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Okay,

So I've been trying to field-test the new Outriders, as I have the old-old models for them, and I don't want them to go to waste. And, I'm not sure if I'm using them correctly or not. On Warhammer-Empire.com they are of the opinion that the Outriders are freaking awesome for the following reasons:

-16" move: 3d6 pursuit (if Fast Cav)
-360 LOS (if Fast Cav)
-Free Reform (if Fast Cav)
-Smaller frontage for huge firepower potential in comparison to Pistoliers and Handgunners

But... to me at least, I've been giving them barding on their horses, as they just don't seem like Fast Cav to me. That Move-or-Fire repeater weapon makes me inclined to give them the barding on their horse, so they can move and survive to get where they're going. It doesn't seem like a lot of points to get the barding, and it does make them more on the Medium Cav side... at least armor-save wise. They seem pretty expensive for Fast Cav, which is normally suppossed to be expendable.

Should I forgoe the barding on the warhorses, and just have them as Fast Cav that gets to shoot maybe 4 out of 6 turns? Any other ideas?

I always give them barding too. And because they are relatively fragile, I try to set them up in woods. I think they should have been made skirmishers, but that's just me.

I've seen them used 3 times, everyone still takes pistoliers.

in every case they had barding and a champ with HLR and were deployed in woods, twice near the artillery firebase and once in an all cav army in the centre.

Lack of Move + Fire is what ruins them for me. On a fast cav unit, I would want something like that to make use.

At the moment, they don't compete in purpose with Pistoliers, but with Handgunners. They offer more shots / frontage and 360 vision if you desire as well.

The problem is they're Special, so while they don't compete in purpose with Pistoliers, they compete in slot which I can get some of their effect by fielding Handgunners in Core saving my special slots for effects that can't be placed in Core (ie Fast Cavalry shooting/fleeing and Warmachines).

As outriders are fragile and expensive but pack a lot of firepower when they get to shoot, I've seen them used often as backfield fire support covering your artillery etc. and threatening big stuff if they get close (hopefully behind some cover/other troops so they won't get exposed to opposing shooting/magic missiles). They certainly aren't something one just push forwards and hope opponent lets them unleash fire at their leisure.

The defensive tactics sort of require your army to be tilted towards the gun&magic-line type as aggressive lists would benefit more from pistoliers.

Outriders cost the same as it would require handgunners to get the same effect that they do.

However, they are much less durable. I've not fielded mine in ages.

I think (Fast Cav) Outriders are great! The firepower of 15 Handgunners in only 5 models. Which, as skyth pointed out, is also their biggest downside. 5 T3 5+ AS models are hardly durable. 15 no save T3 Handgunners hold the edge here.

Still, because of that small frontage I find they form much less of a weak point in my line. Also the 360 degree shooting is ace when you face enemy armies that like to have things pop up in your backfield. They're great as artillery guards in this way.

Of course you need to look out for enemy shooting and magic. If you face lots of opponents with a lot of (magic) missile fire they're not that great. That said I took 2 uits of 5 last tourney and they tended to be my best performing units in each and every battle. That's because I like to play in an aggresive manner (still weirds out people who are only used to defensive Empire lists). So instead of a closing enemy that gets to pick which of my support units to decimate before he decides to make contact I force the issue with a good load of units on the attack that also need immediate attention. Now he has to choose. Do I invest power into taking out or crippling those Outriders, or do I try and hurt that unit that's directly threatening my battle line? Most (wisely) choose the latter.
I've also hidden these boys for the first 2 rounds while I took out enemy threats, having them run into a good firing position in turn 3 and then blast away for 3 turns after that.

You've got to be clever in their use, they're to fragile otherwise. Even so, they're really not that expensive so sometimes I deliberately send them into harms way so they take the hurt that I don't want to go towards a more important unit.

Taking Barding ups their survivability only slightly IMO. Any opponent who wants to hurt them usually has enough power to do so, that extra pip of save won't help much in most cases. For me their free movement (for redeployment) and 360 degree shooting have been far more usefull than a little bit of armour would ever have been. (I've never ever even once thought "Gee, if only their armour was 1 better the unit would still live")

Well, I've done some more field-testing of the Outridders, and it does look like the Fast Cav, 5+ armor save is the way to go. They kinda remind me a lot of the Galloper Gun, in terms of you have to be willing to sacrifice "firing" turns in order to get enfulade shots. And... they're counter intuitive. With the 16" move, your opponent has to send something that either moves just as well to scare off the Outriders, or has to direct magic against them... letting you focus your magic defense. Pistoliers are pretty repsectable, with Multi-shot 2x Pistols that you can use each turn. But, if you are agressive with the Outriders, you can get some 15+ shots off every. Not to mention the extra range of the Repeater Musket gives the Outriders the ability to have a larger zone-of-effect, where-as the Pistoliers have a mobile, but limited-range, zone-of-effect.

To me, 6-sized units seemed to work better than 5-sized. They're still small enough to be really maneuverable, but large enough to really pack a wallop. And large enough to still have US 5 for contesting table corners, or getting your units into their deployment zone.

If you're going to get the Outriders, get the Champion. 4x multi-shots from the Repeater Pistol and Pistol are pretty sweet. And the ability to "sneak" up 8", and still fire the Pistol / Repeater Pistol combo is pretty brutal. The Hochland Rifle is nice, but... you have to get more than one for it to really work. Though, at least the Outrider Champion has the serious BS to use it.

Grenade Launching Bluderbuss is... meh. It's nice that it more-or-less wounds on a 2+ and gives -4 to the armor save... but that just doesn't seem to impressive. If it did d3 wounds, or the small explosion template it might be a bit more impressive. Though... I suppose the Blunderbuss can wound a Steam Tank, which is actually kinda funny.

We did come to the conclusion that the 4+ armor save, non-Fast Cav Outriders, make for a decent shock troop against fast enemy units going at soft-type Empire units. Fast units tend not to have a lot of attacks, or a lot of high strength attacks, or a lower LD. All of which plays into the armored-Outriders doing overwatch. And, if you're going to go armored-Outriders, you really do need the Repeater Pistol / Pistol combo.

On a side note, it would be kinda nice if the Outrider Champion could get the mechanical-horse steed. Might see a bit more of those things, if GW were to allow that, instead of limiting the horse to the Engineer.

I've got to be honest - I'm dissapointed with Pistoliers as they're too fragile for me, but Outriders at least have a harder 'sting' before they're gone - and at only 3 points more a model, this can't be a bad thing.