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As someone who plays mobile tau, it's a playstyle that can be very effective, especially as many people don't expect from tau nowadays.

Why do you have trouble getting bits? I mean if you want to recast stuff you can (though that can get you in trouble). For instance, get a broadside. the TL SMS and the bits for the missile drones can net you 6 missile pods each. Personally, I (bought bits collections &) magnetized mine, but to each their own.

FYI, I play FE, I have a LOT of suits, and getting 2 missile pods for each of them was a chore, let me tell you.

 carldooley wrote:
Why do you have trouble getting bits? I mean if you want to recast stuff you can (though that can get you in trouble). For instance, get a broadside. the TL SMS and the bits for the missile drones can net you 6 missile pods each. Personally, I (bought bits collections &) magnetized mine, but to each their own.

FYI, I play FE, I have a LOT of suits, and getting 2 missile pods for each of them was a chore, let me tell you.

I am out of missile pods, don't have much money and can't buy from bitz sites or the internet, and am not interested in buying a $50 kit for 1 bit.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
As someone who plays mobile tau, it's a playstyle that can be very effective, especially as many people don't expect from tau nowadays.

Even more when it is mobile gunline Tau. I messed with more opponents by marching the tau up the board in methodical supporting fire pattern with a gundrone wall in front. (30 TL Overwatch shots per drone squad tends to slow down charges)

Played a game against Ultramarines. All of my Suits minus the commander died due to crappy rolling for my Jet Pack moves, but I won on objectives.

I played a game against Gunline Tau.
I lost. My opponent had twice the kill points of me. I lost a squad of fire warriors, 2 squads of suits, a Piranha, and a Devilfish. He got First Blood (Devilfish) and Linebreaker.

I killed a unit of Stealth Suits, a Riptide, and a Hammerhead.

I'll write up a batrep later.

My list-


His list:


After his usual ranting about how every tournament list runs 3 railheads and I should buy more railheads, no useful information was gained except that I need to run a Riptide.

How do I inprove my list?

That's cute. Shas'Uis fro Fire Warrior Squads can't take Drone Controller, only Markerlight and Target Lock.

I'll go through anything else that seems suspect but from your list you've spent way, way too many points on toys and not boys. You have 12 Markerlights, 4 of which fire at BS2, the other 8 are immobile. Crisis Suits don't have the weapons to be a threat with EWO, nor do shields do much for them for the points cost. The Buffmander is out of place, you need a unit that can bring serious firepower, such as Broadsides or Farsight Bomb.

I find the Firebase Support Cadre is extremely useful, Riptide and 6 Broadsides all with Tankhunteres and Preferred Enemy (SM).

 Frozocrone wrote:
That's cute. Shas'Uis fro Fire Warrior Squads can't take Drone Controller, only Markerlight and Target Lock.

I'll go through anything else that seems suspect but from your list you've spent way, way too many points on toys and not boys. You have 12 Markerlights, 4 of which fire at BS2, the other 8 are immobile. Crisis Suits don't have the weapons to be a threat with EWO, nor do shields do much for them for the points cost. The Buffmander is out of place, you need a unit that can bring serious firepower, such as Broadsides or Farsight Bomb.

I find the Firebase Support Cadre is extremely useful, Riptide and 6 Broadsides all with Tankhunteres and Preferred Enemy (SM).

I was planning this.

Farsight
3x Fusionsuits w/ Target Locks
2x Plasmasuits w/ Target Locks
2x Missilesuits w/ Target Locks
Buffmander

How useful is one Broadside? They are far too expensive to buy lots:

Broadsides can be very useful, especially in a FBSC; in terms of board control and light to medium vehicle hunting there are few units or formations that are better. Even a unit of just three can have a major impact on your opponent. However, a single Broadside isn't that great, just not enough durability at T4.

Natec wrote:
Broadsides can be very useful, especially in a FBSC; in terms of board control and light to medium vehicle hunting there are few units or formations that are better. Even a unit of just three can have a major impact on your opponent. However, a single Broadside isn't that great, just not enough durability at T4.

Two Broadsides versus a Riptide... Which option is more useful?

You can get three for almost the cost of a EWO/IA Riptide.

So for five points more instead of a S8 AP2 blast or 3 S7 AP2 shots and 4 TL SMS you get 12 TL S7 AP4 and 12 TL SMS..I know which I'd prefer

You can't simply do a firepower comparison. You have to compare them holistically. Broadsides are immobile in a game that demands mobility whether playing shop games with Maelstrom or tournament games with asymmetric mission design.

The Riptide is the more versatile and resilient of the two.

Fair comment, my friends always prefers EW style missions, they're yet to get tactical objective cards :/ hahaha.

My changes for your list:

Drop the Sheild and Stimms of the commander.

On the squad with out a fish I would drop the toys and use the points saved here and later for a third fish. I would also up all the fish to have SMS, and DP if you can afford. Also a fan of sensor spines but those are very terrain dependent.

Ditch all the shields. If you just need some any way get a pair of shield drones on the buffmander. It will make him a little tankier and bounce units with him.

Drop the EWo on the plasma suits. Nice idea but you need those guys out hunting in this list not waiting for drop pods

Split the PF's in to two 4 man squads more targets covered that way.

Put the piranha's in to a single squad, and use the them to blitz the gundrone squad down feild to be dropped of as a general harassment unit while the skimmers hunt armor/high toughness units.

IF you take the Railhead, you pretty much have to take the submunitions.

barnowl wrote:
My changes for your list:

Drop the Sheild and Stimms of the commander.

On the squad with out a fish I would drop the toys and use the points saved here and later for a third fish. I would also up all the fish to have SMS, and DP if you can afford. Also a fan of sensor spines but those are very terrain dependent.

Ditch all the shields. If you just need some any way get a pair of shield drones on the buffmander. It will make him a little tankier and bounce units with him.

Drop the EWo on the plasma suits. Nice idea but you need those guys out hunting in this list not waiting for drop pods

Split the PF's in to two 4 man squads more targets covered that way.

Put the piranha's in to a single squad, and use the them to blitz the gundrone squad down feild to be dropped of as a general harassment unit while the skimmers hunt armor/high toughness units.

IF you take the Railhead, you pretty much have to take the submunitions.

OK. What should I run instead on the Commander?

I usually put an Ion Cannon on it rather than the failgun.

Just a quick post-by from title alone.

YES!
Jet-Pack Units are some of the most Mobile in the game and our Codex is brimming with them. One can make some very nice lists designed around Jump-Shoot-Jumping Suits, Air Support and skimmer based transports.
Even Drones become quite a nice choice, assuming you put them with a decent controller... if you have one of those on the field and a sniper drone team loses their spotter, oh yes, the fun you will have.
Just... don't jump into terrain, I lost so many mobile snipers that way....

 Verviedi wrote:

barnowl wrote:
My changes for your list:

Drop the Sheild and Stimms of the commander.

On the squad with out a fish I would drop the toys and use the points saved here and later for a third fish. I would also up all the fish to have SMS, and DP if you can afford. Also a fan of sensor spines but those are very terrain dependent.

Ditch all the shields. If you just need some any way get a pair of shield drones on the buffmander. It will make him a little tankier and bounce units with him.

Drop the EWo on the plasma suits. Nice idea but you need those guys out hunting in this list not waiting for drop pods

Split the PF's in to two 4 man squads more targets covered that way.

Put the piranha's in to a single squad, and use the them to blitz the gundrone squad down feild to be dropped of as a general harassment unit while the skimmers hunt armor/high toughness units.

IF you take the Railhead, you pretty much have to take the submunitions.

OK. What should I run instead on the Commander?

I usually put an Ion Cannon on it rather than the failgun.

In your list I would just drop the 2 support items I listed. Tau are easy to get toy happy with. If you don't have a specific job for each toy and expect to see it used in most of the games, you probably don't need it. I just don't see those bringing you the value in this list.

If you are running the buffmander with the fusion suits, I can see the RIF being a good investment as you can expect to be in charge range a lot. The NSJ could also see a lot of use. ON the other hand neither is going to be all the much use on the Plasma suits as you should be well out of 12" after a JSJ. IF you are worried about AP2 a pair of sheild drones are probably the better bet for shields.

 Verviedi wrote:

Ok... So I'm stuck recasting missile pods then?

why bother.

ebay always has a stream of bits.

The trick is to look for Smart missile systems, missile pods, and missle pods for the flyer and drones
you can find thoes some times for cheaper than the crisis version

Also since you are running all the Devilfish, it would be worth adding Point Defence Targeting Relay to them. It allows for a more agressive mobile army by making both the DF and FW less vulnerable to charges.

I mean who wants to charge a transport when everything in 6" of it gets to provide OVerwatch in addition to the BC and SMS?