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I played Trukk spam in 4th, BW then Killa Kan spam in 5th, and Bikers and Boyz in 6th. All fun, very different styles.

To OP. As an Ork player I think both your troop choices are the bomb diggity. You get a unit that is awesome at shooting and unit that is great at backfield objective taking. Neither is great at both. So use both. Compare the points and stats of Shootas to your guys and I'd be surprised if anyone Tau player took Ork allies for the troops! And that's not including your force multipliers and special characters.

If I ever played anything but Green (and why does anyone?) and I chose Tau, I'd max out those troops ASAP and find ways to enhance them. (Hint: deploy in cover.)

Veskrashen wrote:
I totally get the PF as special weapons team concept now - I'll be trying out a squad or two kitted with Rail Rifles myself in a few games to see how they do. I still feel like Marker Drones (spread across squads) or Tetras are the way to go for massed Markerlight support though. Depends on how FW FAQs them, once they get around to it.

I also understand why so many people are pissed about losing the S10 rails on Broadsides. It doesn't really impact me, but given how prevalent the assumption is that foot gunline Tau are the default build, I can totally see why people are so frustrated. Since I've never taken a Railgun in any Tau list I've played, and have always gone heavy mech, I've always depended on my Crisis with Fusion to take care of any heavy mech. I still feel that's a viable option, and even more so this edition, where Riptides / Ionheads can drop AP2 / AP3 pieplates on whatever comes out of that tasty transport. Surviving the aftermath of popping a LR is a lot more possible when you can drop 2+ cover ignoring low AP pieplates on whatever comes out. Oh, and the additional FB range is nice too.

I also feel that EMP grenades are a viable counter - moreso in a foot list than in a Mech list, for obvious reasons. With a Mech list you'll have to set things up a turn in advance, which is dicey, but can be doable I think. Time will tell though.

They are definitely beefy units now. Here is the link to my first Batrep:
http://www.40kunorthodoxy.blogspot.com/2013/04/tau-vs-space-marine-battle-report.html

I used the Pathfinders for damage dealing. I didn't fire off a single Markerlight from them all game. Not once.

 PipeAlley wrote:
I played Trukk spam in 4th, BW then Killa Kan spam in 5th, and Bikers and Boyz in 6th. All fun, very different styles.

To OP. As an Ork player I think both your troop choices are the bomb diggity. You get a unit that is awesome at shooting and unit that is great at backfield objective taking. Neither is great at both. So use both. Compare the points and stats of Shootas to your guys and I'd be surprised if anyone Tau player took Ork allies for the troops! And that's not including your force multipliers and special characters.

If I ever played anything but Green (and why does anyone?) and I chose Tau, I'd max out those troops ASAP and find ways to enhance them. (Hint: deploy in cover.)

its the mass of bodies that can actually fight in melee that people like the boyz blobs allied in for. Its probably the only thing im going to run if i ever play Tau with ork allies instead of orks with tau allies (Given the nerfs to broadsides my tactic with tau allies is kinda dead, still seeing if i can revamp one as i have...good god like 8K+ points worth of orks and MAYBE 1200pts of tau lol)

Well I can definitely understand why Tau players are upset, I mean you wait 8 years or so and you get a codex (while has a very viable method of play) which has a lot of weaknesses which can easily be exploited by certain armies, and armies with specific army builds. GWs idea of solving it, is by making Tau able to ally everyone. None the less I like others still think with the right build Tau can be just as competitive as any other army, you just need to play test it a little bit I suppose, as was said earlier I really don't think the codex sucks but which methods and which army builds are competitive will come to light in the coming weeks, just give it a little bit of time. A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

Or the Tau could do what everyone else does to AV 14 and shoot it with melta. I think living armor is gone, so there's no AV 14 I know of that melta can't crack.

 Toasty wrote:
A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

That's just bad fanfiction and has no basis in reality. Unless they added it in the Tau Codex, but it's never even been hinted to be "canon".

Toasty wrote:Well I can definitely understand why Tau players are upset, I mean you wait 8 years or so and you get a codex (while has a very viable method of play) which has a lot of weaknesses which can easily be exploited by certain armies, and armies with specific army builds. GWs idea of solving it, is by making Tau able to ally everyone. None the less I like others still think with the right build Tau can be just as competitive as any other army, you just need to play test it a little bit I suppose, as was said earlier I really don't think the codex sucks but which methods and which army builds are competitive will come to light in the coming weeks, just give it a little bit of time. A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

Martel732 wrote:Or the Tau could do what everyone else does to AV 14 and shoot it with melta. I think living armor is gone, so there's no AV 14 I know of that melta can't crack.

Tau have always had an easily exploited weakness... they suck in Assault. That hasn't changed. How have they got any worse than how they were before, especially in terms of net gain/loss? They can still deal with AV14, as Martel said.

khuffy wrote:
Okay I agree completely with your statements about allies, it seems like they made us alliable with everyone so they could all get access to effective antiair and our suits. I feel like the allies degrade the game as it isn't about using your armies strengths and weaknesses against anothers, its just about patching up your armies weaknesses with anothers armies strengths, kinda removes the uniqueness of each armies ability.

Totally agree with this! Your army no longer has any uniqueness. Sure it's quite cool to field a CSM+DoC army but the enjoyment wanes slightly when you have a pretty much exclusive flier army, say all hell drakes and vendettas or DE with Orks...

I am not a Tau player, but the Tau 'dex is the first one in 6E I felt inclined to purchase; I would like to play them someday.

There is the rumor they are "lacking" support as an allies codex/expansion will come out and they will be able to take "everyone" signifying their ability to diplomatically work with any race. And what's wrong with them allying with the other core codecis? They are master diplomats and aren't xenophobic like pretty much every other race in the game; they leverage strengths of others for their Greater Good. I think that's far more fluffy than before.

I see Tau having trouble with my favorite Necrons list; the AV13 Wall. 3 Ghost Arks, 3 Ann. Barges, 2 Stalkers, and flyer support. Yes, I will have troubles with riptides, but outside of some fusion blasters, my AV13 will be sitting pretty. It will be interesting to finally play the new book as the old book I trounced with that list. I have creamed Tau readily with Space Wolves and never played with SoB/Inquisition. I think the latter would be an uphill battle totally reliant on me "getting there" into their lines with my flamer weapons (though seraphim w/ St Celestine would wreck face... if I make my 6++/6++ versus a pieplate of death dropping on me). I'm awaiting rematches with the new Codex!

I think the naysayers should play them and see truly how they roll. I think they will be pleasantly surprised. And really, not liking Marker Lights? That's as signature to the army as all the suits/mechs.

Sounds like the Tau need to bring plenty of fusion blasters as hedges against AV 13/14 spam.

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 Toasty wrote:
A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

That's just bad fanfiction and has no basis in reality. Unless they added it in the Tau Codex, but it's never even been hinted to be "canon".

I've read the new dex cover to cover and that's nowhere to be found. In fact, I also don't remember seeing anything in this one about them having no connection to the Warp. There was one other bit of fluff I've always heard about them that I can't remember seeing in the book, but I can't remember it at the moment...

Thoughts after a game vs SM:

Gun drones squads have gotten silly effective. The changes to the Pulse Carbine have been a solid improvement. They also still make for a great assault screen.

Loss of Multitracker and target lock on Railheads, really did hurt them. They just don't do fire support like they used and are going to be harder to work to Ideal shot angles with.

Ethereals are about a 200% improvement over the old codex, just don't make one warlord or your going to be giving up 3 VP in one go.

Loss of the network marker lights just hurt. Loss of Target Lock on the SDT controller just seem weird and lowers the unit usefulness. Still 48 rapid fire guns at BS5 are very nice.

Volley Fire and/or Storm of Fire really let FW squad deliver VoF harder and earlier than the most rapid fire weapons.

Broadside teams, really need to split between interceptor and Skyfire. Going all one or the other is probably never going to be the right choice.

Krak Missiles still bring the pain on suits.

Markerlights have a real learning curve this addition because they are so much more important. However, you can still be effective with out them if you are not going suit heavy.

Commander suits are probably going to be much less a fire power mainstay and more a multipler in this edition.

 Peregrine wrote:

valace2 wrote:
not everything can be a haldrake or scythe.

Sure. The GW Hobby (tm) has lots of room for cool model kits that you paint and put on your display shelf and never use because you're too busy winning games with Vendettas and Helldrakes. It's just unfortunate that they had to waste both Tau flyers on that kind of kit.

So every flyer has to be vendetta and heldrake level? I kinda like the fact that you have to choose pathfinders or flyers. I also like the fact that codex AA, flyers are only ok.

The more I ponder the Bomber the more interesting it is.

It can fly off the board if there is no target and leave the drones and then jump the enemy flyer after IT comes on. Now you're attacking from two directions. The interceptor Drones can join a commander suit after they are detached so it appears. This could be quite powerful.

Just a thought that jumped out at me.

 MandalorynOranj wrote:

 AlmightyWalrus wrote:

 Toasty wrote:
A little bit off topic, but I heard a while back, lots of Space Marine players concerned that fluff wise, the Emperor place the Ultramarines near the Tau to protect them as their resistance to chaos holds the key to humanity's salvation from chaos.....or something along those lines. Can I just ask the Tau players who have the codex does it say this in the new Tau codex? If not, is there any fluff that points towards this?

That's just bad fanfiction and has no basis in reality. Unless they added it in the Tau Codex, but it's never even been hinted to be "canon".

I've read the new dex cover to cover and that's nowhere to be found. In fact, I also don't remember seeing anything in this one about them having no connection to the Warp. There was one other bit of fluff I've always heard about them that I can't remember seeing in the book, but I can't remember it at the moment...

Thanks! Really glad that rumour I heard isn't true, that would've just ruined 40k for me..... lol

The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

I see this new codex as one hell of an inprovement! Price reductions, longer range Melta's, More AA than ANY codex can boast of, a wicked MC Battlesuit of Doom!, and not to mention more flexibility than most armies can boast. Even IG barley rivals the Tau's abiltiy to change how they are going to play. You have more options and capabilities to do more nasty things.

I got out right after 6th came out last year. I loved my BA but I just could not cope with the huge change to things. Now that my original favorite army has been updated (with amazing things) I think I will get back into the game.

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

Personally......I think its because not all SM are dumb enough to resist the Tau take over.

And you know, maybe they are smart enough to know when they are outgunned and could use a little help?

Nah! That would mean something other than blind faith is in the forefront of their being.......is that even possible?? lol


Automatically Appended Next Post:
On a side note......WOOOO im a FW now instead of a silly water caste negotiater lol

 Ozomoto wrote:
So every flyer has to be vendetta and heldrake level? I kinda like the fact that you have to choose pathfinders or flyers. I also like the fact that codex AA, flyers are only ok.

Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

 Peregrine wrote:
Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

That's not particularly right or even interesting to say. Stormtalons, Stormravens, and Dakkajets see common use despite not being as underpriced as Vendettas. Similarly, the Dark Eldar flyers fill a gap in the Codex despite not being quite as good as other flyers (though their missiles can be quite effective). Overall, the rule of thumb for flyers isn't "take them if they are Vendettas, Heldrakes, or Night Scythes" but rather "take them if your list needs them." I can see even a Burna Bommer being the optimal selection in the right context.

@Barnowl:

Broadsides do still have multi-trackers, and they also have blacksun filters by default.

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

Elaborate? I was not aware that they were BFFs. Unless this is in the same vein as that stupid BA-Necron fist-bump hyperbole.

 Kingsley wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

That's not particularly right or even interesting to say. Stormtalons, Stormravens, and Dakkajets see common use despite not being as underpriced as Vendettas. Similarly, the Dark Eldar flyers fill a gap in the Codex despite not being quite as good as other flyers (though their missiles can be quite effective). Overall, the rule of thumb for flyers isn't "take them if they are Vendettas, Heldrakes, or Night Scythes" but rather "take them if your list needs them." I can see even a Burna Bommer being the optimal selection in the right context.

The Stormraven makes it into my list as a hedge against the helldrake. But when Vendettas show up, I just write it off. I think I've beaten the IG once out of say seven tries in 6th edition. The IG are rough.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

Elaborate? I was not aware that they were BFFs. Unless this is in the same vein as that stupid BA-Necron fist-bump hyperbole.

They are totally Battle Brother Best Friends Forever at least in the main rule book.

As to why is la mystery. (At least as to my knowledge)

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:

 Desubot wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
The whole Ultramarines defending Tau thing is fan-fiction; it has no basis in actual fluff.

So the mystery still remains as to why they BFFs?

Elaborate? I was not aware that they were BFFs. Unless this is in the same vein as that stupid BA-Necron fist-bump hyperbole.

They are totally Battle Brother Best Friends Forever at least in the main rule book.

As to why is la mystery. (At least as to my knowledge)

Oh, you mean the allies matrix. Yeah, that is odd.

Martel732 wrote:

 Kingsley wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

That's not particularly right or even interesting to say. Stormtalons, Stormravens, and Dakkajets see common use despite not being as underpriced as Vendettas. Similarly, the Dark Eldar flyers fill a gap in the Codex despite not being quite as good as other flyers (though their missiles can be quite effective). Overall, the rule of thumb for flyers isn't "take them if they are Vendettas, Heldrakes, or Night Scythes" but rather "take them if your list needs them." I can see even a Burna Bommer being the optimal selection in the right context.

The Stormraven makes it into my list as a hedge against the helldrake. But when Vendettas show up, I just write it off. I think I've beaten the IG once out of say seven tries in 6th edition. The IG are rough.

the heldrake and nightscythe are strong, very strong but the vendetta is on another level.

 Exergy wrote:

Martel732 wrote:

 Kingsley wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
Exactly. As long as the Vendetta/Helldrake/Scythe exist any flyer that isn't at that level sucks and has no place in a list. This is especially true for Tau, since they have tons of AA and don't need flyers to deal with enemy flyers.

That's not particularly right or even interesting to say. Stormtalons, Stormravens, and Dakkajets see common use despite not being as underpriced as Vendettas. Similarly, the Dark Eldar flyers fill a gap in the Codex despite not being quite as good as other flyers (though their missiles can be quite effective). Overall, the rule of thumb for flyers isn't "take them if they are Vendettas, Heldrakes, or Night Scythes" but rather "take them if your list needs them." I can see even a Burna Bommer being the optimal selection in the right context.

The Stormraven makes it into my list as a hedge against the helldrake. But when Vendettas show up, I just write it off. I think I've beaten the IG once out of say seven tries in 6th edition. The IG are rough.

the heldrake and nightscythe are strong, very strong but the vendetta is on another level.

you know the Vendetta just does not bother me that much. Maybe cause I mostly face it using Nid's. The NightScyth on the other hand is an f'ing pain in the neck.

How is the Vendetta not a problem for Flyrants?

neither one is a problem for Tau. And thats really what I like to focus on. =)