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Hey all, I'm joinhing in a small group of 40k gamers and all of us (about 8) are really new. I know that many of my fellow gamers play at lower point levels (750-1k) and I want to be able to join in the fun. I currently own the getting started with tau set but I know the stigma that tau players can receive. Any list design tips that can help me come up with a fun list that's great to play and be played against?

To me, Tau are up there with Eldar as an army that's easy to build a fun list with. Having lots of good options means it's easy to mix in some subpar stuff and still have a fun game. So with that in mind, you should mostly be fine as long as you avoid...

*Buffmander; can be fine in some lists, but is easily a frustration as he makes a unit annoyingly durable or hands out tons of buffs to the army when using the combined shooting rule from the Hunter Cadre.

*Riptides that abuse Ion Accelerators. Supposedly normal riptides aren't too bad, though they're still impressively durable.

*GMCs. The storm surge is getting lots of scowls. The supremacy suit is getting even more.

*Mind the markerlights. Markerlights are cool and big part of what makes tau unique. Unfortunately, they can also easily make a game against the Tau a huge mismatch. Armies like orks, tyranids, and (to a lesser extent) dark eldar that depend on cover to not get murdered by tau can have a rough time when you use markerlights to completely deny that oh-so-important cover save. Markerlights also make Tau overwatch especially scary (when combined with the supporting fire rule). It's not much fun to have your hormagaunts or wyches or whatever try a charge (y'know. The thing you're supposed to do when facing Tau) only to have so many bodies die to overwatch that they now fail the charge and end up sitting there looking silly as the Tau prepare to finish them off.

I'm not saying don't use markerlights. Markerlights are cool. But maybe be mindful of how many you take and where you take them if your regular opponents are things like foot orks, tyranids, or harlequins.


Edit: If you happen to really like kroot, vespids, or the Tau flyers, these are all "subpar" units that you can enjoy mixing into your list if you find that your matches are a bit one-sided.

First rule of playing tau. stop trying to not be "that guy" you never will. there will always be that one opponent with a gakky attitude who will gripe and complain the whole game about your army regardless of how you are doing in the game.

The thing that matters most is your attitude during a game. Your list will NEVER make you "that guy" your attitude will.
Always come to the table with a smile and a hand shake.

I had an opponent have to leave the building on his own volition to calm down because i had the audacity to play tau in a tournament. he was outside for a solid 15 minutes into our game before he was threatened with disqualification.
He persisted through the whole game to growl whenever i made a successful to hit roll, would nitpick every thing and cry about how broken my army was. he was playing lascannon spam space marines and cheated his whole game.

Had another guy concede to me before even taking his first turn. I blew up a blob of ten eldar windriders with two riptides. he threw his hands up and just shouted his concession at me. he then continued to cry to everyone at the event about my list.

You will always be pre-judged as "that guy" what they think doesn't matter, what matters is how you present yourself in a game. So anyone telling you not to take X unit or you're "that guy" by default is wrong. play your army how you want to as much as you can, However! be mindful of the type and attitude of the game. Is it a tourney with actual prizes on the line? go hard, go as hard as you can within the event guidlines. Just playing or fun? maybe be a little lighter on the power level, but never be a free win(if that makes sense).

I find building a list around Recon Drones/Positional Relay holding units to be rather fun. Just use a lot of dudes that can outflank Kroot blobs/stealth suits/pathfinders/infantry attached to Shadowsun or Darkstrider/Auxillary Formation Vespids and have them outflank onto whichever table edge you want.

I guess it would be a good rule of thumb to avoid using Riptides and things bigger than it. But if you're allowed leniency try avoiding giving them stem injector or EWO as those can really put people down.

I'd also recommend doing some lurking through ATT to find some funky gimmicks that hopefully aren't over explained by +10 paragraphs

die toten hosen wrote:
First rule of playing tau. stop trying to not be "that guy" you never will. there will always be that one opponent with a gakky attitude who will gripe and complain the whole game about your army regardless of how you are doing in the game.

The thing that matters most is your attitude during a game. Your list will NEVER make you "that guy" your attitude will.
Always come to the table with a smile and a hand shake.

You will always be pre-judged as "that guy" what they think doesn't matter, what matters is how you present yourself in a game. So anyone telling you not to take X unit or you're "that guy" by default is wrong. play your army how you want to as much as you can, However! be mindful of the type and attitude of the game. Is it a tourney with actual prizes on the line? go hard, go as hard as you can within the event guidlines. Just playing or fun? maybe be a little lighter on the power level, but never be a free win(if that makes sense).

Wth? you will ALWAYS be judged as that guy? That is BS. You're entire post is pretty flip-floppy.

Ignore this guy. Pretty toxic stance to take.

Tau players have an high tier codex that in focuses heavily on two things. Durability and Shooting; exactly what you need in the current state of 40k. This means you don't have to go into the game with a competitive mindset, you're lists will naturally be pretty good. I'll be straight, what you have in your lists will be dictated by what units your opponents bring to the table normally. 40k is an arms race if you and your group don't agree on what kind of games you want. Just don't be the one to escalate.

First decide what models you like the look of. If you're playing under 1k limit yourself to one centerpiece model, the rest should be a combination of infantry and elite infantry that can handle any threat and provide a solid core.

I assume you like Tau because of the mech aesthetic; so I would recommend picking up Crisis suits, they're a very solid unit that are in most lists.

Have enough models to build different lists so if you find yourself repeatedly winning or loosing you can adjust to suit. Also will help with playing armies that are npt so good. You'll need to accept that pick up games will not always end up being fun too. But if you can't accept going knowing you'll loose, you're that guy.

 Quickjager wrote:

die toten hosen wrote:
First rule of playing tau. stop trying to not be "that guy" you never will. there will always be that one opponent with a gakky attitude who will gripe and complain the whole game about your army regardless of how you are doing in the game.

The thing that matters most is your attitude during a game. Your list will NEVER make you "that guy" your attitude will.
Always come to the table with a smile and a hand shake.

You will always be pre-judged as "that guy" what they think doesn't matter, what matters is how you present yourself in a game. So anyone telling you not to take X unit or you're "that guy" by default is wrong. play your army how you want to as much as you can, However! be mindful of the type and attitude of the game. Is it a tourney with actual prizes on the line? go hard, go as hard as you can within the event guidlines. Just playing or fun? maybe be a little lighter on the power level, but never be a free win(if that makes sense).

Wth? you will ALWAYS be judged as that guy? That is BS. You're entire post is pretty flip-floppy.

Ignore this guy. Pretty toxic stance to take.

Tau players have an high tier codex that in focuses heavily on two things. Durability and Shooting; exactly what you need in the current state of 40k. This means you don't have to go into the game with a competitive mindset, you're lists will naturally be pretty good. I'll be straight, what you have in your lists will be dictated by what units your opponents bring to the table normally. 40k is an arms race if you and your group don't agree on what kind of games you want. Just don't be the one to escalate.

First decide what models you like the look of. If you're playing under 1k limit yourself to one centerpiece model, the rest should be a combination of infantry and elite infantry that can handle any threat and provide a solid core.

I assume you like Tau because of the mech aesthetic; so I would recommend picking up Crisis suits, they're a very solid unit that are in most lists.

Eh I got judged for starting Tau. But I come from an Ork/DE/BA/3 max Flyrant Tyranids so they probably thought I was no longer a whipping boy (I'm technically not a bandwagoner, I had some Tau since 2014, its only now that I'm getting around to painting them).

DRONES
LOTS AND LOTS OF DRONES
(use the drone net formation)
107 in a 1500 point list
They cant hurt AV12+
The formation gives them all +1BS, inteceptor,outflank (some other stuff as well) AND JINK

A fluffy suboptimal list: tau recon force. Lots of stealthsuuts, drones, kroot, pathfinders etc

Well, if you play maelstrom missions, you will need units/models able to move and approach the enemy front rank (and eventually get behind). This is not doable with a static shooty army.

Just dont spam units. Its fine if you take a single Riptide, but taking 3 makes things not too fun. If you oppenent is raging that you took a single Riptide, its because his list is bad, not that your list is too good.

Ive been playing an (admittedly) brutal SM list for a while now. If I see an opponent bringing out an army that is just going to get rolled, I talk to him and change out a few units to sub-optimal Tactical squads, etc.

For you, I would recommend just taking a little of everything. Take 1 Riptide, 1 unit of Crisis suits, 1 buffmander, etc and you will be fine. The problem starts when you spam one unit, and the opponent only has one or two things that can deal with it. Then you kill them first turn

Fisheyes wrote:
Just dont spam units. Its fine if you take a single Riptide, but taking 3 makes things not too fun. If you oppenent is raging that you took a single Riptide, its because his list is bad, not that your list is too good.

Ive been playing an (admittedly) brutal SM list for a while now. If I see an opponent bringing out an army that is just going to get rolled, I talk to him and change out a few units to sub-optimal Tactical squads, etc.

For you, I would recommend just taking a little of everything. Take 1 Riptide, 1 unit of Crisis suits, 1 buffmander, etc and you will be fine. The problem starts when you spam one unit, and the opponent only has one or two things that can deal with it. Then you kill them first turn

Have to agree with this. I'm only going to spam when its an Apoc game, where the larger points limit offsets the spamminess, or when my gaming group arranges competitive games.

Just try not to min max too much.
Take full Firewarrior squads or pick another 1 or 2, they are actually not that Bad.
Alternatively just bring a squad of kroot. They are cheap, Bad, but fluffy.

Even before the recent Codex update bringing more than 1 riptide was instantly labeling you as "that guy", so 1 at most.
At 1k points I would never bring a stormsurge to the table.

Aeri is right. Fire Warriors in Devilfishs for increased mobility. Kroot for outflank. Not more than one Riptide.

Much appreciated! I think I'll check out some kroot and possibly a broadside. No spam, and don't be a jerk, got it

If your looking for mid tier units that won't rock any boats? Ghostkeels without formations and Devilfish with Breachers. Pathfinders as opposed to makrerdrones.

Mech Tau is friendly and fun, grab a few skyrays, stick your fire warrior squads in devilfishes, throw in an ethereal to boost them fire warriors into machine gunners at rapid fire range. Add a buffmander and some crisis suits for long range st 7 and some deep striking fusion.

Alternatively, if your group lets the hunter contingent share the buffs from the buffmander via co-ordinated fire, a hunter contingent can make meh Tau units more viable, like stealth suits and hammerheads.

Honestly, the things you need to be mindful of to avoid being the resident 'that guy' are pretty much independent of which army you run. Playing Tau optimally doesn't even approach the tales of bad sportsmanship and poor hygiene that that particular title truly deserves.

But yeah, if you can say consciously that you don't want to be obnoxious about it, you're already in a pretty good spot. I, personally, would not recommend you go so far as to deliberately hurt your army as some of these other posters have suggested. (Kroot? Really guys?) I honestly think you're better off knowing what the pet peeves are and using your own judgement to figure how far you want to go.

Riptide- it's a bit undercosted for what it does. One can make a great backbone unit, but they become exponentially more nasty the more you take.

Buffmander- Strips cover and confers twin-link to the unit he's in. I honestly don't see a lot of hate for this like some people say, in my local meta it's considered a no-brainer.

Marker lights- This is the one that everyone has an opinion on, and everybody has a different plan to 'fix'. Take them because they are what take Tau's shooting from 'best of a list of bad options' to 'objectively good.'

Formations- Just before the current codex dropped, Tau were considered non-viable against 7.5 armies like the Elder. After, people went ballistic, demanding they be nerfed (which, admittedly happens every time they get a new book, but in this case the ITC went ahead and did it). Except for two new units and two less-than-awesome equipment options, the only difference between those codexes is the formations. And there are some doozys in here.

I disagree with much of the army comp advice above, but agree whole heartedly with the attitude advice. The current Tau codex is built for the todays meta-curion "detachment of formations" build. Not using that build style is to actively go agsinst the intented design of the game. Yes, you should build your lists to your meta, and yes, you should not be a douche. Yet, you also should not dumb down your gaming experience just to not be "that guy". In todays gaming environment, building your army to win the game is not the same is building to defeat your opponent. Build to win missions, to win Maelstrom, not to dismantle your opponent. This will let you avoid the feel badsies while also not buying into the list shenanigans that go with being "that guy".

SJ

I say build to a theme. Don't take a unit because some website said it's powerful; take something you like and a theme you wanna stick with. Now if that happened to align with a cheese build, there's little you can do, but resist the temptation to go all out cheese. Like, if your list can't fit in a Markerlight because you decided you love riptides, don't take stuff out to fit one in. That's a cheese move. Taking a whole army of Riptide Wing because you simply love riptides, that's not cheese. No one can say you're not allowed to like a unit just because it's seen as cheese, but when you're starting to bend backwards just to fit something in your list because of it's rules, especially when that rule is purely to win and not because of a fun interaction (like the barrel of monkeys list at one point could be called cheese because of the first-turn win potential, but it was more funny than frustrating) then it's cheese.

EDIT: forgot to actually finish a sentence. Derp.

 targetdg15 wrote:
Hey all, I'm joinhing in a small group of 40k gamers and all of us (about 8) are really new. I know that many of my fellow gamers play at lower point levels (750-1k) and I want to be able to join in the fun. I currently own the getting started with tau set but I know the stigma that tau players can receive. Any list design tips that can help me come up with a fun list that's great to play and be played against?

Im in the same boat as you and refuse to get a Riptide or stromsurge (although the gw staff keep trying to force me). I'm playing 750 points with a hunter cadre with 1 commander, 3 suits, 10 Pathfinders, 18 warriors and a hammerhead. No cheese of any kind.

It might depend on what your friends are bringing.

If they are all on dakkadakka like you and planning on taking high powered lists then go all out.

If they are not super great at tactics and list building and more into it for the fluff then take some of the advice above.

Above all else though go with what you want to spend hours and hours assembling and painting - since this is where most of your time will go.

Everybody is going to throw lead 3rd empire steam tanks at me but here is my two cents. :(.

#1. 7th ed codex's are like playing apoc in my humble opinion. even dark angles can bring cheese XP . I DON'T WANT TO PLAY APOC, sorry.

#2. Every time I play against Tau I feel like i am reading and singing a 50 page rental contract with all the rules and buffs. I always feel bamboozeld, probably most guys are honest but that's how I feel.

j_p_chess wrote:
Everybody is going to throw lead 3rd empire steam tanks at me but here is my two cents. :(.

#1. 7th ed codex's are like playing apoc in my humble opinion. even dark angles can bring cheese XP . I DON'T WANT TO PLAY APOC, sorry.

#2. Every time I play against Tau I feel like i am reading and singing a 50 page rental contract with all the rules and buffs. I always feel bamboozeld, probably most guys are honest but that's how I feel.

I agree with both of those statements. What do you mean you paid 5-10pts for better leadership on your broadsides....wtf. Wait you can ignore LoS? and cover? and you just increased your BS to hit on 2s?

Here's the best advise I can give you as a player, not just a Tau player, don't worry about being "that guy" because no matter how hard you try you'll be it to someone. Just do what you like, and find those that are on the same level as you to play with, that way you'll be happy and they'll be happy, not one or the other.

"That guy" syndrome only really exists in 40k as much as it does because it's such a warped and small community. In larger communities, if you observe how people interact, you'll notice most competitive players want to play with other competitive players, and most casual players want to play with casual players, with some mixing in between. Though if you go to a store that does Magic drafts with multiple 6-8 man pods, you'll notice that given the choice players segregate themselves based on skill, and I feel like the match making system also does it to some extent as the "death pod" happens far too often for it to just be chance. That's not to say the groups don't enjoy playing with one another when they do, it's simply that they enjoy their own groups more, and when the play for fun in between rounds or before/after rounds, they'll usually have their preferred styles of play, but then again that also mixes.

Edit: This is especially true when players of one group are playing a format of the other group, I know I found it far less satisfying playing a four man free for all Magic format (Conspiracy as it was called) with the casual players than I did with competitive players. Not because one was better or worse, but because there's a certain mentality going into these things, and games that involve a lot of politics tend to be better with people you understand, as opposed to those that roll a dice and make a decision based off of that. Then again, I'm sure those casual players I was with one time would find it more fun to view the chaotic nature of chance, as opposed to a more calculated experience... In other words, different strokes for different folks, as while I felt alienated by their methods, I'm sure they'd feel alienated by mine and my group. Though as a whole I prefer playing with them in more streamlined formats, as then we know the middle ground, as opposed to the more abstract notions that depend on personal ideologies and mentalities. It's all very complicated.

I disagree.
There is a line between Fielding a strong force and a cheese list.
Just take Striking Scorps previous tau list for example.
Very strong list, not cheesy at all.

In our group a New player joined and decided to play eldar and he got advice from some people, Ending up with one of the cheesiest lists possible.
He is New and still needs to master it - but he already is "that guy"

Well than your players f*ck*d him a bit. I mean he doesn't even know what he is doing just heard it were good units. Than he combined good units. A bit sad he is already that guy...

Another important thing is to not care about winning and also find joy in losing.

I know that sounds counter-intuitive to the objective of the game, but having that mindset means you'll be much more forgiving to people who fumble the rules (although do inform them so they can learn about it for the future) and for ambiguous situations. It also means you'll find comedy in your units being inevitably blown apart rather than just raging or resenting.

Personally, sometimes I feign ignorance and don't take an obvious action, pretending I missed it so that the opponent can get an upper hand. I'm not saying you should do this or you're even required to, but if you find yourself completely rolling someone and they're not having fun, it's ok to dial it back a bit and let them climb back. A close match is always better than a complete curbstomp.

Most of what I said is not for the tournament-minded, so do note that going to a competitive scene requires a different mentality, but these should at least make it fun for others to face you. Back when my old club was open, people always loved to get a game in with me cuz no matter what they had, they always felt like they had a chance at winning (yes I know that sounds like i'm the doormat, but I didn't exactly let them have those victories easily).

play to your army's weakness and you probably won't get called 'that guy'. When you bring a static army, play Maelstrom. When you bring a large force, play purge the alien or the Relic.

Also, magnetize your suits. It makes for some entertaining scenario play - Deploy your suits weaponless, they cannot 'arm up' until they take an objective (ammo dump). etc.

MorkorpossiblyGork wrote:

j_p_chess wrote:
Everybody is going to throw lead 3rd empire steam tanks at me but here is my two cents. :(.

#1. 7th ed codex's are like playing apoc in my humble opinion. even dark angles can bring cheese XP . I DON'T WANT TO PLAY APOC, sorry.

#2. Every time I play against Tau I feel like i am reading and singing a 50 page rental contract with all the rules and buffs. I always feel bamboozeld, probably most guys are honest but that's how I feel.

I agree with both of those statements. What do you mean you paid 5-10pts for better leadership on your broadsides....wtf. Wait you can ignore LoS? and cover? and you just increased your BS to hit on 2s?

WTF are you talking about? Taking a sergeant, who has better leadership, is in most armies...