Let me start by stating this is first and foremost an opinion, albeit an opinion that seems to be relatively common from what I have observed both locally and online.
Let’s talk about Tau. I know I know, another posting about Tau! There are hundreds of topics similar to these all over the internet scattered amongst countless blogs and forum postings. This in itself should be telling, but let me elaborate.
It is my opinion that Tau is a horrendously balanced codex in a predominantly shooty edition. There are a multitude of reasons I feel this army quite literally ruins games.
The book seems to pride itself with outright ignoring a large portion of the rulebook itself. Cover saves? Nope. Deep Striking/Outlanking? Nope. Assault? Nope. Line of Sight? Nope. Fliers? Nope. You name it, Tau has an answer for it. This is problematic in what should be a strategic game.
The actual amount of thought that has to go into a typical Tau players turn is rarely more than “what should I shoot and where”. This is rarely an issue, as they have outright ridiculous ranges and firepower that doesn’t care about cover in most cases or LOS. Rinse and repeat until turn 5 to move onto objectives.
Did they shake up the meta? Absolutely, but it a terrible way. All of the seemingly ‘reliable’ ways people mention to ‘beat Tau’ rarely progress beyond anecdotal and circumstantial evidence. This typically involves specific units and lists. Since when is ‘list tailor and know what your opponent will be playing’ an acceptable solution to a strategy game? If he brings scissors, you bring a rock!
On the topic of matchups, Tau has no bad matchups that I can honestly think of- despite this, they outright destroy other armies (Dark Eldar, Vanilla Marines to name a few examples). Some armies simply do not have answers to what Tau can do.
I could go on, but I can summarize my point as follows: If an army wipes you off the board with very little thought or effort simply because you decided to play a pickup game with a balanced all-comers list- there is a problem.
Tau and tournament players will defend this to death and say it isn’t as bad as it seems, but when all of the Tau players I personally know literally FEEL BAD to play their army, there are issues. Tau has been relegated to the win-more tournament army of this edition- it’s Gray Knights in 5th edition all over again.
Well from the perspective of my local play group, nobody can reliably deal with Tau. He quite literally blows everything we can bring off the table.
I think from a casual perspective it is more of a problem. The biggest concern I have is they are simply not fun to play against by any stretch of the imagination.
Stripping away your opponents ability to do anything by ignoring rules is frustrating- as is waiting for 30 minutes while Tau shoots you and you just pull models. So many strategies and units are rendered obsolete just by design.
It's brainless poor army balance.
IG is how shooty should be done- deadly at range, but once you close in they fall apart. Tau mitigate all of these weaknesses.
How many marker lights is your opponent bringing if they are able to strip you completely of cover most of the game.... if half their army is marker lights then hardly any damage dealing weapons are in that army.
Place adequate terrain.... and not just trees.... bring buildings.... so most things can even hit you.
It would also be very helpful to see your army list and his army list, that way we can see how even the matchup are. If your tau player is running 3x riptides 3x pathfinder squads, 3x broadside squads and a bunch of fire warriors with an ethereal and fireblade.... then he is bring some of the most cost effective units in the codex. Alternatively if your army list (I have no idea what your army is) is something like stationary blobs of IG guardsmen with a lord comissar as HQ and a few orgryn squads.... well then.... maybe you should tell him to tone it down a bit.
If I bring 3 vespid squads and only kroot squds supported by skyrays.... I wouldn't exactly jump to conclusions and call my friends 3x helldrake spam list OP.
Generally two Pathfinder Squads, Skyrays, or the Markerlight Commander shenanigans.
It's not just Marerklights- any SMS he can bring/spam is also part of the issue. My point is that he will have enough to deal with the things that rely on cover, typically, before I can deal with it.
I can't outshoot him, either- I also find Tau vehicles to be hilariously tough to kill. I remember when melta was an acceptable way to deal with the tough Tau skimmers. Not anymore.. you get a 4+ at 1" away. This also assumes your dropping/teleporting melta lives to even shoot because of Riptides blowing you up as soon as you appear.
The typical response from most Tau players is to 'kill the markerlights' argument. Ok, fine. I will relegate all of my firepower to attempt to kill it, meanwhile the entire Tau army is shooting at me and weakening my ability to kill things at range every turn. It just isn't reliable. Even if you do kill the markerlights, it's not like Tau is terrible without them. They still have deadly shooting, especially if they roll well.
XenosTerminus wrote: The typical response from most Tau players is to 'kill the markerlights' argument. Ok, fine. I will relegate all of my firepower to attempt to kill it, meanwhile the entire Tau army is shooting at me and weakening my ability to kill things at range every turn. It just isn't reliable. Even if you do kill the markerlights, it's not like Tau is terrible without them. They still have deadly shooting, especially if they roll well.
No don't target markerlights..... that is the worst thing you can do. It will take you two turns to kill all of them. So maybe turn 3 you will be ML free but then you have 2 turns of his full strength army shooting at whatever is left of yours. Kill his heavy hitters first and the game will end with him just shuffling around his pathfinders (who have nothing left to support).
Use some throw away units to rush the Tau in CC (oh know supporting fire) - if you do multiple assaults then supporting fire doesn't really matter anymore as you can only overwatch once per unit. I've had my crisis suits tied up for a turn or 2 by some barebone guard squad who took the initiative to rush in.
Did they shake up the meta? Absolutely, but it a terrible way. All of the seemingly ‘reliable’ ways people mention to ‘beat Tau’ rarely progress beyond anecdotal and circumstantial evidence.
Losing the auto-win button against Tau hasn't shaken up the meta, as tournaments show.
Mentioning what army anyone brings against random Tau opponents is largely irrelevant, because that really proves a point I mentioned earlier. If you cannot bring a balanced all-comers list against Tau (not even against optimized Tau) without having a realistic chance of winning, bar your opponent being inept or rolling like crap- there are balance issues.
Other books have bad matchups, and you will run into situations where you may not have specific things to deal with specific things your opponent brings. That is not the point. The issue is Tau's ability to ignore or shut down entire strategies just based on their army abilities.
How, by any stretch of the imagination, is this the least bit enjoyable to ANYONE playing this game? Is preventing your opponent from doing anything or using specific units/strategies against you enjoyable? Do you enjoy just sitting around shooting without really moving (other than JSJ/late game)? Do your friends play largely melee based armies that have already suffered from 6th editions outright boner for the shooting phase?
Tau is the army for you. But don't expect to make/maintain a lot of friends in a casual setting, ESPECIALLY if your other buddies play for fun and just bring whatever models they have/like.
Tau shats on Beer and Pretzel games, which is ironic since GW has turned this editions focus on that.
Seems like a lot of crying from people whose army could go melee in editions that were before . I play IG and have no problems with tau. They are a very efficient and cool codex which unlike my own isn't based around a 40-50pts undercosted flyer . As bad match ups go . Sure tau have problems with melee ,but melee isn't as easy as it was in editions before this one . Which in the end brings it down to the one rule that is true to all games created by man . If you want to have fun don't start something that only works when others let you , take something that works always and doesn't realy care what the opponent is doing .
I'll be completely honest, I play Tau and I kind of agree with you. I hate it how my friends don't really want to play with me anymore now the new codex drops. That said, once 7th edition drops and close combat is back on top (like its been ever since the game was created) and our codex sucks again I'm going to be interested in the Tau player's reactions.
Dunno. Tau ("A supposedly shooty army") doesn't pwn the shooty game in this shooty edition of 40K half as much as Space Wolves ("A supposedly choppy army") pwn the shooty game in the choppy edition.
dementedwombat wrote: and close combat is back on top (like its been ever since the game was created)
Not really. Virus and Vortex Grenades and Overwatch were on top in 2nd(unless you house ruled limits on them).
Heh, I jumped in with 3rd edition and assumed things were relatively the same throughout the game's life. My apologies for the inaccurate statement. I have certainly heard stories about the dreaded virus grenade, although I've never used it and don't exactly know what it does myself.
Tau just have a little cheese with them for now. I don't mind going against tau, i've won against them and lost against them but every army list and situation changes things so much. The only thing i really try to avoid with my nids is that large blast str 8 shot from the rip tides, if i can avoid those i do alright.
I habe already seen two riptides get engaged in close combat, and suffer because they are not immune to instant death. so it muat not be that hard to get there...
Sure, the Tau can do a lot of things. What people seem to ignore is that they can't do them all at once. They too must use an army list and pick units at certain points cost to fill it. They're not bringing all the HQs, all the units and all the upgrades.
They too have to use target priority against you, so if you let them kill your deathstar for free you have messed up.
I'm against this argument, and I have an explanation.
while I agree that Tau really have an effective counter to anything they will run into, they are, however, spread out across the codex. I think the Tau are like a box of precision tools - there's always a tool for a job, but do you really want to be lugging them all around with you? and, like precision tools, they are far from cheap. I have written a lot of Tau lists for my friends, and my god are some of the options expensive! save for Space Marines, Fire Warriors are some of the most expensive standard troops in the game, and T3 and a save of 4+ is rather average for 10 points. Riptide? Fortune and a excellent bullet magnet while you empty your points wallet. Battlesuits? a single plasma gun can make a Tau player panic - and rightly. Our dear friend markerlights? Think about what extra firepower you could take instead! And if you really think you can combine every tool the Tau have to make an unstoppable list, then its a recipe for disaster. All your separate elements will be so easy to deal with because you simply don't have enough models on the tabletop to pull through.
that's just from personal experience - I haven't been frightened of the Tau - I know their weaknesses. Some units make me jump, but I know that there will be loopholes in the list (like with any army), and if he has been stupid enough to take a pic 'n mix bag of Tau units, then that just makes the hole even bigger.
I am aware Tau have weaknesses, and I never stated they were unbeatable.
The root of my argument has always been that it is poor design to have an army with specific weaknesses but a toolbox, as you stated, to deal with these weaknesses.
Playing against Tau, then, is very much Rock Paper Scissors. Can they take every tool for the job? No, of course not. They can, however, take a lot.. and if you happen to bring a generalist army (like I mentioned- I never analyze an army in a vacuum where they can be beaten with very specific situations) you are likely not going to win. They are just far too capable in this edition of dealing with the majority of threats most non-competitive lists can dish out.
Furthermore, my main point is more concentrated on the fact it is not fun to play against them. What makes 40k interesting is seeing a variety of units and actually moving, shooting AND assaulting. Tau doesn't typically care about most of these things, nor will they let their opponent capitalize on them. That is the issue.
Taking away an opponents ability to do things, or allowing your units to literally tool themselves out to deal with pretty much anything (yes I am aware spare marines can do this- the difference is they are average at it, not excel at it like Tau) is lazy design, and swung the balance pendulum far too much for a book that did in fact need an update badly.
Surely you can't disagree that from a 6e codex perspective Tau is undeniably the best. The other books have largely been considered 'meh' by most people (Dark Angels is laughable- but that's tradition).
Tau are a lot more manageable when you take out their markerlights. It's not the obvious thing to do, prioritising that small unit of pathfinders, when there's numerous battlesuits of various sizes on the other side of the table, but it helps. When I play Tau, I ask my opponent to point out every single one of his markerlights. I then destroy them.
While Tau are certainly a very strong army, I wouldn't call them OP. I think the reason why a lot of people don't playing Tau isn't because they're OP it's because, well, people don't like playing them. They're not a fun army to play. Many Tau players sit at the back, often behind an ADL, and shoot, shoot, shoot. Necrons are at least as good as Tau, but with Necrons you have a lot more threat variety. You've got the normal troops, flyers, large vehicles, tough characters etc. Playing Tau is just not as fun. And because people tend not to enjoy their games with Tau, particularly if they end up losing them, people start to point the cheese finger.
gossipmeng wrote: Meh, people have no problems against my Tau. I also don't see Tau winning tournaments... necrons are still on top.
I really think people are just taking an opportunity to place some of the blame off their own codices OP units and place it on the new FotM.
Tau won Astronomicon Toronto (crushed everyone in Battle Scores and placed Overall.)
For Conquest Toronto Tau placed first Overall and were 3 of the top 5 armies for the weekend.
They also finished first in the Singles event, and were also 3 of the 5 top armies in Singles (and one of the two remaining armies had heavy Tau allies.)
Surely you can't disagree that from a 6e codex perspective Tau is undeniably the best. The other books have largely been considered 'meh' by most people (Dark Angels is laughable- but that's tradition).
Hmm?
Daemons and Eldar "meh"? Dont agree whatsoever.
CSM has very good strenghts, just not an overall "killer" build and simply strange in other respects.
DAs get a whole lot of hating (a lot from netlisters) but have some absolutely amazing options. Sure, monobuild, they might not be top tier but throw some allies in and....
Dont believe everything you read on the net. Bandwagoning gone wild imho.
Mash the above Codicies with Allies and "what exactly is weak now?" Nada.
I don't think a book can be considered good just because of allies- that's not the book standing on it's own- I am of the opinion that Allies is a mess anyway. Cool concept- terrible execution (the same argument I make with Tau- mitigating weaknesses and combining things for combos that are not necessarily intended from a design perspective).
I think I am beating a dead horse here. I have gotten some legitimate people claim they agree that they aren't a fun army to play/against, which was my main point.
As suspected, lots of people are coming in here stating they don't think they are OP, how to beat them, suggestions on how to beat them, etc...
I wouldn't care IF I consistently beat Tau- I wouldn't enjoy those games either. Tau have never been terribly popular by most people (get anime mecha out of my 40k)- but they have officially created THE most boring auto pilot black/white army since, well... ever.
XenosTerminus wrote: I don't think a book can be considered good just because of allies- that's not the book standing on it's own- I am of the opinion that Allies is a mess anyway. Cool concept- terrible execution (the same argument I make with Tau- mitigating weaknesses and combining things for combos that are not necessarily intended from a design perspective).
I think I am beating a dead horse here. I have gotten some legitimate people claim they agree that they aren't a fun army to play/against, which was my main point.
As suspected, lots of people are coming in here stating they don't think they are OP, how to beat them, suggestions on how to beat them, etc...
I wouldn't care IF I consistently beat Tau- I wouldn't enjoy those games either. Tau have never been terribly popular by most people (get anime mecha out of my 40k)- but they have officially created THE most boring auto pilot black/white army since, well... ever.
Are you playing a person with a WAAC list? mid to high probability.
Yes tau are great atm but we are only 5 codices (and 2 supplements) into 6th ed. once we get half of the armies into 6th ed lets come back to this topic and discuss it further.
agreed that some Tau players are downright boring, but you should just stop playing them if they are using a gunline - they will realise your gesture soon enough. Both of the other players in my tiny club are Tau players, and both of them really hate the idea of a gunline, stressing "that's not the way to play the game"
these are the proper Tau players.
and if we are having a conversation about gunlines, then the IG do a much better job of that for the sad player. battalions of cheap russes surrounded by cheap infantry to prevent assaults are far better than any Tau gunline I've seen. And don't get me started on vendettas in beehive like swarms....
what I am trying to say is that other armies can be as OP as the Tau at points, but good players realise that playing lists like this are not fun for them or their opponent. the Tau players who realise this are good players, and all the others should be left behind. problem solved for any apparent "OP codex" that's in the works - refuse to play those who squeeze the juice out of each one. where's the fun in having a simple win? I don't understand people who walk away from a game after destroying their opponent's reasonable list with a gunline who say "that was a great game".
I can give a specific example of why Tau can be frustrating to play.
I play Dark Eldar with a Webway Portal theme. I use Harlequins to escort the haemonculi carrying them to where they will deploy them. The reason this unit is effective is due to its amazing cover save. There are some armies that can hurt it (I'm not a fan of playing against whirlwinds, lol) but nothing like Tau that flat out remove their cover save. I won't play that army against my Tau friend because it will simply be over turn one if I don't go first. Even with first turn it will be an incredible uphill battle.
I have no issue with the nerfs to assault in 6th. We have house ruled that assaults from reserve are legal, but I would still play this style without that (and most definitely lose more, but it would be a fun list).
It is frustrating to have the cool trick up my sleeve just gone. I'm an Eldar and Dark Eldar player, that's how I get my kicks. I pull shenanigans.
What I would like to discuss, how can it be fixed? Tau should be a dynamic shooting army (I think) but not auto win. Is there a simple house rule that preserves their style, but makes them more of a skillful army? Eldar can be very shooty, or very assaulty, but you must play them smartly to do well. I think easy to start, difficult to master is how it should be, rather than any entry level player stomping.
Peregrine wrote: So Tau removed "mindlessly run forward, declare charges, and win the game" as a viable 'strategy'. How exactly is this a bad thing?
Because according to the OP (and I don't agree with him mind you) Tau have replaced that with "pick a target, light its ass up with markerlights, shoot it to hell, win" as a viable strategy.
There are some bad matchups, but those seem more the fault of terrible game design (6th ed power creep, introducing rules which negate BRB rules, only to have codizes which rely on those introduce their own variants which aren't affected and so on).
Are Tau frustrating to play against? OH feth YES! As a army which puts out a lot of pain at long ranges, I constantly find myself cursing for the first one or two rounds, but after that things tend to even out.
Are there some dubious choices? Probably. I know at least a few rules which I'd have made differently (e.g. reducing cover vs ignoring cover) but none are that bad that I wouldn't play against them with most armies (GK without plasma-syphon might be the exception xD).
I love the new Tau codex. For the first time, we have a codex where you can point to almost anything and it's still good. In fact, it's what every codex SHOULD be like - with the slight misstep of some HQs and Vespids, you can build a list around almost any unit and it'll work. Are they boring to play against? Meh, I don't really think so. Immobile gun lines aren't the most fun but I still enjoy seeing them and playing around them because it's at least a fairly unique play style rarely seen outside of apocalypse IG. Notably, Tau have put a big dent in lists like Wraithwing and 2 IG blobs - they still work, but that's a very tough match up. Dark Eldar I don't feel stack up well enough in 6e. They're perfectly fine in most games, but in tournament play the low AV and squishy troops really hurt. Not to mention with the introduction of invisibility, 2++'s became not only possible but not even uncommon - Tau stop this. On top of all this, they also neuter flyer spam as Necron flyer spam VS Riptide/Broadside spam is a total joke match up. Really, they are just all around strong and kill a lot of annoying lists. In what way is this bad? Because they introduce a firing line list? Meh, I'd rather that than the alternatives.
So Tau removed "mindlessly run forward, declare charges, and win the game" as a viable 'strategy'. How exactly is this a bad thing?
Ghawhaar wrote: I play Dark Eldar with a Webway Portal theme. I use Harlequins to escort the haemonculi carrying them to where they will deploy them. The reason this unit is effective is due to its amazing cover save. There are some armies that can hurt it (I'm not a fan of playing against whirlwinds, lol) but nothing like Tau that flat out remove their cover save. I won't play that army against my Tau friend because it will simply be over turn one if I don't go first. Even with first turn it will be an incredible uphill battle.
So do you refuse to play against IG as well? Because the Colossus and Hellhound were shutting down that plan long before the Tau arrived.
Also, "my army doesn't work as well and now I have to change my strategy" is part of the game. Change happens, you have to adapt to it instead of demanding that everyone else have their army house-ruled away so you can keep using the same list forever.
Is there a simple house rule that preserves their style, but makes them more of a skillful army?
No, because they don't need to be fixed, especially since I have yet to see an explanation of what a "skillful" army is.
I don't mind them with my crons. They gave me a reason to pop a monolith down again after all! Railgun hammerheads are the only consistent way they can deal with one, and I don't see them being taken often.
Misslesides are the one thing I hate most in their dex. S7, tons of shots, and lots of ways for them to hit on 2s is silly. I'd be cool with them if they didn't also have range to hit most of the board. They are effective vs just about everything that isn't AV14, and they don't cost that much. They mulch hordes and meqs alike with the pure number of hits, which is almost the exact same as the number of wounds since it wounds everything but MCs and nurgle bikers on 2s. They are even strong vs fliers without having to buy skyfire, just because how many shots they throw at them. They just do too much for what they cost, and their only weakness (melee) is viewed as weak this edition, so many armies only take 1-2 units of strong melee, which can just be picked off.
I have had tao players say they wish they were playing another army in our league, because they are boring. They mostly run gunline lists with at least 1 (sometimes 2) riptides. I have only lost to one of these guys, and that was right after the dex came out, so I didn't know about misslesides yet. They are far from unbeatable, but I agree the games get boring fairly quick.
gossipmeng wrote: Meh, people have no problems against my Tau. I also don't see Tau winning tournaments... necrons are still on top.
I really think people are just taking an opportunity to place some of the blame off their own codices OP units and place it on the new FotM.
Tau won Astronomicon Toronto (crushed everyone in Battle Scores and placed Overall.)
For Conquest Toronto Tau placed first Overall and were 3 of the top 5 armies for the weekend.
They also finished first in the Singles event, and were also 3 of the 5 top armies in Singles (and one of the two remaining armies had heavy Tau allies.)
This,
In a game were it costs well over a thousand dollars in money alone not counting painting/hobby time to field a tournament size army with options its going to take many months more for the "flavor of the month: to finally take hold..but yes we are seeing it alreadyt.I know of at least two groups in my local area were at least half the players have switched to Tau in preparation for upcoming fall GT`s and Tourneys....By design GW is making a killing off this one dex update alone..
Peregrine wrote: No, because they don't need to be fixed, especially since I have yet to see an explanation of what a "skillful" army is.
You're not going to get a perfect description. But something that just sits back and shoots the bejesus out of the enemy certainly doesn't fit it. I guess there's a bit of tactics in terms of what to markerlight and when, and perhaps seeing if there's anything in the enemy army you need to obliterate first.
Something like Eldar is a lot more "skilful". Movement and placement are far more crucial as well as having each unit having a very specific job which it really has to succeed in. If you fail in too many of those jobs, you'll lose. Similarly, you also have to adapt a lot more. Taking Fire Dragons is great if your opponent takes Land Raiders/Monoliths etc, but trying to find use for those Fire Dragons against an Ork Horde is trickier.
I'm not saying Eldar, or any other army, is "skilful", it's just that Tau are one of the easier armies in 40k to use.
To OP like others have said the tau are a balanced codex and to me beating the tau is all about destroying their synergy once that is gone its down hill for the tau after that. My brother plays heavy MC tyranids list with the Doom of M(whatever you call it, I hate that thing it hurts so much, but it always fun to have to figure out how to beat something like that) that list is hard to go to up against and my tau army lists are mech heavy with volume of fire in mind (I also don't just sit there, no fun if I do, also not smart thing to sit there against that list). He destroyed my synergy at turn two and I couldn't do enough damage to hope to make a come back so it was down hill bad after that.
Tau aren't unbeatable by any stretch, but anyone who denies that they are a bit too powerful is kidding themselves. As the OP mentioned, Tau are a bit OTT because of their ability to easily circumvent some of the game's important rules, such as not being able to move and shoot accurately with heavy weapons, flyers being extremely difficult to destroy, etc.
That being said, the game is what it is. Rather than sit here and complain about the state of the codex, you ought to spend more time figuring out how to counter it. If you know that many players in your region are switching to Tau, then you are not tailoring by focusing on that match-up. I build my lists in accordance to what I expect to be facing in general (currently that is Tau, Eldar, Daemons and Necrons). Complaining literally does nothing. GW will not nerfbat Tau for you, TOs will not ban the codex or units.
Every codex in the game has options that can help you deal with Tau. You'll need to build a well-rounded list that can deal with high AV/MC's and Xenos infantry. This can be done by every army in the game (obviously to varying degrees of success). You may have to outplay your opponents due to them fielding more inherently powerful unit options, but so be it. I find challenging armies and lists to be an opportunity to test myself and improve my skill at the game. You should do the same, it's far more constructive than ranting on the internet.
Peregrine wrote: So Tau removed "mindlessly run forward, declare charges, and win the game" as a viable 'strategy'. How exactly is this a bad thing?
For once i agree with Peregrine without raising an eyebrow or something at part of his post.
Tau are just FOTM right now and as peregine said counter the blindly charge tactic most players use. Know what? My tau still cant beat my BA friend despite being "all powerful" because this guy knows wtf he is doing (never beaten him unless he was completely screwing around). And my other friends are 50-50 with me.
The fact that theres suddenly a bunch of BRB rules being questioned because they affect tau the most (but the problem existed beforehand, yet never discussed) and tau being the FOTM proves its just people not used to dealing with them.
Tau don' seem so op to me, a C:SM player, having been one first blooded predator tank short of beating a decent Tau list.
I knew what i was doing, and crafted a 1500 point TAC list that could maybe hold to Tau, thankfully it did. I played a BGNT game against one of them, and was 1 VP short of victory. He ran an ion riptide, longstrike railhead, 2 FW squads, 3 stealth suits, 1 pathfinder squad, piranha, 2 broadsides, and an etheral & suit commander. I was able keep his fire warriors off my tac marines and harrased his riptide to keep them off my troops, and melta sternguard smashed his longstrike. The only things I was disappointed in were my lascannon ST that died to fire warrior snap shots and my tri las pred that was popped by an infiltrated stealth suit melta (just in range too).
Im proud that i kept that game close, because i dictated the battle, even though i went second. He wasn't going and wiping my stuff off the board in droves like i thought he would if given free reign to move his stuff up. All that to say, Tau isn't the end all be all, I kept the Tau reacting to my efforts instead of me reacting to the tau.
The tau dex is certainly pretty good, but it isn't double or triple heldrake op (I've experienced it first hand).
I play tau. I don't see what the fuss is all about. I've been virtually tabled in turn 1 by eldar, dark Eldar, daemons, chaos. It happens.
So I'm sorry gun lines are boring are they?
Two words 'imperial guard' no-one's complains about spamming av14 vehicles with s8 ap3 blasts (or one of the other varieties).
Tau can move and do, usually away from you.
I'm sorry is it a problem I don't constantly advance with the hope of melee? (Although I do just that against some armies).
Yes the ignore cover is bad but really? 2 or 3 of your units might be affected we can only have so many markers.
Plus it not hard to go, I'm taking down that riptide (180-210 point) and concentrate fire.
Another thing that hurts us, lots of small units like combat squads.
We can't target everything. Yes they will die but everything dies.
I think players have become a little 'max out a squad to deal as much damage as possible.'
Doing small amounts of damage to lots of squads will cause morale tests. Tau have Ld of 7-9 it's not beyond reason to believe they might run off the table especially with a gun line being so close to the edge.
Also, Yes my army might be optimised (to me) but that's because i go out thinking I'm going to fight a war. Of course I want to win its only normal. That doesnt make me an arse or something. I still act in a polite and equitable way.
No one goes out with a list thinking you know what I'm gonna lose so hard tonight. I think I might throw a few games for a while because I might upset someone.
Honestly I don't want to trounce someone but the game is competitive in nature (like chess or backgammon or any game).
This is how we (tau) fight.
You tyranids like to charge into HTH You imp guard like tanks
You space marines are largely durable and can do everything.
You space marines are largely durable and can do everything.
And this is why Tau are the FOTM, they counter MEQ with little effort due to plasma spam and riptides. We have less shots than other shooty armies, without marker support our BS is weaker, but the guns we got are almost all AP2/3 with a couple exceptions so we pen armor like nobodies business
There is a difference between Tau and other armies that can ignore cover.
Tau do so by using one unit to allow every other unit to shoot and ignore the save.
Other armies have a blast or large blast that ignores cover. it still sucks, and has the chance to wipe my unit, but is not as close to a guarantee.
I do play a specific style of army, and I have changed my playstyle. I have added units that I had not used previously that have done awesomely.
It is very easy to say just pick apart the Tau synergy, but I do not play armies that can ignore cover (unless I have overlooked something?). His marker lights can go to ground and will most likely survive.
I do play an assault army which is not terribly strong in this edition. I don't mind fighting an uphill battle; that is in part why I play it. What I don't like is a hard counter. Would you expect a 5th edition Daemon player to enjoy fighting Grey Knights? That is how I feel when I play Tau with Dark Eldar, Eldar, or Grey Knights. I am a "beer and pretzels" player. It may certainly be possible to do something, but for me it is all about the experience.
You space marines are largely durable and can do everything.
And this is why Tau are the FOTM, they counter MEQ with little effort due to plasma spam and riptides. We have less shots than other shooty armies, without marker support our BS is weaker, but the guns we got are almost all AP2/3 with a couple exceptions so we pen armor like nobodies business
No army is shootier than Tau currently. I don't have the time or the willpower to do this, but I would wager that if you did the math for all units currently in the game that a Broadside with SMS and HYMP is the most efficient all-purpose shooting unit in the entire game. If a Tau player takes 9 Broadsides with some Drones (or 12 due to the ability to ally with Tau) their army will put out more shots than any other in the game.
Tau, IMO, are a rate-of-fire army.
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Ghawhaar wrote: There is a difference between Tau and other armies that can ignore cover.
Tau do so by using one unit to allow every other unit to shoot and ignore the save.
Other armies have a blast or large blast that ignores cover. it still sucks, and has the chance to wipe my unit, but is not as close to a guarantee.
I do play a specific style of army, and I have changed my playstyle. I have added units that I had not used previously that have done awesomely.
It is very easy to say just pick apart the Tau synergy, but I do not play armies that can ignore cover (unless I have overlooked something?). His marker lights can go to ground and will most likely survive.
I do play an assault army which is not terribly strong in this edition. I don't mind fighting an uphill battle; that is in part why I play it. What I don't like is a hard counter. Would you expect a 5th edition Daemon player to enjoy fighting Grey Knights? That is how I feel when I play Tau with Dark Eldar, Eldar, or Grey Knights. I am a "beer and pretzels" player. It may certainly be possible to do something, but for me it is all about the experience.
You should be playing against players of a skill level that is similar to your own or against players who want the same thing out of the game as you (beer and fun). TAC, fluffy/fun DE, Eldar and GK can all beat TAC, fluffy/fun Tau. Tau don't have a single unit that breaks the game, they have no Heldrake equivalent, for Tau it is about synergy between units, that synergy is less likely to be abused by a player who has the same mindset as you and will result in a much more enjoyable game.
Lol please don't tell me that everyone is getting all pissy about their precious marine dying a bit.
4 tactical squads in combat squads = 8 targets
This is 800 points ish.
You are moving 6" shooting 5 - 10 shots. Hitting on 3s wounding on 3s with a 3+ save.
I could take tau with Dark Angels (apparently the worst codex)
Yes some armies have issues due to age (give them a chance we've had 5 codices in only a short while)
To all dark angels this against Tau
Libby w PFG 95
Libby w PFG 95
Command squad in DP 5x flamer 160
Command squad in DP 5x flamer 160
Tactical squad (10) with melta and missile 180 ish x 4
Tau are good because of the high quantity of shooting they can put out, and that they have effective counters to everything that is good against most shooty armies. Have flyers? Easy skyfire and Interceptor kill flyers. DS in? Interceptor all over. Cover saves? Eat markerlights! Stay back? Eat 60" templates!
Every effective counter to most gunlines is less effective against Tau gunlines. Its not too hard to counter Tau, but doing so leaves you too vulnerable to other armies.
Tau aren't broken however. They're as prone to bad luck as all armies, and can be countered by quite a few current good lists, like Daemons and some Crons.
He said "quite a few" and listed a few examples. He didn't need to list all the examples and he shouldn't be expected to. Tau are good, probably the best overall codex in the game, that still doesn't make them impossible to beat. Every army in the game can beat Tau, even without extreme luck. You just have to know how the army functions and the best way to deal with that. Maybe you'll even have to outplay the opponent! How unheard of!
The point that we are attempting to make is that our armies (Black Templar, Dark Angels, Necron, Eldar, Dark Eldar, and Grey Knights) have had no success against Tau when both sides bring casual lists. These games have not been enjoyable. We hypothesize this is due to Tau fundamentally countering units, special rules, and entire play styles.
While we have certainly complained, I definitely like to hear how to remedy this situation. Saying to "outplay", reference luck, or suggest an army I do not own is not constructive.
Telling me to break their synergy doesn't help. That is quite evidently the way to beat any army. How exactly do you do it? I have been told to kill the marker lights, thereby significantly weakening the rest of the army. I have had great difficulty killing those units in the games I have played. I tend to not be able to ignore cover saves. Is there a better way to deal with them? It seems that I may be better off just ignoring them and trying to kill the rest of his stuff as quick as I can.
I ask this honestly, because such knowledge could quite possibly make fighting Tau an enjoyable couple hours.
LValx wrote: He said "quite a few" and listed a few examples. He didn't need to list all the examples and he shouldn't be expected to. Tau are good, probably the best overall codex in the game, that still doesn't make them impossible to beat. Every army in the game can beat Tau, even without extreme luck. You just have to know how the army functions and the best way to deal with that. Maybe you'll even have to outplay the opponent! How unheard of!
Tau aren't unbeatable. I tabled a TauDar player earlier today with Tyranids, its not impossible. Any build can beat any other, some just do better against Tau than others. There are very few "Hard counters" anymore, I can take any army and go toe to toe with them. I've done well vs Tau by simple priorities. 1. Kill his Markerlights. 2. Kill his Troops. 3. Kill everything else.
Edit: Ghawaar, I can't really give advice on non Tyranid armies because I'm not very experienced, but having a balance of shooty units to take out his key elements helps a lot. Tau are the best current army in my mind, but if this is a friendly match and he's routinely beating you, either bring something a bit less friendly (to ensure a balanced game) or maybe point out to him that he's cheesing up a casual environment.
So many of you replying are simply missing the point.
Let me reiterate once again. I did not say Tau is unbeatable. My primary point is that, for me as a casual player who likes to bring balanced all-comers armies, or just models I own- Tau is NOT fun to play against, and is extremely good at dealing with lists not prepared SPECIFICALLY to take advantage of Taus very few weaknesses.
I do NOT have access to limitless models to just swap in whenever I want, nor would I want to. That is NOT the point. I do NOT want to create a list SPECIFICALLY to beat Tau- I have never seen an army until this codex that I have not been able to at least do decently well against with general all-comers lists.
So again, they are not unbeatable. That does not change the fact they are a mindless army that outright ignore a greater portion of the rulebook in favor of power gamers who just want to play yahtzee with themselves while their opponent pulls models off the board.
jifel wrote: but if this is a friendly match and he's routinely beating you, either bring something a bit less friendly (to ensure a balanced game) or maybe point out to him that he's cheesing up a casual environment.
The latter option is better here. Cheese leads to cheese.
Boniface wrote: Lol please don't tell me that everyone is getting all pissy about their precious marine dying a bit.
4 tactical squads in combat squads = 8 targets
This is 800 points ish.
You are moving 6" shooting 5 - 10 shots. Hitting on 3s wounding on 3s with a 3+ save.
I could take tau with Dark Angels (apparently the worst codex)
Yes some armies have issues due to age (give them a chance we've had 5 codices in only a short while)
To all dark angels this against Tau
Libby w PFG 95
Libby w PFG 95
Command squad in DP 5x flamer 160
Command squad in DP 5x flamer 160
Tactical squad (10) with melta and missile 180 ish x 4
1 troop choice, 2 Heavies, 2 HQs... If you do decide to post other lists, I suggest you make them legal ones as either primary detachments or allies. The one you posted doesn't meet either compulsory criteria.
Ok, I will admit I started really playing this year. I have yet to play a Tau army. So take my thoughts and such with that in mind.
Couldnt an army hit Tau units with Pinning weapons and prevent that ENTIRE unit from Shooting? Granted that is only 1 unit. I play SM, I have taken a unit of Scouts with sniper rifles just for this. I added Telion so I can almost garuntee some sort of hit. Granted, it might not be much. Oh well. It will prevent something from hitting me. Target a ML unit maybe? Make them eat dirt, they cant ML right?
The overwatch thing is Tau right? The help your buddy unit out? Pinning again ftw.Yeah, you actually have to get one off, but umm....the Tau cant shoot you unless they roll decent too right?? Nature of the game.
Do I think Tau are powerful? Yeah, I have watched too many battle reports, seen too many threads of people complaining about them being OP not to. Does this equate to me not wanting to play them? Nope. I wanna try my luck. I lose all the time anyway, so why not go for a full house?
Automatically Appended Next Post:
4 tactical squads in combat squads = 8 targets
This is 800 points ish.
You are moving 6" shooting 5 - 10 shots. Hitting on 3s wounding on 3s with a 3+ save.
I could take tau with Dark Angels (apparently the worst codex)
Yes some armies have issues due to age (give them a chance we've had 5 codices in only a short while)
To all dark angels this against Tau
Libby w PFG 95
Libby w PFG 95
Command squad in DP 5x flamer 160
Command squad in DP 5x flamer 160
Tactical squad (10) with melta and missile 180 ish x 4
I think I/we should have just listened to this guy all along. It is pretty clear that many people see Tau as a problem and many others see no such issue.
If you are a casual player and TFG brings his tourny Tau army, don't play him. If you are a competitive tournament player, adapt - we've seen many FotM lists come and go. Only a few months ago I remember hearing about ravenwing armies rocking some tournaments at the time of their release... they are still decent now, but we have had a chance to work out strategies to take them out.
As for my personal contribution to the issue.... I'll stick to running my fluffy farsight enclave - never was a fan of riptides/pathfinders
DE have always had a uphill battle against Tau. Back when you could run 9 S10 Twinlinked Railguns, you autopenned most DE vehicles, and since most Tau players ran suit heavy with Plasma/missile or TL Missile, they could ID most anything you put on the table and that's with the "gakky" codex.
This is an adjustment period. We are still learning how to fight Tau/Eldar. There was an adjustment period for every other army/rule update.
If you're using an ADL and Tau stripping cover saves got you down, maybe look at getting a Skyshield. Tau can't strip an Invuln save. Not Yet anyways. NOTE: if you are looking to protect your Havocs/Devastators/Long Fangs, This also works on Helldrakes. I switched over to a Skyshield for my Tau, and it has not disappointed me.
XenosTerminus wrote: Let me reiterate once again. I did not say Tau is unbeatable. My primary point is that, for me as a casual player who likes to bring balanced all-comers armies, or just models I own- Tau is NOT fun to play against, and is extremely good at dealing with lists not prepared SPECIFICALLY to take advantage of Taus very few weaknesses.
This is because it's very easy for "casual" players to assemble a battleforce army with little or no plan besides "move forward and declare charges". They don't have much optimization or synergy, but they can get away with it because the default marine army is based around a "do a little of everything" strategy. So units meet in midfield, dice are rolled on both sides, and the "casual" player probably does some damage before losing. Tau, as a dedicated shooting army, exist to punish that lack of coherent strategy by focusing entirely on one aspect of the game and ruthlessly dismantling an army that doesn't have an equally focused strategy to fight back with. Dedicated assault armies work the same way, just with an illusion of the massacre being a game because the "casual" player gets to roll some meaningless dice in the assault phase.
The solution to this is to understand that a "balanced all-comers army" is not "a little of everything". A focused Tau army that brings the appropriate shooting and denial choices to shoot any potential opponent to death is a balanced all-comers army. A marine army that brings a tactical squad, a scout squad, an assault squad, a tank, and a librarian is just a random pile of units.
That does not change the fact they are a mindless army that outright ignore a greater portion of the rulebook in favor of power gamers who just want to play yahtzee with themselves while their opponent pulls models off the board.
Only because you make the arbitrary declaration that shooting decisions (target priority, effective markerlight use, etc) are "no skill" while movement or assault decisions involve tons of skill. Sorry, but it doesn't work like that.
I think part of the problem is, people look at the Tau on paper and then completely abandon any assault based strategy and then try to castle up and play laser tag, which is generally a losing proposition for armies without the initials IG.
Overwatch is generally not that effective, even when its coming from 3 squads. Assaulting Tau can be done, but you have to be fully prepared for the assault. You have to fully commit and accept that you'll lose a few models, and possibly take "non-optimized" lists. Single MCs aren't going to get the job done. Small elite squads (5 or less) probably aren't going to do it either unless they are multi-wound and have a good save. Daemons are probably the best army to pull off an assault against Tau at the moment. Orks could be if people actually used them as a pure assault army (flat out a loaded battlewagon or two, jump out turn two, assault with 20-40 slugga boyz). CSM have a great way to assault Tau with a LR equipped with Dirge Caster and loaded down with 10 Khorne Berserkers. Throw Kharne in the mix and you're going to make a mess of that Tau castle.
Ha, classic. Being told that taking 'a random pile of units' is the reason I am losing against Tau.
There are a few issues here, which honestly speaks volumes about both the state of this game and the general mindset of the overly competitive players that lurk around here
So you are telling me that I can't just bring what I want within a book, that is supposedly balanced (based on points, right?) and expect to do decently? You do understand what is wrong with that statement correct? I have to bring optimized lists and only spam/take what is best to win? What a joke. People like you ruin this hobby.
Furthermore, I never even told you what the Tau player has brought. My most recent game he also took 'a random pile of units'. If his 'random pile of units' can outright destroy mine, which did in fact have a saturation of both AV and AI- what gives? It's not like I made mistakes, really. I was outshot, could not take cover, could not assault (combination of overwatch and 6e's 'random charges are hilarious' rules, and simply so much Dakka my 'amazing 3+ saves' didn't account for gak).
On the point on assault- there is a reason a lot of people lament the death of it in 6e- it is the part of a players turn that involves BOTH players rolling dice (other than your models taking saves). It is also far more dynamic than pew pew across the board, and is very visceral. It should be integral to a game of 40k, in tandem WITH shooting. 6e is a shooting gallery, and quite frankly it seems like the people that enjoy it the most are the competitive crowd. To each their own- enjoy your dumbed down experience.
No, this is not an issue that I can't adapt or change tactics. I have no issue with that with any new books that have come out.
If an army can counter essentially everything you physically own in your army- what then? If an army basically obsoletes your entire collection to the point you cannot play a game against said army, if played well.. what then?
Why are you incapable of seeing this from a casual or 'fun' perspective? I don't care if I lose- I have never had as many issues with this specific army in my entire experience playing this game since 4e. There is very little I can do with the armies I own, and I have tried different lists- as has my main Tau opponent. The results are always the same.
I am not looking for people to say "well I have no issues with them, so there obviously isn't a problem!' I don't care if you are having success... you are failing to realize that for MANY people, Tau is simply not enjoyable to face.
Not everyone has access to limitless models to craft the ultimate list to 'adjust' to ONE FREAKING BOOK. A generalist Marine list that has had no issues against literally 75% of the rest of the armies that are even in this game has nothing on Tau. It is not my tactics, lists, or unwillingness to adapt. Don't assume I am tactically inept or don't know what I am doing.
Zweischneid wrote: Dunno. Tau ("A supposedly shooty army" doesn't pwn the shooty game in this shooty edition of 40K half as much as Space Wolves ("A supposedly choppy army" pwn the shooty game in the choppy edition.
No problem from my side of things.
Also, Heldrakes... Fix those first.
Thanks.
in this case tau>heldrakes. sorry yes the drakes are good, against tau, NOT good... total waste of time unless i want him to interceptor them..
XenosTerminus wrote: So you are telling me that I can't just bring what I want within a book, that is supposedly balanced (based on points, right?) and expect to do decently? You do understand what is wrong with that statement correct? I have to bring optimized lists and only spam/take what is best to win? What a joke. People like you ruin this hobby.
That's been true since long before the Tau codex. If you're playing against competitive opponents then taking "what you want" is a good way to ensure that you lose. The game is not balanced, and pretending that it is doesn't help you win.
On the point on assault- there is a reason a lot of people lament the death of it in 6e- it is the part of a players turn that involves BOTH players rolling dice (other than your models taking saves).
So what? If an assault terminator squad charges a squad of fire warriors the outcome is inevitable and the dice the Tau player rolls don't matter. It's an illusion of having a say in the outcome, but it's no more relevant than if you just pick some dice up and roll them a few times just for the sake of playing with your dice.
It is also far more dynamic than pew pew across the board, and is very visceral.
And that's your subjective preference. I think shooting is far more interesting fluff-wise, and assault is that annoying thing I have to put up with.
XenosTerminus wrote: If an army can counter essentially everything you physically own in your army- what then? If an army basically obsoletes your entire collection to the point you cannot play a game against said army, if played well.. what then?
Except, as people have said before, Tau can't counter everything simultaneously. You may have bought a weak choice of units, but you can't complain about how "unbalanced" the game is just because you're not very good at list construction or don't have enough of a budget to keep up with the game.
Why are you incapable of seeing this from a casual or 'fun' perspective?
I am seeing it from a fun perspective. Some people just have fun in different ways.
Not everyone has access to limitless models to craft the ultimate list to 'adjust' to ONE FREAKING BOOK. A generalist Marine list that has had no issues against literally 75% of the rest of the armies that are even in this game has nothing on Tau. It is not my tactics, lists, or unwillingness to adapt. Don't assume I am tactically inept or don't know what I am doing.
And, as I said, you can get away with that because most armies in the game are other generalist marine armies. Generalist armies don't punish you as harshly for poor optimization because they're probably going to meet you in midfield with at least a few units and allow you to have the illusion of participating in the game. Specialized armies, whether pure shooting, pure assault, pure flyers, whatever, are not that forgiving.
The solution here is to stop playing an unfocused marine list and trying to do a little of everything. It's just not a good strategy.
Most recently I played as BT (and before anyone says it's just because the book is old- vanilla marines/DA have the same issues)
Marshal
-Artificer Armor
-Power Fist
-Storm Shield
-Terminator Honors
-Adamantine Mantle- He goes in a drop pod
Emperor's Champion
-Accept any challenge, no matter the odds- He goes in a drop pod
Crusader Squad of 10 with CCWS, a Power Weapon, and a Melta Gun in a drop pod
Crusader Squad of 10 with CCWS, a Power Weapon, and a Melta Gun in a drop pod
Crusader Squad of 5 with a Lascannon, Plasmagun, and bolters in a Rhino
Venerable Dread with a Twin-linked lascannon/missile Launcher- Tank Hunter Veteran Skill
5 Assault Termies with Furious Charge- 4 Lightning Claws and a Thunder Hammer/SS- These go in a LRC
LS Typhoon x3
Combi Pred x2
As you can see I have a large saturation of long ranged firepower- much of which can also target infantry. The drop pod squads/LRC Termies go for objectives or harass while back field shoots. It's a pretty balanced list with about as much as the book has to offer, save shooty termies with tank hunting cyclones, but this list doesn't lack AT.
There are a multitude of things Tau has to outright just gak on this list. The issue is, I can't think of any other way to approach it. Rhinos? garbage. Drop Pods aren't working. I cant outshoot him.. footslogging is out of the question. Literally the ONLY thing I have seen survive relatively long are AV 13/14.. which I have heard people say Tau have issues with. This just forces me to reiterate my entire point... I would have to spam something to beat them, or list cater. That is not what makes this game fun... at all
XenosTerminus wrote: Most recently I played as BT (and before anyone says it's just because the book is old- vanilla marines/DA have the same issues)
Here is your problem. You have a lot of points tied up in assault (and probably need to assault to win), but you haven't committed your whole army to it. You have a lot of points tied up in long-range shooting, but don't have enough long-range shooting to win the game by itself. You have a drop pod element, but not enough of one to really overwhelm your opponent. You have some vehicles to make your opponent's anti-tank weapons effective (especially Tau STR 7 spam), but not a full commitment to a mech list that would give you proper target saturation.
It's a pretty balanced list with about as much as the book has to offer, save shooty termies with tank hunting cyclones, but this list doesn't lack AT.
And this is why you lose. A "balanced" list with a little of everything the codex has is a weak list because it has no focus. You can do everything, but you're not actually good at any of it. It's weak against every opponent, Tau just make that weakness more obvious.
And this is why 40k has progressively gotten worse. When a balanced list is considered bad. This is the direction this game has gone, and it is unfortunately extremely disappointing. I supposed I should have expected to get bombasted by a bunch of win-more waac players on a 40k forum. These places are, after all, generally full of self-entitled and opinionated 40-somethings who evidently have VERY different perspectives on what is fun (rolling a gak ton of dice in the shooting phase and wiping out poor 'unfocussed and terrible 40k players').
So your suggestion, then, is to literally devote my entire army to ONE strategy. Ok... great. So it will be great against specific things I encounter randomly, but terrible against others.
Rock, Paper, Scissors argument once again. You did, however, prove one of my points. Tau punishes 'unfocussed' army lists. Which is why they are not fun to play against in a casual setting. Perhaps that is all I own? Well, then there is an army that can literally guarantee a win simply because the overall game direction and balancing is to the point you have to spam the best units/make incredibly boring copy/pasted lists to win.
Now I am starting to understand why other people, despite the games having terrible models, always suggest other games (balance).
XenosTerminus wrote: I supposed I should have expected to get bombasted by a bunch of win-more waac players on a 40k forum. These places are, after all, generally full of self-entitled and opinionated 40-somethings who evidently have VERY different perspectives on what is fun (rolling a gak ton of dice in the shooting phase and wiping out poor 'unfocussed and terrible 40k players').
Well, that just thoroughly demolished any credibility you might have had. There's really no point in continuing this discussion if you're just going throw personal attacks at anyone who doesn't play the game the way you want them to.
Credibility? It's a forum for a game that involves plastic soldiers.
It seems like no matter where you turn most conversations about this game spiral out of control into opinionated pissing contests between nerds. I have no issues debating, the issue here is that most people reply with the classic 'my experience says otherwise', automatically dismissing what the other person stated is an issue for them. Either that, or they offer their 'expertise' in list building and army methodology- all very situational and not entirely helpful based on the points I raised.
If it matters at this point some of my most memorable games were in fact, losses. No complaints- just good times with some beers. Could care less what the outcome is, because the games were close, and most importantly fun.
Ever since Tau came out (and to a lesser degree IG) I have just not enjoyed fighting them. That is largely because I, as you already pointed out, like a game with variety. Why have a codex filled with interesting unit choices and great models if you will never see 90% of them?
Clearly I enjoy assault more than shooting, but that is not to say I dislike shooting entirely. I simply think that gunlines, or 'shooty' armies, are boring, uninspired, and often utilize some of the cheesiest rules to outright ignore some of the rules in the game. Do other people enjoy this? Definitely. I can say with relative confidence, however, that the majority of people rarely enjoy facing off against gunlines- it makes for very dull games.
Well, you're the one asking us to take you seriously. So yeah, credibility is kind of important. And since you're now in the insults and 'you're all just nerds' phase of the argument, I sincerely care less and less about your opinion.
People like things that you don't like. Deal. Or complain and call people nerds when they don't immediately take your side.
I think we need to open another thread, only this one would be:
Why Eldar has gone too far.
I'd have to agree with the OP. The new Tau are not unbeatable, but they're good enough so that it really isn't fun for a lot of people to play against them. Even a mediocre Tau list can beat another decent list assuming the skill level and dice rolls of both players are about equal. Of course each player is different - competitive players may actually enjoy the challenge of playing against a good tau list/player - however, the majority of gamers out there are more casual players. The imbalance of Tau - their ability to ignore/bypass many of the normal mechanics of the game - often can make this an unenjoyable experience for these types of players. And it only gets worse if the tau player is good and brings a more optimized Tau list.
The same can be said of the new eldar, necrons and to a degree, the new daemons. All these armies are tough for most casual players to play against. The more optimized lists run by decent generals then make it tough for even the experienced players to play against. Honestly, I am not sure why the new Xenos books are getting more and more powerful whereas the MEQ armies have been mediocre (and this includes Chaos Marines). For those hoping that the new Space Marines will be potentially more powerful than any of the Xenos books, I say to you....don't hold your breath.
I really could care less if you take me seriously or not (my future dreams and ambitions of becoming an internet phenomenon and 40k scholar are ruined)
My main purpose was to gauge what the general populace on here thought about Tau. I think I proved my point. The extent of my 'solutions' can be summed up with the following:
-Don't play against the opponent
-List tailor
-Spam/optimize
-Play different armies because 40k is evidently just an overpriced and flashy version of rock paper scissors with dice
Unfortunately, none of these really solve the problem. I guess I can just play against him and let him pound me into the pavement- I don't want to tell him he can't use his army, afterall
Tau have gone no further than any of their predecessors. Imperial Guard, Space Wolves, Blood Angels, Grey Knights, and Necrons have all held top-dog spot at one point or another. Tau are simply on the up and up right now because they are a meta-spoiler shooting army. Tactics that are good against Tau tend to do poorly against other armies, while tactics that do well against others do poorly against Tau.
I find, from personal experience, that Tau tend to be weak against AV14, struggle against mass AV13, and have infantry that is about as tough as Eldar guardians when taking their leadership values into account. Even their battlesuits, sans the riptide, are deceptively fragile. S8+ weaponry makes a mockery of crisis suits and broadsides. Leman Russes and Land Raiders are just bad business all around for Tau unless they are really lucky.
Paradoxically enough when I see Tau lose, they tend to lose at range.
People also have a tendency to freak out and lose their calm against Tau shenanigans. They psyche themselves out about certain units or abilities, lose track of objectives, or place their units poorly. It helps to take a deep breath, step back, and do a little calm critical thinking. JSJ, massed pulse-fire, ignoring cover.. these are all things that Tau have been doing for quite some time.
My only criticisms of the Tau as a whole at the moment are the riptide and allies. The riptide's 2+ save and 72" range on the ion accelerator is a bit much for a unit that can have interceptor for only five points and that has JSJ while allies-wise I feel that Tau make out like bandits. Farseers, for example, in a Tau force are incredibly mean.
The book seems to pride itself with outright ignoring a large portion of the rulebook itself. Cover saves? Nope. Deep Striking/Outlanking? Nope. Assault? Nope. Line of Sight? Nope. Fliers? Nope. You name it, Tau has an answer for it. This is problematic in what should be a strategic game.
You realize, that tau have the option for all of this, but no way to feasibly employ them all at once in anything but massive point scales?
Yeah....at this point it's clear XenosTerminus doesn't want to change or adapt different tactics in his list but rather wants to alter the game itself to fit around his list and way of how he thinks the game should be played.
If that's not incredibly conceited/arrogant I don't know what is...
Tau are just fething boooooooring to play againts... Both of my main opponents play Tau and my Nids beat them regularly, my Daemons are 50/50, my Eldar and Orks get trounced. But none of that matters because they are 100% boring to play against...
Ive lost plenty of games with my Tau, and against armies that are supposed to be sub-par (like BA). Why? Simple, on more than one occasion i would make a gamble, commit resources to a specific task, then if i could not achieve said objective it would all come tumbling down on me. Thats the thing about Tau, they can hit hard, out maneuver, and really stick it to their foes, but once you get your teeth in them, they are gone! Opponent manged to get a few death company in close combat, then it was all he needed to sweep my entire fire line. Once he took out my Ethereal most of my Firewarriors fell off the board from their poor leadership save.
So, what is needed for you to win is to exploit your enemies weaknesses!! Land terminators in his back field, then come up with some more from a land raider from the front. Making tau split fire is going to slow them down, allowing something to break through. If you want to beat them you will need to be sneaky as well. So, if they deny cover saves, dont even bother with cover! Move flat out and get right in their faces. Or simply hide out of line of sight, make them come to you with their gunlines. Better yet, bring alot of Marines and neophytes to the party. Move them forward in huge groups. Eventually someone is going to make it your to enemies side, and he isnt going to have enough guns to stop that much 3+. Plus your leadership is solid, so you wont be falling back anytime soon. For me, one of the greatest Tau weakness is their pisspoor leadership. The new ethereal is pretty much the only thing that has saved that for them. Which for you, should mean PRIME TARGET. Also, don't concentrate on hard to kill stuff like Riptides. Sure they rock, but they can only rock one shot at a time, so stay away from it and take out its supporting markerlights and eliminate his troops. Ive yet to lose a Riptide, and thats because my opponents know it will be a pain to kill, and take out my scoring units instead. As for supporting fire, simply have a disposable unit go first, making have to decide whether or hes going to overwatch him with everything or wait for the next one. Also, dont forget the handy heavy bolter! That gun can pummel Firewarriors and you can bring more than enough to the fight. Don't forget that Crisis suits are not tough, so a crack missile in the behind will instant death them!
Thats just a few of the ways you can use to beat a Tau opponent. Unlike some older armies, they do not have an I WIN or a I LOSE button, so you will need to be a savvy opponent to win. And before you say anything, you can have fun and be casual with just about anything, you just need to make good tactical choices and, of course, make good rolls. I would suggest that you re-evaluate your strategies, come up with some new ones, experiment with new types of play, and really enjoy yourself (variety is the spice of life). Even if you do lose as long as you made your opponent pay for every piece of ground he took it will all be worth it. I lose as much as I win since my opponents are excellent commanders and rarely am I disappointed. Each game you lose should teach you something you need to win the next,
I'm sorry to say this, but I've been watching this thread all day and it kind of feels like watching the world's slowest train wreck. I've been munching my popcorn quite eagerly for this one.
I guess for this kind of situation you really do just have to concentrate on the scenario. I actually lose a fair amount with my Tau army because I can't close out and grab objectives.
XenosTerminus wrote: Let me start by stating this is first and foremost an opinion, albeit an opinion that seems to be relatively common from what I have observed both locally and online.
Let’s talk about the Armoured Battlegroup. I know I know, another posting about the ABG! There are hundreds of topics similar to these all over the internet scattered amongst countless blogs and forum postings. This in itself should be telling, but let me elaborate.
It is my opinion that the ABG is a horrendously balanced codex in a predominantly shooty edition. There are a multitude of reasons I feel this army quite literally ruins games.
The book seems to pride itself with outright ignoring a large portion of the rulebook itself. Cover saves? Nope. Objectives? Nope. Assault? Nope. Line of Sight? Nope. Having more than one wound? Nope. You name it, Tau has an answer for it. This is problematic in what should be a strategic game.
The actual amount of thought that has to go into a typical ABG player's turn is rarely more than “what should I shoot and where”. This is rarely an issue, as they have outright ridiculous ranges and firepower that doesn’t care about cover in most cases or LOS. Rinse and repeat until turn 5 and one of you has nothing on the table.
Did they shake up the meta? Absolutely, but it a terrible way. All of the seemingly ‘reliable’ ways people mention to ‘beat ABG’ rarely progress beyond anecdotal and circumstantial evidence. This typically involves specific units and lists. Since when is ‘list tailor and know what your opponent will be playing’ an acceptable solution to a strategy game? If he brings rock, you bring a piece of paper!
On the topic of matchups, ABG has no bad matchups that I can honestly think of- despite this, they outright destroy other armies (Dark Eldar, Vanilla Marines to name a few examples). Some armies simply do not have answers to what ABG can do.
I could go on, but I can summarize my point as follows: If an army wipes you off the board with very little thought or effort simply because you decided to play a pickup game with a balanced all-comers list- there is a problem.
ABG and tournament players will defend this to death and say it isn’t as bad as it seems, but when all of the ABG players I personally know literally FEEL BAD to play their army, there are issues. The ABG has been relegated to the win-more tournament army of this edition- it’s Grey Knights in 5th edition all over again.
There you go OP, I edited your first post to highlight the ridiculousness of your opinion.
I am going to try and bring a balanced view from a non-gunline Tau player.
First of all - I fething HATE Aegis defence lines. They ARE the bloody problem in 40katm. It causes far too many armies to forget about proper deployment or using terrain as they just bring a huge piece of 4+ cover themselves and try and out shoot people from behind it. THAT'S boring to play against.
Get your Tau friends to try mech lists or ask them to play more aggressively. Actually - you probably won't want that because we are far more effective close up in my opinion. I often end up getting stuck in and pushing for rapid fire ranges on all my weapons. Be grateful he doesn't do that properly or you would be having a breakdown.
Assaulting - if he has a Riptide and you like assaulting - get him to assault you. I wiped out two LRBT, a command squad and a mortar emplacement with my Riptide last game from assaulting. (made an anti-nid list, didn't bring any fusion or rail) Get him to assault you if you are that bored with shooting. Assault is just the same as shooting you know? Just your models are touching lol.
Get them to try new units? If you're having an unpleasant time then just asking them to try new stuff is not out of order.
Try and change. One of my close 40k friends hasn't beat my Tau yet but he doesn't whine, I ask him to purposely make a great horrible list to beat me. He loves the challenge that Tau offer aside from "rush in to combat".
XenosTerminus wrote: Not everyone has access to limitless models to craft the ultimate list to 'adjust' to ONE FREAKING BOOK. A generalist Marine list that has had no issues against literally 75% of the rest of the armies that are even in this game has nothing on Tau. It is not my tactics, lists, or unwillingness to adapt. Don't assume I am tactically inept or don't know what I am doing.
I realize I've probably spent more on my models than many others, them being metal... But the choices available to Sisters of Battle are very few. I can decide on meltagun or flamer for special weapons, then pick multimeltas, heavy flamers or heavy bolters as a "heavy" choice. Jump troops get inferno pistols (6'' range melta) or handflamers. Transports? Rhinos and Immolators which are basically Razorbacks now, with crappier weapons options. Tanks? Exorcist, 13 AV front armor and a somewhat unreliable Heavy d6 gun (S8, AP1). The only thing I have that I'd want in CC with Tau suits is St Celestine.
I've never managed a wipeout against Tau, new or old. But throwing twice the number of models at them and killing all scoring units always seems to work pretty well. I'll just have to deal with losing half the SoB on it, then keeping something alive to score while the suits jump around me until the game ends.
Edit: yes, spam... I spam enough Rhino hulls that they can't stop them all. And terrain - if you play the Tau over an open field then ofc you will have problems. Once there's enough terrain to break LOS for part of the army they're a whole lot less scary.
One last thing before we allow this thread to die.
OP you play Templars, a codex from the age of the dinosaurs vs Tau, the new hotness, it's not surprising you lose.
You can't complain you keep losing against Tau when you codex is so old.
It hasn't been balanced against this edition (or any recent one).
When your codex has been updated and you keep losing fair enough.
But it's like comparing a Nokia 3210 and a Sumsung Galaxy phone ATM.
I agree you are outclassed and by comparison the Tau codex is overpowered.
I got through 3 pages of this before I had to stop myself from entertaining this whinge-fest.
Lets be very clear here:
TAC is VERY different from your (XenosTerminus) take some of everything approach. As other more credible sources have explained, conflating TAC with Jack-of-all-trades is a huge error.
The reason Tau gets such a bad name is that it can never even delude itself into taking a JoaTrades list because its so obvious it has only one strength. This focus is its strength. You cannot outshoot Tau, and you should not be able to outshoot Tau.
You have to play to your armies strengths. If you know that your army is more assault oriented, you need to come up with a reliable method of bringing your units into assault range. Hoping they don't have the firepower to gun you down appears to be your current strategy, and one you mistakenly believe is the hallmark of a "fun" player.
There are strategies that work. If something works against Tau, it'll work against the shooty elements of any other army. If you have to make the whole list about that strategy, ,you're tailoring against shooty armies.
If you can integrate it into a list that is also capable of dealing with fliers, hordes, Psykers, super mobility, Death Stars, and armor spam, congratulations, you're more skilled than most. If you can't even do that by itself, sorry, but you're less skilled than most.
gr1m_dan wrote: First of all - I fething HATE Aegis defence lines. They ARE the bloody problem in 40katm. It causes far too many armies to forget about proper deployment or using terrain as they just bring a huge piece of 4+ cover themselves and try and out shoot people from behind it. THAT'S boring to play against.
I love seeing my opponents in tournaments doing that -- they are setting themselves up for losing.
Its very difficult to take objectives when your staying in your deployment zone huddled behind a ADL.
gr1m_dan wrote: First of all - I fething HATE Aegis defence lines. They ARE the bloody problem in 40katm. It causes far too many armies to forget about proper deployment or using terrain as they just bring a huge piece of 4+ cover themselves and try and out shoot people from behind it. THAT'S boring to play against.
I love seeing my opponents in tournaments doing that -- they are setting themselves up for losing.
Its very difficult to take objectives when your staying in your deployment zone huddled behind a ADL.
Well, if your scoring units die faster than your opponents, because he is behind an ADL and you aren't, then mobility quickly loses its importance. If your scoring units are dead, then you won't capture objectives. Simple as that. And at the end of the battle, the guy with the ADL just casually moves onto the objective in his table half and wins...
ok, so in retrospect I realize that I lost my cool here, so I will man up and apologize for being rude. I do appreciate the advice, I am just frustrated because my two MEQ armies, combined with the models I physically own, are seeing no success against Tau regardless of my tactics.
BT is basically a lost cause as discussed (being antiquated, and their strengths designed around 4e/assault).
Let me explain why I also believe DA has very little to combat Tau with a few exceptions:
DA's strengths, really, are Bikes and Terminators. Terminators aren't terribly competitive anymore and are generally overcosted for the firepower they bring to the table. Tau also have no issues murdering them, so I don't believe Deathwing lists are really viable.
Bikes are promising, but they suffer because Tau can just remove their cover saves and kill them easily. The PFG is nice, but can only cover so many models.
Whirlwinds are good for taking out Tau Infantry for sure, but that won't win me the game alone, especially if the Troops are in Devilfish.
I have honestly struggled with DA against most armies- the book is just so mediocre overall compared to what else has come out in 6e- it's just mint flavored vanilla marines with a few gimmicks thrown in, and has likely once again been relegated to being a test bed for the new vanilla marine book.
So really, my frustration is probably tied to the fact Tau are very good at killing Marines- 2 of my armies I have played since 4e and spent the most time building/painting/playing. It's like he doesn't even need to try to kill them. I don't know if I can counter that without buying different models to confront his weaknesses/try different strategies, but I really don't want to do that just because of Tau.
XenosTerminus wrote: ok, so in retrospect I realize that I lost my cool here, so I will man up and apologize for being rude. I do appreciate the advice, I am just frustrated because my two MEQ armies, combined with the models I physically own, are seeing no success against Tau regardless of my tactics.
This is a good move. I'm surprised this thread even stayed open. This thread literally turned into a troll thread. I thought most of the advice given was solid. Soliciting advice on how to face a specific army, the questions cant be answered without tailoring the advice to face Tau...
Check it out, I cant beat JotWW spam SWs with my 'nids. I've just come to terms with it.
gr1m_dan wrote: First of all - I fething HATE Aegis defence lines. They ARE the bloody problem in 40katm. It causes far too many armies to forget about proper deployment or using terrain as they just bring a huge piece of 4+ cover themselves and try and out shoot people from behind it. THAT'S boring to play against.
I love seeing my opponents in tournaments doing that -- they are setting themselves up for losing.
Its very difficult to take objectives when your staying in your deployment zone huddled behind a ADL.
Well, if your scoring units die faster than your opponents, because he is behind an ADL and you aren't, then mobility quickly loses its importance. If your scoring units are dead, then you won't capture objectives. Simple as that. And at the end of the battle, the guy with the ADL just casually moves onto the objective in his table half and wins...
if you are Tau of course you markerlight the units behind the ADL and blow them off the table, i've seen it done quite regularly it depends on the mission of course. If it is emperors wil then all you have to do of course is kill a unit first and you have won, unless your oppnent feels very brave and decides to attempt an assault...
on topic...
Tau cause 'problems' and it boils down to a number of factors.
1) if the get firsts turn their 'frist strike' capacity is awesome indeed- the army combo we've bumped into (and i am going to try it out myself...): 2 hammerheads, 2 riptides, 3 broadsides etc it hits like a nuclear strike. My Tau and guard ally deployed as best we could but we got demolished...
2) riptides are a bugger to kill when used properly, they are hard to take down and the assault move is very nifty for getting yourself out of sticky situations: as i call it the 'i'm going to bugger off move
3) Players making mistakes/ bad target priority/army list howlers- here this is area dependent etc. Anecdote: When i buggered over the ace guard player at my club in my first ever Tau game, it was shocking as it was amusing despite having 3 vendettas he failed to kill my riptide despite the fact it was pummeling his army to scrap. 3 vendettas should have minced it easily but no he tried his luck on my hammerdeads and the 4+ save shenanigins bounced them off, and then they proccded to do nothing of value except target practice for my velocity tracker broadsides . The same player now hates Tau after he got wasted by turn 3 by another Tau player but had not bothered to change his list....
It will require a lot of time for palyers to deal with what the Tau can dobut as many have said they are not unbeatable...
At least Tau look cooler, I've beaten them with my CSM and they already have enough trouble with things (I don't use Heldrakes)
When i buggered over the ace guard player at my club in my first ever Tau game, it was shocking as it was amusing despite having 3 vendettas he failed to kill my riptide despite the fact it was pummeling his army to scrap. 3 vendettas should have minced it easily but no he tried his luck on my hammerdeads and the 4+ save shenanigins bounced them off, and then they proccded to do nothing of value except target practice for my velocity tracker broadsides . The same player now hates Tau after he got wasted by turn 3 by another Tau player but had not bothered to change his list....
Sounds like he didn't do target prioritization very well against an army he's yet to actually play, so his ace skills didn't exactly do him well since he failed to kill the better targets.
As a 5th edition Tau player, I remember there were bunch of match-ups which were just so one-sided for Tau to play against that it wasn't even remotely fun. For example, facing Speed Freaks or Green Tide orks was essentially auto-lose. It was so easy to get cover save for the Boyz, the Bikes had 4+ coversave (3+ when turboboost), even vehicles had cover save thanks to KFF. Non-Tau players never understood when I complained about ubiquitous cover saves: "But you have a way to remove cover, what does that matter!" They didn't realize how expensive and difficult to use Markerlights were in the old book. Then there was wound-allocation and multi-assault: if you shot say, 15 Boyz from a mob, they were removed from the back, leaving remaining 15 close to you to assault you, and multi-assault was ridiculously easy to get with a large unit. And once you did, all the Tau units involved were almost invariably wiped out for little to no loss for attacker. It was incredibly frustrating, and opponent generally needed no skill to pull that off. Just walk forward and multi-assault, game over. So in this sense, I get a good laugh when people complain how their previous, boring autowin strategies no longer work. It's funny only when it happens to other people, hm?
That said, I think current Tau codex is terribly designed. From reading both new lore and rules, it's clear than Vetock knew next to nothing about Tau before going into project. See, the old Tau didn't actually shoot that much. Instead they had plenty of gimmicks to make their shots count. They could split fire, move & shoot, enhance shooting by Markerlights etc. By contrast, new Tau is all about spamming ungodly amount of shots. It's like playing Storm of Dakka orks, who are BS5. Instead of cleverly designed rules and wargear, there are boring spammy rules like Volley Fire and boring spammy units like MissileSides, and units which poorly model the fiction, like Riptide. Couple of games I played with the new book were incredibly boring - it was just throw craploads of dice and watch enemy disappear. I actually had to hold back so that the game wouldn't be as one-sided and unfunny. It's an awful book.
Devastator Squad (185pts)
4x Lascannon (80pts), Drop Pod (35pts)
Devastator Squad (150pts)
4x Lascannon (80pts)
Whirlwind (65pts)
Aegis Defense Line (100pts)
Gun emplacement with quad-gun (50pts)
I dont know how many point you play or what you have.
This is the plan.
Aegis is for AA purposes more than anything else.
So set your aegis in the middle with the tac squad with Plasma.
Put some of your devs with the librarian and take divination.
deepstrike belial and the knights within 1" of the army.
Deepstrike the 2 command squads in close and move the last few inches to be 1" away. (interceptor only happens after movement hopefully negating the pie plates)
Use the devs for sniping tanks/big threats.
Use the scouts for MC killing.
Obviously this is just a suggestion and not overly Tau focused. Feel free to take/ignore the advice as necessary.
First, I need to say this. Many people in this forum and you specifically would do well to remember that there is a difference between WAAC and competition. A competitive player is not the same as a WAAC player, in all honesty i've met more WAAC players of the "casual" variety than the competitive variety (of course that's all anecdotal, but it comes to show that they do exist). Second, what is fun to one person may not necessarily be fun to another. It is a good skill to be able to see the difference between something that is subjective and something that is objective. There is no objectively better phase of this game. You may prefer assault, or think that assault is more fun or skill-based, but you will not be able to prove such a statement because it cannot be done. It is a matter of opinion that does not deal with facts and therefore you cannot be right or wrong in it. On a similar note, what is fun to you isn't fun for everyone else. I imagine Peregrine, for example, has natural tendencies when list building that are similar to my own. My mind naturally organizes things based off of efficiency, this extends to wargaming, videogames, card games, etc. It is in my nature and FUN for me to assemble lists of the highest caliber. I also prefer to play against them. I find the games to be more challenging and engaging than playing against a "fluffy" or "fun" list. I do, however, realize that this does not extend to all players.
Advice:
BT are an old, obsolete army who will get badly beaten by Crons, Tau, Eldar, Daemons, etc... If you are going to complain about Tau, you may as well not leave Eldar out of it. Marines especially have very little hope of destroying multiple Wave Serpents + the likely to be seen Wraithknight(s). I would only play BT vs. other obsolete codices, or if you are a much better player than the other folks you face. Keep in mind you are basically playing handicapped with this army.
DA on the other hand should definitely be able to stand toe to toe with Tau, at least in a casual environment. Ravenwing are great and the mobility they offer is very useful. You can use heavy reserves to quickly close on Tau and prevent yourself from being crippled by slogging across the board. Depending on your opinion of allies, you could always ally in some extra goodies, like a Storm Raven or something along those lines. DA Whirlies, Vindicators, Predators are all good buys. I would do a partial mech build with a heavy dosing of Ravenwing and maybe a few Drop Pods (Assault squads for DA can get 3 flamers per 5 men, absolutely brutal for Xenos lists).
If you tell us what the Tau player(s) you face generally are packing, it'll give the community a better chance to help you devise a specific course of action.
gr1m_dan wrote: First of all - I fething HATE Aegis defence lines. They ARE the bloody problem in 40katm. It causes far too many armies to forget about proper deployment or using terrain as they just bring a huge piece of 4+ cover themselves and try and out shoot people from behind it. THAT'S boring to play against.
I love seeing my opponents in tournaments doing that -- they are setting themselves up for losing.
Its very difficult to take objectives when your staying in your deployment zone huddled behind a ADL.
Well, if your scoring units die faster than your opponents, because he is behind an ADL and you aren't, then mobility quickly loses its importance. If your scoring units are dead, then you won't capture objectives. Simple as that. And at the end of the battle, the guy with the ADL just casually moves onto the objective in his table half and wins...
That would be a valid point if the game had AP2 left, right and center, but it doesn't, the majority of fire in the game is S4-7 high AP values, so the cover from the Aegis never even comes into it for most units.
XenosTerminus wrote: Let me explain why I also believe DA has very little to combat Tau with a few exceptions:
DA's strengths, really, are Bikes and Terminators. Terminators aren't terribly competitive anymore and are generally overcosted for the firepower they bring to the table. Tau also have no issues murdering them, so I don't believe Deathwing lists are really viable.
Bikes are promising, but they suffer because Tau can just remove their cover saves and kill them easily. The PFG is nice, but can only cover so many models.
Whirlwinds are good for taking out Tau Infantry for sure, but that won't win me the game alone, especially if the Troops are in Devilfish.
I have honestly struggled with DA against most armies- the book is just so mediocre overall compared to what else has come out in 6e- it's just mint flavored vanilla marines with a few gimmicks thrown in, and has likely once again been relegated to being a test bed for the new vanilla marine book.
So really, my frustration is probably tied to the fact Tau are very good at killing Marines- 2 of my armies I have played since 4e and spent the most time building/painting/playing. It's like he doesn't even need to try to kill them. I don't know if I can counter that without buying different models to confront his weaknesses/try different strategies, but I really don't want to do that just because of Tau.
The argument here is that dark angels can't beat tau because tau can remove cover from bikes? I'm sorry but this is a terrible argument that assumes the tau are running only marker lights and plasma rifles. The vast VAST majority of a Tau's shooting is going to be AP4 missile pods and AP5 pulse weaponry. If you lose 25-30 bikes before getting into CC because you don't have a cover save, then you clearly have no idea what you are doing. A 3+ armour save is still a very valuable thing to have and will make the difference more often than not. This whole argument of removing cover is very pathetic considering the vast majority of units in this game have 3+ armour. The OP and some of his supporters seem to think that all Tau weapons never scatter, are AP2 and have 30" + range.
Rail rifles are zero threat to infantry..... they just don't put out hardly any shots. Then there are plasma rifles and fusions blasters - both are single shot weapons at 24" and 18" respectively (plasma doubling at 12") - if my Tau get that close and you still haven't done any damage then you must be running a foot slogging berzerker army. Lastly we have the riptide (1/6 chance to do nothing, potential to scatter with BS3)... they aren't doing as much damage as people will have you believe. I also strongly doubt that many people are running 3 at a time. All we hear about it how the hobby is too expensive and how people have to save all year - yet magically everyone can afford to run 3 of these.
Stop pretending to play math-hammer and actually PLAY math-hammer. Those fancy Tau units aren't consistently capable of some of the feats described.
XenosTerminus wrote: ok, so in retrospect I realize that I lost my cool here, so I will man up and apologize for being rude. I do appreciate the advice, I am just frustrated because my two MEQ armies, combined with the models I physically own, are seeing no success against Tau regardless of my tactics.
BT is basically a lost cause as discussed (being antiquated, and their strengths designed around 4e/assault).
Let me explain why I also believe DA has very little to combat Tau with a few exceptions:
DA's strengths, really, are Bikes and Terminators. Terminators aren't terribly competitive anymore and are generally overcosted for the firepower they bring to the table. Tau also have no issues murdering them, so I don't believe Deathwing lists are really viable.
Bikes are promising, but they suffer because Tau can just remove their cover saves and kill them easily. The PFG is nice, but can only cover so many models.
Whirlwinds are good for taking out Tau Infantry for sure, but that won't win me the game alone, especially if the Troops are in Devilfish.
I have honestly struggled with DA against most armies- the book is just so mediocre overall compared to what else has come out in 6e- it's just mint flavored vanilla marines with a few gimmicks thrown in, and has likely once again been relegated to being a test bed for the new vanilla marine book.
So really, my frustration is probably tied to the fact Tau are very good at killing Marines- 2 of my armies I have played since 4e and spent the most time building/painting/playing. It's like he doesn't even need to try to kill them. I don't know if I can counter that without buying different models to confront his weaknesses/try different strategies, but I really don't want to do that just because of Tau.
Dont be too scared if the guy likes to camp up inside of d-fish. They are massively expencive for the type of tank that they are.
XenosTerminus wrote: Ha, classic. Being told that taking 'a random pile of units' is the reason I am losing against Tau.
There are a few issues here, which honestly speaks volumes about both the state of this game and the general mindset of the overly competitive players that lurk around here
So you are telling me that I can't just bring what I want within a book, that is supposedly balanced (based on points, right?) and expect to do decently? You do understand what is wrong with that statement correct? I have to bring optimized lists and only spam/take what is best to win? What a joke. People like you ruin this hobby.
Furthermore, I never even told you what the Tau player has brought. My most recent game he also took 'a random pile of units'. If his 'random pile of units' can outright destroy mine, which did in fact have a saturation of both AV and AI- what gives? It's not like I made mistakes, really. I was outshot, could not take cover, could not assault (combination of overwatch and 6e's 'random charges are hilarious' rules, and simply so much Dakka my 'amazing 3+ saves' didn't account for gak).
On the point on assault- there is a reason a lot of people lament the death of it in 6e- it is the part of a players turn that involves BOTH players rolling dice (other than your models taking saves). It is also far more dynamic than pew pew across the board, and is very visceral. It should be integral to a game of 40k, in tandem WITH shooting. 6e is a shooting gallery, and quite frankly it seems like the people that enjoy it the most are the competitive crowd. To each their own- enjoy your dumbed down experience.
You completely misunderstood my advice to you. You stated that Tau to too hard to beat, I pointed out the inherent weakness in Tau (assault) and gave advice to actually take advantage of that. You being a BT player should understand the importance of committing to an assault. Trying to play BT as "balanced" is kind of missing the point of BT in the first place. They are an assault themed army, and should be played as such if you really hope to have much success against Tau.
And no, assault isn't dead in 6th edition, its just not the auto-win it was in editions past. Its harder to pull off now, as it should be, but when the assault lands, its still every bit as effective as before.
Nowhere did I say spam OP units. I merely suggested some options. BT have access to the LRC which makes an excellent transport against Tau because most Tau builds don't take Hammerheads. Crusaders are expensive, but they get the intended job done and they are the signature tank for BT.
OK, so it look like you have a list that is a hybrid between shooting and HTH. I agree that 40K does a poor job of balancing for "points is points." Meaning that not all 1500 pt armies are equal. There is and always has been, a Rock Paper Scissors aspect to 40K. We can't change that. We an try to use it though.
So, going from my recollection of the marine models you have, this is what I would try.
1.) Don't worry so much about cover saves. As others have pointed out, you have 3+ armor. Most of the Tau volume of fire is AP4 or 5. In this case your armor is as good or better than cover.
2.) Adjust your plan. If I recall correctly (don't have BT or DA codexes) you're allowed to drop your pods empty. Use this. Let your troops slog across the board, but drop some or all of your pods as a "pod wall" to give yourself cover/total concealment. If you are facing a Tau using fireblade this will force him to move. Moving Tau don't benefit from his extra shot.
3.) Take your Whirlwind (I think you said you had one?). Park it somewhere out of LOS (if your board doesn't have any LOS blocking terrain that is one of your problems as well) and let loose. If you are shooting at firewarriors use whichever shot is best. This will cause pin checks. Most Tau are LD7, so in addition to killing some, this will eventually mean that some of them CAN'T shoot back.
4.) Overload on threats. Don't spread out your assets across the entire table. Make a concerted assault block and dedicated shooting block. Have the shooting block target the center of his line so that the flank you want to assault becomes isolated. Target that 1/3 of his line for destruction.
5.) If your whirlwind does drive him into his devilfish, then GOOD. That's less volume of fire for him to shoot you with (no Fire points?) as you cross the board.
6.) Above all do NOT panic. Don't let his overwhelming shooting let him get inside your head. Remember you WILL lose guys crossing the board, but even if he shoots down 2/3 of your assault force (which I would hope is at least 3 units) the last 1/3 should be able to beat Tau in HTH.
I hope that helps. Obviously it is not a Point and Click method of winning. There is no such thing. If you roll like crap on your armor saves, you are done no matter what.
To mitigate this, take as many bodies as you can. If you need to, drop some of the fancy equipment. Don't take 5 meltaguns in a squad if 3 will do. Don't kit out characters with 100 pts of wargear that they will never get to use. Part of the key to fighting this matchup is soaking his fire with as many bodies as possible. Take as many guys as you own.
A final note. You've briefly mentioned your armies, but what is the terrain like where you play? Is it all cover that can be shot through? Is there any LOS blocking terrain? The versions of 40K from 5th on really need 1-3 pieces of LOS blocking terrain for balance. Otherwise I see your pain since the Tau can turn it into planet bowlingball by ignoring cover.
Ghawhaar wrote: There is a difference between Tau and other armies that can ignore cover.
Tau do so by using one unit to allow every other unit to shoot and ignore the save.
So, the OP is silly getting all defensive, it sounds like he's spent some money on what he thought was the perfect TAC list. Now, Tau crush it. So, now he's upset and doesnt want to modify anything or change anything or god forbid spend money on a hobby! I Honest feel like A LOT of FoTM whiners are just that!
Now, i quoted the above to clear something up that i hope isn't being done wrong,
Tau dont use 1 unit to remover cover for the rest of the army to shoot at. Its 2 markerlights PER squad shooting to remover cover. Without a crap ton of pathfinders or a big ass squad of marker drones its not that realistic to remove cover every time they are shooting at just about any unit. Pathfinders miss, and drones can only shoot 1 unit. Now, if i could use 2 markerlights to remove cover from a unit and then have my whole army shoot at it, while not having cover anymore, then i would agree that tau are OP. But for ever marker light shooting thats 1 gun NOT shooting. Kill the heavy hitters with all the extra guns you can get since you arent paying for magic laser pointers and you might do a little better.
A good point wolfnid, and something I had overlooked as well (not playing Tau I hope I can be forgiven ). I think some people mentally skip the phrase "for this attack" in the markerlight entry indicating that it applies only to a single unit's fire. They see the "all weapons" part of the entry and take it to mean for the rest of the turn.
XenosTerminus wrote:Ha, classic. Being told that taking 'a random pile of units' is the reason I am losing against Tau.
There are a few issues here, which honestly speaks volumes about both the state of this game and the general mindset of the overly competitive players that lurk around here
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With respect - not really. Some people take this game quite seriously - i'd take my time listening to them, as they're the ones who have figured the game out. they dont have to be "overly competitive" - just serious about the hobby. And i can appreciate that mindset. People say "this works" for a reason. as to the "state of the game", please drop the rose tinted spectavles mate. 40k has always been a bit of a mess.
XenosTerminus wrote:
So you are telling me that I can't just bring what I want within a book, that is supposedly balanced (based on points, right?) and expect to do decently? You do understand what is wrong with that statement correct? I have to bring optimized lists and only spam/take what is best to win? What a joke. People like you ruin this hobby.
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No need to be snarky about it mate. But yes, you cant "just bring what you want". you never could either, so please dont pretend it has ever been different. Whats wrong with the statement? Nothing, frankly. thats just how these games are designed, and there is no point pretending otherwise. For whatever reasons both good and ill, Internal and external balance has never been high on the list of GW priorities im afraid. there have always been junk in codices, and there have always been "builds". certain things work wiell in conjuction with each other, and they'll work better than a mish mash/hodge podge of codex selections.
Saying people "ruin this hobby" by pointing out the flaws and the ways to be smart within the context of those flaws -that is being quite insulting too - please drop the mock indignation and attitude. its not required. Nor is it constructive.
XenosTerminus wrote:
Furthermore, I never even told you what the Tau player has brought. My most recent game he also took 'a random pile of units'. If his 'random pile of units' can outright destroy mine, which did in fact have a saturation of both AV and AI- what gives? It's not like I made mistakes, really. I was outshot, could not take cover, could not assault (combination of overwatch and 6e's 'random charges are hilarious' rules, and simply so much Dakka my 'amazing 3+ saves' didn't account for gak).
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what did he bring, out of curiosity?
I find it hard to believe that he is genuinely so overpowering. Tau as a codex are fine. they dont get to do all these shenanigans for free.
XenosTerminus wrote:
On the point on assault- there is a reason a lot of people lament the death of it in 6e- it is the part of a players turn that involves BOTH players rolling dice (other than your models taking saves). It is also far more dynamic than pew pew across the board, and is very visceral. It should be integral to a game of 40k, in tandem WITH shooting. 6e is a shooting gallery, and quite frankly it seems like the people that enjoy it the most are the competitive crowd. To each their own- enjoy your dumbed down experience.
I completely disagree. assault to me is "run across the table, absorb some ping, and when you get within 6" you charge apply a bazillion attacks and roll up a flank". frankly, in third and fourth it utterly dominated. you could get a first turn charge, roll up a flank and be utterly invulnerable. and you didnt have to think about it at all. saying both players get to roll dice makes it more involving is a bit of a joke - i play warmachine, where all i do in my opponents turn is remove models, and im fine with that.
i waited a long time to hear about an edition of 40k where shooting could finally stand on its own legs, and not have its damage output completely outshone by close combat. you might find cc more visceral, and cinematic, and youre entitled to that POV. i've never felt that way about it - it was always something dumb, and something to avoid-in a game with railguns and void cannons, its ridiculous that a guy with a sword does more killing. Also, calling it a "dumbed down" game smacks of arrogance and spite. i dont know if that was your intention or not - i'll give you the benefit of the doubt - but its doing you no favours.
XenosTerminus wrote:No, this is not an issue that I can't adapt or change tactics. I have no issue with that with any new books that have come out.
with respect, you're dismissing out of hand the advice people are giving.
XenosTerminus wrote:
If an army can counter essentially everything you physically own in your army- what then? If an army basically obsoletes your entire collection to the point you cannot play a game against said army, if played well.. what then?
theyre not what Vendetta IG were. They're not what nob bikers were in their era. theyre not space wolves. theyre not grey knights in their day. So no.
Does it do it for "free"? No, it doesnt. Tau have to work to pull those tricks off. they cant do it all, all the time. and ultimately, if you are sitting back and letting them do it, youvew lost the mental game and the one on the board. where are you pressuring the tau? where are you playing your own game? When an army can counter everything i do, i see it as a challenge. the fact that they can counter stuff means nothing more than the fact that theyre in the game. heaven forbif the fact that they have tools they can use to accomplish a win! this isnt 2-player tekken with no one at the other controller. Seriously, look at what you have that can counter them. tau are squishy, leadership can be iffy, a lot of their high end dakka comes on very expensive, and relatively-easy-to-kill platforms. they cant do cc, and whilst they can dish out firepower, they cant really take it, and suffer in battles of attriton.
Tau dont obselete your collection - they just have new tools, and a new updated gamebook. its time to write yours. tau in sixth are a totally new beast.
XenosTerminus wrote:
Why are you incapable of seeing this from a casual or 'fun' perspective? I don't care if I lose- I have never had as many issues with this specific army in my entire experience playing this game since 4e. There is very little I can do with the armies I own, and I have tried different lists- as has my main Tau opponent. The results are always the same.
"why are you incapable of just saying "yes" and agreeing with me". thats what that reads like. People have offered advice - good advice. believe me, things are not as bad as you make out. in any case "fun" is subjective. for me, "fun" is taking on those hard as nails lists. then again, i mainly play warmachine, so its par for the course for me.
XenosTerminus wrote:
I am not looking for people to say "well I have no issues with them, so there obviously isn't a problem!' I don't care if you are having success... you are failing to realize that for MANY people, Tau is simply not enjoyable to face.
No, you are only looking only for people to agree with you, and damn any one else with a different opinion, or a point of view that contradicts yours. Sadly, thats not how the internet works. For MANY people, tau is simplt not enjoyable to face. Fair enough - but lets be fair. for MANY people [insert army list] is not enjoyable to face. i remember playing tau against the 3.5ed chaos list - auto lose, pretty much. Now replace that with grey knights, space wolves, blood angels etc. many other people simply disagree with you, dont see any problems and enjoy a challenge. With respect, dont dismiss a counter point because its not slavishly and unquestioningly agreeing with you.
XenosTerminus wrote:
Not everyone has access to limitless models to craft the ultimate list to 'adjust' to ONE FREAKING BOOK. A generalist Marine list that has had no issues against literally 75% of the rest of the armies that are even in this game has nothing on Tau. It is not my tactics, lists, or unwillingness to adapt. Don't assume I am tactically inept or don't know what I am doing.
you dont need an absolute fortune to change. a good list against tau will have a lot of the same tools to be useful against a lot of other army types.
XenosTerminus wrote:And this is why 40k has progressively gotten worse. When a balanced list is considered bad. This is the direction this game has gone, and it is unfortunately extremely disappointing. I supposed I should have expected to get bombasted by a bunch of win-more waac players on a 40k forum. These places are, after all, generally full of self-entitled and opinionated 40-somethings who evidently have VERY different perspectives on what is fun (rolling a gak ton of dice in the shooting phase and wiping out poor 'unfocussed and terrible 40k players').
).
remember what i said about this kind of stuff not doing you any favours? your incredibly rude and uncalled for insults for the folks who post here, are without merit. and so is your belligerent and strawmanlike attack on what you think the kind of game they play is also uneccessary. 40k hasnt gotten worse - its just changed and we've gotten older and learned what it is. as to the bucket o' dice comment - thats how 40k has always been. its just now you use the dice mainly in the shooting phase, and not the assault phase.
bear in mind also what "balanced" is changes from person to person. to be "balanced" doesnt necessarily mean a composite selection of the codex with a little bit of this and that - to me, balance defines if i can deal with a variety of threats. if i can with MEQ, TEQ, vehicles etc (or the warmachine equiveland of DASH) my composition doesnt matter - my armys balance is sound.
also, drop the waac comments. waac is a completely different beast to "competitive".
XenosTerminus wrote:
So your suggestion, then, is to literally devote my entire army to ONE strategy. Ok... great. So it will be great against specific things I encounter randomly, but terrible against others.
Not necessarily - but (a) have a plan, and (b) have a focused methodology to how you play. if you're good at short ranged firepower, for example, it makes sense to focus your army on doing this, and also on getting there, rather than doing some of this, and rounding it out with things that really arent necessary. if you have good armour - you take it. if you have good speed, you use it. etc.
XenosTerminus wrote:
Rock, Paper, Scissors argument once again. You did, however, prove one of my points. Tau punishes 'unfocussed' army lists. Which is why they are not fun to play against in a casual setting. Perhaps that is all I own? Well, then there is an army that can literally guarantee a win simply because the overall game direction and balancing is to the point you have to spam the best units/make incredibly boring copy/pasted lists to win.
Not necessarily. id argue "casual" is an attiude, not an army list. tau ounishes unfocused armies doesnt invalidate casual play. it just invalidates bad play. end of story. as to autowin - its not, nor is it anywhere near to being what iron warriors were in fourth, or what grey knights were in fifth.
as to the dismissive comment about spamming the best units/copypaste army lists - you do realise 40k has been this way since third? every army has its "builds" - not just tau. this is not "new", or "unique". 40k has always been like this. every edition had its powerbuilds on the net, from craftworld eldar and BA in third - tau and eldar skimmerspam and the dreaded iron warriors in fourth, mechvet vendetta guard, longfang spam space wolves, purifier spam Grey knights in fifth etc.
XenosTerminus wrote:
Now I am starting to understand why other people, despite the games having terrible models, always suggest other games (balance).
there are a variety of reasons for this - sometimes its just to do something new. commets about "terrible models" are also highly subjective.
XenosTerminus wrote:Credibility? It's a forum for a game that involves plastic soldiers.
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indeed. with people posting. "credibility" implies people willing to listen, and help you. and a lot of your comments have been flat out insulting and incredibly rude and dismissive, and not listening or accepting other points of view.
XenosTerminus wrote:
It seems like no matter where you turn most conversations about this game spiral out of control into opinionated pissing contests between nerds. I have no issues debating, the issue here is that most people reply with the classic 'my experience says otherwise', automatically dismissing what the other person stated is an issue for them. Either that, or they offer their 'expertise' in list building and army methodology- all very situational and not entirely helpful based on the points I raised.
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and why is "my experience says otherwise" wrong?
and with respect, you are just as guilty of not seeing, (or not wishing to see?) things from a different perspective. people with difference experiences to you have pointed out both ways in which to improve your game, and ways in which they feel your point of view is skewed, and not seeing things as they do. experience is a funny thing. if so may other folks have said that you are not entirely correct in your assertions, then maybe it is at least partially true that there is some merit to what they say?
also if its "not helpful" then what is it that you seek? again, it feels like arant on the internet where all you wanted to hear was people agreeing with you. the fact that they dont should give you pause for thought, and maybe let you think about reevaluating your point of view?
XenosTerminus wrote:
If it matters at this point some of my most memorable games were in fact, losses. No complaints- just good times with some beers. Could care less what the outcome is, because the games were close, and most importantly fun.
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same here. some of my favourite games were both close ones and ones where i got horribly massacred.
XenosTerminus wrote:
Ever since Tau came out (and to a lesser degree IG) I have just not enjoyed fighting them. That is largely because I, as you already pointed out, like a game with variety. Why have a codex filled with interesting unit choices and great models if you will never see 90% of them?
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thats 40k as a whole.
XenosTerminus wrote:
Clearly I enjoy assault more than shooting, but that is not to say I dislike shooting entirely. I simply think that gunlines, or 'shooty' armies, are boring, uninspired, and often utilize some of the cheesiest rules to outright ignore some of the rules in the game. Do other people enjoy this? Definitely. I can say with relative confidence, however, that the majority of people rarely enjoy facing off against gunlines- it makes for very dull games.
Can you? Can you speak for the "majority"? Plenty people also dislike playing against assault armies.
XenosTerminus wrote:I really could care less if you take me seriously or not (my future dreams and ambitions of becoming an internet phenomenon and 40k scholar are ruined)
My main purpose was to gauge what the general populace on here thought about Tau. I think I proved my point.
proved what point? with respect, all youve done is state a point of view, and then not listen to other people at all, followed by re-stating it when people came up with counter points, arguments, and different points of view, then casually insult people. you've not proved tau are "boring", nor have you proved they are "overpowered". you've not proved they are "autowins" nor that there is "nothing you can do".
XenosTerminus wrote:
The extent of my 'solutions' can be summed up with the following:
-Don't play against the opponent
-List tailor
-Spam/optimize
-Play different armies because 40k is evidently just an overpriced and flashy version of rock paper scissors with dice
Unfortunately, none of these really solve the problem. I guess I can just play against him and let him pound me into the pavement- I don't want to tell him he can't use his army, afterall
then what does "solve your problem", if youre so unwilling to listen to people's advice? Why did you come here - what is the point? With respect, your personal experience is your experience, your meta is your meta, but these solutions to the problems you face are all valid. But dont not- use them, dont not-listen to them, and then go off and spout the same complaints again and again.
Dark angels can take 3 dev squads kitted out with lascannon (4) for 450pts, or 3 with missiles for 390, you then take 5 five man units with plasma cannons and las plas razorbacks, plus 3 more las plas razorbacks for the devs, also take 2 divination librarians.
Then sit back and out shoot the tau all day long, and that's just greenwing, deathwing can and do also eat tau, ravenwing breeze through tau.
Dark angels are more than capable with dealing with tau and any other army out there...except maybe cron air
I mop the floors with Tau when I play BT the concept of beating them is quite simple. Just take a ton of squads of 5 neophytes and 5 initiates all with BP and CCW maybe a flamer or meltagun in drop pods and then laugh at the tau since you get to stay bunkered down inside your pods for a turn then assault the next and if your entire army is in pods you have just won since the tau can do nothing in CC and struggle against mech armies. They will be unable to touch most of the pods that land then you get the alpha strike with the horde of marines clubbing baby seals in a leather sack
Formosa wrote: Dark angels can take 3 dev squads kitted out with lascannon (4) for 450pts, or 3 with missiles for 390, you then take 5 five man units with plasma cannons and las plas razorbacks, plus 3 more las plas razorbacks for the devs, also take 2 divination librarians.
Then sit back and out shoot the tau all day long, and that's just greenwing, deathwing can and do also eat tau, ravenwing breeze through tau.
Dark angels are more than capable with dealing with tau and any other army out there...except maybe cron air
This!!
IMHO, if you play/like one of the armies with a new dex, then stuff it! They are balanced(against each other) incredibly well from what i can tell. No the DA(and others) aren't grey knight OP. Deal with it, because the tau aren't either. Granted, they have gotten a lot better, and have been given the opportunity to throw a few more bodies around but not THAT much has changed since 4th.
Now, im sorry to all the people that have built their list around killing marines for the past decade but it looks like a wider varying era is upon us! Get used to it and adapt! Like the people that dont just whine.
Zweischneid wrote: Dunno. Tau ("A supposedly shooty army") doesn't pwn the shooty game in this shooty edition of 40K half as much as Space Wolves ("A supposedly choppy army") pwn the shooty game in the choppy edition.
No problem from my side of things.
Also, Heldrakes... Fix those first.
Thanks.
This. My wolves are shooty as hell, and I don't even try to get into CC about 75% of the time. If you want to charge me, GREAT! I have counterattack to mitigate that. Otherwise my grey hunters are perfectly content to rapid fire you off the board.
And yes, Heldrakes are worse. They are arguably one of, if not the, best anti-infantry units in the game. And it's hard as hell to kill.
Tau are easy. Their troops fall apart like wet cardboard. I put as many templates as possible on them and watch them evaporate. Once their scoring units are gone, you can focus on killing the big scary stuff.
I feel like the real issue here is not that Tau are overpowered; it is that some people don't like Tau (for whatever inane reason), and thus don't think Tau deserve the fighting chance which they've been given.
They're not comfortable with the thought of Tau being a vicious enemy to be taken seriously, the way the other armies are.
These are the people who really enjoyed sneering arrogantly while Tau players lost, (or if the Tau fought with flawless tactical genius, tied.)
It's as if they feel entitled to a condescending attitude toward Tau, and GW took that away from them by not only balancing the Codex, but allowing Tau to deprive them of their cheesy tactics, forcing them to fight toe-to-toe.
Every Codex requires a measure of adaptation. Knowing what an army can do is the first step in defeating it.
The Tau are as beatable as any other army... But I guess that's the problem, isn't it? "They're supposed to be MORE beatable than everyone else!"
In regards to the Riptide, I'm just going to quote myself.
Although I'd already decided upon it before, my opinion that Riptides are the most broken and dumb unit in 40k at present has been reinforced. They're just ridiculous. For 200 or less points, you have an almost impossible to kill unit that does absolutely everything. High strength, AP2 pie plates? Yeah. Melta gun for heavy AT? Yeah. Effective AA? Yeah. Nightfighting? Range? Whats that? Oh, you're going to plan to shoot from a distance/assault me? I get a 2D6 jump pack move, so screw you.
12 Lascannon shots at BS4 (aka taking 3 Devastator squads fully tooled up with them) results in an average 4.444 (possibly plus a bit) wounds against a Riptide in each shooting phase. Bearing in mind this thing has a 72'' range and massive height, can jump on buildings and jump down to get LOS on anywhere on the board and abuse cover saves, AND the fact my calculations take into account that the Riptide hasn't gone for the 3++ (in which case, 2.222 wounds) you are basically boned using Devastators. You'll fire once, then he'll drop a pie plate on one of your Devastator squads, and if you even suffer 2 deaths (which is pretty likely), your wound output goes down to 3.704 average. You need to kill these things fast. If he has two, or even three, what the hell are you going to do?
You just devoted the entirety of your 450 point fire support reserves to wounding one 185 point model. Well done.
The only solution I can think of is drop podding Company Vets/equivalents with 10 Combi Plasmas, hoping you get within range and that he hasn't bubble wrapped. If you rapid fire all of them, you've got 5.926 average wounds, or average dead. On the other hand, you now have a 300+ pt squad of 2 attack Tactical Marines that are worthless at anything else, that will inevitably meet the bad end of a metric ton of pulse rifle shots. The fact that you're almost paying double the price of the Riptide just to remove a sub 200 pt model is ridiculous.
You can't ignore it. It can shoot at you 99% of the time, with a S8 AP2 pie plate that will obliterate your infantry. Unless your opponent is a complete idiot you will never charge it, because a competent player will abuse its movement+2D6 (or if he NR's, 3D6) jump to put him miles away from your assault units, if he doesn't already have a bubble wrap. He'll probably be on the other side of the table.
They invalidate Space Marine mechanized armies. You want to know what my 40 Marines in my Dark Angel army would do if they all rapid fired at 12'' at a Riptide?
With the bolters, average 2 wounds.
With the plasma guns, average 2.37 wounds.
You are never, ever, ever, going to get 40 Marines within rapid fire range of a Riptide owned by a competent player. Even if you do you won't kill it in one turn on average, and then that Riptide and the rest of his army is going to either be A) Sitting on or taking the objectives or B) Massacring you with fire.
When I look at my IG, Marines and Ork Codexes, I have to think, 'man, how am I going to set this army up? where's the killy stuff? how do I do W,X and Y without sacrificing Z?'
Usually, that's 'how do I kill tanks, how do I kill MC's, how do I kill flyers, without sacrificing scoring capability too much or list structure/reliability?'
A Tau player can start his list by going 'Oh, this Riptide can have a Velocity tracker, and handle everything. In fact, lets have two. Scoring units, damn. Oh, I know, Fire Warriors, they can start shooting effective fire from turn 1, and they're 54 points starting price. Easy. '
And the most important question, the entire reason for playing the hobby in the first place:
I do not find it fun in the slightest to play someone who can wipe me off the board while I barely get to scratch most of his army. If that's the case, whats the point of unpacking your models?
This is a legitimate concern. I praise Xenosterminus for having the balls to do this because I knew there would be people with delusional happy cookie-cutter images of 40k trying to tear this up before I even entered the thread.
Archonate wrote: I feel like the real issue here is not that Tau are overpowered; it is that some people don't like Tau (for whatever inane reason), and thus don't think Tau deserve the fighting chance which they've been given.
They're not comfortable with the thought of Tau being a vicious enemy to be taken seriously, the way the other armies are.
These are the people who really enjoyed sneering arrogantly while Tau players lost, (or if the Tau fought with flawless tactical genius, tied.)
It's as if they feel entitled to a condescending attitude toward Tau, and GW took that away from them by not only balancing the Codex, but allowing Tau to deprive them of their cheesy tactics, forcing them to fight toe-to-toe.
Every Codex requires a measure of adaptation. Knowing what an army can do is the first step in defeating it.
The Tau are as beatable as any other army... But I guess that's the problem, isn't it? "They're supposed to be MORE beatable than everyone else!"
I have no sympathy for those of this mindset.
I think there is something to this. That whole "young race" thing tends to get some people to think Tau shouldn't have the level of power they do.
Unfortunately, from what I've personally seen, a lot of the Tau hate stems from all the new Tau players who jumped on board the Commie-wagon once they found out how powerful certain builds were. All these players tend to use the same optimized lists containing multiple riptides and broadside units (normally maxed missile-sides). And even that's not the real issue, its the fact that many of these players, being new to Tau, tend to just castle up and shout, "COME AT ME BRO!" While its certainly a valid strategy, its not particularly fun to essentially only have only one side actually doing anything other than rolling dice. Castle-Tau are just boring as feth to play against, but mobile Tau are an entirely different experience, one that I'll gladly play against with either of my armies.
In regards to the Riptide, I'm just going to quote myself.
Spoiler:
Although I'd already decided upon it before, my opinion that Riptides are the most broken and dumb unit in 40k at present has been reinforced. They're just ridiculous. For 200 or less points, you have an almost impossible to kill unit that does absolutely everything. High strength, AP2 pie plates? Yeah. Melta gun for heavy AT? Yeah. Effective AA? Yeah. Nightfighting? Range? Whats that? Oh, you're going to plan to shoot from a distance/assault me? I get a 2D6 jump pack move, so screw you.
12 Lascannon shots at BS4 (aka taking 3 Devastator squads fully tooled up with them) results in an average 4.444 (possibly plus a bit) wounds against a Riptide in each shooting phase. Bearing in mind this thing has a 72'' range and massive height, can jump on buildings and jump down to get LOS on anywhere on the board and abuse cover saves, AND the fact my calculations take into account that the Riptide hasn't gone for the 3++ (in which case, 2.222 wounds) you are basically boned using Devastators. You'll fire once, then he'll drop a pie plate on one of your Devastator squads, and if you even suffer 2 deaths (which is pretty likely), your wound output goes down to 3.704 average. You need to kill these things fast. If he has two, or even three, what the hell are you going to do?
You just devoted the entirety of your 450 point fire support reserves to wounding one 185 point model. Well done.
The only solution I can think of is drop podding Company Vets/equivalents with 10 Combi Plasmas, hoping you get within range and that he hasn't bubble wrapped. If you rapid fire all of them, you've got 5.926 average wounds, or average dead. On the other hand, you now have a 300+ pt squad of 2 attack Tactical Marines that are worthless at anything else, that will inevitably meet the bad end of a metric ton of pulse rifle shots. The fact that you're almost paying double the price of the Riptide just to remove a sub 200 pt model is ridiculous.
You can't ignore it. It can shoot at you 99% of the time, with a S8 AP2 pie plate that will obliterate your infantry. Unless your opponent is a complete idiot you will never charge it, because a competent player will abuse its movement+2D6 (or if he NR's, 3D6) jump to put him miles away from your assault units, if he doesn't already have a bubble wrap. He'll probably be on the other side of the table.
They invalidate Space Marine mechanized armies. You want to know what my 40 Marines in my Dark Angel army would do if they all rapid fired at 12'' at a Riptide?
With the bolters, average 2 wounds.
With the plasma guns, average 2.37 wounds.
You are never, ever, ever, going to get 40 Marines within rapid fire range of a Riptide owned by a competent player. Even if you do you won't kill it in one turn on average.
When I look at my IG, Marines and Ork Codexes, I have to think, 'man, how am I going to set this army up? where's the killy stuff? how do I do W,X and Y without sacrificing Z?'
Usually, that's 'how do I kill tanks, how do I kill MC's, how do I kill flyers, without sacrificing scoring capability too much or list structure/reliability?'
A Tau player can start his list by going 'Oh, this Riptide can have a Velocity tracker, and handle everything. In fact, lets have two. Scoring units, damn. Oh, I know, Fire Warriors, they can start shooting effective fire from turn 1, and they're 54 points starting price. Easy. '
This is a legitimate concern. I praise Xenosterminus for having the balls to do this because I knew there would be people with delusional happy cookie-cutter images of 40k trying to tear this up before I even entered the thread.
I do understand that the potential for the Riptide is pretty high. That potential however has an associated price to achieve.
The weapon still gets hot, which can cost it firing it's main weapon for the turn, or in other words it can fire 83% of the time.
If it fires it has 66% to scatter.
If it scatters it has about a 60% chance to veer off target by 3+" in any direction, which can be effective if the targeted opponent spreads units out.
This is generally minimized by taking markerlights, usually by pathfinders or expensive HQ combinations. I generally have a problem with marine players saying how they aren't getting enough saves when the save is usually removed thanks to a T3 5+ unit that has to sit outside of a tank and is vulnerable to everything ever.
The Nova charge also forces them to risk a few extra wounds or they can take some expensive upgrades to try and mitigate this.
It's not terribly priced for the amount of damage it deals, but I wouldn't say it's broken in anyways. It's not as especially good against flyers or heavier vehicles since the HBC isn't the weapon of choice, and even when that option is taken its usually with a commander to give it tank hunter to really be effective.
I've faced down too many T8+ FMC with iron arm and other psychic powers to really feel anything is broken at this point.
On to the original issue. Tau units are still as vulnerable as ever. Yes they can hide thanks to JSJ, but LOS blocking terrain shouldn't be so heavy that it can completely stop a player from shooting at an enemy. Tau troops are still extremely vulnerable to just being shot at by anything. Deepstriking/outflanking still works just fine. The only weapon to really fear on Interceptor still scatters normally and doesn't allow cover. I've outflanked units right next to an enemy and let him scatter onto friendlys. It doesn't really completely remove that aspect, you just have to work around it instead of plodding straight through. Crisis/Broadside suits are still susceptible to the same kind of weapons they were before, and I can remember getting beaten down by several missile spam and Psyfleman dread spam lists in the past that completely decimated most of my heavy firepower. The tanks are cheaper, but actually less manueverable and defended than before thanks to loss of multi-tracker and the raise in cost and nerf of D. pods.
What really changed? A lot actually. One thing that didn't change though was the Tau being able to field a lot of AP2 weapons and the ability to ignore cover. Before it was a joke because it was so ungodly hard to actually remove it entirely. Most of the lists I've seen actually had people trying to remove markers from their list entirely (except tetras) because it wasn't cost effective. Now that the ability is actually able to be used people say it makes the Tau broken or not fun. It's hilarious to me because every time I tried to explain the limitations of the 4th ed Tau to marine players they'd laugh and just say how I have such insane access to AP2 weapons and removing cover. To me, this is more Karma than anything else.
I don't think Tau are overpowered, but I think the people playing older and underpowered books and struggling against Tau have legitimate reasons to be upset. Not every book has been updated yet so it's expected for problems to arise. If only all books were as well-written as Tau.
The only things that make me frown with Tau are Librarian Farsight bombs and triple Riptide at 1000 points and under, but plenty of other armies can field incredible deathstars and outmuscle you at low points value as well, and at least Tau take huge risks for playing those kinds of builds.
I think it's fortifications and allies and playing older books that are the real problem, not Tau.
Did they shake up the meta? Absolutely, but it a terrible way. All of the seemingly ‘reliable’ ways people mention to ‘beat Tau’ rarely progress beyond anecdotal and circumstantial evidence.
Losing the auto-win button against Tau hasn't shaken up the meta, as tournaments show.
I've seen Demon players kick the ever lovin crap out of Tau armies that bring all the toys.
Clearly some people are going to be a bit...entrenched ....one some of these topics.
I have to say, instead of looking at the strengthes of the tau (or ANY CODEX) instead look at the weaknesses ....
If you fear the riptide, already won he has.
And yes, silly yoda-esque prose aside....read the statline...then read it again...and remember, you don't have to KILL a riptide...you just have to make it useless...
The key to beating tau (an why I have never lost to them) it to not fight their strengths....but their weaknesses.
Now, barring that...I think I am gonna go back to painting minis and watching star wars.
I don't think Tau are overpowered. One thing I'll say for 6th is that most of the codexes have been pretty balanced, if not always fluffy (damn it chaos), which is a nice change of pace.
Many people have hit the nail on the head here with why tau are regarded as OP, while Eldar are not. Hardly anybody likes fighting a gun line, and tau tend to win big (nobody reaches assault, and the list was assault focused) or have a close game. It's rare to see a tau list just get curb stomped, because they always get at least 2 turns of pretty impressive weapons fire.
That said, they are not anywhere near op. siren bomb, iron warriors, or Eldar from 3rd were op. gk and arguably necrons from 5th were borderline op, but even they were defeatable. Tau are just less fun to lose to than say, nids or orks
The problem I find is that tau's weakness is close combat yet you can almost never make it to close combat. I play wolves and I find that I never have enough bodies to make it into combat and still live. I'm not the most competitive player but I can realize that there is some bs here. Just the other day, a crisis suit commander killed my thunderlord in close combat. I did something right finally and then lost when it came down to it. I have regularly been tabled by the end of turn four after killing about 5 people. Every game where he gets to go first, I know the game is over before it starts. He has killed 8 out of 10 terminators deep striking with one riptide shot.
It's all about the terrain in this edition (in my limited experience). Make sure there are no positions where either player can just sit and have open avenues of fire to all parts of the board. LOS blocking terrain is a must, as much as possible. Place a large cardboard box in the middle of the table if you have to. A gun-line player of any sort is never going to do this themselves (why would they?), but you will instantly find that you both are having more interesting games.
Tau are a good book, I wouldn't say they were a game breaking book, they don't have any units that quite break the game the way for example the helldrake did.
In my experience Tau have been rather dull to play against (I play Dark Eldar). Here's why:
1) Everyone and there brother has jumped on the Tau bandwagon, this means 1 out of 3 of my games is against Tau. This can make playing them quite repetitive.
2) The book encourages players to sit back and shoot and not play the game. I would say most of the tau players I have encountered adopt this boring static gunline play, and the changes to marker light encourages this. You don't even need to move out and claim objectives if you can just shoot people off them.
3) Tau is a very beginner friendly army, now this is not to say the Tau codex doesn't have a high skill ceiling, it's just that an average player can do quite well with the gunline playstyle as a result innovative play is not encouraged. If you can beat most players around your skill level by sitting back and shooting why change anything?
4) So far I have won all my games against Tau bar one (using Dark Eldar), what bothers me is each time I feel my opponents clearly had the tools to beat me but had no initiative, no creativity and relied massively on list building in order to win. When their sit there and shoot strategy stops working they just fall to pieces.
Now a lot of the same things could be said about imperial guard, but this goes back to my first point tau are really popular at the moment so people play tau more than they probably want to, combine this with a lot of players not knowing how to deal with tau and a lot of tau players using a very static shooting playstyle and you will get internet "hate".
Can Tau be fun to play against? Sure they have some great potential to play very dynamically, stealth teams with counter fire defence and kroot bait, piranha blocking, aggressive mechanised fire warriors, mobile broadsides with marker support moving into the midfield and so on.
For all the mobility in the new book, GW made the tau static gunline look so much better on paper, as a result your average Tau opponent sits in his deployment zone, guiding and presciencing his riptides with a bunch of broadsides behind an aegis until turn 5 when his windrider jetbikes capture some objectives.
The problem isn't that it's unbeatable, far from it, it's just boring as hell to play against. Playing against it every three games only compounds the matter.
I do agree that most standard Tau lists are very boring to play against, as already mentioned sitting back and unloading a god-like amount of shots at your opponent is a scary things to face. However that is why I am going with a pure Battle Suit list in part for fluff, its decently competitive, and there will be a lot of "jumping around" making the movement phase key as I would probably shoot myself if I just sat back and rolled dice all game
OP if you are interested in learning how to combat tau I would take some example lists and a list of your models over to the list building sub-forum. I would also suggest a less inflammatory title and statements as such statements will attract large numbers of "Tau are OP!!!" and people who disagree with you. Either way it will clutter any discussion on how to deal with tau.
As for this thread I believe some of the stuff in the tau dex is somewhat over costed;
-vespids are a cool model that I never see due to poor rules and worse points pricing
-perhaps stealth teams as they never seem to get taken
and others are under costed;
-velocity tracker should change price with the unit it goes on as these are much better on broadsides and riptides than flakk missiles are on every SM -riptides are under costed by a pretty significant amount, I'm sure people will argue but it is obvious if you look at how many are taken to a tournament setting
-suit command teams probably should have been capped in size at a much lower number to avoid farsight/shadowsun bombs from getting out of hand
I would however say that none of this is particularly beyond handling with a decent TAC list. I consider the new Tau book to be a big step up as the old dex had 1 build that was even decent and you never saw a different build. I now see at least 3 different builds in the competitive bracket.
The real problem is that the old SM builds that were good in 4e/5e are not good anymore against most of the 6e meta. New non traditional lists are starting to see light with drop pod BoD fortresses, LR spam, land speeder spam (yes you would be shocked how good this list can do), and RW.
I see alot of stuff about Tau missile spam but nothing about the fact it has a grand 36" range? This means that a traditional Tau list that wants to deploy at distance has to deploy somewhere ~12" from the board edge.
I will abstain from further commentary of this thread but there has been a huge amount of misinformation thrown out here about Tau durability and DA offense/defense.
jifel wrote: Tau aren't broken however. They're as prone to bad luck as all armies, and can be countered by quite a few current good lists, like Daemons and some Crons.
I agree with this. Certain Daemon builds in particular are very difficult to beat especially if things don't go your way with dice there's practically no recovery...you're done if those FMCs or flesh hounds hit your lines. Support fire and snapshots will not save you.
Competitively speaking...mono Tau isn't the powerhouse TAC list. I think you will see Tau+Eldar or Eldar+Tau varieties being the most frequent in the top 10.
Space marines book is showing its age. Their new book is right around the corner and they always get good stuff. So, hopefully the marine whinging vs. Tau will lessen soon.
I agree with this. Certain Daemon builds in particular are very difficult to beat especially if things don't go your way with dice there's practically no recovery...you're done if those FMCs or flesh hounds hit your lines. Support fire and snapshots will not save you.
Problem with this is that even though Daemons can beat a broad range of stuff (including the Tau Master Race), they can only do this when all the stars align and the Dice Gods smile down to the player. A CD army with all the right rolls is unbeatable. A CD army with random rolls all around the place is a free kill. So personally, I say arguing that the Tau is not OP only because the CD can beat it is kinda' off the mark. Oh yeah, it can... roughly 50% of the times. On the other hand, the Tau army will have a similar efficiency, giving a much better average.
-vespids are a cool model that I never see due to poor rules and worse points pricing
-perhaps stealth teams as they never seem to get taken
and others are under costed.
This is only an excuse for people who need to win with plastic toy soldiers. GW as we know is never "balanced". Can GW really be at fault? From what I here, Privateer Press is extremely balanced and still alot of people only take one or two builds because of "cost effectiveness". So it's not only GW. Even if GW "balanced" everything people will still take the "best units" and people will still be complaining.
So what it comes too is it's not GW fault, it's just people need to "win" with plastic toy soldiers. It's just like saying guns kill. Is it the guns fault or the people who use them?
Tau are a good book, I wouldn't say they were a game breaking book, they don't have any units that quite break the game the way for example the helldrake did.
In my experience Tau have been rather dull to play against (I play Dark Eldar). Here's why:
1) Everyone and there brother has jumped on the Tau bandwagon, this means 1 out of 3 of my games is against Tau. This can make playing them quite repetitive.
2) The book encourages players to sit back and shoot and not play the game. I would say most of the tau players I have encountered adopt this boring static gunline play, and the changes to marker light encourages this. You don't even need to move out and claim objectives if you can just shoot people off them.
3) Tau is a very beginner friendly army, now this is not to say the Tau codex doesn't have a high skill ceiling, it's just that an average player can do quite well with the gunline playstyle as a result innovative play is not encouraged. If you can beat most players around your skill level by sitting back and shooting why change anything?
4) So far I have won all my games against Tau bar one (using Dark Eldar), what bothers me is each time I feel my opponents clearly had the tools to beat me but had no initiative, no creativity and relied massively on list building in order to win. When their sit there and shoot strategy stops working they just fall to pieces.
Now a lot of the same things could be said about imperial guard, but this goes back to my first point tau are really popular at the moment so people play tau more than they probably want to, combine this with a lot of players not knowing how to deal with tau and a lot of tau players using a very static shooting playstyle and you will get internet "hate".
Can Tau be fun to play against? Sure they have some great potential to play very dynamically, stealth teams with counter fire defence and kroot bait, piranha blocking, aggressive mechanised fire warriors, mobile broadsides with marker support moving into the midfield and so on.
For all the mobility in the new book, GW made the tau static gunline look so much better on paper, as a result your average Tau opponent sits in his deployment zone, guiding and presciencing his riptides with a bunch of broadsides behind an aegis until turn 5 when his windrider jetbikes capture some objectives.
The problem isn't that it's unbeatable, far from it, it's just boring as hell to play against. Playing against it every three games only compounds the matter.
A GumyBear wrote: I mop the floors with Tau when I play BT the concept of beating them is quite simple. Just take a ton of squads of 5 neophytes and 5 initiates all with BP and CCW maybe a flamer or meltagun in drop pods and then laugh at the tau since you get to stay bunkered down inside your pods for a turn then assault the next and if your entire army is in pods you have just won since the tau can do nothing in CC and struggle against mech armies. They will be unable to touch most of the pods that land then you get the alpha strike with the horde of marines clubbing baby seals in a leather sack
I looked into this a bit because I had never heard of this. The FAQ for BT does in fact permit this RAW.
Regardless, I don't think I would be comfortable playing Drop Pods in this way, as much as I would love to, without feeling like TFG. It's pretty clear GW just botched up the FAQ and has not updated it, which is honestly no surprise since they don't really care about BT. A Drop Pod is a Drop Pod, and since they updated every other previously different aspect to pre 5e Drop Pod rules, it is not out of the question to play it as such.
Back on topic, there are probably things I could do better against Tau as a whole since my primary lists/strategies are not seeing success- the problem is this won't change the fact I just don't enjoy playing against them. Similar to IG gunlines, it's an army that just lacks a lot of variety- sit back and shoot buckets of dice at your opponent. Bleh.
In my opinion, MEQ armies are actually really starting to suffer in this edition. I remember when being T4 and having a 3+ made you tough as nails. Paying the points for this luxury was worth it. The trend with the 3 most recent Xenos books (Necron, Tau, Eldar) is to just dump so many high STR shots at infantry the toughness is irrelevant, and you WILL roll 1's and 2's via weight of fire.
They made this edition SO shooty that MEQ troops are actually now terrible. It is far more effective to have cheap troops that are expendable. You don't care if the same amount of firepower is coming at you, since the models are more abundant.
I don't think the Vanilla book is going to change this. This may very well be the turning point where MEQ is relegated to Ally fodder/mid-low tier armies. An odd move for GW's cash cow/baby
A GumyBear wrote: I mop the floors with Tau when I play BT the concept of beating them is quite simple. Just take a ton of squads of 5 neophytes and 5 initiates all with BP and CCW maybe a flamer or meltagun in drop pods and then laugh at the tau since you get to stay bunkered down inside your pods for a turn then assault the next and if your entire army is in pods you have just won since the tau can do nothing in CC and struggle against mech armies. They will be unable to touch most of the pods that land then you get the alpha strike with the horde of marines clubbing baby seals in a leather sack
I looked into this a bit because I had never heard of this. The FAQ for BT does in fact permit this RAW.
Regardless, I don't think I would be comfortable playing Drop Pods in this way, as much as I would love to, without feeling like TFG. It's pretty clear GW just botched up the FAQ and has not updated it, which is honestly no surprise since they don't really care about BT. A Drop Pod is a Drop Pod, and since they updated every other previously different aspect to pre 5e Drop Pod rules, it is not out of the question to play it as such.
Back on topic, there are probably things I could do better against Tau as a whole since my primary lists/strategies are not seeing success- the problem is this won't change the fact I just don't enjoy playing against them. Similar to IG gunlines, it's an army that just lacks a lot of variety- sit back and shoot buckets of dice at your opponent. Bleh.
In my opinion, MEQ armies are actually really starting to suffer in this edition. I remember when being T4 and having a 3+ made you tough as nails. Paying the points for this luxury was worth it. The trend with the 3 most recent Xenos books (Necron, Tau, Eldar) is to just dump so many high STR shots at infantry the toughness is irrelevant, and you WILL roll 1's and 2's via weight of fire.
They made this edition SO shooty that MEQ troops are actually now terrible. It is far more effective to have cheap troops that are expendable. You don't care if the same amount of firepower is coming at you, since the models are more abundant.
I don't think the Vanilla book is going to change this. This may very well be the turning point where MEQ is relegated to Ally fodder/mid-low tier armies. An odd move for GW's cash cow/baby
1d4chan's prophecy of the Necrons replacing the Space Marines as the face of 40k is becoming true!
Power armour being low on the totem pole was actually the way it was in 2nd edition too. IMO the thing that really hurt the game in 3rd edition was making marines a more powerful book-- you got lots more experienced players playing some variety of marines which made for rather stilted statistics w/r/t armies played. I'd much more prefer perfect balance, but barring that I'd rather have power armour armies be weaker and thus somewhat rare (with various xenos armies filling in the gaps) than be too strong and have it feel like 2/3rds of the armies you're playing are MEQs.
If our club was a stilted a playing field as was common in 3rd ed (i.e. mostly MEQs vs. the single MEQ army we have playing among the 6 of us) I think we would have gotten border and started playing something else instead. Marines IMO have a pretty awful backstory, and having them show up with the kind of regularity they have just seems odd since they are supposed to be rare special forces.
I will tell you guys how to deal with tau.
Objective games. They suck at them. place objective to where you can hide from tau shooting and just play the waiting game
hotsauceman1 wrote: I will tell you guys how to deal with tau.
Objective games. They suck at them. place objective to where you can hide from tau shooting and just play the waiting game
If you're in cover, the Tau can remove it, if both of you are camping out of LoS doing nothing, you have somehow invented a game more boring than monopoly.
hotsauceman1 wrote: I will tell you guys how to deal with tau.
Objective games. They suck at them. place objective to where you can hide from tau shooting and just play the waiting game
If you're in cover, the Tau can remove it, if both of you are camping out of LoS doing nothing, you have somehow invented a game more boring than monopoly.
hotsauceman1 wrote: I will tell you guys how to deal with tau.
Objective games. They suck at them. place objective to where you can hide from tau shooting and just play the waiting game
If you're in cover, the Tau can remove it, if both of you are camping out of LoS doing nothing, you have somehow invented a game more boring than monopoly.
Tau can remove cover, yes. But it's from either a T3 5+ unit or a unit filled with T4 4+ models. Neither of those is hard to remove.
But Tau are not that great at grabbing objectives. High cost transport and weak troops make it pretty simple to land on more objectives than your opponent.
Seriously though, is this thread against gunlines or Tau. Cause I play fairly mobile and dynamic Tau and am getting a bit upset to have my army refered to as the new "easy mode" or "newb proof" army or that it just wouldn't be fun to play against me. Cause I had plenty of games in late 5th edition where GK and SW players had fun playing me and all they had to do was hide and lob S8+ weapons at my few suits all day long. Maybe it's wrong to compare the effectiveness of a codex made for a certain edition against one that's pretty out of date. I know that Deamons, Necrons, DA, and CSM seem to be fairly balanced against Tau and have been my harder match ups.
Savageconvoy wrote: Tau can remove cover, yes. But it's from either a T3 5+ unit or a unit filled with T4 4+ models. Neither of those is hard to remove.
But Tau are not that great at grabbing objectives. High cost transport and weak troops make it pretty simple to land on more objectives than your opponent.
Seriously though, is this thread against gunlines or Tau. Cause I play fairly mobile and dynamic Tau and am getting a bit upset to have my army refered to as the new "easy mode" or "newb proof" army or that it just wouldn't be fun to play against me. Cause I had plenty of games in late 5th edition where GK and SW players had fun playing me and all they had to do was hide and lob S8+ weapons at my few suits all day long. Maybe it's wrong to compare the effectiveness of a codex made for a certain edition against one that's pretty out of date. I know that Deamons, Necrons, DA, and CSM seem to be fairly balanced against Tau and have been my harder match ups.
Gunline armies as a whole are no fun, why do you think world wae 1 RTS games are so rare?
Seriously though, is this thread against gunlines or Tau. Cause I play fairly mobile and dynamic Tau and am getting a bit upset to have my army refered to as the new "easy mode" or "newb proof" army or that it just wouldn't be fun to play against me. Cause I had plenty of games in late 5th edition where GK and SW players had fun playing me and all they had to do was hide and lob S8+ weapons at my few suits all day long. Maybe it's wrong to compare the effectiveness of a codex made for a certain edition against one that's pretty out of date. I know that Deamons, Necrons, DA, and CSM seem to be fairly balanced against Tau and have been my harder match ups.
It's the gunline. When people think of Necrons, they immediately assume Flyerspam / Wraithspam. When people think Tau, they immediately think gunline. It's a lot of over-generalization that's happening in such discussions and while I do agree that Tau are slightly over the top, that's, as usual 1-2 units that should be notched down and we're good. And really, I think they, just as Necrons, deserve this after being an auto-win for so long.
I've played the new Tau a few times, I've never found them to be too difficult, I'd say I have more wins than losses (although probably a narrow margin).
I currently play Mixed Wing DA and my lists are not competitive really, I just play what I like or is fluffy. (Fluff Bunny btw.)
Also as good as the new Tau are shooting, I've never really been in a game or even witnessed many where they truly dominated the shooting phase over an opponent, I've even outshot them on occassion (I don't even use Banner of Devastation.)
They are a good army and there are a few gripes I have about the book (Riptide, again not rules, I just think it's too strange/dumb.), but in reality I wouldn't say it's any more OP than any other. The only thing annoying me in terms of rules just now is Wave Serpents but even then it's not so bad I'd go on about it.
Also I find Tau are pretty bad on the objective side of things, they struggle to take and hold objectives and in some games that alone can be punishing when it comes to the end game point total.
Once we had a gunline Death Korps vs Gunline Tau game with near total LOS blockage that funneled anything thatbpassed into a no mans land where pretty much every long range gun could fire at the passerby.
So we spent like a half hour shouting variations of "Come at me bro!" At each other before realizing this was going nowhere fast.
Of course this was against my wife and we were gak faced, singing, slurring words drunk
No. The unit that has a markerlight puts tokens on a unit instead of wounds when they fire. The tokens are used by any other unit in the codex.
Say for example pathfinders fire 8 shots, get 4 hits which produces 4 tokens. Then one Riptide uses two tokens to remove cover and fires. If the unit is still alive then another unit can use remaining tokens in the same phase.
Savageconvoy wrote: No. The unit that has a markerlight puts tokens on a unit instead of wounds when they fire. The tokens are used by any other unit in the codex.
Say for example pathfinders fire 8 shots, get 4 hits which produces 4 tokens. Then one Riptide uses two tokens to remove cover and fires. If the unit is still alive then another unit can use remaining tokens in the same phase.
I don't have the Tau codex to reference, but is this accurate?
Our groups Tau player suggested that once a Markerlight is used, it benefits ANY UNIT for the rest of the turn.
For example- 4 markers are placed on a unit. A unit uses two to remove cover, but the unit survives. A different unit then fires but also ignores cover from the previously spent markerlights- the remaining 2 can be used for something else (like increasing BS, for example).
I think the way you described it was how the old Markerlights worked, which IMHO was far more tactical and required thought (I had no problem with them). If I am wrong about this, well, that may completely change my opinion on how I feel about Tau's ability to remove cover- it would be far less of an issue.
I don't have the Tau codex to reference, but is this accurate?
Our groups Tau player suggested that once a Markerlight is used, it benefits ANY UNIT for the rest of the turn.
For example- 4 markers are placed on a unit. A unit uses two to remove cover, but the unit survives. A different unit then fires but also ignores cover from the previously spent markerlights- the remaining 2 can be used for something else (like increasing BS, for example).
I think the way you described it was how the old Markerlights worked, which IMHO was far more tactical and required thought (I had no problem with them). If I am wrong about this, well, that may completely change my opinion on how I feel about Tau's ability to remove cover- it would be far less of an issue.
Dear god no "Immediately before a unit from Codex: Tau Empire shoots at a target that has one or more markerlight counters, it can declare it is using one or more of tl1e markerlight abilities listed below. Each ability costs a number of markerlight counters - remove this number of markerlight counters from the target immediately when the ability is declared. A unit can combine any number of markerlight abilities providing that there are enough counters." pg68
your play group is cheesing you and all you had to do is read. just ask for the rules next time something seems super over powered.
I don't have the Tau codex to reference, but is this accurate?
Our groups Tau player suggested that once a Markerlight is used, it benefits ANY UNIT for the rest of the turn.
For example- 4 markers are placed on a unit. A unit uses two to remove cover, but the unit survives. A different unit then fires but also ignores cover from the previously spent markerlights- the remaining 2 can be used for something else (like increasing BS, for example).
I think the way you described it was how the old Markerlights worked, which IMHO was far more tactical and required thought (I had no problem with them). If I am wrong about this, well, that may completely change my opinion on how I feel about Tau's ability to remove cover- it would be far less of an issue.
Dear god no
"Immediately before a unit from Codex: Tau Empire shoots at
a target that has one or more markerlight counters, it can
declare it is using one or more of tl1e markerlight abilities
listed below. Each ability costs a number of markerlight
counters - remove this number of markerlight counters
from the target immediately when the ability is declared.
A unit can combine any number of markerlight abilities providing
that there are enough counters." pg68
your play group is cheesing you and all you had to do is read. just ask for the rules next time something seems super over powered.
lol
A lot of my gripes from this ENTIRE thread are moot now. While I still find Tau/gunlines to be boring to play against, and overly optimized Tau lists are still extremely busted against casual lists, it's refreshing to hear that Markerlights aren't as busted as I thought they were.
A lot of my gripes from this ENTIRE thread are moot now. While I still find Tau/gunlines to be boring to play against, and overly optimized Tau lists are still extremely busted against casual lists, it's refreshing to hear that Markerlights aren't as busted as I thought they were.
I don't have the Tau codex to reference, but is this accurate?
Our groups Tau player suggested that once a Markerlight is used, it benefits ANY UNIT for the rest of the turn.
For example- 4 markers are placed on a unit. A unit uses two to remove cover, but the unit survives. A different unit then fires but also ignores cover from the previously spent markerlights- the remaining 2 can be used for something else (like increasing BS, for example).
I think the way you described it was how the old Markerlights worked, which IMHO was far more tactical and required thought (I had no problem with them). If I am wrong about this, well, that may completely change my opinion on how I feel about Tau's ability to remove cover- it would be far less of an issue.
Dear god no
"Immediately before a unit from Codex: Tau Empire shoots at
a target that has one or more markerlight counters, it can
declare it is using one or more of tl1e markerlight abilities
listed below. Each ability costs a number of markerlight
counters - remove this number of markerlight counters
from the target immediately when the ability is declared.
A unit can combine any number of markerlight abilities providing
that there are enough counters." pg68
your play group is cheesing you and all you had to do is read. just ask for the rules next time something seems super over powered.
lol
A lot of my gripes from this ENTIRE thread are moot now. While I still find Tau/gunlines to be boring to play against, and overly optimized Tau lists are still extremely busted against casual lists, it's refreshing to hear that Markerlights aren't as busted as I thought they were.
That will teach me to trust my WAAC friends.
They may have to be upgraded from WAAC to TFG. That is some serious rules "mistake". No wonder you were so pissed about Tau, this would effectively make all Tau units/weapons BS5 and ignores cover all the time.
Yeah. I'm guessing your friend didn't play Tau until the last few months. I almost have to assume it's an intentional mistake, since knowing how markers work is like Tau 101.
I knew better then that back before I even got my first battleforce.
This also explains your attitude, under "markers apply to all" limits a 200 point dedication for markerlight allow a full 1500 army to have BS5 or better and ignore cover.
Under the REAL limits? that 200 point dedication will give that to two or three squads, at best. (and that before you take into account their quickly dwindling numbers)
Well ultimately this thread was not in vain, then.
While it degraded temporarily, ultimately I have more insight into how to approach Tau overall, and know one of my major issues was because of an incorrectly played rule.
It also has shown me that I need to study my opponents books more than I have (I haven't done this in 6e much, which is my own fault). I should be able to fix all of my issues bar not enjoying facing them, so with that I do thank everyone that contributed despite my temporary unjustified rage.
That being said- if anyone has anything additional to contribute as far as opinions on the new Tau/how to overcome some of the challenges they present (especially from a Casual perspective), feel free to continue the thread.
In regards to the Riptide, I'm just going to quote myself.
Although I'd already decided upon it before, my opinion that Riptides are the most broken and dumb unit in 40k at present has been reinforced. They're just ridiculous. For 200 or less points, you have an almost impossible to kill unit that does absolutely everything. High strength, AP2 pie plates? Yeah. Melta gun for heavy AT? Yeah. Effective AA? Yeah. Nightfighting? Range? Whats that? Oh, you're going to plan to shoot from a distance/assault me? I get a 2D6 jump pack move, so screw you.
12 Lascannon shots at BS4 (aka taking 3 Devastator squads fully tooled up with them) results in an average 4.444 (possibly plus a bit) wounds against a Riptide in each shooting phase. Bearing in mind this thing has a 72'' range and massive height, can jump on buildings and jump down to get LOS on anywhere on the board and abuse cover saves, AND the fact my calculations take into account that the Riptide hasn't gone for the 3++ (in which case, 2.222 wounds) you are basically boned using Devastators. You'll fire once, then he'll drop a pie plate on one of your Devastator squads, and if you even suffer 2 deaths (which is pretty likely), your wound output goes down to 3.704 average. You need to kill these things fast. If he has two, or even three, what the hell are you going to do?
You just devoted the entirety of your 450 point fire support reserves to wounding one 185 point model. Well done.
The only solution I can think of is drop podding Company Vets/equivalents with 10 Combi Plasmas, hoping you get within range and that he hasn't bubble wrapped. If you rapid fire all of them, you've got 5.926 average wounds, or average dead. On the other hand, you now have a 300+ pt squad of 2 attack Tactical Marines that are worthless at anything else, that will inevitably meet the bad end of a metric ton of pulse rifle shots. The fact that you're almost paying double the price of the Riptide just to remove a sub 200 pt model is ridiculous.
You can't ignore it. It can shoot at you 99% of the time, with a S8 AP2 pie plate that will obliterate your infantry. Unless your opponent is a complete idiot you will never charge it, because a competent player will abuse its movement+2D6 (or if he NR's, 3D6) jump to put him miles away from your assault units, if he doesn't already have a bubble wrap. He'll probably be on the other side of the table.
They invalidate Space Marine mechanized armies. You want to know what my 40 Marines in my Dark Angel army would do if they all rapid fired at 12'' at a Riptide?
With the bolters, average 2 wounds.
With the plasma guns, average 2.37 wounds.
You are never, ever, ever, going to get 40 Marines within rapid fire range of a Riptide owned by a competent player. Even if you do you won't kill it in one turn on average, and then that Riptide and the rest of his army is going to either be A) Sitting on or taking the objectives or B) Massacring you with fire.
When I look at my IG, Marines and Ork Codexes, I have to think, 'man, how am I going to set this army up? where's the killy stuff? how do I do W,X and Y without sacrificing Z?'
Usually, that's 'how do I kill tanks, how do I kill MC's, how do I kill flyers, without sacrificing scoring capability too much or list structure/reliability?'
A Tau player can start his list by going 'Oh, this Riptide can have a Velocity tracker, and handle everything. In fact, lets have two. Scoring units, damn. Oh, I know, Fire Warriors, they can start shooting effective fire from turn 1, and they're 54 points starting price. Easy. '
And the most important question, the entire reason for playing the hobby in the first place:
I do not find it fun in the slightest to play someone who can wipe me off the board while I barely get to scratch most of his army. If that's the case, whats the point of unpacking your models?
I've yet to see anyone come up with a compelling argument against this.
The riptide is still BS 3 with low initiative, and requires a a lot of points to make it that mythical ignore cover never scatter monster that everyone makes it out to be.
Stop trying to kill the damn thing and go for other targets.
if a Tau army is playing them, they are probably putting a Ton of points into supporting it be it marker lights or a support commander.
and you cant forget that if it or anything else has decided to intercept it cannot shoot till the following turn. which gives you a whole turn to do something else.
Kill the troops as he probably wont have many
Kill the pathfinders
and get locked into combat and don't kill the ethereal so you stay locked.
The riptide is a super resilient monster but its out put is diminished greatly if he has no support.
Savageconvoy wrote: Yeah. I'm guessing your friend didn't play Tau until the last few months. I almost have to assume it's an intentional mistake, since knowing how markers work is like Tau 101.
... at the same time, there is SOME measure of personal responsibility here. There is a threshold of shenanigans that, when crossed, makes me say "Lemme see that codex, chief".
Markerlight bonuses lasting for everyone, cumulative, entire turn is like an order of magnitude past that.
When in doubt of a BS rule, ask to see and read it yourself, that's the lesson of this 6 page thread.
Savageconvoy wrote: No. The unit that has a markerlight puts tokens on a unit instead of wounds when they fire. The tokens are used by any other unit in the codex.
Say for example pathfinders fire 8 shots, get 4 hits which produces 4 tokens. Then one Riptide uses two tokens to remove cover and fires. If the unit is still alive then another unit can use remaining tokens in the same phase.
I don't have the Tau codex to reference, but is this accurate?
Our groups Tau player suggested that once a Markerlight is used, it benefits ANY UNIT for the rest of the turn.
For example- 4 markers are placed on a unit. A unit uses two to remove cover, but the unit survives. A different unit then fires but also ignores cover from the previously spent markerlights- the remaining 2 can be used for something else (like increasing BS, for example).
I think the way you described it was how the old Markerlights worked, which IMHO was far more tactical and required thought (I had no problem with them). If I am wrong about this, well, that may completely change my opinion on how I feel about Tau's ability to remove cover- it would be far less of an issue.
Dafuq?
Heck no, if that were true any unit no matter how crazy strong would die every turn as long as we got some markerlights on it.
Markerlights arent AS powerful as people make them out to be. Unless we chuck a LOT of points into them it only bolsters 1-2 of our units, not all of them.
Old markerlights were pointless besides boosting BS, but they were difficult to field. Marker drones were a fortune and pathfinders were as easy to remove as they are now. Unless someone actually used Seeker Missiles the old markerlights didnt do anything at all but boost BS. Now they remove cover as well and are a little easier to field. In fact my tau lists prior to new dex didnt even use markerlights they were so expensive lol..
The riptide is a super resilient monster but its out put is diminished greatly if he has no support.
Whilst I agree with this, I do think that Riptide is a poorly designed unit. It breaks the fiction in that it combines tank-like armament and mobility with extremely durable Monstrous creature. It makes Tau tanks pointless if it wasn't artificially limited by FOC slots: lets face it, if Riptides and Hammerheads were in same FOC slots, would anyone take Hammerhead? Ever?
Wraithlord for example is much less durable against heavy weapons. 2+/5++ monstrous creatures just shouldn't exist - period. Well, at least Dreadknight doesn't really have tank-like heavy weapons.
the Dreadknight is a melee monster, though. And has a once per game (which is all it needs) 30" movement. It doesnt need an anti-tank gun it has an anti-tank blade and really only has issues with laaaarge blobs (like Orks) if he cant torch them a couple times first.
12 Lascannon shots at BS4 (aka taking 3 Devastator squads fully tooled up with them) results in an average 4.444 (possibly plus a bit) wounds against a Riptide in each shooting phase. Bearing in mind this thing has a 72'' range and massive height, can jump on buildings and jump down to get LOS on anywhere on the board and abuse cover saves, AND the fact my calculations take into account that the Riptide hasn't gone for the 3++ (in which case, 2.222 wounds) you are basically boned using Devastators. You'll fire once, then he'll drop a pie plate on one of your Devastator squads, and if you even suffer 2 deaths (which is pretty likely), your wound output goes down to 3.704 average. You need to kill these things fast. If he has two, or even three, what the hell are you going to do?
You just devoted the entirety of your 450 point fire support reserves to wounding one 185 point model. Well done.
You indicate the riptide is using it's overcharge every turn in which case it has a fair chance to fail (1/3 chance) and take a wound for the trouble. Additionally why are you taking a dev squad with no aegis/cover and no ablative wounds? So 584 pts that should average a dead riptide a turn while taking ~1.5 dead meaningless casualties a turn if you bothered spreading out at all. The entire opponent 3x riptide will not even make it through your ablative wounds before we even consider the wounds they take fro overcharging or when they fail to overcharge. Not that this matters as this entire scenario is somewhat ridiculous.
The only solution I can think of is drop podding Company Vets/equivalents with 10 Combi Plasmas, hoping you get within range and that he hasn't bubble wrapped. If you rapid fire all of them, you've got 5.926 average wounds, or average dead. On the other hand, you now have a 300+ pt squad of 2 attack Tactical Marines that are worthless at anything else, that will inevitably meet the bad end of a metric ton of pulse rifle shots. The fact that you're almost paying double the price of the Riptide just to remove a sub 200 pt model is ridiculous.
You seem to have a major misconception that you should be able to kill a 200 pts model in a single turn and only have to sacrifice an equal number of points. This is not balanced in any way as it would mean drop pod SM would be the kings of every and any match up. If you drop a squad like you propose to do then you should drop 3-4 threats all in the opponents face. This means that you will average a dead riptide and the opponent will average a dead squad of mostly useless vets while you hammer his line with the other threats.
This is like me saying Tau suck because when I DS my single unit of crisis suits into the middle of your army they get killed! but only after they manage to kill your land raider.
You can't ignore it. It can shoot at you 99% of the time, with a S8 AP2 pie plate that will obliterate your infantry. Unless your opponent is a complete idiot you will never charge it, because a competent player will abuse its movement+2D6 (or if he NR's, 3D6) jump to put him miles away from your assault units, if he doesn't already have a bubble wrap. He'll probably be on the other side of the table.
Again you put forth statements that are a mixture of falsities and just logical contradictions. Your opponent is a good master player who keeps his army bottled up so you cannot assault his riptides and you are incapable of using cover and spreading your units out so that a large blast wholesale "obliterates" your infantry. If you were to actually read any of the batreps from competent players on this board (read jy2 and reece to see some vs Tau action) then you would realize that players who play their riptides that conservatively usually lose on the objectives as Tau have troubles moving out to claim objectives and have troubling killing things on cover 42.1" away.
They invalidate Space Marine mechanized armies. You want to know what my 40 Marines in my Dark Angel army would do if they all rapid fired at 12'' at a Riptide?
With the bolters, average 2 wounds.
With the plasma guns, average 2.37 wounds.
Just wow, what do these even have anything to do with each other. Mechanized marine armies are invalidated by not killing a MC with bolters? Have you heard of AV11+ or T8? Because you know what is infinitely worse than 2 wounds average? 0 wounds possible. Honestly were you counting on bolters and 2 plasma guns killing everything for you?
You are never, ever, ever, going to get 40 Marines within rapid fire range of a Riptide owned by a competent player. Even if you do you won't kill it in one turn on average, and then that Riptide and the rest of his army is going to either be A) Sitting on or taking the objectives or B) Massacring you with fire.
Just like how you should have brought a way to be within your 12" SM engagement zone with his main force or 42" away with more firepower than 3 S9 AP2 large blasts that do NOT ignore cover, if he cannot get markerlights on you you will keep either your cover or your 3+ save.
When I look at my IG, Marines and Ork Codexes, I have to think, 'man, how am I going to set this army up? where's the killy stuff? how do I do W,X and Y without sacrificing Z?'
Usually, that's 'how do I kill tanks, how do I kill MC's, how do I kill flyers, without sacrificing scoring capability too much or list structure/reliability?'
A Tau player can start his list by going 'Oh, this Riptide can have a Velocity tracker, and handle everything. In fact, lets have two. Scoring units, damn. Oh, I know, Fire Warriors, they can start shooting effective fire from turn 1, and they're 54 points starting price. Easy. '
If the riptide could take unlimited systems for free you would be right. They can take 2 and it costs enough that they usually end up land raider expensive. You are just seeing all the possibilities without taking into account the price or slot limitations. It would be like me saying "you can take 90 plasmaguns in an IG army at 1850 pts!!!" Except that is completely wrong because the plasma gun on a guardsman does cost 20 pts but you cannot actually field this.
I do not find it fun in the slightest to play someone who can wipe me off the board while I barely get to scratch most of his army. If that's the case, whats the point of unpacking your models?
You kind of ruin it with this statement. If someone is capable of doing this to me I consider it a challenge and it is usually one of the more interesting games for me. I usually end up thinking about it for a while and figuring out how to counter it. This has happened exactly once in my entire time of playing 40K (first game ever I perhaps killed 3 DE warriors in 3ed when they were not really that good). If you don't want to figure out how to win and don't want to loose you will need to ask the opponent to scale down on the challenge level. Some people like to play the game on hard and some on easy.
XenosTerminus wrote: Credibility? It's a forum for a game that involves plastic soldiers.
It seems like no matter where you turn most conversations about this game spiral out of control into opinionated pissing contests between nerds. I have no issues debating, the issue here is that most people reply with the classic 'my experience says otherwise', automatically dismissing what the other person stated is an issue for them. Either that, or they offer their 'expertise' in list building and army methodology- all very situational and not entirely helpful based on the points I raised.
If it matters at this point some of my most memorable games were in fact, losses. No complaints- just good times with some beers. Could care less what the outcome is, because the games were close, and most importantly fun.
Ever since Tau came out (and to a lesser degree IG) I have just not enjoyed fighting them. That is largely because I, as you already pointed out, like a game with variety. Why have a codex filled with interesting unit choices and great models if you will never see 90% of them?
Clearly I enjoy assault more than shooting, but that is not to say I dislike shooting entirely. I simply think that gunlines, or 'shooty' armies, are boring, uninspired, and often utilize some of the cheesiest rules to outright ignore some of the rules in the game. Do other people enjoy this? Definitely. I can say with relative confidence, however, that the majority of people rarely enjoy facing off against gunlines- it makes for very dull games.
hahaha so whenever you loose an argument you claim that the other person is a nerd and start rambling on about how this is "only a game" yet you continue raging for the next four pages... Wow now you are a valuable contributor to this forum...
A little late. He apologized for that long ago and it was all based on a terrible misunderstanding pointing to a definate and unfair advantage taken by the Tau player.
12 Lascannon shots at BS4 (aka taking 3 Devastator squads fully tooled up with them) results in an average 4.444 (possibly plus a bit) wounds against a Riptide in each shooting phase. Bearing in mind this thing has a 72'' range and massive height, can jump on buildings and jump down to get LOS on anywhere on the board and abuse cover saves, AND the fact my calculations take into account that the Riptide hasn't gone for the 3++ (in which case, 2.222 wounds) you are basically boned using Devastators. You'll fire once, then he'll drop a pie plate on one of your Devastator squads, and if you even suffer 2 deaths (which is pretty likely), your wound output goes down to 3.704 average. You need to kill these things fast. If he has two, or even three, what the hell are you going to do?
You just devoted the entirety of your 450 point fire support reserves to wounding one 185 point model. Well done.
You indicate the riptide is using it's overcharge every turn in which case it has a fair chance to fail (1/3 chance) and take a wound for the trouble.
Um, no I do not. I explicitly state that my calculations did not factor it in, as though that is the standard situation. I point out that were someone to play a risk, you'd have far worse odds of killing/wounding it.
Additionally why are you taking a dev squad with no aegis/cover and no ablative wounds? So 584 pts that should average a dead riptide a turn while taking ~1.5 dead meaningless casualties a turn if you bothered spreading out at all.
Ironically, you seem to have failed to realize this is the *definition* of a Strawman argument. In addition, if you had seen the page I had posted it on, you would have seen people recommending Lascannon Devastators and writing up lists with them.
Not that this matters as this entire scenario is somewhat ridiculous.
It was to refute the proposition directly on that page, which was that 3 teams of Lascannon Devastators would be a good idea. There is no strawmanning here. I take the proposition exactly as it is, only through return fire estimations I estimate they have cover.
The only solution I can think of is drop podding Company Vets/equivalents with 10 Combi Plasmas, hoping you get within range and that he hasn't bubble wrapped. If you rapid fire all of them, you've got 5.926 average wounds, or average dead. On the other hand, you now have a 300+ pt squad of 2 attack Tactical Marines that are worthless at anything else, that will inevitably meet the bad end of a metric ton of pulse rifle shots. The fact that you're almost paying double the price of the Riptide just to remove a sub 200 pt model is ridiculous.
You seem to have a major misconception that you should be able to kill a 200 pts model in a single turn and only have to sacrifice an equal number of points.
I never stated in this point that this is my view. My view is that you are paying a ridiculous amount of points to kill it with such a strategy.
You can't ignore it. It can shoot at you 99% of the time, with a S8 AP2 pie plate that will obliterate your infantry. Unless your opponent is a complete idiot you will never charge it, because a competent player will abuse its movement+2D6 (or if he NR's, 3D6) jump to put him miles away from your assault units, if he doesn't already have a bubble wrap. He'll probably be on the other side of the table.
Again you put forth statements that are a mixture of falsities and just logical contradictions. Your opponent is a good master player who keeps his army bottled up so you cannot assault his riptides and you are incapable of using cover and spreading your units out so that a large blast wholesale "obliterates" your infantry.
It doesn't take a team of rocket scientists and senior mathematicians to deduce that a S8 AP2 pie plate is going to decimate infantry.
With a melee centric horde army, you can't afford to use cover or spread out too far. Irregardless of spreading out, (which isn't always advisable when you need to hold an objective or get somewhere quickly, even without playing hordes) you're going to get hit fairly hard.
then you would realize that players who play their riptides that conservatively usually lose on the objectives
Riptides can't claim objectives, and have a 84'' threat range. There is no reason to move them forward with your scoring units unless you need to fire off the support weapons for whatever reason, and even then you can JSJ.
They invalidate Space Marine mechanized armies. You want to know what my 40 Marines in my Dark Angel army would do if they all rapid fired at 12'' at a Riptide?
With the bolters, average 2 wounds.
With the plasma guns, average 2.37 wounds.
Just wow, what do these even have anything to do with each other.
I've already attempted to show that Devastators (which are frequently found in SM Mechanized armies, including my own when I still played them actively) are ineffective against Riptides, and this is a reinforcement of the proposition that SM Mechanized armies are invalidated as I'm showing the other key part of the typical list isn't well adapted to handle it either.
Mechanized marine armies are invalidated by not killing a MC with bolters?
*And 4-5 Plasma Guns.
Have you heard of AV11+ or T8? Because you know what is infinitely worse than 2 wounds average? 0 wounds possible.
Which Is why you take Devastators, or Predators.
Honestly were you counting on bolters and 2 plasma guns killing everything for you? *4 plasma guns
How can I honestly respond to this without sighing? When the entirety of your Fire Support Reserves are spent wounding a Riptide which could end up killing a good portion of a squad, I want it to die quickly. If I had to dedicate my Tactical Marines to the task, they wouldn't be much use. Hence double or triple Riptides means you're relying on spending 2 turns killing each one with the entirety of the Devastators or other FSR. 1.5 dead Devastators a turn is only going to hamper efforts further. Yes, on its own this point doesn't make a lot of sense, which I will concede.
Tri-las Predators are roughly about equal in wound output iirc, and they're your only other practical option in the heavy support department. I'm not entirely up to date on the different tank busting methods Tau use but I would not expect them to be much more survivable, and when you do lose one your wound output plunges.
You are never, ever, ever, going to get 40 Marines within rapid fire range of a Riptide owned by a competent player. Even if you do you won't kill it in one turn on average, and then that Riptide and the rest of his army is going to either be A) Sitting on or taking the objectives or B) Massacring you with fire.
Just like how you should have brought a way to be within your 12" SM engagement zone with his main force or 42" away with more firepower than 3 S9 AP2 large blasts that do NOT ignore cover
I never stated they ignored cover. What part of 'Space Marine mechanized army' implies I haven't brought a way to get within the 12'' engagement zone? Please, I'm intrigued.
, if he cannot get markerlights on you you will keep either your cover or your 3+ save.
Non Ion Accelerator big blasts are irrelevant to my argument. I never mentioned marker lights at all.
When I look at my IG, Marines and Ork Codexes, I have to think, 'man, how am I going to set this army up? where's the killy stuff? how do I do W,X and Y without sacrificing Z?'
Usually, that's 'how do I kill tanks, how do I kill MC's, how do I kill flyers, without sacrificing scoring capability too much or list structure/reliability?'
A Tau player can start his list by going 'Oh, this Riptide can have a Velocity tracker, and handle everything. In fact, lets have two. Scoring units, damn. Oh, I know, Fire Warriors, they can start shooting effective fire from turn 1, and they're 54 points starting price. Easy. '
If the riptide could take unlimited systems for free you would be right. They can take 2 and it costs enough that they usually end up land raider expensive.
A Riptide with a Velocity Tracker, Fusion Blasters and Ion Accelerator is 205 points. That's not Land Raider level expensive. That sort of Riptide can basically handle anything, as my quote of myself sought to point out.
You are just seeing all the possibilities without taking into account the price or slot limitations.
Uh, yes I have taken into account the price, and I have implied at least once in my post that they are cheap for what they do. The fact you could take something else in Elites is irrelevant.
It would be like me saying "you can take 90 plasmaguns in an IG army at 1850 pts!!!"
Except that is completely wrong because the plasma gun on a guardsman does cost 20 pts but you cannot actually field this.
You're forgetting the fact that Double/Triple Riptides is about 3 or 4 times cheaper than your analogy (even if edited for realism), and taking a crap ton of plasma guns is not an easy choice that handles everything like adding the odd Riptide is. Nowhere near, in fact.
You just devoted the entirety of your 450 point fire support reserves to wounding one 185 point model. Well done.
It was to refute the proposition directly on that page, which was that 3 teams of Lascannon Devastators would be a good idea. There is no strawmanning here. I take the proposition exactly as it is, only through return fire estimations I estimate they have cover.
How can I honestly respond to this without sighing? When the entirety of your Fire Support Reserves are spent wounding a Riptide which could end up killing a good portion of a squad, I want it to die quickly. If I had to dedicate my Tactical Marines to the task, they wouldn't be much use. Hence double or triple Riptides means you're relying on spending 2 turns killing each one with the entirety of the Devastators or other FSR. 1.5 dead Devastators a turn is only going to hamper efforts further. Yes, on its own this point doesn't make a lot of sense, which I will concede.
Tri-las Predators are roughly about equal in wound output iirc, and they're your only other practical option in the heavy support department. I'm not entirely up to date on the different tank busting methods Tau use but I would not expect them to be much more survivable, and when you do lose one your wound output plunges.
I will just collect the entire dev argument here as you did not understand what I said.
I did not wound it. I killed it on average. This means that over a course of 3 turns you can theoretically average 3 dead riptides with a return casualties of 4.5 dead ABLATIVE wounds (you know the 13pt marines you take to catch bullets for a dev squad, in this case 3 marines and a sarge per squad). So for 600 pts of riptides vs 500 pts of SM the SM win the firefight by a significant margin and get an ADL on top of it. The silly part of this being that you will rarely have these sort of firefight duels where the riptide is going to fire at the devs.
I never stated in this point that this is my view. My view is that you are paying a ridiculous amount of points to kill it with such a strategy.
Wow so you ignore at least 3/4 of what I said? I will restate that 1 drop pod is a dead squad. 3 drop pods is an answer to a problem. That or if your "mechanized" SM force can manage to close to a support distance with the drop pod. Are we talking razorbacks here?
It doesn't take a team of rocket scientists and senior mathematicians to deduce that a S8 AP2 pie plate is going to decimate infantry.
With a melee centric horde army, you can't afford to use cover or spread out too far. Irregardless of spreading out, (which isn't always advisable when you need to hold an objective or get somewhere quickly, even without playing hordes) you're going to get hit fairly hard.
What type of army do you play? A mechanized SM assault army? Besides the point but now I am just curious.
This is 3 of them. I could have put out more firepower with a battlecannon leman russ against the same army. Does this mean the leman russ is OP because SM running bunched up across the board to attempt an assault without cover is a good test of what is OP. Man you must think heldrakes are god like if riptides are OP based on this measurement. Three S9 AP2 large blasts are not what I consider decimating infantry but I don't run SM bodies across an open field. Against my poor DW army it sucks but so does almost every battle in plasma high metas.
Riptides can't claim objectives, and have a 84'' threat range. There is no reason to move them forward with your scoring units unless you need to fire off the support weapons for whatever reason, and even then you can JSJ.
Are you aware they can contest objectives? The way most Tau players deal with objectives on the other side of the board that I have seen is composed mostly of shooting them clean (harder than most make it out to be), contesting with a riptide (probably the most reliable), or claiming it with outflanking kroot (this is not exactly common but is a decent method).
I never stated they ignored cover. What part of 'Space Marine mechanized army' implies I haven't brought a way to get within the 12'' engagement zone? Please, I'm intrigued.
Non Ion Accelerator big blasts are irrelevant to my argument. I never mentioned marker lights at all.
I'll just finish this with the idea that if the riptide does not ignore cover then you can just GtG in cover on an objective and take it as the Tau player has serious difficulties moving out of their deployment zone. This is why ML are important to such an argument. If you are getting within 12" of the engagement zone then why are you so angry with riptides? You should be charging with your force next turn and you should have pushed the tau player into their deployment zone enough that they can never claim the mid/back field objectives.
I don't understand how droppods aren't a good answer to Tau. The only unit that really has the firepower to make effective use of Interceptor against a non vehicle target is the Riptide thanks to the large blast that ignores armor of all kinds. However it's still a BS3 blast and can still scatter, and your opponent can deploy from the drop pod before you get to fire. As I said before:
16.7% chance for the shot to get hot and not fire, and then cancel their next shooting phase as a bonus
66% chance to scatter.
if it does scatter and the radius of the template is 2.5" then any result of 6" or more has a chance to completely miss the target or significantly reduce the amount of wounds. Chance of 6 or higher to scatter on 2d6" is about 60%.
That's kind of far off from a 99% of the time being able to shoot at infantry and obliterate them.
40K is a bad game. The rules are designed to sell miniatures, gentlemen. Balance and gameplay are secondary to making rules that compel people to buy the new toys. This is the business Games Workshop is in. As someone who's been playing the game for a long time, cries about imbalance have been echoing through the 41st Millenium for at least the last 10 years. Perhaps the Tau 'dex is significant departure from the last few codices preceding it, but I don't think this is a new trend, and from what I hear, the Eldar 'dex is pretty atrocious too.
grumpusbumpus wrote: 40K is a bad game. The rules are designed to sell miniatures, gentlemen. Balance and gameplay are secondary to making rules that compel people to buy the new toys. This is the business Games Workshop is in. As someone who's been playing the game for a long time, cries about imbalance have been echoing through the 41st Millenium for at least the last 10 years. Perhaps the Tau 'dex is significant departure from the last few codices preceding it, but I don't think this is a new trend, and from what I hear, the Eldar 'dex is pretty atrocious too.
I don't think 40k is a bad game, I think that's too harsh and vague a term. In fact I think 40k is a great vehicle for storytelling and for having fun with your friends. When both players bring themed or balanced lists tactics are even occasionally involved! The problem with the game is that it isn't designed for tournament level play. The rules are clunky and the codices hilariously out of sync with one another, and it's confused about whether it's a large scale or small scale game (apocalypse being an obvious cash cow aside). Another thing is there are too many factions to balance properly and the nature of the one by one release of dexes means there will never be even mediocre balance. The backstory is great (yes the grimdark is over the top but I think that adds to the charm) and the models are usually fantastic, which is why I remain drawn to the hobby. However if you want a competitive game, 40k isn't it. Epic and BFG are alright but I don't know of anyone personally that plays those anymore (a shame really, if only they would fund them again.) I think WM, Infinity, and FoW are the most tightly written rulesets on the market right now.
My FW heavy IG army eats Tau alive. I out range them, take away the benefit of their precious Aegis, force pinning tests at -1 all over the place, and blow throw their heavy hitters.
It is honestly a joke.
My daemons list makes them cry as well.
I can also beat them with my chaos space marines, but it is a much more balanced fight.
Haven't tested my 20 Paladin Draigo Wing against them yet. I would speculate that match up would depend on how good their intercepter shooting is.
Nah, I would say the same thing about Tau. There is a reason so many people are screaming about them.
Side note, as I said, I have beaten them with pure CSM and Daemons as well. So, no, it doesn't take FWIG to do it. But it sure is fun blowing them away with
FWIG. Tau players typically get a real sour look on their face after about turn 2 when facing my IG.
dlight wrote: Nah, I would say the same thing about Tau. There is a reason so many people are screaming about them.
Like what and how?
Honestly every tau thread iv seen has almost always boiled down to i cant kill riptides even then we try to explain to ignore them and kill the supports and troops.
They are monsters when they are properly supported which greatly increases the points cost per riptide but that argument gets ignored forever.
dlight wrote: Nah, I would say the same thing about Tau. There is a reason so many people are screaming about them.
Like what and how?
Honestly every tau thread iv seen has almost always boiled down to i cant kill riptides even then we try to explain to ignore them and kill the supports and troops.
They are monsters when they are properly supported which greatly increases the points cost per riptide but that argument gets ignored forever.
Personally, I have no problem playing Tau. They had that old, nasty book for so long they deserve a nice update. And they should be good, considering their tech and fluff....
With that being said, I can run some nasty lists myself. And I can run lists that will quickly decimate Tau if I want to.
All is fair in love and war. We are playing a wargame not barbie dolls.
In regards to the Riptide, I'm just going to quote myself.
Although I'd already decided upon it before, my opinion that Riptides are the most broken and dumb unit in 40k at present has been reinforced. They're just ridiculous. For 200 or less points, you have an almost impossible to kill unit that does absolutely everything. High strength, AP2 pie plates? Yeah. Melta gun for heavy AT? Yeah. Effective AA? Yeah. Nightfighting? Range? Whats that? Oh, you're going to plan to shoot from a distance/assault me? I get a 2D6 jump pack move, so screw you.
12 Lascannon shots at BS4 (aka taking 3 Devastator squads fully tooled up with them) results in an average 4.444 (possibly plus a bit) wounds against a Riptide in each shooting phase. Bearing in mind this thing has a 72'' range and massive height, can jump on buildings and jump down to get LOS on anywhere on the board and abuse cover saves, AND the fact my calculations take into account that the Riptide hasn't gone for the 3++ (in which case, 2.222 wounds) you are basically boned using Devastators. You'll fire once, then he'll drop a pie plate on one of your Devastator squads, and if you even suffer 2 deaths (which is pretty likely), your wound output goes down to 3.704 average. You need to kill these things fast. If he has two, or even three, what the hell are you going to do?
You just devoted the entirety of your 450 point fire support reserves to wounding one 185 point model. Well done.
The only solution I can think of is drop podding Company Vets/equivalents with 10 Combi Plasmas, hoping you get within range and that he hasn't bubble wrapped. If you rapid fire all of them, you've got 5.926 average wounds, or average dead. On the other hand, you now have a 300+ pt squad of 2 attack Tactical Marines that are worthless at anything else, that will inevitably meet the bad end of a metric ton of pulse rifle shots. The fact that you're almost paying double the price of the Riptide just to remove a sub 200 pt model is ridiculous.
You can't ignore it. It can shoot at you 99% of the time, with a S8 AP2 pie plate that will obliterate your infantry. Unless your opponent is a complete idiot you will never charge it, because a competent player will abuse its movement+2D6 (or if he NR's, 3D6) jump to put him miles away from your assault units, if he doesn't already have a bubble wrap. He'll probably be on the other side of the table.
They invalidate Space Marine mechanized armies. You want to know what my 40 Marines in my Dark Angel army would do if they all rapid fired at 12'' at a Riptide?
With the bolters, average 2 wounds.
With the plasma guns, average 2.37 wounds.
You are never, ever, ever, going to get 40 Marines within rapid fire range of a Riptide owned by a competent player. Even if you do you won't kill it in one turn on average, and then that Riptide and the rest of his army is going to either be A) Sitting on or taking the objectives or B) Massacring you with fire.
When I look at my IG, Marines and Ork Codexes, I have to think, 'man, how am I going to set this army up? where's the killy stuff? how do I do W,X and Y without sacrificing Z?'
Usually, that's 'how do I kill tanks, how do I kill MC's, how do I kill flyers, without sacrificing scoring capability too much or list structure/reliability?'
A Tau player can start his list by going 'Oh, this Riptide can have a Velocity tracker, and handle everything. In fact, lets have two. Scoring units, damn. Oh, I know, Fire Warriors, they can start shooting effective fire from turn 1, and they're 54 points starting price. Easy. '
And the most important question, the entire reason for playing the hobby in the first place:
I do not find it fun in the slightest to play someone who can wipe me off the board while I barely get to scratch most of his army. If that's the case, whats the point of unpacking your models?
I've yet to see anyone come up with a compelling argument against this.
That is because you defeated your own argument by suggesting one would shoot at a Riptide.
It's really difficult to ignore it.
Not because it's that good, but because that's not how people work.
If you hear that something fires an S8AP2-Large Blast every turn, you get scared and you want to kill it.
It gets quite frustrating that it's almost impossible to kill.
Compared to other MC's from almost every army it's quite the insane model.
T6 with 2+/5++ and possible FNP?
I don't even have that on the MC's that WANT to get close.
Imagine how you would feel if Terminators suddenly get T6 and jump packs.
Compared to other MC's from almost every army it's quite the insane model. T6 with 2+/5++ and possible FNP? I don't even have that on the MC's that WANT to get close. Imagine how you would feel if Terminators suddenly get T6 and jump packs.
If the next space marine codex has anything to say about it, they proablbly will Edit: there are supposed to be marines in marine suits that are ether FA or HS so who knows :p But compared to other MC's it has piss poor aim (bs3 (not really that bad but not great) and fights like a old (I2) lady (ws2) The thing is just damn resilient.
XenosTerminus wrote: ok, so in retrospect I realize that I lost my cool here, so I will man up and apologize for being rude. I do appreciate the advice, I am just frustrated because my two MEQ armies, combined with the models I physically own, are seeing no success against Tau regardless of my tactics.
BT is basically a lost cause as discussed (being antiquated, and their strengths designed around 4e/assault).
Let me explain why I also believe DA has very little to combat Tau with a few exceptions:
DA's strengths, really, are Bikes and Terminators. Terminators aren't terribly competitive anymore and are generally overcosted for the firepower they bring to the table. Tau also have no issues murdering them, so I don't believe Deathwing lists are really viable.
Bikes are promising, but they suffer because Tau can just remove their cover saves and kill them easily. The PFG is nice, but can only cover so many models.
Whirlwinds are good for taking out Tau Infantry for sure, but that won't win me the game alone, especially if the Troops are in Devilfish.
I have honestly struggled with DA against most armies- the book is just so mediocre overall compared to what else has come out in 6e- it's just mint flavored vanilla marines with a few gimmicks thrown in, and has likely once again been relegated to being a test bed for the new vanilla marine book.
So really, my frustration is probably tied to the fact Tau are very good at killing Marines- 2 of my armies I have played since 4e and spent the most time building/painting/playing. It's like he doesn't even need to try to kill them. I don't know if I can counter that without buying different models to confront his weaknesses/try different strategies, but I really don't want to do that just because of Tau.
Up until this post I wasn't on your side. After this post I was in your court and would have jumped to your defense if I had noticed the thread earlier. It takes a big man to agree with people who are disagreeing with you and posting what I see to be negative comments. You came out with an extremely rational post and I applaud you for bringing sense and calm back to a thread where people were bashing you.
After I read even further into the thread and found out what your opponent was doing which, while illegal, would certainly be over powered.
Desubot wrote: If the next space marine codex has anything to say about it, they proablbly will Edit: there are supposed to be marines in marine suits that are ether FA or HS so who knows :p
But compared to other MC's it has piss poor aim (bs3 (not really that bad but not great) and fights like a old (I2) lady (ws2)
The thing is just damn resilient.
We'll just have to wait for that
And BS3 doesn't matter that much when your weapons are Large Blast or Heavy 8-12
The smaller ones are even Twin-Linked Outside of that Tau have something they call "Markerlights", they basically boost BS by one or two and make the attack ignore cover.
Compared to other MC's from almost every army it's quite the insane model.
T6 with 2+/5++ and possible FNP?
I don't even have that on the MC's that WANT to get close.
Imagine how you would feel if Terminators suddenly get T6 and jump packs.
If the next space marine codex has anything to say about it, they proablbly will Edit: there are supposed to be marines in marine suits that are ether FA or HS so who knows :p
But compared to other MC's it has piss poor aim (bs3 (not really that bad but not great) and fights like a old (I2) lady (ws2)
The thing is just damn resilient.
Damn, if people are this upset at a Riptide, I can't even imagine the nerd rage over the Lord of Change who can gain a re-rollable 2++ save... And still hits like a b****** in combat at S8/ap2 and buffs himself/supporting units with 3 levels of Divination...
As for dealing with Tau, as a Daemon player I rely on;
a) bum rushing with my fast units like Screamers & Plaguedrones and the like, while dropping in some large squads of Flamers for support.
b) going crazy with psychic powers that Tau can only ever defend against if they bring in allies. Their basic 6+ DtW rolls is laughably near-useless and even their suits tend not to like a full barrage of S6 Flickering Fire that re-rolls missed to-hits.
Can you take three Lord of Changes for 200 each with 72" S8AP2 Large Blasts?
It's not his Toughness, his wounds, his strength or his movement that upsets people.
It are all those things combined in a Tau-codex which already wins at shooting against most armies.
just my 2 cents but it really just sounds like your tau buddy has a "competitive" build and the rest of you are running casual or "not optimized" lists.
I've seen this in a few gaming groups before everyone has a army or is getting them and 1 person cant decide or wants to build a army he doesn't know all that well, or just feels like it, and so goes online and looks at net lists or tourney lists he sees, and builds one. this then throws the game group meta all to sh*t since no one else is running that caliber of build. it can suck for sure, usually the best way to "fix" it is to just proxy some army of that caliber or 2 or 3 and keep trying those against his tau since its casual play proxy-ing should be np and can make games fun again, especially when you run some crazy SW missle spam d pod list or demons rerollable 2++ deathstar build against it.
Sigvatr wrote: Tau with Riptide spam just won singles ETC. Just sayin'.
It's hard not to win with this match-up:
Top ten armies for 40k are:
Tau vs Dark eldar
Tau vs Tau
Imperial Guard vs Space wolves
Tau vs Necrons
Chaos deamons vs Imperial guard
I'm really interested in monday, when they post the army-lists and we can make a breakdown of each army and how well they did.
It's also quite nice to see what the most played unit and most valued unit is.
3 ripetide list... Beat it with deathwing, he also ran 3 skyrays and 4 battlesuit units, got to love that new farsight dex.
Farsight bomb with shadowsun.. My ravenwing smashed it, he even had a liby with gate in there, now that's shenanigans.
So far every game vs New tau has gone mostly my way, it's a powerful dex to be sure, but nothing the dark angels can't handle lol, incidentally belial and his unit got hit by 2 of those are 9 ap2 pie plates and survived with 2 models left after a deep strike and interceptor, those 2 went on to kill 2 skyrays and 2 riptides, once the termies were in his face with 2 land raiders belting up into his face, there wasn't anywhere to hide his riptides
Commander with a 2+, and the ability to forgo shooting to let something ignore cover. He went with 3 other suits all with missiles and some drones
2 groups of pathfinders
2 Devilfish with Fire Warriors inside
Riptide with the usual cheese
Ion Head
Long Strike
2 groups of kroot with snipers/1 hound
Skyray
Stealth Suit squad of 3
A Sunshark
My basic strategy was to get in his face quickly. It was objectives, so I concentrated all of my forces closest to where the 3 met, with the long range support back field. He reserved his Pathfinders as not to get nuked by the Whirlwinds- this is important, because the outcome was surprising EVEN WITHOUT the markers pretty much all game.
He took turn 1. He concentrated a lot of firepower on my bikes, taking them down to 4 members and a wounded Librarian. That was about it. I used the homer on the bikes to put the pod w/azzy down and deploy towards a lot of his parked tanks. The Knights also deployed in a similar fashion. I managed to assault and kill longstrike with my bikes, and wound the riptide a few times with snipers/devs.
The next turn nothing spectacular happened- casualties here and there. I managed to nuke his skyray with a melta from the bikes as it tried to get away (pretty lucky- needed a 5 since it was outside 12). At this point I was thinking I had this. I controlled an area near most of the objectives and he was on the run. My troops were all in great spots in either cover or near objectives for late grabs. I could camp it out with the troops and pressure him with my 'expendable' units, like the command squad, the dread, etc.
It quickly spiraled out of control. Tau mobility is ludicrous, especially against Marines. He gunned down my bikes, so I lost my fastest unit quickly. Basically the rest of the game turned into my assault units failing to ever catch up to so many skimmers and suits, while he moved around and shot dozens of missiles and burst cannons at my troops. It ended on turn 6 with a table.
Now, I am sure my list could 'be more optimized'- that's not the point here. As I originally stated, I am having trouble against ANY Tau list, regardless what I bring with what I physically own. He didn't fire off a single markerlight. He either ignored it outright with missiles, or just weight of fired me to death so it didn't matter.
So I ask- what now? Keep asking him to bring crappier and crappier lists? That doesn't really sound very enjoyable.
Basically my opinion stands (even if I need to play more games against them)- Tau is just not fun to fight against. Thoughts? Advice? Opinions? Flames?
XenosTerminus wrote: Now, I am sure my list could 'be more optimized'- that's not the point here.
Of course it's the point. You can't complain about other armies being "overpowered" or "not fun" when you're bringing weak and unfocused lists. All you're discovering is that when you bring a list with a little of everything you lose to a list that is 100% dedicated to "shoot you to death from a safe distance".
Kangodo wrote: Well, you CAN complain.
It shouldn't take a top tier 'competitive list' to beat an average list.
No, but the DA list is far from average. We're talking about throwing a couple battleforces on the table and wondering why it's hard to win against an army that has a coherent game plan.
I have not played tau with my DA yet however with my orks I did have an issue that really bothered me. It might be just last edition dex vs new edition dex but the thing that bugged me was most times a new dex came out I might need to make a small change here or there to my tac list in order to deal with possibly facing that army. With the Tau release though I felt like I had to redo a huge amount of my tac list or just hope I did not face them. I didn't like that another factions book had such a huge effect on my own armies tac list.
XenoTerminus do you have vassal? I would happily give you a game where you can play my optimised Tau and I'll play a dark angel list if it would help.
It's meant in a genuine way and if you're struggling against them I will try to help.
On a separate note as soon as the new space marines drop, no one will think Tau are OP or anything.
But they will applaud GW for making fast terminator types that can shoot like broadsides. (Centurions look to be those).
Another thing about riptides, everyone knows they can only move 6" right then 2-12" in jump. That's averaging only slightly more than a bike which can probably assault.
To beat riptides seriously get into assault. If it runs it's dead.
Kangodo wrote: Well, you CAN complain.
It shouldn't take a top tier 'competitive list' to beat an average list.
This was originally one of my main points. I guess since I am not really an overly competitive player I don't think with that mindset, but I honestly didn't find my list to be 'bad'. If that is what is being insinuated here, well then that speaks more so the state of the apparent balance of the DA book (I am of the opinion that the book only offers a few 'competitive' builds in the sense a tournament player would bring it). I brought things the DA book does well overall with synergy and a plan. If you honestly cannot do something like this without going complete 'tournament' mode, my point has once again been made here, at ;least against Tau.
That being said, I think 6e is a mess overall, not just Tau. While 'metal bawkses' were indeed annoying for a lot of armies in 5e, I feel that edition just 'felt right'. You could play shooty if you wanted. You could actually play melee armies, too.
It's as if they observed the quantity of marine players, and the fact everything was based on that 'baseline', and designed an entire edition to turn that on its head. This is great for Xenos players, obviously.
So really, maybe it is more so that this edition really is poor for Marines, which I am still confident the new book will not fix. Yes, we may get a 'broadside like unit', but even if points go down for things like Sternguard or Vanguard, the fundamental issues with Marines in this edition will still be present.
Marine stats are no longer 'above average'. WS/BS 4 are handed out like candy (Eldar is now entirely BS4, even Guardians).
T4 is largely irrelevant since it seems every book has ways/access to spam High STR shooting. If you are always wounding T4 on a 2+, it's moot.
3+/2+ have many more answers. Helldrakes, plasma abundance, or just weight of fire is sufficient.
We now have the worst transport in the game. No, seriously. Rhinos are terrible in this edition- it's basically one turn of extra movement, and that is if it doesn't get popped before you can move it.
I can probably count on a single hand how many overall Marine unit templates function in any way that is effective now. We are just no longer elite or special. Perhaps, then, that is the root of the issue. I am playing two armies that are not optimized to win against armies that capitalize on 6e's mechanics.
The problem is GW already has this template established, and I feel they have no idea how bad it really has become. Marines perform rather mediocrely. I honestly believe they still think our stats/armor make us good. If only they really knew.
First off he is now aware of his markerlight oversight, so that has been corrected.
I told him to bring a mostly competitive list but not go too overboard. I brought Dark Angels.
Here is my list:
Azrael
Librarian (he rolled the ignore cover blessing and I took Prescience)
+Bike
+Power Field Generator
+Mastery Level 2
PFG is pointless, the Bikes get a consistent 5+ jink if you move and a 4+ if you turboboost.
Command Squad (They podded with Azrael)
+4x Flamers
+Power Fist
+Standard of Fortitude
Personally I would have taken either meltaguns or plasmas instead, preference on the latter. You would have shaved most of the wounds off the Riptide easily that way.
The standard here is pretty pointless. I wouldn't even take an Apothecary, they're a suicide unit, they're going to die anyway. In this regard I see it as extremely inadvisable to throw in a 200 point character with them as well.
Tactical Squad in a Rhino
+Plasma Gun
+Lascannon
If you take Tac Squads in Rhinos take at least 4, or none at all. They die far too easily and give up first blood with ease.
Scout Snipers suck. As in, they're abysmal. Never take them unless you're running minimized troops for an out-of-troops gimmick list or supporting DW.
Ravenwing Assault Squad of 6 with a Multi-melta attack bike (Librarian went here)
+2x Meltaguns
Melta's pretty naff in this edition, you'd be better off with plasma. Black Knights rip Riptides to pieces and are more survivable, especially if you bring an LSS.
Deathwing Knights
Did you put a locator beacon on your Azrael drop pod? the one-two punch is quite effective if these guys DWA turn 2.
Venerable Dread in a pod- Plasma Cannon and Heavy Flamer
I'd replace the PC with an assault cannon or multi melta. This unit is pretty naff in general.
Don't ever go both ways. You're not Wolves, you can't splitfire, so only half of the weapons in the squad can be effective at whatever you shoot. I'd take 4 ML's or 4 Lascannons. Plasma Cannons are naff vs Riptides.
2x Whirlwinds
Another bucket full of naff. I'd take either:
Ravenwing Support Speeders with dual heavy flamers - if you deepstrike onto the locator beacon no scatter bubble, you can annihilate a FW unit. Also only 60 points, so its cheaper than a Whirlie.
Alternatively, an assault squad with just two flamers, sergeant with combi-flamer and a drop pod. It comes to a ridiculously cheap 105 points.
I'll try to summarize what he took the best I can
Commander with a 2+, and the ability to forgo shooting to let something ignore cover. He went with 3 other suits all with missiles and some drones
2 groups of pathfinders
2 Devilfish with Fire Warriors inside
Riptide with the usual cheese
Ion Head
Long Strike
2 groups of kroot with snipers/1 hound
Skyray
Stealth Suit squad of 3
A Sunshark
My basic strategy was to get in his face quickly. It was objectives, so I concentrated all of my forces closest to where the 3 met, with the long range support back field. He reserved his Pathfinders as not to get nuked by the Whirlwinds- this is important, because the outcome was surprising EVEN WITHOUT the markers pretty much all game.
He took turn 1. He concentrated a lot of firepower on my bikes, taking them down to 4 members and a wounded Librarian. That was about it. I used the homer on the bikes to put the pod w/azzy down and deploy towards a lot of his parked tanks. The Knights also deployed in a similar fashion. I managed to assault and kill longstrike with my bikes, and wound the riptide a few times with snipers/devs.
The next turn nothing spectacular happened- casualties here and there. I managed to nuke his skyray with a melta from the bikes as it tried to get away (pretty lucky- needed a 5 since it was outside 12). At this point I was thinking I had this. I controlled an area near most of the objectives and he was on the run. My troops were all in great spots in either cover or near objectives for late grabs. I could camp it out with the troops and pressure him with my 'expendable' units, like the command squad, the dread, etc.
It quickly spiraled out of control. Tau mobility is ludicrous, especially against Marines. He gunned down my bikes, so I lost my fastest unit quickly. Basically the rest of the game turned into my assault units failing to ever catch up to so many skimmers and suits, while he moved around and shot dozens of missiles and burst cannons at my troops. It ended on turn 6 with a table.
Now, I am sure my list could 'be more optimized'- that's not the point here. As I originally stated, I am having trouble against ANY Tau list, regardless what I bring with what I physically own. He didn't fire off a single markerlight. He either ignored it outright with missiles, or just weight of fired me to death so it didn't matter.
So I ask- what now? Keep asking him to bring crappier and crappier lists? That doesn't really sound very enjoyable.
Basically my opinion stands (even if I need to play more games against them)- Tau is just not fun to fight against. Thoughts? Advice? Opinions? Flames?
While I agree with you still on some level I am not surprised you struggled with the list - its not ready, and I have to agree with Peregrine in that its not even average. You've got loads of wasted points and cherry picked choices that don't work together.
Well that's refreshing. Being told that the list you took is absolute crap and your unit choices are 'bad'. That's what is wrong with this game.
I am still convinced that the internal balance for this game is atrocious. If you can't bring a relatively balanced list and expect to do at least decently against another army without catering your choices (you basically told me to spam things to help kill the riptide, or avoid things because they aren't 'optimal'.
Really that's the crux of it. GW has made it so that anyone that pages through a codex, spams what is optimal or the best, and shows up to random games will curb stomp people that just take what is in their collection or what they enjoy (from the same codexes).
It's infinitely frustrating as a casual player, I hope you realize that.
XenosTerminus wrote: Well that's refreshing. Being told that the list you took is absolute crap and your unit choices are 'bad'. That's what is wrong with this game.
But that's been a problem since long before the Tau codex. Your list would have been bad through all of 5th, and all of 6th even if the Tau didn't exist at all. So it's a legitimate complaint to criticize GW's appalling lack of balance and playtesting, but that has nothing to do with the Tau (or any other specific codex).
If you can't bring a relatively balanced list and expect to do at least decently against another army without catering your choices (you basically told me to spam things to help kill the riptide, or avoid things because they aren't 'optimal'.
Except you don't have a balanced list, you have a pile of random units. Taking one assault unit, one shooting unit, one drop pod, one support psyker, etc, is not a balanced list, it's just an unfocused mess.
I said relatively balanced- and try not to sound so arrogant with a definitive description on what is or is not 'balanced'. That is your opinion.
It had a good amount of long range shooting, support, things to deal with infantry in cover, assault elements, etc. All of the units themselves may not be what is considered competitive or optimal, but from a marine perspective it had tools to deal with a wide range of targets.
A list like mine would be just fine against an opponent who didn't bring their A game so to speak. The issue is that even when Tau doesn't bring an optimal list (he didn't) I still struggle. I was very successful in 5th edition and before Tau, even with lists like that.
The thing is, even a Sub optimal Tau list is going to do more or less the same thing. Shoot.
Unless you are feeling froggy with Aun'Shi, No one should ever be pining to get into assault in the Tau Codex. And even if you are feeling froggy, you don't jump.
You need to look at what you want your army to do and say "ok My Goal is to X, so I need to take Y to make X happen"
You want to make your list Something Oriented. If you make it assault oriented. Nothing saying you can't take one or two small squads of Devs for Vehicle popping duty. If you go shooting oriented, unless you have a hell of a durable brick of something to throw at them or somethings that are just stupid fast, you want to avoid assaulty units. If you are doing Drop pod assault, Do it. Make every game start with you playing "it's Raining Men" as you drop half your pods right in his face. If you want to Mech up, you gotta go all out. Fill your Deployment zone with Hulls.
Tau do not have a whole lot of Options. They might have a lot of toys, but they all do the same thing. make something more shooty or make something more durable.
This is a rare thing, so take it to heart-I AGREE with peregrine.
And it almost never happens.
Your list is "balanced" in the sense it got a bit of everything, but honestly that's the worst possible plan. a "balanced" list is one that got a strict "win plan", with some units that are there to deal with things that brake the plan. (for example whirlwinds for assault armies, they let you force the enemy to split up a bit, and soften him up before charging.)
And "balanced" in the sense that it got a weapon for every enemy type in the game.
What your list got is a lone rhino to be teared apart before he reachs, if there were many SOME would reach.
a lone drop-pod to be shredded as it comes alone, lacking the numbers to have lasting presence until reinforcements arrive.
A flamer suicide unit (the one in the pod), highly unlikely that they would manage to do enough damage to be worth it.
Mixed weapons on the dread and the devs, something that should NEVER be done-they will never be effective, no matter the target.
Snipers...meh...I WANT to love them, but find it hard.
Whirlwinds, in a list not meant for them.
Your army is a mess of units that make no sense next to each other, they do not support each other, do not assist each other and lack any redudncy.
Yes, you do alot of thing, but alot of weak things. most of your pushs are done by a single unit. its like send them into the meat grinder one by one, rather then try to either evade or overflow it.
XenosTerminus wrote: I said relatively balanced- and try not to sound so arrogant with a definitive description on what is or is not 'balanced'. That is your opinion.
It had a good amount of long range shooting, support, things to deal with infantry in cover, assault elements, etc. All of the units themselves may not be what is considered competitive or optimal, but from a marine perspective it had tools to deal with a wide range of targets.
A list like mine would be just fine against an opponent who didn't bring their A game so to speak. The issue is that even when Tau doesn't bring an optimal list (he didn't) I still struggle. I was very successful in 5th edition and before Tau, even with lists like that.
Look at it from my perspective - The old SM Mechanized army with Devastator support doesn't work that well at all anymore, and that's the only thing my 10,000 points of Marines I've spent years collecting can competitively attempt at present (I'm experimenting with the DA S.O.D but I don't expect much), unless I ever manage to think of a Deathwing army that isn't pure cack.
Seriously, as others have said, focus your army. From that list you could pan out and:
1) Make a rapid attack force filled with bikes and land speeders and the like
2) Make a drop pod orientated list that rips the key elements of the opponent's army apart before he can do diddly squat
3) Attempt a Deathwing/Veteran orientated list
4) Make a list orientating around the Standard of Devastation, which is incredibly fun to use.
Iur_tae_mont wrote: The thing is, even a Sub optimal Tau list is going to do more or less the same thing. Shoot.
This. Tau only seem "overpowered" to you because the Tau codex is entirely dedicated to shooting. Even a "casual" player who just brings "cool" or "fluffy" units is pretty much guaranteed to build an army that has a unified strategy of "shoot from a distance until you win", which gives them a significant advantage over a marine codex where picking a bunch of random units probably gives you a mix of strategies without any unified plan. This doesn't mean that Tau are overpowered, it just means that it's a little easier to accomplish the bare minimum of list optimization and a lot easier to avoid common newbie traps.
XenosTerminus wrote: It had a good amount of long range shooting, support, things to deal with infantry in cover, assault elements, etc. All of the units themselves may not be what is considered competitive or optimal, but from a marine perspective it had tools to deal with a wide range of targets.
And that's the problem. You have shooting units, assault units, drop pods, and no coherent plan. You don't have enough of a drop pod alpha strike to do much more than send your units to their deaths ASAP, you don't have enough shooting to win a shooting war, and you don't have enough assault to force your way through shooting + JSJ + overwatch + meatshields and successfully assault anything. You have no threat saturation to overwhelm your opponent's counters in any aspect of the game, all you can do is pray they didn't bring a focused list.
A list like mine would be just fine against an opponent who didn't bring their A game so to speak
We're not talking about A games, to compete with that list you pretty much have to have your opponent bring their F game. The fact that some of your opponents have previously used equally bad battleforce armies doesn't change the fact that your problems with Tau have way more to do with your poor list building choices than how powerful the Tau codex is.
XenosTerminus,
Balanced doesn't mean randomly picking things from a codex and slapping them together. It means having the ability to handle many threats instead of building a skew list via spamming.
You attack others opinions and cite your own as fact. This is hypocrisy at its finest.
I mean, you are having issues with an MC and have A plasma gun.
Uno.
Your dev squad has never been a good choice in any edition. Plasma cannons want to target heavy infantry while launchers want to target tanks or light infantry (krak vs frag, respectively)
2 whirlwinds? One of the worst tanks in the game since its inception...and you run 2...?
Please explain how your list is in any way, shape, or form balanced. I've been playing since 3rd, have played 2nd, necronmunda, and all the other things that give me crazy neck beardage, and I am just not seeing it.
They may seem a little abrasive and definitely aren't telling you want you want to hear, but these guys really are trying to help you out against us tau players.
It comes down to focus, which your army seems to lack. Most TaC lists have a plan centered around melee, shooting, or some form of midfield hold objective type plan. Now if they are all shooty they bring different guns to be TaC. If they focus on melee then they might bring different squads for their different targets.
What your list is doing is sending your troops to their death one squad ar a time it seems with only 1 or 2 really strong hitters. Well as a tau player I'm gonna shoot the scariest thing down first. If you only have 1 scary unit then its not your opponents fault that you lose.
Automatically Appended Next Post: Not to mention Tau's biggest win or lose button is target priority. If we pick the right tar gets first we excel. If we pick a wrong target though we can crumble extremely easily. Give your buddy a much harder time pickin the right target out of the bunch and your games will go smoother. I hope. good luck fighting the greater good!
I play my IG against Tau a LOT. My buddy who plays Tau is also a mathhammer/board game wizard and I tend to lose board games in general a lot. That being said, all of our games end up being fairly even unless he tailors his list to destroy mine or vice versa. It's really just a matter of choosing a well balanced army and knowing your own tactics. Something that really helped me was pouring over the codex and making about 50 different lists for 750 points. It's few enough points to make you really consider your list, yet enough points that you can realistically include most units in your army.
Tau gunline is very similar to the IG Blowjobber lists from a couple years back, only worse. At a fairly major tournament I went to last weekend there was a kid there that I considered a little slow. He literally sat there with a goofy grin on his face, set up his Tau gunline (minimally painted) and blasted everyone off the table. His list played itself (it was obvious his dad put everything together and made him go). I just looked on and laughed.
I think one of the problems is tau lists are easy to make. A really good list will need testing and balancing and what not but for the most part tau have the fewest choices of units of any of the codices and only two of those units are bad. So if I slap together 1500pts or so of suits, troops and marker lights chances are my list is going to be very good. Whats more, all my units will be on the same game plan, shoot the hell out of everything. If you were to go to any other codex and just slap together units you would have a mix of ranged and melee, lots of sup par choices and a few good choices.
Seriously try to make a list with any HQ but Aun'shi and any fast attack but vespid. Maybe cut out stealth suits too, but they actually aren't that bad. The only way you can make a bad list is if you take too much wargear on your tanks or make bad support system choices. Just putting the minimal effort into list building, like making sure you have anti-infantry and anti-tank, is more than enough to make a reasonable list.
Tau is also one of the most adaptable armies out there able to deal with just about anything. This means it is really easy for tau to change to fit a local meta and easily come out on top.
Please don't misunderstand. I do appreciate advice.
The issue is far too many people (not just here) offer very little constructive criticism. Most of the responses have been very rude.
I can look into optimizing my list. I see that point. The issue is that for everyone, they might not be able to do that with their collection. I mentioned this before, but not everybody has access to limitless or exactly what they need to be 'competitive'. The majority of people that play this game are not those that regular forums or attend tournaments- they are casuals, who generally play with the models they own/like. They don't pour through books and look for the absolute best synergy, cheapest options, or what the meta deems to be the best.
Please keep this in mind when you reply and provide feedback. Not one comment addressed how I could have potentially dealt with the Tau list based on WHAT I TOOK. And if I simply cannot because Tau lists, even basic ones, pick apart unfocussed lists (based on the principal of everything just shoots you to hell thus has autopilot synergy)- I may not be able to control much.
XenosTerminus wrote: I can look into optimizing my list. I see that point. The issue is that for everyone, they might not be able to do that with their collection. I mentioned this before, but not everybody has access to limitless or exactly what they need to be 'competitive'. The majority of people that play this game are not those that regular forums or attend tournaments- they are casuals, who generally play with the models they own/like. They don't pour through books and look for the absolute best synergy, cheapest options, or what the meta deems to be the best.
Yes, and this has nothing to do with the Tau. Balance in 40k is awful, and it's very easy to buy a random collection of models that has no real hope of winning games. And yes, that's a very bad thing. But it has been like that since long before the Tau codex, and will almost certainly continue to be like that for the foreseeable future even if new armies come out that are better than Tau.
Please keep this in mind when you reply and provide feedback. Not one comment addressed how I could have potentially dealt with the Tau list based on WHAT I TOOK.
That's because what you took is an unfocused mess. Sometimes lists are just so bad that they have no real hope of winning no matter what you do in the game, and all you can do is learn from your mistakes and make a better list next time.
And if I simply cannot because Tau lists, even basic ones, pick apart unfocussed lists (based on the principal of everything just shoots you to hell thus has autopilot synergy)- I may not be able to control much.
What you can control is your own list. Yes, the Tau "always shoot" strategy makes it easier to avoid newbie traps and make a list that doesn't completely suck, but we're talking about newbie traps here, not optimizing the last 1% of your tournament list. You need to at least take the most basic steps to bringing a good list of your own before you can complain about how overpowered other armies are.
XenosTerminus wrote: Please keep this in mind when you reply and provide feedback. Not one comment addressed how I could have potentially dealt with the Tau list based on WHAT I TOOK. And if I simply cannot because Tau lists, even basic ones, pick apart unfocussed lists (based on the principal of everything just shoots you to hell thus has autopilot synergy)- I may not be able to control much.
Then please at least tell us what is in your collection so we can at the very least make comments based on that (I say this as a DA and a Tau player).
XenosTerminus wrote:Well that's refreshing. Being told that the list you took is absolute crap and your unit choices are 'bad'. That's what is wrong with this game.
like it or lump it, that's how it is, and that's how its always been. there are such things as "good lists", and there are such things as "bad lists". we're just being honest about it. how is it "wrong" to discuss this, and to analyse why?
XenosTerminus wrote:
I am still convinced that the internal balance for this game is atrocious. If you can't bring a relatively balanced list and expect to do at least decently against another army without catering your choices (you basically told me to spam things to help kill the riptide, or avoid things because they aren't 'optimal'.
Really that's the crux of it. GW has made it so that anyone that pages through a codex, spams what is optimal or the best, and shows up to random games will curb stomp people that just take what is in their collection or what they enjoy (from the same codexes).
It's infinitely frustrating as a casual player, I hope you realize that.
Yes?
And so what? With respect, you're making it sound like this is something brand new, that this lousy internal balance thing is somehow new, and sprung upon us with no warning. this observation isn't new! simple fact of the matter is 40k has always been like this. internal/external balance is atrocious (but it was ok when tau were terrible in fifth, i'd warrant ) "spam the optimal" is how 40k has always been. this isn't a new observation. And frankly, there is no reason to be so melodramatic and shocked by it. Nor is there any reason to be so dismissive, or defensive about what is quite simply common advice in this game.
If you want to randomly put things on to the board, its a simple fact that you need to be prepared for the consequences against someone who has optimised things. "casual" doesn't come in to it. "casual" is an attitude. what youre doing is something different. you are implying you don't want to step up. that somehow, you are entitled to win, just with what you have. and im sorry to shatter your illusions here, but that's not how wargames work. Just like sports, you don't just "win", you have to have the right tools and training.
XenosTerminus wrote:I said relatively balanced- and try not to sound so arrogant with a definitive description on what is or is not 'balanced'. That is your opinion.
It had a good amount of long range shooting, support, things to deal with infantry in cover, assault elements, etc. All of the units themselves may not be what is considered competitive or optimal, but from a marine perspective it had tools to deal with a wide range of targets.
A list like mine would be just fine against an opponent who didn't bring their A game so to speak. The issue is that even when Tau doesn't bring an optimal list (he didn't) I still struggle. I was very successful in 5th edition and before Tau, even with lists like that.
and his opinion is right. arrogance doesn't come into it. "balanced" can be defines multiple ways - to me "balanced" implies being able to deal with a variety of threats. can you deal with heavy armour? can you deal with light armour? MEQ? TEQ? GEQ? can you deal with flyers? the mechanics of how you go about doing this are up to you. you can be entirely armoured and be "balanced", you can be entirely "close range dakka" and still be "balanced". you seem to be assuming a "balanced list" is a "cross representation of the units of that list". which is a random assortment of stuff. your lists have a lot of excess, and poor internal synnergies. It wont do well against a lot of B or C lists, let alone A lists.
the fact you struggle against tau is a lot less to do with tau, and a lot more to do with sub optimal choices on your part. harsh? yes. true? yes.
XenosTerminus wrote:Please don't misunderstand. I do appreciate advice.
The issue is far too many people (not just here) offer very little constructive criticism. Most of the responses have been very rude.
.
For someone so appreciative of advice, you've been horribly dismissive of that very advice offered to you, and extremely condescending to others replying to you with a different POV. You not liking the answer doesn't change what the answer is.
And "rude"? im sorry, but I take huge issues with this. Please, don't confuse "honesty" with "rudeness". with respect, you are the one who has been saying things like "People like you ruin this hobby." And worse. Regarding the "constructive criticism" comment - I always find that one funny. people have been going out of their way explaining to you what works and what doesn't. and why. really, that cant do any more. what kind of "constructive criticism" are you looking for? you cant turn a donkey into a racehorse. And you cant offer any magical solutions to turn a sub par list into a competitive one. that's simply not how this game works. constructive criticism is honest criticism - its helping you improve. and they've done that. they've told you about what you have and how it doesn't work, and they've told you about the tools avaialabe to you, and tactics from this that will bring you up to par.
however, if your definition of "constructive criticism" is"saying nice things about what you have, for the sake of it", or "mindlessly agreeing with your skewed view of tau OPness" then im sorry, but we cannot help you there.
XenosTerminus wrote:
I can look into optimizing my list. I see that point. The issue is that for everyone, they might not be able to do that with their collection. I mentioned this before, but not everybody has access to limitless or exactly what they need to be 'competitive'. The majority of people that play this game are not those that regular forums or attend tournaments- they are casuals, who generally play with the models they own/like. They don't pour through books and look for the absolute best synergy, cheapest options, or what the meta deems to be the best.
Please keep this in mind when you reply and provide feedback. Not one comment addressed how I could have potentially dealt with the Tau list based on WHAT I TOOK. And if I simply cannot because Tau lists, even basic ones, pick apart unfocussed lists (based on the principal of everything just shoots you to hell thus has autopilot synergy)- I may not be able to control much.
its a sad truth, but you are not simply "entitled" to win, just because you have X in your collection. there is no way around it. that isn't to say your "factions" cannot win - they can. they have the tools.
you have the answer, and you know what to do. its a start, and its a good, positive starting point. whether you like the answers or not is irrelevant. the answers are unchanging. whether you take the advice or not-for whatever reasons- is entirely on you. but bear in mind, should you not, and should you keep losing to tau, its on your head. its not because tau are OP. its because you chose not to evolve your play to deal with them. if you have the tools that will bring you up to par, and you choose not to use them, then you cant really blame the other guy for a sub par gameplan/performance on your part
XenosTerminus wrote:Please don't misunderstand. I do appreciate advice.
The issue is far too many people (not just here) offer very little constructive criticism. Most of the responses have been very rude.
I can look into optimizing my list. I see that point. The issue is that for everyone, they might not be able to do that with their collection. I mentioned this before, but not everybody has access to limitless or exactly what they need to be 'competitive'. The majority of people that play this game are not those that regular forums or attend tournaments- they are casuals, who generally play with the models they own/like. They don't pour through books and look for the absolute best synergy, cheapest options, or what the meta deems to be the best.
Please keep this in mind when you reply and provide feedback. Not one comment addressed how I could have potentially dealt with the Tau list based on WHAT I TOOK. And if I simply cannot because Tau lists, even basic ones, pick apart unfocussed lists (based on the principal of everything just shoots you to hell thus has autopilot synergy)- I may not be able to control much.
First off are you aware that your thread is entitled; "Why Tau has gone too far"? How does this thread title lend itself to constructive criticism on how to use a list against a Tau list? Then you are looking for tactical advice with a singular list against a generalized Tau list with a minimal write up of the game.
Firstly if this is your entire collection of models you need to play smaller point level games. This will allow you to field a good balanced list with the models you own. Post your collection and what you need help with in the list building forum with a title that doesn't say, "I want to complain about Tau" and you will get more constructive advice.
You actually have gotten some reasonable advice. Notice people who were fighting earlier in the thread are all in agreement on what your problem is. Your list is a very poorly balanced list by any measurement. Your units do not have clear purposes, you do not have a broad selection of the codex, you do not have a plan to deal with any threat. Look at your "I was in control" moment. You controlled a zone around objectives rather than controlling the opponents position or inflicting real damage to the opponent. This is bad against any shooting list as they do not depend on being near the objectives for winning. They kill you and move onto the objectives in turn 5. You should have had the Tau opponent cornered so they had no board room to maneuver. Your current list lacks mobility and durability...it also lack firepower...so with the tools you have at this point level you struggle.
In the current thread you cannot even find your army list without searching. This is a very bad sign for actually getting advice.
All right, I will bite. If it is in fact the list, what is your opinion of a good DA list?
I can see if I have the resources to actually pool one together.
Let me reiterate something I mentioned before, however. I have actually had success against pretty much every opponent in our casual play group/club with these 'terrible' lists. Are my opponents constantly bringing tournament worthy lists? No. But they are all not bringing terrible lists either. I have been struggling against Tau the most, which is why the previous comment about how it is hard to bring a 'bad'' Tau list, and that it punishes 'bad' lists more so than a lot of other books, that is part of my issue with Tau.
They are the my Achilles heal for casual non-serious lists.
XenosTerminus wrote: All right, I will bite. If it is in fact the list, what is your opinion of a good DA list?
The problem is that when we are not talking about tournaments, a discussion about what is "good" is kinda useless. Every playgroup is different and has different stuff, so we can't even say that things are bad. Our Tau-player brings one Riptide, while the Tau in another group might bring three to a casual game. Our Necron-player brings Flayed Ones and he is successful because we field 'random units with a theme/synergy' instead of 'spamming good units'. My own Necron list has only taken Canoptek Wraiths once to a game, because I have many other units I prefer in a 1500pnt-game. Our Chaos-player doesn't even own a Helldrake, so yeah..
People might say that a Whirlwind is bad, and they might be right. And if two Whirlwinds make you win the game in your meta, that means it is a good unit for you.
My Blood Angels have weak, average and a few good units. But the weak units in a Tau-codex are good units compared to my average. So that means that if I want to beat a weak/average-Tau army, I need to bring my best units and I need to stay away from my beloved Sanguinary Guard. I really WANT to bring my Sanguinary Guard, but it only takes one Riptide to kill them all with a single shot.
The "Tau-problem" that many people are talking about is that even when you try to be as weak as possible, you will probably annihilate an average Codex "X"-list. That means that one Tau-player in a playgroup already changes the entire metagame, people don't like that. It's why I actually stopped collecting a Tau-army, because I know that it will ruin the fun of everyone else in our group.
I made a 2k Drop Pod list I think would work well in this edition for you.
HQ
Belial with TH/SS
Elites
Company Veterans - 7x Combi-Plasma, drop pod
Troops
Tactical Squad x10, MM, PG drop pod
Tactical Squad x10, MM, PG drop pod
Scout Squad with sniper rifles (home objective campers)
Deathwing Terminator Squad - 2x Plasma Cannons, 5 TH/SS, 10 Men
Fast Attack
Assault Squad with JP's exchanged for drop pod, 2x Flamer, Combi Flamer
Assault Squad with JP's exchanged for drop pod, 2x Flamer, Combi Flamer
Heavy Support
Tri-Las Predator
Tri-Las Predator
Tri-Las Predator
With this list you can reliably kill two Riptides a turn, or destroy his armored vehicles without breaking a sweat. You can shove 11 Terminators anywhere on the board without scatter turn 1 or 2 and either make them an immovable object on an objective or make them an unavoidable threat by shoving them in front of his lines.
Your Tactical squads and Assault Squads can deal with hordes and dug in Firewarriors, as well as wipe scoring units off objectives and take them themselves. Unless you roll incredibly poorly for scatter or he has multiple effective interceptor weapons your opponent cannot do anything to stop your alpha strike.
XenosTerminus wrote: All right, I will bite. If it is in fact the list, what is your opinion of a good DA list?
The problem is that when we are not talking about tournaments, a discussion about what is "good" is kinda useless.
Every playgroup is different and has different stuff, so we can't even say that things are bad.
Our Tau-player brings one Riptide, while the Tau in another group might bring three to a casual game.
Our Necron-player brings Flayed Ones and he is successful because we field 'random units with a theme/synergy' instead of 'spamming good units'.
My own Necron list has only taken Canoptek Wraiths once to a game, because I have many other units I prefer in a 1500pnt-game.
Our Chaos-player doesn't even own a Helldrake, so yeah..
People might say that a Whirlwind is bad, and they might be right.
And if two Whirlwinds make you win the game in your meta, that means it is a good unit for you.
My Blood Angels have weak, average and a few good units.
But the weak units in a Tau-codex are good units compared to my average.
So that means that if I want to beat a weak/average-Tau army, I need to bring my best units and I need to stay away from my beloved Sanguinary Guard.
I really WANT to bring my Sanguinary Guard, but it only takes one Riptide to kill them all with a single shot.
The "Tau-problem" that many people are talking about is that even when you try to be as weak as possible, you will probably annihilate an average Codex "X"-list.
That means that one Tau-player in a playgroup already changes the entire metagame, people don't like that.
It's why I actually stopped collecting a Tau-army, because I know that it will ruin the fun of everyone else in our group.
Thank you for this post- it is the first post that made me say 'he gets it'.
That is the issue. We play casually with generally units we either just own or enjoy. We like variety, as it makes for more interesting and variable games. While I realize I could bring very focused and specific lists to combat Tau, that is not how we generally do things.
It is not uncommon for us to plan for an evening of 40k and just pick a points value. The only knowledge we will have about our potential opponent is simply what codexes they own. We don't typically disclose what army we will be playing. With that in mind, we tend to create lists that do a little bit of everything, or thematic lists. This has not been an issue since the new Tau book came out.
Our Tau player has basically smashed everyone to pieces regardless of what he brings. Could we all bring specific lists to combat Tau? Of course- and if he doesn't bring Tau that week our list may be terrible against his other armies. That is the point here. It's a book that excels at what 6e favors and is generally failproof against most things- it's a horrendously unfun book from a casual perspective.
Well if you bring crappy casual unfocused lists that don't know what to do and expect to beat a list that is designed to shoot you off the board and as Peregrine says, 'has a coherent strategy' of course they're going to have an advantage.
The Tau Codex is well written in that 90% of the units in it are worth taking- I'd say only about 60-70% of the units in Dark Angels are worth taking. This is why he can bring a number of effective lists.
Its like the equivalent of you bringing a block of Swordsmen, Crossbowmen and Knights while your opponent brings varying types of Muskets and Cannon, and you're being surprised that you can't win.
Your crossbows aren't as shooty as their muskets, your Swordsmen are prone to their cannon elements and your Knights can't turn the tide on their own.
Again, demonstrating my point about Tau and casual fun. The entire book is designed to do that regardless of what you take.
It's auto pilot and lacks diverse list creation. He has brought multiple lists every week that all play the same. It's boring, lacks creativity, and by the nature of how the book was designed goes against the principal of how we play casually.
You can reply saying how 'unfocussed and crappy' my/any list is until the Sun implodes. I get it. You don't like the list and only analyze this game from a competitive standpoint. Fine, you win. I am terrible at this game, lack proper list creating skill and am playing for all the wrong reasons (to win, of course!).
The fundamental point of all of these conversations was always how Tau is not fun to play against, and how casual players struggle against them. They are the quintessential Win-more army of this edition so far, hence why they gak all over casual principles.
The "Tau-problem" that many people are talking about is that even when you try to be as weak as possible, you will probably annihilate an average Codex "X"-list.
Kind of a proves that making "average" list is both waste of money and probably not the wisest thing to do. People shouldn't play bad armies or bad codex and if they like some models which have bad rules, why not use counts as ? Sang guard is weak , then play them as space wolfs or grey knights or even tau . Scouts as normal fire warriors , baal as a long strike hammer head , Sang guard as crisis suits and the new sm centurions as broadsides. You can even add a Riptide by using a Dreadknight model . The army will have all the feathery marine feels and be good on the table.
Thank you! I understand this problem because we had this too with MtG. I will explain how that went and you should just imagine that the colours are codices if you don't understand how the game works. Decks are like army-lists and cards are like units:
Everyone had fun with their own decks and then the colour black got a cheap powerful card that every black deck had to use. The colour white had the best answer to it, so they brought their big guns to counter it. Blue, red and green where in the middle of a nuclear war and had to step their game up. Within half a year the game went from: "Eating snacks, smoking cigarettes and drinking beer." to highly competitive matches that weren't relaxing and enjoyable.
Mr.Omega posted a good DA-list there, it will do quite well against Tau Empire! The only 'problem' with that list is that it would totally annihilate every other player.
Many groups don't just play with a pre-decided point value, they also play with a pre-decided powerlevel. And no matter what a Tau-player does, his powerlevel is so high that it 'forces' me to take a tournament list if I want a fair and fun game. I don't want to buy 40 ASM, 4 Razorbacks and some Predators just to prevent him from winning in turn 1. Nor do I want to buy an additional 12 Wraiths, 3 Nightscythes and one Annihilation Barge so I can win against Tau. Because if I do that, I will automatically win against the other lists and I force them to do the same.
In my groups I prefer to balance my lists to the opponent. If I play against our new Ork player with only a limited amount of models, I will 'weaken' my list so both of us can have fun; Tau can't do that.
Wait. So when you were playing in 5th ed you didn't buy razorbacks for your BAs and wraihts , scyths and AB weren't the first models you bought for your necron. What else could you buy for your armies . 5th ed Blood Angels were razorspam all the way and both the 5th ed and 6th ed necron were using wraiths. The storm raven alone and the leaks about flyer rules in 5th ed , should have made you buy scyths in advance.
I can't even imagine what other stuff you could buy for a 1500 lists.
How about models I like?
It's a modelling game first, a beer and pretzels game second and somewhere in the last spot is it a competitive game.
I have almost 6000 points in Crons, but only 7 Wraiths, one flyer and 2 Barges.
The rest are Monoliths, warriors, scarabs, triarch stalker, etc, etc.
It might be hard to understand for some people, but (pre-Tau) it can be fun to make up army-lists with any units from the codex and just battle each other.
XenosTerminus wrote: Again, demonstrating my point about Tau and casual fun. The entire book is designed to do that regardless of what you take.
It's auto pilot and lacks diverse list creation. He has brought multiple lists every week that all play the same. It's boring, lacks creativity, and by the nature of how the book was designed goes against the principal of how we play casually.
You can reply saying how 'unfocussed and crappy' my/any list is until the Sun implodes. I get it. You don't like the list and only analyze this game from a competitive standpoint. Fine, you win. I am terrible at this game, lack proper list creating skill and am playing for all the wrong reasons (to win, of course!).
The fundamental point of all of these conversations was always how Tau is not fun to play against, and how casual players struggle against them. They are the quintessential Win-more army of this edition so far, hence why they gak all over casual principles.
Its perfectly possible to bring a focused, casual list with Marines. Your problem is that you mix everything together in a paste that doesn't work - your strategy is incoherent. It doesn't take a barrel of braincells and the entirety of the world rocket scientific community to keep to a strategy with a list.
For instance, create a casual line up of Tactical Marines, close combat power armor veterans, whatever you want to handicap yourself with, then give them all drop pods. Thats by no means a competitive list or even a tournament list, but it'll sure as hell work against Tau.
Change the thread title to Why GW has gone too far.
Seem odd to blame a fictional creation for apparent woes.
I can sympathize with the OP to a certain degree but you seem hung up on the Tau. is this a symptom of being jaded with 40k in general? (being that its a poorly balanced creaking mess). And I say that as fan of 40k albeit having stepped back for some time.
It might be hard to understand for some people, but (pre-Tau) it can be fun to make up army-lists with any units from the codex and just battle each other.
Cute. You do realize that 5th was criminally worse about balance, every codex(barring nids) one-upping the other to almost Super-Sayian levels of Nonsense each book, right?
I remember when one guy ran Paladin/Purifier GK and Sang Guard/Death company BA in my group and, funny enough, the only one that could beat either of his lists was me and my old 4th Edition Tau.
Now the new books are pretty balanced against one another and the older books suffer because they were written with old rules in mind.
However, even if I were to pin the name of every tau unit on a dartboard and pick what units I used by throwing darts, I would never get a CC list. I would without a doubt get a list focused on shooting 100% of the time with Tau.
You don't need THE MOST OPTIMAL LIST EVAR!!!111!11! You need a list with a goal. A plan. What do you want to do? Hold Objectives? shoot? drop from the sky in tin cans? Assault? something else?
Then from there all you do is make that work better. You can do that without making a Tourney list and if your group is all having trouble with the Tau, then when they see you beat them with a list with an Actual plan in mind( or even give the guy a run for his money), They just might learn from what you did and follow suit.
Kangodo wrote: How about models I like?
It's a modelling game first, a beer and pretzels game second and somewhere in the last spot is it a competitive game.
I have almost 6000 points in Crons, but only 7 Wraiths, one flyer and 2 Barges.
The rest are Monoliths, warriors, scarabs, triarch stalker, etc, etc.
It might be hard to understand for some people, but (pre-Tau) it can be fun to make up army-lists with any units from the codex and just battle each other.
Ok , but if you collect models not to game , but just to own them , why do you care about losing ?
He cares about his gaming group? I know the feeling and wrote about it in another thread. To recap, we have 6 player's in our group, having fun games with non optimal armies (orks, tau, ba, sm, eldar, necron). Previously anyone could win our minitournaments, but not anymore. With the same models our Tau player doesn't even have to try so hard to win. From my perspective the new Tau do feel somewhat over the top.
Naw wrote: He cares about his gaming group? I know the feeling and wrote about it in another thread. To recap, we have 6 player's in our group, having fun games with non optimal armies (orks, tau, ba, sm, eldar, necron). Previously anyone could win our minitournaments, but not anymore. With the same models our Tau player doesn't even have to try so hard to win. From my perspective the new Tau do feel somewhat over the top.
Ban tau from participating in your mini tourneys, everyones happy.............oh.
Except the Tau player This thread is not about demanding change, we'll have to wait till all the codices are updated.
People just want to talk about it.
With the new Grav-weapons it seems like the Riptide-problem is at least a bit 'countered'.
Kangodo wrote: Except the Tau player This thread is not about demanding change, we'll have to wait till all the codices are updated.
People just want to talk about it.
With the new Grav-weapons it seems like the Riptide-problem is at least a bit 'countered'.
Kangodo wrote: Except the Tau player This thread is not about demanding change, we'll have to wait till all the codices are updated.
People just want to talk about it.
With the new Grav-weapons it seems like the Riptide-problem is at least a bit 'countered'.
Theres talking and then theres talking...
Riptides are slightly diluted by Grav weapons but stil able to deal damage and draw panicky 'oh my gawd!' knee jerk response from on the ground commanders
Kangodo wrote: How about models I like?
It's a modelling game first, a beer and pretzels game second and somewhere in the last spot is it a competitive game.
I have almost 6000 points in Crons, but only 7 Wraiths, one flyer and 2 Barges.
The rest are Monoliths, warriors, scarabs, triarch stalker, etc, etc.
It might be hard to understand for some people, but (pre-Tau) it can be fun to make up army-lists with any units from the codex and just battle each other.
Ok , but if you collect models not to game , but just to own them , why do you care about losing ?
Winning is nice, but not the priority for myself (or most of the people in our gaming group).
A balanced, varied, enjoyable 2-3 hours of throwing dice and watching things explode/kill each other is. I don't know how many times I, or anyone else that is experiencing the same issue, has to re-explain. Tau can basically take whatever they want to a game and proceed to just shoot you off the table.
I mentioned this before, but some of my more memorable games were losses. The difference is, the games were extremely close, with both armies barely having anything left. These games incorporated a large variety of unit types and saw each phase of the game played out equally. Tau? Deploy, shoot, run away. Rinse and repeat until your opponent is dead.
This is where the 40k playerbase is divided. The competitive-minded people never see anything as a problem or detriment, because there will always be a solution, or optimized list that can 'counter' something effectively. That's great for you, but from a small casual group perspective, this literally throws the 'meta' out the window.
Not even our Tau player enjoys playing them anymore.
Mr. Burning wrote: If thats the case the guy playing tau should try something else or dig out his 4th ed codex again.
maybe you guys should also dig your codexes out and have fun building a list to try and rip the tau a new one.
another explanation is that your tau player may just be a better general than you and may be needing a new level of opponent.......
So he shouldn't play with new rules or take another army?
We CAN build a list that beats an average Tau-list. The only problem with that is that we end up copy-pasting the tournament list instead of using models we like.
Wait.. You did NOT just make that argument?
I can give a two-year old a Tau army and he would probably win with it.
Mr. Burning wrote: If thats the case the guy playing tau should try something else or dig out his 4th ed codex again.
maybe you guys should also dig your codexes out and have fun building a list to try and rip the tau a new one.
another explanation is that your tau player may just be a better general than you and may be needing a new level of opponent.......
So he shouldn't play with new rules or take another army?
We CAN build a list that beats an average Tau-list. The only problem with that is that we end up copy-pasting the tournament list instead of using models we like.
Wait.. You did NOT just make that argument?
I can give a two-year old a Tau army and he would probably win with it.
Just like there is replying and going "There is nothing wrong with Tau, they are perfectly balanced. You are the problem!"
Exactly. I can build a list to crush Tau with models I own. I don't want to, though. With general casual play/lists, it's not uncommon to encounter things that you can't counter effectively since you did not plan for it. That's fine, since it is generally only a unit or two- a good player can work around and it play for the mission.
Tau? They have the tools to deal with literally anything in the game (except an abundance of AV14, but lets be honest.. nobody does this)
Mr. Burning wrote: If thats the case the guy playing tau should try something else or dig out his 4th ed codex again.
maybe you guys should also dig your codexes out and have fun building a list to try and rip the tau a new one.
another explanation is that your tau player may just be a better general than you and may be needing a new level of opponent.......
So he shouldn't play with new rules or take another army?
We CAN build a list that beats an average Tau-list. The only problem with that is that we end up copy-pasting the tournament list instead of using models we like.
Wait.. You did NOT just make that argument?
I can give a two-year old a Tau army and he would probably win with it.
Just like there is replying and going "There is nothing wrong with Tau, they are perfectly balanced. You are the problem!"
I have no opinion either way on tau being balance/not balanced.
There are options out there, If these options are not taken then theres nothing anyone can say that will change someones mind about Tau being roflstomp OP or not.
Give tau to an incompenetent user and they definitely will not be able to win.
And yes if a user is not happy with an army, then changing tactics/units or army/game are some of the only choices available. Harsh but true.
If the option is to field a highly competitive list and ignore the units you like than it's not really an option.
And that is what he, and I, are saying: We can beat Tau, but that means I would leave the models at home that actually made me want to play this codex.
I don't play to win and I don't mind if I lose a game, but there is 'losing' and 'getting your ass kicked starting in T1'.
So what you are saying sounds like: "If you want to enjoy the game, you have to stop playing the things that makes you enjoy the game."
If my 'fun-list' loses because he took a tournament-list, I wouldn't mind.
It's the part where his 'fun-list' annihilates our 'fun-lists' without any effort.
Kangodo wrote: If the option is to field a highly competitive list and ignore the units you like than it's not really an option.
And that is what he, and I, are saying: We can beat Tau, but that means I would leave the models at home that actually made me want to play this codex.
I don't play to win and I don't mind if I lose a game, but there is 'losing' and 'getting your ass kicked starting in T1'.
So what you are saying sounds like: "If you want to enjoy the game, you have to stop playing the things that makes you enjoy the game."
If my 'fun-list' loses because he took a tournament-list, I wouldn't mind.
It's the part where his 'fun-list' annihilates our 'fun-lists' without any effort.
If a player isn't having fun then some options that may reinvigorate a players appetite for play may include changing lists, changing group or taking a break and coming back.
Isn't part of the fun changing and tinkering with your lists to see what possibilities there are?
edited for reconsideration.
The Tau codex is what is it, having faced 6th ed tau lists it a few times I am aware of its power. I am also aware that in the hands of different generals the same(ish) list has wildly differing results. This is why I advocate a change of scene/ or theme.
Kangodo wrote: If the option is to field a highly competitive list and ignore the units you like than it's not really an option.
And that is what he, and I, are saying: We can beat Tau, but that means I would leave the models at home that actually made me want to play this codex.
I don't play to win and I don't mind if I lose a game, but there is 'losing' and 'getting your ass kicked starting in T1'.
So what you are saying sounds like: "If you want to enjoy the game, you have to stop playing the things that makes you enjoy the game."
If my 'fun-list' loses because he took a tournament-list, I wouldn't mind.
It's the part where his 'fun-list' annihilates our 'fun-lists' without any effort.
If a player isn't having fun then some options that may reinvigorate a players appetite for play may include changing lists, changing group or taking a break and coming back.
If the player doe not want to change yet continues not having fun, then what is the point of continuing?
Isn't part of the fun changing and tinkering with your lists to see what possibilities there are?
For some people this may be the case, but you are missing the point we are trying to make here.
Beating a dead horse.
Our entire group within reason enjoys the game for the same principle reasons, even the Tau player. Up until the new codex, we were able to bring basically whatever list we wanted (which does touch on your point of list design- this is included). We all had a decent chance to win, or even just actually be able to play/interact with the game, regardless of the outcome.
Tau lists, unless PURPOSELY made to be bad, have the tools to do well against any army, even when played by sub-optimal players. Can you deploy units in reasonably decent locations? Good.
Can you pick a target and shoot it until it is dead? Good.
Can you run away when/if things get close? Good.
That's Tau in a nutshell. Do some people enjoy this? Yes.
It's pretty telling to me, however, that this release has generated the largest outcry from the playerbase since Gray Knights.
Just curious, but from what you could remember on the Tau player before the new dex, did he run Crisis and Broadside heavy armies with minimal troops? Because Tau had very little deviation in the last army, so while you think that he could have ran anything, you may be surprised as to what he was actually forced to run. Same thing happened to a friend and I when we started playing Tau. We tried running other units, but just couldn't. The lists we used for "fun" were the monobuild list because anything else would pretty much end the game quicker than it'd be worth to bother unpacking.
As to the issue at hand, the issue isn't with Tau. Yeah, it's easy to build lists, but because the codex basically spells out that Fireblades go with Firewarriors with Pulse rifles and not with Broadsides. You should take a look at the CSM codex. If you tried to bring a little bit of each with that book, you'd have a garbled mess.
It does suck that you can't just field any unit you want, but it's one part of tactics. Check out the Tactics page and you can see that one of the most crucial aspects to the game is understanding how to do master effective list building.
XenosTerminus wrote: Our entire group within reason enjoys the game for the same principle reasons, even the Tau player. Up until the new codex, we were able to bring basically whatever list we wanted (which does touch on your point of list design- this is included). We all had a decent chance to win, or even just actually be able to play/interact with the game, regardless of the outcome.
And, again, this is not GW's fault. It's your fault for playing bad lists. You happened to all play terrible un-focused lists so it "worked" for a while, but eventually it was going to come to an end as soon as someone figured out a list that avoids those mistakes. It's just coincidence that it happened to be the Tau that did it.
Tau lists, unless PURPOSELY made to be bad, have the tools to do well against any army, even when played by sub-optimal players.
Every army has those tools. The Tau codex just makes it easier to avoid basic newbie mistakes and reach a minimal level of list quality. But once everyone reaches that very basic level of list quality the Tau "advantage" no longer exists.
That's Tau in a nutshell. Do some people enjoy this?
And you could over-simplify ANY army and say the same thing about it.
It's pretty telling to me, however, that this release has generated the largest outcry from the playerbase since Gray Knights.
Yeah, if we just pretend that Necrons didn't happen...
XenosTerminus wrote: Our entire group within reason enjoys the game for the same principle reasons, even the Tau player. Up until the new codex, we were able to bring basically whatever list we wanted (which does touch on your point of list design- this is included). We all had a decent chance to win, or even just actually be able to play/interact with the game, regardless of the outcome.
And, again, this is not GW's fault. It's your fault for playing bad lists. You happened to all play terrible un-focused lists so it "worked" for a while, but eventually it was going to come to an end as soon as someone figured out a list that avoids those mistakes. It's just coincidence that it happened to be the Tau that did it.
Tau lists, unless PURPOSELY made to be bad, have the tools to do well against any army, even when played by sub-optimal players.
Every army has those tools. The Tau codex just makes it easier to avoid basic newbie mistakes and reach a minimal level of list quality. But once everyone reaches that very basic level of list quality the Tau "advantage" no longer exists.
That's Tau in a nutshell. Do some people enjoy this?
And you could over-simplify ANY army and say the same thing about it.
It's pretty telling to me, however, that this release has generated the largest outcry from the playerbase since Gray Knights.
Yeah, if we just pretend that Necrons didn't happen...
No, you are mistaken. It is GW's fault for horrendous internal and external balance. Do you honestly think that GW purposely makes probably 75% of a codex 'bad'? No. They do not cater this game to the competitive crowd. They are a model company first and foremost, and fully expect their average customer to buy cool models. Isn't that why people still play 40k (unless they only care about winning)? The lore? The story? The narrative? So they can build, paint, and play with miniature representation of things that exist in this narrative.
Their lack of apparent rules testing and balance is simply abused by the overly competitive player who scours the codexes for what IS the best, balance be damned. That's the way it is. You can point at the majority of the units in the DA codex, for example, and call them crap unless equipped a very specific way, spammed, etc. This is normally not an issue for casual gamers, because they rarely min/max, spam, or bring the absolute best units or craft what you incessantly call 'good lists'. Then, naturally, opinionated players who literally cannot fathom that anyone would simply want to bring a wide variety of models in a game to have fun and just throw down, are upset that a book basically prevents this from being feasible. I mentioned the Tau player is upset about this too.
It's pretty obvious what kind of player you are. The problem is you literally have nothing to offer to this discussion than 'your lists are bad', 'bring better units', or 'you have to be more competitive to have fun'. This is clearly not the point, and you clearly cannot comprehend the underlying issue here as you are strictly of a single mindset.
XenosTerminus wrote: No, you are mistaken. It is GW's fault for horrendous internal and external balance. Do you honestly think that GW purposely makes probably 75% of a codex 'bad'? No. They do not cater this game to the competitive crowd. They are a model company first and foremost, and fully expect their average customer to buy cool models. Isn't that why people still play 40k (unless they only care about winning)? The lore? The story? The narrative? So they can build, paint, and play with miniature representation of things that exist in this narrative.
Their lack of apparent rules testing and balance is simply abused by the overly competitive player who scours the codexes for what IS the best, balance be damned. That's the way it is. You can point at the majority of the units in the DA codex, for example, and call them crap unless equipped a very specific way, spammed, etc. This is normally not an issue for casual gamers, because they rarely min/max, spam, or bring the absolute best units or craft what you incessantly call 'good lists'. Then, naturally, opinionated players who literally cannot fathom that anyone would simply want to bring a wide variety of models in a game to have fun and just throw down, are upset that a book basically prevents this from being feasible. I mentioned the Tau player is upset about this too.
And what does this have to do with the Tau? This has been happening since long before the Tau codex. People who bring a pile of random units lose to anyone who makes a basic attempt at building a good list, no matter what codices are involved. The Tau codex just makes it a little easier to avoid the biggest newbie mistakes.
It's pretty obvious what kind of player you are. The problem is you literally have nothing to offer to this discussion than 'your lists are bad', 'bring better units', or 'you have to be more competitive to have fun'. This is clearly not the point, and you clearly cannot comprehend the underlying issue here as you are strictly of a single mindset.
I'm not saying that you need to be more competitive to have fun. I'm saying that your opinions about game balance have no value because your problem is entirely caused by your bad list, not by the Tau codex. You can't bring a hopelessly weak list and then complain that your opponent's army is overpowered when you inevitably lose.
Naw wrote: Does this mean that you acknowledge the Tau codex being there on the cheesy side with dexes such as GK and Necrons?
No, I'm saying that the outrage over Necrons (especially once 6th introduced flyerspam) was far worse than any "outrage" over the new Tau codex.
XenosTerminus wrote: No, you are mistaken. It is GW's fault for horrendous internal and external balance. Do you honestly think that GW purposely makes probably 75% of a codex 'bad'? No. They do not cater this game to the competitive crowd. They are a model company first and foremost, and fully expect their average customer to buy cool models. Isn't that why people still play 40k (unless they only care about winning)? The lore? The story? The narrative? So they can build, paint, and play with miniature representation of things that exist in this narrative.
Their lack of apparent rules testing and balance is simply abused by the overly competitive player who scours the codexes for what IS the best, balance be damned. That's the way it is. You can point at the majority of the units in the DA codex, for example, and call them crap unless equipped a very specific way, spammed, etc. This is normally not an issue for casual gamers, because they rarely min/max, spam, or bring the absolute best units or craft what you incessantly call 'good lists'. Then, naturally, opinionated players who literally cannot fathom that anyone would simply want to bring a wide variety of models in a game to have fun and just throw down, are upset that a book basically prevents this from being feasible. I mentioned the Tau player is upset about this too.
And what does this have to do with the Tau? This has been happening since long before the Tau codex. People who bring a pile of random units lose to anyone who makes a basic attempt at building a good list, no matter what codices are involved. The Tau codex just makes it a little easier to avoid the biggest newbie mistakes.
It's pretty obvious what kind of player you are. The problem is you literally have nothing to offer to this discussion than 'your lists are bad', 'bring better units', or 'you have to be more competitive to have fun'. This is clearly not the point, and you clearly cannot comprehend the underlying issue here as you are strictly of a single mindset.
I'm not saying that you need to be more competitive to have fun. I'm saying that your opinions about game balance have no value because your problem is entirely caused by your bad list, not by the Tau codex. You can't bring a hopelessly weak list and then complain that your opponent's army is overpowered when you inevitably lose.
Naw wrote: Does this mean that you acknowledge the Tau codex being there on the cheesy side with dexes such as GK and Necrons?
No, I'm saying that the outrage over Necrons (especially once 6th introduced flyerspam) was far worse than any "outrage" over the new Tau codex.
I posted one list, and hesitated to do so for this very reason. How do you know I haven't brought 'good' lists? Because of one list I posted? Are you assuming I can't build a 'good' list simply because I brought one, with anecdotal evidence? And actually, it's funny. because you called the list a 'pile of random units'. It had duplicates, so really your only definition of a list that does not meet this criteria would be.. you guess it... a list that spams units, likely ones you would classify as 'good'.
The purpose of this thread was from the beginning Tau from a casual perspective, not competitive. Tau is not fun to play against, and ruins games from a strictly casual perspective. If an entire player base has to adjust their lists to specifically combat one army there is a problem.
You constantly reply with the same formula- calling lists bad, saying things aren't optimized, list building, etc. All things a tournament/competitive person cares about. You keep arguing this point to death, and it is tiring to read/reply to someone who literally cannot see what is being argued here.
Well if you brought a good list last time, it wouldn't have mattered because of the rule confusion for markerlights let your opponent effectively buff his entire army to BS5 for 44 points, or BS5 Ignore cover for 88.
But I think you're making this more personal than it really needs to be, and understand your frustration. It's not you and it's not about you, so let that anger go.
Now there is plenty to learn in this thread. Most of that is to understand that things can't be your way sometimes and the the game isn't balanced fairly. It's a tough lesson.
Again, list building is a critical point to the game. It's the first thing you should do before purchasing models to me. When you have a list that is tuned right it works for you, and you don't have to work with it or have it work against you. It will help your deployment and tactics through out the game. I'm not familiar with DA, but several players have commented on your list and I'd listen to them.
Automatically Appended Next Post: And personally the comments that "Tau aren't fun to play against" and "Ruins games" is kinda messed up. I play Tau and I have had several very hard fought and balanced games. I play a competitive list too. So all my work and games were hours of someone forced to play against me? That they didn't have fun? Or by me picking an army that was monobuild through 5th and the start of 6th is somehow ruining the game all together? A lot of people have made that comment and I think it's BS.
XenosTerminus wrote: How do you know I haven't brought 'good' lists? Because of one list I posted?
Because of that, and because you defended it as a "balanced" list instead of just admitting it was weak, and said that you want to continue bringing lists like that. It's pretty clear that this is a typical list for you.
And actually, it's funny. because you called the list a 'pile of random units'. It had duplicates, so really your only definition of a list that does not meet this criteria would be.. you guess it... a list that spams units, likely ones you would classify as 'good'.
Having duplicates doesn't make it less of a random pile of units. It's a random pile of units because it has a couple assault units, a couple shooting units, a drop pod, a couple scoring units, etc. It may have two copies of something, but the list as a whole has no focus.
The purpose of this thread was from the beginning Tau from a casual perspective, not competitive. Tau is not fun to play against, and ruins games from a strictly casual perspective. If an entire player base has to adjust their lists to specifically combat one army there is a problem.
The problem is you're narrowly defining "casual" to mean "I only play with weak battleforce-style lists and refuse to bring better ones". That isn't the same definition of "casual" that other people use.
I think the main problem with tau is that a casual tau list will smash most other fluffy or fun lists from what I've seen, I only know one tau player and he seems to play a pretty optimised list so I wouldn't play him as that isn't what I'm about. I know my own list would bite the dirt hard against tau and I'd most likely be tabled by turn 2, I just don't find getting shot off the board before you do anything much fun.
Edit: I understand that casual varies depending on the person, to me it means playing relatively infrequently (maybe once a month), possibly having a limited collection to pick from, playing models that you like the look of over effectiveness or any combination of the above. Also the fluff list player is probably going to suffer a bit harder against them too. I know that a shooty army is going to do well in a shooty edition but however you look at it tau aren't much fun to play against for someone unable/unwilling to change their list.
Ugly Green Trog wrote: I think the main problem with tau is that a casual tau list will smash most other fluffy or fun lists from what I've seen, I only know one tau player and he seems to play a pretty optimised list so I wouldn't play him as that isn't what I'm about. I know my own list would bite the dirt hard against tau and I'd most likely be tabled by turn 2, I just don't find getting shot off the board before you do anything much fun.
This is only because you (apparently) define "fun" and "fluffy" as "weak" instead of "I enjoy playing this" and "represents an aspect of the fictional universe of 40k".
Savageconvoy wrote: Well if you brought a good list last time, it wouldn't have mattered because of the rule confusion for markerlights let your opponent effectively buff his entire army to BS5 for 44 points, or BS5 Ignore cover for 88.
But I think you're making this more personal than it really needs to be, and understand your frustration. It's not you and it's not about you, so let that anger go.
Now there is plenty to learn in this thread. Most of that is to understand that things can't be your way sometimes and the the game isn't balanced fairly. It's a tough lesson.
Again, list building is a critical point to the game. It's the first thing you should do before purchasing models to me. When you have a list that is tuned right it works for you, and you don't have to work with it or have it work against you. It will help your deployment and tactics through out the game. I'm not familiar with DA, but several players have commented on your list and I'd listen to them.
Automatically Appended Next Post: And personally the comments that "Tau aren't fun to play against" and "Ruins games" is kinda messed up. I play Tau and I have had several very hard fought and balanced games. I play a competitive list too. So all my work and games were hours of someone forced to play against me? That they didn't have fun? Or by me picking an army that was monobuild through 5th and the start of 6th is somehow ruining the game all together? A lot of people have made that comment and I think it's BS.
Ditto. I've been playing a Gunline Tau army since the end of 4th/start of 5th. I learned real quick to go to Crisis Spam in 5th and dealt with it until 6th dropped when I could play my gunline again. Now we even have HQs for Gunline Tau and I can do my army like I wanted from the beginning, A Gunline with Mobile support, But everyone else who just steamrolled over Tau in 5th now have a problem that A Shooty army in a Shooty edition has the tools to Shoot.
So you're just going to refuse to play someone who might play an overpowered list that might table you, but really don't have experience against that kind of army? Kinda quiting before the race even starts with that attitude. So what would you play then?
And a "casual" Tau list won't stomp anything automatically. Suit, Firewarrior, drones, and Broadsides are just as vulnerable as they ever were while tanks took a bit of a dive in surviability. Riptides are the only real exception, but it's like adding the Heldrake to CSM. One unit and suddenly nobody wants to play it.
Ugly Green Trog wrote: I think the main problem with tau is that a casual tau list will smash most other fluffy or fun lists from what I've seen, I only know one tau player and he seems to play a pretty optimised list so I wouldn't play him as that isn't what I'm about. I know my own list would bite the dirt hard against tau and I'd most likely be tabled by turn 2, I just don't find getting shot off the board before you do anything much fun.
This is only because you (apparently) define "fun" and "fluffy" as "weak" instead of "I enjoy playing this" and "represents an aspect of the fictional universe of 40k".
Most certainly not! I play with the models I have in my army that I like the look of and fit my armies theme, if you read my edit you will see my view of the casual player, I like my lists to reflect the background and be consistent with the fluff. I do however realise that because of the way I like to play my armies I will most likely suffer when I play a newer dex or an optimised list. Just for the record my armies are orks trukk rush, and pre heresy BA.
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Savageconvoy wrote: So you're just going to refuse to play someone who might play an overpowered list that might table you, but really don't have experience against that kind of army? Kinda quiting before the race even starts with that attitude. So what would you play then?
And a "casual" Tau list won't stomp anything automatically. Suit, Firewarrior, drones, and Broadsides are just as vulnerable as they ever were while tanks took a bit of a dive in surviability. Riptides are the only real exception, but it's like adding the Heldrake to CSM. One unit and suddenly nobody wants to play it.
No I won't refuse an opponent but I tend to organise my games in advance and as a player who likes to play themed armies I tend to look for similar opponents, I play infrequently (not by choice but through other commitments) and play a heavily un optimised list from a 4th edition book, I wouldn't turn down tau generally but I'm not gonna play against a tau player who I know plays an optimised list. I play what I have in my collection and what I like the look of, I have played against optimised lists before and for me it's often not an enjoyable experience as I like the fluffy, fun side of games, not facing some guy who has done some sums and worked out the nastiest list he can take.
Maybe that's why my games are close and I don't really understand the whining about tau. I don't castle, and I don't like riptides, oh and I like stealthsuits!
However, close or not I have yet to lose with my new dex but I'm also mainly playing noobs.....I should provably play them with my wolves....oh well I don't mind winning lol
Ugly green trog, I understand your point of view with mister optimised tau.
As for the rest of the whiners, either accept the challenge or quit bitchin. My main opponent is necrons (only played him once since the new dex dropped) and I know I'm happy with the upgrades because I got tired of getting my ass handed to me on a regular basis. TAU SHOULD THRIVE in the atmosphere that is 40k whether melee or shooting is the beesknees or not. Focus your list a little more if you want to win. Look at real militarys, they don't take a bunch of random ass units, toss em into a meat grinder n expect them to live. Why are you doin the same thing with your troops?
I have not read this whole thread... However my 2 cents is this. Tau do have a ton of game breaking things in their codex. Marker lights allow you to raise your BS for snapshots being one of my biggest peeves just because it is. However as broken as people on the net seem to think the tau are, In my gameing group our tau player seems to lose an awful lot... He has only won about 2 or 3 games since the new dex has dropped. he has a riptide, has a bomber, has pathfinders, brings the farsight bomb from time to time, but he just never wins games. I don't really think that they are that over powered despite the fact that they seem to break every rule in the game.
I think another issue is that some people here that complain about tau have never SEEN casual tau armies.
Seriusly, I see riptide spam with ethreal buffed gunline and missilesides being considered "casual tau" when they compare it to their own "casual lists"
Really people? you take the MOST optimized tau possible as an example of "casual"? you might as well call the flying bakery "casual"
When did you last see stealth suits in game? krootox? vespids? the pope? darkstrider? piranhas? sniper drones? railgun broadsides? the sharks? fish of fury? EMP commandos?
They hardly show up, if at all, right?
BECAUSE THE TAU YOU PLAY AGAINST ARE NOT PLAYING CASUAL LISTS.
Lots of fun to be had with these guys, but they are honestly just not quite as good. if you see several these hit the field-you know you are facing a casual "fun" list. its like seeing 1k sons, rough riders, MoTF, assault dreads, sniper scouts, etc...
You both know it would probably not work, but you like having them around.
Stop complaining about tau just because you send out casual lists against fully optimized competitive ones and get crushed. either optimize your own lists, or play against non-optimized tau. you can't have both ways.
I just don't understand Casual players that well at all, though that's probably because there isn't an active casual gaming community or club for a long way where I live.
The only time I ever played casual lists and took what I wanted on a 'rule of cool' perspective I came home from a campaign weekend of 5 games with 5 losses. The 4th and 5th games were against basically tournament armies. A Tervigon spam list with Swarmlord and a guy playing Nurgle CSM at 3k, with loads of flyers, a FW Great Unclean One, Zombies, Typhus, the lot. There was no contest. I couldn't kill a single Tervigon and we got completely overrun, and the Nurgle guy ended up losing just a couple of CSM Marines and zombies, as well as a Hell Talon or something I managed to luckily snap shot.
The second and third games were against competitive lists. Game 2 was a complete disaster. I moved my mechanized marines forward, they died. He had 40 Marines holed up in buildings, Havoc Squads that shot down my Storm Eagle with Terminators inside, and just to top it off his CSM Lord killed a 14 point Sergeant of mine and turned into a Daemon Prince. Jeez, thanks.
The third game was against some guy who brought a Super Heavy Tank with a massive cannon, spammed Trygons and took a Warrior+ Tyranid Prime mycetic spore deathstar, as well as a crap ton of Genestealers. Wow, a load of fun that was. If it hadn't been for the fact that my Contemptor managed to roll a 6 on one dice like 3 or 4 times in a row with his Assault Cannon causing multiple chain reaction results I'd have been tabled a turn earlier. My tooled up Terminators met his Genestealers and Trygon in close combat and subsequently died.
Now while I'm no WAAC guy,losing 5 times in a row sucked a lot of the fun out of the entire thing. Bringing a casual list is like participating in a lottery, was basically the biggest conclusion I drew. Well, aside from the fact that I think Monstrous Creatures in 6th are the epitome of 40k's no logic fun leech moments.
A Vanquisher shell can easily penetrate and decimate a Land Raider yet it would take minimum 6 shells to even have a chance of killing your average MC? How the hell does that work? And yes I know Beast Hunter shells exist.
If your list doesn't have a reliable MC killer then you will get smashed (sometimes literally) when you come up against them. Riptides are the worst example of this. If you can't tie them up and your list can't kill one in two shooting phases you'll probably lose. The only real way to reliably deal with MC's is to play competitively. You can take a single melta gun in your Command Squad for character purposes and still stand a chance against vehicles. You'd need 4 plasma guns to stand a chance against an MC.
I know one guy on another forum who's a friend of mine who goes to a club where they play competitively but ban the scummy and overpowered strategies like Farsight bombs, and they get along fine.
Ugly Green Trog wrote: I think the main problem with tau is that a casual tau list will smash most other fluffy or fun lists from what I've seen, I only know one tau player and he seems to play a pretty optimised list so I wouldn't play him as that isn't what I'm about. I know my own list would bite the dirt hard against tau and I'd most likely be tabled by turn 2, I just don't find getting shot off the board before you do anything much fun.
This is only because you (apparently) define "fun" and "fluffy" as "weak" instead of "I enjoy playing this" and "represents an aspect of the fictional universe of 40k".
Now you are just being arrogant with your position.
Let's turn this around. Had not Tau been updated to 6th, would you tell the Tau player that his list making skill is bad, causing him to lose his games?
Without list optimizing I can get good games against any of our opponents, just not with Tau. Is that my weakness? I do not think so. If I build a list specifically Tau in mind I most likely beat the rest comfortably.
No other army has such a built-in synergy, every melee oriented army can have ranged support and vice versa, just not Tau. This has always been the case, it is just that this time it just feels a bit too powerful.
My idea of having good time means that our lists contain a little of everything and we are fine with that.
Also the ally system benefits Tau more than allying Tau into your list. Tau with Eldar can be vicious
Naw wrote: Let's turn this around. Had not Tau been updated to 6th, would you tell the Tau player that his list making skill is bad, causing him to lose his games?
What does this have to do with anything? The issue here has nothing to do with power creep since the 4th edition codices, the OP plays DA and the problems mentioned so far are all about poor list construction, not being stuck with an old and weak codex.
Without list optimizing I can get good games against any of our opponents, just not with Tau.
Which only happens if your opponents are bringing bad lists. Seriously, all you're doing is complaining that good lists beat bad lists. You can't expect GW to balance the game around an environment where nobody makes good list-building decisions.
No other army has such a built-in synergy, every melee oriented army can have ranged support and vice versa, just not Tau. This has always been the case, it is just that this time it just feels a bit too powerful.
So let me get this straight:
Army A has good ranged units and good melee units.
Army B only has good ranged units.
And somehow army B is the more powerful one? Are you kidding? How exactly does the Tau lacking melee units make them more powerful instead of less?
(And no, the "it's easier to build a list" reason doesn't matter. You don't judge army power level based on how easy it is to avoid making the worst possible lists.)
My idea of having good time means that our lists contain a little of everything and we are fine with that.
So why exactly are you complaining about game balance when you're deliberately making bad strategy choices? This makes about as much sense as complaining that Tau are underpowered because I took an ethereal and two squads of kroot in a 2000 point game.
I'm not a fan of playing against Tau atm. The only exception being if the player decides to bring some Kroot in his army. Not because Kroot are inferior, but because it shows he has some imagination & is just there for fun like I am.
If I see a list with nothing but Riptides/Drones/Battlesuits etc, I politely decline & wish them the best of luck.
Commissar Benny wrote: Not because Kroot are inferior, but because it shows he has some imagination & is just there for fun like I am.
Err, lol? How does having Kroot (a solid unit which can be taken purely for how well it wins games) show "imagination" or "fun" in ways that other units don't?
Had the "honor" of finally playing a Tau with Riptide spam. Uhm...yeah. I mean, I am used to GW selling overpowered, $-expensive models on purpose but the Riptide's gotta be a joke I somehow missed.
180 points for the Riptide. Uhm. How is this even borderline close to being balanced? Its rules are overpowered compared to even other 6th codices. Even the oh-so-overpowered-Necrons pay at least 205 pts for a C'tan shard that is vastly inferior to it in all regards. And its double-fire ability just takes the cake. Not suprised that the 3x Riptide list at ETC did so well.
Goddamnit GW, you dun goof'd. Again.
I'll just pass playing such lists and if in a tournament, 0 comp or sportsman and move on.
Personally I'm not seeing a problem with tau and I run daemons (no nurgle at all) and normally in a <2k list there's no greater daemons and mostly khorne use tactics, terrain, movement, threat overload, this wins games.
Skullhammer wrote: Personally I'm not seeing a problem with tau and I run daemons (no nurgle at all) and normally in a <2k list there's no greater daemons and mostly use tactics, terrain, movement, threat overload, this wins games.
I know I personally struggle here because all my old threat magnets; deffdredd, kanz, trukks of boyz with PK nob just fall apart to small arms fire meaning they just happen to die quickly on the first turn shortly before everything else.
Commissar Benny wrote: Not because Kroot are inferior, but because it shows he has some imagination & is just there for fun like I am.
Err, lol? How does having Kroot (a solid unit which can be taken purely for how well it wins games) show "imagination" or "fun" in ways that other units don't?
I almost never see Kroot fielded. I have about a dozen stores available within 50-70 mile radius that host 40k events & seeing Kroot on the table is rarer than Sisters of Battle. Despite Kroot being a intergral part of the Tau codex, no one uses them. Its almost the same list every game. Riptides, Drones, Battlesuits. Riptides, Drones, Battlesuits. Why bother taking the time to think & advance kroot through cover to assault when you can just sit back with battlesuits, drones, riptides & put no thought into the game?
Commissar Benny wrote: Why bother taking the time to think & advance kroot through cover to assault when you can just sit back with battlesuits, drones, riptides & put no thought into the game?
See, this is your problem. You think that Kroot are an assault unit because they used to be in the old codex. They aren't anymore, now they're a shooting unit (often with snipers, to deal with MCs) and cheap meatshield. Taking them or not taking them is just a choice between shooting units, no more or less "fun" than any other shooting unit in the codex, not a sign that the Tau player is "creative" or whatever and going to find a way to assault you.
I'll just pass playing such lists and if in a tournament, 0 comp or sportsman and move on.
Really your giving him a 0 on sportsmanship because he brought a TOURNAMENT LIST to a TOURNAMENT ...that makes perfect sense, you may need to grow up a little before playing in a tournament with that kind of attitude. Sportsmanship should be about the players attitude not what he brings to the table, lists like that are what you should expect at a tournament. People like you acting childishly because "he took a tournament list" is the reason why that part of the score is now banned at my FLGS.
Mr.Omega wrote: A Vanquisher shell can easily penetrate and decimate a Land Raider yet it would take minimum 6 shells to even have a chance of killing your average MC? How the hell does that work? And yes I know Beast Hunter shells exist.
That is one of the problems with this shooty edition. They made tanks and walkers worse with the hull points. Tanks should last longer, but every penetrating hit has a 1/3 chance of killing the target. Glancing a tank to death is also easy. Riptides, dreadknights, wraithknights should have been walkers, but given how weak they are I am not surprised they are monstrous creatures instead.
I do not mind a shooty game at all, I would much rather shoot than assault, yet my chosen armies are BA and Daemons. When the SM codex is available, I will choose another chapter and hope the centurions are something else than walkers or Very Large Infantry
Naw wrote: Let's turn this around. Had not Tau been updated to 6th, would you tell the Tau player that his list making skill is bad, causing him to lose his games?
What does this have to do with anything? The issue here has nothing to do with power creep since the 4th edition codices, the OP plays DA and the problems mentioned so far are all about poor list construction, not being stuck with an old and weak codex.
You are so not getting the point of this, are you?
Without list optimizing I can get good games against any of our opponents, just not with Tau.
Which only happens if your opponents are bringing bad lists. Seriously, all you're doing is complaining that good lists beat bad lists.
You do not even know what kind of lists I create. Maybe you are mixing me up with someone else. I am not complaining that good lists beat bad lists. I wrote that the same lists in 5th edition started getting the beating in 6th from our Tau player. The changes were 6th edition and the new Tau codex.
You can't expect GW to balance the game around an environment where nobody makes good list-building decisions.
I do not expect GW to balance anything at all, their track record is quite poor here. I guess they balance based on casual play and what models they want to sell, as they don't ever seem to expect people to cherry pick only the superior units from a codex. Read some of their battle reports, e.g. when Daemons codex came out, they had a game where the Burning Chariot was used. I can't begin to guess how that or the Daemon Prince survived past turn 1 or how the chariot was able to use any of its weapons
No other army has such a built-in synergy, every melee oriented army can have ranged support and vice versa, just not Tau. This has always been the case, it is just that this time it just feels a bit too powerful.
So let me get this straight:
Army A has good ranged units and good melee units.
Army B only has good ranged units.
And somehow army B is the more powerful one? Are you kidding? How exactly does the Tau lacking melee units make them more powerful instead of less?
Maybe I should have been more clear, I assumed what I wrote would make sense. Or you just chose to misinterpret it.
Tau pretty much folds if you can tie them in CC, but they have some serious tools against ever getting into CC they can't win. First bubble wrapping with Kroot, second the Riptide smash, third JSJ to stay away. They don't need CC, for anything.
(And no, the "it's easier to build a list" reason doesn't matter. You don't judge army power level based on how easy it is to avoid making the worst possible lists.)
Now you lost me here, but nevermind.
My idea of having good time means that our lists contain a little of everything and we are fine with that.
So why exactly are you complaining about game balance when you're deliberately making bad strategy choices?
The topic at hand was have Tau gone a bit too far and I believe they have. I gave some examples as to what this means in our small gaming group 5th vs 6th edition. You seem to position yourself based on how OP started this thread and have not progressed further yourself. At least the OP apologized for his attitude.
This makes about as much sense as complaining that Tau are underpowered because I took an ethereal and two squads of kroot in a 2000 point game.
Because Kroot are bad? Huh. Try drop podding when the other table half is filled with them.
Commissar Benny wrote: Why bother taking the time to think & advance kroot through cover to assault when you can just sit back with battlesuits, drones, riptides & put no thought into the game?
See, this is your problem. You think that Kroot are an assault unit because they used to be in the old codex. They aren't anymore, now they're a shooting unit (often with snipers, to deal with MCs) and cheap meatshield. Taking them or not taking them is just a choice between shooting units, no more or less "fun" than any other shooting unit in the codex, not a sign that the Tau player is "creative" or whatever and going to find a way to assault you.
Which is utterly stupid. Why are the melee choice now suddenly a 24" Sniper Choice?
It's probably the worst lore thing I've seen done to a unit in the longest while, utterly non-existent towards what kroot do!
Peregrine wrote: Army A has good ranged units and good melee units.
Army B only has good ranged units.
I don't think Tau are a problem, but this is a seriously bad analogy. Most people complaining come from a position where Army A's assault is not enough to counter-act Army B (Tau's) ranged strength and anti-assault tools, while Army A's shooting is also weaker than Army B's, making you generally inferior all around.
Why can't Tau be competitive? All I'm hearing is whine whine whine, while I, as a Tau player, still struggle to win against better opponents. The only change I have seen since the new codex is that Tau have gone from sub-par to competitive. My casual lists still lose against more competitive lists and my competitive lists still lose against better made lists. Can anyone actually make this post die? I know its not me because this post makes me so mad. Try waiting patiently for your book to be updated. Then you can say that Tau aren't over powered and stop all this stupid posting from happening.
Skullhammer wrote: Personally I'm not seeing a problem with tau and I run daemons (no nurgle at all) and normally in a <2k list there's no greater daemons and mostly khorne use tactics, terrain, movement, threat overload, this wins games.
Daemons are actually a really bad match-up for Tau.
Between a dozen plus levels of psychic shenanigans they can only defend against if they bring an ally, the Grimorie of True Names and our insane speed, Tau can have absolute fits keeping us at arms length.
A Beast spam list for example gives them only 1 shooting phase when Daemons go first. (2 if Tau go first.) And while Tau firepower is scary, it can't deal with that many threats all at once.
Screamer Council is also fun to pull on the Tau as they can't ever kill it.
Flying Circus isn't the best option, but it can work somewhat if you take the Tzeentch version.
Hell, even running a single double Greater Reward + Bangstick LoC and hit him with the Grimorie every turn will roflstomp the Tau... 3 levels of Divination gives him good odds of landing Forewarning, and if he gets Misfortune or Precognition it's pretty much just auto-pilot.
TheCadreofFi'rios wrote: Why can't Tau be competitive? All I'm hearing is whine whine whine, while I, as a Tau player, still struggle to win against better opponents. The only change I have seen since the new codex is that Tau have gone from sub-par to competitive. My casual lists still lose against more competitive lists and my competitive lists still lose against better made lists. Can anyone actually make this post die? I know its not me because this post makes me so mad. Try waiting patiently for your book to be updated. Then you can say that Tau aren't over powered and stop all this stupid posting from happening.
I understand your frustration,when the Farsight Enclave Book came out I decided to get a second army of pure Suit variants because I love the theme and know it would look pretty awesome on the table top. As soon as I did many of the local crowd (aka the ones I dont hang out with both at and outside our FLGS) starting complaining about another Tau player and having to fight the "cheese" as they call it. These are also the kind of guys that never want to listen to advice, adapt their tactics or strategies and play pretty nasty power lists of their own (one plays the Necron Flying Circus for example).
I say let people complain about them being OP, majority of them are saying that because they have not found a way to beat them yet. I can be honest and say that I hate fighting Tau since, as already mentioned, they negate alot of tactics armies utilize but are they unbeatable? Not by a long shot.
TheCadreofFi'rios wrote: Why can't Tau be competitive? All I'm hearing is whine whine whine, while I, as a Tau player, still struggle to win against better opponents. The only change I have seen since the new codex is that Tau have gone from sub-par to competitive. My casual lists still lose against more competitive lists and my competitive lists still lose against better made lists. Can anyone actually make this post die? I know its not me because this post makes me so mad. Try waiting patiently for your book to be updated. Then you can say that Tau aren't over powered and stop all this stupid posting from happening.
I understand your frustration,when the Farsight Enclave Book came out I decided to get a second army of pure Suit variants because I love the theme and know it would look pretty awesome on the table top. As soon as I did many of the local crowd (aka the ones I dont hang out with both at and outside our FLGS) starting complaining about another Tau player and having to fight the "cheese" as they call it. These are also the kind of guys that never want to listen to advice, adapt their tactics or strategies and play pretty nasty power lists of their own (one plays the Necron Flying Circus for example).
I say let people complain about them being OP, majority of them are saying that because they have not found a way to beat them yet. I can be honest and say that I hate fighting Tau since, as already mentioned, they negate alot of tactics armies utilize but are they unbeatable? Not by a long shot.
This is not the point that is the primary topic of discussion at this point. The issue is not that Tau is OP or unbeatable- it has always been that they are not enjoyable to fight against for the majority of people, especially casually.
Let me reiterate the primary points here again, although I know people will still continue to reply with the same arguments that are irrelevant to the point (especially peregrine):
1) Are Tau enjoyable to face?
This is an opinion, but I do not believe so (nor do a lot of people, especially form a casual perspective- and honestly, who enjoys seeing 3 riptides on the other side of the table)
2) Are Tau unbeatable?
Of course not, but the book is very good at shooting most 'unfocussed' or 'fun' lists right off the table, which is an issue for casual metas where nobody really brings optimized lists on a regular basis.
Anyone can bring a very optimized list and do well, but Tau is an entirely different beast. Like I mentioned before, even if people like Peregrine refuse to believe it, I have not had nearly as many issues until the new Tau book with the lists he constantly calls bad/unfocused to either win or have a legitimately good game, regardless of what my opponent brings.
3) Are Tau Cheesy?
As is the trend with every army, the people that play them defend them to death. Tau has, on the other hand, seen an increase in the admittance even by people that play them that they sometimes feel cheesy. The issue comes with the books ability to play on 6e's strengths while simultaneously ignoring core rulebook rules (this is just bad design). The riptide is indeed the flavor of the month and is ridiculously cheap for what it does when you compare it to say, Nid MC's. The book is also poorly designed because unlike IG, the other king of shooting, all of the 'weaknesses' the book exhibits can easily be countered or outright ignored. High mobility, supporting fire, JSJ, Interceptor, etc... Allies further compound the issue, but really that stands for every army
So again, the chief argument is NOT with lists here, or that Tau are unbeatable. The issue is that for a lot of people, especially casually, Tau just mops the floor with them. This was not the case with other armies even in 5th with relatively unchanged tactics/lists. Should we be required to change entire casual metas because of one book? You may think this is the answer, but for many people this is where the perceived unbalance comes from. I don't want to have to bring overly competitive lists to stand a chance against one army- that is not what the game is about for me/many others.
How is the Tau book poorly made? I keep on hearing that and I think: I bet that is more of people whining about losing to Tau now they have to attack the design of the codex! Also how would Imperial guard be the king of shooting? How is that even a thing? Tau are supposed to be the shooting army. Imperial guard are supposed to be the: bring more bodies army.
TheCadreofFi'rios wrote: How is the Tau book poorly made? I keep on hearing that and I think: I bet that is more of people whining about losing to Tau now they have to attack the design of the codex! Also how would Imperial guard be the king of shooting? How is that even a thing? Tau are supposed to be the shooting army. Imperial guard are supposed to be the: bring more bodies army.
Did you play in 5e? Ever heard of the Leafblower?
IG are indeed about more bodies (at least in the fluff) but nobody plays them that way. They are all about bringing as many guns as they can to the field and shelling/shooting you off the board before you can close the gap.
This is pretty similar to how Tau players play gunline. The difference, however, is that Tau has a multitude of special rules and abilities, on top of far superior mobility, to mitigate anyone that survives long enough to get in their face. Proper internal balance/design suggests that extreme strengths should have corresponding weaknesses to compensate. This is not the case with Tau, which is why the book is poorly designed. Mix with allies for more lulz
Yes I played 5th edition, pretty seriously too, I think one of my worst games was against a leaf blower IG list. Now that guy doesn't play in my local group any more along with a couple other people who aren't really wanting to play the game anymore because of the new codexes, mainly Tau and Eldar. I think they should just keep playing the game because there are literally thousands upon thousands of ways to play this game that don't include complaining. A couple things about me: I don't play gunline all the time, I rarely take allies anymore, and I don't spam anything like riptides and pathfinders, but instead change up my lists to test out different tactics. You think the Tau book is unbalanced? Thats different then being poorly made (thank god for that). How do you know that their strengths outweigh their weaknesses? I think that their strengths finally gave them the ability to overcome their weaknesses in certain situations like a balanced book should.
I think it is funny that all these complaints boil down to the Tau codex being poorly made of the Tau army being cheesy. Some of us have been with the army since day one. I never had issues with Tau in 5th ed. 6th made the meta change a lot and I had to go with the flow to fill the gaps that came as armies changed until the new codex came out.
I do not think the new codex is cheese, or poorly made. It is a codex that balances out the strengths and weaknesses of the Tau and allows for all sorts of builds now.
Can people spam certain units? Yes but this can be said of every codex, Chaos with Hell Drakes, Imperial Guard with Vendettas and so on.
TheCadreofFi'rios wrote: Yes I played 5th edition, pretty seriously too, I think one of my worst games was against a leaf blower IG list. Now that guy doesn't play in my local group any more along with a couple other people who aren't really wanting to play the game anymore because of the new codexes, mainly Tau and Eldar. I think they should just keep playing the game because there are literally thousands upon thousands of ways to play this game that don't include complaining. A couple things about me: I don't play gunline all the time, I rarely take allies anymore, and I don't spam anything like riptides and pathfinders, but instead change up my lists to test out different tactics. You think the Tau book is unbalanced? Thats different then being poorly made (thank god for that). How do you know that their strengths outweigh their weaknesses? I think that their strengths finally gave them the ability to overcome their weaknesses in certain situations like a balanced book should.
I don't agree with this. If an army can overcome their weaknesses, they don't have weaknesses. An example of a 'balanced' army would be Vanilla SM- they neither excel or are weak in any major areas if you play them correctly. This is the issue myself and a lot of people have with Tau in general- you more or less just have to deploy, shoot, and move away from your opponent if they get close.
Necron? Short ranged shooting and terrible in melee (mindshackle Scarabs/Wraiths excluded, but that is part of the books cheese).
IG? Terrifying shooting, but very vulnerable to assault and alpha strikes.
Tau don't care about either of these issues as a shooty army while the others do. It's a shame really because while I agree Tau did need major improvements, they basically gave the book a sweeping points reduction while simultaneously buffing nearly every ability they already had, and added additional things to increase their performance. None of the other 6e books received such a sweeping heap of buffs and universal improvements.
I don't think most people's problem with the new Tau is that they are good at shooting, the problem lies in a few spikes, mainly the hilariously undercosted Riptide. Tau have always been about shooting and nobody would mind them being good at it, the problem starts if they're starting to get game-breakingly good at it.
Skullhammer wrote: Personally I'm not seeing a problem with tau and I run daemons (no nurgle at all) and normally in a <2k list there's no greater daemons and mostly khorne use tactics, terrain, movement, threat overload, this wins games.
Initially I had some issues with Tau, then I figured out how to fight them with my Daemons. Now I have a nice 1.5k all comers that has been able to lay the smack down on Tau pretty reliably. Threat overload is the name of the game against Tau. Plus every model in our army always getting 5++ is pretty nice. Some people in my local are starting to think that Daemons are the "hard counter" to Tau. Those are also the people who think 6th is a "Rock Paper Scissors" game.
Tau are weak against assault, you have to get to them but it is not hard to do so. Drop pods or deepstriking work wonders. I don't understand this generalized complaining about an army that is good at shooting and somehow because they are good at one thing they must be OP.
Flying Toaster wrote: Tau are weak against assault, you have to get to them but it is not hard to do so. Drop pods or deepstriking work wonders. I don't understand this generalized complaining about an army that is good at shooting and somehow because they are good at one thing they must be OP.
It isn't that simple, as mentioned with their preventative abilities/buffs.
The combination of random charge distances, overwatch/supporting fire, interceptor, and general TAU mobility makes dedicated assault elements pretty unreliable as a 'hard counter' to the supposed weakness the army has.
Drop Pods are great, but you would literally the majority of your army right in their face to do any reasonable amount of damage, and even then you have to survive a round of shooting before you can charge.
For a Marine army, podding or deepstriking anything that poses a remote threat to a Tau gunline eats up a ton of points, much of which you will likely end up throwing away to torrents of fire or AP2 shots. It's a sound strategy in theory, but in principal it doesn't work terribly well.
On top of this, this harps back to my main point- I don't or should not have to list cater to stand a reasonably decent chance at beating a specific army.
it hurts so much, but it always fun to have to figure out how to beat something like that) that list is hard to go to up against and my tau army lists are mech heavy with volume of fire in mind (I also don't just sit there, no fun if I do, also not smart thing to sit there against that list). He destroyed my synergy at turn two and I couldn't do enough damage to hope to make a come back so it was down hill bad after that.
doesn't pwn the shooty game in this shooty edition of 
. The same player now hates Tau after he got wasted by turn 3 by another Tau player but had not bothered to change his list....
). I think some people mentally skip the phrase "for this attack" in the markerlight entry indicating that it applies only to a single unit's fire. They see the "all weapons" part of the entry and take it to mean for the rest of the turn.
...that makes perfect sense, you may need to grow up a little before playing in a tournament with that kind of attitude. Sportsmanship should be about the players attitude not what he brings to the table, lists like that are what you should expect at a tournament. People like you acting childishly because "he took a tournament list" is the reason why that part of the score is now banned at my 
