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Since its been confirmed that the Farsight Enclaves supplement allows (actually requires) crisis suits to be Troops, I was wondering what the recommended loadout would be if no other troops were taken.

I'd say twin MP and no other equipment (except mandatory bonding ritual).
Spam that S7 and Spam it so much it hurts.

See, I was thinking burst cannons as standard since you will be outnumbered and you'll need the high rate of fire.

IA Riptides in the elites slot can easily drop cover ignoring, AP2 pie-plates all day long, especially since they don't have to compete with XV8s for the elites slot.

I just dont see that.

A 3-man crisis is not all that durable on the long run - a 6 wound T4 3+ unit is not all that hard to shift, I think if you'd ask any marine player they'd agree with that. If you want to increase their durability you'll need drones which in turn bumps up the point cost of the squads by a fair margin.

If you think about it, a squad of suits with 4-6 drones runs at 200+ each , if you want more than one of those you start to eat up points from those 'Riptides that will be dropping cover ignoring AP2 pie plates all day long'.

I'd have 2-4 Xv8s as troops and than have 1-2 Squads of Fire Warriors stand in front for cover saves vs most opponents.

Keep in mind I doubt that people will advance foward with XV8 Troops, but rather sit back and fire away.

That said I'll have to play around with some army lists first to see what can be fit in at what points levels, but as it is, I'd say its too early days to say anything 100%, give it a couple of weeks and we'll probably know what the go is.

wighti wrote:
A 3-man crisis is not all that durable on the long run - a 6 wound T4 3+ unit is not all that hard to shift, I think if you'd ask any marine player they'd agree with that. If you want to increase their durability you'll need drones which in turn bumps up the point cost of the squads by a fair margin.

IMO this is the biggest problem. Crisis suits just don't have enough wounds per point to hold objectives against a serious attempt to remove them. You'll need to supplement them with regular infantry troops for holding objectives if you want to be able to count on your objective staying under your control. For example, a unit of Kroot in your own deployment zone can GTG behind an ADL for a giant pile of 2+ save wounds, and that's much tougher than a small MEQ squad.

The best use of being able to take crisis suits as troops is that the crisis suits you already want to take are now scoring and in a different FOC slot from Riptides. For example, I could see taking 2-3 single fusion suits as suicide anti-tank in your leftover troops slots, and if they happen to stay alive long enough to score that's just a nice bonus.

I think you are looking at them wrong.

Just use them like you would use any crisis team, as a forward attack force, DS fusions, heatwave trolls, etc...
And near the end of the game, if you see some are in a tactical location to grab an objective, go for it.
Don't RELY on them to do it, they are backup to the regular troops.

That's probably another good way to use them both of you. But I think the most common use for them will be just to add another unit of suits to a standard Tau army, since its likely that 2 or even 3 Elites slots are going to be riptides.

The suits need a proper use. Make one unit antiair and keep them back. Your units that move forward need those gun drones and plasma/more missiles to deal that damage. Your deep strikers need melta.

Now that you can spam missile pods, you need to take advantage of that. Not much can weather 4 S7 shots a turn.

Just because they are troops doesn't mean there is going to be one universally good loadout now. It is still going to be heavily influenced by what you need your crisis suits to do. It wouldn't be horrible to have, 2 units of double missile pods sitting in the back. A unit of double plasma rifles with a commander advancing forward and a unit of double fusion blasters deep striking in. Missile pod crisis suits are pretty survivable just sitting out of range and avoiding los. With a commander in iridium armor, or new riptide commander, the plasma suit unit can take a huge beating before being put down. A suicide fusion team isn't horrible.

sounds like the crisis suits will become tau terminator troops (like what the dark angels can have with the deathwing)

If you want "all purpose" take the suits as plasma/fusion or plasma/fusion/flamer and add gun drones for additional str5 and ablative wounds. If you don't take the the flamers for wall of death purposes then maybe add counterfire defense system if you have the points for it. This unit can take down anything in the game and will make their snapshots against flyers and assaulters starting at BS2 if you buy the CDF. Add the usual markerlight support and enjoy.

Anything else then you need to consider their role as the upgrades and gear are too expensive. You can easily kit them out for Anti Air, Anti Tank, or Anti Infantry. With 6 troops slots your crisis suits can cover anything you might need to shoot. I personally will still be taking some outflanking sniper Kroot in the Farsight Enclaves list.

While "all purpose" is, on paper, a good thing, the general consensus is that specialized suits are simply too efficient in comparison.

Rather then 2 teams of plasma/fusion a team of plasma/plasma and a team of fusion/fusion tends to get the job done better.

You can simply swarm the field with literally a trio of suits with a dual-wielding of every single gun type. 18 suits per force org will not take THAT much of a tax on your opints if you dont overburden them and trust the pure numbers to get the job done rather then buy expensive defensive gear.

The only way I could see a squad with two weapon types would be running two suits with dual plasma and a third with target lock and dual fusion blasters. Still really good against TEQ/MEQ while having a decent amount of firepower against vehicles.

The problem is that markerlights will be very spread out. So I'm probably going to try running Troop suits with dual missiles. 4 shots per suit at high S to fill multiple roles and due to the weapons AP4 I generally won't need marker tokens to remove cover. It gives me troops with good range, large shot volume, and versatility to take on MC/FMC/Light vehicles as well as all infantry types.

I'd be worried about just spamming S7. It is done better and cheaper by broadsides.
Bursts, Plasma, Flamer and Fusion all seem better to me.
I think I'd start building with Riptides, Broadsides and some marker lights, then fill in with crisis.

For a multi task team, take 2 crisis suits, one with 2 fusion, and flamer, and the 2nd with airbursting frag, fusion, and flamer.
It's 116 points and can either pop off 3 melta shots, or 2 templates and a large blast that are all S4 AP5 ignore cover.


What everyone is saying about holding objectives is totally true. But that's what Kroot and allies are for. It's even fluffy for Tau not to hold objectives.

-Matt

Crisis suits with dual missile launchers are 13 points cheaper, but are scoring and mobile compared to the stationary but twin-linked 2+ broadsides.

Burst cannons are terrible in comparison, because you're getting 4 more shots, but at -2S and half range. Plasma and Fusion are indeed better, but again they take more support to really shine. For a spam approach, the shot volume and range of the mobile jetpack troops wins it out for me.

Besides, it's not like I won't be able to take broadsides as well. It's not like I'm giving up Plasma, broadsides, or fusion to take missile troops. I'm giving up Pulse rifles in exchange for missiles.

Is it safe to say you would need 1-2 regular troops ala fire warriors/ kroot, or can an all suit army be viable?

Suits are troops for all intends and purposes, I think there is an obvious conclusion.

As for HawaiiMatt's "multi-spec team", WHY? you got a whole 6 suits in-no need to maximize suit per slot.
I doubt you would take a full 18 anyway!
Make a tank-hunting team on one edge, and infantry-hunting team on another. you can spare the slots enough for even stand-alone suits now.


Savageconvoy you forgot that BC suits are also cheaper then MP suits, so its also a consideration. "dakkasuits" are in fact quite good when it comes to weight of fire, not firewarrior good, but 8 shots at 43 points is not to be underestimated, as Isome learn the hard way.


As for how to equip our suits, I think we need to revaluate all settings, what is good as elite might not work as troop, and what is a bad idea as an elite might actually work as a troop.
Being troops might open up paths that did not work before.

Being a suicidal drop unit is less valuable, being able to hold your ground becomes more, suits now need to last to the endgame, unlike C:TE where the suits just do some damage to reduce stress of kroot/warriors.

Will the deathrain return? likely. its a good way to do some damage while staying out of harm's way.

Dakkasuits will probably see a rise, as if you got no FW for it, you need SOMEONE to provide high rate shooting to handle hordes. 3 dakkasuits and 6 gun drones is a good setup for serving as the bulk of the otherwise target-optimized force.

Heatwaves will also be a good option, while being a mere amusement as elites they are pretty good at clearing squishy backfield units, and charging into them is harsh. once I gather enough suits, I'll run a team of them for every game as my objective grabbers.

The Fusion-Plasma-Flamer setup will likely not enter farsight armies, unlike C:TE you don't need to mill as much options as possible from each slot, reducing costs and increasing focus will probably go a long way wheninstead of 1-3 crisis teams we can field 4-6



One must remember-farsight is NOT codex tau, the signature systems change alot, and the organizational change MATTERS. in C:TE elites were crowded and troops were sparse and that led for suit designs intended for pure kill power and being able to do as much as possible.
With farsight allowing you to simply field more suits, there is no reason to use the same setups blindly.

 BoomWolf wrote:
...the signature systems change alot...

This is really important. Losing out on the Engram and MSS (unless you spend 500 points on Farsight and two Commanders) is going to make the army play far differently than with a standard suit-heavy list (as tempting as it might be to ally in a standard Tau Commander with those pieces of kit along with a min squad of Kroot).