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I love the orks, we all do in some deep dark part of our bodies. But recently i have had feelings of moving on to other armies. why? because i took it upon my self to finally put down the "unbeatable" tau gun-line my "friend" has put together over the years. he usually doesn't play his gun-line because no one will want to ever play against him if he does, but i love a good challenge so i couldn't resist betting him some money over it.

I cant find a way to even put a dent in it. He had originally set it up to take down some one else's death company list, and hasn't failed him since. so after 36 games with out a single win I am begging some one out there to help me find a way to put this beast down.

okay so i cant tell you the exact list but what he does is:
>2-3 squads of 2-3 broadsides with drones siting in the very back of the board
>then all around them he has around 4 squads of fire warriors that are sort of in and onion formation so if you do get the charge off the rest will just mow you down on their turn.
he has 1-2 transport fishy things with machine guns that run around with a squad of fire warriors in them, and what he does is drops them off just far enough away to avoid the charge but puts your squad into rapid fire range (o and i have a really hard time killing the dam transports.
>and if hes has enough points (he changes his list very slightly depending on what you bring) he throughs in some character female tau in a stealth suite that just infiltrates and uses her super melta guns to destroy any big targets.

>and all he does is blasts away anything big with the broadsides before they get to do anything, wile pestering you with the devilfish transporter thing's and the stealth suite lady.

i am more than willing to buy new ork stuff so don't worry about what i have, just please help me come up with a list that can stomp this army into its "greater good" ars.

Hmmm.... Tons of boyz, Snikrot to sneak in behind them, and a Shokk Attack Gun to outshoot them maybe? And a KFF mek to keep those boyz alive on the trek?

Perhaps even a few scouted Deffkoptas with buzzsaws to zoom in and ignore some armor saves in melee and tie them up?

ive tried snikrot, and after the first charge he just gets mowed down. and the SAG is not reliable enough.i like the idea of a KFF though, and the deffkoptas might be good if i can get first turn other wise they to will just eat it.

If you're willing to buy new models, you could invest in a battlewagon list. One-Shot weapons like railguns really struggle to take down battlewagons underneath a kff from the front, and koptaz/buggies/gretchin can be used to keep shadowsun out of range of your wagons. You can use tank shocks to move that onion out of the way, or simply a weagon full of burnaz to toast them. Another option is to have a single kopta assaulting one of the units of fire warriors at side and force them to move towards it during pile-in.

By turn two you should hit his lines using your Waagh!, and those broadsides will struggle to kill enough orks before they go down, especially while the bigmek with KFF is still around. Just keep your army together and use them as a huge sledgehammer.

nitties wrote:

okay so i cant tell you the exact list but what he does is:
>2-3 squads of 2-3 broadsides with drones siting in the very back of the board
>then all around them he has around 4 squads of fire warriors that are sort of in and onion formation so if you do get the charge off the rest will just mow you down on their turn.
he has 1-2 transport fishy things with machine guns that run around with a squad of fire warriors in them, and what he does is drops them off just far enough away to avoid the charge but puts your squad into rapid fire range (o and i have a really hard time killing the dam transports.

A friend of mine plays Tau, so I've gone up against them a few times. I don't have the codex and I'm not an expert on them though. But if I recall correctly, isn't a squad of Fire Warriors REQUIRED to purchase a Devilfish? So if he's sending you up against 4 squads of Fire Warriors, he needs a Devilfish for each one. Just making sure you're going up against a legal list, but I'm sure you probably are since the player is a veteran as you describe him.

nitties wrote:>and if hes has enough points (he changes his list very slightly depending on what you bring)

That's kind of beardy. I mean, sure he knows he's going up against Orks and he knows that so I'm sure he could tweak his list a little... but you're saying he tweaks his list a bit depending on what units you're bringing to the table?

You don't really give any indication of what list you're using, but I'll try to help.

First a word on tactics vs. Tau. You probably know this already, but get them into melee. Once you get Tau in melee, they go down hard. Getting into a shooting war with the Tau as Orks is just asking to get stomped, and YOU'RE the Ork so YOU should be doing da Stompin!

The way you describe his "Onion" tactics it sounds like you're doing it wrong. You seem to be saying that you reach his line, assault 1 squad of Fire Warriors, annihilate them, and then get shot to pieces next turn. You shouldn't be assaulting ONE squad of Firewarriors.

- Don't assault him with 1 group of Boyz at a time! Assault him with 2 or 3 groups of Boyz at a time! Assault ALL his firewarriors at once!
- If he's keeping his Fire Warriors really clustered together, MULTI-Assault them! Even if you don't kill them all, you'll keep them engaged in CC and not shooting at you.

Here's some specific anti-Tau strategies that can work well.

1) Nob Squad in a Battlewagon covered by a KFF.

The Broadsides will be targeting the Battlewagon, and hopefully it will absorb a lot of firepower before it goes down. Once it does, a good-sized squad of Nobz with Cybork and a Painboy can take a LOT of wounds before going down. Even if this unit ends up footslogging for a turn because you lost your Battlewagon, they stand a good chance of making it into combat and wiping out a lot of Tau.

2) Kans w/ Grotzookas covered by a KFF.

It sounds like you're fighting infantry mostly, and the Grotzooka is great at taking out groups of Fire Warriors. The only drawback is that the Broadsides will probably eat up your Kans if you roll unlucky on your KFF saves.

3) Warbikes / Nob Bikers

They have a cover save, and with a Warboss on a bike can be devastating both in shooting and assault.

4) Hoarde.

As many Boyz as you can get. You should be shooting for at least 90 Boyz on the field, all covered by one or two KFFs. The first 2-3 turns will be painful, but you should have enough Boyz left to just roll over him.

5) Zagstrukk and Snikrot can both be awesome at taking out targets of opportunity. It sounds like Snikrot has worked well for you before, but when he comes in, he just doesn't have any support so he dies next turn.

Some stuff to play with...

Individual deff koptas with rokkits and buzzsaws for taking down tanks. If you get the first turn, turboboost in your scout move, then move, then shoot, then assault. If you don't get the first, hold them in reserve.

Battlewagons with a barebones big mek with KFF, take 3 of them. Put 19 boys with a nob with PK and BP in each, take a ladder for each, a deffrolla, grot riggers, 2x big shootas and a grappling claw.

Nob bikers.

Lootas, small squads for tearing up light tanks and battlesuits.

Rokkit equipped killa kans.


Regarding the 'template of terror' burnaz in a battlewagon, this is one of my favourite things, but I use it principally against space marines and their variants as it overwhelms their armour saves. Small and mobile units of tau are not their principal prey. Take more lootas instead against tau.

okay so lets say i have 3 battle wagons with 1-2 big meks with kff, they have the deff rollas, i should just full throttle them up as fast as possible loaded up with as many boyz as possible and then declare waaaagh on turn 2? and also have lets say some 1- 2 squadrons of buggies to harras and try to take care of shadow-sun.

um to murrdox, i don't think there are any rule that say they have to take a devilfish, i think that because of how they work most people just do, and he chooses not to.

o and can some one correct me if I'm wrong, the kff gives 5+ cover to the infantry and 4+ cover to vehicles? for some reason i keep thinking its the other way around.

Ork gunline, six squads of 30 boyz with 3 squads of 15 lootas, that's enoughb to throw anyone off/ make them surrender from the sheer ammount of time it takes you to move your army.

nitties wrote:okay so lets say i have 3 battle wagons with 1-2 big meks with kff, they have the deff rollas, i should just full throttle them up as fast as possible loaded up with as many boyz as possible and then declare waaaagh on turn 2? and also have lets say some 1- 2 squadrons of buggies to harras and try to take care of shadow-sun.

um to murrdox, i don't think there are any rule that say they have to take a devilfish, i think that because of how they work most people just do, and he chooses not to.

o and can some one correct me if I'm wrong, the kff gives 5+ cover to the infantry and 4+ cover to vehicles? for some reason i keep thinking its the other way around.

I know there's SOME Tau unit that REQUIRES purchasing a Devilfish. Maybe it's Pathfinders not Firewarriors?

On your second question, KFF gives 5+ to infantry, and yes, 4+ to vehicles. Technically vehicles also get the 5+ save as well, but they usually benefit from the 4+ save unless you're dealing with a squadron of vehicles and only 1 member of the squad is in it.

I haven't gone up against your friend's specific army, but I'll give you a few tips that have worked for me in the past.

- I've used a Kan Wall list against a Tau army, but that army was more well rounded, and included a lot of Crisis Suits and not many Broadsides. I came close to tabling him. The Deff Dreads and Killa Kans under the KFF just absorbed so much firepower, it took him forever to bring those units down, and by then I was in his face.

- Storm Boyz actually work pretty well against Tau. Just 1 - 2 small units of Stormboyz can wreck Firewarriors. Keep them hidden behind terrain, and jump them forward at the same time your main force gets there.

If you go for a Battlewagon assault, you'd want 3 Battlewagons loaded with Boyz, maybe 1 with Nobz. One KFF Mek should be enough to cover all three battlewagons. Use a Warboss for your other HQ. Make sure to give the Battlewagons Armour Plates so they never get stunned, a Deff Rolla, and maybe Grot Riggers. I like giving all my Battlewagons a Kannon because it's cheap, and it can be fired as a defensive weapon.

Basically every turn just go forward as far as you possibly can (13" with Red Paint Job). On Turn 2 you should be able to zoom forward 13", Disembark, Run, Waagh!, and then Assault his firewarriors with the contents of all three Battlewagons. After that happens, drive the Battlewagons around and just start Tank-Shokking and ramming everything they can.

nitties wrote:okay so lets say i have 3 battle wagons with 1-2 big meks with kff, they have the deff rollas, i should just full throttle them up as fast as possible loaded up with as many boyz as possible and then declare waaaagh on turn 2? and also have lets say some 1- 2 squadrons of buggies to harras and try to take care of shadow-sun.

um to murrdox, i don't think there are any rule that say they have to take a devilfish, i think that because of how they work most people just do, and he chooses not to.

o and can some one correct me if I'm wrong, the kff gives 5+ cover to the infantry and 4+ cover to vehicles? for some reason i keep thinking its the other way around.

3 BWs, 1 big mek with a KFF in there. Put boyz in there, ensure pk and bp nob with each.

1 Warboss with an individualised nob biker unit.

2 Deffkoptas with buzz and rokkits. They hunt tanks and battlesuits.

2 units of lootas, small units around 5 models, so that shooting them is a difficult decision re the issue of 'target priority'.

Snikrott and a nasty unit of kommandos.

The KFF does indeed provide a 4+ save to vehicles and only a 5+ to infantry.

Never fielded buggies myself. Don't really see the need. I did once field a unit of 7 deffkoptas against tau, it was very effective and scary but unfortunately highly expensive pts wise.

looks like a job for green tide like mustela said... 180 boys prfferabkly shoota boys. include 2 big meks with kff and some lootas 3 groups of 5 as much as it pains me to say you might also find sucess in kanwall depending on the points 2 big meks w/ kff 9 kans and 180 boys behind them make sure you have 3 rokkits per group of boys and just walk foward

lol would love to do green tide but he can put down so much fire power at range that it will just eat every unit before they get a chance, any wya i sort of put to getthere and army that with the help of you guys might just work (1500pts)

hq
war-boss on bike
big mek with kff

troops
2 units of 20 boyz with nob,klaw, poll
1 unit of 19 boyz with nob, klaw poll

fast attack
12 regular bikers with nob,klaw poll

heavy support
3 battle wagons with deff rollas, armor, paint, and riggers

and every unit, thing has stuff on it to round it up to:

total
1500

the plan will be to have the 3 wagons side by sid with the big mek in the one in the middle, and then have the bikers + warboss biker right behind them (still close enough to get kff save)
hey does the cover save on the bikers go down to 3+ with the kff or does that not work?

then ill just have every thing charge up as fast as possible toward the gun-line, keeping bikers in the back so they are block from line of sight and can support/attack any thing that trys to get behind the wagons.

by turn 2 i hopefully will be close enough to move up disembark, waaagghh, charge and get into multi-combat, and the biker will run around to shoot and assalt stuff, and the battle wagons witll just deff rolla over everything ells

what do you think?

Looks like an awesome list. I like it! This should really wreck the Tau. Couple of pointers:

- Bikes don't need to hide behind the Battlewagon! They have the "Exhaust Cloud" ability which gives them a 4+ cover save NO MATTER WHAT. They don't need to stay near the KFF.

- Break up the bikes into 2 squads of 6. A few reasons for this: 12 Biker minis are hard to maneuver around terrain, you'll give your opponent multiple targets, and you can get a 2nd PK Nob on a Bike in there.

- Remember to give your Battlewagon 1 or 2 weapons so that a "weapon destroyed" result doesn't immobilize it! There are a couple of schools of though on this, but in my group at least, the Deffrolla counts as Wargear and not a weapon which can be destroyed.

Tell us how this works out for you!

Since your opponent is loading up on Broadsides, I would expect that not all your Battlewagons will make it to offload their targets. However, you'll still have a lot of Boyz footslogging towards him from any that blow up, and your Warbikes should be able to charge forward and decimate some firewarrior squads.

trus tme... not much in the game short of blood angels can take out 180 orks. I think your list looks good though

I'd also suggest giving the battle wagons at least 2 shootas or somthing even if they never shoot. and agree zoom those bikes up as quick as possible... heck if you found the points I'd take wazdakka over a warboss on a bik, but he's mroe points and might nto be possible at 1500.

I play tau so I may be of some help here. also know a little about orks.

First thing is first.

he has 1-2 transport fishy things with machine guns that run around with a squad of fire warriors in them, and what he does is drops them off just far enough away to avoid the charge but puts your squad into rapid fire range (o and i have a really hard time killing the dam transports.

Rapid fire is 12" only. So if he is dropping them out of a Devilfish 12" away to rapid fire into you, you should be able to charge next turn.

Devilfish are hard to kill. An average tau player will equip them with disruption pods (+4 cover save when you are further than 12" away) and flechett dischargers. For every model that charged the tank, they take a STR 4 wound.

Broadsides are vulnerable to outflankers. kammandos should be able to take care of them, but mind you they have a 2+ save with 2 wounds a piece.

Fire Warriors DO NOT have to take a Devilfish APC, but Pathfinders MUST take one. Pathfinders have pinning weapons.

One thing you may not be familiar with, Marker Lights.

A markerlight will do one of a couple of things, and they are all cumulative.

Marker Light - 36" STR - AP - Heavy 1

-Reduce LD

-Reduce Cover (up until its non existent)

-Increase BS of a unit

-Fire a Seeker Missle (STR 8 AP 3 Unlimited Range BS 5)

-Eliminate Night Fighting on a unit

Among some other things. Those are the best uses. Squads that can have markerlights are:

Anything that can take Drones (Firewarriors, Crisis Suits, Stealth Suits), they use Marker Drones

Stealth Suit Team Leader (These are the guys with machine guns that have night fighting rules always)

Fire Warrior Team Leader

Path Finders (every model can have one)

Sky Ray Missile Defense System (Tank with rockets)

So your KFF that grants cover can be nulled completely.

Rail Guns are STR 10 AP 1 72" Heavy 1 weapons. Broadsides are TL, Hammer heads are not.

If this tau player was smart what he would do would be to keep Devil Fish near the ground troops, and when you come rolling in with wagons, load them up and zoom out.

SIGNS TO WATCH OUT FOR:
If the tau player is focusing fire on one side, that means when you get near him he will scoot to this side. Usually one of the short table edges. If you see them blasting out one end, start scooting your tanks over and prepare for them to run.

Your lootas will die to Stealth Teams. They are equiped with Burst Cannons. 18" STR 5 AP 5 Heavy 3. Stealth Teams have jet packs, which allows for a 6" move, relentless, and 6" move in the assault phase, known as Jump Shoot Jump.

Crisis Suits and Stealth Teams have these, BROADSIDES DO NOT. In order for a Broad Side to fire its TL Rail Gun it MUST have Advanced Stabilization Systems, which gives it Slow and Purposeful.

Tau are auto equiped to deal with hordes, with lots of Str 5 fire from long range, and tanks that can fire as if they are FAST for a 5+ wargear option, and Smart Missile Systems: 24" NO LOS STR 5 AP 5 Heavy 4

Fusion Blasters (Melta guns) will be equiped to suicide crisis teams to take out tanks. Plasma Rifles will usually accompany, 24" STR 6 AP 2 Rapid Fire (no gets hot) and missile pods will pop light vehicles. 36" STR 7 AP 4 Heavy 2.

Keep in mind all of taus vehicles are Skimmers and are NOT FAST, with the exception of Piranhas, but may fire as if fast.

Hope this information was some help.

Great info Abyssel. Hopefully all that will be helpful to the OP. Thanks also for clearing up my confusion on the Pathfinders / Devilfish requirement.

As Abyssel stated, Markerlights are HATEFUL and can turn your KFF into a fancy light show which does nothing. However, in your original post, you talked about a lot of tactics your friend uses... without mentioning markerlights. Those things are one of the most useful things in the entire Tau codex, so if your friend isn't using Markerlights on you, consider yourself lucky. Also consider yourself warned if he starts using them after he has 3 Battlewagons under a KFF speeding towards him!

Abyssel good info I learned more abotu tau there, only one prerson i know a tthe shop i play at has a tau army and he preers to play his space marines as blood angels or wolves for obvious reasons. but i am wondering as a tau player how well would tha tlist do against a kanwall with the 180 ork boyz behind it. you're lookling at a 4+obscure save across 9 walkers and 180 boyz getting 4+ saves as well

I am also curious if the marker lights would work against a kff for the walkers as they are vehicle and are considered obscured not in cover assuming 1/2 or more of the squad is in 6 inches of the big mek w/ kff and if it is worded for cover save i don't know honestly which way it'd lean ( imight be thinking it wrong and it may do the obscured to or obscured may be considered a cover save i dont honestly know thats why i'm asking)

You can target vehicles with ML's and take away the cover saves, and it works with obscured targets to. So if I lighted your ork mob with 3 marker lights from infiltrating or DSing stealth teams, and reduced their cover saved to nothing, everything that shot at them would have them gone. Same goes for vehicles. once the cover is gone on it everything gets a free shot. the only thing that stays on one unit is the BS increase up to BS 5.

EDIT:

Same goes for if you are in cover, lights will still rip that cover save away.

Take a Green Tide list with some Lootas for fire support and a KFF, along with a Warboss for extra killy factor. Watch 1/3rd of your army die as you cross the board, and table the Tau army turns 3 & 4 as you close the gap and there's nowhere for the Tau to reposition to avoid massive assaults.


Seriously, most Tau armies have huge problems dealing with Green Tide lists, they just can't kill all those boys, and when the distance closes they simply have no where to go because *everywhere* there's Boyz, and they get eaten alive in CC.

Seems like that may be the way to go.

Railguns are useless when shooting at a single ork...

Let alone having a gretchin screen infront. In fact I'm actually sure Gretchin can beat Tau in CC....

Hey, its possible, Grots can do surprising things. Just ask this guy




But Ive read alot of battle reps with Tau facing off against Orks, and usually the horde works best, as far as an average goes. Obviously it relies more on how well you play your army. But in saying that, if the Tau guy cant shoot enough, your going to win. Orks just rip everything Tau up in CC. So if you go horde, and have something that can harass/tie up the back field, then your more then golden. I know usually its not too smart splitting up your forces as an Ork player, but if you (god I cant believe Im going to suggest this) take Snikrot and crew and use them to take out or tie up the backfield like say, his broadsides (burnas will work great on those guys, bye bye 2+ save) that will cause him to panic, even if just a little. Then he will have to either deal with the threat right away and ignore the 150+ boyz or ignore the kommandos and deal with the boyz. Either way he has a nice problem on his hands.

Hording was how I started, its fun losing 40 or so boyz before hitting the lines and then STILL smash the hell out of the opponent

Boyz, lots and LOTS of boyz........

Agreed, its a great build to start with. Because if you decide to go with any of the other popular builds, youll have more then enough boyz to pull them off. Except biker builds, but thats kind of a given

omg, thank you all so much for this info....and there is so much of it!
Abyssel you are the man! thank you for that great infor on the tau, really usefull, and yes he does use marker lights, and for some reason never hits me with them so i didn't bother noting them.

it makes me happy that some of you thing that my list is strong , list building has never been a strong point of mine i usually just go fro the big shinny stuff (stoppa!)

so i think i will just go ahead and get the rest of what i need for that list, but also go and get more boyz for the green tide list allot of you are suggesting, and now that i think about it and do some math, the tau would have to kill 40 orks every turn for 4.5 turn to kill 180 orks (and with kff their chances of that go down) so thats 2 kff and 6 full squads of boyz (shootas) with nob/klaw/poll's.

about how many turnd do you thing it would take to get across a stander table width wise? (its what we usually play) and thats with standard roll's for on running.

( i already have 98 ork boyz, most from AoBR)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
o and if any one is board could you come up with a funny/wikked ork list that uses the max about of fast attak ----- and in fast attack i was wanting to use my deffkopters i got 12 of them because i wanted the apoc battle formation

o i know it sounds silly but i have great luck using them against space marine armies and the apoc formation is really a sight to behold

by the way um... i don't really know what/how the hole force organization works, or what the real rules are. i know that you need at least 1 troop and an hq, but what are the limits to each section of your forces, whats the max limit of fast attack that i can play in a standard game.
never really payed any attention to it because i usually just bring my boyz and other stuff, just no large number of them.

At least 1 HQ and 2 troops
At maximum 2 HQ 3 Elites 6 Troops 3 Fast Attack 3 Heavy Support

There is a chart in the ork codex, you should check that.

One thing I would make sure to watch out for if you're going the horde route is large squads of flechette equipped piranha. There are two basic reason these are the ultimate anti-ork/horde weapon.

1. Piranha will be able to block your movement. A savvy Tau player (any Tau player worth is salt really) will take his piranha (I would take 2 squads of 5 against a green tide list) and deploy them in conga lines across your front, blocking orcs from getting to where they want to go.

2. If you try to assault his piranha (never, ever do this) each one will be able to inflict a str4 hit on each of the models in the your unit, for every unit in his. So, if you have 40 boys charging 5 piranha, he gets 200 free shots before you can do ANYTHING (think purifiers).

3. If you're Kan-Walling fusion guns on the piranha will pop the hell out of your poor walkers.

For the most part the battle shouldn't be too hard, just make sure you always multi-assault and do not give him the chance to dictate your movements. When that starts happening (even when you think that its YOUR idea) the Tau have already won.

thx Jidmah for the chart, lol i guess i was to stupid to figure it out XD.

and Sekminara thank you SO much for that advice with the Parana, i never thought about them being that much of a threat to me, but now I loath to see them upon the battle field.

O and i just got some messed up news, i text-ed my friend who plays the jacked up tau army and apparently the 1500pt list he has been using against me isn't really even his good list. Instead his true tau gun-line that he made to specifically beat a blood angel death company list is 2000pts including:

7squads of fire warriors
6 broadsides
1 tank (probably one with a big gun, but he didn't give me the exact name of it)
shadow sun
1 ethereal
and LOTS of drones, so when you think you are going to hurt soothing a drone pops up and takes a bullet -- really annoying on shadow sun.

this list makes me sad in the pants. i guess i could just increase the size of my horde.... no i max out on troops already.... um i don't know what else to add.

and the same goes with my battle wagon list, do i get more bikes? nob bikes? buggies? lootas?.... aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa panic attack, and i get paid this Friday!!!! PLEASE HELP!

Kill the ethereal, it will make his entire army make a leader ship check, IIRC the average tau leader ship is 7 ( he cant confer shadowsuns leader ship to all of them. if this is his "good" list is is not that scary, he has no crises suits, ( the best option in tau). He has virtually no mobility, ( are there devil fishes with the fire warriors?)

Deff koptas to early assault the fire warriors to tie them up / wipe them, will definitely get there points back.

All in all this is a very poor tau list.
1.Any deep striking element will eat this alive. He has no mobility.
2.He took an ethereal ( one of the worst if not the worst unit in the game) .
3.He didn't take any of their strong units ( Crises suits)


Lets break it down.

7x squads of fire warriors.
( they will break at the first sign of trouble. They are paper thin even in shooting.) Kill a few force a morale check watch them run off the board

6x broadsides-These are actually a good choice ( albeit the only one) they will mulch tanks. You said he had a lot of drones, I imagine that he put some drones with the Broadsides as ablative wounds. If you are going true horde you nearly make his unit obsolete.

1x hammerhead ( this is the one with the big gun)

This is the only pie plate in his army. First turn assault it with koptas and watch it fall.

Shadowsun- Hugely expensive meltas against a horde=not effective. Her leadership bubble with in 6-12 in ( cant recall it exactly) will make the other units leader ship not terrible, however if all the unit is doing is sitting there giving that ability, then that is a Massive point sync.

Ethereal-Even with Shadowsun's leadership buff this chioce is terrible. Kill this unit and watch half of his army run off the board.

Again this tau list is actually very bad tie up the hammerhead early with def koptas maybe some kommandos ( normally wouldn't take them but since we are tailoring)

Advance your horde up, and eat his army, he will not be able to kill enough before you get there.

Hope this helps.

-Jace

To comment on some of Jace's advice

2.He took an ethereal ( one of the worst if not the worst unit in the game) .

I'll expand on this a little later in the post, but I want to make it clear that ethereals are not as terrible as people make them out to be. More on this in a bit.

7x squads of fire warriors.
( they will break at the first sign of trouble. They are paper thin even in shooting.) Kill a few force a morale check watch them run off the board

Yes, if they are not accompanied by an ethereal or shadowsun, they will break, guaranteed. Now Jace gives us some sound advice: make them take a couple of morale checks. Again, not considering the possibility of ethereals or shadowsun interfering, this would be relatively easy to do - if you weren't playing orks. The second you try to start getting into a shooting war with Tau (even to just force "a couple of morale checks") you start playing their game, and as I may have mentioned before, the second you start playing the Tau game, is the second you start fighting an uphill battle. If you shoot at his units you won't be running towards them and will be getting into combat 1-2 turns later than you should. Any units that shouldn't be running or that can shoot on the move (kans, bikes, lootas) are better left shooting higher priority targets, where you'll get more bang for your buck (hammerheads, piranha, pathfinders). The addition of Shadowsun and and an Ethereal make these little dudes rock hard. Not only can they reroll all break tests (passed or failed) but they can reroll them at EITHER Ld. 8 or Ld. 10. Not only does this give the firewarriors the flexibility to run when they need to run (to let their friends riddle your poor orks with pulse rounds) but also gives them the stubbornness to stay when under concentrated fire. As such, trying to break the firewarriors, at least in your opponents new armylist, is futile.

Shadowsun- Hugely expensive meltas against a horde=not effective. Her leadership bubble with in 6-12 in ( cant recall it exactly) will make the other units leader ship not terrible, however if all the unit is doing is sitting there giving that ability, then that is a Massive point sync.

Again Jace has some good points. Shadowsun is a bit pricey, and yes, against hordes her meltas are largely ineffective. But then again, have an 18in leadership bubble in combination with the ethereal's rerolls is nothing to sneeze at. Keep your hard units away from her and don't bother shooting her (perma-nightfight makes any shooting, esp. ork shooting largely useless). When the time comes swamp her with a big squad of boys and she'll go down quick. More likely than not your opponent is going to have Shadowsun tucked away deep in his gunline, so its unlikely that you'll be able to assault here until endgame.

Ethereal-Even with Shadowsun's leadership buff this chioce is terrible. Kill this unit and watch half of his army run off the board.

So Ethereals, probably one of the most misunderstood units in the Tau army. In the vast majority of conventional lists the ethereal is terrible (as Jace has already mentioned). But, in a list build around it and Shadowsun, the Ethereal becomes of the most effective (and aggravating) force multipliers available to the Tau. Where the Ethereal shines is in his ability to manipulate firewarriors to do whatever the hell he wants them to do. Say you charge his units, you don't manage to wipe them out, but you win combat by 3 wounds. The Tau player now has to make a morale check on Ld. 7 (10-3). He makes it. This is phenomenal for you, because you'll eat his squad in his own assault phase then have the opportunity to charge your assault phase. But, with an Ethereal he can choose to reroll the PASSED test. Now, once he rerolls we can assume that he fails, putting your orks in rapid fire range of six 12 man firewarriors squads (one at BS4). This tactic, in conjunction with layering his gunline ("onioning" like you mentioned) will make breaking into his castle a long, casualty ridden, and frustrating experience. Killing the ethereal, if your opponent's placement is good, will also be difficult as he will likely be in the centre of an onion with a squad of fearless BS4 firewarriors as bodyguard. If you do manage to kill the ethereal (highly recommended if you don't need to sacrifice too much manpower for it) the Ld. 10 that Shadowsun brings will minimise the extent of the damage.

I think the rest of Jace's advice is more or less spot on. The army that your opponent is bringing is not usually a particularly successful one, just run and multi-assault as many squads as you can, so that your opponent has to make the choice between letting his squads pass or fail the break tests. Being a gunline its most likely that even if you don't chase down the routing unit (sweeping advance) it'll run off the board. One thing I can also recommend is using expendable or tough "bait" squads to draw in shooting from multiple firewarrior units, whether or these units die really isn't of any concern (since they probably would have been rapid fired to death after eating a squad anyway), whats important is that the firewarriors aren't shooting at your softer, and most importantly more numerous boyz(for the nasty dilemma-inducing multi-assaults).

Feel free to correct me about anything (or give me some advice).

Sorry about using your post as a template Jace

Sekminara

You make some good points, however if you are spending 180 points on shadow sun then more points on an ethereal that really do not add any offensive power to your army then, well it is a poor army.

The tau army above is simply horrid, no mobility is the number one reason. This should be the FOCUS of a tau army. To the OP simply run your boyz at him every turn then waagh multi assault him to death. Use koptas to take out the hammer head early he will not be able to kill enough of your boys, you should easily table him.

*edited for spelling.