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I have a friend of mine who always plays tau and typically plays 1500+ pt matches with me so he can span riptides, and let me tell you one of these is good, two is great, and 3 is freaking insane. We're talking consistent twin-linked, heavy burst cannon, and a ton of ignores cover fire coming from buffmanders and just in general insanity. I've usually played a foot-slogging list and recently invested in 3 rhinos for my grey hunters, but I'm new to them and don't quite know how to play them. Can anyone offer some list ideas or tips for taking down the little blue devils.

Drop pod Jaws.

Drop pod in and jaws so its a 3+ to keep the model? Guess its time to invest in rune priests again

Riptides are immune to JAWS as they are Jump Pack Monstrous Creatures. If you read the JAWS entry it does not list this as a target of the power. I thought this also until the Tau player I was going to do it to pointed this out.

LongFang4Life wrote:
Riptides are immune to JAWS as they are Jump Pack Monstrous Creatures. If you read the JAWS entry it does not list this as a target of the power. I thought this also until the Tau player I was going to do it to pointed this out.

Wrong on two counts I'm afraid.
1) They are *Jet* Pack Monstrous Creatures, not Jump. Not that it makes a difference.
2) Jet/Jump is just an addition to another unit type. For the purposes of Jaws, for example, they are just another MC. The Tau player played you, unfortunately.
-TG

he is family so and we agreed to the ruling so not really getting played. Where do you read that for the purposes of JAWS they are just MC?

Because in 6th Jump/Jet isn't a unit type - so they're MC (Jet Pack).

thanks, you just made my day... is there a BRB pg # reference I can use when I JAWS the hell out of his triple riptide list?

Yup 3 rune priests in termi armor with lightning and jaws and pods should hopefully fix it, unless I just fail all the psycher tests or get denied

LongFang4Life wrote:
thanks, you just made my day... is there a BRB pg # reference I can use when I JAWS the hell out of his triple riptide list?

BRB p.47:
Unlike most other unit type categories, '|ump' is not a classification in and of itself. Instead, you'll find it occurs before
another category - commonly Infantry, sometimes Monstrous Creatures and perhaps, rarely, other things. Jump units
therefore share two sets of rules, the Jump unit rules, and those of their base type. Jump Infantry would, for example,
follow the rules for Jump units and Infantry.

Thanks everyone for your help I feel like it was a gross oversight on my part for not realizing it to begin with

Also, throw more than one in a pod and have them split up as they disembark (independent characters). This way they're not a giant of a target for Early Warning Override; plus you get to point the Jaws Lines at separate targets.

 Wilytank wrote:
Also, throw more than one in a pod and have them split up as they disembark (independent characters). This way they're not a giant of a target for Early Warning Override; plus you get to point the Jaws Lines at separate targets.

Do be aware of this. He could shift his riptides to Ion Cannons, and pie plate you with Early Warning Override to vaporize your rune priest before it ever does anything (double strength shot that can armor pierce any non invul the rune priest is packing, which is another reason to watch out on dropping them all together in one pod). The other question is does he play base Tau, or Farsight?

If he's playing Farsight, he could take the Talisman and counter this pretty handedly too.

You could also try to tarpit it with blood claws or sky claws.

 Wilytank wrote:
Also, throw more than one in a pod and have them split up as they disembark (independent characters). This way they're not a giant of a target for Early Warning Override; plus you get to point the Jaws Lines at separate targets.

Can`t split off from the unit when you enter from reserves unfortunately

Yeah, termi armour on a RP is not as great for this as you might think. They can shoot through your 2+ easily, and in close combat can smash at AP2 and S10 to double you out. If you are gonna spam RP's, personally I would rather spend the points on more RPs than the armour since I dont think RP's can even take storm shields so they are limited to the 5++ of the TDA itself.

 Illumini wrote:

 Wilytank wrote:
Also, throw more than one in a pod and have them split up as they disembark (independent characters). This way they're not a giant of a target for Early Warning Override; plus you get to point the Jaws Lines at separate targets.

Can`t split off from the unit when you enter from reserves unfortunately

Why is that ?

Page 124 -
If an Independent Character has joined a unit in reserve,it
cannot leave the unit whilst in reserve, and it cannot choose to leave the unit on the turn it arrives from reserve.

Good to know.

 Maniac_nmt wrote:

Do be aware of this. He could shift his riptides to Ion Cannons,

If he's not already using Ion Cannons, the correct way for Marines to deal with Riptides is derision, laughter, and finally, ignoring them.

Just put some cheap guyz with a runepriest to eat up fire and spread a bit. Don't see no problem with it. U'll most likely counter his riptide list. Although, i'd not spam runepriests, one is enough cause otherwise u're tailoring a list against u'r friend...and it's not very friendly. On the other hand 3 rapetides ain't very friendly either so u'll be worth each other

My first thought was Thunderwolves with TH/SS. They have the range to catch the Rips if they try and run, and the oomph to take 'em down in close combat, plus the survivability to make it there.

I always handle Riptides with the suitable application of thunder hammers, and have never had a problem with them. Space Wolves have a faster, tougher delivery system for the same weapon, so I'd go with that.

If you can't fit in 7 or more drop pods, it's fine to have 2 Rune Priests in a single pod. They can disembark 6 inches in opposite directions with conga lined Grey Hunters providing coherency and fire off Jaws at different targets.

They can't fire Jaws at different targets. It's a PSA, meaning a shooting attack, and everyone in the squad has to fire at the same target.

Regardless of how many RPs you play, just having them in the army forces the Riptide player to counter deploy against them. They become a very powerful disruption unit until they land, which can give you the advantage.

 Tyberos the Red Wake wrote:
If you can't fit in 7 or more drop pods, it's fine to have 2 Rune Priests in a single pod. They can disembark 6 inches in opposite directions with conga lined Grey Hunters providing coherency and fire off Jaws at different targets.

Yes and no - you still have to fire at the same unit, but this method would still allow you to cover a lot of ground, even so.

Thanks for the clarification, I'm a scrub when it comes to psykers.

Jaws is fun to play with, and I can only imagine it gets better when you have multiple Rune Priests (which I haven't tried, as yet), crossing lines, etc. The main thing to be careful of, in this, is that yes - you can have 2 (or 3, or 4) RPs in a Drop Pod, but yes - first turn out of the DP, they have to target the same unit. So, if you target a Riptide (which I believe can only be run as its own unit, right?) with Jaws and he's removed from the table, nobody else in that RPs unit (including the other RPs) can target anyone - they'd all have to target the same unit, which is now gone.

On the other hand, if you have the RPs on opposite ends of the line, then target a unit on the other side of the Riptide (roughly making an X, with the RPs on one side, members of the targeted unit on the other side, and the Riptide as the center of the X), you can keep hammering him, even if he makes a Deny (remember, with Jaws, the first unit hit is the only one who can Deny). Lots of related hijinks can ensue. Interesting idea. I've gotta remember that.

zbg97 wrote:
Jaws is fun to play with, and I can only imagine it gets better when you have multiple Rune Priests (which I haven't tried, as yet), crossing lines, etc. The main thing to be careful of, in this, is that yes - you can have 2 (or 3, or 4) RPs in a Drop Pod, but yes - first turn out of the DP, they have to target the same unit. So, if you target a Riptide (which I believe can only be run as its own unit, right?) with Jaws and he's removed from the table, nobody else in that RPs unit (including the other RPs) can target anyone - they'd all have to target the same unit, which is now gone.

On the other hand, if you have the RPs on opposite ends of the line, then target a unit on the other side of the Riptide (roughly making an X, with the RPs on one side, members of the targeted unit on the other side, and the Riptide as the center of the X), you can keep hammering him, even if he makes a Deny (remember, with Jaws, the first unit hit is the only one who can Deny). Lots of related hijinks can ensue. Interesting idea. I've gotta remember that.

Riptides can come with drones to form a 3 model unit, so they do not have to be solo. Also, you can attach commanders to them and they are no longer solo.

Podding still leaves you seriously hoping he doesn't just pie plate you with a Str 9 AP 2 Template that blasts the carp out of your before you are ever allowed to fire off Jaws.

I wouldn't base your entire strat around JoTWW, because as soon as Space Cheese gets a new codex, that ability is probably gone. It's also not very TAC. Would you use this list against an unknown opponent? The Tyranids thank you for your support.

The blast is only S9 AP2 ordnance if the Riptide nova charges it. There's not much point in nova charging an ion accelerator if you're not going to be firing it at vehicles. I think it's more likely you'd be being hit with S8 AP2 heavy instead.

Not that it matters much against marines.