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In the same vein as my GK super thread, I plan to start up a new Tau tactical of all the different tips and tricks with them. Please forgive the incomplete format as I'm still learning the army but I think I got enough so far to start up the process. will update this thing as time goes so please forgive the lack of complete content so far but I'll pretty much do it just like the GK tactical with by unit breakdown with the expectation that people will have read what the rules are and add to it over time.

Last edit: July 16, 2013 (Edit Formatting. Future content edits will be in Violet color to be in line with the other tacticals and GW FAQ style)

HQ -

XV8 commander – This guy loves drones! With a drone controller, he will be buffing all our spinning disk friends to BS 5 which is amazing for laying down a ton of pulse carbine shots from gun drones, or even quite a few markerlight drone hits to take some pressure off your pathfinders. Running him in a squad of crisis suits is also pretty good as he can give them excellent buffs like tank hunter/ignore cover/twin linked. Other buffs like twin hit and run, fleet, and furious charge for fun are available as well. Always take the puretide chip. Sticking him with broadsides can help take out some armor reliably (up to AV 12 anyway and maybe 13’s.). With allies, you can also give some interesting buffs like hit and run to a squad of TH/SS terminators from space marines or even with something assault from elder like striking scorpions (which are amazing now btw)
Another role for the commander especially in suit teams is as the tank. Plop on iridium armor, and stim injector and he’s a beast to take down at T5 (hard to instant death at range and would need str 10 hits to down) He can suck up a lot of small arms fire for the team and you can always look out sir any Ap2 shots onto something else as well.

Personally I've been running Two in many occasions and usually one as a "mark-O" meaning take drone controller + squad of marker drones to get a tone of BS5 markerlights onto a target. The other I use to sometimes bolster a kroot squad's Ldr and generally get all the buffs hiding in the back to deny warlord or give broadsides/riptide tank hunter.

Additional notes - the bodyguards while more expensive than regular crisis suit squads, can be handy to have just because they do not take up a FoC. You can fill your Elites with riptides (or single riptide as an ally attachment) and deploy a unit of bodyguards. The bodyguard crisis suits also do not have to join with the commander like they did in the old codex so you can have them as an independent unit or possibly even guard a squishy ally commander.

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Etheral – really good buff machine, for 50 points he can solve a lot of leadership problems for fire warriors and kroot. Giving you the ability to shoot and run (albeit with snap fire) is still better than nothing and can help keep tau mobile. If you want to keep a more static gunline, the increased shots help a lot to thin out assaulting units that get close. Keeping him inside a devilfish can boost his aura range but I find it kind of a waste of points for the most part as stringing out units work nearly as well anyway. Just be careful that he's worth an extra victory point so I'd almost never make him my warlord (as slay the warlord is worth a VP and he'd give up 2). Only real a problem in 1/6 games however as most times we're gonna be dealing with objectives. If you do chose to make him a warlord, you actually get to limit your warlord traits down to just 3 choices, one of which is skyfire, other is ability to recover from going to ground (like the IG GBITF) or rerolls to hit of 1's in a bubble.

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Aun Shi - Melee Tau! Frankly this guy is not that great to use. He is str 5 but has no AP. Going rending isn't really that reliable and it's almost always better to just use a regular cheap etheral for most set ups or if you must use him, just keep picking the patient hunter as he does have a nice 4+ invul rerollable save at least ( though frankly it's just not worth the points most times)

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Aun' Va – The space pope! I just love saying that. Anyways, his paradox of duality seems to be a really fun save and based on the wording, you can potentially have several saves stacked up i.e. he can claim an armor/cover save from behind an aegis, then he can get his paradox of duality save, and then finally can get a FnP save. That’s 3 chances to stop a wound so it’ll be pretty hard to dislodge the space pope. His other buffs are also pretty good but he is somewhat annoying in that you can’t join him to a squad since he is not an IC though you can join another IC such as a commander to him. This combo is very annoying for the enemy as you can make your commander your HQ and redirect all AP1/2 shots to Aun'Va while you look out sir everything else that is not AP1-2 over onto your iridium armor FnP commander. In either case, it's going to be very tough to take down your warlord whichever one it is. Fun trick to help deny your opponent slay the warlord. In general, I'd just use storm of fire + zephyr's grace for the most part to make my gunlines somewhat mobile.

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Cadre Fireblade – Good boosts and cheap HQ choice to help with fire warriors. Competes with some other very good choices. I’ve liked him in some games but I usually go for the ethereal and or commander(s). He's somewhat good with big fire warrior squads and can generate some nice shooting at range though I've never found much use for him to split fire himself with his markerlight though if you feel like you can wipe out your target completely, you can use him to help set up more markers for other teams.

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Darkstrider - fairly fun choice actually to use. I personally perfer him in an offensive pathfinder team with his structural analyser which can help instant death quite a lot of stuff (namely marines HQ's) if you synergize it with str 6 rail rifle shooting (or ion rifle which can actually have a better range of targets as you can double out T5 characters though most of those will get their armor save so I'm not sold on this vs rail rifles. Ion great vs wraiths however as they get invul and you have cheaper guns) Regular fire warriors would be a fair choice to take down things like IG or other Tau T3 (which becomes T2) but still best bet to threaten things that may suck up alot of other shooting.

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Commander Shadowsun – some really nice changes basically giving great cover saves with stealth and shrouding to just about anything you want along with the ability to outflank. Can make for some great assault options to threaten your opponents especially with allied armies like the elder or a bunch of TH/SS terminators. As drones are hard to claim cover saves with, having her along to protect your broadsides against Ap2 shooting is also a valid tactic though you don’t get too much use out of her BS5 melta guns. She would be a very good choice to infiltrate some allied heavy elites like terminators or even eldar wraith guard. The guaranteed 3d6 jet pack thrust moves would benefit any crisis/drone squad/riptide/stealth team that she's paired up with nicely.

Other than outflanking, she can be used to just buff your backline as well. Getting sick of rolling 1's on your expensive longshot hammerhead? Use her command and control drone to make it practically twin linked. Same goes for potential gets hot ion cannons on riptides or even pathfinders. Stealth and shrouding work just as well with crisis suits on your own side of the board and crossing the map with 3d6 assault + run + 12' jetpack move is still pretty good to get a late game midfield objective.

Of note, her infiltrate cannot be used to give infiltrate to non-infiltrating units as you must be deployed on the board before the infiltrate rule kicks in so no infiltrating all your assault assets up front turn 1.

As strange as it is, you can infiltrate her with a bunch of rangers/scouts/and even the Eldar HQ of Illic Nightspear though you still have to place the squad at normal infiltrate ranges. You can't just have her infiltrate up to meltagun range unfortunately with Illic as his rune does not transfer to the squad at this time anyway until they FAQ it properly.

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Commander Farsight – The farsight bomb is most certainly back in action this edition. The ability to take 7 body guards and you can attach another supporing commander to the mix gives you one really killy team. Tons of melta burns with deep striking no scatter will mess up just about anything’s day. My recommendations however is to stick to plasma with some melta suits to use as anti-armor or anti-MC asset like killing off an enemy riptide or DK. Use fire warriors to focus down tropps. Dropping into too much enemy fire however is still not recommended as tau are still pretty lousy at CC and will get chewed up by Thunder hammers or force weapon GK’s or krack missle fang spam (or even vs other tau seeker missles)

You can also attach him to a SM librarian with gate of infinity and benefit from his no scatter deep strike placement. Can't assault move but with the perfect positioning you get to chose anyway, it's actually a viable strat to get them into pretty much anywhere you want.

Despite the fluff reasons, it is entirely possible to have farsight + shadowsun + giant blob of crisis suits deep strike/outflank into the enemy backfield. With target locks sprinkled liberally around, you can engage alot of things at once with this deathstar. More of a fun choice I think but it can be somewhat useful as well since it has good mobility which alot of deathstars suffer from and can kill more than one unit at a time.

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Elites

XV 104 Riptide – This guy so far is THE go to unit for Tau in most games. He does need a markerlight unit to function at his fullest however but his ion cannon at long range is supurb. Keeping him out of assault is not too hard either with JSJ assault moves. The part that completely breaks this guy however is that despite being a MC, he can take drones which make him a unit that you can join IC’s to. This opens up a whole host of possibilities:
These include –
Support commander – ignore cover interceptor/skyfire/tank hunter which can make that ion accelerator really go to town on even on vehicles.
Shadowsun – outflank or just provide MC with good cover saves and can roll up a flank on his own along with some nice cover saves so you don't have to depend on that nova generator. The rules for cover saves and MC means that he just has to have a toe (or at least part of his base) inside an area terrain like ruins and he gets the cover save. You do not need the 25% obstructed rule desite his size at times. Size does matter however if you are in the open.

The ion accelerator seems to be the general purpose gun at this point and despite gets hot, you have a good chance to use the large blast to full effect most times anyway with some marker lights support. The heavy burst cannon if it had rending I'd say would be a tough call but since it doesn't have that, I'd almost always pick the ion accelerator. As to the support weapons, fusion blasters seem kind of overkill by my estimates as you really don't want to be close to the enemy to use it (most things that are AV 14/13 can hurt you back or have nasty assault troops inside) so leave the fusions to someone else. Plasma rifles make you a good anti-terminator unit and my personal loadout (as I use the riptide to target other elites/light vehicles for the most part) but there is essentially nothing wrong with the smart missles as you get a bit more range out of them and more shots so it would be more of a local meta issue.

The shielded missle drones are decent for being T6 and 4+ invul and can be used to block quite a few hits just in case you fail your nova reactor (which can happen some 1/3 of the time!) Try to guess where the next incomming AP2 fire will be comming from and position the drones in front of that direction. With an etheral nearby or IC attached, you have a good chance to pass ld 10 moral checks even if these drones die. The drone controller support system unfortunately does not improve the BS of missle drones. Also of note, if you lose a drone (provided that you took any), you will need a leadership check and can fairly easily run off the board on a 3d6. Personally I'd just put the drones behind the riptide at all times and tank all the shots if I was near the board edge. If I was midfield ish, I'd consider risking the ldr 9 check (or 10 if you attached a support commander to him) and or if the riptide has just 1-2 wounds left.

Vs light fliers like the new eldar or Tau planes, the heavy burst cannon can be pretty effective still. Bringing down FMC can be easier with the burst cannon as well so there is a place for the cannon. With the burst cannon version, I think the shield drones make more sense also as the range of fire would be more similar. The IA one won't be able to shoot them too much if at max range. Personally I really like Eldar allies helping me with the skyfire/interceptor variant of the riptide for an anti-air role as prescience or fate runes will carry over into your enemy's phases which goes a long way to help the ion riptide score reliable hits on intercepting fliers.

Additional note: Get's hot's also can be rerolled if you have "twin linked" essentially or if you buffed BS to 6 or higher so you can fire the regular overcharge ion accelerator pretty reliably. Most people also play that while the Nova charge failure (which is pretty damn often if you ask me) does not grant you an armor or invul save, FnP is not a save so you can still take that to hopefully offset the wound. Not entirely sure if legal yet but I think the new Eldar wraithseer can help heal the riptide too with some of the battle rune powers.

A somewhat cheese move but totally legal if you want to ignore assaults altogether would be to Jump on top of Impassable terrain (as long as you can balance there). You treat it as dangerous terrain but as a MC, you automatically have move through cover so auto pass and can sit up there forever if you wanted to. You can still however be assaulted by other Jump or flying things though so it's not completely fool proof but things like beasts/Calvary/infantry can't get to you. Bikes however can ride up there to get you still.

Enemy counters to the riptide -

GK = DK's with force weapons are probably the biggest most common threat you will see. Avoid CC at all costs. Can't intercept vs their shunt move and if one was close by, I'd usually risk a nova charge to go for a 3+ invul or 4d6 run away move. Unload everything on the one (or possibly 2 that come in) With sufficient volume of fire they can be brought down but you will take casualties invariably. Very difficult to blast 2 off them off in one round however and you will probably need some sacrificial screening units to help with them

CSM - flying MC's and oblits are probably the biggest issues I see. Most of their fast options that get into CC are pretty slow so you should have little trouble. Again, MSU builds with some sacrificial units to protect the riptide from assault and to force grounding checks are the way to go.

Daemons - more of the same flying MC's. Generally should be able to survive if you place him far back enough and interceptors with volume will take care of the deep striking horrors. The riptide will be able to survive warpflame fairly easily (uness you roll a 6 of course), so you shouldn't have too much trouble. The issue only really comes up with firing priority. Do you take shots at the FMC's? Or do you go after the scouted up hounds on turn 1? This is again a tough call and more often than not I run some more sacrificial fire warriors or drones (hence I still quite like some of those cheap parianas and occasionally a single bodyguard crisis suit by himself (2d6's 1' away from the beasts so to force them into place/make them waste movement) into the path of the hounds to buy myself more time to shoot something worthwhile down.

New Eldar - really depends on what you face. Is he rushing a wraith knight at you? Focus fire!. If he's trying to torrent you, just tank it and let your other MSU squads chip away at them in return. He can try to strip wounds as well with rending/prisms and lances and really will be up to the rest of your list to stay at range and fire back. With the IA, I tend to have the range so I'm only really super threatened by the prism and can hug ruins for a decent save without always overcharging.

Space wolf - drop pod rune priest trying to JAWS you? this one is tough as our Iniative 2 (3 for being a MC) can cause us to fail pretty easily. I'd use interceptors on multiple units specifically for this. It's a cheap upgrade and my plan generally has me trying to frag the priest before he can cast. Str 8 IA charged shot tends to help quite a bit. I'd try to go first in this kind of scenario just so I can pre-cast prescience on my interceptor units (riptide) to help with this kind of thing. Incidentially I almost always take plasma guns as my backup weapon instead of the missles because I prefer to deny any hard hitting assault things their armor. Yet another thing you can do if you are using Eldar allies is to have the farseer or unit with farseer in front of the riptide from where you expect the drop pod to come from (usually side with some cover and it is somewhat predictable even with decent players) The Jaws will likely have to pass through the farseer unit who will have a 4+ deny the witch vs most lv 1 suicide rune priests and can give you a point to take the runes of warding still.

Necrons - wraith star is probably the biggest threat. Generally I'd take a flank and that way it'll let me try to get away during assault moves to stay away from the necrons. This way it will usually be turn 3 before I get caught and I can at least make up my points with death wraiths from the riptide. I'd also try to keep him away from my other units to prevent multi-assaults. If he ignores the riptide in favor of killing my troops, I'd just try to kill off his wraiths or his backfield on the next rounds. As long as some small squad of fire warriors survive somewhere on the map and or elder allies jetbike scoring things on the other far aside of the map, I'll still win. This is my trade the riptide to win scenario. Case the riptide? I'll make sure you'll be too far away to kill or contest much else but sure, you can super kill him with MSS/warscythes/rending w/e you want. It's all good with me

IG - gunline trading hits and interceptor vs planes/storm troopers and the like usually has us in a more favorable position. The Str 9 ordinance shot can be devastating vs parking lots especially with ignore cover (which according to the wording on markerlights makes the weapon you fire gain the ignore cover rule so you don't have to get other vehicles touched by the blast marker a save either. Just touching the marker is full strength now so it's quite good that way.

Vs other Tau - This would be a tough match up and I'd say in general whoever got to go first may survive and whoever got hotter dice will do better. No real tricks here in a mirror match of fire power since both sides may have ignore cover and get lots of hits on. Consider overcharge for the 3++ but really, it's gonna be whoever shoots first and has a more balanced list to pressure harder earlier will do better. Always remember to play the mission however. Losing the riptide cause the whole of the enemy team focused it down is fine as long as you got more of the objectives at the end.

VS orks - take out the lootas and that's about all I can recommend lol. Just stay away from melee and you'll be fine.

VS marines in general - totally list dependent but same principles. Intercept Deep strikers/drop pods. Maintain air superiority if possible. Get ready to eat a bunch of AP2 missles/lascannons from the storm raven by hiding in ruins and you will do ok. Take out his devestators with lascannons. Don't be too afraid to charge a land raider as long as whatever inside isn't too bad. We overall have the advantage here if played right.

Vs Nids - MSU those flying tyrants down if possible. Bubble wrap if you can with some cheap fire warriors or drones. Shouldn't be too bad overall. Drowing in gnats is a possibility too though and you may have to use lots of fire to down the tervigons instead.

Vs DE - venoms and lances can ruin your day still and it's really about killing them before they do you in. Down the venoms ASAP as they force a lot of wounds. FnP helps in this kind of match up tremendously and I usually have 2 riptides so I split the duty. The FnP / interceptor one generally deploys a bit more up front so it "tanks a bit more" since no one can resist rapid fire just abouts. The skyfire interceptor one stays a bit further back and offers additional fire support. 72' guns and other long distance firepower goes a long way to negate night shields. Flickerfield will still be annoying so I often don't waste markerlights to strip cover as I'm gonna need him to fail a 5++ no matter what.

Vs SoB - take out those exorcists ASAP! Overcharge IA with the str 9 ordnance has a decent chance to kill or at least pen/make it snap fire on a one to one basis. Having potentially 3 shooting at you while some sisters with an undying st.celestine flying in your face will probably take down at least one riptide/lock it in combat while you wittle down the rest of the threats. Neuter the exorcists either by riptides or deep striking crisis suits to side armor and then use your small arms to burn down the seraphrim/st. Celestine.

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XV8 crisis suit teams - Will really need markerlights to function well however as they really need the BS skill increases to be at their best. Essentially fills the same role as they have in prior editions as your heavy mobile fire support unit but competing with the riptide makes them a bit less attractive. The FAQ on the weapon loadouts favors Tau greatly as you can now take 2 plasma rifles as singles and do not need to twin link. The old plasma + missles work just as well but I personally prefer squads to be more specialized and I find it to be more efficient if I unload all AP2 fire at something or a lot more missle shots at range against one target. Be careful of fighting other tau however as seeker missles will insta gib a suit. Krack missle spam or lascannons will also give these guys a bad time.

It depends on if you want to use them to suicide or use them as more of a center piece but in the latter role, try to get some drones in there to block shots especially against sites where AP3 str 8 hits may be comming from. A cheap gundrone can block a bullet pretty well though their leadership makes this still a risky tactic.

Also can throw in some marker drones to help other units finish off a unit in case your suit team fails to kill it completely though personally I've not found this that useful as with good positioning, you can generally take down most things you build them to handle. As I've been messing around more with the riptide, I've been finding my elite slots quite crowded so sometimes I'd opt for the bodyguard crisis suits instead.

Personal favorite load outs currently is 3 suits with 2 plasma rifles each and no other specific upgrades other than maybe interceptor if I have points (range is an issue so I save their fire for possible rapid fire in my turn). Another one is double missle pods + interceptor. This gives me a cheap deterrent for light fliers and the range lets me hit most things that may come up. It's usually enough shots to force a jink and then I can take out w/e it is with markerlight support and more missles/heavier fire power in my turn. Added benefit of being able to deep strike these guys into the enemy backfield makes it much harder for fliers to avoid but not ideal as they can just not come in till turn 4 like some games lol.

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XV25 Stealth Team - I've never been a big fan of these guys and so far not impressed with them either. The increased shots from the burst cannon now at 4 vs the 3 last edition gives these guys a bit more punch and you can infiltrate them up to decent locations though all it really has done for me with that was cause them to get assaulted. Tried them in most successfully in the outflank role as backline distraction though still not a top pick for me given point restrictions. Their homing beacon is somewhat useful as they can help crisis suits show up where they need to. Most people hear that they have a 2+ save in ruins don't even bother shooting at them so I've not had too much success in getting them to tank shots. Fair movement (6'+run+2d6 assault, can get them decent map placement at least) has gotten me linebreaker a few times since they tend to get ignored if the enemy lacks assault units.

Additional uses for me have been vs some IG parking lots to infiltrate them up the side and then try to get side or rear armor shots with some markerlight support. Str 5 can still Pen with decent amount of shots. Melta will also make them a threat so hopefully should draw some fire (which is what they are great at absorbing but terrible at getting shot at with any priority at times)

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Troops

Fire warriors – overall good asset to most lits and always needed to cap objectives. I tend to prefer the pulse rifles still and leave the carbines for any drones. There are so many options for these guys now I love it. The low leadership problem has been fixed with etherals or you can always attach allied characters to them. EMP grenades are really nice and I like to keep some or at least one squad with them just so I can wreck some AV14 if I lose all my rail cannons/fusion blasters or just get so sick of 4+ jink saving Tau/Eldar transports up in my grill lol. While good EMP is not completely necessary and in a truely competitive list, I doubt I'll really take them much.
Remember that the photon grenades will give them stealth at close range to the enemy meaning 3+ cover in ruins vs assault units and their bolt pistols at least. In MSU roles, you may or may not appreciate having photon grenades as you may not want them to be stuck in combat leaving other folks unable to shoot.

Support fire may seem kind of nice but it's pretty hit and miss. Packing too many squads together make you vulnerable to flamers/blast tempaltes and frankly it's pretty unreliable. After a few games with people and they've usually figured out that it's not that big a deal and you'll get assaulted anyway. Just remember to have pathfinders fire first of course and you then may get lucky and get to snap fire at improved BS.

I tend to run these guys as MSU for the most part and I run several squads as I tend to use sacrificial units pretty often as screen or secure objectives. Remember, ALWAYS play the mission. These guys may be giving their lives for the greater good but make it count. They may be pawns but use them to distract/harass/screen and ultimately win games. Everything else in our codex is quite killy but for the most part 6th edition is about objectives.

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Devilfish - the fish is kind of in a mixed spot. AV 12 is not that hard to crack but can help with tau gunline mobility (though outflank tends to work better). The improved guns often won't have alot of markerlights to take advantage of since most other things will have better target priority. I've had some fun with the smart missles though as just an annoyance unit role to snipe shots at people behind LOS though the gun drones are more useful tactically as you can have blocking bodies to put between potential assaulters. It's overall an expensive transport with the nearly mandantory disruption pods and frankly I'm not using them much other than increasing an etheral's aura range. Compared to the new Eldar Wave serpent or even the massed AV 13 of the new sisters of battle forge world repressors, I'm just not as big a fan of the devilfish when comparing transports. Really too slow to get across the map on turn 4 or 5 (12' move + 6' flat out move) alone usually means you have to start moving this thing filled with troops by turn 2-3 to get to where you need to them camp and hopefully survive. Remember their flatout save is a 4+ with Jink and 3+ with a disruption pod. This is much better premise than imperial tanks not able to flatout if they want to use smoke at 5+ cover.

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Kroot Carnivore squad - overall, these guys are quite fun to use now and I've really liked to use these guys now especially in an outflank and objective camping role. Due to their leadership, I've been always running them with an ethereal or other high LD IC attached. They fill a nice tactical spot with cheap sniper fire (rending, 4+wound on MC's, precision strike across the squad). Sniper rifles don't replace the pulse rounds so you can fire them on the move in non-sniping mode so they can be effective pretty much anywhere. Despite being a kroot rifle, their pulse rounds also benefit from the etheral's storm of fire for increased rapid fire effectiveness. Doesn't work on sniper rounds though. This is one of the options available to tau to help burn down really tough things like Iron arm nids or the new eldar Wraith Knight.

On outflanking squads I tend to pay for a shaper to try and pass ldr checks a bit easier though not really necessary as long as there is an etheral somewhere along the back edge of your board to "catch" them with his ldr 10 bubble though this does make holding positions a bit more risky

Kroot Hounds = 5 point acute senses buff for my squad. I just get one just to allow my outflanks to be more effective but actually worth taking (at least one anyway). You can't really get all the beast movement bonuses with infantry in the same unit (as there is no way to not buy the 10 kroot) and their stats are not good enough to make actual assault troops so to me, just stuck as an acute sense buff.

Krootox rider - too expensive and really has their role already filled by other units. Maybe has a role as the support auto cannon on outflaking squads but generally I'm not sold on the unit.

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Fast Attack

This will be a very key slot for Tau as the tactical roles are so different between all these choices and most are really good. This will probably be the biggest differences between


Sun Shark Bomber - besides the bomb rules problem (which most people will play with just having a bomb on board anyway), it has some fun ways to play. You can also drop off your interceptor drones at the enemy backfield and have them intercept rear armor of enemy aircraft fairly easily. Additionally, you can actually attach the drones to a commander who can buff them to BS5 with a drone controller too. I think it's the best codex flier anyway. It also has the additional advantage of having the markerlight and some seeker missles which you can fire on other air targets manually as well.

Dropping off your drones deep into the enemy backfield is almost a must in my opinion as the bomber tends to not survive too long. Unfortunately this squad cannot score linebreaker as drones are not scoring/denial units.

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Razorshark Strike Fighter - the pulse ion turret seems interesting as you should be able to fly over other fliers and get some nice rear armor shots on them with the tail gun though the burst cannon won't get to fire. (it can't actually rotate past the engines in the default build. with magnets you can rotate it but I do not know if it will be "modeling for advantage" to do so. The extra seeker missles are again best used early as the flier is actually quite fragile. The BS3 unfortunately hurts this flier somewhat unless you can buff it with like eldar divination (since marker lights would be a bit tough to place on fliers from most ground sources)

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Pathfinder Team - these guys will probably be the most contraversal unit for most tau players based on personal playstyle. Kept in the traditional markerlight role they perform well enough. Cheap markerlights in a squad that really needs to hug cover to stay alive along with using heavy weapons makes them ideal to camp with gunlines. With support fire and stringing them out in a row, you can get good coverage to help them light up assault targets for others to improve their snap fire bs. They are horribly vulnerable to flamers however especially things like St. Celestine/shunting DK's with incinerators/ interceptor GK's with incinerators/ heldrakes/ or other ignore cover weapons like noise marines and colossus blast templates so they can get burned down really fast.

With the ion rifle and rail rifle, you can alternatively use them as your sniper teams which can still stay mobile (to a degree as they have pretty poor survivability in the open) especially with darkstrider which makes them into good character assasins with the -1 toughness coupled with str 8 or str 6 ap1 shots. Leave the markerlights to commander with marker drones. Their range is also very good so you can engage at some good distance (30')

The positional relay hopscotch - Just as an aside, the positional relay can replace the need for acute sense and you can actually outflank a pathfinder team into the enemy's backfield who has their own positional relay which will then allow you to have further units outflank just about anywhere along the entire backside of the enemy's deployment area. Incidentially this may also let units outflank onto your own backfield which is normally not even an option so you can counter deep strikers or other outflanking units potentially.

I've not really found much of a role for the grav inhibitor drone or the pulse accelerator as their carbines just don't impress me enough to be worth buffing. I'd leave the str 5 shooting to fire warriors.

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Tetra (Forge World) - Didn't make it into the codex but I really liked this unit. The new forge world relaunch of the Taros campaign changed these guys to Heavy 2 instead of 4 marker lights but made them twin linked so it'll end up kind of the same though it's a slight nerf in my opinion. Still a good backup markerlight source that is quite mobile which I personally prefer instead of the very static pathfinders which may make it hard for the rest of the Tau army to engage. If your area allows forge world, a squadron of these guys will most times make your build.

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Remora (Forge World) - This has been changed a lot in the rewritten Imperial armor book and has been quite buffed. This thing is quite worth taking now with a further points decrease from the last imperial aeronautical book. It's also really durable in that it's short enough to benefit from most ruins as well as skyfire and shrouding. The guns on it aren't bad (vs infantry anyway - kind of crappy at str 5 vs other fliers) but the fact that it can markerlight too makes it pretty darn good since it has 2 seeker missles.
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Barracuda air superiority fighter (Forge World) - good amounts of guns on this thing and fairly cheap at near storm talon prices from the latest aeronautica book. This thing is further improved in the new imperial armor Taros campaign re-release and has an extra armor to the front 11/10/10/10 along with some excellent guns. Quite a bit different than the codex fliers in the range and use of it. Very competitive fast attack slots choice for Tau. Probably our best Air Asset. (Just in case you were wondering it's got an ion cannon just like the one on the hammerhead, 2 sponson burst cannons and one twin linked missle pod)

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Piranha - Fulfils a similar role to the SM land speeder in that it will be a quick fast gunboat to deliver meltas for the most part where and when you need it. Burst cannons and drones can be good vs horde type lists but I really see this thing as a melta delivery vehicle with a good jink + disruption pod save (though I really find it tough to find the points to buy them pods since I use them typically sucidially). You can also unload your drones to act as an anti-charge bubblewrap squad as well so it will be a fairly good all around unit but competing with pathfinders and fliers will be a tough sell to include in every list. With the change to broadside str 8 railguns, I can see these guys still finding a home in metas where you see alot of AV 14 like land raider spam, Lehman Russ walls, necron av 13 walls, and bastions that need to be cracked. With their fast skimmer status, I can almost always get these guys into position by turn 2 anywhere on the map to get off my meltas (just be careful of the eldar wave serpent's shields and holo fields if you are going for a quick frag) [12' + 18' flat out +12' move 2nd turn] Totally wish there was a way to give them scout/outflank but oh well.

I almost always dismount the drones asap and have them engage other targets as they would still exist after the vehicle invariably dies and often have different target selection. The drones are fast enough with (6+2d6 assault move) to be effective on their own.

In addition, a full squadron of piranhas will create 6 gun drones (essentially for free) and you can attach a commander with drone controller to buff them to BS 5 (saves you 14 points a gun drone) Give the commander some anti-infantry weapons and you got yourself a pretty fearsome shooting squad for very cheap. (Incidentially if you roll personal warlord trait and get scoring, these free gun drones are now potential denial units too)

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Gun Drone squad - marker squad! Top roles is with a support commander with a drone controller and you'll be able to get virtually all the marker lights you need on a target that you probably don't need too many other sources of markerlights. This is probably their best role on most lists. Gets a bit more expensive but it is alot better than pathfinders as they can move and fire due to being jet packs and can also use JSJ to get back into LOS terrain to help stay alive. Good mobility to just skirt around the edges of the battle and work their way up to get linebreaker with the commander. These guys have become so popular that many folks are now figuring ways to specifically kill these guys. Beware of just taking one squad of these guys as one heldrake can ruin your day. Remember that in the squad they cost 14 points a piece while with the commander bought as wargear, they are only 12 points (though cap at 2)
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Vespid stingwings - used to be really just jump troops that had anti-MEQ guns. Again, competing with markerlights and fliers will be a tough sell to include in most lists still. I honestly have 6 of them from back in the old metal days but I really can't find a place for them in a competitive list.

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Heavy Support

Broadside – a lot of changes to these guys, some good, some bad and will really affect the way you build your lists.
The railgun set – Str 8 AP1 shots are pretty decent at penetrating and blowing up AV12 but starts to get pretty unreliable vs AV13 or 14 unless you stick a tank hunter support commander in with them. The range nerf and damage nerf really has hurt this build. You are also no longer going to be able to fit them on top of the bastion with the new 60mm bases which kind of suck. New SOB FW repressor spam with AV13 and of course the new Eldar (or tau) 4+ jink and especially the wave serpent shields make these guys much less attractive. Needs more volume to counter things like necron destroyer wraiths.

The high yield missle set - numerically these things come out ahead despite the str 7 vs 8 railguns but you do lose some range which can place your broadsides uncomfortably close to plasma cannon fire range. The str 7 volume of fire is enough to glance/wreck most things to death and come out ahead vs infantry/light vehicles over the railgun. Far superior vs Eldar vs the railguns at the right ranges especially vs D-scythe wave serpent spam.

Missle drones – almost always take these drones (well I like them anyway). The added str 7 power is usually worth it for the points. Depending on the deployment facing, I use them to soak up Ap2 fire or I hide them behind the broadsides to let the 2+ armor broadsides suck up the damage (depending on their board position and what enemies guns I expect to see. Unfortunately drone controllers don't work on missle drones so it's kind of a wasted buff however markerlights or Eldar prescience / fortune blessings still work well. Keeping them with a commander with multi-spectrum sensors (with tank hunter) can vastly improve the amount of damage the missles will do to the more wide spreading mech now a days.

The biggest debate for these guys really come down to what you want them to do. Broadsides are there in every scenario to provide anti-medium/light vehicle damage and some ranged decent strength fire. Your choice mostly will be to decide between interceptor or skyfire. (personal choice for me is interceptor as I use the riptide to provide me with skyfire/interceptor and hopefully get some markerlights to help buff them in the shooting phases. Most of their weapons are already twin linked so I don't usually case prescience or guide on them. They are also very static as opposed to a riptide so they usually have to contend with deep strikers attacking them and or harassment) (I also really hate how expensive the velocity tracker is so I often don't buy it in favor of the interceptor support system)


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Hammerhead gunship and longstrike - Will be hard to miss if you get the warlord triat of "through unity, devastation" or with commander shadow sun's command link drone if you take longstrike. As there are very few sources of str 10 fire and predominance of multi-wound toughness 5 things assaulting in daemons, DA's, chaos marines all have quite alot of these and even bike marine captains or T5 nid MC's, I have a feeling I will almost always at least keep one hammerhead in the list just to bring the threat. Having a 4+ jink save in the open via disruption pods is still pretty decent. The ion cannon is good too actually but I'm again using riptides to supply my ion fire and use the hammerhead to provide rail fire with submunitions. The smart missle system is my personal favorite so far instead of drones as you can have this guy parked near your units to help snap fire overwatch. There is I feel a bit too much expectation for myself and longstrike anyway. I invariably roll a few 1's and every time I do, I feel like I just wasted his points. Statistically he's a decent upgrade but not completely necessary.

The hammerhead suffers a lot from having to always move to get jink (unless you can find a nice building to hunker down in with sensor spines) and not able to shoot all its weapons with good accuracy.

Forgeworld hammerhead turrets - The changes that made them into 2 weapons needs to be FAQ'ed as we no longer have multi-trackers and so you'll be snap firing one of the guns. In general, stick with the ion cannon or railgun+submunitions.

(of note, given the power of fire prisms from eldar allies, I keep wanting to toss out my one hammerhead and instead use the points for the more maneuverable and still quite survivable prism instead)

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Skyray - you are either going to love it or hate it. Vs other tau, the seeker missles will help one shot crisis suits nicely. The markerlights can light up aircraft and since you can manually fire the seeker missles, you can really bring down a high priority flier with essentially 6 missles all in one turn (though you'll be pretty useless after that unfortantely and be kind of an expensive though survivable markerlight choice.) This unit synergizes well with my non-skyfire broadsides as I can mark up a plane with it in my shooting phase reliably (I expect my aircraft to be dead usually or I just didn't take Tau planes) and unload on them with the twin linked missle pods or do a ripple effect with a marker drone squad at BS 3 (possibly with guide/prescience) and then can blow up the plane with the broadsides at pretty high BS. Tactic really only reserved for very high risk targets like storm ravens or heldrakes/vendettas or FMC of some sort that just has to die that turn. I generally have no missles left by turn 4 so it tends to just be markerlight support and or good for ramming/burst cannon/sms shots.

Against FMC's, the skyfiring markerlights are another way to force grounding checks. You get hit with the lights it forces a check. While not exactly clear if seekers count but we've been playing it locally as they count as different source attacked so we force more grounding checks for each seeker missle hit. Ask your local meta if that is how they would play it too.
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Tau Sniper Drone Team - these guys have really been buffed, the drones can all fire at bs 5 thanks to the drone controller and you can hide the marksman behind cover full time as he just needs to stay alive and doesn't need to look at the enemy to buff the drones. The drones themselves can still JSJ and can get behind LOS themselves as well so this squad can be fairly annoying to take down but completely dependent on the available LOS blocking terrain you have. The only downside however is that the longshot pulse rifle is not that useful vs every target. (can be buffed by the etheral to fire extra shots however if at rapid fire range which is at 24' actually) and the limited number of shots per point you are spending. Park them in or behind a ruin and you are looking at some tough long range snipers with a 3+ save.

Incidentially, if you want, you can put a drone controller commander and put the marksman up front so he'd die. Once he does, you now have a bs5 mobile sniper squad that moves around at 48' and rapid fires a lot.

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Fortifications

overall I feel like Tau are probably going to be best played as a mobile gunline but fortifications will still definately have some uses.

Bastion - overall great cover for broadsides to hide inside, and maybe something on top to fire the quad/icarus on top. I'm hoping that the fire cadre fireblades will fill this role or maybe some pathfinders sitting up there. Constantly taking dangerous terrain tests with jumpacks however will discourage some crisis suits sitting up there though using it to block LOS is going to be primarily why I'd take this thing. Gotta make sure there's something that can reliably hide my jetpacks.

Vehicles also get a 3+ cover save if they are partially obscured so you can get a 2+ cover save with d-pods. SMS also don't need LOS so all you need is the turret pocking out to get the benefit and can still shoot back nicely.

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Aegis - probably fair place for holding an objective and to camp it with fire warriors or something allied in. Would be ideal for some IG allies to hold the aegis with a blob and a commander to use "get back in the fight" orders. Lots of lists need this thing to be effective but Tau has enough interceptor and skyfire to make it not always necessary. Can be a good source of a comms relay if you are going for a reserve heavy build.

Compared to the bastion, I have an easy time having my attached farseer in with broadsides in here (buffing leadership and possibly granting them perfect timing as well) and can take advantage of the quad gun or Icarus lascannon man the gun without having to resort to getting some sort of sniper rifle. If you presience/guided the broadsides and their drones, you carry over the blessing into the interceptor phase so you will be able to get a twin linked Icarus lascannon.
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Skyshield - not that useful for tau as it is say for IG but can be useful vs things like helldrakes vector strikes (which ignore cover) or noise marine spam with igore cover weapons or other tau using marker lights on your units. Bonus for our vehicles is that you don't need to bother moving it for jink saves and can save points on disruption pods or shield drones/shield generators. This thing is pretty damn big so can have some problems even finding a place to put the thing down. Can also hide things under the legs for LOS blocking survival too. It's almost impossible for any flier to draw LOS to a unit under the skyshield.

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Fortress of redemption - As much as I like the way this looks, it's so many points and just so big I have a hard time actually using this thing in a competitive manner. Good place to hide some broadsides however as it's big enough though and can get some nice ordinance krack missle fun to fire off with some cheap drones operating the thing. (also so expensive!)

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Allies

This is the best part of Tau (and just about everyone else actually other than nids) Tau can ally with just about everyone and can add in something for any and all occasions.

Significant mention goes to:

Eldar + Tau - my personal choice for the past few months as I've loved having a small cheap buffing unit to my tau. Runes of warding changed now which has really upset my ability to limit my enemy's buffs but at least can help give me some 3+ DtW vs some of the daemon and eldar attack/debuff powers.

Having a farseer join in with fire warriors or kroot helped offset their low leadership many times without needing to take an etheral. If I got lucky and got ignore cover power, I can ally the farseer in with the broadsides or my interceptor/skyfire riptide and destroy most anything flying my way without the need for markerlights. Farseers also have the added benefit of taking both divination and fate runes so they can actually buff two units instead of just one like the old version with guide and prescience. Eldrad can't cast 2 powers anymore but the regular cheaper farseer more than makes up for it.

Some of the Eldar remenant of glory choices are also quite fun to consider for our gunlines. Faolchu's wing can let you basically "run" into the enemy backfield to score line breaker with the far seer on like turn 5 if your broadsides are already good to go or dead. Doing this also lets you buff your allies one last time before you run over so it has many added benefits. (almost a guaranteed way to score 1 VP with 30 points)

The Uldanorethi long rifle can give your Farseer something to do other than sit there at extreme range and try to snipe things the broadsides are gunning at though it's pretty crappy honestly for the points. The mantle of the laughing god I've not found to be as useful as you can't really build a full list around this like you can as Eldar Main. The shard of Anaris is a way to get fearless for 40 points but it's not all that useful as far as I can tell.

Additional mention goes towards that the eldar jetbikes are really fast and can offset a lot of the static nature of tau gunlines. You can also go with a wraithseer (gives up divination/fortune buffs though) and get some very sturdy T6, 3+, fearless troops to help hold distant objectives if you get them wave serpents which have really become one of the best transports in the game now (though this is quite expensive in points) Telepathy has some very good powers if you roll up puppetmaster and or hallucination though the default power isn't as good. Having her in with like a wraithguard unit in a wave serpent will let them get into range most times to get these handy spells off.

If your area allows forgeworld, the Nightwing Eldar flier is quite good with 2 bs 4 bright lances and 2 shiruken cannons good at taking out a lot of other fliers. Keeping it out interceptor range is the hard part but not impossible as you can fly in on your far edge and then vector dance to shot angle. The nightwing is also really good as it has shrouded which means a 5+ cover save just coming up the board if you jink it's actually buffed up to a 2+ cover save because of agile rule(+1 to cover from jink) ( see IA: aeronautica page 5). Similar things can be done with the crimson hunter from regular codex Eldar though of course you won't get the shrouded which is its best asset. (nor the agile rule) The nightwing is fairly survivable but you may have to do some psychic powers like guide to keep the damage up.

The Wrath Knight is a very good unit as well. It'll take the place of what you imagine a hammerhead to be doing (i.e. popping high toughness targets). It is also fast and a great fire magnet so you can use him pretty aggressively which can be pretty refreshing. It can be a tough pick between the wraith knight and a fire prism so you have to decide what kind of list you want to make and if already have what it takes to cover the fire prism targets (I.e. riptides in general and possibly hammerhead)

One other really good combo is if you have a support commander with tank/monster hunter (puretide chip) + Multi-sensor suite and command and control node, you can join him up with a bunch of Dark Reapers and effectively get crazy amounts of str 8 fire which essentially can and will kill just about any and everything in the game handidly (glance Av14 fairly reliably - instant death T4 models etc) and will ignore cover... and is twin linked and can pen vehicles fairly reliably or wound monsters like the wraith knight and is AP3 so will eat marines especially with the str 5 ap3 heavy 2 profile. They are also slow and purposeful so they will be able to move and shoot. For protection, may consider a primaris battle runes power spirit seer or warlock if you are Eldar main (for Conceal which gives you shrouded) Parked in a ruins will net you some awesome 2+ cover save too!



Orks + Tau - Very cheap bodies to hold down the field and offer counter attack options that are very good and fast like nob bikers. Recent torunaments had good showings with the "Torks" as well played by saber-X in West Coast USA. Basically offering again sturdy objective campers which Tau lack. Having some mixed in nob bikers can give you some much needed assault potential while Lootas are kind of like more expensive missle drones incase you wanted more str 7.

IG + Tau - great choice to man the stationary fortifications while the tau bring the mobile guns. Either way, alot of guns all around! I like using the bastion to hide some artillery and blob squads to hold objectives while crisis suits get the enemy back field. This choice however is a bit lacking if you are facing a dedicated assault build army like slanesh fiends/seeker builds and you really are just there to wipe the enemy before they ever have a way to get to your lines. Daemon prince flying circus builds will also be tough to stop if they get into your lines with enough LOS blocking terrain so it's very important on placement.

SM + Tau - ATSKNF fire warriors rawr! Seriously though, with the changes the disruption pods (just +1 cover save now, and not stealth so it will stack with stealth), having a techmarine boosted ruins can help boost some cover saves to 2+. Taking a thunderfire cannon can get you a second bolster and good anti-horde fire power. Having storm talons and storm ravens available as well is fairly useful as well (but storm raven conflicts with the thunderfire so it'll depend on your role for the allies) A librarian can also give you some psy defenses as well though this is kind of a minor buff. Best played if you like elite type armies. Farsight with his warlord trait and his large cadre of bodyguards with target locks can also join together with a space marine Libran using gate of infinity and hop around the map without scattering which will be really handy tool in many cases to contest or get rear armor shots on things. More will come with the SM codex drop in a few months.

GK + Tau - great at protecting the gunline and while I love both armies, I'm hard pressed for points usually when I mash the two of them up. Both support good shooting and GK offers some good anti-deep strike protection with warpquakes or "I've been expecting you." But the costs in terms of points is tough to handle if you want to get all of the great units. Riptide + DK can work well together however be careful of shunting into the enemy back field and then get scatters on top of lol. Overall solid choice but probably can do a bit better with other allies since GK doesn't help the Tau scoring too much and has problems as elite armies with too few bodies and not too much maneuverability.

Chaos Marines + Tau - I see more Tau as the ally in this mix just cause I really like noise marines. On the flip side, cultists can be good bodies to hold objectives and leave the heavy lifting to tau backed up by some tough bikers or spawn. Would be kind of like orks but also different in your basic troops and terrain. My latest incarnation of this includes blast master marine squads + oblits + 2 heldrakes + Marker-O with marker drones + IA riptide, + crisis bodyguards with interceptor and heavy slot generally goes to missle spam broadsides. Very killy but very static.

Necrons + Tau - not sure necrons really even need allies but Tau can definately use the assault options offered by necron wraiths and of course fliers will always have a role as allies. As necrons probably have the strongest assault options right now in the wraithstar (D.lord + weave + MSS + warscythe + 6 wraiths), it'd be hard to not take advantage of this if you are lacking in assault/counter assault roles. If you got enough guns to just kill eveyrthing however, you may not even need these guys around. (beware as even the wraithstar has some trouble vs like a 30 seeker blob + herald or large amounts of str 8 shooting)

SW + Tau - can provide some good psy protection as well as JAWS for the rune priests and drop pod meltas to help compensate for the decrease in broadside abilities to take out AV 13/14. I can see this still as fairly strong choice. Can have some thunderwolves as the counter assault element as well. This is now the only way for Tau to offset enemy psychic power buffs but likely will change with the next SW or SM codex launch.

Sisters + Tau - Can be fun as you can have St. Celestine as a big annoyance and can still get linebreaker (as she may not be scoring in this alliance but can still be denial). Outflanking dominos can get meltas to where you need them as well. Mostly will be there to provide additional melta suport / multi-melta fire. Not really that competitive I feel though now you can throw up a wall of AV 13 transports (forge world repressors), it may be a great distraction and LOS blocking ability. Too bad not allies of convenience. Ahh well.

DA + Tau - This would be a fun way to get some terminators into mostly a carapace armored force. DA terminators backed up by some long range fire power would be a fun choice though you really can't afford too many points in this respect. Having some terminators show up on turn 1 for a deathwing assault + drop pod can be fairly devastating to an enemy however and can buy your guline time to get the enemy down without too many losses. Tau would also really just be the support army to provide the skyfire traditional terminator forces are weak at. An interesting combo is the ravenwing command squad and their rad grenade launcher which can synergize with the darkstrider structural analyzer which can make your rail rifles instant death even T5 enemies like necron destroyer lords or SM bike commanders or heck, daemon princes. The combo works but it is kind of dependent on somewhat squishy units so not always a sure take and only really kind of effective as the enemy can usually LOS the wounds anyway. The power generator can be kind of handy to buff static hammerheads / broadsides clustered around your techmarine in the back as well but it's a shame he can't join into a squad. The newest FAQ disallows for you to increase the range of the power generator by being in a vehicle now.

BA + Tau - I'd use the tau as the big gunline and have a bunch of fast scouting BA units and jump infantry with FnP to distract the enemy. Not really my top choice for a combo.

BT + Tau - I'm just gonna wait till the new BT codex updates them. I just can't find any particular use for them as an allies just yet that's not already done by SM above.

DE + Tau - while it's possible, it is not really recommended as there's definately better choices for additional shooting. Unless you really want to get in a void bomber or some missles from nightwing, I'd do something else. Best use in this list for us is venoms to help with putting wounds on very very tough MC's like Iron arm Nids or the elder wraith knight.

Daemons + tau - fun choice and actually can do some good as the daemons in this role are essentially purely sacrifical. Throw a bunch of seekers and daemonettes which all are fast at the enemy and tie them up while your gunline goes to work. Your allies will all be essentially suicide squads. I'd use some FMC + deep striking horrors + hounds or seekers to really just get into the enemy's face quickly.

I 've been a fan of your GK thread so I am gonna watch this closely cause I am sure it is gonna be interesting and full of informations. Way to go mate .

 sudojoe wrote:
I anticipate (based on the white dwarf) that the nova generator charge up effects will not be often used as it's going to be risky to wound yourself.

Nice first post. On this though - depending on the Codex of course! - I respectfully disagree. On one of the occasions it overcharged, the Gets Hot! rule was mentioned. Unless it changes for the suit, that means you have to roll a 1, THEN a 4+ to suffer any damage at all. I'll take that risk happily!

phew, finally had some time to update this while watching all the news today. I'll get more stuff updated over time.

all Etheral give away extra victory points, be sure to mention that, not worth taking them unless you really plan to use them. I am NOT saying they are bad. Just that you better have a plan.

Shadowsun is just not getting the love... toughness 3 yes that kinda hurts. but 3+ armor and a 5+ invuln. C&C drone that allows any unit within 12 to reroll 1's two fusion blasters (18" melta guns for you SM players) with split fire, and precison shots on 5 and 6s. Stealth and shrouded for a whole unit. 3d6 assault move.

You could put her in a unit of crisis suits, the one I'm playing around is x3 suits with plasma and burst cannons + sun and her drone. tons of shots good against heavy infantry and tons more durable and mobile than a veteran tau player is used to having.

note on allies... everyone wants eldar for fortune, but I say go with a SM libby for null zone and gate. Tau can boost BS with markerlights and rerolls (through twin linking crisis suits for example) that it just seems redundant. Take that libby and get rerolls on thier saves instead. Gate can help with mobility also /shrug.

One of my favrotie tactics is commander with drone controller joining the pirahana gun drones.

You get 2 units out of 1.

Take 4-5 fusion pirahas, and dislodge the 8-10 gun drones (hopefully the commander has marker drones)

this turns the pirahans from a 200-250 pt unit into just over 100 pts of fusion fun as the drones which are just over half its cost are now bs 5 with the commander!

Give the commander cyclic and a burst cannon to for lots of shots or give him target lock and some other weapons to shot another target.

Keep the drones by an ethereal as well for +1 shot at half range if needed.

I thought the Riptide burstcannon had Rending on Nova Charge. Though honestly I think the Ion Accelerator is the better option since you get a S8, AP2, large blast without the nova charge which gives you the option to use the 3++ or 4D6" jump.

Really I'd only take the burst cannon if they let you take two or if it was twin-linked.

nice overview, but the shielded missile drones do not benefit from the drone controller on an attached IC still with the C&C node they make up for BS2.

Great post!

A couple notes though. Shadowsun can't make the riptide infiltrate, though she does increase its jump move if shes the warlord.
Also, taking drones on the riptide increases the chance that your 200 odd point death machine will go running off your board edge the first time someone shoots at it.

Shadowsun can make the riptide outflank. And her C&C drone is great for avoiding overheat.

 sudojoe wrote:


Kroot Carnivore squad - overall, these guys are quite fun to use now and I've really liked to use these guys now especially in an outflank and objective camping role. Due to their leadership, I've been always running them with an etheral. They fill a nice tactical spot with cheap sniper fire (rending, 4+wound on MC's, precision strike across the squad). Sniper rifles don't replace the pulse rounds so you can fire them on the move in non-sniping mode so they can be effective pretty much anywhere. Despite being called a pulse round, they do not benefit from the etheral's extra shot buff which is kind of a shame.

This is incorrect, read the the Storm of Fire entry all the way to the end, it specifically states that it works with Kroot firing pulse rounds

Otherwise, great read!

thanks for the corrections! I totally missed alot of the stuff above. I've corrected the mistakes. Next update in a few days hopefully after I get the 2nd riptide built so I don't have to proxy in DK's lol.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Theorius wrote:
One of my favrotie tactics is commander with drone controller joining the pirahana gun drones.

You get 2 units out of 1.

Take 4-5 fusion pirahas, and dislodge the 8-10 gun drones (hopefully the commander has marker drones)

this turns the pirahans from a 200-250 pt unit into just over 100 pts of fusion fun as the drones which are just over half its cost are now bs 5 with the commander!

Give the commander cyclic and a burst cannon to for lots of shots or give him target lock and some other weapons to shot another target.

Keep the drones by an ethereal as well for +1 shot at half range if needed.

I was under the impression that the gun drones just made 3 units of 2 drones each. Are they supposed to form just one large drone unit? I can't find the rules on how to play that unit.

Phew, finally got some time to update this thing.

Eldar allies are amazing for Tau. I'm really loving the new "Taudar" or "Eld-tau" in so many variations.

Tough wraith guard scoring troops complement our squishy objective campers while counter attacking striking scorpions can offset a lot of our assault problems.

My biggest problem right now is that I'm liking the fire prism much more than our hammer head (even with longstrike in it) and I'm liking the wave serpent way more than our devilfish.

I like the riptide more than the wraith knight though.

Jetbikes for last min objective grabbing have gotten so much better this edition.

I'll try to update this thing a bit more frequently but been busy at work.

I think its important to mention that the Riptide is not fearless and if it takes Drones and loses just 1 it will be forced to take take a moral check. With the range of the IA the Riptides will be hanging around the back board edge and will be almost guarenteed to jump its self off the tabel on 3d6 if it fails. Can anyone else confirm this?

 Messy0 wrote:
I think its important to mention that the Riptide is not fearless and if it takes Drones and loses just 1 it will be forced to take take a moral check. With the range of the IA the Riptides will be hanging around the back board edge and will be almost guarenteed to jump its self off the tabel on 3d6 if it fails. Can anyone else confirm this?

This is indeed true. I also need to put in that I've lost another riptide to mindwar a few times in the past though I haven't encountered the new mind war but have taken a few wounds to executioner from the new elder due to terrible rolling. JAWS is another problem that sometimes comes up and it's one of the reasons I almost always take interceptor and cast divination on the riptide (carries into the enemy phase too). Good points though and I'll go update that too.

 sudojoe wrote:

 Messy0 wrote:
I think its important to mention that the Riptide is not fearless and if it takes Drones and loses just 1 it will be forced to take take a moral check. With the range of the IA the Riptides will be hanging around the back board edge and will be almost guarenteed to jump its self off the tabel on 3d6 if it fails. Can anyone else confirm this?

This is indeed true. I also need to put in that I've lost another riptide to mindwar a few times in the past though I haven't encountered the new mind war but have taken a few wounds to executioner from the new elder due to terrible rolling. JAWS is another problem that sometimes comes up and it's one of the reasons I almost always take interceptor and cast divination on the riptide (carries into the enemy phase too). Good points though and I'll go update that too.

For that reason i really dont think its worth putting drones with a Riptide.The missiles are also only 36" compared to the IA's 72" so you wont be getting much use out of them if your riptide positioning is correct, at least in the first few turns against a non fast army. I tend to use Missilesides with missile drones to get my fill of S7 Missiles. I do however use the SMS on both my Riptides to hit enemies such as spawn that tend to approach fast and hide some of their unit out of LoS but i have been considering switching to the Plasma Rifles.

I'm actually kind of with you on that one too. My points on drones generally go to broadsides too. I just wanted to put in the pros and cons as much as possible. I tend to see a fair share of drop pod assaults and I like the plasma guns better against most targets. I counter fast moving assault units usually with sacrificial units. Fast moving spawn really aren't that bad as they usually have fairly lousy saves and are still fairly vulnerable to our small arms fire. Usually can reposition most of my important stuff enough to go into either a split castle formation at double edges or just cut behind them with riptides getting fast boosts.

I've re-written quite a bit more on the riptide and also added common counter riptide strats by other codexes and ways I've countered the counters before.

BTW, I have the new IA3 2nd book, the Barricuda is actually 11/11/10/2hp and at 130pts is a steal compared to are other flyers, honestly, if this model was a plastic unit from GW itself, it would be flying off the shelves like vendettas and nightscythes. it has the new ion cannon, a tl mpod, 2x burstcannons that have a special rule that ignore all saves from units that jinx. (And since they can shoot backwards as well, this may be a viable tactic to destroy units like helldrakes), lastly it can also take 4 seekermissiles. With and increased BS to 4 this unit is a great deal. Costs the same as a wraithknight, and if your FLGS allows forgeworld, probably worth looking into.

Has anyone had any success spreading your markerlight sources around your forces. I've been running 3 MSU pathfinder units coupled with a Skyray and a Cadre Fireplace as my markerlight sources.

Now the Fireblade and the Skyray are durable on their own way but the small pathfinder units tend to get shot down relatively fast and I was thinking that I'd consolidate the units into 1 or 2 larger ones and then put some markerlight drones in my Crisis units with drone controllers.

That way I'd end up either with less total flashlights or more points spent in them but would gain durability and mobility.

Anyone running Crisis units with markerlights care to chime in?

Ps. I'm currently running an Ethereal and a Fireblade as my HQ choices so a Commander with drones is not something I'm looking for at the moment.

I run Crisis suits with Markerlights, but also use a Commander with drone controller for BS5 markerlights. I run 6 markerlight drones in the unit, and who are all plasma and missile pods with target locks.

Works well for me, especially early in the game as you can normally get at least 5 of the 6 markerlights onto a unit but still unload missiles and plasma into other targets from the Suits.

Whether it would work as well without the commander?

I am not that good at mathhammer so won't even attempt, i would say even with 6 drones, you'd likely only get 2 Markerlights.

Which to me seems like a waste of points.

Infiltrating 2 large unit of pathfinders into some ruins might be a better bet?

To run the crisis suits without a commander I usually go with a build like this.
2x suits 2xMpods (or PR) TL 2x markerdrones each
1x suit Shas'vre Multi spectrum suite, Command and control node, drone controller 2x markerdrones

this unit outputs 8 missiles with rerolls to hit and ignore covers saves at one target (Thats good enough to not need markerlights itself) and the 6 markerdrones shoot at the primary target with BS3 and rerolls, normally nets 4-5 markerlight hits.

With commander, just give him the same weapon type as the normal suits, TL, DC iridium armor and puretide chip if your using missiles. you can then change out the DC on the shas'vre for a vectored thruster to allow the unit to escape as needed.

This unit now really hammers vehicles with 12 tankhunter missiles, 4 at BS5 all rerolls and ignore cover saves.
The marklights with BS5 now and reroll almost always get 6 hits.

I find this unit to be very effective.

I've got a lite version of that with a 'vre using the chip. Gonna have to give the suite and the node some thought as well

Coyote81 wrote:
To run the crisis suits without a commander I usually go with a build like this.
2x suits 2xMpods (or PR) TL 2x markerdrones each
1x suit Shas'vre Multi spectrum suite, Command and control node, drone controller 2x markerdrones

this unit outputs 8 missiles with rerolls to hit and ignore covers saves at one target (Thats good enough to not need markerlights itself) and the 6 markerdrones shoot at the primary target with BS3 and rerolls, normally nets 4-5 markerlight hits.

With commander, just give him the same weapon type as the normal suits, TL, DC iridium armor and puretide chip if your using missiles. you can then change out the DC on the shas'vre for a vectored thruster to allow the unit to escape as needed.

This unit now really hammers vehicles with 12 tankhunter missiles, 4 at BS5 all rerolls and ignore cover saves.
The marklights with BS5 now and reroll almost always get 6 hits.

I find this unit to be very effective.

Really like that commander team, similar to how i run mine but i run it without the 'vre with equipment.

Think i will give it a go in my next game, thanks!

 Messy0 wrote:
I think its important to mention that the Riptide is not fearless and if it takes Drones and loses just 1 it will be forced to take take a moral check. With the range of the IA the Riptides will be hanging around the back board edge and will be almost guarenteed to jump its self off the tabel on 3d6 if it fails. Can anyone else confirm this?

Also, if you take 2 drones, would that not drop the majority toughness down as well, making the riptide more vulnerable to small arms fire?

Riptide drones are T6.

And the new huge broadside is still T4. Yeah I'm still upset with that.

Made some new additions and corrections to the first post. So far really been loving fire prisms and the mobility that Eldar bring with jetbikes and been doing well with flier-less lists with the new Taudar despite the lack of runes of warding.

Are you forced to take drones to make the riptide able to join an IC? It seems rather silly that it's sometimes an IC and sometimes not based off of one model.

Nope. It's the potential to be a Multi-model unit that matters. Not the number of models in the unit.

Riptide is such a huge base its not that hard to hide whatever is in the same unit with it. I probably wouldnt take the shield drones if i put shadowsun in a group with it, since theyre crazy expensive and single wound models and i tend to roll boxcars on EVERY leadership test when i actually have good leadership around.
Not to mention taking the shield drones means now you have 2-3 T4 models, instead of a T3 T4 and T6...majority toughess is now 4 not 6 and THAT hurts more than anything that drone would save.

Not that is always the best idea but I have seen great success with a Fireblade lending split fire a broadside suit...getting your broadside team to shoot at different targets can be very effective. He can just hop back and forth between fire warriors and broadsides to give whatever is needed to the game.