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I am a new (have yet to play a full game or a game with my army at all) player and have a question. One of the guys that I will be playing against most often (almost always) has a hammerhead. I am getting a Valkyrie (yes I play IG). With his gun being strength 10 and AP 1 and my the valk being a relatively large, flying target, how can I stop it from being ripped apart the first turn?

Cover giving units, such as another cheap flying Object.
You could reserve It all and then fly on popping his Hammerheads.

Use your scout move to turbo boost, you get a cover save if you don't go first. The main problem with hammer heads is lack of Rate of Fire, so they hit 2/3 times, of those hits they pen 2/3 times, but you can SMF (skimmers moving fast) ignore half of those pens. So that works out to like 21 percent pen rate per hammer head, with about 14 percent kill rate on pens (3+ kills due to AP1 and your turbo boost), you can also be killed on glances, but its pretty unlikely. So, you should be fine most games

Forgot about the scouts rule, thanks.
If I run it as a vendetta it should be fine taking out the tanks it self. Otherwise I can always drop in storm troopers.

Kill the hammerhead rofl.

You can also do what my friends brother did when his hammerhead died to a land raider, throw that bilble of a book at it, break it, then he can't use it.

In all seriousness, turbo boost or flank. Flanking will probably work better. Remember though when you turbo boost you still have to stay like 12-18" away (i can't remember it exactly). At the same time you can always use terrain like the rest of us normal people who don't get cool batman toys.

One thing to remember that us Tau players can remove cover with our markerlights, but at the same time that means we're not increasing the BS of other units.

Does he only have a hammerhead cuz if theres only one, you can just take a tank with fairly high rate of fire ( or many wepons) and blast it before he blasts u. A Tau vehicle has almost always disruption pod( always obscured beyond 12") so you need rate of fire to take it down.

I havent hit with my hammerhead for so many games. so much for a 2/3 chance. What you really should be scared of is if he gets broadsides.

Ledabot wrote:I havent hit with my hammerhead for so many games. so much for a 2/3 chance. What you really should be scared of is if he gets broadsides.

QFT

MrTau wrote:Does he only have a hammerhead cuz if theres only one, you can just take a tank with fairly high rate of fire ( or many wepons) and blast it before he blasts u. A Tau vehicle has almost always disruption pod( always obscured beyond 12") so you need rate of fire to take it down.

Indeed, if he's only got one Hammerhead you hsould be able to just swamp him with AV12. To be honest, you should worry a lot more about Broadside suits when it comes to tanks, and you should be more concerned with the Hammmerhead's submunition shots if you've got lots of infantry.

ChrisWWII wrote:

MrTau wrote:Does he only have a hammerhead cuz if theres only one, you can just take a tank with fairly high rate of fire ( or many wepons) and blast it before he blasts u. A Tau vehicle has almost always disruption pod( always obscured beyond 12") so you need rate of fire to take it down.

Indeed, if he's only got one Hammerhead you hsould be able to just swamp him with AV12. To be honest, you should worry a lot more about Broadside suits when it comes to tanks, and you should be more concerned with the Hammmerhead's submunition shots if you've got lots of infantry.

But it also has lots of maneuverability, The Hammerhead itself can hide behind cover to stop you shooting at it first turn, then jump out 12" and shoot the Railgun.

GoDz BuZzSaW wrote:

ChrisWWII wrote:

MrTau wrote:Does he only have a hammerhead cuz if theres only one, you can just take a tank with fairly high rate of fire ( or many wepons) and blast it before he blasts u. A Tau vehicle has almost always disruption pod( always obscured beyond 12") so you need rate of fire to take it down.

Indeed, if he's only got one Hammerhead you hsould be able to just swamp him with AV12. To be honest, you should worry a lot more about Broadside suits when it comes to tanks, and you should be more concerned with the Hammmerhead's submunition shots if you've got lots of infantry.

But it also has lots of maneuverability, The Hammerhead itself can hide behind cover to stop you shooting at it first turn, then jump out 12" and shoot the Railgun.

Hammerheads don't need to hide. Read the part about tau vehicles always having disruption pods. Also, if you can completely hide a vehicle that large, you are probably playing with too large/too much terrain.

Just want to make something clear here.

1) Skimmers do not Turbo Boost. They move Flat out. (mostly the same, but slightly different.)
Skimmers Moving Fast is not a rule anymore. It was a rule in 4th edition.
[just being pedantic for moment]


2) If you scout move and have the second turn, you still get your Save. (4+ for Flat out, 3+ for turbo boosting). It is in the most recent BRB Faq.

Again, Broadsides are a bigger threat to you. Hit them first, then look to the hammer head. I would only place your valk in reserve or flank it if it's the only major armour target on the board, and if it is your doing guard wrong. If you give us a better idea of want you have in your list then we may be able to better advise.

sHOEbOX wrote:Again, Broadsides are a bigger threat to you. Hit them first, then look to the hammer head. I would only place your valk in reserve or flank it if it's the only major armour target on the board, and if it is your doing guard wrong. If you give us a better idea of want you have in your list then we may be able to better advise.

Well, at least the way I build Broadsides, with shield drones, they could take several rounds of shooting before going down.

Also crisis suits with twin linked missle pods can easily put a few damage rolls on you.

I've run
Tau for the last 8 years. I never run a single tank ever. If you see one hammerhead you see 3. usually 2 railheads and an ionhead. Your best bet against any Tau vehicle is to DS next to it with plasma and cook it on the side or rear armor from within 12".

At 11 & 15/16" a hammerhead has no disruption pod save.

notabot187 wrote:

GoDz BuZzSaW wrote:

ChrisWWII wrote:

MrTau wrote:Does he only have a hammerhead cuz if theres only one, you can just take a tank with fairly high rate of fire ( or many wepons) and blast it before he blasts u. A Tau vehicle has almost always disruption pod( always obscured beyond 12") so you need rate of fire to take it down.

Indeed, if he's only got one Hammerhead you hsould be able to just swamp him with AV12. To be honest, you should worry a lot more about Broadside suits when it comes to tanks, and you should be more concerned with the Hammmerhead's submunition shots if you've got lots of infantry.

But it also has lots of maneuverability, The Hammerhead itself can hide behind cover to stop you shooting at it first turn, then jump out 12" and shoot the Railgun.

Hammerheads don't need to hide. Read the part about tau vehicles always having disruption pods. Also, if you can completely hide a vehicle that large, you are probably playing with too large/too much terrain.

Erm, do you play with Any Terrain at all?

A Hammerhead can hide behind a ruin easily enough to stop AT weaponry from shooting at them for the first turn, assuming that you are playing with 6 proper 12" by 12" Terrain Peices that fill up to 25% of the board you could easily hide behind it and then use Devilfish to cover it up at either flank, If they can see, you can claim that The Vehicle is so heavily obscured to get a 3+ cover. D Pods are nice, but they don't do the job as well against Dark Lances, I'm an experienced Tau player, and I'd never take just one vehicle, when it comes to Vehicles in 5th Ed, go big or go home, In 1500 Points, I have 2 Hammerheads and 2 Devilfish Along With 2 Broadsides, this job works the trick for either taking out tanks or infantry. Lets also take a look at a game type, In Table Quaters, the Tau player could keep his hammerhead at the back, 1st turn your best bet will be the Valkyrie, as there will not be much else in range. Then let's take a look at DoW, the Tau player has to start the hammerhead off the table and will move it on first turn getting a free shot, sure the Guard player can reserve all of his units, but that is not going to help win the game, 1 Railgun is not as good as people think.

I would never recommend just broadsides, they are good, but they are going to die really easily as the AT firepower will be directed on them.

Hammerheads are very unimpressive most of the time. With their singleshot BS4 gun, it only has 66% to hit. Couple that with cover saves, and it becomes roughly around 33% and we havent even begun to talk about the penetration dice, and the chances it wont get shaken and stunned before its next turn.

Point is, if there is something to be afraid off, it would be the Broadsides. Not the Hammerheads.

Any Tau player worth his salt would never use a Hammerhead as AT.

It's all about pie-plating the hell out of infantry blobs (in which they do a very good job, even with cover). Two H-Heads pie-plating a single squad will make short work of it.

Broadsides are great, easy to hide and if you put A.S.S on them they will hide, move and then shoot.

All in all, don't worry about his H-Head unless you have lots of infantry.

gr1m_dan wrote:Any Tau player worth his salt would never use a Hammerhead as AT.

This is true, I only use my Hhead as additional support for AT if I specifically need to kill a vehicle, as Hammerheads to a good job against mech armies, the broadsides can pop transports, the hammerheads blast them, or The Hammerheads take down more.