Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Here's what I have and what their jobs are:

HQ
Command Squad - Fire support
Shas'El w/ plasma rifle, missile pod, shield generator, HW target lock, HW multi-tracker
Shas'Vre w/ plasma rifle, shield generator, 2 shield drones

ELITES
Crisis Suit - deep-strike tank hunter
TL fusion blaster, shield genereator

6 Stealth Suits - deep-strke disruption

TROOPS
12 Fire Warriors - Hold the line!, take objectives
photon grenades, Shas'ui, bonding knife

12 Fire Warriors - Hold the line!, take objectives
photon grenades, Shas'ui, bonding knife

12 Fire Warriors - Hold the line!, take objectives
photon grenades, Shas'ui, bonding knife

12 Fire Warriors - assault, take objectives
photon grenades, Shas'ui, bonding knife, EMP grenades, pulse carbines
Devilfish (decoy launchers, multi-tracker)

FAST ATTACK
Piranha - tank hunter
fusion blaster, decoy launchers, targeting array, 2 seeker missiles

8 pathfinders - marking/fire support
photon grenades, 3 rail rifles
Devilfish (decoy launchers, disruption pod)

Bring hammerheads for tank hunting since they are much more reliable.

Well, at 1500 points how many heavy vehicles is an enemy going to take? In which case I have 4 different options to take them out.

1) The piranha's fusion blaster.
2) 2 seeker missiles. The piranha's role in this case is to use it's speed to maneuver into getting a flank shot. The pathfinders can then use their markelights to call in the shot. With a little luck and proper positiong, this can be done on turn 1.
3) My DF mounted firewarriors are equipped with EMP grenades. Many people have had doubts about them, but an exploding Monolith silenced any I might have had.
4) Crisis suit with TL Fusion blasters. With deep strike, he get get up close and personal with just about anything.

Any light to medium vehicles can also be dealt with by the commend squad and pathfinder rail rifles.

In 1500 points:

IG will often field 3 Russes/Demolishers.

Necrons will field 1 Monolith.

Tau will field 2-3 Hammerheads

Marines will field 1 Land Raider

You'll want railguns to deal with all of the above threats, and that's just off the top of my head. Getting that close (fusion blasters) to kill tanks is a good way to get your Fusion Blaster-toting models kilt. (Not just killed, kilt.)

Also, I'm not so sure about Photon Grenades. You WANT your squads to get eaten in the very first round of close combat so that the enemy assault squad is left hanging out in the wind, ready to be shot on your turn. Photon Grenades really reduce that chance.

Ah, but with 5th ed. coming up, how many of those armor arrangements will be sacrificed on order to gain scoring units? I'm not thinking about just the here and now (well maybe I am since what I showed is pretty much all I have) but later as well. And, if the enemy does field that many vehicles, then I can clearly bring enough firepower to bear to prevent him from gaining advantages in land grabbing situations.

As far as photon grenades go, I have found 2 things:

1. If the enemy is good enough to take you out on the 1st turn, they don't need bonus attacks.
2. If the enemy does require a charge to get the upper hand, then firewarriors are survivable enough to bog down enemy units for extended periods of time. I have made this work against most notably against a unit of youngbloods and a carnifex.

If you cannot kill the enemies tanks, they will CONTEST the objectives.

1 leman russ equals 6 troop choices swarming a single objective.

Really.

Whoever said firewarriors are survivable...in close combat...please, slap yourself with a trout.

Good Grief! You held up a 'fex in CC with Fire Warriors?! Why were your troops anywhere near that thing? Or was it intentional?

Aeddon wrote:Good Grief! You held up a 'fex in CC with Fire Warriors?! Why were your troops anywhere near that thing? Or was it intentional?

There was a bit of misjudging of distances on my part.

And another thing; survivable doesn't have to mean winnable. A 4+ armor save - despite what many players may believe - is actually good! Now whether that survivabilty under the new CC rules continues remains to be seen.

Yeah, my buddy plays a winged tyrant. My only options are either good deployment, stay mobile or send as much fire downrange as I can!

thats a fairly ballanced army by would benifit if you had some braodsides

for all of that sake, you need a Hammerhead tanks and/or Boardside suits for your army.

boardside suit is really kick ass for against MC armies(i.e. fexes, d.prince, etc)

these is a big problem with tau and extended combats:


if enemy models are in combat you can't shoot at them.


re-read that. let it sink in.

tau dont have any combat orientated troops (kroot dont count because anything that is good in combat will kill them and anything that isnt will shoot them) or your primary way to kill stuff is to shoot at it. if you cant shoot at it you cant kill it. holding something up in combat is all well and good but what if that thing is say on an objective? thats an objective you cant control. what if the combat finishes on your turn? your likely to get charged again.

in 5th, where there is no consolidating into fresh combat, any combat tau fight has to be lost quickly, the turn youre charged. if you do this then of your turn whatever was in combat will just get shot to death by the rest of your army. this is a good thing. on the other hand if a squad of firewarriors are sat on an objective in combat with a fex then there is no way your going to get that objective back. if that happens on multiple objectives you may as well kiss the game goodbye. even in anihilation (or whatever its called) games. if you cant kill stuff you cant win, and if you cant shoot something you cant kill it.

ergo, photon grenades are like shooting yourself in the foot.


ok the issue of tanks:

a hammer head with disruptor pobs is not only very hard to kill in 5th, but also provides essential cover (that blocks LOS) for your suits to JSJ. this is in addition to being able to kill stuff very well.

Here are some problems I see.

1. You are posting on a forum with a large population of competative players, the advice you get will take your list to the 95% percentile of competiveness, which means we'll suggest you take out anything that isn't great, which also means you may lose good stuff to be replaced with great stuff.
2. If that is all the models you have, you wil need to rethink your wargear layouts, aka I like pathfinders, but I like emp grenades and no railrifles. Markerlights are pretty effective if used well, and the one game in 5 that you charge a tank and blow it up makes the other 4 games that you never use them worthwhile.
3. If what you have already works, you don't need to post (aka photon grenades), so take all advice you don't like with a grain of sugar.
4. Photon grenades are not good for all the reasons anyone has mentioned on this thread already. (add a grain of sugar to this :p )
5. Your HQ choices are interesting, you have sheild drones and sheild generator... you realize they have jumpjets, they can jump from a peice of terrain, shoot then jump back. If you do this, you don't need the sheilds, with 55pts saved you can buy something else. Also a plasma rifle to me on a shas'vre isn't fire support, now a plasma rifle and a missle pod, that makes me think about fire support. And if you find a way to cut out enough wargear... aka photon grenades, you could take your tank hunter crisis suit and convert him to another shas'vre with plasma rifle and missle pod. Actually you could just run those two suits as regular elite choices and save even more points.

Back in 2000 when tau was brand new, there was a white dwarf article that had a 1500pt tau army, if I recall, it had an etheral (not good) but 9 crisis suits (all elite with plasma/misslepods) and 6 broadside suits, and 2 10 man firewarrior squads. I wouldn't say its an optimal configuration, but the amount of firepower pouring out of that army was fairly amazing.

Sazzlefrats wrote:
5. Your HQ choices are interesting, you have sheild drones and sheild generator... you realize they have jumpjets, they can jump from a peice of terrain, shoot then jump back. If you do this, you don't need the sheilds,

I don't know, I've found that the plasma rifle tends to get a lot of attention from an opponent who know's what it can do. I always take a shield generator and it's saved my behind quite a few times!

Aeddon wrote:
I don't know, I've found that the plasma rifle tends to get a lot of attention from an opponent who know's what it can do. I always take a shield generator and it's saved my behind quite a few times!

Yes, but what he was saying was that if you use your suits correctly you can position yourself behind terrain, jump out to shoot, then go back behind terrain for a cover save so it's like you have the shield generator without actually paying points for it. Then you take those points you saved by dropping the shields and buy more guns.

Also, ditto what everyone else is saying about the photon greandes. All they do is make it to where you lose combat slower (thus denying you shooting at what assaulted you) and then when your firewarrior squad does eventually die (and they will) you are losing even more points. The photon grenades also make the worst case close combat scenario much more likely which is that you don't run away after the first round of combat but then your opponent breaks/destroys your unit on your following turn and then gets to assault a new unit, without you getting a chance to shoot at the close combat unit rinse and repeat. You are essentially helping your opponent avoid your shooting. This is a lose/lose secenario.

I understand JSJ. Maybe it's because I play a lot of armies that focus on speed (fast-assault 'nids; marines on bikes and speeders) so my enemies always get to me eventually.

as everyone has said. photon nads = bad idea

also, with the new transport rules, you will not need to buy an overpriced DF for the fir warrior squad with EMP's as you get one with the pathfinders. and the FW's can use them.

i have never used them, but with new rules plan on taking a small unit of FW's with EMP nads and a pathfinder DF. i wouldent go larger then 8 guys though. it is a lot easier to hit tanks in CC now.

in general, lower the number of FW's in your squads.

the best things for suits that i have found is plasma missile pod, and multi tracker. hard wire a drone controller on someone who can get "wargear" (like the 5 point team leader upgrade, or anyone in the command squad) and buy 2 shield drones. this adds 2 more wounds at the same toughness and armor save, and grants that 4+ save you want all for 10 points more then the shield generator (drop a fire warrior). and for a shield drone, just dont put the guns on a gun drones and shazam you got yourself a shield drone.

since you are only using up 2 eliet slots, split your stealth suits into 2 units, drop 2 more fire warriors and buy each squad a fussion blaster.


one more thing.... ware are the rail guns????

at least a broadside teamleader with ASS and hard wired drone controller with 2 shield drones. (rolls for something like DT every turn, but can still fire rail gun and has 2 more 2+ armor saves, and 2 4+ invul.


add some kroot or human aux units (imperial armor unit) to throw out some cover saves... like put a 36 point 6 man squad of humans in front of your pathfinders.... if you need to move them out of the way then "run" them back into position to give cover saves.

When I finally buy myself some broadsides, I'm giving them targeting arrays.

btw, I tested my list as-is last Friday against a guard army with 2 small platoons, an HQ platoon, 10 Hardened Veterans in a Chimera, 1 Basilisk, 1 Russ, and a Demolisher. The result was a massacre... on him! We didn't keep track of turns and fought to the end.

Command squad - picked off a bunch guardsman from various squads and killed the enemy's last man (a Commissar) in close combat. Lost both shield drones to a Basilisk shot.

Crisis suit - failed to destroy the Demolisher but did smash the chimera before getting cut down by the Commissar.

Stealth suits - Destroyed the Russ by shooting it in the back, beat a squad in close combat, and gunned down a platoon command squad before getting shot up themselves.

Warrior Squad 1 - lost half the squad in the 1st turn from the russ and picked off a few guardsmen.

Warrior Squad 2 - Picked off a few guardsmen and lost one from a stray Basilisk shot.

Warrior Squad 3 - gunned down a platoon command squad and a few more guardsmen. No casualties.

Mounted Warriors - EMP'd the Demolisher, shredded another squad and assisted the Crisis suit in destroying the command squad. Lost 1 to the Demolisher and 8 more to the Basilisk. Devilfish was destroyed shortly after unloading its troops. The gun drones survived, but were later destroyed by the veterans.

Piranha - The guard player went 1st and wasted no time in destroying it. The gun drones survived the rest of the game, however.

Pathfinders - Crippled the HQ's fire support squad and killed a few more before being forced to flee by the Chimera. the Devilfish finally destroyed the Basilisk near the end.

Woot! Go Tau!!!