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.

Thinking of getting back into 40k wanted to here from the tau fans....

The above three are essentail must-have vehicle upgrades.

Disruption pods - Get them.

Multi-tracker - 12" & shoot main weapons, very good for Ioncannon & railgun hammerheads.

Vehicle mounted gun drones + the above - These guys fire in addition to any other allowed firable weapon, so you can move 12" & fire these two in addition.

Um, 10 kroot + 5 hounds = 100pts. Weak as peanuts as they have standard LD7 and no save but are T4 & can outflank (which is important). In close-combat they are very effective, for thier points, with the hounds. Again, with outflank they will survive alot longer. Use these guys

6 Fire warriors (mandatory) plus a 8man pathfinder squad (very useful) and a pathfinder devilfish (mandatory, with the pathfinders). Jump the firewarriors into the devilfish first turn, make use of my above vehicle upgrade suggestions, and use the pathfinders markerlights to improve your shooting etc.

Tau battlesuit commander (mandatory) equipped with various bits of wargear to suit taste. But also equip a positional relay, field 1-3man (i prefer 2man) teams of crisis battlesuits with TL-Fusion guns & flamers. With the positional relay (deploy on 2+) and the pathfinder devilfish (re-roll scatter if in LOS) you will get some very accurate very powerful deep-striking anti-tank.

Cyclonic Ion blaster is rubbish. Airburst fragmentation launcher is awesome. There are alot of units that can get 2+ cover saves yet only have a 5+ armor save, these are usually sniper squads. Either way, the Airburst frag launcher will decimate these type of units. Special issue wargear doesnt have to go onto Tau HQ commanders, you can field it on standard crisis battlesuit teamleaders.

Stealthsuits are fun and tricky. Dont use fusion guns with these guys, it muddies thier function - you can easily field fusion guns/railguns elsewhere. 18" Burst cannon range, plus a 6" retreat move (From the Jetpack Unit type special rule) will make great use of the stealthfield rule.

Hope those tidbits help. Pm if you want more suggestions.

Tau strengths: Firepower.
Tau weaknesses: Close combat.

That's all that there is to it.

Avoid Kroot and Vespid; kroot make a crappy close-combat screen, and you can avoid close combat through means other than sacrificing points (setup, mobility, etc). If you're going to play TAU, then play TAU, not Tau+allies.

Tau have the biggest guns. Use and abuse that idea. Railguns are STR10, AP1...on a broadside, they're twin-linked. Rail rifles cause pinning, markerlights are absolutely abusive if you learn to use them....

You can make a Tau gunline (no mobility) capable of destroying a mechanized army's mobility in 1 turn (two if necessary) and require the enemy to trudge across the battlefield towards you bit by bit while you lay down withering fire. You can pin an army in place with markerlights and pinning weapons. That big squad of marines and HQ is leadership 10? Oh, here's 6 markerlights and a pinning test at leadership minus 6.

Use your strengths to complement each other, and maximize the things that Tau are good at.

Kroot are ok for outflanking objective grabs, and are just as tough as fire warriors in cover. It depends on what the rest of your army is, but you can hardly go wrong with 10 kroot for 70 points.

I honestly cannot say how effective Pathfinders are. My last 2 games against my friend who plays Tau, a Defiler shell scattered onto them and killed the whole unit on the first turn (the shell was always aimed elsewhere).

Fire Warriors are very mediocre. They need a longer range than 12" to get their second shot if they want to be effective.

Crisis suits can be super annoying and surprisingly decent in assault (well, moreso than you'd expect).

Broadsides are just nasty.

As my main opponent is Tau, I can tell you what made him cry when he first started: tough infantry. Plague Marines, Plague Bearers, Necrons, just about any T4 MEQ. Firewarriors just flounder against them. My friend learned to build his Crisis suits around killing infantry with Plasma, leaving his anti-tank to his Hammerheads. He uses his Firewarriors, mounted in Warfish, as a clean up crew, disembarking and rapid firing into any unit weakened by a submunition shot or otherwise exposed.

I'm going to point out though, that Kroot are not good at melee. They are a cheap units to leave on your home objective. They can infiltrate ahead to grab objectives early, and will put out decent fire. Don't rely on them to grab objectives via outflank though. They aren't a sturdy unit and there are far too many things that can go wrong with that. I've seen it go well and help to win the game, but I've also seen it go horribly wrong.

In my experience, Tau don't have the massive amounts of guns to clean a board. They do have massive guns, but they have to be decisive about where they use them. You don't have extra shots, so make the ones you do have count. My experience is mostly with Mech Tau, and gun-line is a whole different beast, so take that with a grain of salt.

A full strength 100pt (more points, though, equals more awesome hounds. There may be a higher happy medium) kroot squad charging a full strength marine squad, hounds kill 1.3 marines, marines in return kill 3.3 kroot, kroot in return kill 1.7 marines. These guys will do much much better vs I3 guys and/or vs weaker T or saves. Concidering thier points, they can tie up units quite well. That is good in melee, for thier points.

Troops capture points. Firewarriors do not capture points @ 10pts/model.. besides the mandatory 1+ team & useful pathfinders devilfish. Kroot with outflank/infiltrate can get into positions that would otherwise kill-off firewarriors. For thier self-contained point cost @ 70-100 (depending on usefulness) its a steal & allows you to concentrate your spending power on awesome-sauce battlesuits/stealthteams/broadsides/hammerheads etc.

Pulse rifles are the single best small-arms to deal with T4 MEQ. The meq-save point is slightly irrelevant as no small arms ignore 3+ saves but str5 kills T4 on 3's. With marker light support (2-3shots required per unit to up it by +1BS) you can also hit on 3's. But its tricky to field a proper pulse rifle gunline so the point is moot. Only plasma/fusion guns will kill FNP'er realistically, though.

Why pathfinders werent sitting in cover, I am unsure. With either thier scout more and/or the devilfish - they should be able to move into somthing covering.

If you take Kroot then just invest in the Kroot hounds its well worth it.

Don't take Gun Drones on your vehicles unless it is a pirahna , you're giving your opponent free killpoints if you are playing a killpoint mission.

Warfish is your friend.

10 Firewarriors 100 points

Devilfish with SMS; multitracker, target, disrupt 115

215 points

Personally don't think if your taking a lot of devilfish that the SMS is worth it but that might just be me. I take 4 devilfish in every game and finding an extra 80 points gets pretty hard sometimes. That said if your only fielding one or two then I think it's essential.

KP's are a very big problem for the Tau i'm designing. But KP missions aren't as bad as they could be, there are ways to mitigate even high KP armies of Tau.

Oh and the fish would be 120pts Holli

So basically I haven't played Tau since 4th edition (where I loved them). I have recently come back to the game and have been re-tooling my Tau to work with the new 'dex. Since my army list got completely ignored I feel this thread can be a good chance to ask some Tau questions I have:

Bonding-is it really worth it? It seems like running Crisis Suits in teams of 2 is better than worrying about this because of the low morale of everything in the army. For Firewarriors is it worth it? Is it even worth upgrading to the Shas'ui for the extra morale? It seems these guys just break at the first sign of trouble. They are certainly not worth 12 points (that's another story).

Stealthsuits- I am about to try these babies with 3 suits, and 6 gun drones. The drones are cheaper then a squad of them this way (10 per as opposed to 12 per) and are stealth. I have this unit bonded but only upgraded to a team leader for 5 points. Is this worth the 160 points total?

Team leader vs. Upgrade- It seems like just upgrading one Tau to a "team leader" is better than the full upgrade to new level. The upgrade is 5 points more and is really only giving you close combat (waste) and access to specialty items. If you aren't taking specialty items why bother?

Devilfish and Pathfinders- I have these guys but never used to use them. People rave about them. Their point costs makes me wary though.

If I can think of more I'll post. Any Tau players or opponents that can help would be very appreciated.

JGrand wrote:- all of that-

Bonding - Yes, if the sqaud is bigger than minimum.

Stealthsuits - If you loose one stealthsuit model you loose one stealthsuit drone controller meaning you loose 2 drones. In terms of firepower, they add essentially the same amount of shots per point (and its pinning) but you do loose out on armor saves. So while you could get a squad of 4 that fires 12 str5 shots, a squad of three plus three gun drones gives you a squad where 1/2 the saves are 4+.

Use drones in larger squads & try just one-per drone controller. I like the idea of 6 suits, one networked markerlight drone for the team leader allowing me a potential of 18 str 5 bs4 shots with JSJ awesomeness!

Team leader upgrade - Useful for bonding knifes, useful for suit special issue stuff.. the only SI worth taking that shouldnt go on your commander is the airburst fragmentation projector, awesome bit of kit - Espicially combined with a locator beacon (from a pathfinder fish) and a positional relay.

Pathfinders - Markerlights are useful. You -have- to buy atleat 6 firewarriors. If you combine the firewarriors & the devilfish, you have a hard-to-kill mobile scoring vehicle. Job done! Oh, people wont like this idea but Pathfinders can equip EMP grenades - Should put out a nice 12" threat radius to any vehicle nearby.

I havent played since before 4th,this is a great source of info so everyone.. KEEP IT COMMING...and Thank you

There is something you have to be wary of. Pathfinders don't have a place in every list. They are very difficult to use because they are fragile, static and generally a lynch pin to lists that do use them. The enemy figures this out, then takes advantage to the fragile and immobile parts of the unit.

The best thing I've seen to make Pathfinders work is Outflanking them. If you wait a turn or two for your main force to draw the enemies attention, the added bonus of Pathfinders when he can't spare resources to kill them will win the game.

I'm thinking of running two teams of these suits in a 1500 point army:

Shas'ui (team leader)-Plasma Rifle, Missile Pod, Targeting Array, HW Multi Tracker
Shas'ui -Plasma Rifle,Missile Pod, Multi tracker
-139 points per team

I love the plasma+missile pod combo.

For the HQ I have:

Shas'El- Plasma Rifle, Missile Pod, Targeting Array, Hard Wired Multi Tracker, Hard Wired Stimulant Injector
-107 points

Any suggestions on these guys?

Hulksmash wrote:Personally don't think if your taking a lot of devilfish that the SMS is worth it but that might just be me. I take 4 devilfish in every game and finding an extra 80 points gets pretty hard sometimes. That said if your only fielding one or two then I think it's essential.

SMS on a devilfish is a mistake. You want your devilfish to be moving 12" every turn, so that Meele will only hit them on 6's. Combined with a Flechette launcher Devilfish make very good anti-charge units. Even if your opponent goes around the devilfish it will cause him to bunch up, making prime targets for AFP's, flamers, and Submunitions. Having drones allows you to fire everything you have if you have a multitracker, and keeps the cost of the fish under 100 points.

Recommended devilfish configuration:
-Multitracker
-Disruption Pod
-Sensor Spines (so you can move in terrain without penalty, essential if you want to unload your firewarriors into cover)
-Flechette Launcher

Actually your a skimmer so they hit you on 6's anyway but I do believe in moving that fast most every turn and i don't like being tempted to move slowly to use the SMS.

I'm also a big fan of targeting arrays. The increase in cost pays for itself across the game.

Hulksmash wrote:Actually your a skimmer so they hit you on 6's anyway but I do believe in moving that fast most every turn and i don't like being tempted to move slowly to use the SMS.

I'm also a big fan of targeting arrays. The increase in cost pays for itself across the game.

the hitting skimmers always on 6's rule was removed in 5th edition.

Multi-tracker makes Devilfish able to fire like a fast vehicle.

Fast vehicles can move 12" and fire one main weapon.

Smart Missile System = one main weapon.

Am I missing something?

With drones, a Burst Cannon, and a multitracker, you can fire 5 shots moving over 6". If you get a SMS the most you can fire is 4.

Well hot dang! I knew there was a reason I moved so fast all the time anyway My bad! So it's even more important not to waste the points on SMS then

I'm curious to know whether people take SMS, burst cannons, or drones on their railheads?

Liquidwulfe wrote:With drones, a Burst Cannon, and a multitracker, you can fire 5 shots moving over 6". If you get a SMS the most you can fire is 4.

& At the cost of 20pts. QFT.

On my rail heads? Burstcannons and target lock, i loves me some bang bang! and 6 bs4 st5 shots is nice

The obvious has been stated in that the Tau's major strength lies in Shooting, and their major weakness to Assault. I just wanted to add a couple things to that:

Tau are actually built around Mobility. That's right, even stronger than their shooting ability is their ability to remain mobile while shooting. Between "fast" firing vehicles and JSJing suits and drones, the whole list is based around mobility. In all honesty, Tau win games in the movement phase, with proper positioning to deny assaults and concentrate fire on segmented portions of the enemy force. They are technically outshot by static gunlines, like IG. And while it can be argued that the Eldar are truly the masters of the Movement phase, the Tau give them an excellent run for that title, and combine it with a dedication to long range suppressive fire. Eldar, while still elite specialists, are a generalist army, giving options for shooting, assault, mechanized, monsterous, or jetbiking forces. Tau trims this down to shooting, mechanized, and Jetpack forces, but the complete abandonment of "waste" on assault skills means that every Tau unit is always marching to the same beat: Shoot, shoot, then shoot some more.

So, with that in mind, there is a specific weakness of the Tau that you should be aware of. Jump-packs and bikes.

JSJ is great in the ability for someone who wants to shoot and deny return fire. It's not so great for people trying to run away. Any army that can field even a mediocre assault unit on jump packs (SM Assault Marines, I'm looking at you here) will have a tool of complete annihilation against your army if you don't neutralize them. Your suits may be high strength, decent toughness and armor, but all it takes is a powerfist seargent to make you start trading 100 pt suits for one or two 22 pt Assault Marines. Even the Tau commander is woefully unequipped to deal with a fast assault element that slips through the gunline. This applies to bikers, jump-packers, and DS-Assault troops. Bikers can be shut down with transport walls, but Jump Infantry will go right over them.

So, to put this back in the Tau's court, what you have to do is learn to shut down the enemy's mobile elements first. If you see Raptors, ignore the Plague Marines until they're gone if you possibly can. If you're up against an all-assault army, like Blood Angels, you'll need to learn to use sacrificial units, and understand how to sell their lives as dearly as possible. Anything you can do to just tie up that unit for another turn will keep them away from the rest of the army for that much longer.

Also to note, Tau suits and Commanders are very vulnerable to Lascannons and Rocket Launchers at range, and plasma up close. Playing against them, I use a lot of plasma because unless my opponent makes a mistake, I'm not going to get the chance to assault, and I'll take the extra shot on the disembarking round, because half the time it's the only shot I get!

Liquidwulfe wrote:With drones, a Burst Cannon, and a multitracker, you can fire 5 shots moving over 6". If you get a SMS the most you can fire is 4.

With the SMS you get one less shot, sure, but the 4 you do get have 6" more range and ignore cover, which is huge. Plus that one less shot means one less kill point for your opponent.

orchewer wrote:

Liquidwulfe wrote:With drones, a Burst Cannon, and a multitracker, you can fire 5 shots moving over 6". If you get a SMS the most you can fire is 4.

With the SMS you get one less shot, sure, but the 4 you do get have 6" more range and ignore cover, which is huge. Plus that one less shot means one less kill point for your opponent.

Sadly wrong, otherwise it would be a no-brainer.

SMS only ignore the need for TLOS but models can claim a coversave. Its 20pts to save 1 possibly KP & loose 1 shot and 2/5 pinning potential.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ionheads? Seems to me theres a need for anti-transport which multiple broadside suits, single-shot railheads or fusion suicide battlesuit seem to be a bit overkill..

Likewise, equipped with a multi-tracker & gundrones etc, puts out a nice amount of hits, 3 of which are @ str7 ap3. Two of these, 2-3man broadside team & some tl-fusion/flamer 2man battlesuits (with a Positional relay and marker beacon!). Some nice, strong, varied pew!

The options are there, just requires players to drop clung-to concepts.

Dashofpepper wrote:I'm curious to know whether people take SMS, burst cannons, or drones on their railheads?

Forget about Railheads.

Broadsides FTW!

Don't take Gun Drones on your vehicles unless it is a pirahna , you're giving your opponent free killpoints if you are playing a killpoint mission.

Don't think they count for KPs. Don't think them living prevents the Hammerhead from giving up KPs, but they're also not worth any KPs themselves. Would love to know if you've seen it FAQed otherwise (or at all).

Anyway, as has been said, Tau are a mobile heavy shooting force that suffers in CC. They also have access to a nice blend of weapons, from Meltas to Plasma Guns, to Autocannons (equivalents), to Railguns, to Railguns with Submuntions, to lots of S5AP5 shooting. You can pretty much build a list to shoot down anything in the game if you specialize in that specific target (Fireknives for MEqs, S5AP5 for Guard/Orks, Railguns/Fusion for tanks, etc).

As always, the trick with Tau is shooting the other guy before he can get into CC. In my experience the enemy IS going to eventually get into CC, the key is to minimize the impact to your list, not let them get multiple units, expensive units, and don't let them get there with big strong squads. Crisis Suits can often slug it out with the remnants of a Gaunt squad, etc. etc. But if they get assaulted by 24 Gaunts, they're done.

They're a very unforgiving list, and I think that's what keeps them from being in the top tier. One bad decision, or one bit of bad luck, and they can really start to suffer, unlike, say, Marines, who tend to be so well rounded that a "shooty" Marine squad can still often slug it out in CC and survive. Fire Warriors can't.

You have to keep on top of them the whole time, and stay alert. I remember playing a game with my Tau, where by turn 3 I was embarassed how bad I was crushing the other guy, and I started backing off, not trying to keep the pressure on, not wanted to "run up the score." Next thing I know he's into CC, then not long after I'm playing for a draw in turn 6. Things can turn against Tau in a hurry.

Phryxis wrote:

Don't take Gun Drones on your vehicles unless it is a pirahna , you're giving your opponent free killpoints if you are playing a killpoint mission.

Don't think they count for KPs. Don't think them living prevents the Hammerhead from giving up KPs, but they're also not worth any KPs themselves. Would love to know if you've seen it FAQed otherwise (or at all).

The drones are in fact a unit that disembarks...and, in fact, MUST do so if the vehicle is destroyed. Unit=KP, period. They are free KPs.

Yes, it is a major disadvantage for the Tau, but it is one that they must live with until their next dex.

Perhaps, but if they are shooting my devilfish, then they are giving me a warm fuzzy feeling inside. Devilfish are notoriously hard to kill.