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@Farsidedowm- A couple of small points.

The Prism Cannon does not ignore cover. It is not ordnance so cover and LoS applies as normal.

Also sounds like you were playing against a fully competitive list w a list that still has a way to go. For curiousities sake, "Could you post just how many in each unit he was running?". The number of units and type of units sounds a little off. I normally wouldn't be so quick to question your opponents list but if he played the Prism Cannon as ignoring cover then it is fair to question his list.

About the fire warriors, yeah, they are good, people under estimate their ability all the time. Thats why I run my squads at 9-12 strong and try to have at least 2 squads of them.

Kroot have a learning curve. In order for them to be effective you have to gain enough knowlege of how to deploy them against each different army/build/deployment/mission.

Pathfinders in a 750 list is sort of "Meh" IMO. They will help but cost you much needed points for models that don't kill anything.

Deathrains- Yep

Firestorms- They require you to be aggressive in order to be fully effective.

C.I.B.- You would probably feel better about it if you hadn't rolled all the 1's. But yeah I'm not a fan of the C.I.B. because of the points cost and the A.F.P. is not much better IMO. Been my experience that with the Tau, if it has the word special next to it then whatever it is will fail to impress. Didn't say sucked, just that they will not overwhelm you with awesomeness for the points you spend on them. As the codex gets older(new codices =power creep) cost efficiency increasingly becomes more of a problem.

A big problem with this list is with pinning so much on a single broadside.
How do you think the game would have gone if you had armed the commander as a deathrain w/ TL, joined him to the other Deathrains, and dumped the points from the Firestorms elswhere?
Maybe run 2 Broadsides with a TL on the team leader or do something completely different.

I'll comment more after I get a look at your opponents list.

edit spelling

focusedfire wrote:The Prism Cannon does not ignore cover. It is not ordnance so cover and LoS applies as normal.

I feel so cheated. I had my kroot gone to ground in the forest for a 2+ from his wave serpent's fire when he dropped those 2 shots on me, telling me I didn't have a cover save. My devilfish probably also could have been saved by the disruption pod. My deathrains, pathfinders, and firewarriors too! UGH!!!

focusedfire wrote:Could you post just how many ib each unit he was running?

I'll try to do the best I can to get this all right. After all, his list was in German and he kept dropping surprise after surprise on me.

HQ was Farseer with Doom riding with the DA's in the Wave Serpent

Troops were 5 rangers, a 3 man guardian jetbike squad, and 9 Dire Avengers+Exarch with Bladestorm in a Wave Serpent with Star Engines and Spirit Stones (and yes he did downgrade my 'crew stunned' to 'shaken')

Heavy was 2 Fire Prisms with Star Engines and Spirit Stones.

Ok, I just came to approximately 793 points with that list. -_-

That guy was shady. The two times the dice did scatter he didn't even send it the full number of inches (yeah, I know BS affects it), and his jetbikes somehow managed to pass a leadership check on a 10 (that I called him out for). Of course I'm still new, so I probably don't even have a clue of some of the stuff he was sneaking past me.

And as a skimmer, is it possible to just fly over impassible terrain (like a building) without taking some kind of test? Literally the one time I shook the crew on one of his fire prisms, he just flew 24" away over and behind a building.

I was seriously considering changing my commander to CIB-tl missile pod so that at the beginning of the game he could link up with my deathrains(on average 5.3of6 shots hitting and 1 in 6 penetrating? yes please! Tack on a markerlight hit to boost my bs one more or drop those pesky cover saves, and I'm golden.), and as things wound down and I was dealing more with foot sloggers, he could run over and join up with the firestorm team.

Thinking about that game, and considering the setup, I feel like I should have deepstruck my HQ team and forced the vehicles to either put their backs to me (9 shots penetrating on 6 and 4 shots penetrating on a 4) or my broadsides/deathrains. That or used my devilfish more aggressively to get on of the teams in behind them.

Obviously this is a take all comers list. I didn't prepare it for Eldar because I didn't even know what I was going to be playing against. I still want it to be that, even after this performance.

So I took into account what you said about pathfinders (they die fast-although they did last until turn 3 in my game) and putting a lot on the single broadsides, and I constructed this experimental list.

HQ
Commander (attached to Elite Squad 1): 113 points
Shas'el Crisis Suit
-Cyclic Ion Blaster, Twinlinked Missile Pod
-Hardwired Multitracker and Drone Controller (1 shield)
-Stimulant Injector

Elite
Squad 1: 100 points
(2) XV8 'Firestorm' Crisis Suits
-Missile Pod, Burst Cannon
-Multitracker

Squad 2: 106 points
(2) XV8 'Deathrain' Crisis Suits
-Twinlinked Missile Pod
-Targeting Array

Troops
Squad 1: 170
(1) Firewarrior Shas'ui
-Bonding Knife
(5) Firewarriors
-Pulse Rifles
(1) Devilfish
-Burst Cannon, Gun Drones
-Disruption Pod, Multitracker

Squad 2: 70 points
(10) Kroot Carnivores

Heavy
Squad 1: 190 points
(1) XV88 Broadside Battle Suit Team Leader
-Twinlinked Railgun, Smart Missile System
-Advanced Stabilization System
-Hardwired Target Lock and Drone Controller (1 shield)
(1) XV88 Broadside Battle Suit
-Twinlinked Railgun, Smart Missile System
-Advanced Stabilization System

749 Points

I feel like this is a very devious list-not cheesy(although I am running the minimal amount of troops), but I get the feeling that the average SM player running several transports will look at it and go, "ah crap." Meched-up armies will cower in fear. That guy would have been left with nothing but a Wave Serpent by the top of turn 2. With the right amount of LOS blocking terrain, on average all my opponent will have to shoot at is an AV-12 4+cover transport, 2+ (one with 4+ invuln) armor way at the back of the board, and a cheap squad of troops, which will most likely have gone to ground for a 2/3+ save.

-Unfortunately I had to demote my devilfish to a dumbfish to make it work. Sad day-although I could drop the firewarrior Shas'ui and Stim Injectors to bring it back, what do you think? The 25 points does decrease the number of KP I grant by one, makes my devilfish a powerful BS4 7 shot gunship, and I'm losing a 1 leadership and the chance to regroup in case 4-5 of my firewarriors die, plus my commander (who so far has taken very few shots)loses a 50% chance to save AP 3+ hits that make it through his armor.
-I decided to keep the Commander with squad 1, because I want them moving up off the break to utilize their full strength and start picking off troops jumping out of their wrecked/immobilised transports. *His shield drone will not benefit the deathrains, who will constantly be jumping back behind LOS blocking terrain, and without the markerlights, I won't have to worry about which squad I need to boost BS for. Even then, at turn one his squad is most likely firing 4 BS3 and 2 rerolled BS4 7-4 shots. On average 3.8 are hitting, just from them. Throw in the shots from my deathrains and that's 7.3 hits, virtually guaranteed to penetrate an AV12 vehicle at least once, or wound around 6 units. Once the firestorms get within 18", add the power from 2 burst cannons and a CIB, and I'm just ending whole squads, one turn at a time.*
-I'm curious, do I still need deathrains? Should I demote them to firestorms for more anti-infantry? I feel like without the boost to bs from markerlights (my broadsides won't be hitting on rerolled 2+'s anymore), they should stay as is. *That, and they are utilizing 100% of their effectiveness the entire game.*
-The kroot are back to being a minimal squad, meaning I'll probably use them as a shield for my broadsides, or infiltrate into cover to draw fire because my pathfinders won't be there to be my bait anymore.
-Once again, if my opponent is going first, I can keep my broadsides out of los and in pristine condition so when they shuffle out, they can split their fire and hopefully disable two tanks. After they finish smoking anything requiring their railguns, they'll be able to act as a slow moving heavy armored crisis team, skittering forward while unleashing 8 SMS shots to infantry.
-Should I drop one of my crisis suits and bring back the pathfinders? Or drop one, upgrade one, and return my devilfish to gunship status?

I'm worried how this list might do against Hordes or those that heavily utilize cover, and I don't have any plasma in my list to deal with 2+ armor saves (I have a funny feeling deepstriking Terminators would give me way too many problems)or a FNP heavy army, but seeing how Mech is supposed to be king in 5th, I feel on average I should do alright.

What do you think?

Edit:added some additional thoughts on commander and deathrains*

Ok, due to my fear of playing against a horde list, I did a little looking around for a 750pt Nids list. Kind of tough since many were obsolete and I needed one built around their new codex, but I did find one that was very heavy on the troops.

It's contents were essentially:

1 tyranid prime(bonesword/scything/AG/TS) attached to 2 Hive guard (at the back)
10 termagants(spike rifles) hanging back to hold objective
20 hormagaunts leading the charge
18 hormagaunts(AG/TS) behind them
18 hormagaunts(AG/TS) behind them

Out of curiosity, I did a 2 round practice game, to see how many could get into my lines. In this case it was a Pitched battle. I went with my latest build, though I dropped the shas'ui from the firewarriors, and the stims from my commander in exchange for upgrading my devilfish to a warfish. Seeing that the termagants have terrible weapons and are hanging back, and the only other source of ranged firepower were the two Hive Guard with their 24" 8-4 Assault 2 weapons, I wasn't too worried about hiding my troops, deploying the firewarriors with their 30" range rifles as a cover granting barrier for my broadsides, and my kroot infront of my devilfish to act as a shield against charging troops. I had my HQ team deployed pretty far forward to take full advantage of their firepower, with my Deathrains JSJ'ing from behind the devilfish. Assuming the tyranids went first, were moving 6" and running 5", and taking into account effective ranges of my units, I was wiping out almost an entire line of gaunts the first turn, with my command team jumping back well out of range of the Impaler Cannons .

I'm taking a break midway through this to announce all that I had effectively firing at the gaunts:
@BS4:
(7) 5-5 shots (from Devilfish) MH says: 3.9 wounds!
(5) 3-4 shots (from HQ) MH says: 1.7 wounds!
(2) twinlinked 7-4 shots (from HQ) MH says: 1.5 wounds!

@BS3:
(10) 4-6 shots (from Kroot-who rapid fired on second turn) MH says: 3.3 wounds(or 6.6 rapid)!
(12) 5-5 shots (from XV-8's/FireWarriors) MH says: 5 wounds!
(4) 7-4 shots (from XV-8's) MH says: 1.7 wounds!

MH average: 17.1 wounds! (all ignore 6+ armor save)

...and the Hive Guard:
@BS4
(4) twinlinked 7-4 shots (from Deathrains) MH says: (assuming cover) 1.2 wounds!

@BS3
(2) twinlinked 10-1 shots (from Broadsides) MH says: (assuming cover) 0.63 wounds!

MH average: 1.83 wounds! (all ignore 4+ armor save)

By the end of turn 2, Combined fire from my broadsides and deathrains had killed off the two Hive guard, who never got their weapons in range, leaving the prime very vulnerable with T5, only 12 gaunts left facing a kroot shield (I did better than average: MH would have the final squad of 18 gaunts left-still manageable), and 10 termagants, who's S3 weapons did not have me worried in the slightest. I still had my full army, and everything but the Kroot was out of assault range. With the next turn, my kroot would be dead, but so would his Prime and the remainder of his hormagaunts, leaving 10 termagants to mop up. Now unless my read-through of the codex was incorrect and these gaunts are supposed to be getting FNP saves, or there are some rules I'm missing, I feel that this playthrough gave me some confidence in my build. Hell, for all I know, the tyranid build was bad.

I'm sorry for this pseudo-battle report, but I at least wanted to prove to myself that my army had some form of stopping power against a very large horde of enemies, as long as I show some courage with the deployment of my troops (especially my hq team-they need to be delivering the firepower of those 2 burst cannons and the CIB almost every turn, and they can as long as they jump straight back), and don't go to ground every time I get a few shots taken at me (firewarriors will still probably be hiding in the devilfish the majority of the time), my list can have a good amount of fire power and heavy killing power (via Broadsides and Deathrains), with some of it's most powerful parts (the xv-8's) being very mobile.

I think it would be far too difficult to try testing this against anything else, but I felt tyranids were pretty cut and dry (charge forward in an attempt to get into assault range).

If I played this all wrong, or if you still have any considerations for my build, let me know! I'm still curious if I should be changing my deathrains now that I'm running two broadsides. I'm also considering how different this battle would have turned out if I'd kept my most recent list and sacrificed the firepower of my devilfish for a more survivable commander/firewarrior team.

Of note, had I positioned my troops incorrectly and not taken advantage of my 18" weapons on my devilfish and HQ teams both turns, I would have lost the ability to wound about 6 gaunts and most likely would have been overrun. Additionally, I didn't check, but my opponent could have also screened his first line of hormagaunts with the termagants, to give me another 10 I'd have to deal with. Most likely, I wouldn't have been able to handle this many either. Or if my firing performed below average... This is pretty sobering-but for a list angled towards dealing with Mech forces, I was pleased enough. Also, I did not want to go first, as I feel that would have granted me an advantage that I can't always rely on.

Once again, tell me what you think!

Edit 1&2: changed broadsides back to BS3, and fixed math.

Had a game against Necrons today, Objectives, running the Warfish version of my newest list again. He had a deceiver (is that common at this points level?), 6 scarabs turboboosting everywhere for a 2+ save, and 21 warriors broken up into 2 squads. I lost due to a combination of things: complete lack of BLOS terrain(nothing but forests), bad target priorities (I really wanted those scarabs dead-I couldn't afford to let them get into CC with one of my suit teams and tie them up the whole game, but I probably shouldn't have gone so far as to target them with my Broadsides), abysmal rolling on my part (5/6 3+ saves failed), amazing rolls on his part (9/10 3+ saves passed), poor suit placement (my deathrains should have been out in the open far back, with my firestorms up front behind my devilfish), and some failed knowledge of rules regarding tank shocking and WBB for me. However, I did win in Kill Points (2-1)

What did I get out of it?

-I miss my pathfinders. The ability to rip 2 points off his swarm's cover saves with my deathrains firing probably would have yielded me a much more success than having an additional broadsides. I'm still not going to change back however, as I feel for most games the broadsides would do me a lot more good.
-The deathrains once again did admirably. They're not delivering many shots, but I'm practically guaranteed 3-4 wounds every turn. The fact that they were always out of range from my enemies as well was very nice.
-The firestorms did badly. I'll chock this one up to very bad rolling. Over 2 turns 12 shots from the burst cannons wounded absolutely nothing, and this was even before saves were taken. My opponent reccommended I drop the suits and pick up a single fireknife (I'm guessing allocating the remaining points towards a shas'ui for my firewarriors, making the suit a team leader with a targeting array, and a stim injector for hq), but I think it's an utter waste. Sure, that single shot would be at 24", but what about my CIB? In the same two rounds with my horrible rolling it managed a rending hit and 2 wounds. Personally I'd say that's pretty good for dealing with MEQ's. I think running a single fireknife would just be putting too many eggs into one basket for a gun that is too expensive, and still allows a WBB roll. Had I had better rolling, I think things would have turned out very differently, and the VoF I get against hordes is just too strong to ignore.
-The kroot were amazing. Once again I infiltrated them, pulling them away when his C'Tan got near, forcing his squad of 11 warriors to focus their on them and for only 2 wounds with a 2+ save, and when his Deceiver finally got in range, they tied him up for 2 whole turns (one good roll on leadership-my only lucky moment in the entire game). So yeah, it took his 300 point unit basically the entire game to kill off my 70 point unit. At higher point levels I'm looking forward to giving them a lot more loving.
-The devilfish held. A good 7 shot gunship that acted as a mobile weapons platform and blos for my deathrains. Unfortunately it suffered from the same bad rolls as everything else, but it did it's job, and did it without having to worry about being destroyed once.
-Having a second broadsides guaranteed results. Every single turn, I was seeing at least one wound from them. Since my opponent had no tanks, their effectiveness against a mech heavy force is yet to be seen, but I'm looking forward to it.

Just to clear things up, here is the list I was running. I'm still trying to decide if the change to gunship in exchange for the loss of a shas'ui and stim injectors is worth it. As of yet, I still haven't faced Space Marines, Orks, or Tyranids in an actual battle.

HQ
Commander (attached to Elite Squad 1): 103 points
Shas'el Crisis Suit
-Cyclic Ion Blaster, Twinlinked Missile Pod
-Hardwired Multitracker and Drone Controller (1 shield)

Elite
Squad 1: 100 points
(2) XV8 'Firestorm' Crisis Suits
-Missile Pod, Burst Cannon
-Multitracker

Squad 2: 106 points
(2) XV8 'Deathrain' Crisis Suits
-Twinlinked Missile Pod
-Targeting Array

Troops
Squad 1: 180
(6) Firewarriors
-Pulse Rifles
(1) Devilfish
-Burst Cannon, Smart Missile System
-Disruption Pod, Multitracker, Targeting Array

Squad 2: 70 points
(10) Kroot Carnivores

Heavy
Squad 1: 190 points
(1) XV88 Broadside Battle Suit Team Leader
-Twinlinked Railgun, Smart Missile System
-Advanced Stabilization System
-Hardwired Target Lock and Drone Controller (1 shield)
(1) XV88 Broadside Battle Suit
-Twinlinked Railgun, Smart Missile System
-Advanced Stabilization System

749 Points

Just a thought...I'm curious if I should downgrade my broadsides team to a regular one with shield drone (85pts) in exchange for 2 more Deathrains. Although that is an absurd amount of XV8's...maybe drop one, add one to Elite Team 2, and bolster my troops (potentially even bringing back the pathfinders)? Although I'm not too fond of a Deathrain team with a very large footprint. I think I need more experience with this force before I come to any major decisions along those lines however. I just randomly thought of it while I was posting the list.

Once again, I apologize for these pseudo-battle reports, but I'm trying to make this thread an in depth analysis of my army as it progresses rather than a strict look at points. I want to rationalize all my decisions within the confines of my playstyle, and make the changes necessary-both to my army and my tactics. As I get more games in this will most likely happen less and less, especially now that I'm out for the summer, and done with final projects.

What do you think?

It is not common for someone to run a god at this point level and for the necrons even more so because of the points taken away from buying troop units.

Just makes phasing them out that much easier. As to how you deal with the god, don't. Ignore him because he has no ability to catch you. He is slow unless he can get into assault.


I'd like for you to critique this list:

HQ
Shas'el w/ TL-MP, TL, HWDC+1 SD 89

Elite
2 Shas'ui w/ TL-MP, TA 110

Troop
9 Shas'la + Shas'ui w/ BK + D-Fish w/ SMS, DP, MT, TA 225

Troop
10 Kroot + 5 Hounds 100

FA
5 Gun Drones 60 pts

HS
HH w/ BC, Rail, DP, MT 165

Well, I just finished a game against some Nids and absolutely wrecked them. My firestorm team absolutely tore through his gaunts like butter, and my kroot acted as a perfect wall delaying his outflanking genestealers and allowing me to blow them up. One thing of note, with only two small troop choices, and one acting as a buffer/distraction (aka dead), I'm finding it very difficult in objective based games to make more than a single capture. Essentially I'm forced into either tabling my opponent or lose/tie. Having said that, every one of my units (except for the firewarriors, they were just chilling in the dfish) did their job exceptionally. The deathrains are a permanent addition. The broadsides punched holes in every single MC. But on his behalf, he was new, he'd never played tau, he rolled doubles on his first tervigon spawn of 9, and he was trying out a new list he'd just built.

focusedfire wrote:
HQ
Shas'el w/ TL-MP, TL, HWDC+1 SD 89
Elite
2 Shas'ui w/ TL-MP, TA 110
Troop
9 Shas'la + Shas'ui w/ BK + D-Fish w/ SMS, DP, MT, TA 225
Troop
10 Kroot + 5 Hounds 100
FA
5 Gun Drones 60 pts
HS
HH w/ BC, Rail, DP, MT 165

I'm interested. Gun drones that can act as a fast moving buffer, a small kroot bomb, and a strong firewarrior team in gunship. 3 (basically) deathrains keeping my suits out of range at all times and a seemingly impregnable HH capable of dropping much needed pie plates (it's a shame it's not ordnance though-I could down an entire squad of those pesky scarab swarms). Since it seems my 6 firewarriors are getting almost zero use from me, maybe this will encourage me to work with them in a better manner. I'll try to run this after I get a few more games in with my current list. Although, if it turns out I'm still not using my firewarriors, I may try to decrease their number and pick up another deathrain.

I behaved on that list. If I was going to be a D**k it wold be full mech with an Ionhead added in the list by pulling the gun drones, hounds and 4 FW.

So I was thinking long and hard about those gun drones-sure they're the same price as pathfinders, but they're jump pack troops, able to respond to any situation 24", cover an area of 12" as a shield, and still be able to shoot. If I had them, I wouldn't always have to use my kroot as my primary meat wall, potentially allowing me 2 scoring units at the end of the game on a pretty regular basis, so even if I don't table his army, I still have a shot at winning. Unfortunately this meant dropping one of my firestorms, but on the upside they make for a smaller unit footprint (I've just been having trouble moving 3 suits and a shield drone around effectively).

So this is what I came up with:

HQ
Commander (attached to Elite Squad 1): 103 points
Shas'el Crisis Suit
-Cyclic Ion Blaster, Twinlinked Missile Pod
-Hardwired Multitracker and Drone Controller (1 shield)

Elite
Squad 1: 50 points
(1) XV8 'Firestorm' Crisis Suit
-Missile Pod, Burst Cannon
-Multitracker

Squad 2: 106 points
(2) XV8 'Deathrain' Crisis Suits
-Twinlinked Missile Pod
-Targeting Array

Troops
Squad 1: 180 points
(6) Firewarriors
-Pulse Rifles
(1) Devilfish
-Burst Cannon, Smart Missile System
-Disruption Pod, Multitracker, Targeting Array

Squad 2: 70 points
(10) Kroot Carnivores

Fast
Squad 1: 48 points
(4) Gun Drones

Heavy
Squad 1: 190 points
(1) XV88 Broadside Battle Suit Team Leader
-Twinlinked Railgun, Smart Missile System
-Targeting Array
-Hardwired BSF, Target Lock, and Drone Controller (1 shield)
(1) XV88 Broadside Battle Suit
-Twinlinked Railgun, Smart Missile System
-Targeting Array

750 Points

-I figured that in any game where my broadsides might be in trouble of getting shot up off the break, those 4 could act as mobile cover for them, allowing them to stand perfectly still and deliver two BS4 (rather than BS3) twinlinked shots. Additionally my suits would still have a shield drone for protection.
-Against nids they could act as bubble wrap for anything I might find exposed, or protect a good portion of the board (11-12" properly spread) from outflanking genestealers.
-With the 3 points left over I threw a hardwired Black Sun Filter on my Broadside leader. Perhaps I should instead change my firestorm to a deathrain? I feel that this would leave me with an even bigger lack of firepower coming from that team, so I'm not too sure. That, and it would further discourage my from getting my CIB in range.
-Unfortunately they are an easy kill point, but I feel that the rest of my army (minus the kroot) are durable enough that I can deal with that.

What do you think? Are they worth the loss of a suit? Should the remaining suit be a Deathrain? Should I throw the A.S.S. back on my broadsides?

List looks solid. I'd be tempted to tweek for 2 more gun drones or dropping the CIB for a PR but that is about it. At 750 points you have plenty of crisis suits with this build.

As far as the Broadsides go, experiment with them. It is up to your preference. Remember that at 750 points the standard game board is much bigger and plays to the Tau's advantage.

So I've emerged victorious from my last two matches: the first against horde Orks and the second against Necrons.

Against the Orks I recognized a few things(the list I was facing included a big mek, 2 units of lootas, 2 units of shoota boys, and 2 deff dreads-hardly designed to be competitive, but still a good learning experience as far as facing Orks for the first time goes):

-The gun drones are a very easy kill point, and if my opponent doesn't have a cover granting AP 1/2 weapon, they're awfully useless. Sure they can protect the suits as a bubble wrap unit, and sure if they survive being out in the open for long enough they may end up pinning a unit but they honestly aren't zooming all over the place like I thought they would.

-In this case he was using a Shokk Gun (which ended up rolling doubles twice) attached to lootas and went second, so I was unable to move my broadsides out of LOS without giving up a turn of shooting. This cost me a suit in the end, and the Targeting Arrays never paid off. However, splitting my fire at his two dreads was very effective.

With this in mind, I decided to trade my drones for pathfinders and revert to A-Stabs. I decided that since my broadsides won't be moving more than 6" a turn, the pathfinders can keep up with them. Sure I'd lose the markerlights for that turn, but they'd still be able to fire Pulse Carbines at BS3 (vs the Gun Drones at TL BS2). I'd simply have to view the Pathfinders as a meat shield with the capability to multiply my force's killing power. Essentially, they'd be making up for the lost targeting arrays. In a game like against Necrons, they wouldn't have to worry about shielding for the broadsides and could simply take their own cover, and thus draw large amounts of fire or my opponent would suffer the consequences. If my opponent decided to run scarab swarms I could easily rip off those 2+ cover saves and completely disable them in one turn.

In this case, my opponent was running a Nightbringer (360 points, which took the entire game to kill off my 70 points of fire warriors-the only unit I lost-I'm starting to notice a trend amongst Necron HQ's) and two squads of Warriors. Despite my terrible rolls and his amazing saves, I forced him to phase out on turn 6. I once again went first. The pathfinders threatening to infiltrate forced him to spread his forces out, and the kroot absorbed rounds of firing with their 3+ forest cover save phenomenally. Those 1-3 markerlights per turn were great, virtually guaranteeing that my broadsides were dropping 2 warriors per turn, and with the A-Stabs, they were able to shuffle enough to keep the warriors from being granted cover saves twice.

-It was very important for me to field my entire army this game, and risk losing my troops (it was seize ground), but all the combined fire on his warriors was pretty overwhelming, even with my bad luck (and with a terrible misuse of my kroot at the top of 5-trying to run to an objective rather than rapid on the warriors and force the phase out right there).

-I made sure to ignore his costly nightbringer-given the guy played him terribly, and due to terrain half my army was pushed into a corner by him. Even then I managed to use my devilfish aggresively to protect my suits from him. It probably would have taken me five rounds to drop the guy, and in that same time I managed to take out 8 warriors.

-I've been missing the pathfinders ever since I dropped them, and with the need for a small protectionary unit for my broadsides, they just seem to work better than drones (all around same defensive stats-reduced movement which doesn't affect me-markerlights). Unfortunately, they do mean that I can't start my firewarriors in my devilfish, but that's just a risk I'm going to have to take. I still need to play a few more rounds with this newest list, but I really liked it in this game. Funnily enough, it's very similar to one of my earlier lists that I never got to run, except that it has 2 broadsides instead of 1.

-I will say this for the hundredth time: for the price, the deathrains are ridiculous. 3-4 wounds from the back end of the board per turn with only one bad round of rolling, and I never have to worry about them getting shot at. I'm still trying to decide if I want to drop the BSF from my broadside suit in exchange for making the lone firestorm a deathrain as well, but I had an extremely difficult time getting my HQ team close enough this game with his C'Tan leading the charge, the one turn they did manage to get close enough, my firestorm did score 4 wounds by himself though. In any other situation where I could have gotten closer to his troops sooner, I think I would be holding true to my current list.

For clarification, here it is:

HQ
Commander (attached to Elite Squad 1): 103 points
Shas'el Crisis Suit
-Cyclic Ion Blaster, Twinlinked Missile Pod
-Hardwired Multitracker and Drone Controller (1 shield)

Elite
Squad 1: 50 points
(1) XV8 'Firestorm' Crisis Suit
-Missile Pod, Burst Cannon
-Multitracker

Squad 2: 106 points
(2) XV8 'Deathrain' Crisis Suits
-Twinlinked Missile Pod
-Targeting Array

Troops
Squad 1(riding in Pathfinder Devilfish): 60 points
(6) Firewarriors
-Pulse Rifles

Squad 2: 70 points
(10) Kroot Carnivores

Fast
Squad 1: 168 points
(4) Pathfinders
(1) Devilfish
-Burst Cannon, Smart Missile System
-Disruption Pod, Multitracker, Targeting Array

Heavy
Squad 1: 190 points
(1) XV88 Broadside Battle Suit Team Leader
-Twinlinked Railgun, Smart Missile System
-Advanced Stabilization System
-Hardwired BSF, Target Lock, and Drone Controller (1 shield)
(1) XV88 Broadside Battle Suit
-Twinlinked Railgun, Smart Missile System
-Advanced Stabilization System

750 points

Feel free to shoot me your thoughts. I'm probably going to get in another game with this list tomorrow, so I'll have some additional comments for this list, maybe even after facing an opponent that doesn't try to run an illegal 875 point list at 750 (yes, he first tried to pull a list including a monolith, lord, and nightbringer in addition to only one troop choice) or hopefully a good army of space marines.

I'll probably try the drones again in the future, but not this weekend at least.

Well I am currently sitting at 6 (straight) victories, something I'm pretty proud of, given I've been primarily playing against newer players like myself, but they're the only ones that seem to take interest in small point games.

Game 4 was Gray Knights, and it turned out to be a complete massacre due to some ridiculously good rolls on my part (I rolled 3 6's on one of my CIB to-wound rolls) and very poor armor saves on his part (I've never seen so many 1's).

Game 5 was (finally) Vanilla Space Marines! Capture and Control, Spearhead and he was running 2 squads of 10, with one broken up into combat patrols, an autocannon Predator, a las Predator, and a Captain. Fortunately, his biggest threat to my broadsides was downed at the top of turn one, and I managed to immobilize one of his 10-man rhino as well. The pathfinders did well, drawing off the other rhino (I infiltrated them off to his left) taking two turns to be killed before delivering some well placed markers and rendering that squad caught out in the middle of nowhere and ineffective the rest of the game. I did make the mistake of deploying my firewarriors from the devilfish to rapid fire his bigger squad (some poor rolls resulted in him losing merely two from my entire army's combined fire-and the following round the shas were sent running off the board-which was then followed by the destruction of my stunned devilfish). However, my kroot made a glorious appearance on turn 4 to rapid fire and thusly follow up with an assault in turn 5 to completely wreck the squad. They then spanned out over two objectives while I proceeded to finish off one of his other squads that was sitting on an objective from long range, for the 2-1 win (and 5-3 KP moral victory)

Game 6 was once again against Demon Hunters, but this time on the opposite side of things: 6 rhinos carrying a ton of stormtroopers. However it didn't feel like much of a victory, because although I managed to wreck one of his melta rhinos at the top of 2 (it was DoW-annihilation) and shake 2 others, it wasn't until at the bottom of 2 when he drove all of his vehicles across some central terrain...and immobilized the other melta rhino and his inquisitorial rhino. Realizing there was no way his troops from those vehicles could reach me without being torn apart by my ap4 firepower, he quickly conceded. I accepted, because he was very courteous about it.

So, with the last 4 games being with my current list, and no major problems spotted (other than low leadership on my pathfinders, firewarriors, and kroot), I'm really getting a kick out of it. I still need to work on deployment, allowing enough room for my suits to get in behind my devilfish, where to deploy my pathfinders/kroot, and the best position for my broadsides (even though it seems like virtually every transport besides the devilfish has the same side/front armor values), but I'm learning, and getting better. Hopefully I can work my way up to 1k(perhaps on a 6x4 board), but I really favor these smaller point games.

At this low of point level pathfinders aren't really needed... and with you only having 4 they aren't really worth the hassal...you wont really notice how effective they are till you have at least 6, but if you can take 6 you might as wlel take 8 and rape some face

i started to tweak your list but then i saw you updated it and put pathfinders in... i woulda taken some small adjustments to your first list, taken out the gun drone squad and fit you in a 2nd squad of 10 kroot..

@Farsidedown- Congaratulations, I am glad that you have developed a list that suits your play style.

As to the smaller point games, I agree to some extent. They don't require as much of a time investment and they are closer to the original intent of the game. IMO, 2500 point games are to large for the standard 6' x 4' board. Games at the 2500 pt level seem to lose a lot of the battlefield tactics and maneuvering. I like my game board and points to break down like this:

250-750 points should use a 4' x 4' gameboard

1000-1500 points should use a 6' x 4' gameboard

1750-2250 points should use a 8' x 4' gameboard

2500+ points should use a (12'+) x (4'+) gameboard

The reason I don't usually push for wider boards is the difficulty in playing and measuring mid board of a table that is 4'+

Well, my winning streak continues, and yet I felt rather depressed after a match today. I was facing a (mostly) bike army. He had his Captain on a bike with two squads of 5 bikes (with attached attack bike) and a single squad of assault marines (wtf?). I managed to table him on turn 6, but I feel had I been playing with his army (and attack bikes instead of assault marines) I would have completely crushed my tau army. Why? 3+ turbo boosting cover saves. Fortunately the majority of my primary fire still wounds them on a 2+ but if he wanted he could have just driven them straight up the middle right at my suits and proceed to melta them all to death.

Luckily, I was able to go first and got 2 turns of fire out of my pathfinders, ripping those saves off for my broadsides, and once he did kill them (in cc? I still don't understand why he didn't just shoot them to bits, or for that matter, melta the devilfish that they were trying to screen) half his army was a sitting duck to be blown to pieces by my entire army, but that still left me with the other half. I blocked well with my kroot, but apparently 10 of them rapid firing into regular marines only produces a single wounding hit (which was promptly saved). At the end of turn 4, I was still going strong, but turn 5 arrived, and thanks to his turboboosting, all my suits were able to score...0 wounds. I attempted to form a sacrifical wall with them to block him from jumping all over the fire warriors on my objective, but he completely ripped my broadsides (and deathrains) to pieces in a single round of cc, scoring one wound and sweeping them both. Turn 6 saw me using my devilfish to shock his unit (he lost one attempting to DoG), rapid firing with my fire warriors for another kill, and finally blasting with my hq squad for victory, but like I said, it was bittersweet.

While I did have pretty bad rolls and I tactically outmatched him, I did not deserve the win against his army. I don't think his list was cheesy in any way. It was relatively balanced (though I think it would get swept by a horde list) and it was just downright more powerful than mine, and I don't know how I could optimize my list against one like his while still being competitive against other formats (no, I'm not putting Ionheads in my list, because there's no way I'm running melta-I tried it already). One thing I am looking forward to when I hit 1k points is fitting plasma into this list, because right now, it just can't deal with non mech SM armies well at all.

Edit: fixed spelling errors

Wow, the depth of the insight on your choices, inspiring.

As for the board sizes, I agree, mostly, over 2,000 should be 8x4. 2,000 and lower is fine @ 6x4.

Inquisitor_Syphonious wrote:Wow, the depth of the insight on your choices, inspiring.

Thank you very much!

Something I would like to try out in the near future if I know I'll be facing Space Marines or other MEQ's is downgrading my Devilfish to Dumbfish (-25pts), upgrading my deathrains to fireknives-plasma rifle, missile pod, multitracker- (+18), and figuring out what to do with the 9 left over points (if I drop the BSF from my broadsides I'll have 12). I'm not too fond of the idea of removing those 24" BS4 shots from my devilfish, but this might make me much more lethal against those pesky 3+ armor saves.

@Farsidesown-

First, Congratulations on another win.

Second, Every player gets to this point. A point where you know your armies weaknesses so well that you feel that you could easily take the other players army and dismatle yours without breaking a sweat.

Third, A win is a win. If anything you should be more proud of your victory if you feel your opponents list out-matched yours. If you win in such a situation and you were rolling poorly on top of everything, so much the better.

Fourth, While your having a preference, to not use certain unit combinations, may go against the teachings of Tsung Tzu, I believe it is natural to go with ones strengths. I like my Ionheads and DS-ing Fusion suits but their use requires a lot of practice and a very different play style to that of a typical Tau build. If using them doesn't work for you that is fine. Just remember that each equipment/unit shift is a trade off in other areas.

Fifth, you are working with an older codex that is limited by non-5th ed points costs and suffering against the current codex creep. The main areas where the codex suffers is that the Tau are a high mobility and high VoF army that is now:
A) less mobile than most if not all of the other armies
B) Now produces an innadequate VoF due to coversaves
C) The nerfing of Vehicle glancing weakened all Pulse weapons ability to affect transports.

And finally Sixth, Again congratulations on your winning streak.