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I have written a 1500 Tau list and would like to know how good it would be and if there are anyways I can improve it

HQ - Ethereal

Elites - Riptide with Ion Accelerator and Fusion Blaster

Troops - 10x Fire Warriors
Troops - 10x Fire Warriors
Troops - 10x Fire Warriors
Troops - 10x Fire Warriors
Troops - 10x Fire Warriors
Troops - 10x Fire Warriors

Heavy Support - 3x Broadsides with EWO and VT
Heavy Support - 3x Broadsides with EWO and VT
Heavy Support - 2x Broadsides with EWO and VT

Seems to be lacking in reliable anti AV14 IMO... Otherwise seems fairly good.

It is onlya 1500 point game, I therefor feel that AV14 wil be a rarity but if it does come up I have a Fusion Blaster and Lots of S8 Shooting that should be able to deal with it.

AV14 is most certainly NOT a rarity at 1500pts, especially against guard, crons, and often MEQs too. S8 is not reliable enough to deal with say... 3 land raiders, and the riptide is unlikely to get close enough / live long enough to use the fusion blaster.

As mention above you need more anti AV14.

Also the Broadsides are illegal they only get 1 support system. I would also swap at least 2 squads over to missiles and get missile drones with the points dropped from the VTs.

Then drop 2 FW squads get stones and EWO and atoms on the Riptides. Get some Pathfinders and a couple of solo Crisis suits with two fusion guns each.

Maybe replace one of the interceptorsides with a hammerhead with longstrike? Bs 5 s10 ap1 with tank hunters would definitely prove useful against landraiders and such. The other alternative is to give all the firewarrior squads marker drones and replace a hammerhead team with a sunforge bomb..

Ultimately you need fewer broadsides...the interceptorsides look cool but your overemphasis on firewarriors is weakening your ability to deal with av14 and fliers because your heavy slots are entirely focused on anti flier.

Maybe replace one of the interceptorsides with a hammerhead with longstrike? Bs 5 s10 ap1 with tank hunters would definitely prove useful against landraiders and such

Long strike has a 1 in 5 chance to kill an AV14 tank. This is a terrible idea.

The other alternative is to give all the firewarrior squads marker drones and replace a hammerhead team with a sunforge bomb..

This is a good idea.

Ultimately you need fewer broadsides..

Blasphemy you can never have too many Broadsides!! But it is only true of Missilesides, he has far too many Railsides... I also agree he should cut down on the FWs.

 FlingitNow wrote:

Maybe replace one of the interceptorsides with a hammerhead with longstrike? Bs 5 s10 ap1 with tank hunters would definitely prove useful against landraiders and such

Long strike has a 1 in 5 chance to kill an AV14 tank. This is a terrible idea.

The other alternative is to give all the firewarrior squads marker drones and replace a hammerhead team with a sunforge bomb..

This is a good idea.

Ultimately you need fewer broadsides..

Blasphemy you can never have too many Broadsides!! But it is only true of Missilesides, he has far too many Railsides... I also agree he should cut down on the FWs.

Yes so many firewarriors is frankly overkill, and too easily killed by pieplats. I would suggest dropping 2 fw squads (which still leaves an insane 30 overwatch shots if they're grouped right) and all but 1 interceptorside team (preferably leaving 1 of the 3 man squads).

Then get a novaforge team (all triple fusion) and get something with a locator beacon like pathfinders in a DF. Use the scout move to get the devilfish in close, array the pathfinders on turn one to guard against incoming fire to the devilfish (or alternatively use the DF to protect the recon drone) then pop and drop any landraiders you see.

The advantage, though, of taking longstrike is that he can overwatch, and his high BS coupled with the s10 ap1 shot and tank hunters means that he gets a 62% chance of glancing or better against av 14. Ad AP1 to that and you're garunteed a hull point if not an immobilized. I don't know where you're getting your math from...but last I checked 62% is a lot better than 20%...

It's even better if you're going up against the AV14 spam kings, the IG. No IG player would ever leave his side facing a Railgun, and with Longstrike's preferred enemy, his wound percentage on tanks jumps to 73% For the ability to hit them across the map outside of retaliation range, we don't have anything that can match them anymore.

Plus overwatch means you can pop a round into incoming MCs, or fire off the secondaries into a unit attempting to assault your nearby firewarriors.

Check your maths. 5/6 hits 5/9 pens 1/2 explodes totals a 20% chance to kill. As you say Longstrike gives unlimited overwatch 3 shots makes much better use of that than 1...

I think 2 singular fusion is enough though it requires a little ML support at least with the flamer they are not redundant against hordes.

 FlingitNow wrote:
Check your maths. 5/6 hits 5/9 pens 1/2 explodes totals a 20% chance to kill. As you say Longstrike gives unlimited overwatch 3 shots makes much better use of that than 1...

I think 2 singular fusion is enough though it requires a little ML support at least with the flamer they are not redundant against hordes.

4+ glances or better. which means knocking a hullpoint off or better. Couple that with the ability to do it across the table and you can see how he's a viable competitor to a novaforge battalion that (without a lucky roll on the warlord chart or else spending the money on farsight) has a chance to die in the deployment, or will die in the following turn when his passengers/vehicle buddies (depending on whether you're against MEQs or GEQs) get their hands on you.

I could potentially see giving a novaforge team hit and run to help mitigate the assualt from a LR's passengers, but unless he's leaving his AV14 tanks well away from the rest of his army, we don't have a way to keep the team alive when a guard player retaliates.

I agree that an ion cannon is far more beneficial for overwatch, but honestly I see Overwatch with a hammerhead as just a cherry on top of the awesomeness that is a 62% hull point kill. After all, killing a tank isn't just a matter of lucky rolls anymore. Concentrated glancing hits can bring anything down now, meaning that vehicle spam is also more in danger of our high strength pulse rifles.

There is no question that the mathhammer says novaforge with 3 TL melta shots and 3 more regular melta shots is enough to take out AV14, my only concern is that's 171 points just in the platform and the guns that will die when anything worth carrying or being carried by AV14 gets its hands on them. Which, considering the short range of the Meltas, is reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally likely.

Which means in general by the time Long strike has either 1 shotted or removed 4 HPs from that LR it is in your deployment zone and the contents are killing far more than a 100pt throw away unit...

I wouldn't take 3 man teams 2 is enough. You start 9" from your opponents LR and the JSJ 2d6" which means you've a decent chance of getting away from the contents. Or if you DS you can JSJ towards his deployment zone meaning he has to redirect something away from your army to deal with them. Win win really.

Ah but here's where we get into more than just the mathhammer (because I agree, mathhammer says novaforge wins hands down)


Dudes with novaforge pop in to nuke a big tank, then they jsj 2d6 back. On average that's 7 inches, but that could be anywhere from 2 to 12 inches. Which, assuming they're at 9 inches puts them between 11 and 21 inches away from what is likely a flank on the opponent's entire army. If I'm playing my ba, I'm not gonna waste my termies trying to go after novaforges, they just capped my tank. I'm gonna use my far faster and more ablative assault squad that can shrug off 4-6 BS3 melta shots because jump infantry can use their jump packs for an assualt move and assault squads carry pistols to at least pick off any drones or knock the 4-6 wounds off that crisis team.

If I'm playing my IG, my tanks are gonna be spearheading infantry spam, so my chimeras are gonna offload and pump lasguns and multilasers into those crisis suits.

Against longstrike, that hammerhead is damn sure gonna be my first target, but he's gonna outrange me. That means one of two things, either I avoid him and go for infantry with my battlecannon, or I try and push through the fire. In the latter case longstrike is drawing fire from something that could be eating through my important stuff (riptides, suits, firewarriors) while in the latter case I get to go after his av11 with poking attacks that will be sure to draw his ire and his fire.

Add in longstrike and the hammerhead becomes just dangerous enough to worry about, while a novaforge bomb or a novaforge squad will either get as suprise kill or get targetted and popped because of their drastically short range. That's the benefit of longstrike, the hammerhead's range means that he's dangerous without being in danger himself...something that meltas have never had.

That's why Meltavets are always stuck in a valkyrie, or multaguns stuck in a transport/on a land speeder. Melta is scary, but its short range means it's pathetically easy to kill it before it can reach you.

Of course the fact we've overlooked entirely is the old kansas city shuffle, take a novaforge bomb and longstrike, give your opponent one thing he can't touch that's a nuisance and one thing that is dangerous once but he can kill. It'll force him to cluster up in a vehicle spam situation, or else try and bulldoze with a LR and in either case he ends up with a lot of dead vehicles.

You dont need that many Fire Warrios, also i would drop some broadsides and take crisis battlesuits, give one squad fusion blasters and jump nice a close and shoot their armoured vehicles and their elites, such as space marine terminators and meganobz and riptides, etc. (and any other high armour squad)