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hi i wanna do a tau army this is what Ive brought
4x crisis suits (2x drones in each)
25x fire warriors
3x stealth suits
1x devil fish
2x packs of drones (most of them broke)
I'm getting a hammer head soon
is this a good start, what should i get next also how should i arrange my army (e.g. how many fire warriors in each team, what weapons should i give the crisis suits etc)
hoping to get 1750 cheap but effective

Broadsides are always a good bet, as their railguns are twin linked, but if you need some anti horde, hammerhead submunitions add versatility

Not enough broadsides lol

in any case 25 fire warriors are ok for a while as the most i have is 24 split into 6 8 or 12s depending on your list.

hopefully you have a codex to start making your list and then im sure eveyrone will be happy to give further cc.

as for now id like to see more crisis suits and broadsides as they are tau bread and butter. but it depends on your play style. (i actually like a stealth cloud of 6 stealth suits and 2 gun drones each)

i have a codex for tau my friend at my local hobby told me for the crisis suits that for team leaders i should do

a good base i that start with is a shas'el crisis suit HQ and 2 squads of 8 fire warriors. from there i add depending on what i want. if your able magnitize your suits so you can interchange weapons at a whim but for my local meta i go fusion blaster and plasma rifle wiht MT combo.

also take a look at the tau tactica in the tactics forum as it has good information.

Broadsides are better in the new edition. You can snap shoot at HQ's in units and out right kill them, but not forgetting S10 anti everything is always good. I would split your firewarriors up into 4 units of 6 and get 2 more battlesuits that way you have enough troops for an objectives match and also you have more BATTLESUITS. Its how you will equip your battle suits that will make the most difference. Have a look at the link below for some ideas on how to equip them for each situation.

http://warhammer-tau-army.blogspot.co.uk/2009/03/tau-battlesuit-weapons.html

If you want I can make you up an army list with what you have and add some extra units to make up 1750 as cheap and easy as possible but still being effective. Let me know and im sure I have 2 lists one for horde and one for MEQ, which I use against Chaos and Nids. Im not saying they will win you matches but they win me about 70% of my matches.

my friend told me that for the crisis suits i should go with fusion blaster and plasma rifles for the hq and team leader because i can give them hw multi-tracker and targeting array then for the averge suit i should go with fb and flamers


Automatically Appended Next Post:
ill make a list tonight and post it tomorrow

Its up to you with fb and flamers but if i have fb i usually have plasma rifle with it to go tank amd teq huntimg as flamers will get you too close to am enemy so they will charge. although with the new movement in the assault phase of 2d6 you get back out of trouble. its worth considerimg as against orks and nids you will cause lots of punisment. stick with the build on your hq that is nice maybe throw 2 shield drones in that unit to soak wounds up. look forward to seeing your list. its got me thinking about my battlesuit builds now :-)

well my friend (hes the type of guy that people would ask him instead of the shop workers for ruling ) said that fusion blasters are wasted on the tau crisis suits with a bs of 3 any way hears my list

**HQ**
shas'o 75
*fb, pr, sg, hw mt ia 77
**troops**
8 fw 80
*shas'ui +10
**bk 5
8 fw 80
*shas'ui +10
**bk 5
8 fw 80
*shas'ui +10
**bk 5
devil fish 80
3 crisis suits 75
*shas'vre +10
**fb, pr, ta, hw mt 47
*(pr, flamer, mt) x2 58
3 stealth suits 90
*(ta) x3, fb 32

total 829

this is what Ive got i could change the upgrade lay out but the upgrades is what my friend told me is a good place to start i wanna make it to a 1750 points game and i was hoping to have 4 troops 2 foot slogging 2 in devil fish the foot sluggers give fire cover while the devil fish crew get into a better position (for example i go first and the enemy deploys in an inconvenience position or to after objectives)
Ive herd a lot of people say take snipers they can position shoot some one they can't they are not actually snipers :( but i was thinking of them to get rid of annoying devastators(equivalent) then a unit of broad sides for units of tanks or terminators then a hammer head for the single tank and horde squads, i also fought of getting another 3 stealth suits to add to the squad

You need to decide what your battlesuits will need to fight. If your going against MEQ you want alot of Plasma Rifles and FB. If your going agaisnt Eldar / Gaurd / Other Tau / Orks and Nids then you will want to take Missile Pods with thier AP4 and being 2 shots from far away. If you are going against alot of troops like orks or nids then take TL Flames and get the reroll to wound.

Instead of FB on HQ you could take Missle Pod with the Plasma Rifle that will give you 2 S7 AP4 shots from 36" then you have 1 shot at 24" doing S6 AP2, This will keep them away from the enemy so you dont get rapid fired or charged. With the 6th ed rules you can get rid of tanks quiet quickly by glancing them to death unless it is something like a monolith or land raider. So if you get within 12" of an enemy you can unleash 4 shots per battle suit and even if your not you can choose to sit further away and snipe away with the missile pods. These battle suits will also be able to take on GEQ, MEQ, TEQ and Tanks. If your set on FB with a PR then you will have to get quite close to enemy units meaning your likely to end up in combat and will lose your best squad for mobility and firepower.

On the other Battlesuits if you want flamers I would go with TL Flamer, Burst Cannon and HW Multi Traker this will unleash pain on anything with an armour save of 5+. This will make them Anti Horde.
If you need a suit than can take light tanks and horde troops like Orks then take TL FLamers, FB and HW Multi Traker, that way you can get rid of a tank then when all the boys jump out you can start BBQing.

You should have your HQ with 2 Sheild Drones and a Shas'vre bodygaurd equipped with the same weapons as your HQ so i would go with:

HQ
Shas'ui
Missile Pod & PR
HW Multi Traker
HW Drone Controller
2 Shield Drones

Shas'vre Bodygaurd
Missile Pod & PR
HW Multi Traker


ELITES
2 Battlesuits
1 Shas'vre (for the extra WS)
2 TL Flamers & 2 Burst Cannons
2 HW Multi Traker



That way your unit of battle suits arnt trying to do to much all in one unit. You could have your HQ and his body gaurd shooting at the likes of Rhinos and other light tanks and also if the enemy has any 3+/2+ saves then these are the suits to do the job. If you want alot of orks and nids dead then you send your Elite battlesuits equipped with Flamers and Burst Cannons. I have upgraded one of the flamer dudes to be Shas'vre that means he has a better weapon skill just to make sure if they get in combat which it is highly likely they will then an extra WS will help to hit in combat.

What will you be fighting the most becuase that will dictate what battle suit layout you will want. if you use flamers against marines they will most likely shrug it off and then rapid fire your soon dead battlesuits.

well there are 16 armies altogether and my friends at the store keep changing so i work out what i wanna go against by sorting out how many armies do what
MEQ 7 ( each one is a space marine army
guard/nuns 2 ( i put it on its own because it can go from one extrema (foot loggers) to the other (parking lot))
TEQ 4 (TEQ to me means tyranid or equivalent as they can be horde assault )
NEQ 3 (horde shooting army i.g. necrons/tau)
as 10 can have a lot of tanks then ill go for tank busting then as 11 armies get real close 7 being MEQ ill go for powerful damage at close range (also I'm an aggressive tau player as in by the second turn i hardly have anything in my deployment zone)
i tend to favor powerful and lots of damage weapons in close range (I've also charged with my tau a lot and never lost combat doing it so far hope this isn't jinking it)so i prefer my list but ill try yours o and on the elites where you've put you cant have hw multi-tracker on the normal crisis suit as its the team leader that can choose from the war-gear section and also i don't like missile pods and id prefer to leave the burst cannons to the stealth suits

sorcerorofkhorne wrote:
well there are 16 armies altogether and my friends at the store keep changing so i work out what i wanna go against by sorting out how many armies do what
MEQ 7 ( each one is a space marine army
guard/nuns 2 ( i put it on its own because it can go from one extrema (foot loggers) to the other (parking lot))
TEQ 4 (TEQ to me means tyranid or equivalent as they can be horde assault )
NEQ 3 (horde shooting army i.g. necrons/tau)
as 10 can have a lot of tanks then ill go for tank busting then as 11 armies get real close 7 being MEQ ill go for powerful damage at close range (also I'm an aggressive tau player as in by the second turn i hardly have anything in my deployment zone)
i tend to favor powerful and lots of damage weapons in close range (I've also charged with my tau a lot and never lost combat doing it so far hope this isn't jinking it)so i prefer my list but ill try yours o and on the elites where you've put you cant have hw multi-tracker on the normal crisis suit as its the team leader that can choose from the war-gear section and also i don't like missile pods and id prefer to leave the burst cannons to the stealth suits

Just to standardize your terms:
MEQ= Marine Equiv.
GEQ= Guard Equiv.
TEQ= Terminator Equiv
Horde= does mass foot slog.

Honestly you sound like you would have more fun with a more aggressive army.

well my last army was chaos and i just wanted to humiliate attack oriented armies (e.g. the time this guys mefiston from blood angels gets charged by my tau and lost his last 3 wounds) and it kinda throws my enemy of balance (like the time i brought 2 land raiders to a 1000pts game or the time i brought a lode of berserkers and never charged but won by out shooting them) its quite fun but i really enjoying getting up close to the enemy and punishing them with range weapons (mainly the emperor worshipers like today we had a 400 point game i went against a gray knight army with 4 terminators one being a grand master i charged with my daemon prince won combat in a challenge against a justica and they failed their leadership and ran of the table (lol)) but i do prefer mobile shooting that's not crap marines (applying all emperor suck ups) or guard

If you like getting up close then use the TL Flamers. even against MEQ & TEQ you will do a few wounds especially with reroll to wound and then charge haha. your battlesuits would be best for shooting and charging with S5 T4 if i remember right. take the shield drones aswell to soak up wounds so your battlesuits are still around to fight back.

Let me know how you get on with charging with tau at WS2 / WS3.

i had a 600 point game against the shop keeper and lost because i adjacently put a unit too close to one of his wraith lords na but check his list out for 600 points
HQ
avatar
troops
3 guardian jet bikes *2
heavy support
wraith lords *2

Posting your list will help us with feedback.

hq

shas'o
fb pr mt target lock sg

elites

shas'vre
fb pr mt target lock ta
shas'ul *2
(fb pf mt) *2

stealth suits
3 ta 1 fb

troops

9 fire warriors *2