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Can someone help me understand why a Tau Mechanized infantry list doesn't work? By Mechanized Infantry list I mean a force that has everything mobile in either a devilfish or jetpacks. The only possible exceptions being riptides and broadsides. I've read several places that people feel the army comp doesn't work anymore, but it seems good in theory to me. Before I go and buy though, I want to understand why it doesn't work.

From a Theory standpoint I would expect the doctrine to go as follows:

Line up your firewarriors spread out with good fields of fire. Use pathfinders to get into forward positions for marker lighting up the enemy or using Ion Rifles to cut down the enemy assault troops/infiltrators. Use Kroot Snipers to infiltrate and take on monstrous creatures/high toughness mondels/provide fire support to the rest of the army. Stealth Suits are used to counter anything that gets too close to the pathfinders/kroot snipers. Broadsides and Commander+Crisis suits provide anti tank/heavy infantry. Sky Rays go for anti air. The whole army with a few exceptions is fairly mobile. With 30" range it should be easy for 3+ fire warrior squads to cover a lot of objectives. Once the enemy gets close to charge range or rapid fire range, you mount your fire warriors up in their devil fish and relocate to another part of the board before redeploying and firing again.

Also, are seeker missiles worth the cost? Or should I just rely on the load given with a sky ray? If they are worth it, how many should I consider being enough for the army for a complete game?

A couple of reasons. First, medium vehicles in 6E are stupendously easy to kill between HP's and the vehicle CC rules.

Devilfish lost a lot of survivability and utility between the 6E core rules changes for vehicles and transports, and the codex update change to Disruption Pods, along with the Devilfish remaining at its 4E Invinci-skimmer price.

On top of that the rules for rapid fire weapons got better, Fire Warriors can double tap at 3" farther and can move and fire at full range and effect always, meaning the infantry operate better than they did when not mechanized.

I like to load them up in fishes because its nice to have mobile cover with some sexy SMS action, especially against xenos and guardsman. My usual tactic is to drop the FW off in a nice piece of terrain and have them provide a nice firebase while the fish then goes around to harass, annoy, and generally draw anti-tank fire from the enemy. However, the point costs kill me when the transport costs as much as taking another squad of infantry with the same amount of movement!

Im still debating on the costs of it, but i have had a few fruitful engagements against armies with lighter AT when done properly. Ive had a few lists where the only "immobile" unit to start on the field were the 2 pathfinders squads, while everything else was jump packs or hover tanks.

Mechanized while not optimal is still playable, especially with say 2 12 man fw squads 1 11 man an ethereal and three devilfishes. Gives 108 shots at 15". But the problem is the fact youre paying 80+ points for a transport which doesn't actually do that much for tau units.

As stated in the above post. The price point for the ability to transport these units is not worth it. Kinda of sad as Tau mech units are cool as hell in the looks department.

With a few upgrades a devilfish can add A LOT of fire power to a FW squad. Unfortuanetly after you spend all those points on a fish you coulda got a whole other FW sqd. Being unable to ''under'' a fish anymore makes them less useful as speed bumps. The only thing I can see them doing is adding some end game ability to snatch objectives, & not very well I must say.

I have tinkered around with a 4 Devilfish with twin Ethereals, twin skyrays and a Hammerhead is 1533. When you load everything out.

You could throw in 2 Riptides or infiltrating Stealth Suits etc...
Though if you are playing with Forgeworld, you can get some tetras in there and a Squad of remoras to be competitive in a fun tourney.

I forgo the infantry part of the idea, but do foten run a mechanized list. Bring a big squad of piranha 3x hammerhead/skyrays and some allies with high armor units (I recommend Master of Forge on bike, he can join a tau unit and benifit from markerlights with a conversion beamer, a Dakka Predator, an ironclad dreadnought and a droppod tactical marine squad.)

This list can put a lot of armor out. And some lists struggle to kill AV13 all together. (I can beat necron croissant spam) Just a recommendation. A space marine librarian might be better.

Running a hybrid mech/gunline force myself, I haven't noticed any particular weakness. In fact, the ability for firewarriors to go zooming across the board in the late game towards objectives is still just as effective as ever. Further, devilfishes can provide cover/block LOS against the things that ID them, so I haven't really see what's so bad about Mech now either. If anything, it's working pretty well. I tabled a BA team in my last game for example.

Yea, devilfish combined with an ethereal really makes an infantry force much scarier.

Also gives your scoring units some serious mobility, especially from reserve.

Devilfish just cost too much now.
1) They can no longer move+fire as if fast, reducing their power and in many cases negating the increases in number of shots that came with 6th ed codex.
2) They don't have nearly as good a cover save as before (5+ when moving at reduced fire power, 4+ with a disruption pod) and it costs them more.
3) Light vehicles are very easy to kill now with the way hull points work. Everyone is moving away from mech in general unless you can spam enough cheap vehicles to achieve target saturation.
4) They cost a lot. Starting at 80, getting to 105 with minimal upgrades, you don't get much firepower from that. Firepower might not be everything, for the same points we can get quite a few mobile support or shooty elements in the army: 2 piranhas with Fusion Blasters. 3 Crisis suits with flamers. 1 Skyfire Broadside. 1 Support Commander... To start running a mechanised list, suddenly you're spending 300 points (1/6) of your army on stuff which is not hugely survivable, not really that mobile and not very good at shooting.

I think their is a lot of closed box thinking going on in here!

dpods offer 4+ cover (awesome!) a 50% of shrugging off melta shots, lascannons, etc, not bad at all in my book....

you can marker light a target so a dfish or hammerhead can move and still shoot raising the snap shot bs score (i think this works? so its like the old way just needs help to do it)

riptides are jetpack as well so they are mobile!

a care fireblade and/or ethereal makes for some mean rapfire from a devilfish drop....MEAN

Trasvi wrote:
Devilfish just cost too much now.
1) They can no longer move+fire as if fast, reducing their power and in many cases negating the increases in number of shots that came with 6th ed codex.
2) They don't have nearly as good a cover save as before (5+ when moving at reduced fire power, 4+ with a disruption pod) and it costs them more.
3) Light vehicles are very easy to kill now with the way hull points work. Everyone is moving away from mech in general unless you can spam enough cheap vehicles to achieve target saturation.
4) They cost a lot. Starting at 80, getting to 105 with minimal upgrades, you don't get much firepower from that. Firepower might not be everything, for the same points we can get quite a few mobile support or shooty elements in the army: 2 piranhas with Fusion Blasters. 3 Crisis suits with flamers. 1 Skyfire Broadside. 1 Support Commander... To start running a mechanised list, suddenly you're spending 300 points (1/6) of your army on stuff which is not hugely survivable, not really that mobile and not very good at shooting.

1) if you need to move and fire your devilfish you're doing something wrong. Devilfishes should fire before or after disgorging troops, not while they're careening around the board. They never had the firepower for that.
2) they have the exact same cover save they used to have, a 4+ when moving flat out
3) Devilfishes still have higher than normal armor, limiting what can kill them. And considering that dedicated anti tank weapons have always torn through them like tissue paper, the hull points issue isn't a big one (plus don't they have 3 hp?)
4) They cost the same as they always have, with a price decrease for upgrades. And once again, you're treating the devilfish like it's a waveserpet or a razorback. It's not, it was never meant to be. It's a tank to carry your guardsmen-with-handcannons in better comparative safety than Imps. Further, you're comparing apples to oranges. Complaining about how you could get more dakka in another slot with the points ignores the fact that no one buys devilfishes for dakka. Devilfishes have never had good dakka What they have had is AV12 on their front face. A very deformed front face that means you can force quite a wide arc to fire at the "front". Let's compare your examples shall we?

Piranhas can't carry drones or firewarriors, meaning if they need to rapidly redeploy you're screwed. Crisis suits can't carry anything with them, nor can they survive as well as Devilfishes (since a DF can't be harmed by bolters). And no one buys pure flamer crisis suits because they're only good for throwing into a meatgrinder, and there is enough anti-meatgrinder now to not have to get them. 1 Broadside has inferior dakka, inferior speed, inferior survivablity, and inverior transport capacity.

Are you seeing a pattern? None of your examples fill the same role as a Devilfish in that none of them can actually get your scoring units where they need to be.

Theorius wrote:
I think their is a lot of closed box thinking going on in here!

dpods offer 4+ cover (awesome!) a 50% of shrugging off melta shots, lascannons, etc, not bad at all in my book....

you can marker light a target so a dfish or hammerhead can move and still shoot raising the snap shot bs score (i think this works? so its like the old way just needs help to do it)

riptides are jetpack as well so they are mobile!

a care fireblade and/or ethereal makes for some mean rapfire from a devilfish drop....MEAN

1. Dpods add +1 to cover saves so you're 6+ in the open for 15 points making an expensive vehicle even more so.

2. So? If you move at all you're only getting 4 shots with a vehicle that's replacing a unit that could provide you with a greater volume of fire for the same points.

3. Yep, new shiny

4. Nope. Cadre fireblade volley fire rule only works if you don't move and getting out of a devilfish counts as moving. Ethereal power works at rapid fire range; if he dies, lose an extra victory point.

No reason to take devilfish, especially since they no longer have the ability to shoot as "fast" skimmers. You get to shoot one gun, yay for you.

edit: Darn ninja

Mech lists got better relative to foot lists this edition, but while almost everyone has gained from this, there are a couple of armies that haven't. One of them is tau.

The main reason for this isn't the transports (because disruption pod skimmers are still near the top of the group), but rather, the passengers. Putting firewarriors in a devil fish makes as much sense as buying a land raider and throwing some sniper rifle scouts in it.

Firewarriors are a superb gunline unit, what with being able to handle anything bar the heavier armor with just their small arm. At a very large threat range. With the ability to ignore cover from all the way over on your side of the board. They already have something that they're good at, while they don't really gain anything... at all... by being put in a transport. Meanwhile, they don't get to start shooting right away, and all that ability to move upfield is only going to get you into close combat faster. You know, where you don't want to be.

Firewarriors had a flash in the pan when there were stupid and broken rules in 4th ed, but the fact is that firewarriors just aren't designed to be transported around. The only other thing that can even TAKE a devilfish is pathfinders, which you want to transport around even LESS.

As such, the problem with Tau mech lists isn't transports, the problem is the Tau codex itself.

 Ailaros wrote:
Mech lists got better relative to foot lists this edition, but while almost everyone has gained from this, there are a couple of armies that haven't. One of them is tau.

The main reason for this isn't the transports (because disruption pod skimmers are still near the top of the group), but rather, the passengers. Putting firewarriors in a devil fish makes as much sense as buying a land raider and throwing some sniper rifle scouts in it.

Firewarriors are a superb gunline unit, what with being able to handle anything bar the heavier armor with just their small arm. At a very large threat range. With the ability to ignore cover from all the way over on your side of the board. They already have something that they're good at, while they don't really gain anything... at all... by being put in a transport. Meanwhile, they don't get to start shooting right away, and all that ability to move upfield is only going to get you into close combat faster. You know, where you don't want to be.

Firewarriors had a flash in the pan when there were stupid and broken rules in 4th ed, but the fact is that firewarriors just aren't designed to be transported around. The only other thing that can even TAKE a devilfish is pathfinders, which you want to transport around even LESS.

As such, the problem with Tau mech lists isn't transports, the problem is the Tau codex itself.

Pretty much this, the additional guns you get for gunlining outweigh the dubious limited mobility and 'protection' gunline affords. I prefer a mech build, personally, but I don't think it's optimal.

I'm agreeing with Ailaros! This is a miracle.

I think the biggest problem with devilfish is they don't mesh well with their troops. Necrons for example get open topped transports and are durable so they don't care if it explodes, which is hard to do thanks to the AV13. Units with a couple special weapons generally get transports with firepoints. Devilfish really don't do anything for firewarriors. A devilfish can act as an armored escort, but you could just get a Piranha for half the cost and it's just as effective.

I've played Mech Tau for a long time and I think it's still a completely viable option. Of course, this might just be my personal bias coming through - I really don't like gunlines.

Mechanized Tau gets to avoid many weaknesses that infantry-based Tau struggle with. Fast heavy flamers (helldrakes, dreadknights), Thunderfire Cannons, Biovores, Whirlwinds, most Guard barrage weapons...these things devastate any Tau infantry. Most of them can barely scratch the paint on a Devilfish.

Tau's biggest weakness is that most players are afraid to move forward. While I actually think that Tau should be pushing towards the middle of the board, Devilfish allow you to stay back (if necessary) and still reach nearly any objective in 2 turns.

The free gun drones, while they're no longer able to contest objectives or get linebreaker, are still nice for blocking. 3 Devilfish gets you 3 units of drones. Better than using a unit of Kroot for bubble wrap.

The firepower is also not that terrible. 3 Devilfish (plus drones) are about equivalent to another unit of Fire Warriors. So you're not just spending all those points on the transport ability.

Lastly, the Devilfish isn't actually that easy to kill (deceptively so). You can spend the first turn moving flat-out to get a 3+ cover save. Not a whole lot gets through that. To put that in perspective, a Vendetta has roughly a 12% chance to destroy our transports. A unit of 10 Lootas will barely take a single hull point off. 5 drop-podding Sternguard with combi-meltas only stand a 50/50 chance at killing it.

Well, the big thing I think is that while almost everything else in the codex got better or cheaper, the Devilfish really didn't do either. The upgrades that made it so fearsome before either disappeared, got nerfed or became more expensive. The Devilfish itself remained the same price as well.

So the Devilfish got worse while everything else in the codex got better (or at least tread water). Alongside this, one of the best Mech Tau tricks (shooting on the move) has disappeared. End result the most attractive builds for Tau move away from Mech and towards suits or lines.

This doesn't mean that mech Tau no longer works, but that it doesn't work the same way and isn't as forgiving as it once was.

Mechanized firewarriors really haven't worked since 4e, where they enjoyed numerous advantages due to the 4e ruleset and where the point cost associated with most models was higher in general. And even then, you only really got away with it because there was no real penalty to just taking the minimum two troops choices and only buying two mechanized firewarriors squads while keeping the rest of the army elites, fast attack and heavy support.

Devilfish suffer from two problems, they are both prohibitively expensive and they don't really do anything for your army. As many other posters have pointed out, firewarriors can engaged enemies fine from your DZ, and you don't really gain anything by sacrificing a turn of shooting to move the firewarriors closer in. The only thing going for the devilfish is its survivability, but because the fish serves no real purpose, this is of limited benefit. At the end of the day, the devilfish is really just an expensive, well protected hiding hole, and you don't win games by keeping your troops out of battle (and if you really need to keep them out of battle, reserves are free).

I am sure there are all kind of neat tricks that can be performed using a devilfish, but you must remember how much you are paying for them. For the cost of two mechanized firewarrior squads, you can field 60-70 kroot instead. You can have an infiltrating horde on the field for just a pair of these units. The price just isn't worth it.

I'm seeing a massive lack of creative thinking here...Devilfishes aren't like any other transport in the game. It's not like buying a landraider for a scout team because Devilfishes are designed to be just stable enough to get a target to its destination, not a bulletsponge. Further the Devilfishes are excellent for carrying carbine FW teams because they can zoom, deploy, fire, and get back in, and even if they get blown out of the water carbines are powerful enough now at close range to take vengeance on their attackers.

?

A unit can't embark and disembark in the same turn. Meanwhile, where do firewarriors need to go? Where is their destination? They can already shoot stuff halfway across the board right from where they deployed in the first place.

If you were talking about slugga boyz, where their destination was "over there where they are, or else I don't get to do any damage", or "over there so I can get my melta guns into melta range" that would be one thing, but firewarriors?

Seems like giving up firepower for the mobility that they don't need to get in range with said firepower isn't really a gain.

Anyone who enjoyed using Fish of Fury deserves to be punched in the throat. Feth that tactic.

I guess it really depends on your playgroup and your play style.

My Fire Warriors provide at least 50% of the damage in my lists. It's true that they don't really need the extra mobility - they're likely to be in range of just about anything they want to shoot. However, the ability to rapid fire something 27" away is very nice (6" move, 6" disembark, 15" rapid fire).
You can have 50 Fire Warriors shooting 50 shots from 30" away...or you can use an Ethereal and 2 Squads in Devilfish and get 70 shots for roughly the same price. Sure, there are downsides. But I don't think footslogging FW is strictly better.

The other thing, which I briefly mentioned before, is the bane of footslogging Fire Warriors...decent strength, AP 4 barrage weapons. Biovores, Griffons, and Whirlwinds are common in my playgroup. 50 Fire Warriors behind an Aegis would last approximately 2-3 turns against some lists I see.

Siphen wrote:
I guess it really depends on your playgroup and your play style.

My Fire Warriors provide at least 50% of the damage in my lists. It's true that they don't really need the extra mobility - they're likely to be in range of just about anything they want to shoot. However, the ability to rapid fire something 27" away is very nice (6" move, 6" disembark, 15" rapid fire).
You can have 50 Fire Warriors shooting 50 shots from 30" away...or you can use an Ethereal and 2 Squads in Devilfish and get 70 shots for roughly the same price. Sure, there are downsides. But I don't think footslogging FW is strictly better.

The other thing, which I briefly mentioned before, is the bane of footslogging Fire Warriors...decent strength, AP 4 barrage weapons. Biovores, Griffons, and Whirlwinds are common in my playgroup. 50 Fire Warriors behind an Aegis would last approximately 2-3 turns against some lists I see.

Not to mention the up and coming triple-thunderfire SM build. The only reason Tau gunlines are doing well at the moment is that people (unbelievably) have yet to switch to massed template ignores cover weapons.

First,

Thank you everyone for the execellent, CIVIL discussion. It is so nice to see this kind of debate on a public forum.

Now, To my original post, it seems there are two camps, those who think devilfish armies are poor because of the high cost associated with an armor 12 burst cannon (and wonder at the sanity of someone wanting to get their firewarriors CLOSER to the enemy) and those who see excentric uses for them and like that style of play. Pesonally, I never saw the Devilfish as a "get my troops closer to the enemy tool. I always saw them as a "get my troops away from the enemy tool" or a "I need to get in range and claim this objective" tool.

For example, I think the math is that for assaulty troops like Assault Marines, they can move 12 in the movement phase and average 7" on the charge. So if they are within 19" of you, they can possibly charge on their next turn. If you cannot forseeably whittle them down enough to be able to kill them with overwatch, then you need to get away or your tau will crumble. Knowing this, when they reach this threshhold, you should pile your Fire warriors into the devilfish, and relocate it, probably laterally across the table. The devilfish can move 18 in one turn, then you can get another 18" out of the movement the next turn between 12" move and 6" disembark. So by sacrificing 1 turns shooting that assault unit is now ~ 36" away from you unless they chose to chase you, in which case they would be ~ 24" away. Sure you are sacrificing a round of shooting, but you are denying the opponent the ability to do anything with that unit. This strategy might not work if the opponent has enough melee heavy units to cover the entire board, but concentrated fire from what you do have on the field should allow you to eliminate some of the close assault units and create a safe zone to kite into.

Am I thinking too much into this? Or are my estimates too risky? For example, a Blood Angels assault squad that includes a power sword on the sergeant and two plasma guns is 235 points, the 12 man fire warrior squad with devilfish is 254 points. They are close enough in points that with the above strategy in mind you *should* be able to keep those assault marines at bay all day long by kiting and shooting. Now you have neutralized his squad while giving up only half of your squad's use (shooting every other turn). Unless I am missing something.

If the above is a valid tactic that can seem mainstream use, then the question becomes do you give up too much shooty in your army to be able to do this such that you can no longer out shoot another shooty army, such as IG or Necrons.

I guess I don't get it then. To me, firewarriors are my "stand behind that wall and shoot anything that moves" while my kroot are used as objective grabbers/holders since they're more suited for it. Honestly, I only took devilfish previously so that I could keep my book mandated unit alive for any length of time while my kroot were doing the heavy lifting. Now, firewarriors have access to fire multipliers like the fireknife and are rewarded for not moving; combined with an ethereal and you can sit behind an ADL or mass on top of a skyshield and do some serious damage to any non-mech within 15". If some of them die due to ignore cover weapons...they're cheap enough and that means they're not shooting my riptide or broadsides. Besides, it's not like I don't have deepstriking suits, riptides, broadsides, hammerheads that would have fun with thunderfire cannons.

Siphen wrote:You can have 50 Fire Warriors shooting 50 shots from 30" away...or you can use an Ethereal and 2 Squads in Devilfish and get 70 shots for roughly the same price. Sure, there are downsides. But I don't think footslogging FW is strictly better.

But then add time back in. Turn 1, those firewarriors on foot are shooting. Turn 1, those firewarriors in a transport are twiddling their thumbs. In the first two turns of your analogy, the foot firewarriors get 100 shots to the transported one's 70.

Then add cover back in. The firewarriors on foot are very likely in cover, while the dudes disembarking from a transport to get int 15" range are much, much less likely to be so. That's the difference between mere heavy bolters gunning you down and not.

Then add your opponent back in. You just drove into double-tap range of his rapid fire weapons. A range that he was going to struggle to get into if he had to march across an open field against pulse weapons fire.

Then you add your opponent's movement back in. Some armies WANT to get close to your firewarriors. In fact, given how terrible firewarriors in close combat, that's going to be pretty much everybody. If your opponent gets into your double tap range, then those points spent on transports are going to waste. Useful against a guard gunline, perhaps (the key word there being perhaps - risking an explosion and spending points just so that you can shoot them later?), but against a drop pod list?

And as for moving firewarriors away from stuff, if your opponent is close enough to target firewarriors with assault, they're likely close enough to target a devil fish with krak grenades. Also, where are you going to run the firewarriors to? Away from an objective, somewhere in the corner a dozen inches away or so? You're just delaying the inevitable.

Also, firewarriors now gain from the army-wide overwatch. You actually WANT your opponent to assault your flimsy speed-bump squads now.

I use 1 Devilfish, and it has an Ethereal in it for the Aura range and survivability boost.

 Ailaros wrote:
?

A unit can't embark and disembark in the same turn. Meanwhile, where do firewarriors need to go? Where is their destination? They can already shoot stuff halfway across the board right from where they deployed in the first place.

If you were talking about slugga boyz, where their destination was "over there where they are, or else I don't get to do any damage", or "over there so I can get my melta guns into melta range" that would be one thing, but firewarriors?

Seems like giving up firepower for the mobility that they don't need to get in range with said firepower isn't really a gain.

Sure firewarriors can hit stuff across the table but you're ignoring some pretty big problems with that:

How can they capture objectives halfway cross the table?
How do they reposition when an assault squad with JPs closes the gap in two turns?
How do you surivive an army that's actually using template weapons, especially in this edition of plamsa?

I mean you'd think you of all people would realize how weak the gunline is to template weapons, I've seen how many hellhounds you have. Not to mention that for a guy who hates fighting gunlines you sure don't seem to be thinking about the how tau do actually need to move...Battlesuits can't grab anything ever after all, and they're the only part of the army that can move quickly without a devilfish. Would it have been nice to get a price nerf on the devilfish with this codex? Hell y es. But the simple fact of the matter is that Devilfishes haven't changed at all. They're still excellent at being transports for repositioning and protecting our incredibly pathetic troop choices (sure they have great guns, but they have terrible stats and don't get the benefit of 30 man blob squads). A devilfish can be cover, it can be firesupport for a gunline, and then it can pick up a squad when things get too hot and zoom away. And honestly if you've ever had a DF survive enough fire to burn through 3 HP you are clearly the luckiest sonofabitch on earth, because dedicated anti tank tears through them like any transport, and small arms can't touch them.