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I was thinking up a new idea for a crisis team, that probably isn't cost effective, but might be fun for someone to try. I got the idea when thinking about Eldar wraithguards, which are great damage soakers.

So, here's the team:

3 Crisis suit team:
Suit 1:
-Shas'vre
-Flamer
-Drone Controller + 2 Shield Drones
-Shield Generator
-Stimulant Injector
-Bonding Knife
Suit 2:
-Flamer
-Drone Controller + 2 Shield Drones
-Shield Generator
Suit 3:
-Flamer
-Drone Controller + 2 Shield Drones
-Shield Generator

The total point cost comes to 257 (like I said, really expensive).
I think this would be a fun team to try though, especially against tyranid/ork hordes.

The unit has 12 wounds, each with a 3+ SV, and 4+ invulnerabily save (ISV? What's the abbreviation for that?). I would imagine using them with a static army. As the hordes get too close. These guys can put down 3 flamer templates, and then assault. I would imagine that they would be pretty hard to kill. Also, if they get the assault, that would be... 21 attacks, I believe.

Also, since they can deep strike. They can drop in at the back of your opponents army, and probably tie up... virtually anything, probably the whole game.

They could also deep strike in and harass horde CC armies as they charge your main force. The opponent probably wouldn't want to get into CC with these, becaus they'd be hard to kill, but wouldn't exactly be able to avoid them either.

Like I said, probably not a cost effective unit, but it might be fun for someone to try

This Tactic will work until you face anything that can instant death them such as battlecannon's which most chaos armies include. Powerfists will also ruin your day along with melta's.
Give a non shas'vre a different loadout to the others so you can abuse wound allocation more.

very fun... not very good...

your damage output potential per point spent is very low...

The Tau army is quite fragile, but it does make up for this with massive dmg output.

Forget about survivability and concentrate on dmg output.

If you want a damage soaking tau unit, go with this.

Shas'o
Plasma Rifle, Missile Pod
Shield Generator
stimulant injector, Iridium Armor
HWMT, HWDC, 2 Shield Drones

attached to a regular crisis team

Team Leader
Plasma Rifle, Missile Pod, Shield Generator, HWMT, HWDC 2x Shield drones

Shas'ui 1
Plasma Rifle, Missile Pod, Multi Tracker
Shas'ui 2 TL MP, DC, 2x Shield Drones

this gives you an 8 man squad, with a total of 14 wounds
3 models with 2+ armor, 1 with feel no pain, and 6 with invulnerable saves, all of the multiple wound models are unique.

This squad takes a ton of small arms fire to kill and can dish out a lot of fire, 6 missiles 2 TL missiles, 3-6 plasma shots. If you know you are going to be fighting IG or swarm armies, go for burst cannons instead of plasma rifles.

They only thing you have to be very careful of are large blasts that are 8+S and 3- ap. Even a large blast will probably only cover 1-2 models if you use 2" coherency, but if it scatters a little it can hurt, try to stay in cover if you have to face some.

only 2 models don't have invulnerable saves, you can allocate High S low AP shots like lascannons to drones, and less than 7S low AP shots like hot shot lasguns and rending hits to your commander or shas'ui's with invul saves, that way you have a lower chance of losing models.

One of the great things about tau is that if you work it right, you can get defensive or manueverability bonuses without sacrificing firepower

This squad would make a great front line screen to provide cover for your FW squads that are advancing

have the FW's line up in about a row of two, about 1-1.5 inches apart, more if the enemy uses a lot of blasts or templates. Then put this squad in front as close to the fire warriors as you can, covering most of the squad of fire warriors. At the start of the turn you plan on advancing, move the FW's up 6" through your crisis team and open fire on close things, this should put the FW's about 3" in front of the larger model squad of crisis suits. The crisis suits will probably be tall enough to see over FW's directly in front of them to not give cover. Then in the assault phase jump in front of the FW's. This will draw fire toward the crisis suits, and if the enemy sends its lower AP rounds such as autocannons(beware of these in IG, a friend of mine runs heavy weapons squads of them so he can Fire on my Mark them to make me reroll cover, this is a powerful blow to Fire Warriors to have 4-5 turns of this) they FW's will get cover while moving up at full speed.

The main problems with this are first, the Iridium Armor slows down your second jump, if you use this tactic a lot, drop the IA. Second, this is implying that you are 12" away, a dangerous place for tau. If you are fighting IG, SM TAC squads with no power weapons, or some other non melee weak unit, then this is fine, crisis commanders with a full crisis team at their disposal will tear them apart. But against orks, this is a dangerous tactic, as always you should never move withing 12" unless you are sure that the rapid fire and other shots can kill anything in assault range.

Another way to run this tactic is to use cheaper gun drone squads, they can't take nearly as much punishment but they can still take the fire while JSJ pinning rounds.

As far as the high str low ap shots like battle cannons go, a turn of hammerheads and broadsides will usually make short work of one. Against IG I usualy down one AV14 vehicle from a few railguns a turn, and can usually stun/shake others.

Hi

If I'm not entirely mistaken, the Fifth Edition (at least) will only allow you to make one saving throw, even if more are available (armour save, cover save and/or invulnerable save). So why buy 2 Shield Drones to every Crisis Suit if they already have a Shield Generator - that's just wasting points, no? That's 30pts for every Crisis Suit, which can just as easily be spent on more Crisis Suits. I don't get it...

You can allocate wounds to the drones and let them die instead of the suits. They are ablative wounds, making them very useful.

If I recall correctly.

medd wrote:each with a 3+ SV, and 4+ invulnerabily save (ISV? What's the abbreviation for that?).

3+/4++

There are too many things that can kill them outright with only the 4++ for protection. At more than 80pts each they need badly to be T5.

I like this notation:

Armour Save: Sv
Cover Save: Cv
Invulnerable Save: Iv

So a Space Marine Chaplain in cover would have Sv3+, Iv4+, Cv4+.

Nurglitch wrote:I like this notation:

Armour Save: Sv
Cover Save: Cv
Invulnerable Save: Iv

So a Space Marine Chaplain in cover would have Sv3+, Iv4+, Cv4+.

I think you mean Cassius (toughness 6 )

Shield drones allow you to have an extra wound and also an invulnerable save. Most instant death weapons are 1-2 shots. These wounds will get allocated to the drones and your firepower for the suits will not be diminished in any way even after all drones are lost. Adding Iridium armor and stim injectors give a 2+ for armor and feel no pain further increasing it's survivability.