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I am in the infancy of starting my tau army (currently at 3 suits, but with 2 more in the mail).

I'm really excited to be starting tau. I love the way they look, the way they play (believe it or not), and that they aren't a top tier army. I like the difficulty involved. Coming from space marines, where they are plug and play, I enjoy the challenge of having to really know my army, and knowing that every unit lost could be disastrous. All of the things said before I know, and I am still very excited to be playing an army I love, and won't be swayed by these arguments.

Just my 2 cents

The sad part about it is that I am actually considering building a Tau army because I like the battle suits, I just have a thing for robots and mechs, the mechs in this army remind me of mechwarrior games...

loota boy wrote:I mainly agree with all of the above posters. Also, for an army that relies souly on shooting, they need a better BS. 3 just won't cut it if you have no cc to back it up.

It works for the Imperial Guard well enough.

Tau's problem is that the current list was built *very* closely to the 4E LoS, Vehicle and Skimmer rules. Those got radically changed (you can actually kill Skimmers now!) and as such the Tau have been left hurting being much easier to kill, while their opponents generally have gotten better and more capable units and their tanks aren't tin can coffins anymore.

Tau can do fine. The problem is that they only have like one build that works. Crisis Suit/Broadside spam, with minimal FW and lots of Kroot if possible. Those lists really aren't bad at all, but that's all Tau can do really, and so if someone shows up with Stealthsuits and Fire Warrior spam, it just doesn't work, at all.

Also, Devilfish are overpriced. Not good when everyone else has 35 point Rhinos and 55 point Chimeras.

i love the tau models its just the codex in my opnion i picked it up expecting high BS low WS and lots of shot or high st weaponry and was dissappointed i still saw them being playable but only to experienced players who work on fine tuning lists for a long time.

its just SM have the pick up and play factor i just hope if a new edtion is released it would be good to see SM vs new tau in a box

Mike Noble wrote: and so if someone shows up with Stealthsuits

They will work very well, when used properly. In fact, against anything but guard infantry spam, I do just fine with my tau. Well, armor guard can probably cause trouble if they get first turn or lucky...

I have actually found my vespid very useful in larger games. It's basically very mobile ap 3 that can, down a sqaud if I've already hurt it, or at least to soften it up.

Now too many firewarriors actually do suck. Hard. It's kinda ironic.

Alphacerberus wrote:i love the tau models its just the codex in my opnion i picked it up expecting high BS low WS and lots of shot or high st weaponry and was dissappointed i still saw them being playable but only to experienced players who work on fine tuning lists for a long time.

its just SM have the pick up and play factor i just hope if a new edtion is released it would be good to see SM vs new tau in a box

Well that's disheartaning, I'm playing Tau as my first army . Though they are still very much a work in progress.

graidstin wrote:

Alphacerberus wrote:i love the tau models its just the codex in my opnion i picked it up expecting high BS low WS and lots of shot or high st weaponry and was dissappointed i still saw them being playable but only to experienced players who work on fine tuning lists for a long time.

its just SM have the pick up and play factor i just hope if a new edtion is released it would be good to see SM vs new tau in a box

Well that's disheartaning, I'm playing Tau as my first army . Though they are still very much a work in progress.

i don't wish to dis-hearten you just be prepared to put alot of effort in learning your codex and its limits as with any army its just tau need a little more extra care i respect any half decent tau player because i know atm its hard for them to get to the standard of the SM genration because they have to be perticular and uniformed "mostly" on what they choose

with a new codex comes your time to shine although it does mean you won't be the only tau players

striderx wrote:

Luco wrote:This thread makes me want to curl up and cry for losing so miserably to Tau...

Why do you have to? You lost to a competitive codex that was played well.

Was refering to the amount of space marines/guard kill tau outright arguments. I play marines (DA granted) and got my rear handed to me.

Luco wrote:

striderx wrote:

Luco wrote:This thread makes me want to curl up and cry for losing so miserably to Tau...

Why do you have to? You lost to a competitive codex that was played well.

Was refering to the amount of space marines/guard kill tau outright arguments. I play marines (DA granted) and got my rear handed to me.

So they can win? I was talking to my friend yesterday and he was saying in all the time that he has seen the Tau played they have never won.

Tau relies on the player not just the army if you get unlucky or don't play tactically you won't win with tau but if you knwo what your doing and plan accordinbg tau can be just as good as any other codex just don't expect to wing against BA jumpack armies :S

Alphacerberus wrote:Tau relies on the player not just the army if you get unlucky or don't play tactically you won't win with tau but if you knwo what your doing and plan accordinbg tau can be just as good as any other codex just don't expect to wing against BA jumpack armies :S

So you're basically saying that the Tau are not meant for new players?

effectively yeah but im not saying new players don't try just keep at it it will take a couple of games and a couple of defeats to make any player into a good one just don't get dis-heartened as tau are the most difficult army to play

New players will find Tau harder to use than SMs, for example.

Synister_Intent wrote:

Luco wrote:

striderx wrote:

Luco wrote:This thread makes me want to curl up and cry for losing so miserably to Tau...

Why do you have to? You lost to a competitive codex that was played well.

Was refering to the amount of space marines/guard kill tau outright arguments. I play marines (DA granted) and got my rear handed to me.

So they can win? I was talking to my friend yesterday and he was saying in all the time that he has seen the Tau played they have never won.

Yes they can. I've seen them table a decent ork player, but I've also seen them struggle against a good sisters player (who'd never faced them before).

Synister_Intent wrote:

Alphacerberus wrote:Tau relies on the player not just the army if you get unlucky or don't play tactically you won't win with tau but if you knwo what your doing and plan accordinbg tau can be just as good as any other codex just don't expect to wing against BA jumpack armies :S

So you're basically saying that the Tau are not meant for new players?

Yes and No.
No if you get frustrated easily after losing 20/20 games

Yes if you can take the lossesss and go on to improve yourself in the game.

Winning with Tau requires you to almost master all of the following :- Refused flanking, bubble wrapping, road blocking, target priority, etc. It is impossible for an amateur or intermediate player to be good at ALL of these. But it happens that the majority of the players falls in this band, and many just couldnt get pass that intermediate level - these are the people who says Tau sucks.

In fact, I am currently trying to figure out how to comfortably win Tau using an ork wagon spam list. There is almost no way you can get pass those road blocks of skimmers.

I took an 8 year break from wargamming but got back into 40k when I returned to the states and bought Tau because I remember how much trouble they used to give my Khorn army...back in the days of pop-up tanks and when battlesuits made me curse my opponent.

I lost every game I played until I gave up and bought an ultramarine army and now win more than I lose in 40k.

Strider, want to beat Tau with Orks? don't do wagon spam just horde up and run across the table; your Tau opponent won't be able to mass enough fire into you. Put some lootaz in cover and bring down the skimmers. Gritsnock (sp?) always gave me trouble.