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Hello! Sometime in the next year I plan on picking up Warhammer 40k. Not only that, but I'll be picking up two armies at once. (I'll be going very slowly). I've decided the first army I'm going to get are going to be the Tau. I plan on pitting the two armies against each other for most of my games. My question is, what should I pick for the second army that would create continuous good games between the two? An even match, if you will.

Some of the armies I have my eyes on are the Blood Angels, Ultramarines, Orks, or mixed Imperial Guard with some kind of Space Marine (considering that is something you can actually do?). I haven't ruled out the other armies but those are the ones that have caught my eye.

My original go-to had been the Orks but I'm a little worried about the whole melee vs ranged thing. I don't want every game to come down to 'did the orks make it to melee and win, or did the tau gun enough down first and win'. I'd prefer a more... diverse, tactical game. Any thoughts? Any match ups against the Tau you've found quite fun in the past? Thanks in advance!

The "did the Orks get to melee/or did the Tau shoot them all before they got into contact" is a thing that makes the Tau very frustrating to play as/against for melee armies, but the drones can make them very frustrating to play against for shooting armies. I find them frustrating to play against and frustrating to play as; every game ends up feeling one-sided one way or the other. If you really like them you can make it work but you'll want to be careful if you're planning to try and teach people the game while playing as the Tau.

I generally recommend anyone just starting off at least seriously consider Space Marines since they're the most widely available, easiest to find cheap secondhand on Ebay, in every starter box, don't require a huge number of models, and are pretty straightforward to play and paint. Which Chapter is down to personal preference, though there are specific units that are better in one force than another.

Yeah, I've gotten the impression that the Tau are pretty good. Once I do get both armies the plan is to let friends who don't have one play one army while I play the other. If one army turns out to just be better I'll probably be letting the friends field that army while trying to crack it with the other myself. Hopefully the knowledge of both lists will even the odds a bit.

The most important question is what kind of Tau list are you going to build. Immobile castles are fairly strong but effectively play themselves and can be hateful to melee armies that can't shut down overwatch. A more mobile army can be a bit harder to play with Tau and aren't supper competitive but still decent. Just don't over do it with Shield Drones outside of a tournament.

I'd recommend one of the Aeldari factions, Craftworlds or Drukhari, as they can make for a good match up with Tau.

Medievalriot wrote:
Yeah, I've gotten the impression that the Tau are pretty good. Once I do get both armies the plan is to let friends who don't have one play one army while I play the other. If one army turns out to just be better I'll probably be letting the friends field that army while trying to crack it with the other myself. Hopefully the knowledge of both lists will even the odds a bit.

This is pretty much how I roll.

My advice is buy your Tau Dex and read its history and fluff. Figure out which of their Nemeses are most interesting to you. Buy and paint a small patrol for crusade, or even just a kill team if you already have KT rules. Then do the same for the Nemesis you have chosen. Then FIGHT! Then switch teams and FIGHT! If you enjoy both armies, record your campaign results (assuming Crusade is out by then), and allow your collection to grow as you earn the requisition points to field additional units.

This ensures that you're always using what you've got, and it spreads the painting out evenly across your gaming schedule.

If on the other hand, you don't like the way the game felt against that nemesis, go out and buy another kill team/ combat patrol from the next on the list, then rinse and repeat.

Just don't like build tournament tuned net-lists and everyone will have plenty of fun.
I would not recomend orcs unless you really like the army's aesthetic.
Some flavor of Marines are a fine matchup against Tau - marines are the powerhouse these days and some colors of them can outshoot even competitive Tau lists without too much fuss.

IMO Tau turn unfun when you've got three Riptides and big ass pile of drones eating every shot that gets through a Riptide's charged-up 3++ invulnerable. Its easy enough to avoid building that army.

I do the same with T'au vs Chaos Space Marines/knights. It is usually one sided by first turn but has been getting better. Some of that is my use of Hammerheads, they kill or die T1. Ghostkeel are hit or often miss but cool, stealth suits are my fave.

I would think that Drukhari or Necron are good matchups. Both can keep up on shooting but also have reason to bring the fight in. Some of my better matches using either of my armies are against a Necron player.

Thanks for the replies! I certainly don't plan on building any sort of tournament list. It'll be all casual fun between friends for me.

As far as my future Tau list; maybe I'm in the minority but I actually don't like the giant mechs like the Riptide and probably won't get one (at least not for a long time). I prefer the smaller crisis battlesuits. Also not a big fan of most of their vehicles like the hammerhead and transports but I do like the Broadsides. I also really want some fast attack options so chances on me getting some Vespid or some Piranha are high.

I am strongly considering some kind of Space Marine. Things I like there are the Whirlwinds (I love indirect fire. In my mind I see it being good against Tau.), Drop pods, and Dreadnaughts. That makes me want to go Ultramarines. But then I'm also a big fan of the Death Company and Baal Predators in the Blood Angel list. I don't know enough about the other lists to comment much. Thoughts on them would be appreciated.

Also, can anyone comment on mixed Space Marine and Imperial Guard armies? Is that a thing? Is it any good? Which Space Marines pair best with them?

As for the other ideas; the wife will be helping paint and she doesn't want to paint Chaos so that's a no-go. Which is too bad because the Plagueburst Crawler looks pretty sweet. While I think the Eldar seem good I just have never liked their models much. The Dark Eldar models are cool, especially their transports/vehicles, but I don't think I'd enjoy their play-style much.

Making Tau fun to play as and agaisnt is easy: Just don't spam riptides and drones, use the 95% rest of the codex. Believe me, no matter what internet says you can win many games using other units like vehicles, piranhas, etc...! (Theres a bunch of top players winning tournaments with lists like those. A recent 100 person tournament on TTS was won by a tau list what was 3 commanders , 9 hammerheads with FW ones and 3 flyers)


Normally I play vior'la with a TON of assault weapons: Piranhas, stealth suits, ghostkeels, vespids, breachers, etc... people really gets surprised with how fast they are, how hard they can punch in medium to short distance and in general most people just dont expect to face tau and dont face riptide and drone spam.

I have little expiriance with playing vs tau as at my store two people played them, and both had indentical list. But from what I have seen and expirianced, Tau are a very skew list. Either they are so more powerful, and cancel all your army tricks and you don't do much damage to them, besides some drones and bad placed marker stuff. Or your army is better then taus, be it because you are better at shoting and more resilient, engage them turn 1 in mass melee or you have over powering psychic phases to boost your shoting or melee, that the tau just fall apart.


horrible to play as a new player, or with an unoptimised list too. No idea how fun it is to play with a totaly un optimised tau list, plus I am not sure if that even exist. Most tau players seem to like the stuff that also happens to be good. riptides, shield drones, suit commanders all seem to be well liked. not many proponents of vespids and similar units .

I find those comparisons extremely unjust and born from past editions and tainted by a subjetive perception aroud how in general Tau are less liked by their aesthetics and fluff.


How are Tau less funny to play agaisnt that any marine gunline that destroys you turn 1 and is extremely resilient? Than 7th necron decurions, than eldar flyer spam, than eldar in 7th, than demon summoning ad nauseam or Chaos and their untargeteable possessed bombs from alpha legion because theres nurlings in the ruins and a dark apostle in front? How are Tau less fun than ork nob jumping wounds between themselves or GK paladins doing the same?

The game is full of unfunny lists. Tau have one of those too. They also have a ton of fun lists, they are just shooting based like a TON of lists out there that have 0 meele components.

Space marines are generally a good starter army, the fact that they come in every edition's boxed game makes them a cost effective option too. Space marines are pretty strong in 8th edition, whether that is till true in 9th remains to be seen, but depending on the army lists you play, most armies can be built to be a pretty good match up against most others. Competitive/tournament play is another thing entirely, but for fun/learning games tau vs space marines should work well.

As others have said, tau tend to be more fun to play with and against when avoiding the super competitive option like lots and lots of drones and riptides.

I'd recommend the new starter set for 9th when its released and if you want tau, their start collecting set. That would give you 3 armies to play around with if you find that one of them doesn't really fit for you.

 Galas wrote:
I find those comparisons extremely unjust and born from past editions and tainted by a subjetive perception aroud how in general Tau are less liked by their aesthetics and fluff.


How are Tau less funny to play agaisnt that any marine gunline that destroys you turn 1 and is extremely resilient? Than 7th necron decurions, than eldar flyer spam, than eldar in 7th, than demon summoning ad nauseam or Chaos and their untargeteable possessed bombs from alpha legion because theres nurlings in the ruins and a dark apostle in front? How are Tau less fun than ork nob jumping wounds between themselves or GK paladins doing the same?

The game is full of unfunny lists. Tau have one of those too. They also have a ton of fun lists, they are just shooting based like a TON of lists out there that have 0 meele components.

Any pure-shooting leafblower list has the problem where the game is going to be either "I win because I touched the guns," which feels bad for the gunline player because they know they're going to lose a long time before they actually do and either have to be a sore loser and scoop early or sit there watching the other guy slowly grind through their stuff, or "I lose because I got wiped without touching the guns," which feels bad for the other player because they don't get to interact with the game other than just pulling models off the board. It's a zero-sum experience. Either the gunline player has fun or the other player has fun.

The problem with the Tau is that GW's design team has chosen to define the army's personality as "pure-shooting leafblower list," which means they have no choice other than to do the thing that makes the game feel bad for one player or the other.

I completely disagree with the notion that pure shooting lists can only be alpha strike leafblower ones, and that Tau can only be played like that.


Most competitive Tau lists are like that , as just most competitive lists are like that in trought the editions. Hardcore competitive lists are a miserable experience in this game no matter how they are built.

Tau "normal" lists are perfectly fine to play as and agaisnt.

I get it. I love meele, but reducing the game of a heavy shooting lists vs a heavy meele lists just as "If I touch him I win" is a very reductionists way of looking at the game. I have won ton of games based around avoiding confrontation, attacking where and when needed, scoring points and making the enemy come for me when I'm in a shooting disadvantage.

Tau are, currently, the most poorly made GW faction, and they usually take this distinction. GW doesn't really seem to know how to disincentive non interactive gunlines in favor of mobile more dynamic firepower, so every good tau army has been some variation of "Long range shooting suit, blob of infantry, drones" regularly throughout many editions.

Tau are not fun to play against

stratigo wrote:
Tau are, currently, the most poorly made GW faction, and they usually take this distinction. GW doesn't really seem to know how to disincentive non interactive gunlines in favor of mobile more dynamic firepower, so every good tau army has been some variation of "Long range shooting suit, blob of infantry, drones" regularly throughout many editions.

Tau are not fun to play against

So Imperial Guard?

I know "if I touch the gunline I win!" is a reductionist way of looking at the game. The point I'm trying to make is that it's a bad habit that is taught to people by exposing them to the Tau when they're trying to learn the game. I have a friend who has quit 40k entirely because he picked up Tau when starting because he liked the aesthetic, and had so many bad experiences with them that he felt like he needed to scoop as soon as an enemy unit got into melee with any of his stuff.

It is perfectly possible to play Tau without shoving yourself into the leafblower zero-sum bad game box. My assertion is that if the OP is expecting to buy two armies and play with friends who don't play 40k that the alpha-strike-leafblower zero-sum bad game problem is a pitfall they need to be aware of.

As a Tau player, I'm currently building a Thousand Sons army to play against it. I can say that if you want an entertaining list, consider one that can increase its numbers. Anything from a Daemon summoning list to a Tervigon and Biovore heavy nid list.

I'll admit something: Tau are a army with a smaller fanbase than many others. Many tau players are those that jump between tau, eldar and chaos based in whos the most OP.

That, an also, Tau players dont like experimenting that much and just like the one ring, the tri-riptide is always tempting you the moment you start losing using other armies. One needs a great will to resist that temptation.

 Galas wrote:
I'll admit something: Tau are a army with a smaller fanbase than many others. Many tau players are those that jump between tau, eldar and chaos based in whos the most OP.

That, an also, Tau players dont like experimenting that much and just like the one ring, the tri-riptide is always tempting you the moment you start losing using other armies. One needs a great will to resist that temptation.

don't lump all players into the same playstyle. After all, it is well known that all dark angels players use imperial soup.

I'm a Tau player and have been defending them in this same thread

But the truth is the truth, the perception around Tau players is warped around meta chasers and people that just likes tri riptide too much. Of like... 10 tau players i personally know, only 4 are real Tau fans and of those except for me that has only one, all have 3 riptides. They don't always use them but the moment they go to tournaments I can assure you they do.

 Galas wrote:
I'm a Tau player and have been defending them in this same thread

But the truth is the truth, the perception around Tau players is warped around meta chasers and people that just likes tri riptide too much. Of like... 10 tau players i personally know, only 4 are real Tau fans and of those except for me that has only one, all have 3 riptides. They don't always use them but the moment they go to tournaments I can assure you they do.

Well you can increase the number of players you know that only have a single Riptide. Though, I do have 2 Stormsurges (Which may explain why I'm a bit salty that they are vehicles and don't benefit from Savior Protocols), and at the last tournament I attended, I brought the one and a Tigershark.

And let me tell you that using Farsight to get 2 rounds of BS2 shooting with that beast was downright entertaining!

And so you know, I rarely use the same list twice. While I sometimes fall on my face in the rankings, I enjoy shaking things up for both myself and my opponent.

 Galas wrote:
They don't always use them but the moment they go to tournaments I can assure you they do.

Well, it would help if GW stopped taking our toys away which allowed the army to function as mobile combined arms and artificially limiting them, either through one-per-army wargear (JSJ jetpack which is limited to Tau sept for some fething reason), sept tenets (Stabilisation Systems, etc.), stratagems (pretty much all our previous signature wargear) etc.)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 carldooley wrote:

Well you can increase the number of players you know that only have a single Riptide.

I own zero. Despise that model for what it did to the perception of the average Tau army and it signalling the beginning of Tau becoming about giant stompy robots.

But then, I think I'm pretty much the Martel of Tau players

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
Well, it would help if GW stopped taking our toys away which allowed the army to function as mobile combined arms and artificially limiting them, either through one-per-army wargear (JSJ jetpack which is limited to Tau sept for some fething reason)

To be fair, there is the Dal'yth Strike and Fade stratagem, and the Riptide has Boost (though it requires a nova-charge to utilize).
Am I the only one who shepherds my Riptide with an Ethereal to mitigate the NC MW?

apologies to the OP. in addition to 1k Sons, or a breeder force, can I suggest a horde force. One where you can kill 80% of the enemy but they still win on objectives.

So back on topic...

Strongly leaning towards some kind of Space Marines vs Tau. Which Space Marine faction should I go with? Any favorites vs Tau? Any favorites in general? The two I'm leaning towards are Ultramarines and Blood Angels.

Medievalriot wrote:
So back on topic...

Strongly leaning towards some kind of Space Marines vs Tau. Which Space Marine faction should I go with? Any favorites vs Tau? Any favorites in general? The two I'm leaning towards are Ultramarines and Blood Angels.

Ultramarines and blood angels are popular, ultramarines favour shooting whereas blood angels favour melee ( compared to each other) with a new edition about to launch its hard to go into specifics, however my general recommendation is not to go as an established chapter. Pick a colour scheme you like for the models and that you’ll enjoy painting, and that you can paint well enough that you’ll be satisfied with it, I don’t know how good/experienced a painter you are. Colour schemes to avoid as a beginner are very light colours ( white and yellow) and black is also difficult to make look good.

The advantage of choosing your own colour scheme is you can play them with the same rules as a famous chapter, but there’s also scope to go your own way using customisable successor chapter rules. This is especially useful as a beginner because until you’ve played a few games you won’t know what style of play you enjoy more - rushing headlong into battle, siting back and shooting, manoeuvring around and sneaking etc.

The same advice applies to tau and other armies too. The main thing is to enjoy the games and the pick something you think you’ll have fun with.

Aash wrote:

Medievalriot wrote:
So back on topic...

Strongly leaning towards some kind of Space Marines vs Tau. Which Space Marine faction should I go with? Any favorites vs Tau? Any favorites in general? The two I'm leaning towards are Ultramarines and Blood Angels.

Ultramarines and blood angels are popular, ultramarines favour shooting whereas blood angels favour melee ( compared to each other) with a new edition about to launch its hard to go into specifics, however my general recommendation is not to go as an established chapter. Pick a colour scheme you like for the models and that you’ll enjoy painting, and that you can paint well enough that you’ll be satisfied with it, I don’t know how good/experienced a painter you are. Colour schemes to avoid as a beginner are very light colours ( white and yellow) and black is also difficult to make look good.

The advantage of choosing your own colour scheme is you can play them with the same rules as a famous chapter, but there’s also scope to go your own way using customisable successor chapter rules. This is especially useful as a beginner because until you’ve played a few games you won’t know what style of play you enjoy more - rushing headlong into battle, siting back and shooting, manoeuvring around and sneaking etc.

The same advice applies to tau and other armies too. The main thing is to enjoy the games and the pick something you think you’ll have fun with.

Those are some pretty good points. Thanks!

I had planned on White. Blue, Orange and a little black for the Tau. Hopefully that doesn't end up being too difficult, it'll be my first time painting anything.

Medievalriot wrote:

Aash wrote:

Medievalriot wrote:
So back on topic...

Strongly leaning towards some kind of Space Marines vs Tau. Which Space Marine faction should I go with? Any favorites vs Tau? Any favorites in general? The two I'm leaning towards are Ultramarines and Blood Angels.

Ultramarines and blood angels are popular, ultramarines favour shooting whereas blood angels favour melee ( compared to each other) with a new edition about to launch its hard to go into specifics, however my general recommendation is not to go as an established chapter. Pick a colour scheme you like for the models and that you’ll enjoy painting, and that you can paint well enough that you’ll be satisfied with it, I don’t know how good/experienced a painter you are. Colour schemes to avoid as a beginner are very light colours ( white and yellow) and black is also difficult to make look good.

The advantage of choosing your own colour scheme is you can play them with the same rules as a famous chapter, but there’s also scope to go your own way using customisable successor chapter rules. This is especially useful as a beginner because until you’ve played a few games you won’t know what style of play you enjoy more - rushing headlong into battle, siting back and shooting, manoeuvring around and sneaking etc.

The same advice applies to tau and other armies too. The main thing is to enjoy the games and the pick something you think you’ll have fun with.

Those are some pretty good points. Thanks!

I had planned on White. Blue, Orange and a little black for the Tau. Hopefully that doesn't end up being too difficult, it'll be my first time painting anything.

There are loads of painting tutorials online. The official GW ones are pretty good for starting out, and if you’re using their own brand of paints they tell you exactly what colours they’re using for stuff. For more advanced techniques your better off looking elsewhere for videos, there are a lot about though. For starting out the GW ones are great though.

For the first time painting I’d watch the basic videos for pointers and what not before you begin, and experiment with the colours you like on one or two smaller models to start off and see how you go. If you find the colours aren’t working for you, you can always start over.

I’d get the 9th starter set as well as the Tau army. There’ll be lots of cheap Necrons going on sale in the next few months (all the old warriors and other replaced models, broken up starter boxes etc.) and there’s always loads of space marines on the 2nd hand market. That way you can have 3 fairly different armies and the rules for the new edition.

Necrons are comically easy to paint, so there’s no worries there and you can field a painted army fast. Space Marines can very easy if you pick the right scheme.

Tau right now are one of the few armies that can stand toe to toe with marines (which is fun if you’re a Tau players, since current SM are pretty busted).

If you’re going to build an SM army against Tau (based on current rules), do NOT build Blood Angels. You will get waxed. Iron Hands or Ultramarines would be a safer bet, you want to out shoot the Tau.