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Hello all,

I was taking a look at my current 2K list and I was thinking about my crisis suits and I can't decide which is better considering the purposes of the rest of the army & the design of the current codex, and the recent increase in Pie Plates of doom?

Currently I am running 2 Broadsides, and 2 hammer heads. This seems like plenty of anti-heavy vehicles, while Missile Pods deal with the mediums, but then I am short on anti-MEQ? Basically this breaks down to which is better 3 + 1 squads of Fire Knife, or 3 + 1 squads of Helios?

3 +1: 3 Crisis Suits + Shas El all with the same weapon load out.
Fire Knife: Plasma Rifle, Missile Pod, Multi-Tracker
Helios: Plasma Rifle, Fusion Blaster, Multi-Tracker

The price is the same, but it seems like you would get better anti-MEQ & Anti-Soul Grinder for the army this way? It also will make the army a bit more deep strike focused due to the change in range?

I personally prefer helios suits, but fireknives are good too.

If you have any deathrains, I would take Helios suits, but if you do not have any deathrains, I would recomend fireknives, though personally I would still take helios suits.

Fire knives for Anti-marine. The problem with helios against marines, is that you have to get to close, and too many marines pack to many bolter shots that are going to do a number on your suits, with or without their special weapons. Fireknives lets you deal with marines with AP2 and via number of wounds caused. All while staying out of range. I'd much rather have a full squad of fireknives for the whole game, then a helios squad for maybe two turns, before they each too much firepower. And when not killing marines, fireknives are excellent transport breakers. I usually take my HQ with 3 elite fireknives and make one huge shooting fireknive unit to deal with MEQ. (I add a farseer for flavor though). The I support them with deathrains. I never take helios. Anything that needs to be shot by a meltagun, should be hit with a railgun and marker lights to deny cover saves.

I personally like the Fireknives. You have a greater chance of getting your Helios caught in CC/Rapid fire by getting too close. While the helios has better anti-meq/teq it only has superior anti-tank at close range, but you already have nice railguns for this job. Missile pods will allow you to put some hurt on meqs and deal with light armor at a distance, keeping your suits safe. I would go with the Fireknives

I would also recommend missile pods. Tau are all about focussing fire on specific units to break their combat effectiveness. The long range on missile pods allow your suits to contribute to firing on a wider range of enemy units, rather than making it obvious to your opponent where you are going to strike.

Like others have said, the fireknife advantage is the ability to stay out of range of return fire, while having a loadout to handle most armies. Fireknives are probably the first crisis team any tau player should add, then using other more specialized teams to fill in the extra elite choices as needed.
I usually go one/two fireknife, and one or two blade or firestorms.

I have never been impressed by helios teams, as the low BS and rate of fire can really whiff. The only place I like the helios config is on my commanders; with BS5 I can be fairly certain those precious few termi killing shots will connect.

Fireknife for TAC - long range s7 is something tau lacks short of ion cannons, plasma is versitile AP2 (24 or 2x12) whereas the helios is putting you really close to get your expensive guns off. Fireknives can participate from the onset.

I find the Fireknife too split personality for me, with its weapons having radically different optimum ranges its hard to really use either weapon optimally. You're either wasting half of the very expensive plasma guns shots by being too far away or you are wasting 2/3rd of the Missile Pods range to get maximum shot count.

The Helios on the other hand, has an ideal range, 12 inches, at which everything hits and does maximum effect on the vast majority of targets. You have to make sure that you stomp whatever it is you wish to die flat when you go for it with a Helios, so there is very little room for error, but they kill very, very well. Also, as I tend to face a fair bit of 2+, that better AP value is a big, big deal for me.

Depending on points I like to have some units of Helios and some of Deathrains and send each after different threats.

I'd go Helios for TAC lists, assuming you have enough anti-armor in the rest of the list. I'd disagree that Fireknives are better against MEQ, since to get the most out of them you need to bounce into rapid fire range for the PR - and that puts you in FB range as well. If you're wanting to dance at the 24" line, then I'd go with Deathrains or Firestorms instead - you get more MEQ kills per point on average. Besides, with cover being so ubiquitous these days, I feel that relying on long range AP1/2/3 when it comes to killing MEQ is overstating it's effectiveness.

Fireknifes are great, with the jump shoot your looking at 30" shooting assuming you moved up with the plasma and the missile pods are great for aircraft.

Helios suits are tempting but if you are looking at fusion blasters, but I think the sun forge load out is better if you are looking for melta guns.

I run Helios with my HQ suits. The only thing better than a Plasma Rifle and Fusion Blaster at 12 inches is a Plasma Rifle and Fusion Blaster that hits on a 2+.

With tetra support, helios,

fire knifes without as markerlights and a good deepstrike will generally insure only one or 2 marines will be left standing and completly fail moral, making em run away before they can regroup (though i cant remember if atsknf stops the under 25% rule)

otherwise the fire knives can whittle them down with weight of fire from a decent distance.

I usually only run HQ and bodyguards as FK, that way I can still take a TA and multitracker. Elites are always twin-linked Missile pods due to reliability and shot volume.

Personally I would take the missile pods over any other weapon every time. With Plague Marines and Bikes becoming so prevelent in my meta, it's nice to ignore their expensive Toughness Bonus. S7 +36" range also gives it a better amount of versatility, especially with as many fast moving units as there are right now. I could never imagine bringing a Fusion because to use it I'd have to get too close to the enemy for my preference. I know that you get a 2D6" move, but I play concervatively and there will be those games where I roll nothing but 1's to hit and jump away 3-4".

It's really a matter of playstyle and purpose. I run so many Missiles that I can keep the enemy at bay, and later once the fight is knocked out of them I can move forward with my HQ to finish off some units.