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My friend plays a cut-throat tau list which is anti TEQ (because everyone else in the group plays MEQ). His riptide alone tables us, even in team games. Generally he uses:

Broadsides with skyfire (2)
Riptide
Anti TEQ Crisis (2-3 small squads)
Pathfinders
Hammerhead
Devilfish with small troops

He has a 5-6 SMS and plenty of AP, so he can take TEQ or hordes. Even though his troops are really light, he hides them in the devilfish every game using the SMS, ignoring LOS, and then last turn jumps the objective. Any ideas for counters?

The current meta inspired tau lists have some trouble with landraiders filled with troops.

Likewise, TFC work a treat at nuking markerlights, whirlwinds are also decent at this (but bad et everything else).

Disregard everything that isn't marker lights before you close any distance, then close the distance fast. A bait unit can be good to keep pressure off your ignores cover things till the markerlights are gone.

Drop pods can be mean too, provided you move your stuff out of line of sight of the interceptor stuff before ending your movement phase.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Knowing what you play would help too.

saxophonic618 wrote:
My friend plays a cut-throat tau list which is anti TEQ (because everyone else in the group plays MEQ). His riptide alone tables us, even in team games. Generally he uses:

Broadsides with skyfire (2)
Riptide
Anti TEQ Crisis (2-3 small squads)
Pathfinders
Hammerhead
Devilfish with small troops

He has a 5-6 SMS and plenty of AP, so he can take TEQ or hordes. Even though his troops are really light, he hides them in the devilfish every game using the SMS, ignoring LOS, and then last turn jumps the objective. Any ideas for counters?

Granted I don't know what army you're playing, but I know for my CSM's it's all about fast. The only game so far I've played against tau I had everything either deep strike or rhinos or bikes. I was moving everything 12+ inches and he had to choose which unit to shoot. I think you need to decide up front what you're going to sacrifice and make his target selection a rock and a hard place and get the bulk of your forces on him as soon as you can. Riptides are riptides, I've played against one and I left it completely alone and granted it did alot of damage it was never anything so scarey I HAD to kill it. if you have any kind of fast moving tarpit you can get into CC like I had a maulerfiend that tied up 250 points of troops of his (he didn't realize how fast the thing was) and just start to pick him apart you should be ok. The best thing I can say, have all of your upfront units meet his army at the same time. So even if he does overwatch with the whole army on one unit? The rest are there to punch a huge hole in his lines.

If he has all his troops in transports he should have serious volume of fire issues (not to mention Devilfish are bloody expensive!)

If the markerlights go away Tau shooting gets a lot worse, and if you just ram your entire army into the Tau lines as quickly as possible then you stand the best chance.

Honestly, what would scare me the most is a bunch of really fast things that are good at close combat closing with me as quickly as possible. Don't give us time to kill them all. A turn 2 assault would be what you're thinking about here.

Eldar. How many points? for starters IF i were to tailor a list, which every now and then i do (but its not as fun). I would bring 3x3 Walkers with Star cannons. Then guardiansx2 in waveserpents x2, 2x10 warp spiders, probably no rangers, but I would bring 3x3 Wind Rider Jet Bikes. then to top it off some wraithguard or fire dragons. Just target priority with the Riptide or pathfinders first. EACH walker squad puts out 12 str 6 ap 2 shots. (8 hit for bs4, 4 wound, no armor save, 5+ FNP i think, so thats like 3ish wounds a turn PER SQUAD). In addition say he's in cover thats 5+ and you only get two wounds per squad...thats one dead riptide per turn. Then fire your IGNORE cover Serpents at pathfinders first turn. Second turn move closer and use ignore cover again. 3rd turn, move 6, unload 6, dakka with 20 shots and use serpent shield and that should kill pathfinders. For TEQ crisis, you should then focus them right after the riptides. Its like even more wounds per squad. (assume 5+ cover, toughness is usually 4, so wounding on 2s, so thats 8 hits 6-7 wounds, and with the 5+ cover thats a minimum of 4 wounds and then FNP if they paid for it. thats pretty much 1 dead crisis team a turn. Broadsides, I'd kinda ignore. Yes they will hurt but not as bad with no pathfinders and not as much as the crisis and riptides will. So with the warp spiders, after the riptide is down, and pathfinders are somewhat lessened go balls deep on them with FD/WG and Warp spiders. You will win. and then if they still have anything left turn 4 you can use jetbikes that you hid all game to claim objectives.


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actually broadsides i would dakka with one warpspider squad then assault...you have better ws, equalish str, more attacks on the charge, and higher initiative, and more bodies. He will go down to weight of that. and they can cover the distance so thats a turn 2 thing. also turn 2 you can crash one or two of his crisis suits with Wraithguard/FDs and shouldn't have trouble getting back armor on vehicles with other warp spider squad.

I'd like to add that deep strike/outflank is actually worse a lot of the time than moving up the board, since it assures I'll get to shoot at them at least twice before overwatch (interceptor, then my next shooting phase since they can't assault).

If you have some troops in Av 14 vehicles then you should get across the board in turn 2 anyway, so there's no advantage in the amount of firepower you have to endure.

has anyone tried running a LR with a vindicator behind it, I wanna know if something like that would even work

 Mojo1jojo wrote:
has anyone tried running a LR with a vindicator behind it, I wanna know if something like that would even work

Well, you wouldn't be able to shoot very much.....

Vindicators are for eating shots, and making a 24 inch bubble of 'feth you'

Bike armies from Dark Angels codex make me nervous. They are a very difficult army to face for Tau. They can counter your counter shinanigans with outflanks and the like and their speed means when ready they can definitely get to you. a Lot of firepower there and ther Tay weapon str, while good, is up against T5 with 3+ seve, so the wounds dont pile up near as fast. Theres something to be said for a large bike contingent with outflankers.

To take down tau, concentrate on pathfinders to remove force multipliers such as BS5 shooting and ignores cover.

Once pathfinders are dead target priority should go to whatever weapons are most efficient against what you are deploying. If you rock hordes, prioritize his fire warriors and pulse weaponry. Running MEQ, try making a priority of Ionheads, plasma crisis teams, and possibly the riptide (riptides are very hard to kill, you may just be better off accepting them as a force of nature and hunt troops instead). Mech'd up? try killing missileside, railheads, and anything carrying fusion or Ion weaponry. If you run TEQs, your main concerns are plasma and riptides.

Tau troops are pretty soft and often depend on the very cover saves they are so good at ignoring.

If they bring an ethereal, it will pay dividends to hunt it (you get a bonus VP, they lose Ld10 and other cool buffs). Keep in mind that most tau players will bury the ethereal in the back of a full strength firewarrior squad or kroot mob.

As a tau player my hardest list to face isn't a melee list. I'm confident that I will have 1-2 good shooting phases before the enemy even has a chance to start seriously depleting my firepower. My fear is actually a heavy shooting list. A good shooting list is a threat from turn 1 and can prioritize the tools I need to hurt them.





Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jancoran wrote:
Bike armies from Dark Angels codex make me nervous. They are a very difficult army to face for Tau. They can counter your counter shinanigans with outflanks and the like and their speed means when ready they can definitely get to you. a Lot of firepower there and ther Tay weapon str, while good, is up against T5 with 3+ seve, so the wounds dont pile up near as fast. There's something to be said for a large bike contingent with outflankers.

Bike lists have low body count. Our S5 pulse weapons counter the bikes T5 fairly well.

1 Pathfinder Squad +1 Ethereal buffing 1 Firewarrior Squad (250ish points). 4 marker hits, 36 BS5 S5 shots->30 hits->15 wounds->5 dead bikes with 2 lights still left on target, This will happen to any bike squad within 15" if the tau lines. If the bikes are turbo-boosting to gain field position they won't be inflicting serious casualties on the tau forces.

A harder bike list for the tau to face would be a dakka banner lists. The banner is a weakpoint in the list, but distance from the tau firing lines will lessen the impact of pulse fire on the bike list.

Get your guys into transports/drop pods/deep striking and use powerful close ranged weaponary and close combat units.

Some examples could be:

With blood angles use storm ravens and drop pods and get some death company dreadnoughts and other units in his face.

With eldar use wave serpents and warp spiders and use your mobility to run circles round him and close combat anything you can prey on.

Seems like he's adapted to the local meta well and made he decision to protect his troops by keeping them in their busses.

This reduces the volume of fire he has, but he gets to focus the quality shots with overwhelming numbers.

In regards to AV 14 rushes. That may work out, or it may not. Those anti TEQ crisis suits could have Fusion Blasters. Being able to deep strike, roll 8+2D6 for penetration at a range of 9 inches, then back up 2D6 inches makes it plausible for a crisis team to pop a land raider and back up out of the reasonable threat range of its occupants. The riptide may have a fusion blaster too.


Depending on what gear this fellow has on his units, he may also be well equipped to stop Deep Striking and Flyer type attacks as well.

Speed is an interesting and plausible counter, though the problem I see is that this player is able to essentially ignore armour and cover saves and giggles excitedly at low model count armies, even if they are high toughness. So bikes and jetpacks are easy meat. Also, keeping his troops in the Devilfish means he can keep his fragile scoring units out of reach, so expact the fast units to get the Broadsides and Pathfinders, but his troops and battlesuits will just dance away and shoot some more.

In short, pretty much any variant of a marine force is in deep trouble against this list.

To beat this list you are going to need to have a large enough volume of bodies on the ground to absorb all that high strength shooting and keep combat effective or something that doesn't rely on cover, armour saves or high AV to protect it. Pretty much anything else you are loosing too many points each time the Tau shoot to remain combat effective.

So my suggestion is to flood him if you can. Of course most Marine lists don't flood well, but this build will really struggle on Orks, Guard, Tyranid swarms and similar.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Another thing. Yes the SMS ignore LoS and Cover, they don't ignore armour like almost everything else he uses. Lots of LoS blocking terrain should keep some of your higher end stuff alive for the sprint to the finish and reduce his avenues of escape.

In any situation though, this army is going to devastate its opponents as long as its pathfinders are still functional and is dangerous without them.

 Jancoran wrote:
Bike armies from Dark Angels codex make me nervous. They are a very difficult army to face for Tau. They can counter your counter shinanigans with outflanks and the like and their speed means when ready they can definitely get to you. a Lot of firepower there and ther Tay weapon str, while good, is up against T5 with 3+ seve, so the wounds dont pile up near as fast. Theres something to be said for a large bike contingent with outflankers.

I'm mixed on this. I know the bikes can get insane amounts of fire and the T boost makes pulse rifles and plasma rifles less effective. However a lot of our weapons such as the riptide make them fall just as fast as anything else. These can be a gamble and I think a lot of it relies on deployment and who goes first.

I've had a few games where bikes get deployed in the open or scout moved into the open only to lose the first turn and get most of the bikes removed first turn. I've also had it where the speed and firepower they put out had me on the ropes for a long time. I do think bikes have the best blend of speed and power while still being cost effective and could do a lot of damage to Tau while still having an effective TAC list.

On the subject of Dark Angels, I have never seen a DA terminator unit live to see it's shooting phase.

For general advice against Tau, I think target priority is the best thing to learn. Riptides are beasts and huge targets, but should be left alone until late game and I think the same would go for hammerheads.
Turn 1 the firepower should be focused on Pathfinders. I wouldn't stop shooting until every last pathfinder is dead or atleast reduced to the point where they can't regroup if they run. After that, units like Crisis suits, Riptides, and Hammerheads will be stuck with Low Ap weapons that still allow cover saves, reducing their effectiveness about 1/3. They also can't boost BS, so it means Riptides and hammerheads will be more affected by scatter and Gets Hot. Taking down markerlights hurts the whole army and it's easy to split fire up thinking that you should take down the bigger threats.
The Devilfish should be completely ignored. Weapons that could hurt the Devilfish reliably would be put to better use against suits.
Hammerheads and Riptides should be ignored up until Turn3. Riptides can put a couple wounds on themselves with Gets Hot and Nova and the Hammerhead can lose some hullpoints. If you start putting on wounds early then they could play more conservatively and not use the nova charge. Let them do the free damage and just finish them when they are weak.
Broadsides and Suits should get hit with whatever S8+ weapons you have just to try and get one wound through to cause a moral check.

Don't be afraid to play aggressively. As fast as Riptides are, it's still hard to put templates on units when it could scatter back onto your own units.

 Thaylen wrote:


Bike lists have low body count. Our S5 pulse weapons counter the bikes T5 fairly well.

A harder bike list for the tau to face would be a dakka banner lists. The banner is a weakpoint in the list, but distance from the tau firing lines will lessen the impact of pulse fire on the bike list.

I think you're dismissing them too quickly yet in the same breathe pointing out why the bike army IS good. Lol. I have been on the receiving end and it was impressive both times. Dakka banner, 4 outflankers, two Skimmer units... It was a metric ton of shots on TOUGH chassis. I respect the Banner bike build like this and think it is a very good answer to the question: how can I beat up on some Tau.

The General still has to SHOW UP or all bets are off. obviously.

 Jancoran wrote:

 Thaylen wrote:


Bike lists have low body count. Our S5 pulse weapons counter the bikes T5 fairly well.

A harder bike list for the tau to face would be a dakka banner lists. The banner is a weakpoint in the list, but distance from the tau firing lines will lessen the impact of pulse fire on the bike list.

I think you're dismissing them too quickly yet in the same breathe pointing out why the bike army IS good. Lol. I have been on the receiving end and it was impressive both times. Dakka banner, 4 outflankers, two Skimmer units... It was a metric ton of shots on TOUGH chassis. I respect the Banner bike build like this and think it is a very good answer to the question: how can I beat up on some Tau.

The General still has to SHOW UP or all bets are off. obviously.

The point was that without a dakka banner, bike lists can't match tau firepower from long range. And when they get closer, tau firepower improves dramatically.

You refuse to play Tau, you make some disparaging rhyming remark about their army, and generally make them feel so bad about playing Tau that they'll stop.

You know like people used to do with Grey Knights

but if I come up with anything better I'll let you guys know.

Its basically about threat overload. There's a 99.5% chance that you will lose a shooting battle with Tau, so get in their face. Unfortunately they have interceptor, so if you are getting close, it needs to be a lot of things in their face, all at the same time. A massed Drop Pod assault, or Khornedog lists, perhaps even FMC spam can do the trick.

All of those options my army does not have access to. The way I have learned to face tau is to...

Not play them. They are extremely broken and are very difficult to do damage to without losing your entire unit that you attempted to damage the tau with.

I was just in a tourney yesterday and won all of my games besides my last game which was at top table against tau. Naturally I did the best I could to bring down their large threats then branch out to the smaller threats. Unfortunately they all have the same threat level, when you have 3 squads of troops that can put out over 100 shots with one little buff you know you have a broken army. There is just no way to beat them with my army. It is impossible for me to outshoot them with my 24" range I don't have the numbers (and nobody currently does) to engage them in CC.

What's your exact army list? You seemed to do great against the rest of the tournament. I wonder why Tau gives you such a hard time. It's been said that the new Tau book is one of the most balanced ones in the game.

Tau are very, very tough. No obvious weaknesses if the list is built correctly. Just try to outmanuever and outplay your opponent. That is the best advice I can give because I honestly don't think there is a "counter" to Tau. They will almost always win shooting wars due to more durable and powerful shooting platforms. Assault is mostly dead vs. Tau due to supporting fire combined with Markers and LD10 stubborn Kroot bubblewraps.

What is your list exactly?

Excuse my ignorance, what gives Kroot L10 and stubborn?

Saythings wrote:
Excuse my ignorance, what gives Kroot L10 and stubborn?

Ethereal gives a LD 10 bubble and can choose to give units within a bubble Stubborn. It's quite good and the reason you will see people recommending Ethereals left and right.

Ah gotcha. But then you lose Infiltrate/Outflank and give the opportunity for another Victory Point :( Boo.

Thank you for clearing that up tho.

I typically steam roll tau. Bake them to death with a pair of heldrakes, and my daemons destroy them with flying circus spam

Can supporting fire go off more than one per turn. Let's just say there are 4 squads all with 6" of each other. My marines charge one squad and all 4 overwatch them. My second marine squad charge another squad. Now do the remaining 3 squads overwatch again? Or is that once per phase you get to overwatch?

I had great success with Whirlwinds and Thunderfire Cannons. Generally speaking they die fast against pieplates normally. These two units are golden in 6th in my local meta against almost all opponents right now.

Other than that try to play the mission and stay out of LOS (and range from the sms) as much as possible. If theres not much terrain youre screwed. Also i found it very hard to beat them when there is an uneven number of objectives and they are able to place more. Normally they score first blood against me so its a double disadantage from the start. We normally play 3 book missions at once (relic and kill points + either "Big Guns never Tire" or "the scouring" randomly) and i try to play strictly the mission against them. If you play 1 random book mission its harder to beat them i think.

A little more information would be good to give some advice.

Saythings wrote:
Ah gotcha. But then you lose Infiltrate/Outflank and give the opportunity for another Victory Point :( Boo.

Thank you for clearing that up tho.

Don't let this deter you. You can make it very hard to kill Ethereals. (Hint: Riptides can be joined by ICs. Have fun shooting barrages at a Riptide..) The benefits outweigh the negatives.

Do you mention Barrages specifically because of Barrage Sniping? How does joining a Riptide help? So he gets majority T6?

I should also mention I play a very strange Tau/Ork Allies list and I was just wondering how to make my 40 kroots stronger

I've been trying out:
Shadowsun
6 Stealth Suit
-2 Fusion (Interceptor on 2 Fusions), 4 Burst
10 Kroot w/ Snipers and 1 Hound
10 Kroot w/ Snipers and 1 Hound
10 Kroot w/ Snipers and 1 Hound
10 Kroot w/ Snipers and 1 Hound
5 Pathfinders
5 Pathfinders
Riptide with Ion/Pulse (Skyfire/Interceptor)
Riptide with Ion/Pulse (Skyfire/Interceptor)
Warboss on Bike +Upgrades
10 Nobs (Painbody, 2 PKs, 7 BCs, Waagh Banner, Bosspole)

Very strange army, kinda themed, but fun fun fun to play

Kroots being L10 and Stubborn seemed op but it comes with the cost of an Ethreal

Yes, Barrage sniping is a good way to remove Ethereals. Attaching him to a Riptide gives him the benefit of having T6, having a very, very durable unit to absorb shooting for him and it makes it less attractive to be sniped through barrages since most barrages have little to no effect on a Riptide.

I'm not saying it'll make your Ethereal impossible to kill, but it makes them quite difficult to remove, which is good enough.

My Ethereal(s) die very infrequently because they are easier to protect than most folks give them credit for.

A sinlge ethereal is rather easy to protect, with the 12" bubble for his abilities, you have a lot of play on exactly where you can hide the little bugger. Sticking him on the back end of a firewarrior squad (behind ADL) or a riptide are good ways to hide him. Additionally he doesn't need LOS to give his buffs so he can easily be hidden inside of a ruin behind a wall. The first floor of 2 story ruins are a good place to hide him if you are worried about your opponent using barrage weapons to snipe him out.

The biggest problem with ethereal hunting is that if you are dopping shots on him/ his squad, you aren't shooting the move vulnerable elements of the tau army, pathfinders and suits without iridium armor commanders.