, after 6th was released. So if the OP was Broadside heavy he might of lost some shooting punch but, the counter to the OP is this; the Tau got a LOT better in a lot more ways than they got nerfed.

 Hollowman wrote:

I was looking it over, and it appears the entire range of IG tanks are ALREADY terrible, apart from the Hellhound. They all follow the same restrictions you are so upset about being applied to your Tau, whom you apparently feel are supposed to be Eldar.

I don't expect Tau to be Eldar, I expect them to be Tau. I don't expect them to be IG. It's not so hard to follow, is it?

 Redbeard wrote:
I dunno, a unit of 3 S10 broadsides w/ skyfire, would expect to down a 5++ FMC each turn.

3 shots * 3/4 hits * 5/6 wounds * 2/3 failed saves = 5/4.

As for the ork bubblewrap, that's a gamble that I'd take if I were playing the MC list. I'd hit the orks with all my MCs at the same time, hope to kill half of them, and keep them fearless at the end of my turn. Your turn, you're not shooting and, I kill enough more that they lose fearless and break. My turn, I'm out of combat and start charging your units. I'm sure it's slightly more complicated to get the exact numbers down, and might involve a little pre-fight shooting to make sure the odds are stacked my way.

That unit would cost an arm and a leg and I dont think T5 multiwounders are common enough to make it worth it. And what is the point of talking about Str10 skyfire broadsides. Clearly they would be beyond broken but not because of fmcs/plaguedrones/etc, but rather because they would make Heldrakes and Stormravens terrible. No point in being upset that something that would really hurt game balance wasn't introduced.

And there is no way all 5 fmcs live to assault one squad. With the amount of shots I pack I could comfortably kill 2-3 in a turn assuming average dice. My list packs quite a bit of shooting and most of it is designed to waste infantry.

LValx wrote:

That unit would cost an arm and a leg

270 points, using old-codex broadsides + velocity trackers. If they kill one FMC, they pretty much make those points back. Or one landraider for that matter.

And what is the point of talking about Str10 skyfire broadsides.

Well, this is a thread based around discussion of what Tau didn't get and/or lost in this codex. Seems like the ideal place to talk about such things.

Clearly they would be beyond broken but not because of fmcs/plaguedrones/etc, but rather because they would make Heldrakes and Stormravens terrible.

Wait, so a helldrake, which pretty much makes any 3+ save unit terrible, would be totally undone by one army having an answer to it? One even without interceptor, so these flying dragons could still roast a unit, possibly making their points back, before being shot down? I think you overstate the impact that a unit that can kill an already unbalanced model might have on the game.

Anyway, they didn't get them, so it's moot. But to me, the loss of T5 instant-killing feels more significant than the loss of S10 on armour.

 Redbeard wrote:

LValx wrote:

That unit would cost an arm and a leg

270 points, using old-codex broadsides + velocity trackers. If they kill one FMC, they pretty much make those points back. Or one landraider for that matter.

And what is the point of talking about Str10 skyfire broadsides.

Well, this is a thread based around discussion of what Tau didn't get and/or lost in this codex. Seems like the ideal place to talk about such things.

Clearly they would be beyond broken but not because of fmcs/plaguedrones/etc, but rather because they would make Heldrakes and Stormravens terrible.

Wait, so a helldrake, which pretty much makes any 3+ save unit terrible, would be totally undone by one army having an answer to it? One even without interceptor, so these flying dragons could still roast a unit, possibly making their points back, before being shot down? I think you overstate the impact that a unit that can kill an already unbalanced model might have on the game.

Anyway, they didn't get them, so it's moot. But to me, the loss of T5 instant-killing feels more significant than the loss of S10 on armour.

I do think str 10 AP1 with Skyfire on multiwound 2+ models would be OP. One flyby from a Heldrake doesnt do much damage if a player properly deploys and spreads. Tau can also ally with most everyone so I think if it were available you'd see a ton of them to combat Drakes/Vendettas/Ravens. I think that it would be just a little too good. I think loss of Str10 but access to Str8/7 Skyfire is good enough.

Veskrashen wrote:

milo wrote:

 winterman wrote:

FW Devil fish in reserve + pathfinder unit with recon drone gets within 6" of a side edge near opponent objective = profit. In other words a psudeo outflank option that no other army has.

And if I read the rules correctly, you can have your recon drone in your own corner, within six inches of one of the table sides, and bring a unit with outflank in from anywhere along that table edge, including your opponents deployment zone (provided you enter from that table side). Talk about unexpected. You'll get a lot of side armor and rear armor shots with that.

That's... pretty dang evil, actually. You could even chain a second recon drone through near the opponent's back edge, and get stuff coming in off the back side of the table as well. Very nice catch.

Nope. You have to be near the board edge you want to come in on. Re-read the entry.

This thread surprises me. The OP seems to be concerned with things that I dont think are going to CHANGE the fundamental way the Tau opeated. It WILL make every FOC an intersting discussion.

Tau ALAYS used Markerlights. PLaying without them is fine but, why do that to yourself? You already needed the Fish's for troops anyways. I am surprised this "reliance" on Markerlights is an issue to anyone. I'm not even sure you actually need that MANY of them to make the army function. You only NEED a few. That you can have many more is cool though.

You'll note that we can't spam STr 10... But now we can spam (and cheaper) STR 7!!! Like all day long. ALL day long. Unless the enemy is playing with 0 Land Raiders, we can handle one with meltas. So spamming STR 7 and not having things blow up on us sounds kina good. enemy transports are going to be toast. Everything BUT a LandRaider is going to be toast. So what's the gripe? What, you have to fire a DIFFERENT gun to get the same result and this bothers you? Come now, did you notice we pay less for Broadsides also? The loss of A.S.S. was a surpise though.

Getting to the back of the enemy deployment is done with Kroot. Are you not aware of Kroot? Or you jut hate them and wouldn't use them? If so thats kinda on you, not the codex. The Kroot with Hounds and Krootox is a formidable unit now with some neat tactical tricks you can do (I call it the yo-yo) wih the hounds. Until 6E I always had two units. Now I probably will again after a bit of testing. Can't say for sure yet but they look good, and they look necessary in some ways.

I wont ever say the Devilfish should be that expensive. I agree there. I was fairly shocked when I saw its price. But then, Burst Cannons and Missiles are better too, so... They kinda got better for the same price which isn't the worst it could have been. The loss of Multitrackers effect was a head scratcher though. Kinda wierd, Kinda not awesome. But the drone thing and/or twin linking makes up for that somewhat. but not totally. I agree. Shoulda shaved 10 points off those or so.

I am seeing a bright side to this, personally.

 McNinja wrote:

Veskrashen wrote:

milo wrote:

 winterman wrote:

FW Devil fish in reserve + pathfinder unit with recon drone gets within 6" of a side edge near opponent objective = profit. In other words a psudeo outflank option that no other army has.

And if I read the rules correctly, you can have your recon drone in your own corner, within six inches of one of the table sides, and bring a unit with outflank in from anywhere along that table edge, including your opponents deployment zone (provided you enter from that table side). Talk about unexpected. You'll get a lot of side armor and rear armor shots with that.

That's... pretty dang evil, actually. You could even chain a second recon drone through near the opponent's back edge, and get stuff coming in off the back side of the table as well. Very nice catch.

Nope. You have to be near the board edge you want to come in on. Re-read the entry.

What he means is, you have two pathfinder units with recon drones. One you deploy in your zone at either edge. When you roll for outflank you bring the second pathfinder team with recon drone on the board anywhere along the table edge your first team is, that point just happens to be across the table and withing 6 inches of the enemy table edge. You now have a recon drone within 6 inches of the back table edge and your other outflanking units can come on the field anywhere along the back edge.

Stealth suits, Crisis teams lead by Shadowsun, Kroot, other Pathfinders and Firewarriors lead by Darkstrider are the only ones who can abuse it though :/

 Jancoran wrote:
I wont ever say the Devilfish should be that expensive. I agree there. I was fairly shocked when I saw its price. But then, Burst Cannons and Missiles are better too, so... They kinda got better for the same price which isn't the worst it could have been. The loss of Multitrackers effect was a head scratcher though. Kinda wierd, Kinda not awesome. But the drone thing and/or twin linking makes up for that somewhat. but not totally. I agree. Shoulda shaved 10 points off those or so.

Stuff like this confuses me with several of the new 6th ed books, most notably the Daemons. They make all kinds of changes to justify a points cost, whether cheaper or more expensive, without actually fixing a unit. So yes, the Devilfish got better weapons that GW must think justifies its point cost. But that doesn't make it any better at being a transport, especially when most of the time it can't use them to great effect.

Similar things are when they make units substantially worse (like the Hammerhead) but "balance" it by making them cheaper. Cheap isn't always the solution! I will gladly pay more points for more effectiveness, but I can't do that if they take units and make them less effective for less points with no mitigating factors. You can still only take 3 of them, after all. This seems to be GW's new design philosophy as a whole, especially evident with how they changed Daemon troops, but it's pretty worrying to me.

Nonetheless, one must admit...the Devilfish IS better for its points. So I mean... lets face it Devilfishs weren'tthe centerpiece of any offensive the Tau ever mounted other than insofar as GETTING the REAL threat to its destination. those extra shots are BETTER when coming from Piranhas now anyways. Do some math. straight up Piranhas are stupidly awesome price. No meltas. Just Burst Cannons and the Drones. GREAT price. So save your points on the Devilfish's and put them on the Piranhas. You know you wanna.

 MandalorynOranj wrote:

Stuff like this confuses me with several of the new 6th ed books, most notably the Daemons. They make all kinds of changes to justify a points cost, whether cheaper or more expensive, without actually fixing a unit. So yes, the Devilfish got better weapons that GW must think justifies its point cost. But that doesn't make it any better at being a transport, especially when most of the time it can't use them to great effect.

Similar things are when they make units substantially worse (like the Hammerhead) but "balance" it by making them cheaper. Cheap isn't always the solution! I will gladly pay more points for more effectiveness, but I can't do that if they take units and make them less effective for less points with no mitigating factors. You can still only take 3 of them, after all.

Yeah, this was irks me, people keep gushing "but Hammerhead is so cheap now!" But it doesn't matter how cheap it is since it's limited by FOC. It's not same thing at all like it was with Chimera or Razorback price drop because those units you could spam in response to their cheaper cost.

In the old book you could take Hammerhead as cheap but basic, or fully-kitted but expensive. (usually, fully kitted was more effective). Now, you can take it cheap but basic. So the new book has actually less options here. It's same thing with some other things, like new Suit armoury, or in larger scheme of things, Markerlights. You didn't have to play previous book with loads of Markerlights. You could, and they were often very effective, but they weren't mandatory. I like Markerlight mechanic, but I don't like to be force-fed things.

I don't agree with all this 'Hammerheads suck' crap, I actually think you are more likely to take them than before, In the previous Tau Codex, Broadsides could do a better job than the hammerhead for much cheaper, and now they can't do that, you need something that can to fill that gap, And whilst Broadsides aren't terrible, for me they do a job that my Crisis can already do efficiently enough, this allows me to fill my heavy support with the High AV AT that I need, which Hammerheads can provide. Also, Hammerheads are BS4 so they hit 2/3rds of the time, and whilst that isn't overall reliable with 1 shot (Believe me I know! ) The increase of Markerlights means you can light up a tank to hit on a 2+ or remove the cover, you can also look at Longstrike, who is brilliant for Anti Tank, beig BS5 and having tank hunters, as well as this, the support weapons like the SMS got much better, Whilst the Hammerhead was a great movable option in the previous codex, you're making it sound like you can't move at all, you can still move 6" and fire the Railgun with no Issues, and it's still one of the best high AV anti tank options in the game, you just now need to look elsewhere to broadsides to get good Anti Armour.

In my list I'm going to run 3 Hammerheads, 2 With Railguns and 1 With Ion Cannons, they are versatile enough to dish out high S Pie plates as well as take on armour, they're pretty cheap too compared to their IG counterparts, and I don't think they will die too auickly either, glancing hits can't stop your railgun from shooting anymore, which was the biggest pain and mech is still viable in 6th, and is still a great build, you will see people switching to infanty for their meta, but that further helps a mech army to prosper as melta is replaced by Plasma and less Power fists ar taken as well as Disruption pods being really useful when combined with night fightig, fortifications or ruins to provide a good cover save.

To sum up, Hammerheads aren't useless, they've just changed, and whilst this was quite a chunk to read (and i wouldn't blame you for ignoring it, given yor anti-new Tau views) you will discover that they aren't that bad, and I myself really like the new Tau book, the only issue i find with it is where the source of my markerlights will come from!

Miri wrote:

 McNinja wrote:

Veskrashen wrote:

milo wrote:

 winterman wrote:

FW Devil fish in reserve + pathfinder unit with recon drone gets within 6" of a side edge near opponent objective = profit. In other words a psudeo outflank option that no other army has.

And if I read the rules correctly, you can have your recon drone in your own corner, within six inches of one of the table sides, and bring a unit with outflank in from anywhere along that table edge, including your opponents deployment zone (provided you enter from that table side). Talk about unexpected. You'll get a lot of side armor and rear armor shots with that.

That's... pretty dang evil, actually. You could even chain a second recon drone through near the opponent's back edge, and get stuff coming in off the back side of the table as well. Very nice catch.

Nope. You have to be near the board edge you want to come in on. Re-read the entry.

What he means is, you have two pathfinder units with recon drones. One you deploy in your zone at either edge. When you roll for outflank you bring the second pathfinder team with recon drone on the board anywhere along the table edge your first team is, that point just happens to be across the table and withing 6 inches of the enemy table edge. You now have a recon drone within 6 inches of the back table edge and your other outflanking units can come on the field anywhere along the back edge.

Stealth suits, Crisis teams lead by Shadowsun, Kroot, other Pathfinders and Firewarriors lead by Darkstrider are the only ones who can abuse it though :/

Sorry, I think I misread his post. However, Recon Drones also have Homing Beacons, so you could also Deep Strike.

Miri wrote:

 McNinja wrote:

Veskrashen wrote:

milo wrote:

 winterman wrote:

FW Devil fish in reserve + pathfinder unit with recon drone gets within 6" of a side edge near opponent objective = profit. In other words a psudeo outflank option that no other army has.

And if I read the rules correctly, you can have your recon drone in your own corner, within six inches of one of the table sides, and bring a unit with outflank in from anywhere along that table edge, including your opponents deployment zone (provided you enter from that table side). Talk about unexpected. You'll get a lot of side armor and rear armor shots with that.

That's... pretty dang evil, actually. You could even chain a second recon drone through near the opponent's back edge, and get stuff coming in off the back side of the table as well. Very nice catch.

Nope. You have to be near the board edge you want to come in on. Re-read the entry.

What he means is, you have two pathfinder units with recon drones. One you deploy in your zone at either edge. When you roll for outflank you bring the second pathfinder team with recon drone on the board anywhere along the table edge your first team is, that point just happens to be across the table and withing 6 inches of the enemy table edge. You now have a recon drone within 6 inches of the back table edge and your other outflanking units can come on the field anywhere along the back edge.

Stealth suits, Crisis teams lead by Shadowsun, Kroot, other Pathfinders and Firewarriors lead by Darkstrider are the only ones who can abuse it though :/

Actually, I was really just talking about one Recon drone. A table edge stretches from one corner of the table to the next, correct? So, when I am looking at the table from my deployment zone, the left table edge intersects both my deployment zone and my opponents. If I have my recon drone IN MY DEPLOYMENT ZONE within six inches of that table edge, my outflanking units can come in ANYWHERE on that table edge, including in my opponent deployment zone (from the side.) You could do more with two recon drones, I admit.

I did a blog on the Pathfinders you might find interesting on what Pathfinders ARe now.

The Pathfinder role has 100% changed really.:

Link to blog, please?

SO! Focusedfire and I have butt heads on many things before but also attempted to make tau competitive and a fun all-round army to play. As for my opinions of the new dex, I'll list them:

Biggest, BIGGEST hit was the loss of S10 broadsides, nothing else really matters, not even the required use of markers for the rest of the army, as soon as a 2 point reduction in power was allowed, the H rail rifle became obsolete. Don't get me wrong, a 60" range S8 ap 1 twin-linked gun is still VERY useful, its just that it may or may not (leaning towards may not) be more useful than high yield missiles. If you want a great all comers unit, get high yield with early warning (amazing), if you want arguably the best flyer killer in the game and a very good anti light to medium vehicle killer, get skyfire railsides, remember that even though against av12 flyers you need 4s just to glance, just get that one pen through and weight of fire doesnt matter. At minimum the vehicle is nudered with snap shots only, or roll a 4 or higher and its gone. No other ultra long range gun can boast that effectiveness.

As for av14, this has been the real crux as "what to use" tactics with the new dex. Railsides were the mainstay, something new had to be found and there are options. The first and most obvious option is longstrike in a railhead, used him a bunch and must say he is unbelievably good. The biggest problem I ever had with railheads in the old dex, and the reason I never used them was 1 BS4 shot. 66% chance to hit with one shot is TERRIBLE odds, and was a pointless weapon for most of the game. Now we have a wait, BS5...yes!, Tank hunters... Yes! Preferred enemy for IG(the only other army other than marines of some way, shape or form that would EVER field av14) feth yeah, sign me up!

He has more than paid his points back on multiple occasions, and in the event you REALLY need some vehicle killed, there is no better option. That helldrake really need to go down? Marker lights, BS5 genst air, 2 to glance 3+ to pen, 50% chance of auto destruction...

No as an avid fan of targeting arrays, and someone who particularly hated marker lights in the old dex, I was dissapointed to see the array go the way of the dodo... But now markerlights are carryable in nearly every unit, and they reflect the bs of the drone controller. I mean holy feth was this an improvement, BS5 marker drones that JSJ with a commander? simply rediculous and will outperform pathfinders in nearly every scenario.

This brings up the next point. Pathfinders... I still don't understand the renown for this unit, they used to suck hard being very expensive for a BS3 marker...now they are even worse! Oh yeah they dropped 2 points and don't require a devilfish, ok...but they are still BS3...T3...have now a 5+ save which means even a basic flamer gibs them... and gakky leadership means that in order to field them effectively means you REQUIRE an ethereal... They also have access to the great new special weapons, that for whatever reasons fire warriors can't get? (Like you would ever use them in a markering squad, and offensive pathfinders are VERY expensive one-offs, T3 5+ save with LD7 base just doesnt ever hold up. And to require an ethereal means that where ever the ethereal is, that is one of the first targets your opponent will destroy, as once the ethereal is gone, the rest of the firebase folds fairly easily.

As for amazing new units, other than upgrade characters and HQs, the Riptide was an icredible addition. It is arguably the most resilient MC in the game, and boasts horrendously strong weaponry against any form of infantry. The Nova charge is a "meh" ability that I would likely only attempt once, or stop using if it ever failed. I mean its a T6 5wound terminator with a 60" range weapon that can freakin JSJ, doesnt get better than that. And its cheap! Carnifex cost for a much better unit.

Other new amazingness is as mentioned earlier, the drone controller rule. I mean MAN did this make drones suddenly amazing. One HQ I have been messing around with is a DS'er joined to a 12 man unit of gun drones. ITs hilariously entertaining to stick a very powerful HQ with 14 drones(including the HQ's drones), all being BS5, drones BS5 twin linked pinning, and with a target lock they can fire at different things. I call the strat "Crowstorm" and it has worked incredibly well.

In any case, I was hoping for suits to be base BS4 but what can you do, there is definitely a lot to work with in this dex, and I don't feel it is in any way limited to one strategy.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
Link to blog, please?

oops. I thought it was in my signature. sawee.
http://40kunorthodoxy.blogspot.com/2013/04/new-tau-pathfinders.html

Good tactical analysis.

I now know who to shoot first when I face tau

I'm still running two hammerheads. One Railhead with Longshot and one Ion head. S8 AP3 large blast doesn't really care about BS4 and Longshot is BS5 and tankhunter.

Naturally I will have fusion guns and possibly an EMP run and gun unit just in case the Railhead gets gimped early, but its obvious that Longshot is the go to guy for all of your at range AV14 needs.

The last unit will probably be 3 rail broadsides, 6 missile drones and a babysitting commander giving tankhunter, no cover, and BS5 to the drones. This unit will be rocking the 2+ save and down any AV13 or less thing in a single phase of shooting just due to stripping hull points. Yeah this is a lot of points 300-350ish, but removing multiple heavy or light squadron threats a game it should make its points back pretty fast.

 Jancoran wrote:

oops. I thought it was in my signature. sawee.
http://40kunorthodoxy.blogspot.com/2013/04/new-tau-pathfinders.html

I was actually wondering about this too for pathfinders. For 26 ppm you get a better plasma gun that doesn't get hot and the unit gets to run three of these in a 4 man squad. I'm not a big fan of the ion gun simply because of the gets hot on a 5+ model scares me initially, but the unit does have quite the bit of firepower. I'm surprised to see so many people not really mentioning these enough. I even chuckled when I saw a player using pathfinders with railrifles the sunday after release, because I'm used to them being more of a throw away unit. After a second of thought I realized that this is actually not a bad idea.

One tactic I'm enjoying so far is taking a recon drone with devilfish. I ran this last Sunday and it was pretty fun and effective. A small squad of pathfinders moving 12" scout and then 18 during the movement phase to get within 6" of the back table edge. Turn 2 you unload the pathfinders, hopefully with rail rifles, and bring in kroot behind enemy lines and call in deepstriking helios suits to establish a foothold in the enemy territory. With all the low Ap weaponry and volume of shots it will be incredibly hard to remove the units from the area, and that's if the enemy isn't trying to remove the Kroot infestation from his backfield. What I really like about this, is that it's a more aggressive approach to the standard Tau gunline and it forces the enemy to focus on maintaining his ground instead of trying to advance. Best part is, is that if the pathfinders get stopped anywhere along the table edge, it still works decently enough to establish well defended position for advancement.

 Jancoran wrote:
oops. I thought it was in my signature. sawee.
http://40kunorthodoxy.blogspot.com/2013/04/new-tau-pathfinders.html

One major thing you're overlooking is the high price of rail rifles. Two rail rifles costs as much as a crisis suit with two plasma rifles, and the crisis suit is a much better platform for those guns. Meanwhile you're giving up the one unique thing that Pathfinders do, mass cost-effective markerlights.

I can imagne that now the devilfish will be more popular with pathfinders now, I personally am going to try a 3-fish set-up, protecting my warriors and having a fish for the pathfinders to get some ground, and have a sniper drone team to try picking down anti-tank infantry.

My anti-armor will mostly be Broadsides and Crisis suits, and seeker missiles for whatever i can mark.
( yeah i like the system with the seeker missiles can ignore cover, and being a str 8 ap3 that is resolved at BS5 and dont count toward the weapons fired on vehicles, and the fish can have 2 and shoot them even without a mark )

Correct.

The blog was written to be informative on their uses, BUT they also perfectly reflect the mobile force deployment that I have always liked Tau for. My battle fields always end looking like we came from all directions. I've not played a gunline version (except for one specialized tournament that I went to) in like 6 years.

As the blog mentions, you will have pinpoint accuracy in your deployment and a way to ensure the safety of those arriving.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Peregrine wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
oops. I thought it was in my signature. sawee.
http://40kunorthodoxy.blogspot.com/2013/04/new-tau-pathfinders.html

One major thing you're overlooking is the high price of rail rifles. Two rail rifles costs as much as a crisis suit with two plasma rifles, and the crisis suit is a much better platform for those guns. Meanwhile you're giving up the one unique thing that Pathfinders do, mass cost-effective markerlights.

Did you even read the article?

And for the record, the markerlights are NOT the best thing about them anymore. Pathfindersd are T3, 5+ saves...instead of T4, 4+ saves. If you rely on Pathfinders for their markerlights rather than getting them elsewhere in the list, you're probably not going to like the results as much.

And no one "overlooked" the cost of the mini-meltas.

 Jancoran wrote:

And no one "overlooked" the cost of the mini-meltas.

Mini-meltas? What? Where?

 Jancoran wrote:
Did you even read the article?

I read it. You spent a lot of time talking about how great their special weapons are, when in reality they're overpriced and ineffective compared to crisis suits.

And for the record, the markerlights are NOT the best thing about them anymore. Pathfindersd are T3, 5+ saves...instead of T4, 4+ saves. If you rely on Pathfinders for their markerlights rather than getting them elsewhere in the list, you're probably not going to like the results as much.

T3/5+, but you can have more of them than you have marker drones (unless you skip the drone controller commander and leave them at BS 2). In terms of pure point and FOC slot efficiency Pathfinders still win.

And even if you care more about their homing beacon ability than the markerlights the markerlights are still better than throwing away points on the upgrade weapons.

I agree with Peregrine, marker drones are only more effective if you take a shas'o with a drone controller to make them BS5, unit to unit, without buffs, the pathfinders are better, you also need to understand that whilst a 5+ save is bad, it's not the end of the world, sure there's stuff that ignores cover but heavy flamers would roast normal tau anyway, and from normal fire i'd be looking to get these pathfinders in some ruins to make get that 4+ and light targets up with the support of a few ion rifles to weaken the squad down. I think Ion rifles are better as they provide a blast option, it makes the rail rifles look too expensive for me as I wouldn't want 5+ save models getting too close, 15 points for a 50/50 chance to hit just doesn't work for me, IG veterans get a better price on their melta, and their BS4.

Pathfinders will still be the main source of markerlights for me, my commander is benefitting a plasma/TL fusion squad with tank hunters/Monster hunter so i can deal with the big hitters, he is also useful in adding survivability to the squad with T5/2+ as he can take a hit from Lascannons and the like.

I agree with the OP in that markerlights seem to be central to the new dex. Where we diverge is that I am happy about this. Losing the compulsory devilfish on pathfinder teams is my favourite thing about the new dex.

I always loved the idea of Tau units 'helping' each other and many of the new rules seem to be reinforcing the idea of collectivism which I really like. But I can see how this would be annoying if you have ditched the idea of markerlights, like many would have done in response to the terribly uncompetitive previous codex.

The OPs point on the S8 broadside nerf is also a very good one - tbh this was the first negative thing that jumped out of the codex for me... to an extent balanced by having an 18' range fusion blaster. However you're right this isn't the same as blowing up a land raider from your table edge.

My view on this is that AV13/14 spam is going to be a rock to my Tau scissors to an extent, a bit annoying yes but we got better at doing alot of other things.. can't wait to face a horde army, and with so much rending ability we should be very capable of dealing with 2+ and 3+ save armies. Our ability to take out light vehices has definitely increased with cheaper crisis suits.

 troy_tempest wrote:
I agree with the OP in that markerlights seem to be central to the new dex. Where we diverge is that I am happy about this. Losing the compulsory devilfish on pathfinder teams is my favourite thing about the new dex.

I always loved the idea of Tau units 'helping' each other and many of the new rules seem to be reinforcing the idea of collectivism which I really like. But I can see how this would be annoying if you have ditched the idea of markerlights, like many would have done in response to the terribly uncompetitive previous codex.

My main concern with this is that new Tau armies will pretty much look the same, and probably play the same. There are lot of options, but maybe not that many Options.

 troy_tempest wrote:

The OPs point on the S8 broadside nerf is also a very good one - tbh this was the first negative thing that jumped out of the codex for me... to an extent balanced by having an 18' range fusion blaster. However you're right this isn't the same as blowing up a land raider from your table edge.

My view on this is that AV13/14 spam is going to be a rock to my Tau scissors to an extent, a bit annoying yes but we got better at doing alot of other things.. can't wait to face a horde army, and with so much rending ability we should be very capable of dealing with 2+ and 3+ save armies. Our ability to take out light vehices has definitely increased with cheaper crisis suits.

I don't have problem with Broadside nerf as such, but the army's internal balance is now skewed in a way which is in strange conflict with well estabilished background of the army. Of course there are other armies with similar limitations, but they are explained with their lore limitations (Orks, Tyranids). Tau feel like they COULD build really powerful guns, but don't really bother because they like the challenge of getting close & shooting it with Fusion blaster. It's much more sporting than mass Railgun fire!

Backfire wrote:

 gr1m_dan wrote:
Gpfunk has it spot on.

Instead of spending the last week moaning Backfire why don't you actually get loads of games in and post the reports and how you felt units did instead of "this sucks because of this" etc.

I don't need to. I can read rules, you know. Honestly, you just don't get it: this is not about some stat nerf or price increase, this is about missing rules which were essential in playing the vehicles. It's like if Orks lost Furious charge and Mob rules. You don't NEED to take test games to realize that the army has become something totally different and does not work like the old army and if you loved playing Green Tide, then it does not matter how good Killa Kans or Big Gunz had become, the army you liked is unviable.

Is it bad that I really liked the idea of relying on markerlight spam?

I guess that's my meta...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Backfire wrote:


I don't have problem with Broadside nerf as such, but the army's internal balance is now skewed in a way which is in strange conflict with well estabilished background of the army. Of course there are other armies with similar limitations, but they are explained with their lore limitations (Orks, Tyranids). Tau feel like they COULD build really powerful guns, but don't really bother because they like the challenge of getting close & shooting it with Fusion blaster. It's much more sporting than mass Railgun fire!

I get you here.

I was a bit miffed when they were only S8AP1. I think if they're going to force them to be, they could at least allow them to be two-shot instead of Twin-linked.

I think 3x Tau Broadsides shooting 6 S8AP1 shots, along with 12 S5AP5 shots (Ignoring Cover) and 12 S7AP4 (Markerlight) shots at a Flyer would feel really gratifying.

I also kinda wish that tau had some kind of access to an IC that was a battlesuit Shas'vre, or rather, that Bodyguards were IC (or like wolf guard - can join a squad.) I can think of a few uses for this - sit them in a squad of drones (12+2, 6 markerlights to deal with that hindrance.) with a drone-controller and a Puretide engram Chip behind an ADL, - with an Autocannon.

They'll ruin most flyers, and it'd only cost 347 points - you'll get full anti-flyer as well as Markerlight capabilities, in a 15 unit blob that is also capable of moving quickly and thrusting away from a bad situation. You could even give the Shas'vre a Fusion gun to deal with close tank responses.

I totally get the PF as special weapons team concept now - I'll be trying out a squad or two kitted with Rail Rifles myself in a few games to see how they do. I still feel like Marker Drones (spread across squads) or Tetras are the way to go for massed Markerlight support though. Depends on how FW FAQs them, once they get around to it.

I also understand why so many people are pissed about losing the S10 rails on Broadsides. It doesn't really impact me, but given how prevalent the assumption is that foot gunline Tau are the default build, I can totally see why people are so frustrated. Since I've never taken a Railgun in any Tau list I've played, and have always gone heavy mech, I've always depended on my Crisis with Fusion to take care of any heavy mech. I still feel that's a viable option, and even more so this edition, where Riptides / Ionheads can drop AP2 / AP3 pieplates on whatever comes out of that tasty transport. Surviving the aftermath of popping a LR is a lot more possible when you can drop 2+ cover ignoring low AP pieplates on whatever comes out. Oh, and the additional FB range is nice too.

I also feel that EMP grenades are a viable counter - moreso in a foot list than in a Mech list, for obvious reasons. With a Mech list you'll have to set things up a turn in advance, which is dicey, but can be doable I think. Time will tell though.

Veskrashen wrote:
I totally get the PF as special weapons team concept now - I'll be trying out a squad or two kitted with Rail Rifles myself in a few games to see how they do. I still feel like Marker Drones (spread across squads) or Tetras are the way to go for massed Markerlight support though. Depends on how FW FAQs them, once they get around to it.

I also understand why so many people are pissed about losing the S10 rails on Broadsides. It doesn't really impact me, but given how prevalent the assumption is that foot gunline Tau are the default build, I can totally see why people are so frustrated. Since I've never taken a Railgun in any Tau list I've played, and have always gone heavy mech, I've always depended on my Crisis with Fusion to take care of any heavy mech. I still feel that's a viable option, and even more so this edition, where Riptides / Ionheads can drop AP2 / AP3 pieplates on whatever comes out of that tasty transport. Surviving the aftermath of popping a LR is a lot more possible when you can drop 2+ cover ignoring low AP pieplates on whatever comes out. Oh, and the additional FB range is nice too.

I also feel that EMP grenades are a viable counter - moreso in a foot list than in a Mech list, for obvious reasons. With a Mech list you'll have to set things up a turn in advance, which is dicey, but can be doable I think. Time will tell though.

I've made some really really really cool builds mixing Gunline Tau with Drone Spam.

Drones are an excellent way to spam Markerlights, if you're willing to fork out for the commander to go with them (Painful, I know. But it can work. Let's have a look.)

In my list, I take no Flyers, no Broadsides, and I'm considering dropping my Hammerheads. The riptide's novacharge can be awesome enough as it is. (I am very content with S9AP2, Ordnance with re-rolls on a BS3+3ML model - my list allows you to spam out enough ML to deal with the first blood points.)

My small, finalised Drone squad is:

Commander, MSSS, NSJ (Just 'cos. I think this is the best Signature system in the book.), Drone Controller, 2x missile/Markerlight drones Drones

I also take 2 FB (or FB/PR if this is illegal. We'll see) and a Target Lock if I have points.

I then take 12 Drones, 6 Markerlight and 6 either shield or gun drone, although this would actually work with 12 markerlights.

Stick this behind an ADL, let a shield drone (just for the fact that it's outrageous) use the gun, if it intercepts, it ignores cover and is BS5 thanks to the commander. Otherwise, it's an incredible firepower base for the same reasons. This also gives your little drone squad some protection - you could also crowd firewarrior squads in there if need be.

note that should you have to move out to markerlight (at 36" range, this is unlikely), you can do so without firing snap shots - you're relentless, after all!

Reason to take either, or. (6x):
- Gun Drones if you'll be lacking in Fire warriors and think 6 extra pulse rifles will do your backline well
- Shield Drones if you'll be leaving your commander behind, alone. (I do not recommend this, as this unit should be used to support other units.)
- Markerlight Drones: The idea behind the new Tau is Concentration. IT isn't about spamming out good units that can fight efficiently on their own (Read: SW, DE to some extent.) It's about spamming out the mediocre units you have, and making something of them. This makes Markerlights very important (They drastically increase accuracy and ignore cover.) as 14 markerlights will usually hit 12 times, and 12 markerlights is enough to give 3 squads BS5 and ignores cover.

Couple this with a Hammerhead, a riptide and a Stealth or XV8 squad, and you have an almost guaranteed kill.

The problem of having S7/8 spam isn't as bad as people seem to think; AV14 isn't as prevalent as it was, LR being the only Viable AV14 model that is continually used. The trick note with LR is that they usually have to charge you, to disgorge a unit or to simply get into fething range. - when something is shooting at you at 12" range (or, at a stretch, 24"), you seem to forget that your Fusion blasters, as a rule, have a melta threat radius of 21". 2 of them, markerlighted with full BS bonus and Ignores Cover, is more than enough to put a cramp on a land raider's style.

You also all forget that you have fething haywire grenades. Sure they make a fire warrior 11 points, but think about this: 6 fire warriors will hit a Dreadnought on a 4+, 3 will hit, 2 will glance and 1 has a chance of penning or doing nothing. If you have a squad of 9 fire warriors (99 points with EMP), they will systematically destroy your Dreadnought.

9 fire warriors also wreck a land raider in combat. hitting on 3's, they get 6 hits, 4 glances and a pen. - sure, the squad inside will slaughter your fire-warriors. Oh, what's that? your Firewarriors cost exactly 5% of your 2k army? they managed to destroy a 15% cost unit, with ease?

Some things to think about:
Drone squad/commander drones
EMP grenades.

A further note on EMP grenades:

If you really want to go for the whole Alpha "I need to kill this unit" kinda tactic, consider a Markerlight drone squad with a commander, then 3x Stealth suits with 2x FG and Target locks (that way, you can target with all 6 fusion guns, get the +BS/Cover bonus, while still bringing 48 burst cannon shots at other units. )

You don't need Long Range S10AP1 spam. You need to forget your conception that Tau should never enter close combat.

All these threads are starting to look like "Glass half full, half empty, debates".

I dont understand how Tau players are so fearful of AV13/AV14...

AV13 Vehicles that are actually scary?
Soulgrinder, Annihilation Barge, Command Barge, Furioso.

AV14?
Land Raider.

You have 18" Fusion Blasters that you can easily TL and put on suits that can move 12". This gives you an effective melta range of 21". If you do the math that 21" will outrange the average assault distance of a LR-borne unit. It also means you can jump to kill things like Furiosos/SGs/Command Barges, before they get into your lines. Annihilation Barges pose something of a threat, but their shooting isn't backbreaking. Efficient as they may be, they will struggle to bring down large numbers of infantry.

^ Not exactly, as the jump movement comes after the shooting phase.

But DS is always possible, if unreliable.

Edit for ignorance, lol.

LValx wrote:
... ? Jetpacks can move 12" in the movement phase then move 2d6 in assault. A unit of 3 Crisis Suits with TL Fusion guns should be able to reliably neuter an LR. If you are really worried you can even give them double Fusion blasters. Either way, 12" movement + 9" melta range is 21" threat radius. If I brought an LR, i'd be quite worried.

Jet Pack units can only move 6". Or 12" if they are Beasts/Cavalry.

That definitely makes it a bit worse. But, I still wouldnt be overly stressed about a LR. Kroot are fantastic bubble wrap that will get easily killed by any LR-borne assault units. Then you can simply shoot the unit down. Most Tau units should be able to take down units of Terminators that are close to their lines pretty easily.

LValx wrote:
That definitely makes it a bit worse. But, I still wouldnt be overly stressed about a LR. Kroot are fantastic bubble wrap that will get easily killed by any LR-borne assault units. Then you can simply shoot the unit down. Most Tau units should be able to take down units of Terminators that are close to their lines pretty easily.

The problem is the LR itself, and not its cargo. A Redeemer can wreak havoc with its two super-flamers, the Crusader can kill the FWs and (more importantly) the Pathfinders and the Phobos can ID Broadsides and Crisis suits (and harass Riptides). Assault is dead idea against a good Tau army, but disruptive units (like LRs) can make it fall apart like a house of cards.

Yeah, but the LR would need to get quite close for it to be using flamers or hurricane Bolters to good effect, at which point those 18" Melta weapons can really do a number. For what it's worth the Riptide can also help with his Smash attacks.

I don't think the guns of a LR should be too threatening unless they are of the DA Banner variety, but there are also differing opinions on how the Banner effects the Hurricane Bolters.

I can see why people would be concerned, but the fact is that the Tau are no worse equipped to handle a LR than most other armies. Orks have it rough, Nids have to rely on assault, Daemons have to rely on assault, most imperial armies have to use Meltaguns that are 12", Eldar have to use short ranged Melta. The only army I can think of that simply abuses LRs at any range are Crons and that is really only if they decide to take Haywire Crypteks. I suppose Manticores can do it pretty well also, but they have to rely on rolling a 6 and actually hitting the LR with a scatter.

I find that losing the S10 AP1 on Broadsides isn't so bad. If you really think about it, having a 72" range TL slaughterer of vehicles IS a little much. Other armies don't really have anything to compare. All this means is that, as said above, Longstrike in a Railhead and TL Fusion Blasters on suits are the key for heavy anti-armour. And a Riptide with a Nova Charged Ion Accelerator is MADNESS.

Also, markerlights are amazing, makes average BS almost irrelevant. Yeah, there isn;t necessarily a cheap or easy way to spam them, but isn't the point of spamming to remove other elements of your army to take too much of something else?

I've been having some pretty good times with the new 'dex. It offers a lot more variety than the old one in 6th ed. I think we'll always miss S10 Railsides, but that was one of the only good (broken) things in a fairly sub-par (broken) book. Now we have so much CHOICE! I haven't had this much fun with my Tau since I first used my lovely (definitely so, so broken) Broadsides years ago.

And Broadsides are still amazing... 65 Pts for 4TL str7 and 4TL str5 ignore cover and BLOS is quite good!

 Jakoto wrote:
I find that losing the S10 AP1 on Broadsides isn't so bad. If you really think about it, having a 72" range TL slaughterer of vehicles IS a little much. Other armies don't really have anything to compare.

*cough* Bastion-Breacher Shells *cough*

 AtoMaki wrote:

 Jakoto wrote:
I find that losing the S10 AP1 on Broadsides isn't so bad. If you really think about it, having a 72" range TL slaughterer of vehicles IS a little much. Other armies don't really have anything to compare.

*cough* Bastion-Breacher Shells *cough*

Yeah but those can be inaccurate as hell. And dont have an option for skyfiring. The Str10 on Broadsides would have been really, really rough on anyone taking a Flyer as AP1 has such a good chance of outright killing things. If they existed (Str10 Broadsides), I think i'd never even consider something like a Storm Raven again!

 AtoMaki wrote:
*cough* Bastion-Breacher Shells *cough*

Good point. But we still have the Longstrike Railhead. And 18" Meltas. I don't feel unfairly treated at all, I think Tau have become even more adept at being shooting-phase geniuses full of dirty tricks. Darkstrider+Grav-inhibitor; Skyfire/Interceptor EVERYTHING; Markerlights...all the time; Ethereals in a tight cluster of FW...the list goes on.

Garukadon wrote:
All these threads are starting to look like "Glass half full, half empty, debates".

It's definetely glass half empty!

Of course, it could have been avoided by making the glass full right from the start.

Backfire wrote:

Garukadon wrote:
All these threads are starting to look like "Glass half full, half empty, debates".

It's definetely glass half empty!

Of course, it could have been avoided by making the glass full right from the start.

When did this topic turn into another Codex: Baledrakes and Nurgle discussion? Or do I have a deja vu ?

LValx wrote:

 AtoMaki wrote:

 Jakoto wrote:
I find that losing the S10 AP1 on Broadsides isn't so bad. If you really think about it, having a 72" range TL slaughterer of vehicles IS a little much. Other armies don't really have anything to compare.

*cough* Bastion-Breacher Shells *cough*

Yeah but those can be inaccurate as hell. And dont have an option for skyfiring. The Str10 on Broadsides would have been really, really rough on anyone taking a Flyer as AP1 has such a good chance of outright killing things. If they existed (Str10 Broadsides), I think i'd never even consider something like a Storm Raven again!

S10Ap1 is not really that special when really start to think about it. One Railgun is roughly equivalent of two Lascannons. This means that AT power of three Railheads can be duplicated by just two Predator Annihilators (very roughly, please don't jump on that comparison). Most Imperial armies can (if they want) spam loads and loads of Lascannons, they're not restricted by just HS slots. They can also take Multi-meltas, which are even better than Tau Fusion blasters.

Of course in real world, not that many armies have even those six Lascannons as spamming them by the dozens gets too expensive. And I've always said I agree that having ability to spam squadrons of S10AP1 would have been destabilizing if combined to all crazy good stuff Tau got in the new book. But still, restrictions imposed to Tau in long-range AT fire department seem artificial. Most Imperial armies don't have such restrictions. Neither do Eldar or Deldar, they can take tons of Lances if they want.

Backfire wrote:


S10Ap1 is not really that special when really start to think about it. One Railgun is roughly equivalent of two Lascannons. This means that AT power of three Railheads can be duplicated by just two Predator Annihilators (very roughly, please don't jump on that comparison). Most Imperial armies can (if they want) spam loads and loads of Lascannons, they're not restricted by just HS slots. They can also take Multi-meltas, which are even better than Tau Fusion blasters.

Of course in real world, not that many armies have even those six Lascannons as spamming them by the dozens gets too expensive. And I've always said I agree that having ability to spam squadrons of S10AP1 would have been destabilizing if combined to all crazy good stuff Tau got in the new book. But still, restrictions imposed to Tau in long-range AT fire department seem artificial. Most Imperial armies don't have such restrictions. Neither do Eldar or Deldar, they can take tons of Lances if they want.

Maybe this is what is a sign whats comming up for the new dexes from now on? rarer str 10 ap 1 stuff, and general "nerfs" across the board the make the game balanced by putting most things down a notch?

If you have the slots (and Tau have good stuff in every slot), I could see taking 3 units of 4 Pathfinders. They give you all kinds of good options for very little cost. You can hold them back and use their Markerlights, you can put them forward as a speed bump to slow down a fast assaulter, you can Outflank them, which is really nice if you've got EMP grenades and/or Special Weapons.

This is an especially nice option if you try for Positional Relay shenanigans. Infiltrate a Stealth Team, make for the opposing board edge (should take just one turn), then your Pathfinders can Outflank from the rear of the enemy army. A squad of 4 with just Carbines and can actually do a number on a lot of objective holding Troops choices, but basically force a response, because you can't let guys with EMP grenades run around a fire base.

Long story short, though, is that you get 4 meaningful units that start at 44 points each. If you can't think of any number of fun things to do with their firepower, markerlights, or optional EMP grenades and special weapons, then you probably shouldn't be playing 40k.

Dracoknight wrote:

Backfire wrote:


S10Ap1 is not really that special when really start to think about it. One Railgun is roughly equivalent of two Lascannons. This means that AT power of three Railheads can be duplicated by just two Predator Annihilators (very roughly, please don't jump on that comparison). Most Imperial armies can (if they want) spam loads and loads of Lascannons, they're not restricted by just HS slots. They can also take Multi-meltas, which are even better than Tau Fusion blasters.

Of course in real world, not that many armies have even those six Lascannons as spamming them by the dozens gets too expensive. And I've always said I agree that having ability to spam squadrons of S10AP1 would have been destabilizing if combined to all crazy good stuff Tau got in the new book. But still, restrictions imposed to Tau in long-range AT fire department seem artificial. Most Imperial armies don't have such restrictions. Neither do Eldar or Deldar, they can take tons of Lances if they want.

Maybe this is what is a sign whats comming up for the new dexes from now on? rarer str 10 ap 1 stuff, and general "nerfs" across the board the make the game balanced by putting most things down a notch?

I've been thinking about this, and certainly there have been signs that the designers want to curb "inflation" which got real bad during worst days of Ward era books.

OTOH, Imperial codex which can spam most Lascannons for the cost is also the newest (Dark Angels).

I played Trukk spam in 4th, BW then Killa Kan spam in 5th, and Bikers and Boyz in 6th. All fun, very different styles.

To OP. As an Ork player I think both your troop choices are the bomb diggity. You get a unit that is awesome at shooting and unit that is great at backfield objective taking. Neither is great at both. So use both. Compare the points and stats of Shootas to your guys and I'd be surprised if anyone Tau player took Ork allies for the troops! And that's not including your force multipliers and special characters.

If I ever played anything but Green (and why does anyone?) and I chose Tau, I'd max out those troops ASAP and find ways to enhance them. (Hint: deploy in cover.)

Veskrashen wrote:
I totally get the PF as special weapons team concept now - I'll be trying out a squad or two kitted with Rail Rifles myself in a few games to see how they do. I still feel like Marker Drones (spread across squads) or Tetras are the way to go for massed Markerlight support though. Depends on how FW FAQs them, once they get around to it.

I also understand why so many people are pissed about losing the S10 rails on Broadsides. It doesn't really impact me, but given how prevalent the assumption is that foot gunline Tau are the default build, I can totally see why people are so frustrated. Since I've never taken a Railgun in any Tau list I've played, and have always gone heavy mech, I've always depended on my Crisis with Fusion to take care of any heavy mech. I still feel that's a viable option, and even more so this edition, where Riptides / Ionheads can drop AP2 / AP3 pieplates on whatever comes out of that tasty transport. Surviving the aftermath of popping a LR is a lot more possible when you can drop 2+ cover ignoring low AP pieplates on whatever comes out. Oh, and the additional FB range is nice too.

I also feel that EMP grenades are a viable counter - moreso in a foot list than in a Mech list, for obvious reasons. With a Mech list you'll have to set things up a turn in advance, which is dicey, but can be doable I think. Time will tell though.

They are definitely beefy units now. Here is the link to my first Batrep:
http://www.40kunorthodoxy.blogspot.com/2013/04/tau-vs-space-marine-battle-report.html

I used the Pathfinders for damage dealing. I didn't fire off a single Markerlight from them all game. Not once.

 PipeAlley wrote:
I played Trukk spam in 4th, BW then Killa Kan spam in 5th, and Bikers and Boyz in 6th. All fun, very different styles.

To OP. As an Ork player I think both your troop choices are the bomb diggity. You get a unit that is awesome at shooting and unit that is great at backfield objective taking. Neither is great at both. So use both. Compare the points and stats of Shootas to your guys and I'd be surprised if anyone Tau player took Ork allies for the troops! And that's not including your force multipliers and special characters.

If I ever played anything but Green (and why does anyone?) and I chose Tau, I'd max out those troops ASAP and find ways to enhance them. (Hint: deploy in cover.)

its the mass of bodies that can actually fight in melee that people like the boyz blobs allied in for. Its probably the only thing im going to run if i ever play Tau with ork allies instead of orks with tau allies (Given the nerfs to broadsides my tactic with tau allies is kinda dead, still seeing if i can revamp one as i have...good god like 8K+ points worth of orks and MAYBE 1200pts of tau lol)

Well I can definitely understand why Tau players are upset, I mean you wait 8 years or so and you get a codex (while has a very viable method of play) which has a lot of weaknesses which can easily be exploited by certain armies, and armies with specific army builds. GWs idea of solving it, is by making Tau able to ally everyone. None the less I like others still think with the right build Tau can be just as competitive as any other army, you just need to play test it a little bit I suppose, as was said earlier I really don't think the codex sucks but which methods and which army builds are competitive will come to light in the coming weeks, just give it a little bit of time. A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

Or the Tau could do what everyone else does to AV 14 and shoot it with melta. I think living armor is gone, so there's no AV 14 I know of that melta can't crack.

 Toasty wrote:
A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

That's just bad fanfiction and has no basis in reality. Unless they added it in the Tau Codex, but it's never even been hinted to be "canon".

Toasty wrote:Well I can definitely understand why Tau players are upset, I mean you wait 8 years or so and you get a codex (while has a very viable method of play) which has a lot of weaknesses which can easily be exploited by certain armies, and armies with specific army builds. GWs idea of solving it, is by making Tau able to ally everyone. None the less I like others still think with the right build Tau can be just as competitive as any other army, you just need to play test it a little bit I suppose, as was said earlier I really don't think the codex sucks but which methods and which army builds are competitive will come to light in the coming weeks, just give it a little bit of time. A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

Martel732 wrote:Or the Tau could do what everyone else does to AV 14 and shoot it with melta. I think living armor is gone, so there's no AV 14 I know of that melta can't crack.

Tau have always had an easily exploited weakness... they suck in Assault. That hasn't changed. How have they got any worse than how they were before, especially in terms of net gain/loss? They can still deal with AV14, as Martel said.

khuffy wrote:
Okay I agree completely with your statements about allies, it seems like they made us alliable with everyone so they could all get access to effective antiair and our suits. I feel like the allies degrade the game as it isn't about using your armies strengths and weaknesses against anothers, its just about patching up your armies weaknesses with anothers armies strengths, kinda removes the uniqueness of each armies ability.

Totally agree with this! Your army no longer has any uniqueness. Sure it's quite cool to field a CSM+DoC army but the enjoyment wanes slightly when you have a pretty much exclusive flier army, say all hell drakes and vendettas or DE with Orks...

I am not a Tau player, but the Tau 'dex is the first one in 6E I felt inclined to purchase; I would like to play them someday.

There is the rumor they are "lacking" support as an allies codex/expansion will come out and they will be able to take "everyone" signifying their ability to diplomatically work with any race. And what's wrong with them allying with the other core codecis? They are master diplomats and aren't xenophobic like pretty much every other race in the game; they leverage strengths of others for their Greater Good. I think that's far more fluffy than before.

I see Tau having trouble with my favorite Necrons list; the AV13 Wall. 3 Ghost Arks, 3 Ann. Barges, 2 Stalkers, and flyer support. Yes, I will have troubles with riptides, but outside of some fusion blasters, my AV13 will be sitting pretty. It will be interesting to finally play the new book as the old book I trounced with that list. I have creamed Tau readily with Space Wolves and never played with SoB/Inquisition. I think the latter would be an uphill battle totally reliant on me "getting there" into their lines with my flamer weapons (though seraphim w/ St Celestine would wreck face... if I make my 6++/6++ versus a pieplate of death dropping on me). I'm awaiting rematches with the new Codex!

I think the naysayers should play them and see truly how they roll. I think they will be pleasantly surprised. And really, not liking Marker Lights? That's as signature to the army as all the suits/mechs.

Sounds like the Tau need to bring plenty of fusion blasters as hedges against AV 13/14 spam.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 Toasty wrote:
A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

That's just bad fanfiction and has no basis in reality. Unless they added it in the Tau Codex, but it's never even been hinted to be "canon".

I've read the new dex cover to cover and that's nowhere to be found. In fact, I also don't remember seeing anything in this one about them having no connection to the Warp. There was one other bit of fluff I've always heard about them that I can't remember seeing in the book, but I can't remember it at the moment...

Thoughts after a game vs SM:

Gun drones squads have gotten silly effective. The changes to the Pulse Carbine have been a solid improvement. They also still make for a great assault screen.

Loss of Multitracker and target lock on Railheads, really did hurt them. They just don't do fire support like they used and are going to be harder to work to Ideal shot angles with.

Ethereals are about a 200% improvement over the old codex, just don't make one warlord or your going to be giving up 3 VP in one go.

Loss of the network marker lights just hurt. Loss of Target Lock on the SDT controller just seem weird and lowers the unit usefulness. Still 48 rapid fire guns at BS5 are very nice.

Volley Fire and/or Storm of Fire really let FW squad deliver VoF harder and earlier than the most rapid fire weapons.

Broadside teams, really need to split between interceptor and Skyfire. Going all one or the other is probably never going to be the right choice.

Krak Missiles still bring the pain on suits.

Markerlights have a real learning curve this addition because they are so much more important. However, you can still be effective with out them if you are not going suit heavy.

Commander suits are probably going to be much less a fire power mainstay and more a multipler in this edition.

 Peregrine wrote:

valace2 wrote:
not everything can be a haldrake or scythe.

Sure. The GW Hobby (tm) has lots of room for cool model kits that you paint and put on your display shelf and never use because you're too busy winning games with Vendettas and Helldrakes. It's just unfortunate that they had to waste both Tau flyers on that kind of kit.

So every flyer has to be vendetta and heldrake level? I kinda like the fact that you have to choose pathfinders or flyers. I also like the fact that codex AA, flyers are only ok.

The more I ponder the Bomber the more interesting it is.

It can fly off the board if there is no target and leave the drones and then jump the enemy flyer after IT comes on. Now you're attacking from two directions. The interceptor Drones can join a commander suit after they are detached so it appears. This could be quite powerful.

Just a thought that jumped out at me.

 MandalorynOranj wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 Toasty wrote:
A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

That's just bad fanfiction and has no basis in reality. Unless they added it in the Tau Codex, but it's never even been hinted to be "canon".

I've read the new dex cover to cover and that's nowhere to be found. In fact, I also don't remember seeing anything in this one about them having no connection to the Warp. There was one other bit of fluff I've always heard about them that I can't remember seeing in the book, but I can't remember it at the moment...

Thanks! Really glad that rumour I heard isn't true, that would've just ruined 40k for me..... lol

The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

I see this new codex as one hell of an inprovement! Price reductions, longer range Melta's, More AA than ANY codex can boast of, a wicked MC Battlesuit of Doom!, and not to mention more flexibility than most armies can boast. Even IG barley rivals the Tau's abiltiy to change how they are going to play. You have more options and capabilities to do more nasty things.

I got out right after 6th came out last year. I loved my BA but I just could not cope with the huge change to things. Now that my original favorite army has been updated (with amazing things) I think I will get back into the game.

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

Personally......I think its because not all SM are dumb enough to resist the Tau take over.

And you know, maybe they are smart enough to know when they are outgunned and could use a little help?

Nah! That would mean something other than blind faith is in the forefront of their being.......is that even possible?? lol


Automatically Appended Next Post:
On a side note......WOOOO im a FW now instead of a silly water caste negotiater lol

 Ozomoto wrote:
So every flyer has to be vendetta and heldrake level? I kinda like the fact that you have to choose pathfinders or flyers. I also like the fact that codex AA, flyers are only ok.

Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

 Peregrine wrote:
Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

That's not particularly right or even interesting to say. Stormtalons, Stormravens, and Dakkajets see common use despite not being as underpriced as Vendettas. Similarly, the Dark Eldar flyers fill a gap in the Codex despite not being quite as good as other flyers (though their missiles can be quite effective). Overall, the rule of thumb for flyers isn't "take them if they are Vendettas, Heldrakes, or Night Scythes" but rather "take them if your list needs them." I can see even a Burna Bommer being the optimal selection in the right context.

@Barnowl:

Broadsides do still have multi-trackers, and they also have blacksun filters by default.

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

Elaborate? I was not aware that they were BFFs. Unless this is in the same vein as that stupid BA-Necron fist-bump hyperbole.

 Kingsley wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

That's not particularly right or even interesting to say. Stormtalons, Stormravens, and Dakkajets see common use despite not being as underpriced as Vendettas. Similarly, the Dark Eldar flyers fill a gap in the Codex despite not being quite as good as other flyers (though their missiles can be quite effective). Overall, the rule of thumb for flyers isn't "take them if they are Vendettas, Heldrakes, or Night Scythes" but rather "take them if your list needs them." I can see even a Burna Bommer being the optimal selection in the right context.

The Stormraven makes it into my list as a hedge against the helldrake. But when Vendettas show up, I just write it off. I think I've beaten the IG once out of say seven tries in 6th edition. The IG are rough.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

Elaborate? I was not aware that they were BFFs. Unless this is in the same vein as that stupid BA-Necron fist-bump hyperbole.

They are totally Battle Brother Best Friends Forever at least in the main rule book.

As to why is la mystery. (At least as to my knowledge)

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

Elaborate? I was not aware that they were BFFs. Unless this is in the same vein as that stupid BA-Necron fist-bump hyperbole.

They are totally Battle Brother Best Friends Forever at least in the main rule book.

As to why is la mystery. (At least as to my knowledge)

Oh, you mean the allies matrix. Yeah, that is odd.

Martel732 wrote:

 Kingsley wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

That's not particularly right or even interesting to say. Stormtalons, Stormravens, and Dakkajets see common use despite not being as underpriced as Vendettas. Similarly, the Dark Eldar flyers fill a gap in the Codex despite not being quite as good as other flyers (though their missiles can be quite effective). Overall, the rule of thumb for flyers isn't "take them if they are Vendettas, Heldrakes, or Night Scythes" but rather "take them if your list needs them." I can see even a Burna Bommer being the optimal selection in the right context.

The Stormraven makes it into my list as a hedge against the helldrake. But when Vendettas show up, I just write it off. I think I've beaten the IG once out of say seven tries in 6th edition. The IG are rough.

the heldrake and nightscythe are strong, very strong but the vendetta is on another level.

 Exergy wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Kingsley wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

That's not particularly right or even interesting to say. Stormtalons, Stormravens, and Dakkajets see common use despite not being as underpriced as Vendettas. Similarly, the Dark Eldar flyers fill a gap in the Codex despite not being quite as good as other flyers (though their missiles can be quite effective). Overall, the rule of thumb for flyers isn't "take them if they are Vendettas, Heldrakes, or Night Scythes" but rather "take them if your list needs them." I can see even a Burna Bommer being the optimal selection in the right context.

The Stormraven makes it into my list as a hedge against the helldrake. But when Vendettas show up, I just write it off. I think I've beaten the IG once out of say seven tries in 6th edition. The IG are rough.

the heldrake and nightscythe are strong, very strong but the vendetta is on another level.

you know the Vendetta just does not bother me that much. Maybe cause I mostly face it using Nid's. The NightScyth on the other hand is an f'ing pain in the neck.

How is the Vendetta not a problem for Flyrants?

neither one is a problem for Tau. And thats really what I like to focus on. =)

Well. I'm not sure about that. The price point of the Vendetta makes many of the Tau's AA options much less efficient. You now have multiple AV 12 fliers to engage with S7 weapons that the Tau pay a non-trivial sum to make skyfire.

This all goes back to the Vendetta having the cost of around a dreadnought or predator. It's insane. And it's so insane that I think that it can stress the AA of even the Tau. Because remember, the Vendettas and all the IG are shooting back!

Tau should not fear Aircraft as much. Lascannons hardly matter against Tau bcause a Heavy boloter may as well BE 3 lascannon!

So a lot of the aircraft options that are fear inducing, like the Heldrake, are less cool against Tau who tend to be (well...historically) much more an MSU and ablative army. My latest plan is to play with 115 models. So when the Heldrake kills 5, I am not sure Tau feel it as acutely. Hehehe.

I'm not saying be an idiot and disregard them in your planning. I am just saying that Tau have plenty of anti-air options and shouldn't really feel AS pressed as other armies when it comes to them.

What does Flyer spam list look like for IG? shouldn't they basically have nothing on the field?

We Should have a decent chance at removing most of whats on the field with our freaky range and infiltrating marker support. At the least we have the tools for it.

I don't think anyone has added yet but what do you guys think of the Death from the sky's add on for tau flyers? getting that d3 marker lights on everything within 12" is kinda cool.

Sorry, Desubot, no such luck. The Vendetta costs no more than a predator. And IG have lots of cheap units. I've seen IG air cav lists at 2K that still fill their deployment zone with 5 Vendettas in reserve!

I fought the 9 Vindetta list with 81 shots a round, filled with Demo vets. Barely tied it. It's just the mot ridiculous combo you can imagine. Painful. Real painful.

and yet... They could be quite vulnrable to Tau.

My question upcoming will be: Do pople still invest heavy in Broadsides? I'll be vry interested to observe which way that goes. Will we see 9 Broadsides? Seems lss necessary for sure. But the firepower... M'lord the firepower.

 Desubot wrote:
What does Flyer spam list look like for IG? shouldn't they basically have nothing on the field?

We Should have a decent chance at removing most of whats on the field with our freaky range and infiltrating marker support. At the least we have the tools for it.

I don't think anyone has added yet but what do you guys think of the Death from the sky's add on for tau flyers? getting that d3 marker lights on everything within 12" is kinda cool.

Lots of T7 board presence due to Artillery Battery's and Sabre Defences Platforms. Look at the revised list and read the comments here: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/516897.page

 Andilus Greatsword wrote:

Toasty wrote:Well I can definitely understand why Tau players are upset, I mean you wait 8 years or so and you get a codex (while has a very viable method of play) which has a lot of weaknesses which can easily be exploited by certain armies, and armies with specific army builds. GWs idea of solving it, is by making Tau able to ally everyone. None the less I like others still think with the right build Tau can be just as competitive as any other army, you just need to play test it a little bit I suppose, as was said earlier I really don't think the codex sucks but which methods and which army builds are competitive will come to light in the coming weeks, just give it a little bit of time. A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

Martel732 wrote:Or the Tau could do what everyone else does to AV 14 and shoot it with melta. I think living armor is gone, so there's no AV 14 I know of that melta can't crack.

Tau have always had an easily exploited weakness... they suck in Assault. That hasn't changed. How have they got any worse than how they were before, especially in terms of net gain/loss? They can still deal with AV14, as Martel said.

Let's go over the gain/loss, and you can tell me if you find it well balanced.

Losses -
Broadsides - str10/ap1, Advanced Stabilization Systems, TA. Reducing overall mobility synthesis with a highly mobile army//reducing firing effectiveness both in accuracy and power.
XV8 Shas'vre/Bodyguard squad - TA Increasing reliance on ML support systems to retain original shooting power.
Vehicles - Mutli-Tracker, Disruption Pod reduction, reducing overall mobility synthesis with a highly mobile army.
Troops - Shas'ui loses access to varied infantry wargear, allowing you to "kit" your troops to respond or work with certain circumstances. Forced to take defensive grenades, increasing the likelihood that your troops will survive initial conflict, leaving enemy troops unable to be fired upon during your shooting phase.

Gains -
Suits - Automatic MT/BSF, saving valuable points and opening up options. Increasing your ability to perform firing actions with Broadsides who really could never afford a MT except on their Shas'ui
Shas'ui - Addition of automatic systems allows you to not require the Shas'ui upgrade to your troops in order to have an effective unit.
Hammerhead - For the points of the '06 codex's hammerhead, you can have one at BS5 with TH, PE - IG, and opening up multiple Overwatch opportunities.
Troops - Kroot become a powerful shooting addition to the army, with extremely expendable points for infiltrating snipers.
Markerlights - Across the board Markerlights became an option you can field everywhere. A reduction of almost 60% of the cost of ML drones, and removal of required PF taking DF makes markerlights an extremely spendable option. Also increasing the power of the cover save removal, while losing the LD subtractions
HQ - A strong addition creates a varied and widely usable HQ addition to any army, and indeed, opens up a lot of new options to you.
Heavy Support - Most units remain the same, XV-88 gains the H4 missile pod to replace the railgun. The biggest change here are the Sniper Drones - BS5 48" rapid fire sniper rifle... incredible. The only drawback is how expensive the kits would cost to get the full 9 drones... >.>
Fast Attack - Again, Pathfinders lose their required DF, and we gain two flyers. I don't plan on fielding them, but they could be fun to have around.
Elites - The Riptide is quite a powerful model, a massive presence on the field. XV-8's become a lot more fieldable, and the presence of automatic Multi-Trackers basically kills off any twin-linked kit, with increased ML support you can ensure shooting stays accurate with two weapons. If we actually CAN utilize two of the same weapon without twin-linking one this will be an enormous buff, but I don't see it happening. They like keeping the selections varied.

I mean, really here, all in all, we saw a lot of power increase, and lost our AV14(from across the table) stopping power. Our fielding options increased tenfold, and our original options that we came to know and love remain mostly intact, with the addition of extremely cheap Markerlight support on the drone level. Honestly, I'm gonna need another KR case just for all the troops and models I need to get to be able to field them. I'm still worried that the intent here was to create a stationary base that we have to skirt around, creating a weak-point to attack in our lines, as opposed to having to cross the battlefield almost twice by the end of the game if played right, but we can counter this by utilization of fast moving drones if that's our intent. I just wish there were more players in the Myrtle Beach, SC area, lol.

 Jancoran wrote:
neither one is a problem for Tau. And thats really what I like to focus on. =)

Yeah Helldrake is probably more of a problem simply becuase the torrent weapon will eat FW and suits as well or better than marines. On the upside we got way more AA than most marine codex.

 Jancoran wrote:
Tau should not fear Aircraft as much. Lascannons hardly matter against Tau bcause a Heavy boloter may as well BE 3 lascannon!

Er, what? How can a weapon that wounds on a 2+, ignores armor, and inflicts instant death "hardly matter" for an army that is built around T4/2W/3+ units?

Mine isn't.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
Tau should not fear Aircraft as much. Lascannons hardly matter against Tau bcause a Heavy boloter may as well BE 3 lascannon!

Er, what? How can a weapon that wounds on a 2+, ignores armor, and inflicts instant death "hardly matter" for an army that is built around T4/2W/3+ units?

He's probably not running T4/2W/3+ suits. Which can easily be done with Riptides, Skyrays / Hammerheads, and massed Kroot / FWs / PF. Especially since he mentioned that he runs 115 models at 2000pts.

In which case, no, they don't really matter.

 Jancoran wrote:
Mine isn't.

Then your list sucks. You can't build a viable Tau army without having good targets for lascannons.

Veskrashen wrote:
In which case, no, they don't really matter.

Err, no. Lascannons are awesome against vehicles and MCs. The only way you can avoid caring about lascannons is to bring nothing but Fire Warriors and Kroot, in which case your army sucks because you have a handful of "autocannons" as your only weapon above STR 5 AP 5.

Lol. Peregrine, your lack of imagination continues to astound me. Have we not HAD this discussion before? I think we have.

And you idn't even pay attention to what he was trying to tell you Peregrine. He's pointing out to you that I dont really HAVE but Two armored hulls in that list, and one of them doesn't even start on the board.

So you can take all the bristling Lascannons you want to against me. I'm fine with that. After you kill the ONE hull that matters, all those points are wasted. But sure. you'll kill it and I'll try to look concerned when it happens. Deal?

 Jancoran wrote:
He's pointing out to you that I dont really HAVE but Two armored hulls in that list, and one of them doesn't even start on the board.

Sigh. Try reading the post again. Lascannons are good at killing vehicles, but they're also good at killing battlesuits. To ignore lascannons with Tau you have to remove all of your vehicles AND all of your battlesuits, which leaves you with a crippled army.

Try reading again. He's telling you I dont have any Crisis teams in the force Im talking about.

Dude. Seriouly. Your knee jerk posting without understanding what you're posting on is really... annoying.

 Jancoran wrote:
Try reading again. He's telling you I dont have any Crisis teams in the force Im talking about.

And I'm saying it's not just crisis suits. Lascannons kill Broadsides and Riptides just fine, along with all Tau vehicles. If you have a list that can ignore lascannons then your list sucks.

It sucks when you do get hit by it but we at least benefit from cover while denying the enemies.

You realistically shouldn't have suits tanks or most anything in the open anyway.

Jancoran, im curious as to what your list is. sounds like heavy infantry foot spam

First, im gonna say is anyone who thinks tau need markerlights to shoot effectively are pretty much fully slowed.(and ive seen a lot of them in this post.)

Markerlights in the old codex costed too much to be effective. you literally lost shooting efficiency 9 times out of 10 because you needed to use full squads of pathfinders with an overpriced devilfish, and then you had limited effective targets due to range/mobility limitations as well as some armys just not having any big juicy units to dump ammo into.

Im happy about the pathfinder buff but im dissapinted with the shield drone, stealthsuit and broadside nerfs. The firepower around the rest of the dex has gone wayyy wayyyyy up however, and we have the ability to spam out intercept units like nobody's business.

Overall the dex got stronger but I feel like the entire playstyle of the army has been overhauled and Its going to take a lot of time, effort and money to figure out how to make it work all over again. I am a little dissapointed because I finally felt that i had 6th edition tau down to a science.

 Jancoran wrote:
Try reading again. He's telling you I dont have any Crisis teams in the force Im talking about.

Dude. Seriouly. Your knee jerk posting without understanding what you're posting on is really... annoying.

What is your list? That'll solve this circle jerk of "lol lascannons can't hurt me" and "yes they can" by actually showing what it can or cannot hurt.

There's a lot of stress being shed over Lascannons (and anything else str8 and greater) being able to murder suits, but that's been the way that the Tau have died since 4E when I started. The situation you're describing (Where tons lascannons are on the field shooting you) straight up never happens, and if something like it does, then you've got an option to alter your deployment pre-game when you see what they're bringing.

The battlesuit unit that falls to heavy lascannon fire is one that didn't bring enough drones to eat shots for them, or failed to return to cover. In either of those situations you're going to die. period. I've played TONS of marine lists, and with exception to the GK when they've got 15 models on the table at 2000 points, it's really not difficult to bring marines down. Honestly it's your greatest hope that they just deploy so they're sitting in the back of the field. Then it's on them to outshoot you, rather than taking advantage of your weakness in close combat and dropping things in a foot away.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
Try reading again. He's telling you I dont have any Crisis teams in the force Im talking about.

If you have a list that can ignore lascannons then your list sucks.

I especially liked this part of your comment.

If you could post that one more time, I'd appreciate it. It gives me something I can hand to my opponent before we get started to inform them of the easy time they are about to have.

 Jancoran wrote:
I especially liked this part of your comment.

If you could post that one more time, I'd appreciate it. It gives me something I can hand to my opponent before we get started to inform them of the easy time they are about to have.

Sigh. So when are you going to post your lascannon-ignoring list that is so awesome?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Anbutou wrote:
I've played TONS of marine lists, and with exception to the GK when they've got 15 models on the table at 2000 points, it's really not difficult to bring marines down.

The game is not just Tau vs. MEQs. Marines might not be able to bring LC spam, but IG certainly will, along with a lot of other things that battlesuits fear. And many of those things will be protected by dozens of meatshields you have to kill before you can even try to wound the real guns.

IG has always been our direct counter. When did this suddenly change? The ability to field massive amounts of units on one heavy gun, or drop multitudes of pie plates overhead pretty much ends our games before they begin. How was this supposed to be different? Confer automatic invulnerable saves to every unit that we own and reallocate to a t6 across the board? You're in for a hard fight when you face a competent Guard player, that doesn't change no matter what list you're running.

Do you really think SM smiles when they see a well built guard list deploy across from them? We've got one of the most variable, most adaptable armies in the game, we can build a list pretty much ENTIRELY out of deep-strike eligible models, we can avoid killing grounds like no ones business. IG is just one of those battles that's nearly over before it begins. You take this into account when facing them.

 Blaggard wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
Try reading again. He's telling you I dont have any Crisis teams in the force Im talking about.

Dude. Seriouly. Your knee jerk posting without understanding what you're posting on is really... annoying.

What is your list? That'll solve this circle jerk of "lol lascannons can't hurt me" and "yes they can" by actually showing what it can or cannot hurt.

You have to understand that I have explained this to Peregrine IN PARTICULAR, ad nauseum. I have explained to him how to win sans Crisis Suits and so on, haverefferred him on to the blog which has ample m,aterial on this subject, and NOT just on one occassion. He has rejected and rebuffed it every time. So putting up a list wont solve his lack of imagination. He'll just tell me how "sucky" it is. And that's different from now...how? Lol. Big circle. I'll just let it rest I think.

To wade into this mess, he has a point. I 100% believe that you can build a list that doesn't have crisis suits. But a list that "ignores" lascannons?

Besides, the example of 9 vendettas is a bad one. They are unmanageable for most lists at 4-5, and that leaves tons of points for more IG killy death.

 Jancoran wrote:
I have explained to him how to win sans Crisis Suits and so on

Again with the same "no crisis suits" strawman. Please stop ignoring the fact that lascannons also efficiently kill all Tau vehicles as well as Broadsides and Riptides, therefore any "lascannon proof" list would have to remove all of those as well.

haverefferred him on to the blog which has ample m,aterial on this subject, and NOT just on one occassion.

What, your blog saying "rail rifle Pathfinders are good"? That's well short of making an entire list.

Oh, and your blog that you have referred me to contains exactly one new-Tau army list (in the battle report), and that list contains crisis suits, Riptides and multiple vehicles. So no, you haven't done anything to explain how your lascannon-proof list is supposed to work.

He'll just tell me how "sucky" it is.

So you admit that it's a bad list and you're refusing to post it because then everyone will see how weak your argument is?

Martel732 wrote:
To wade into this mess, he has a point. I 100% believe that you can build a list that doesn't have crisis suits. But a list that "ignores" lascannons?

Besides, the example of 9 vendettas is a bad one. They are unmanageable for most lists at 4-5, and that leaves tons of points for more IG killy death.

I dont know what "unmanageable" means. My opponent managed his Vindettas just fine!

I've been playing without Crisis teams for years. I have a lot more reason to play with them now than I used to and i did test them out recently in a test list, which wasn't a tourney list. If peregrine had actually read more than a sentence on the blog he'd have known that.

Having said that, the Lascannon is just a really expensive single shot. Against an army with 117 models, the Lascannon is not causing me much angst. I am far more concerned with Artillery, Lootas and the like. High volume is the way to go against it, not Lascannons.

i dont get the markerlight hate. in the old codex, markerlights could be used to boost BS if you needed it, and generally you would have 3-6 markers a turn. the REAL benefit was to remove cover and make LD checks impossible.

as far as i know thats still available, but in infinitie more abundance. markers everywhere for cheaper, and its not 1 marker per effect anymore, so its much better. remember when a single marker hit reduced cover by 1? now its 2 to just flat out ignore it.

tau have ALWAYS been a "team style" army. every unit had to work together with others to be effective, individually they sucked, but when comboed in with other units, suddenly tey got wicked powerful. the same seems true in the new book. by themselves unit stink.... but the theme of getting your units to work together for victory is very obvious. the book is full of units that are force multipliers, and if you can use those well, you will win without an issue.

but i guess since the tau didnt get BS 6 t5 2++ guys as 15pt troop options, and str 10 ap 1 on everything that means they suck.... h8rs gun h8 huh,

My question is, WHY DONT PATHFINDERS HAVE INFILTRATE?!?!?!? lol it just fits them sooo much that I feel its a typo that they dont have it.

Wolfnid420 wrote:
My question is, WHY DONT PATHFINDERS HAVE INFILTRATE?!?!?!? lol it just fits them sooo much that I feel its a typo that they dont have it.

I would have been more interested in Stealth and/or Moves Through Cover with them to be honest.

Wolfnid420 wrote:
My question is, WHY DONT PATHFINDERS HAVE INFILTRATE?!?!?!? lol it just fits them sooo much that I feel its a typo that they dont have it.

They effectively have infiltrate if you think about it.

@Jancoran

Why do i have a feeling those you are arguing with have the notion that losting a unit in a wargame is the end of the game?

I mean, if you play GK with like 15 models on the table i can understand how a single loss can be devestating, but against your list that i presume have like 50 troops and still enough points for a tank and some pathfinders, then yes a lascannon shot is your least worry as the cannon might poke at a tank, but after the tank is dead it only cause 1 wound at max against a troop. And suits only have 2 wounds anyway, so getting one insta-gib`d is not that grand of a loss. ( Try Tyranid warriors with 3 wounds, now thats bad )

Dracoknight wrote:
Why do i have a feeling those you are arguing with have the notion that losting a unit in a wargame is the end of the game?

It isn't the end of the game, but that doesn't mean you can just ignore losses. Tau aren't IG, we win by bringing powerful (and expensive) elite infantry, not by having a giant horde of redundant heavy weapons. Each unit removed is a significant drop in firepower and therefore a significant drop in our chances of winning. If we throw them away recklessly (for example, by pretending that Vendettas and Helldrakes are harmless) it's very easy to get to a point where you just can't kill the enemy fast enough and your remaining troops get wiped off the table.

the cannon might poke at a tank, but after the tank is dead it only cause 1 wound at max against a troop.

Which is only a problem if you're playing an army that has nothing but lascannons. If, instead, you also brought plenty of anti-infantry weapons then having your anti-tank weapons become less effective once they've killed everything is far from crippling. And of course if you've reduced a Tau army to Fire Warriors and Kroot you've probably won the game.

And suits only have 2 wounds anyway, so getting one insta-gib`d is not that grand of a loss.

It's a huge loss. Instant death against Tau potentially doubles the incoming firepower, usually without allowing any armor saves. The combination of those two things negates the durability advantage crisis suits are supposed to have and tends to result in entire units being removed from the table.

The point is the crisis suits normally isnt without protection, be it shield drones, shield themselves, or the iriduim suit for tanking, and with the JSJ that crisis suits and their drones can do they can easily get their cover against a Lascannon.

Tho they can still hit but there is always ways of luring away cannons, and Jancoran here prolly have a tank for bait for your lascannons.

Its all up to tactics, and in a game of dice, even the best save cant help you, but it doesnt stop you from using them. ( Oh no my 2+/3++/FNP Riptip CAN roll 1s, better not take it to be sure! )

Don't think any army will ignore lascannons, unless its a primary infantry army. But at the same time, few armies are able to bring so many lascannons either. IG is probably the only one that comes to mind that can bring . The typical MEQ army usually doesn't have that many lascannons.

You can have drones in front of your suits to take the initial hits. Hopefully by the time he gets through the drones, you would have taken out his lascannons. Drones are 12 points a pop, and can benefit from cover. If they are shield dronesthey even have a 4+ invulnerable save. So, well worth it for absorbing a lascannon hit.

Dracoknight wrote:
The point is the crisis suits normally isnt without protection, be it shield drones, shield themselves, or the iriduim suit for tanking, and with the JSJ that crisis suits and their drones can do they can easily get their cover against a Lascannon.

Yes, you still have defenses, but those are limited. Cover is often only a 5+, shield drones and shield generators are expensive (especially now that shield drones lost their controller's armor save and are the same price as gun/marker drones), and iridium armor is one per army. Lascannons don't automatically remove entire crisis suit/Broadside units, but they are a huge threat to them.

Tho they can still hit but there is always ways of luring away cannons, and Jancoran here prolly have a tank for bait for your lascannons.

Sure, but Jancoran's initial argument was that lascannons (and Vendettas) are weak against Tau because Tau have no targets for them. Bringing tanks to be a target for lascannons kind of contradicts that plan.

Its all up to tactics, and in a game of dice, even the best save cant help you, but it doesnt stop you from using them. ( Oh no my 2+/3++/FNP Riptip CAN roll 1s, better not take it to be sure! )

That's a ridiculous strawman. You don't have to pretend that saves are worthless to acknowledge that some weapons are way better at killing certain target types than other weapons. Nor does acknowledging the fact that Tau have units that are vulnerable to lascannons mean that you should remove all of those units from your list.

(In fact I already clearly stated that a Tau list without those units sucks.)

I think you are mad because your army has weaknesses. Every army, new or old, has weaknesses. Yours is the lack of mobile scoring. Mine is the lack of resilient scoring. A space marine's is AP3, a terminator army's is ap2

The trick is to use your strength's to counterbalance your weaknesses. You have long range firepower, therefore you should aim to take out the enemies anti-tank with it, to ensure you can get a devilfish in the back lines. Or, use kroot. Or vespids.

You said you have no jump infantry, what you kind of meant was "I don't like vespids"

 Peregrine wrote:

Its all up to tactics, and in a game of dice, even the best save cant help you, but it doesnt stop you from using them. ( Oh no my 2+/3++/FNP Riptip CAN roll 1s, better not take it to be sure! )

That's a ridiculous strawman. You don't have to pretend that saves are worthless to acknowledge that some weapons are way better at killing certain target types than other weapons. Nor does acknowledging the fact that Tau have units that are vulnerable to lascannons mean that you should remove all of those units from your list.

(In fact I already clearly stated that a Tau list without those units sucks.)

Not a strawman, a extreme example of your arguments.

So far you just ignored the point that a Tau army most likely manage to destroy these types of weapons during their first rounds of shooting, so "ignoring them" is not really a option if your units are weak to it.

Tau have the Range, they have the Markerlights and they have hit`n run shooting ( JSJ ) that can poke at these anti-tank weaponry if they so desire, but as you said the lascannons are not the only weapon so its a tactical choice to go for the target that pose the most danger to your set-up.

In the case of Lascannons use LOS to your advantage, use the long range of your tanks to take them from the other side of the board.

I think he is thinking about Vendettas but doesn't want to come right out and say it. Not a lot of other stuff can bring too many lascannons unless its a vendetta squadron.

Eldenfirefly wrote:
I think he is thinking about Vendettas but doesn't want to come right out and say it. Not a lot of other stuff can bring too many lascannons unless its a vendetta squadron.

Its that flying thing isnt it?
Well in that case Tau have the best anti-air choices in the entire game currently.

Dracoknight wrote:

Eldenfirefly wrote:
I think he is thinking about Vendettas but doesn't want to come right out and say it. Not a lot of other stuff can bring too many lascannons unless its a vendetta squadron.

Its that flying thing isnt it?
Well in that case Tau have the best anti-air choices in the entire game currently.

They do, but I would doubt they would be able to deal with them effectively, a Vendetta squad coming in will get at least one Turn of Lascannon firing (unless the Tau Player takes Skyfire AND Interceptor, in which case that's a lot of points spent and 2 support slots taken up (only giving you one weapon), so it's most likely that Vendettas will be able to take suits down pretty easily, even given that JSJ won't really help as Vendettas are flyers, can move 18" and fire all 3 TL Lascannons and hence are positioned high up to see over some cover.

Tau can deal with the rest pretty easily, but Vendettas? They will be hard to take down, anything above S8 doesn't have Skyfire and Vendettas are AV12 meaning that Missile Pods probably won't penetrate, meaning that you'll need to waste a couple of units to deal with them, and that's just 1 Vendetta, let alone a squad of 3 or more squads.

 GoDz BuZzSaW wrote:
519014 5510300 null]
case that's a lot of points spent and 2 support slots taken up (only giving you one weapon),

Also Boardsides can take 1 support and Riptides can take 2 ( And if i misunderstood, all suits also have multi-trackers to boot )

 GoDz BuZzSaW wrote:
Tau can deal with the rest pretty easily, but Vendettas? They will be hard to take down, anything above S8 doesn't have Skyfire and Vendettas are AV12 meaning that Missile Pods probably won't penetrate, meaning that you'll need to waste a couple of units to deal with them, and that's just 1 Vendetta, let alone a squad of 3 or more squads.

One useful method is to have a Commander with Puretide neural engram man a Quad-Gun, giving himself Tank Hunters the turn before he has to start intercepting things. Tank Hunters means that strength 7 shots suddenly inflict a result 5/9 of the time instead of 1/3 of the time. Vendettas are very scared of this.

 Peregrine wrote:

Dracoknight wrote:
And suits only have 2 wounds anyway, so getting one insta-gib`d is not that grand of a loss.

It's a huge loss. Instant death against Tau potentially doubles the incoming firepower, usually without allowing any armor saves. The combination of those two things negates the durability advantage crisis suits are supposed to have and tends to result in entire units being removed from the table.

Where are crisis suits supposed to have insane durability. They are supposed to jump into cover and out of line of sight. They are supposed to bring heavy firepower on a very mobile platform. I dont see where they are supposed to be out in the open, providing cover for things behind them, thanking all incoming fire.

I've now had two games with Tau. I have found that theyb are still essentially the same pre-codex ... that is they suffer the same weaknesses. Talk all you like about Kroot infiltrating and claiming objectives, talk all you want about cascading markerlights. Increase in range for fusion is also good. Sure these help. But your troops still run off the table. A solid fast army capable of getting in close fast ... let us say two DPs and some hounds as an example, will ruin your backfield turn two. So yes, the new MCs are nice, we have skyfire and intercept options all over. But we lose units fast and each lost unit really decreases the efficiency of your list exponentially.

I'm not claiming doom and gloom. But those rushing to pick up a new army thinking it as good as the CSM codex or GK codex will be disappointed much like those who jumped on the DA bandwagon. They are better allies though now, which is a small caveat. Being able to take a cheap HQ ( fireblade) put him on a quad with FW, a few suicide Crisis suits ( TL- fusion and done) and broadsides or hammerhead is nice. Stand-alone? I think we have not improved that much.

At least there are ways of getting around the leadership problems that Tau have vs. before when they had none. That in itself is an improvement. Sadly, 5th edition made people lazy list builders and players as the game degenerated into spam and Flavor of the month builds. Now that the game actually has more diversity in lists, diversity in missions, etc. there is no real right answer anymore. Some combos from 5th still work well, but most have been passed up by the newer diversity that the 6th edition codexes bring.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

One useful method is to have a Commander with Puretide neural engram man a Quad-Gun, giving himself Tank Hunters the turn before he has to start intercepting things. Tank Hunters means that strength 7 shots suddenly inflict a result 5/9 of the time instead of 1/3 of the time. Vendettas are very scared of this.

Agreed.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Where are crisis suits supposed to have insane durability. They are supposed to jump into cover and out of line of sight. They are supposed to bring heavy firepower on a very mobile platform. I dont see where they are supposed to be out in the open, providing cover for things behind them, thanking all incoming fire.

Yeah, I don't get it either. Other than going down in cost and built in wargear that you previously had to pay for...nothing has changed in the way Crisis teams functioned. Same with their durability. The upside now is that when they die, they didn't cost you an arm and a leg.

It sounds like having HQs that provide area benefits is an upgrade from the old codex. The new list has a lot more skyfire. I don't see how anyone can claim the new codex is not a significant improvement. Are the Tau Necron good? No. But they won't be listed as one of the bottom armies anymore I think.

 Peregrine wrote:

...we win by bringing powerful (and expensive) elite infantry, not by having a giant horde of redundant heavy weapons. .

This is the problem with Peregrine. Someone got a bunch of cliches about Tau in his head at some point and he bought them hook line and sinker.

Anyone else reading would UNDERSTAND intuitively that regardless of the name on the Codex, if you bring 117 of anything (I forgot to count two hounds, so its really 117), you're going to stop caring about most flyers in the game and CERTAINLY the Lascannons will be no more than minor annoyances..

The Dark Angels flyer is the one I probably wouldn't like to see, but no one takes it anyways (odd that). Still, that would be one that would be more frightening to Tau. And if you recall, we started down this road when I said that I was not as concerned about flyers because I can spread and ablate their effectiveness with my numbers and three Lascannons off a Vindetta would not worry me.


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Dracoknight wrote:
@Jancoran

Why do i have a feeling those you are arguing with have the notion that losting a unit in a wargame is the end of the game?

I mean, if you play GK with like 15 models on the table i can understand how a single loss can be devestating, but against your list that i presume have like 50 troops and still enough points for a tank and some pathfinders, then yes a lascannon shot is your least worry as the cannon might poke at a tank, but after the tank is dead it only cause 1 wound at max against a troop. And suits only have 2 wounds anyway, so getting one insta-gib`d is not that grand of a loss. ( Try Tyranid warriors with 3 wounds, now thats bad )

I know. I know... Exactly! I know...

Just post the list already. Don't think of it as defying Peregrine but educating the rest of us as to why lascannons aren't scary to tau.

 Blaggard wrote:
Just post the list already. Don't think of it as defying Peregrine but educating the rest of us as to why lascannons aren't scary to tau.

+1 here. I'm curious because I've never played Tau before and often face IG, so having this list in my pocket would be nice.

I'm not defying Peregrine. This is a Tactics thread, not a List thread and I am avoiding turning it into that. I dont want it to become about critiquing the list. Theres plenty of places to do THAT.

My point was simple and straightforward: 117 models makes lascannons effectively non issues. I think the point was made, I think its accurate and I think that is enough of that subject. Maybe I'll post the list in a list THREAD after i have more games with it so i can provide Batreps and the like to help. As it is, I post it now and we totally derail from the point with no real value being added to a tactical point.

"117 models makes lascannons effectively non issues."

Not necessarily true. It depends on whether 15 of those 117 are good targets for lascannons. The lascannons don't exist in a vacuum either. Last time I checked, IG have all kinds of nasty templates to deal with the other 102 models.

 Jancoran wrote:
I'm not defying Peregrine. This is a Tactics thread, not a List thread and I am avoiding turning it into that. I dont want it to become about critiquing the list. Theres plenty of places to do THAT.

My point was simple and straightforward: 117 models makes lascannons effectively non issues. I think the point was made, I think its accurate and I think that is enough of that subject. Maybe I'll post the list in a list THREAD after i have more games with it so i can provide Batreps and the like to help. As it is, I post it now and we totally derail from the point with no real value being added to a tactical point.

I mostly agree with you. If you have 117 models, i'm going to assume a large number of them fall under Troops. The object of 40k, generalizing here, is to capture and defend objectives. Lascannons will not be effective vs. large numbers of troops. Now some of those 117 models may be susceptible to Lascannons, but if they aren't troops, it isn't too big of an issue.

I know a lot of players especially feel that Lascannons are a good investment. I think in the current 40k "meta" they are generally not a good place to put points. I'd much rather take Autocannons because they can put out more firepower for less cost.

In 5th edition having things such as Lascannons was better because mech was more predominant. In 6th infantry is more predominant and such weapons are very inefficient vs. cheap, expendable bodies. Even massed Marines (which obviously aren't as popular due to the Drake) have little to fear when an opponent brings Lascannons.

I take Broadside teams and still don't really fear Lascannons. I've played vs Obliterators and Vendettas and neither has really struck much fear into me. They might be effective vs my Broadsides, but they will do squat to my 60 Orks or my ~40 Tau troops.