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I'm looking to shake up my playstyle a little bit, and aim to build lists focused around fast, hard-hitting threats and alpha striking. My normal gunline-style list revolves around 3 units of 12 FW, 2x6 Pathfinders, 6 crisis suits, and 3 hammerheads, with kroot thrown in for flavor - typically this is around 1500 points or so, once I factor in drones and whatever HQ I feel like using. However, I've been having a lot of trouble facing other shooty armies - losing pathfinders totally neuters me at long range, and I don't have much in the way of flyer defense either.

I've become infatuated with 5 dual-seeker piranhas, who have always done stellar in every game they've been a part of so far. If possible, I would like to hear suggestions for good units to include alongside those. I also dislike riptides, and don't really want to buy such an expensive model that I don't even like (not going to proxy a gundam, I hate those too lol), so "use a riptide" is going to fall on deaf ears.

So what can I do to re-work my Tau in this new image?

Think about shadowsun since she will up your mobility on units that you already enjoy using, and grant them stealth/shrouded.

For markerlights, if you're feeling a need to be a bit tougher and mobile, the drones that carry marker-lights trade some of their accuracy for improved toughness and mobility, but its a big swap. Else, a squad of tetras is still nice (although not at all as nice as it previously was). They are mobile, tough and fast.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Don't count out devilfish either. You can use one to stretch the etherial bubble effect, and they make your fire-warriors somewhat immune to early game fire.

Id scale down from 12 units of FW if I was gonna use dfish though, since 1/3 are likely to die from an exploding transport, and then they are decently likely to be pinned too. Maybe two small squads in fish, two medium squads on foot?

Generally if you want mobility, stick to battlesuits, mounted firewarrior teams or walking ones, hammerheads and marker drone teams with attached drone controller having guys.

XV9s are pretty damn good for mobile Tau armies, shame that their models, being forgeworld products, will cost you an arm, a leg, your soul, and your firstborn.

mounted FW are looking pretty nice right now because once you drop your FW squad the devilfish can hide and use its SMS to really annoy your opponent

Devilfishs with 12/11/10 with SMS and the Burster cannon can provide a bit of firepower while being a minimum 5+ saves.

So If you want a full mobility Tau you might want to look into:

Commander

Crisis suits

Kroot in outflank

Pathfinders in a Devilfish with a recon drone to make your kroot come in as you want ( also the added benefit you can deepstrike 6" within the fish without scatter )

Phiranas as they are cheap and fast

Drone squadrons can be pretty good as they are jet pack infrantry as well as your crisis suits.

Hammerheads, even when moving if you have markerlights on the table you can make em move and shoot pretty accurately.


As much mobility there is avaliable to the Tau, far too many prefer their defensive lines due to the support fire, but with a bit of thought you can have very fast and mobile Tau that can easily kite CC based armies, but can be shot down if the board lacks LOS blockers or terrain.

I too am looking to build a mobile Tau army, and I am kind of irked at the gunlinish direction Vetock took the codex in. My suggestions for keeping the army mobile:

Troops: Devilfish would be ideal for mounting troops but are just too expensive. Instead, take a lot of kroot. Infiltrate/outflank gives them a lot of deployment flexibility, and move through cover means they will not be slowed down from terrain as much as firewarriors. They got a lot of good options and are a rather flexible troops choice.

Elites: All three options are excellent here, and this and fast attack are going to be your most crowded slot. I would strongly suggest you reconsider the Riptide, its basically a faster moving, deepstrike capable ionhead with superior AP and the ability to fire an anti-tank large blast when necessary. You can also use nova reactor boost to give it 4d6 of assault phase movement, so it can get around the battlefield really quick. Its basically what the hammerhead should have been. Shunt some crisis squads off to the HQ slot so you can take a pair of these along with three battlesuit squads or a stealth suit squad along with a pair of crisis squads.

Fast Attack: You need to ditch the sluggish pathfinders, so it looks like drone squads for marker support. Unless of course you can use Tetras, which don't need to be attached to your hq for accurate markerlight fire, keeping the hq free to run solid crisis squads. Piranha seem like a rather solid option as well. You also have the fliers, which would fit in with a mobile cadre, although I am not certain how well they will perform, as they are rather expensive for what they do. The razorshark seems to be the more mobile flier, as the Sun Shark needs to fly at exactly 18" to use its drones properly, so experiment with it first (unless you have a Barracuda). Alternatively, use necron flyers for air support, keeping your fast attack slots free for marker support and piranha.

Heavy Support: Avoid if at all possible, everything is rather sluggish. You may need a railhead or two due to the lack of anti heavy tank options in the codex, but otherwise keep clear of this slot.

HQ: Use to pick up slack in the elites and fast attack. If running riptides, use to keep enough crisis suits in the list, otherwise use to attach commanders to marker drone squads.


My ideal list would be Kroot for troops, Tetras for marker support with remaining FA allocated to either Piranha or Razorsharks, a pair of Riptides with either a Crisis or Stealth Suit squad in elites with two more Crisis squads from hq. If you still have remaining points, consider fielding an allied Doom Scythe or Vendetta in place of hammerheads (isn't it sad that IG can do fast anti-tank gunships but Tau cannot), or if you have hit 2000, unlock a second detachment for more elite and fast attack choices.

Phanixis wrote:
Unless of course you can use Tetras, which don't need to be attached to your hq for accurate markerlight fire, keeping the hq free to run solid crisis squads.

Keep in mind, tetras are now BS3; unfortunately targeting array's no longer exist.

Still better than BS 2. A single tetra generates 2 markerlight hits for 50 points. Marker drones require 84 points to carry out the same task without the commander. Granted, they will probably be more resilient, but those points add up fast.

Here's a basic mobile Tau force that I drew up to show how scary the new Codex can be:


Cadre Fireblade- 60
Ethereal- 50

XV104 "Riptide" Battlesuit with ion accelerator, twin-linked smart missile system, and early warning override- 190
XV104 "Riptide" Battlesuit with ion accelerator, twin-linked smart missile system, and early warning override- 190

12 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles and Devilfish with gun drones and disruption pod- 203
12 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles and Devilfish with gun drones and disruption pod- 203
11 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles and Devilfish with gun drones and disruption pod- 194
12 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles- 108

10 Pathfinders with two rail rifles, Shas'ui with rail rifle- 155
6 Pathfinders- 66
6 Pathfinders- 66

Skyray Missile Defense Gunship with disruption pod and twin-linked smart missile system- 130
Skyray Missile Defense Gunship with disruption pod and twin-linked smart missile system- 130

Aegis Defense Line with quad-gun- 100

84 models (71 infantry, 6 jet pack infantry, 5 tanks, 2 jet pack monstrous creatures)
1845 points total

This force can more or less tear the heart out of many armies in one round of shooting, with over 200 shots under optimal conditions. It's not that bad defensively either-- many forces will have trouble doing substantial damage to the Devilfish push, and the Skyrays cover air targets (especially flying MCs) very effectively. The Pathfinder squad with rail rifles is designed to be flexible as either a third Markerlight unit or a surprise outflanker against weakly defended objectives, IG artillery, etc. They should easily be able to clear objectives defended by only a Guard squad, a small Marine unit, etc.

I think a squad of 5 Stealth Suits would be more optimal than the 10-man Pathfinder unit, but they are very easy to see coming and I predict the outflank threat from the Pathfinders will catch several opponents off guard. Pathfinders for whatever reason read only as a support unit for many players, where Stealth Suits are likely to be spotted as an Outflank threat at an initial glance.

One unit I was impressed with at my local club was a support commander with 3x dual missile pod and target lock crisis suits, everyone had 2 marker drones. The suits benefit from the buff commander, and the drones benefit from meatshield crisis suits - with missile pods in particular, they can all stay at 36" and not worry about most small arms fire. It seemed very efficient.

I was actually considering skyrays - for a mobile(ish) Tau force, they can stay still to unload on a flyer. Seeker missiles are versatile enough that they can be used against bikers and MC's and lighter vehicles, so they're a fairly TAC unit, and the additional vehicles help saturate higher AV's and negate things like baledrakes to an extent.

What luck have people had using Fish of Fury type tactics with the new dex? Are carbines worth it for this specific purpose and/or how would I need to use them differently to get the most out of them? Dispod d-fish or no dispod, or no devilfish altogether? Kroot are nice, but I can't really fit 15+ in most normal sized terrain without clumping them up for a good flamer/blast, and multiple big units of them will have a hard time getting any sort of save versus the inevitable return fire they'll get.

 Kingsley wrote:
Here's a basic mobile Tau force that I drew up to show how scary the new Codex can be:


Cadre Fireblade- 60
Ethereal- 50

XV104 "Riptide" Battlesuit with ion accelerator, twin-linked smart missile system, and early warning override- 190
XV104 "Riptide" Battlesuit with ion accelerator, twin-linked smart missile system, and early warning override- 190

12 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles and Devilfish with gun drones and disruption pod- 203
12 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles and Devilfish with gun drones and disruption pod- 203
11 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles and Devilfish with gun drones and disruption pod- 194
12 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles- 108

10 Pathfinders with two rail rifles, Shas'ui with rail rifle- 155
6 Pathfinders- 66
6 Pathfinders- 66

Skyray Missile Defense Gunship with disruption pod and twin-linked smart missile system- 130
Skyray Missile Defense Gunship with disruption pod and twin-linked smart missile system- 130

Aegis Defense Line with quad-gun- 100

84 models (71 infantry, 6 jet pack infantry, 5 tanks, 2 jet pack monstrous creatures)
1845 points total

This force can more or less tear the heart out of many armies in one round of shooting, with over 200 shots under optimal conditions. It's not that bad defensively either-- many forces will have trouble doing substantial damage to the Devilfish push, and the Skyrays cover air targets (especially flying MCs) very effectively. The Pathfinder squad with rail rifles is designed to be flexible as either a third Markerlight unit or a surprise outflanker against weakly defended objectives, IG artillery, etc. They should easily be able to clear objectives defended by only a Guard squad, a small Marine unit, etc.

I think a squad of 5 Stealth Suits would be more optimal than the 10-man Pathfinder unit, but they are very easy to see coming and I predict the outflank threat from the Pathfinders will catch several opponents off guard. Pathfinders for whatever reason read only as a support unit for many players, where Stealth Suits are likely to be spotted as an Outflank threat at an initial glance.

I'd suggest trying SMS on your fish the ability to ignore cover and TL is some of great value for the cost plus you don't need LOS and it gives some extra range

Fish always need SMS, end of story. 10 Points to force your opponent to shoot them instead of your scoring units? Yeah ok.

Here's a basic mobile Tau force that I drew up to show how scary the new Codex can be:


Cadre Fireblade- 60
Ethereal- 50

XV104 "Riptide" Battlesuit with ion accelerator, twin-linked smart missile system, and early warning override- 190
XV104 "Riptide" Battlesuit with ion accelerator, twin-linked smart missile system, and early warning override- 190

12 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles and Devilfish with gun drones and disruption pod- 203
12 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles and Devilfish with gun drones and disruption pod- 203
11 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles and Devilfish with gun drones and disruption pod- 194
12 Fire Warriors with pulse rifles- 108

10 Pathfinders with two rail rifles, Shas'ui with rail rifle- 155
6 Pathfinders- 66
6 Pathfinders- 66

Skyray Missile Defense Gunship with disruption pod and twin-linked smart missile system- 130
Skyray Missile Defense Gunship with disruption pod and twin-linked smart missile system- 130

Aegis Defense Line with quad-gun- 100

84 models (71 infantry, 6 jet pack infantry, 5 tanks, 2 jet pack monstrous creatures)
1845 points total

How exactly is this a mobile force? The Riptides I get, they belong there. Same for the mounted firewarrior squads (although yikes those troops are expensive, I could field nearly my full compliment of 120 kroot for those firewarrior squads, but at least you are keeping them mobile). The rest of the force, not so much. Aegis defense doesn't move, and the pathfinders are pretty much stuck in place. The skyrays also can't move if you want to use both markelights or shoot down flyers, while the cadre fireblades main benefit can only be used if you don't move. Only about half this army is composed of mobile elements, it seems to fall well short of the goal of making a mobile army.

generalchaos34 wrote:I'd suggest trying SMS on your fish the ability to ignore cover and TL is some of great value for the cost plus you don't need LOS and it gives some extra range

chrisrawr wrote:Fish always need SMS, end of story. 10 Points to force your opponent to shoot them instead of your scoring units? Yeah ok.

I've actually found that SMS on Devilfish are not optimal in a mobile army, because a moving Devilfish can fire both its Burst Cannon and its Gun Drones at full BS. The same cannot be said for the Smart Missiles. Further, the Drones can often pull off tricky moves that opponents may not expect.

Phanixis wrote:How exactly is this a mobile force? The Riptides I get, they belong there. Same for the mounted firewarrior squads (although yikes those troops are expensive, I could field nearly my full compliment of 120 kroot for those firewarrior squads, but at least you are keeping them mobile). The rest of the force, not so much. Aegis defense doesn't move, and the pathfinders are pretty much stuck in place. The skyrays also can't move if you want to use both markelights or shoot down flyers, while the cadre fireblades main benefit can only be used if you don't move. Only about half this army is composed of mobile elements, it seems to fall well short of the goal of making a mobile army.

A single firebase unit plus two small Pathfinder squads doesn't make an army immobile in my view-- those elements simply lend balance to the composition. I also tend to play Skyrays very mobile-- hence the disruption pods-- though your mileage may vary.

Do some quick math for wounds output on Drones vs SMS.

SMS: 36" Threat.

In 18" range with no LoS: SMS.

In 18" range with LoS:
SMS Burstcannon: 3.6r hits, 3 of which ignore cover and los.

Burstcannon Drones: 4.2r hits, none of which ignore cover, 2.2r of which might cause pinning.

So for 10 points you gain 18" threat, ignore los, and +wounds against anything in cover within 18".

You lose .6 of a hit and lose ignores cover with 3 hits.

You also lose the ability to separate your Drones, which can be very useful for blocking, emergency situations, absorbing Overwatch, etc.