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.

 Blood Hawk wrote:
What are peoples first impressions on the eight from chapter approved? I would like them a lot more if they didn't cost command pts. If anything they look like they may be fun to run in some casual games at the local store.

I really like them. They seem fun and fluffy.
I want to paint them like sentai heroes each with a different colour.

Getting my tau at Xmas from the Mrs I'm thinking of building a list with 3 ghostkeels who range out ahead of the main force and play aggressive to distract the enemy. Then have a holding force in the rear with some fire warriors, Hammerheads and a storm surge.

Not sure how that would do but it would be quite cool looking I think!

What are the thoughts on Broadsides with 2x High Yield Missiles, 2x Smart Missiles, and advanced targeting systems? A unit of 3 is somewhat pricey, but that is 48 shots from the squad...

I prefer to use Velocity Trackers on Broadsides, as it is cheaper and provides a little bit better shooting against some of the problem flying enemies (all flavors of Eldar, other Tau, Custodes bananabikes, etc.). ATS is probably better taken on a Riptide, although even there it is fairly pricey.

I was wondering if anyone could help with wound allocation on a unit with multiple defensive capabilities.

I’ve kitted out my crisis suits, 2 have shield generators and the third has a crisis iridium battlesuit. I’m unsure how to allocate wounds when they come in. Let me try to explain my confusion…

The unit gets hit x3 by a weapon with AP0. I decide to use the save of the irdium suit. I save 2 but 1 goes through, leaving this chap on 2 wounds.

I then get hit x3 by a weapon with AP-3. This time I try to save with the shield generators invulnerable. 2 I save but the third goes through, causing a wound on another model in the unit.

At the end of the shooting, one guys on full wounds and two are on 2.

Is this right? Play a lot of AoS and you can’t allocate wounds to multiple models in the same unit. You have to take from one until it’s dead and then move onto another.

I’ve checked the rules but can’t see anything that says you can’t allocate to multiple models in a unit. Am I just being blind?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 lare2 wrote:
Is this right? Play a lot of AoS and you can’t allocate wounds to multiple models in the same unit. You have to take from one until it’s dead and then move onto another.

I’ve checked the rules but can’t see anything that says you can’t allocate to multiple models in a unit. Am I just being blind?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I'm 99% sure there is a rule that you can't have multiple wounded models in a unit - once one model is wounded all wounds have to be allocated to it until it dies.
But I don't immediately know where it is in the rules.
Might be able to find it in an hour. Will have to see.

It's in the BRB. Once a model in a unit has taken a wound, no other model can take a wound until the first wounded model is KIA.

Sterling191 wrote:
It's in the BRB. Once a model in a unit has taken a wound, no other model can take a wound until the first wounded model is KIA.

Yep, you're right. Not much to do at work so just checked it out again.

Allocate Wound: If an attack successfully wounds the target, the player commanding the target unit allocates the wound to any model in the unit (the chosen model does not have to be within range or visible to the attacking unit). If a model in the target unit has already lost any wounds, the damage must be allocated to that model.

I was just being blind the first time. Cheers guys. Only just learning to play with Tau so some of their abilities are really throwing me a curve ball to figure out after having spent the last year solely running Death Guard.

 lare2 wrote:


Yep, you're right. Not much to do at work so just checked it out again.

Allocate Wound: If an attack successfully wounds the target, the player commanding the target unit allocates the wound to any model in the unit (the chosen model does not have to be within range or visible to the attacking unit). If a model in the target unit has already lost any wounds, the damage must be allocated to that model.

I was just being blind the first time. Cheers guys. Only just learning to play with Tau so some of their abilities are really throwing me a curve ball to figure out after having spent the last year solely running Death Guard.

And you havent even gotten to the Drone shenanigans yet

Sterling191 wrote:

 lare2 wrote:


Yep, you're right. Not much to do at work so just checked it out again.

Allocate Wound: If an attack successfully wounds the target, the player commanding the target unit allocates the wound to any model in the unit (the chosen model does not have to be within range or visible to the attacking unit). If a model in the target unit has already lost any wounds, the damage must be allocated to that model.

I was just being blind the first time. Cheers guys. Only just learning to play with Tau so some of their abilities are really throwing me a curve ball to figure out after having spent the last year solely running Death Guard.

And you havent even gotten to the Drone shenanigans yet

Ha! The first time I read the codex I thought you needed a PhD or the like to run Tau... was a serious WTF moment!

Think I'm slowly, gradually, maybe getting a grasp of their rules!

 Blood Hawk wrote:
What are peoples first impressions on the eight from chapter approved? I would like them a lot more if they didn't cost command pts. If anything they look like they may be fun to run in some casual games at the local store.

Mixed feelings. Some of them are nice, others just make no sense whatsoever loadout wise. And I don't mean that in the sense of "these loadouts aren't the most powerful crunchwise so they suck", they don't make sense from a... well, logical POV, for as far as you can apply logic to the 40k universe. For example, Why do Brightsword and Torchstar not have Shield Generators if they have to get so close to do their damage? Why does Sha'Vastos have such an incredibly schizophrenic loadout (plasma rifle is medium range, flamer and shield generator are for short range and with the drone controller you want to sit at the max range of a gun drone swarm and let them blast away)? Arra'Kon would have been way better off changing his Airbursting Fragmentation Projector for another CIB or Plasma Rifle to hunt heavy infantry and light vehicles with and O'Vesa wasted an incredible amount of time creating a special piloting assistance system half of which provides the exact same effect as a single markerlight. I mean, these are elite T'au warriors with an enormous amount of knowledge about tactics or warfare. You'd think that they'd at least bolt weapons and subsystems onto their battlesuits that synergize with one another and their preferred fighting style and are not completely redundant like O'Vesa's targeting aide.

edit: now that I'm at it, might as well offer some suggestions:

Brightsword: Switch Target Lock for a Shield Generator
Torchstar: Switch Drone Controller for Shield Generator
Arra'Kon: Switch AFP for second Plasma Rifle or CIB
Sha'Vastos: Completely changed, triple AFP + Drone Controller. This lets him hang back, flush out targets out of hiding with his AFPs and let a drone swarm blast away.
O'Vesa: Not sure. Maybe change to +1 to wound rolls or something.

I'm having a hell of a time trying to figure what to arm my suits with. My heart is set on taking at least two commanders, maybe one Coldstar and one vanilla. What are some good loadouts post-CA?

On that note, with JSJ now restricted to either a relic or strategem, is it even worth it to bring more then one Commander suit?

 BlaxicanX wrote:
I'm having a hell of a time trying to figure what to arm my suits with. My heart is set on taking at least two commanders, maybe one Coldstar and one vanilla. What are some good loadouts post-CA?

On that note, with JSJ now restricted to either a relic or strategem, is it even worth it to bring more then one Commander suit?

Most definitely. The BS 2+ alone is worth gold in a Tau army, especially when paired with the ridiculous mobility of the Coldstar or the Enforcers capability to pack multiple CIBs.

Even standard Crisis Commanders do great work in the back field with supportive gear like drone controller, handing out CNC to your heavy hitters. Missile pods are 9 points cheaper post CA, so you have a nice option to deal some damage from within your gunline, too.

JSJ is a nice thing to have (and you probably want it on one of your Commanders), but I don't feel it is a deal breaker not to have it. Saviour protocols, Ghostkeels, Stealth Suits, Piranhas and turn 2 deep strike can all make sure your commander stays relatively safe. Just make sure not to blast 40" up the table with your Coldstar turn one.

Another thing to consider is that Shadowsun has been reduced by 57(!) points in CA. A second Kauyon, reroll 1s for one unit nearby each turn, -1 to hit on herself and her (better) shield drones as well as the option to CNC make for a great package at that point range.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
I'm having a hell of a time trying to figure what to arm my suits with. My heart is set on taking at least two commanders, maybe one Coldstar and one vanilla. What are some good loadouts post-CA?

On that note, with JSJ now restricted to either a relic or strategem, is it even worth it to bring more then one Commander suit?

You might try a Command-and-Control Node commander. Keep him cheap, since he won't be shooting much but giving re-roll wounds to nearby shooty units like Missilesides.

Thanks for the feedback lads. I hadn't considered a cheap commander for babysitting broadsides. Are broadsides our bread and butter AV? What are we taking to deal with backline heavy hitters like knights, triple russes etc?

 BlaxicanX wrote:
Thanks for the feedback lads. I hadn't considered a cheap commander for babysitting broadsides. Are broadsides our bread and butter AV? What are we taking to deal with backline heavy hitters like knights, triple russes etc?

The Focused Fire and CNC Node Stratagems make a lot of things quite dangerous at S7. Just be sure to bring lots of CP and the Puretide Engram, b/c you'll need lots of CP.

Fortunately our cheap Battalion, the Greater Good 17 (3 5-man Strike Teams and 2 Fireblades) clocks in at 189 points, very similar to the Imperial Loyal 32. So having CP should not be a major problem for Tau.

 ZergSmasher wrote:
Fortunately our cheap Battalion, the Greater Good 17 (3 5-man Strike Teams and 2 Fireblades) clocks in at 189 points, very similar to the Imperial Loyal 32. So having CP should not be a major problem for Tau.

unfortunately a commander which you'll want in every detachment are way more points, also a riptide is 2 Russ's in points. It's also 5 firewarriors who still loose shooting matches with infantry squads.

So the Pulse Driver Canon is looking a lot more attractive with the points drop right?

 GreatGranpapy wrote:
So the Pulse Driver Canon is looking a lot more attractive with the points drop right?

Better, yes. Good enough to run competitively, I'm not sure. Stormsurge still costs as much or more than a Knight, and is less durable, so as much as I want to run mine I'm not sure it's worth it. I really need to get a few games in with my Tau now that CA is live, as there are quite a few nice reductions.

On an unrelated note, I'm going to throw 3 flamer-suits into my list for my next game and just see what happens.

With the CA drops, it's only 135 points for three flamer-suits. That's 9d6 auto-hitting bolters on a flying 8'' move chassis that doesn't need any auras or markerlight support to function.

And even if they do absolutely nothing and then die, what's 135 points in the grand scheme of things?

So I got the Start Collecting box for Christmas and it's encouraged me to get into a non-Imperium force for once. Nothing's built yet but planning to magnetise the XV8s. What would be a good loadout for them, and what would be a good way to bulk out the force?

I'm thinking the following for around 1000pts, this is just a pure estimate so it may be way off:

Triple Fusion Coldstar with Drone Controller
Ethereal

10x Fire Warriors
5x Fire Warriors
5x Fire Warriors

3x XV8s (loadout undecided)

2x Remora Drones
5x Pathfinders

2x HRR Broadsides.

Is this viable at all? The Remoras are a flying escort for the Coldstar, and will be firing with BS3+ thanks to the Drone Controller while also providing character blocking and a natural -1 to hit.

 Valkyrie wrote:
So I got the Start Collecting box for Christmas and it's encouraged me to get into a non-Imperium force for once. Nothing's built yet but planning to magnetise the XV8s. What would be a good loadout for them, and what would be a good way to bulk out the force?

I'm thinking the following for around 1000pts, this is just a pure estimate so it may be way off:

Triple Fusion Coldstar with Drone Controller
Ethereal

10x Fire Warriors
5x Fire Warriors
5x Fire Warriors

3x XV8s (loadout undecided)

2x Remora Drones
5x Pathfinders

2x HRR Broadsides.

Is this viable at all? The Remoras are a flying escort for the Coldstar, and will be firing with BS3+ thanks to the Drone Controller while also providing character blocking and a natural -1 to hit.

Sounds like a plan!

I'd go for something like this:



Darkstrider and the Cadre Fireblade make your Strike Teams a lot more dangerous and flexible. They also provide much needed Markerlights and Photon Grenades on BS 2+ (which can be used as the EMP-Grenade stratagem to set off the Focused Fire stratagem against tough vehicles).

The XV8 have become much cheaper in CA and the 3xFlamer setup keeps them that way while efficiently roasting GEQ, which are quite popular these days.

The Recon Drone on the Pathfinders is a nifty tool for bringing in those Crisis with the Positional Relay Stratagem. This way you can depstrike them right in front of the enemy when they don't expect it, since the stratagem circumvents the usual 9" restriction.

The Sac'ea Detachment provides cheap utility with two more Markerlights on BS 3+ rerollable, the Ethereal aura for your Strike Teams and Dahyak Grekh as a cheap filler who also has some neat tricks of his own.

So I have in a few days a 2000is battle against space wolfs and I have been thinking about something like this:

Batallion: (T'AU SEPT)

CADRE FIREBLADE

COMMANDER SHADOWSUN

STRIKE TEAM (5)
STRIKE TEAM (5)
STRIKE TEAM (5)

XV104 RIPTIDE BATTLESUIT
> HEAVY BURST CANNON
> 2x SMART MISSILE SYSTEM
> ADVANCED TARGETING SYSTEM
> TARGET LOCK

XV104 RIPTIDE BATTLESUIT
> HEAVY BURST CANNON
> 2x SMART MISSILE SYSTEM
> ADVANCED TARGETING SYSTEM
> TARGET LOCK

2 x XV88BROADSIDE BATTLESUITS
> 2x HEAVY RAIL RIFLE
> 4x PLASMA RIFLE
> DRONE CONTROLLER
> SHIELD GENERATOR


MV4 SHIELD DRONE (4)
MV4 SHIELD DRONE (4)
MV7MARKER DRONE (4)

Batallion: (T'AU SEPT)

CADRE FIREBLADE

COMMANDER IN XV86 COLDSTAR BATTLESUIT
> 4x FUSION BLASTER

STRIKE TEAM (5)
STRIKE TEAM (5)
STRIKE TEAM (5)

3x XV25 STEALTH BATTLESUITS
3x XV25 STEALTH BATTLESUITS

3x XV8 CRISIS BATTLESUIT
> 8xPLASMA RIFLE
> 6xMV1 GUN DRONE
> DRONE CONTROLLER


Vanguard: (SA'CEA SEPT)

COMMANDER IN XV86 COLDSTAR BATTLESUIT
> 4x FUSION BLASTER

FIRESIGHT MARKSMAN
FIRESIGHT MARKSMAN
FIRESIGHT MARKSMAN

2nd Riptide might be better spent. 1 is always good. two... it gets forced to always shield itself for a mortal wound and thus cant use the better goodies and becomes the easily identifiable first and easiest target to kill. Thus i usually only see one in a list. But it is good.

 Jancoran wrote:
2nd Riptide might be better spent. 1 is always good. two... it gets forced to always shield itself for a mortal wound and thus cant use the better goodies and becomes the easily identifiable first and easiest target to kill. Thus i usually only see one in a list. But it is good.

When people are building lists to do 28 wounds to a T8 3++ a riptide will die turn 1 and T'au lists tend to be lots of drops and more likely to go second.
It's very much a 2 is 1, 1 is none to shoot back unit.

Ice_can wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
2nd Riptide might be better spent. 1 is always good. two... it gets forced to always shield itself for a mortal wound and thus cant use the better goodies and becomes the easily identifiable first and easiest target to kill. Thus i usually only see one in a list. But it is good.

When people are building lists to do 28 wounds to a T8 3++ a riptide will die turn 1 and T'au lists tend to be lots of drops and more likely to go second.
It's very much a 2 is 1, 1 is none to shoot back unit.

I haven't really seen that much but then, the entire list must be considered. Though if thats true it almost seems an indictment on the Riptide in general in that meta.

I just watched and played in a couple games against a guy here with a Riptide and honestly the Riptide wasn't an important target because to kill more and hold more, its just easier to kill other things and let the Riptide have its day. but with 2 iptides, a whole lot of "other things" disappear and suddenly you kind of have to deal with it. so it's somewhat of a catch-22. I sorted it out by using the middle ground, the StormSurge. it splits the difference. Its got its definite downsides but its good ENOUGH.

The Big Box Rule still applies in 8th as much as it ever did in previous additions:

1 Big Box unit is a target
2 Big Box units are a tactic
3 or more Big Box units are a strategy (because you will need one)

SJ

 jeffersonian000 wrote:
The Big Box Rule still applies in 8th as much as it ever did in previous additions:

1 Big Box unit is a target
2 Big Box units are a tactic
3 or more Big Box units are a strategy (because you will need one)

SJ

While I've never heard this expression, literally ever, I will say it's interesting.

If Riptides were cheaper, maybe. but the 300 points you spend on the second Riptide cuts into a fair number of alternative targets like i said and leaves you with an obvious one: the one without the 3+ invul. If both use it, then the second Riptide is suddenly not as menacing. Honestly I've struggled with this question over and over again in my own lists. I am not certain there is a right answer. Tactica for ME works WELL or even maybe BETTER when people focus on the Surge and I can afford for them to. So on some level this also comes down to your endgame.

I usually run 3 Riptides in my Tau lists, and they put in good work. It does require a significant investment in Shield Drones to keep them alive, but the firepower is really solid.