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Sigh, I have come to you, dear Dakka, to help me with a problem. There is one player at my store that I have yet to beat with my Tau. This army is horde Orks led by Ghaz. Now, I have not faced him very often, and the times I have are less than ideal (Dawn of War, he has first turn etc etc), but generally he and I are two of four players vying for top spot in our monthly tournaments. Most of the time, I end up playing someone else as I usually get between 18-22 points in games one and two while him and another player usually average 23-24 points per game.

So, when I do face him, it is usually on table 1 for the whole shebang as it were.

Before I get into my ideas, I'll give you his rough list (2k points)

Ghaz
5 Lootas
2x30 Slugga Boyz w/ PK, Bosspole
20-30 Grotz with Runtherd
7-9 Nobz, fully diversified running with Ghaz in a Trukk
20 Stormboyz - Nob with PK, Bosspole
3x3 Kanz - all with missile launchers

He knows his army well, and he generally doesn't make deployment mistakes. Assume a full 25% terrain with probably at least one good LOS blocking piece per deployment zone (which inevitably hides the Trukk full of pain)

I usually run
Commander w/AFP, twin missile wargear to taste
3x3 Fireknives
2x6 FCW
10 Kroot 7 hounds
2x4-6 Pathfinders
2 D-Fish w/ dis pods and flechette dischargers
2 Piranhas - fusion, dp, ta, flecettes
3 Broadsides with 2 shield drones (either BASS or plasma/multi)
2 Hammerheads - railguns, dis pods, multi

I'm leery of changing my list too much since this is basically what I have painted (plus a few more suits, I could run 15 crisis) but I basically have anything you can think of minus the Vespid (shocker I know).

Generally, these are the options I feel

Option 1
Deploy and Go First. Standard Tau bubble wrap formation Keep as far away as possible (only deploying about 6-10 inches onto the board) and shoot. Hope for the best. Target the Trukk and Stormboyz first (if I can). Possibly counter-charge with kroot as he gets close (if possible).

Option 2
Deploy and Go Second.
Try to refuse a flank, accept that I'm probably gonna get charged turn two. Focus on wiping out the fast stuff and the closest stuff first. Use vehicles to block approach paths.

Option 3
Same as option 1 or 2 but add a Pos Relay. Try to gain a flank charge with my kroot turn two via outflank.

As you can see, I've made some concessions in my list on the off chance I'll face him (flechettes, railheads, AFP) but I feel if I specialize my suits too much, I'll have a hard time dealing with MeQ (not to mention our resident Deathwing Player).

I am working on another 20 man kroot squad (10 kroot, 10 hounds) which I hope to replace the 2nd FCW and 2nd Pathfinder D-fish with (I'll merge the two pathfinder squads). Double Kroot loops can be effective against him.

Here are the observations I've made while playing him so far.
1. With the exception of Kanz and Ghazzie's Squad, my kroot will wreck any of his squads on the charge.
2. I have a hard time shooting Ghazzie's squad down.
3. He is a very fast player, and will generally make sure to get the full 2" coherency. Big blasts are hitting 4-5 orks.
4. Grots are objective campers. Usually on his side of the board, usually in cover, usually going to ground.
5. The game is decided on turn 2 or 3 at the latest. He usually wrecks his opponent's chances of winning the turn the Waagh goes off.
6. He is very cautious of my kroot after losing 45 orks to a single squad of them one game. He will either dedicate a Kanz mob or Ghazzie to taking them unless he is confident he can get the charge.
7. He thinks he is next to unbeatable. So far, very few people have proved him wrong.

So I put it to you Dakka. What is the magic bullet? Any list changes should be made with the knowledge that I'll have to face any of the other races in two other games (we have a very wide spread of armies here at the FLGS) so keep that in mind. Is there something I've missed?

1) I m assuming you always wreck the truck on turn 1?
2) Did he play his rokkits on Kans as TL?

striderx wrote:1) I m assuming you always wreck the truck on turn 1?
2) Did he play his rokkits on Kans as TL?

1) usually, Sometimes it is completely and I mean completely out of sight. Of course, every time I've played him - he's used the tiny tiny Gorkamorka Trukk. He's recently upgraded to the new one.

2) I honestly don't remember. Are they twin linked?

Just off the top of my head, I see the following options available to you.

Target priority:

Stormboyz and the Trukk need to die turn one. Letting them get the first jump or flat out 19" move is a huge blow. If you get first turn, these 2 units need to die. Every Missile Pod and Railgun in your army hits the Trukk, and every Pulse Rifle/Burst cannon is on the Stormboyz. Markerlight the Trukk if it's obscured to get rid of the save, or increase your BS on the Stormboyz.

Once these 2 units are down, spend turn 2 clearing out toys. Meaning, Kans. Everything in your army can hurt them except for the Kroot. Don't be afraid to shoot Pulse Rifles at them; an immobilize --> wreck.

Boyz should be nearing your lines on turn 3, but hopefully by now you've cleared enough Kans to get your Kroot in the Boyz' way. At this point, you should begin utilizing your mobility. If his Stormboyz are dead and Nobz are stranded, you can pretty well jet across the board with your Fish and Railheads to get behind him. Jump infantry with an assault move will always be faster than footsloggers. Don't be afraid to sacrifice your Broadsides if you can get a Boyz squad to charge it. If you take down his Trukk and most Kans, you don't really need the Broadsides at that point.

Keep him honest:

A lot of WAAC players (sounds like he's close to being one) won't always keep themselves honest on their rules. Remember, Killa Kans do have BS3, but their Rokkits are not twin-linked. Make him make his movements in his movement phase, and running in the shooting phase, and along with that, make him roll his difficult terrain/running one unit at a time, and move them after each roll. Otherwise, he can coordinate his units' random movements, and gain an unfair advantage. Also remember that when Ghazghkull is with a unit, they always move at the speed of the slowest model, and Ghazghkull always moves as if moving through difficult terrain. However, he is an IC, and has Move Through Cover, so the unit as a whole moves, and charges, a maximum of 3D6, pick the highest, inches.

Other Strategies:

Piranhas could be one of your best friends in this match up. Definitely split them up into multiple units, and consider buying more. One of your best tactics with a Piranha is to flat-out it straight in front of an enemy unit/vehicle. Keep in mind that he cannot move within an inch of your model, and if he shoots it, you get 4+ cover, if he charges it, you get Flechette and he hits on 6's. Put two of these bad boys spaced 3-4 inches apart in front of his Nob trukk, and watch him have to drive around. It's like being a sheepdog, only with lethal intentions

Ghazghkull and the Nobz will, quite simply, kill anything they charge. This unit is too tough to waste time shooting, also. Sure, you can ignore the rest of his army and shoot this mob, but it'll frustrate the hell out of you how many saves they have. Wound allocation, FnP, and the 5+ make them crazy hard to kill, and he can just put railgun and missile wounds on Ghaz, who ignores ID. Your best, and just about only hope, is to pop the transport turn 1, and make that unit walk. If you cant to this, run. Evacuate your forces from that area with your superior mobility, and maybe harass Ghaz with a sacrificial, but not entirely, Devilfish.

Lastly, if you need to move his Gretchin off of his objective, tank shock works wonders. The unit does not have Mob Rule, so they are never fearless. Instead, the best they can do is leadership 7 with a re-roll. Put 2 tanks into it, or cause 25% casualties, and they are not terribly hard to break. You've got Skimmer Tanks for a reason. Use em, abuse em, and fly over his Boyz head's to his deployment zone!

shealyr wrote:Just off the top of my head, I see the following options available to you.

Target priority:

Stormboyz and the Trukk need to die turn one. Letting them get the first jump or flat out 19" move is a huge blow. If you get first turn, these 2 units need to die. Every Missile Pod and Railgun in your army hits the Trukk, and every Pulse Rifle/Burst cannon is on the Stormboyz. Markerlight the Trukk if it's obscured to get rid of the save, or increase your BS on the Stormboyz.

Once these 2 units are down, spend turn 2 clearing out toys. Meaning, Kans. Everything in your army can hurt them except for the Kroot. Don't be afraid to shoot Pulse Rifles at them; an immobilize --> wreck.

Boyz should be nearing your lines on turn 3, but hopefully by now you've cleared enough Kans to get your Kroot in the Boyz' way. At this point, you should begin utilizing your mobility. If his Stormboyz are dead and Nobz are stranded, you can pretty well jet across the board with your Fish and Railheads to get behind him. Jump infantry with an assault move will always be faster than footsloggers. Don't be afraid to sacrifice your Broadsides if you can get a Boyz squad to charge it. If you take down his Trukk and most Kans, you don't really need the Broadsides at that point.

Keep him honest:

A lot of WAAC players (sounds like he's close to being one) won't always keep themselves honest on their rules. Remember, Killa Kans do have BS3, but their Rokkits are not twin-linked. Make him make his movements in his movement phase, and running in the shooting phase, and along with that, make him roll his difficult terrain/running one unit at a time, and move them after each roll. Otherwise, he can coordinate his units' random movements, and gain an unfair advantage. Also remember that when Ghazghkull is with a unit, they always move at the speed of the slowest model, and Ghazghkull always moves as if moving through difficult terrain. However, he is an IC, and has Move Through Cover, so the unit as a whole moves, and charges, a maximum of 3D6, pick the highest, inches.

Other Strategies:

Piranhas could be one of your best friends in this match up. Definitely split them up into multiple units, and consider buying more. One of your best tactics with a Piranha is to flat-out it straight in front of an enemy unit/vehicle. Keep in mind that he cannot move within an inch of your model, and if he shoots it, you get 4+ cover, if he charges it, you get Flechette and he hits on 6's. Put two of these bad boys spaced 3-4 inches apart in front of his Nob trukk, and watch him have to drive around. It's like being a sheepdog, only with lethal intentions

Ghazghkull and the Nobz will, quite simply, kill anything they charge. This unit is too tough to waste time shooting, also. Sure, you can ignore the rest of his army and shoot this mob, but it'll frustrate the hell out of you how many saves they have. Wound allocation, FnP, and the 5+ make them crazy hard to kill, and he can just put railgun and missile wounds on Ghaz, who ignores ID. Your best, and just about only hope, is to pop the transport turn 1, and make that unit walk. If you cant to this, run. Evacuate your forces from that area with your superior mobility, and maybe harass Ghaz with a sacrificial, but not entirely, Devilfish.

Lastly, if you need to move his Gretchin off of his objective, tank shock works wonders. The unit does not have Mob Rule, so they are never fearless. Instead, the best they can do is leadership 7 with a re-roll. Put 2 tanks into it, or cause 25% casualties, and they are not terribly hard to break. You've got Skimmer Tanks for a reason. Use em, abuse em, and fly over his Boyz head's to his deployment zone!

Thanks for taking the time to post this. I appreciate it. Again, as stated before, I haven't faced him under very good conditions (night fight, dawn of war, that kind of thing) so I think I'll have a better time of it if I actually get a decent fight out of him.

I think the biggest problem is the 18" charge once he declares the Waagh!. Assuming he's run all his stuff forward on turn one, he should be between 17 and 12 inches from my deployment zone with his boyz. This realistically gives me one turn to shoot his stuff down. Piranhas do work obviously, and I haven't faced him since I've added them to the force. Should be interesting.

Do you think going first and shooting or going second and refusing one flank would work better?

I assume you have pretty good knowledge of Tau, so I am not going into details.

I noticed you only have 1 squad of kroots to bubble wrap / speed bump. That for sure (I can almost guarantee this), is not sufficient. You need 1 more squad of them to buy another round of shooting. I would say this alone increases your chance of winning by say, 30-40%.

Also, did you remember to drop the drones on your vehicles for another layer of bubble wrapping?

In the OP, I mentioned working on another 10 kroot, 10 hound squad (I refuse to use unpainted models)

I think it'll be interesting because my force has refined itself quite significantly since it last played.

Your list is similar to mine, Sgt_Scruffy. Like you, I won't play with unpainted models, so I haven't had a chance to try this yet, but I feel that with so few anti-infantry shots, I'm going to run a really cheap squad of Crisis Suits with twin-linked Burst Cannons and a Flamer to boot; a squad of three runs 123 points and (hopefully) can be used as a decent speedbump where necessary.

With Firewarriors and Stealth Suits, you're paying 20 points per S5AP5 hit (on average). With the Crisis suits I described above, you're paying 18.2 points per S5AP5 hit, plus you have the Flamer as a hold out weapon. I realize that Firewarriors have better range, but yours are cooped up in Devilfish. Stealth Suits do have the Stealth field, but that doesn't help when the Orks get close. Just something to consider.

Killa Kans do not have an option for 'twin missile launchers'... you might want to check that one. They can have a single rokkit each.

shealyr wrote:Just off the top of my head, I see the following options available to you.

Target priority:

Stormboyz and the Trukk need to die turn one. Letting them get the first jump or flat out 19" move is a huge blow. If you get first turn, these 2 units need to die. Every Missile Pod and Railgun in your army hits the Trukk, and every Pulse Rifle/Burst cannon is on the Stormboyz. Markerlight the Trukk if it's obscured to get rid of the save, or increase your BS on the Stormboyz.

Once these 2 units are down, spend turn 2 clearing out toys. Meaning, Kans. Everything in your army can hurt them except for the Kroot. Don't be afraid to shoot Pulse Rifles at them; an immobilize --> wreck.

Boyz should be nearing your lines on turn 3, but hopefully by now you've cleared enough Kans to get your Kroot in the Boyz' way. At this point, you should begin utilizing your mobility. If his Stormboyz are dead and Nobz are stranded, you can pretty well jet across the board with your Fish and Railheads to get behind him. Jump infantry with an assault move will always be faster than footsloggers. Don't be afraid to sacrifice your Broadsides if you can get a Boyz squad to charge it. If you take down his Trukk and most Kans, you don't really need the Broadsides at that point.

Keep him honest:

A lot of WAAC players (sounds like he's close to being one) won't always keep themselves honest on their rules. Remember, Killa Kans do have BS3, but their Rokkits are not twin-linked. Make him make his movements in his movement phase, and running in the shooting phase, and along with that, make him roll his difficult terrain/running one unit at a time, and move them after each roll. Otherwise, he can coordinate his units' random movements, and gain an unfair advantage. Also remember that when Ghazghkull is with a unit, they always move at the speed of the slowest model, and Ghazghkull always moves as if moving through difficult terrain. However, he is an IC, and has Move Through Cover, so the unit as a whole moves, and charges, a maximum of 3D6, pick the highest, inches.

Other Strategies:

Piranhas could be one of your best friends in this match up. Definitely split them up into multiple units, and consider buying more. One of your best tactics with a Piranha is to flat-out it straight in front of an enemy unit/vehicle. Keep in mind that he cannot move within an inch of your model, and if he shoots it, you get 4+ cover, if he charges it, you get Flechette and he hits on 6's. Put two of these bad boys spaced 3-4 inches apart in front of his Nob trukk, and watch him have to drive around. It's like being a sheepdog, only with lethal intentions

Ghazghkull and the Nobz will, quite simply, kill anything they charge. This unit is too tough to waste time shooting, also. Sure, you can ignore the rest of his army and shoot this mob, but it'll frustrate the hell out of you how many saves they have. Wound allocation, FnP, and the 5+ make them crazy hard to kill, and he can just put railgun and missile wounds on Ghaz, who ignores ID. Your best, and just about only hope, is to pop the transport turn 1, and make that unit walk. If you cant to this, run. Evacuate your forces from that area with your superior mobility, and maybe harass Ghaz with a sacrificial, but not entirely, Devilfish.

Lastly, if you need to move his Gretchin off of his objective, tank shock works wonders. The unit does not have Mob Rule, so they are never fearless. Instead, the best they can do is leadership 7 with a re-roll. Put 2 tanks into it, or cause 25% casualties, and they are not terribly hard to break. You've got Skimmer Tanks for a reason. Use em, abuse em, and fly over his Boyz head's to his deployment zone!

GREAT STUFF!

Except for the 3d6 thing... ONLY ghazzie would benefit... since he is IN a squad, that squad only gets 2d6 take the highest...

frgsinwntr wrote:Except for the 3d6 thing... ONLY ghazzie would benefit... since he is IN a squad, that squad only gets 2d6 take the highest...

Not true. Ghazghkull is the only model which counts as moving in difficult terrain. The squad moves at the speed of the slowest model. Whatever Ghaz rolls on his move through cover 3D6 is the speed of the slowest model.

If another member of the squad is in difficult terrain, it would only be 2d6. If not, it's 3d6.

You have a lot of vehicles. 2 devilfish, two hammerheads, two piranhas. Tau vehicles are expensive.

My advice:

Choose a mechanized force, or abandon your mechanized force. If you completely mech up (everyone in a vehicle, with suits being the exception as they bounce around), you can focus on mangling his anti-tank weaponry - the kans and Lootas. Your kroot choosing to outflank will leave him unable to leave gretchin in the backfield safely (or orks near board edges)....

And against this in particular, broadsides aren't going to do nearly as much for you as a Helios team with Fusion/plasma. They will *eat* Nobs. You jump up to 12", dump out fusion and plasma, then back to 18".

Your pathfinders seem misplaced. They're expensive, their devilfish is expensive, and they are best served pumping up the BS of a unit with a lot of firepower....of which you don't have any. Imagine a Farsight Bomb that was all BS5. Or a unit of 12 firewarriors rapid firing into something at BS5. And where you can't effectively use that, you can use them to decrease cover saves - but he's not running a Big Mek with a KFF. The Kans are going to have trouble getting cover, as is the trukk - and when the nobs get exploded out into a crater, you don't even have a heavy hitter unit to nuke them (Like a helios team) to make those pathfinders useful.

Piranhas - don't underestimate their value - they are *great* for blocking movements - any skimmer army has that as a nasty trick against armies like this (or a mechanized assault army) but you can do it even better because of flechette launchers.

I can't really offer you more specific advice because of your professed lack of additional models.

thanks for the advice. I have almost all the models I could possibly use. Most of them are not really painted yet though. I could pump out a few units before the tourney though.

This is what I'm thinking after I've read the advice offered (thanks everyone!)


Shas'el - AFP, pos, relay, missile pod hwmt 102
3x3 Fireknives 3x186
6 FCW- 60
10 Kroot - 8 hounds 118
10 Kroot - 8 hounds 118
8 Pathfinders 96
Devilfish - disruption pod, flechette Discharger 95
2 Piranhas - 2 fusion, 1 dis pod, 2 target arrays, 1 flechette 155
2 Piranhas - 2 fusion, 1 dis pod, 2 target arrays, 1 flechette 155
2 Railheads- burst cannons, dis pod, multi 2x165
2 Broadsides - multi/plasma. Team Leader w/ 2 shield drones, hw-target lock 210

I need the fireknives and broadsides to deal with mechanized armies I may face. Piranhas make up for my lack of railguns. Kroot add bubble wrap, counter assault, and scoring. Everything except the broadsides are mobile by some means. Think this army is good enough to take the Orks and any other force I may face?