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Heya guys a friend and I got into 40k about a month ago now and having a blast! We're hoping to make our list a bit more competitive so we can join in on more of the local events.
Any advice/criticism is welcome!


Cadre fireblade
commander w/ c&cn msss puretide chip and stim injection

x2 Riptide w/ ion tlfb vt ewo
x3 crisis w/ tlflamer burster cannon

x12 firewarriors
x12 kroot w/ sniper rounds 1 hound
x12 kroot w/ sniper rounds 1 hound

x5 pathfinders
x5 pathfinders

hammerhead w/ submunition longstrike sms dpod
skyray w/ gun drones bsf
x3 broadsidea w/ tlhymp sms ewo x6 missile drones

Apologies if layout is off norm still new to the site. Thanks in advance

Okay, first off I'd say get the velocity tracker off of the riptides and give them stimulant injector. With the skyray you don't need to worry about skyfire too much. Next, drop the hounds, I know why you put them in there, but acute senses don't matter too much if you just give a suit of any kind a positional relay. It will allow you to come on from which ever board edge you want if the suit with it is with in 6" of the edge.

The crisis suits should either missile pods or fusion blaster, and I would lean towards the missiles. It will free up your railgun to focus on AV 13 or higher. If you're worried about hoards, change your fireblade to an ethereal and add another full squad of fire warriors.

Last thing is to think on a drone commander rather than a buff commander. It will get more markerlights on the field, and will hit a lot better. Just give him a shield generator, stimulant injector, drone controller and possibly vectored retro-thrusters to get out of close combat.

If you have any questions for me just send me a PM.

I agree about taking an ethereal over a fireblade. The kill point hurts, but ethereals are better in virtually every other way. Hide him with the broadsides to minimize losses.

Your buffmander could probaby use some extra toys, like iridium armor and a neuroweb jammer if points allow.

Iontides just need EWO. HBC tides work well with VT+EWO, and need stims far more due to the nova charge on the HBC.

Also agree about dropping the crisis burst and fire. You can get S5 dakka elsewhere, take missiles, fusions, or plasma a la carte. Disagree about dropping the hounds though, as they are I5 bullet sponges, and work independent of pos relay.

Skyray needs smart missiles. Give out sensor spines if you can afford on both.

See, i disagree with the 2 above posters. If you had more fire warriors i would say take a Ethereal for sure. But without a solid gunline the fire warriors will have to keep moving to claim and for that job the fire blade is better. With only 1 unit of fire warriors the Fieblade is just better and less of a liability. with a list like yours castling is bad and thats an ethereals main advantage. Stick with the fire blade

Without enough protection the Ethereal is an easy victory point.

I would also agree that you should go Fusions on the crisis. You would b surprised how often longstrike fails and hes only got 1 shot. You could also go TL Fusion/Plasma for a anti AV/TEQ squad.

You are quite light on markerlights.I wold consider giving the commander a drone controller and 2 marker drones that would hit on 2's and be twinlinked (overkill but reliable). Since they are his personal drones you can also join other units with him.

To do all this i would drop the V.tracker, because ion rips with v.tracker sucks. Drop the hounds and infiltrate the kroot which will also push back an scouts such as white scars.

I would also drop the stim injector on the commander for a shield gen, Both would be awesome but expensive. S10 isnt that rare anymore with wraithknights/guard running around and FnP wont help you there. its a 4+ instead of the FnP 5+ so you dont have to rely on cover so much and he can still tank like a boss.

List looks good so far tho. And your layout is just fine!

I agree with the above poster and not the first guy...

Hounds are fine in your Kroot if you plan on Outflanking them. They cost the same amount of points as a positional relay and you DON'T need to keep your suits on the far edge of the board. Seriously, why do you recommend that?

If you only had one Riptide, I would recommend a Stimulant Injector on them. But with 10 T6 wounds on the board, it's superfluous and unnecessary. I would also recommend that you switch one of the IA Riptides to HBC, you'd be surprised on how powerful it is. And I DON'T recommend a Fusion Blaster on your Riptides, you don't want to risk them getting into combat so you'll never be close enough to use it.

Take SMS on your tanks, it has the same number of shots but it's a longer range AND it ignores cover/LOS.

I don't know about competitive, but living under the same roof as a Tau player and constantly fighting him, this list wouldn't last long against me.

Foremost, If you want sniper shots take sniper drones. They come at BS: 5, and are pulse weapons. Meaning a correctly equipped team can drop 18 shots every turn with a FireBlade behind the cover of both Stealth and Shrouded. Kroot are the glassiest of the glass swords, and anything with ignores cover will sneeze and they'll be gone.

About the Suits, if you want S: 5 get fire warriors, it's a waste of a mount on a Suit. The common build i fight is Plasma gun/Fusion Gun; this allows for serious tank and elite hunting. Use them as a scalpel to remove whatever is being mean to your gun line.

SkyRay has it's purposes if you aren't fielding Broadsides; Pick One, dump the other. If you keep the Broadsides, give them Skyfire. I'd suggest this, as the Skyray is limited to 6 shots. If you stay with the Broadsides, trade some of those Missile Drones for Shield Drones, I'd say 2. You're losing some stopping power for some staying power, but remember that you can't shoot when you're dead.

The pitfall and greatest reason this list would lose is an opponent only has to kill the 24 Kroot (T 3 6+ save) and 12 Fire Warriors(T 3 4+ save); 36 kills and you can no longer hold objectives. More Fire warriors is always a better idea. One of the beauties of the Tau is the Pulse Rifle; this is the answer to AV 10 and 11, as well as most of any kind of infantry including but not limited to Terminators.

Finally, never take an Ethereal unless you're absolutely positive you can keep him safe. In Purge the Alien he's single-handedly worth 3 points and has no armor. Don't believe for a second that he won't be shot at because he will. A lot.

Heya guys thanks so much for all the feed back! I've had to drop a riptide to fit all the recommendations not sure if that's a good idea though.
Ethereal seem really great but that extra point isn't worth risking I think not while I'm new still anyway. I like the fusion plasma crisis idea. I was using the flame bursters to drop in on squishy cultists and the like.
Here's the updated list 1 less rippy is worrying me though

Cadre fireblade
commander w/ 2 marker drones c&c node msss puretide chip irridium armour drone controller stim injection and shield

Riptide w/ ion sms ewo
x3 crisis w/ TLfusion plasma

x12 firewarriors
x12 kroot w/ sniper rounds 1 hound
x12 kroot w/ sniper rounds 1 hound

x5 pathfinders
x5 pathfinders
x5 pathfinders

Hammerhead w/ longstrike sms submunition dpod sensor spines
skyray w/ sms bsf sensor spines
x3 broadsides w/ tlhymp sms vt x6 missile drones

this leaves me with 3 points spare for bonding on the crisis or broadsides? I'm not sure about this though, feels like too many points are invested in upgrades.

Who is the commander going with? If the riptide, I would find a way to give him the CnC node as well as the multi-spectrum. If you do this, you could probably forgo the Pen chip, maybe the Iridium as well. Riptide becomes twin linked and gets a S8 AP2 blast w/ ignores cover.

Also, I think you NEED at least one more squad of troops, preferably fire warriors. I know you seem to like Kroot, I do too, but they just aren't competitive enough IMO to forgo a group of fire warriors. The only time I run kroot, is usually in APOC or when I just don't have enough points for something else useful.

My 2 cents on the Ethereal, I almost ALWAYS run one. I've been experimenting with some of the others(Darkstrider is really nice against Eldar Wraith army), but if/when the enemy gets to your gunline, that +1 shot comes in handy. Sure, he's worth 3 points(if he's your warlord/are playing KPs), but since casualties are removed from the front, if you keep him at the back of your line, he should be fine. Most of the time there are much more scary things to shoot at, then MAYBE getting a precision shot on the Ethereal.

Could also maybe drop Longstrike, you have Markers, so if you really need a tank dead, mark it up, otherwise, BS4 should be fine.

Tau is a awesome army. Everyone has a different playstyle. I personally run farsight with all crsis troops and a 1 squad of kroot to push back infiltrators. I would prefer another riptide to long strike. Take a heavy burst riptide. They are surprisingly powerful and would make up for your lack of fire warriors.

I had fun w/ Riptide w/ IA and Fusion Blaster and buff commander moving towards enemy lines for the eventual charge. Nova charge for 3++ ,Pop stubborn the turn you charge and be amazed how your opponent cant crack the majority T6. Lose combat? Oh well, stubborn testing on LD10. Hit and run out in his turn.

I thought the buff commander could sit with the broadsides and do nasty things with them. I wanted him to go with the Riptide but it means getting at least one of those expensive drones and then if they pop the done the Riptide has a chance of legging it off.
The thing I'm most worried about is heldrakes cos they seem quite common and can ruin my troop lines.
I think I might be getting caught up in longstrikes cool factor, he does good work for me but I'll have to try some games without him and see as 45 points would give allot of wiggle room