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I find my pathfinders get eaten alive very quickly in my games so I was thinking maybe throwing them in a devilfish to give them a bit of protection and mobility so I have a couple questions

Is it worth the 95pts (fish+dpod) to do it?

how many can fire out of the devilfish in a turn?

do the pathfinders count as moving if the devilfish they're in moves?

can the devilfish move flat out and pathfinders still shoot?

thsnk you in advance

no the pathfinders cant shoot if you move flat out, check the back of the rule book theres a chart that shows the effect on passengers and embarked transports moving. I have no idea how many can shoot out id assume it has 1 fire point,
I cant tell you if its worth it but keeping them in cover helps.

No firepoints, so none.

Thanks both of you I didn't know the chart was back there. Any tips for keeping them alive a bit longer besides use cover?

I find Devilfish to be a bit expensive for what you get so they only come out in larger point games. Put an Smart Missile System on them and they become a Warfish....a decent tank that shoots through cover.

Still a bit expensive for just 4 S5 shots that ignore cover.

The best way to keep Pathfinders alive is to try your best to keep them hidden and make use of the 36" range on the markers. Put out threats as a bit more appealing targets.

However the pathfinders are inherently vulnerable; that's why most people just end up using buffcommanders, markerdrones, and allied farseers.

What's the reasoning for making them so eexpensive anyway?

Its they're potential for an army changing mechanic that drives em up, also the access to special weapons and drones...

Unless you're talking bout the fish, and its because its got decent armor for a transport, the Tau dont like losing troops or vehicles.

One option to increase the survivability of Pathfinders is to max out drones. Unfortunately, the cost is comparable to adding a Devilfish (92 points for the five drones, if you include the shas'ui tax).

But a squad of 4-5 pathfinders, 1 Recon Drone, 1 Grav-inhibitor Drone, 1 Pulse Accelerator Drone, and 2 Gun or Marker Drones gives your squad a majority toughness of 4, and provides 6 ablative wounds (Recon Drone has 2 wounds) with a 4+ save. Its not ideal, but its an option.

The lack of survivability of Pathfinders is why you find more people using the Heavy Support slot (Sky Rays) for markerlight support.

The 2 mls on the skyray just aren't enough lol.

Screen them with other troops, unlike normal shooting you can't grant a cover save against a markerlight (because you can't save against them).

Abuse the JSJ of your suits to make them virtually un-target-able (if they can't see the unit, they can't shoot it).

Look up something called "the Fish of Fury" for Tau. The basic idea is that you put the Dfish between your Pathfinders and something that might threaten them, trying to block line of sight (it can be done), but also blocking assault charges.

In the movement phase, you move the fish out of the way, so your Pathfinders have full view to a target.

In the shooting phase, fire the marker lights, then flat-out the fish back in front of your pathfinders, blocking return fire and charges.

Also, the devilsfish is great if you want to more your pathfinders around. Since rail rifles and ion rifles are able to be fired after disembarking, you can put them in place deeper on the board when outflanking, and still open fire right away. (Assuming you are using the fire support pathfinders, not marker light pathfinders)

Alternatively, a squad of marker drones can jump shoot jump, keeping themselves out of line of sight. If you join a character with a high BS and a drone controller to them, they put out markerlight hits very reliably and survivable, albeit expensive.