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Are Tau even considered viable under the current 5th edition ruleset with their Codex? It seems like they've lost a lot of what used to make them good, and I haven't heard much about them even being considered for a tournament or even most casual games.
So is there any way to make Tau work, or are us Tau players stuck waiting for a new Codex?

It really depends on who you ask.

I don't think anyone has figured out how Tau work in 5th edition, not even GW (where is the explanation on target lock and squads with flachette dischargers???)

There are really strong units in the current codex, but also two units that are really bland, uninteresting, and not quite as effective as they could be. Unfortunately these two units are your troops choices, at least one of them is fairly cheep.

Some people do well with them; unfortunately, I don't.
I love the models and have tried different ways to play them and many, many lists but just don't win with them. What with most of the armies being close combat orientated and the plethora of DSing or scouting units ensures instant death for my tau.

Scoot, shoot, and block with Kroot

Been working ok in 5th ed for me, though I'm not a tournament player.

They work pretty well. Having skimmers that can ignore stopping in difficult terrain allowed a Tau player to snatch a Draw from me by contesting the objective with a Hammerhead. You just can't play them like SMs and hope to survive. You have to be more careful and crafty like an Eldar player.

I don't consider them viable. I have a decent sized Tau army but whereas I can play successfully at the national tournament level with my Orks, I struggle to pull a draw against even the locals with my Tau. They just don't have any way of fielding things that are really nasty or solid troops or cheap firepower or any kind of assault threat. When Farsight can take a power weapon-wielding bodyguard and failsafe detonators become the norm for fire warrior units and everything gets cheaper points-wise they'll work a lot better. Kroot also desperately need some kind of morale rule. As is, they charge into combat and lose against any kind of marine simply because the marine has 3+ armor to their none.

I love the way the army plays and I can't wait for them to get a new codex. Until then they've colonized the space underneath my bed for the greater good.

I played my freinds tau, he ran a blttlesuit based army witho shova, and took all plasmaguns, that decimated my SM army, but on the other hand tau is all he plays.

Captain Shrike wrote:I played my freinds tau, he ran a blttlesuit based army witho shova, and took all plasmaguns, that decimated my SM army, but on the other hand tau is all he plays.

That may crush MEQ's but against an ork horde or nid swarm, that's vastly less effective.

I have played them since their introduction & currently I think they CAN be viable but the problem is so many things ARE viable & more viable then Tau at their best. I came in 7/31 in a local tournament with my Tau but then again if you go to 'ard boyz where people are running IG leaf blower & other "top quality" lists (I won't start ranting about how many cookie-cutter lists I see there) Tau just don't stack up.

I only played against a Tau army once, and it was a 3-way battle (Orks and SM). We only got to play to the bottom of the third turn. most of the game included the Tau player's models sitting in cover with the tanks hovering next to his table edge, blasting at my orks (mostly with the tanks) and everything else at the SM. Was kinda funny that my freind and I deployed our largest CC forces next to each other and had them beat each other to death, and I never got into CC with any Tau!

I think it depends on the size of the game, @1500 and lower mech Tau are awesome,BUT the problem comes when the game creeps over 1500 they start to loose their luster. I have noticed they are good at 1750, but once they hit 2k they are meh, because all they are adding is FW. That is my opinion.

Right now, they can really only ever deal with other armies with specific lists, whereas many other armies are balanced or good enough to run an all-around army and win most games, no matter what you go against. Tau tend to be an all-or-nothing type of army in that regard - while a Suit list can crush an MEQ list beneath its feet, it'll never put out the sheer number of shots needed to deal with an Ork horde. On the other hand, a Kroot/FW army could potentially put down a good number of hordey lists, but it doesn't have the anti-armor to deal with MEQs.

They are a very tricky army to play well. I've had some success playing against myself, but that's mainly because I can't write decent lists for anybody but MEQs, which Tau counter pretty easily with a Crisis mob. And yeah, like rednekgunner said, it doesn't take much (for the most part) to fill up those slots. You can fill up three Heavy Support slots for about 240 points at the cheapest (And it wouldn't be a half-bad Heavy army). A full 6 Troops slots takes just 720 points - most armies can do that and take up two or three. (Wolves and Marines, for example, can take really expensive troops). Once you hit a certain point, all you can really add is more Fire Warriors, or start dumping points into upgrades and useless units.

I feel it helps if you play ONLY Tau. The times I've played other armies people have lent me, and then played again with my Tau, I make stupid mistakes in regards to the Tau.

Personally, I've have pretty good luck with them. I've won almost all of the games I've played, loosing only really to Tyranids. Not lost at all to Guard, SM, and Chaos. But then it is about the dice, maybe even more so for the Tau than other races.

Some blog described the way Tau play to the band Dreamtheater. Very very chaotic and hard to understand and like, but once you reach that point, they can play phenomonally.

I have a Tau suit style army with Hazard suits in the mix, and I don't have too many problems. Just don't treat them like marines and you'll be fine, just be careful with your unit selection. I go plas/missile on suits and use the hazards on any large groups of inf.

I also take Hammeheads over Broadsides, as it lets you take on inf and mech armies so no wasteage. Permanant cover save for 5 points? Please

You have to be carefull about what you take, but it doesn't make 'em bad!

As much as I like having the Hammerhead, I tend to like to split the HS slots between a Hammerhead and a Broadside. The main reason is that while the Hammerhead is nice, I can never seem to hit with it when I need to, yet my Broadside has not yet failed to disable or destroy an enemy vehicle when the going was tough. Maybe it's just a luck thing (Well...it is a luck thing) but I've just had more success taking one of each.

As a Tau player, I have noticed that with each new codex coming out, Tau have been increasingly becoming unplayable. It still is possible to win, (and I've had my share of victories in recent months) but it requires a lot of luck and and a LOT of strategy.

Luckily, rumor is Tau are the next xeno army to be updated.

meh I still think they can be over powerd....

But thats just me

Tau have numerous issues or challenges (management speke for problems) in 5e, you only need refer to the various Tau Proposed Rules to see what the concerns are and how players think they should be addressed. (Or not addressed, if they are not Tau players.)

IMO Tau are currently somewhat over-priced compared to newer codexes, however just making them cheaper won't help much because there are basic problems with the structure of the army, especially FW capabilities and the number of vehicles they can take.

Having said all that Tau are not unviable, just 2nd or even 3rd tier.