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.

Combat res. If they do 8 wounds you do 4, you test at -4.

Gotta love 5th edition. Unless of course you have some sort of upgrade that says you always test at base leadership or something

I still think a typical Lash list would do pretty well against this list.

With terrain, cover saves, and potential line of sight issues, it wouldn't be impossible for one or both of the Lash Prince/Sorcerers to be able to survive long enough to get their chance to be effective.

The uber-unit of suits is way, way too big to be able to hide behind any but the most massive pieces of terrain; I I'd love to see the actual square inch size of the unit's footprint when bunched up.

The one to two lashes would bunch the unit up nicely into a big, round target. Three Vindicator rounds or nine plasma cannon shots from Obliterators would do a pretty big number against that unit. I think Vindicators would probably be worse due to the AP 2 and instakill S10 shots. Also, the footprint of the unit would be so big that it would take a pretty serious deviation to keep from hitting at least some of the models.

Keep in mind, a typical lash list has 2 prince, while he has a large amount of long range fire. If the lash prince hides, then it isn't lashing, and any vindicators will be prime targets for broadsides/hammerheads early on.

Im not saying this list would crush lash, but lash relies on the durability of its plague marines, which this list would rip through, and its oblits (rarely vindi's, or more than one) which would duff on shield drones for quite a long time.

I just can't see lash princes living longer than 15 shield drones, and whoevers drops first will most likely be the victor.

this thread wins....

i need to play more in the ard boys format...

as of now, I just haven't played any 2500 point games with the ard boys scoring and KP criteria.

Other wise I'd love to add to this discussion.

Cool list Aftersong, I'm sure its not perfect, but a great starting point for tweaking and discussion.

Farsight should be fearless, right?

Should be maybe, but when I checked the codex, he isn't.

Does he get anything special in the regards of Ld

Nope.

Just Ld 10 and a bonding knife, so his unit can regroup even if under half. But if you're broken in combat, you've got a 50% chance of just being run down, and even after that you've got to get more than 6 inches away so you can start testing to regroup, or risk just being ushered off the board.

Wow, thats really harsh, take a commander suit with commander node or whatever it is so you can retest or use Ld 10 unmodified

There is no upgrade that does that for tau.

They have one command control node which lets all models within 12 inches use the bearers leadership for target priority test, which we don't have anymore in fifth.

Whats the plan for T hammers in a crusader? What about two of them?
26" possible threat range.

Then again ard boys is every two years for 40k thus far.

That is a good point, at the ard boyz level, I would agree in saying you're a bit light on anti-tank, you'll run into some tank spam armies (esp. AV 14 ones) that will give you serious headaches as you only have a couple meltas and a couple railguns.

If it were me, I'd try to slim some points out of the big unit into some more AT, or at least some spread out seeker missiles for light tanks.

So I completely forgot about negative modifiers on ld tests due to wounds, my expiriences with assault in 5th edition has been only on my firewarriors who get gibbed in the first round of fighting anyways. However I do have a solution.

Failsafe Detonator - This device is intended as the ultimate expression of the doctrine of the Greater Good, and is to be used only in the direst of circumstances. The Failsafe Detonator may be triggered if the bearer is part of a team that is forced to make a fall back move having lost an assault.

The team is moved as normal but the character stays where he is and the enemy may not make a sweeping advance. Once his team has moved, and before pile in moves, the character activates the detonator - place the large blast marker centered on the character, and roll for partial hits on other models as normal. Every model hit takes a single, strength 8, AP- hit, and the character is removed as a casualty. The enemy may not consolidate.

So we avoid being run down plus we have the chance to instakill some nobs denying them FNP as well in addition to potentially being able to assault back in the following turn depending on which turn they broke of course

As far as land raiders go maybe i have been just been lucky so far in my 40k career but they rarely last more than one round of shooting from broadsides, granted i've only played against them a handful of times all those times they were at least immobilised if not destroyed by the end of turn 2, as far as their payload of thunder hammer termies go I am packing 11 plasma rifles in this list, foot slogging assault termies will not fare well. Multiple Raiders could certainly become a headache but I only have to stun them every turn, with 3 rail guns and 5 fusion blasters destroying 1 quickly and keeping the others on glance lockdown for a few turns doesn't seem impossible.

By no means do i consider this list unbeatable, for a 2500 point army is is seriously lacking in volume firepower, the main thing I am hanging my hopes on is shock value. Sit back and watch people bungle around trying to figure out how to deal with a dead hard unit of suits mucking up their day. I seriously doubt the list would be too much trouble for anyone who had seen it a few times and had a solid plan in mind for how their particular army should deal with it. In fact anyone who can deal with nob bikers effectively could probably deal with this, it just that nobody expects cheesy bull poo like this from a Tau army

Its not a bad solution, but keep in mind, this does involve your commander farsight exploding himself. Edit: Just realized any suit could take it, and farsight can't be upgraded. Whoops!

Also, your unit is still broken and unable to regroup until they get further away than 6 inches form the nob bikers. For jetpacks this is generally easy with the first fall bakc move, just depends if the combat ends in your turn or in his.

Also, as he'll most likely bum rush you and you'll try to hang back as long as possible in order to maximize the amount of shooting you get on the bikers...your fall back move for the squad may very well be off the board since its on 3d6.

I like the list, but I do think you could lessen the spam in the unit, still keep the wound allocation madness, and then use the points to compensate for a few other weaknesses, without losing the theme/craziness/effect/look on peoples faces.

Its not much, but your leaving the 14 drone attacks out of the assault profile. Also, Farsight should never have to face a full strength squad in CC due to shooting and mobility.

focusedfire wrote:Its not much, but your leaving the 14 drone attacks out of the assault profile. Also, Farsight should never have to face a full strength squad in CC due to shooting and mobility.

wow I just assumed shield drones didn't get attacks in CC I never even bothered to check, against nobs they still account for less than a wound but hey with some good dice rolls that could be pretty funny

Aftersong wrote:hmm what am i missing? why would I only be using ld6 rather than farsights ld10?

If you take 4 casualties by combat resolution in assault, your leadership would drop correspondingly. 10-4=6. Found this out the hard way using a iridium commander against a tactical squad.

Aftersong wrote:
wow I just assumed shield drones didn't get attacks in CC I never even bothered to check, against nobs they still account for less than a wound but hey with some good dice rolls that could be pretty funny

Can you image a lump of hovering metal trying to smash a ork nob on bike to the groud, god that would be funny

targetawg wrote:Keep in mind, a typical lash list has 2 prince, while he has a large amount of long range fire. If the lash prince hides, then it isn't lashing, and any vindicators will be prime targets for broadsides/hammerheads early on.

Im not saying this list would crush lash, but lash relies on the durability of its plague marines, which this list would rip through, and its oblits (rarely vindi's, or more than one) which would duff on shield drones for quite a long time.

I just can't see lash princes living longer than 15 shield drones, and whoevers drops first will most likely be the victor.

That's assuming the Tau player goes first, and there isn't sufficient terrain for the chaos player to hide his princes and/or get good cover saves for his Oblits/Vindis. Also, remember that the two Lash Prince + Heavies is a basic take for a 1750 list. 'Ard Boys is 2500, so the chaos player is going to have a bunch of other stuff that the Tau player has to worry about, like 4 large squads of Berzerkers charging forward, Chaos Terminators, or Raptors; all of these things are valid threats that have to be dealt with.

And, if the chaos player went first, it would be totally different. The footprint of the huge suit unit is such that it just plain won't be able to be hidden in the vast majority of games. The Lash(es) drag them forward, have a chance to pin, and a halfway decent round of shooting from three Vindicators or nine Obliterators should kill every one of the drones and start putting either wounds or instakills on the suits in the first round of shooting. It could, possibly if both Lashes go off, result in the Suits unit being hit by both Princes and a pile of Berzerkers in a first turn assault. In this scenario, this suit unit would go down like a freshman on prom-night, and the rest of the army would be at a serious disadvantage.

I have some issues with your retinue choices:
Targeting array on all is 70 pts. 1 markerlight hit would have the same effect and not cost you 7 hardpoints. Ditch the arrays and bring some incedental markerlights, marker-drones are PERFECT in this unit and 2 hits + will go to removing cover saves and increasing pin-checks.
Consider the mighty flamer. 7 flamers from one unit will put out a staggering amount of damage in the range band you intend to operate in. Just so happens they are dirt cheap and you have some free hardpoints after dropping the TAs.
More targetlocks, it will save you a lot of headaches when declaring charges and managing your firepower.
Gundrones! Shield drones are great, but there's only so much AP or instant death firepower that needs to be absorbed. Gun drones taken as a minority will not effect the wound rolls and will put out a good amount of firepower & pinning with those markerlight hits on the unit.
Add a Shas'o IC, stim injectors & shield drones. He usually sticks with the unit, but has the option to break away and tie something down for a turn.
Failsafe detonator, mandatory.


With those in mind, my ideal 5th edition farsight retinue would be:
Farsight, plas, shield, blade, hwTL
1: plas, mp, flam, hwMTT, hwTL, hwDC - 2 marker drones
2: plas, mp, flam, hwMTT, hwTL, hwDC - 2 shield drones
3: plas, mp, flam, hwMTT, hwTL, hwDC - 2 gun drones, failsafe detonator
4: plas, airburst frag, flam, hwMTT, hwTL, hwDC - 2 marker drones
5: plas, fusion, flam, hwMTT, hwTL, hwDC - 2 shield drones
6: plas, fusion, flam, hwMTT, hwTL, hwDC - 2 gun drones
7: plas, fusion, flam, hwMTT, hwDC - 2 shield drones
Total: 1005 (your first list was 985)

Shas'o: plas, fusion, flamer, hwMTT, hwTL, hwDC - 2 shield drones, stim injector (considered positional relay, if demons or drop pods are a flavor you intend to face - this wargear lets you change a lot of games)
161

1166 spent!

Really, the positional relay on the IC outside of the unit might be really good. Consider the dual lash argument - you can't lash what is off the board and will be coming in when and where I want it to. Plus you have the pathfinder fish already for the deepstrike reroll.

@moz

While I do agree with your logic the reason I went with the Target Arrays was to reduce the # of markers needed to support the unit, 7 arrays is 70 points 2 marker drones is 60 the drones can be killed the arrays can't, and with the suits already being bs 4 via Arrays I can allocate all my precious marker hits to removing cover saves. In addition marker drones have a 4+ armor save and T3 where shield drones are 15 points less and have a 3+ save and T4. In this case I prefer staying power to firepower but that is just a matter of personal preference all your points are valid, and dropping the Arrays for flamers is actually looking mighty tempting.

I'm glad someone is looking at refining the choices made on the unit itself as when I put it together it was merely a theory that i wanted to share and see how the community reacted to. So in my choices the only real criteria was making sure all of them were equipped differently for instance I only included the target locks as a means to make the suits different and didn't give much thought to which suits it would be most useful on.

So Overall I think you have me sold on flamers over Target Arrays, I still think shield drones are the better buy as longevity is important to this squad and # of target locks is probably a matter of personal preference, when it comes to shooting I don't mind a little overkill taking place as we all know a few bad rolls can turn too much firepower into just enough and I would rather know for sure what is not going to make it through the shooting phase rather than hoping and praying that splitting up your shots will be effective.

Also I really like the idea of adding a shas'o to the mix 1 more suit 2 more drones

Moz, you make some very good points. I would like to offer up a couple of counters, though.

70 pts for increased BS Vs Markerlight. To get the bs increase garanteed every round you pretty much need 3 markers right there. Thats 30pts and if you want to keep the mobility its 90pts. I feel that Markers are overworked in 5th ed just pulling down coversaves. So I'd just leave the markers to the coversaves and if you have any extra hits then and only then lower leadership to try for the pin.

IMHO- flamers are over rated. Not something I'd casually sacrifice a hard point for. Most targets that flamers are good for the fire warriors are better. With flamers you end up sacrificing the effectiveness of the crisis suits. The flamers are cheap because you get to use them once and then the suits are in assault. To me the hard point weapons slots are for plas, fusion, and miss.

Target locks, yes, agreed. About 3 of them.

Gun drones, yes, agreed. Cut the number of shields in half and replace with gun drones.

IC, don't think you can add him to Farsight squad. Could be wrong though.

IC can join the unit, no problem. To him it's just another unit on the board.

Target locks are mostly for jumping up to one unit that you can kill in assault, then unloading on a different unit nearby that you aren't going to assault. This is where giving each squad member a lock is useful. You can do some pretty wicked combos this way.

Flamers are meh until you get multiple flamers in a squad. Imagine the scenario above with 2 ork mobs chasing after you. Farsight and crew can probably handle one squad in assault, so he jumps between the 2 units and the shas'o breaks off to assault the secondary target. 4 gundrones fire at the primary target, and 7 flamers, 8 plasma funs, and 1 airburst open up on the secondary. If each flamer gets on average 4 orks, that's 28 flamer hits (14 wounds). Add that to the 7 or so from the airburst (4 wounds and pincheck), and the 9 from the plasma (~8 wound and 5 get through the KFF), then the mob is going to be seriously hurting.

That's 7 orks left that the shas'o will dive into (and probably win against with 2 shield drones for the Klaw attacks and 5 x WS4 St5 orkfighter swings).

Then farsight's crew gets to stomp on another 30 man unit in assault. The targetlocks let your 1000 point investment of a squad pull double duty.

I'm sticking by my markerdrones, and largely because they don't die if you don't elect them to take wounds. You'd have to be out of shield drones, gundrones, unwounded suits, and non-critical wounded suits before you'd consider pulling marker drones out.

Thats some pretty good advice on rearranging the unit, I was wondering how you'd go about facing a horde army, and forgot to even look at swapping the unit itself.

Flamers are almost always worth it.

@Moz,
With the flamers its just wounds, with the fusion blaster its insta death. With marker support, fusions get the edge.

Not knocking marker drones. Just think I'd set them with a broadside squad and keep them out of assault.

Target locks, I find that to really be effective that you need to team up 2 to 3 suits on the same target. So 3 target locks to split off on the seperate target and the rest fire on the originally targeted unit.

Your concept is very good. It just doesn't suit the tactics that I do best with.

So eight termies forced to stop an assault because of your HQ having some special equipment. Its kinda hard to stop a 26" assault.


Another thing to look at is the horde ork army with a bit of FNP biker in it.


Your army list has an idea and its nice to see that people are trying to work on making it complete. Btw dont take anything I say the wrong way, im just pointing things out to look at if you might of mist it, IE three plus armour 14.

Aftersong wrote:
@auretious taak

if you look every suit is slightly different weather it be a hard wired blacksun filter, a target lock, or a different weapon no 2 suits have the same kit allowing me to use wound allocation magic to not remove a model until all the shield drones are dead all the bodyguards have 1 wound and farsight has 2

My bad, I've not slept much these past 3 days at all so it all looked the same, damned shorthand...Also, I just clarrified withmyself youc an't use Farsight and Aun Va which sucks cause that wold have been broken!

Nice discussion.

Auretious Taak.

I've played Apocalypse @ 2.5K with a Farsight list. The biggest weakness as pointed out is the LD. Fail a LD check in HTH and your army is just going to run away. The rest of your army isn't going to do so much, especially against a mech or jump infantry heavy opponent. I think you'll do fine against hordes and soft infantry.

I commend you on your willingness to do the multi-wound, differently armed large squad. I find them very annoying to run in practice.

I look forward to reading how you fared.