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I just hate using internet "lists" and LOVE doing my own thing so for the last month I've just been studying the Tau codex on the bus ride home from work every single night. I've explored tons of potential combinations and have come up with extremely effective core army.

Review what the crucial pieces are to my strategy:

Crisis Suit Commander - When I first read the new codex this HQ stood out to me, we're used to having a suit as our warlord so this piece fell very easily into my army. The # of effective configs you can load this guy out with is insane. A lot of people have been pouring over making him a support option for your army but I strongly recommend going a more traditional approach.

This model never changes for me, I keep him cheap and tough maximizing his low base cost and high base stats.
Burst Cannon
Burst Cannon
Stim-Pack
Drone Controller

This loadout leads him to a wonderful 128 cost, drone controlling giving potentially 42 points of ballistic skill for 8 points. Good deal. Burst cannons got a huge bump in the new codex costing less and getting an extra shot. They mesh well with the drones he will be joining. Stim-pack is honestly optional, I have no problem what so ever taking my 3 systems and leaving the 4rth blank. It comes down to who you're facing and what HQ is going to be your warlord. I feel generally it's a safe bet to grab FNP for 15 points on a 4 wound model.

Crisis Suits - Much debate over these models. People love plasma's on them but I find that they get me greedy with rapid fire and end up getting assaulted OR they end up shooting 2 strng 6 shots each at 24'' which isn't very impressive. At bs3. Never been impressed,

This will be the most controversial piece of my army for games to come but I swear by the old Deathrain loadout, TL MP/MP. All day long. Each suit will come in at 57 points for 4 strng 7 shots at 36''. Two of which are TL. Each suit has a 3+ and two wounds AND two of the shots are TL. Did I mention JP thrusts?

Anyone that plays a second army will realize how fantastic a tank hunter these models can become, Fusions aren't flexible enough. Try Broadsides, I beg you. You will fall back to suits instantly. Heavy is such restriction on these types of models. I will take mobility over slight defensive gains and a SMS system anyday of the week. To me the comparison isn't even close.

I take a full squad of 3 @ 1k points and depending where I'm going two @ 1.5.

Pathfinders - These are great models, I never take them if I don't intend to fire their markerlights every single turn. I always weigh out taking firewarriors over them at 2 points less a model and with the giant targets to use markerlights in my army I find myself taking them often.

I always allocate a unit to use my lights in my army ahead of time. It's always a Hammerhead/Deathrain squad/Riptide. They provide enough.the correct firepower vs targets with high cover saves. They are an amazing counter to popular Eldar tanks.

36'' and Heavy makes markerlights tricky to utilize on the right targets though. I always use my scout move aggresively and get them into cover. They are almost always targeted first which is fine because they are cheap.

Gun Drones - Secretly the best unit in the codex. Rocking two shots each at strng 5 pinning TL. 18 inches, toughness 4 AND they have jetpack moves. At 14 points a model their bs 2 may make it sound balanced but once you pair a fast attack choice with your commander you will cream your pants in dakka. Hitting on 2's TL with a drone controller is dirty each and every time you pick up 30+ dice hitting with a wildly high % of them.

I run a giant blob around my commander, regularly blowing away warlord squads the turn they deepstrike. Make sure to take 2 on the cheap for your warlord instead of the fast attack choice.

Riptides:

I am on the fence on this elite choice. Their weapons are such a mess. Strng 8 ap 3 blast is inefficient and gets hot? We aren't guardsmen. I enjoy the heavy burst cannon, I can deal with get's hot on an "assault" weapon but we have acess to better 5-6 strng weapons already. I always take SMS with them. I rarely take any upgrades including drones since they are so expensive and can cause ridiculous leadership checks with 3d6 fallbacks.

What are they good for? A giant roadblock. They soak up SO much firepower it's ridiculous. I position them centrally and let me vunerable units do their work at my riptide eats all of their shots. Players need to learn to ignore these guys.

Overall they aren't crucial, but fun to use. They make their points back and are at their best when shooting at GEQ with their bolter or MEQ with the blast's but it's tough to make those loadout decisions ahead of time.


Hammerheads - Ugh. I love these. They are a good contestant for the best tank in the game with their trifecta of flexible firepower/high armor/cheap cost. 130 will get you a model that can hold your back ranks for an entire game and blow away tanks or troops alike. The problem I have is that I run so few vehicles that when I do take them they are targeted with all of my opponents anti-vehicle weps right away. Giving them nothing to shoot out will make their weapons inefficient, I take 0 or two always taking the blast template at the cheap 5 points. I forgo DP now and keep them cheap.

Firewarriors - They are amazing. 9 points gets you a strng 5 bs 3 shot at 30''. It took me playing other armies to appreciate how great that deal is. Especially when you factor in all the etheral buff's they can recieve and the fireblade options.

I take them regularly allocating an extra points directly into these squads. Generally 2 at 1k. Use their rapid fire aggresively and you will be impressed at how many glances they can deliver.

Farsight - He is SO diffucult to gauge on effectiveness. He isn't as much as a monster as we'd like in combat but armourbane and ap2 do make him scary if you can support him. Which you can't because we're Tau.
4++ invul helps but 165 hurts.

The real draw is his warlord trait. Not deviating on DP's opens up SO many options with you gun drone squad. Opening up dreads from behind to blowing away warlords all while cheerfully moving 2d6 back on the turn you DP is awesome. Test him, it's high risk. See if you like it.

My go to list recently has been:

Warlord Farsight

Commander BC BC Stim D. Controller
2 Gun Drones

3x XV8 TL MP/MP

6x Firewarriors
6x Firewarriors
6xPathfinders

Riptide /w Ion

11 Gun Drones

1001

Gives you a wide array of tools to use even abl to deal with av 14 at 1k is a nice comfort.

I suggest playing defensively until you get your reserved Drone/Commander Squad in and then go full tilt looking to hold 1 objective with both squads if the mission provides and just look to table the opponent.

Have fun, try some different things out and love the game

farsight really shouldnt be in that list. He doesnt do anything except deliver a bomb. He costs as much as a buffmander and aside from assaulting vehicles he doesnt help the army.

Which blows. I want to use him. If we had one unit that could assault it would be better. Curious of theres any allies we can stick him into..

So, what exactly do you do if you face a list with AV 14? Only your Riptide and Farsight in melee can even attempt to roll dice against it.

 Peregrine wrote:
So, what exactly do you do if you face a list with AV 14? Only your Riptide and Farsight in melee can even attempt to roll dice against it.

Hammerheads were mentioned...
Even so, if you find they're getting targeted constantly, it's worth spending the extra to give the Fire Warriors EMP grenades too.

I generally ignore it and blow up whatever comes out. LR's don't win games on their own and their firepower is negligible.

LR lists aren't especially competitive at 1k either.

I agree that Farsight is dipping into the fun part of the game a bit too much, but I've had success with him (or her) WHOEVER is piloting assaulting vehicles after splitting from the drone group.

He can also effectively tie up whatever heavy weapon squad is avail. Something no other Tau unit enjoys doing.

165 isn't insane, don't be afraid to try it out.

Not scattering changes the game of DP in such a major way.


.

I like your thoughts..

The place I differ with you is on the drones attached to the commander. I prefer marker drones, and give the commander a target lock so he can shoot at whatever he wants with committing the marker lights

Aijec wrote:
I generally ignore it and blow up whatever comes out. LR's don't win games on their own and their firepower is negligible.

LR lists aren't especially competitive at 1k either.

.

I admit that I don't have much experience against Tau (almost none, to be honest) and thus don't know their capabilities very well.

However, as a CSM player, against LRs I'll be worried more of the unit that they transport. At least for Chaos Space Marines. They are so expensive that it would be a waste to use them without delivering a powerful assault unit.
In my own case it's Abaddon with 8 CSM/Chosens with Icon of Excess (this means that Abaddon will have 2+ armor, 4 wounds, 4+ invuln save, Feel No Pain, T5, Eternal Warrior and 8 power armour bodies with feel no pain to cover him + eventual chaos boons that he'll gain during the match. And sits inside AV14... not exactly easy to kill ).
I don't know if with your list you have the tools to kill him efficiently, but trust me that his damage is absolutely NOT negligible. And if you let him use his LR for the whole game... well.. good luck

What really saves you is that it's quite difficult to fit much armour in a 1k point list... but I'd take this in account for larger games,

I think the main problem with that list is the 2 squads of 6 troops which will die and wont take much effort to do so, especially if you like you said "Use their rapid fire aggresively" all you can do is 1) hope you can annihilate you opponent 2) stick them in reserves and hope they come on after you have been able to take out what can harm them.

Also the ion accelerator is ap2 with all rounds which makes a big deal to their effectiveness sticking ewo on it is pretty much mandatory at 5 points makes anyone think twice about deep striking within 60" of you.

 Super Ready wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
So, what exactly do you do if you face a list with AV 14? Only your Riptide and Farsight in melee can even attempt to roll dice against it.

Hammerheads were mentioned...
Even so, if you find they're getting targeted constantly, it's worth spending the extra to give the Fire Warriors EMP grenades too.

There wasn't a hammerhead in his 1k list. I think you have too many points in HQ for a 1K game. I would drop Farsight in order to add a hammerhead and beef up your troops. I also think that sniper Kroot work better in smaller games than naked 6 man FW units.

I like that you are thinking outside the box.

That said this list seems several sandwiches short of a picnic.

For a list with such weak scoring its awfully light on scary stuff.

Two commanders and a ton of drones is the pretty much the worlds worst 400+ death star.

As I said in the article

A. I look to hold one objective with tabling my opponents scoring units, I realize the # of troops in the list is below average

B. I would love to face a chosen/abbadon/lr list at 1k

That's over 600 points I believe and would probably get a single charge off the entire game.

C. I have already conceded that farsight isn't necessary but extremely fun and with the right mindset he will earn his points back.

I'm trying to work on a homing beacon stealth squad instead of farsight adding a 3rd squad of warriors in the process.

If I were to go to a tourney I'd slap fw's and kronor with snipers in the army just to play sit are and flexible.

I love facing traditional Death Stars with my own, combining riptide blasts and drones volume
Of shots I regularly break their formation losing far less points in the process.


I want to urge people to try the list out, this is field tested more than I care to admit to.

Taking an anti-infantry HQ, with anti-light vehicle battlesuits, standard pathfinders and rail-heads is an acceptable and effective setup.

Something I've been thinking of recently is if you're thinking about taking gun drones, take a unit of 5 piranhas with fusion guns. Split off the 10 attached gun drones first turn as one big squadron and move the commander (w. drone controller) to join them. if your opponent goes first use the piranhas as mobile cover for your gunline. if you go first rush them into his face and melta a tank. Either way you then have 10 cheap AV10 hull points forming a barrier between the two of you which has to be dealt with and becomes difficult terrain when your opponent shoots them down, as well as your squad of gundrones.
Best of all it only uses a single Fast Attack slot!

enjoyable article. Did you consider the Firesight Marksmen instead of Pathfinders? Many have overlooked them but they are actually an EXCELLENT and heartier alternative to Pathfinders in the role you are suggesting them in.

I use my Pathfinders entirely offensively and dont fire their Markerlights but once in a blue moon but the way you're using them, it could be a better fit to put Firesight Marksmen there. Depends on the Heavy slots you intent to use i guess, but consider it.