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I don't end up playing much tau (thank god) because all but two people in my club have quit playing them out of sheer embarrassment, but every time I do I leave with a disgusted taste in my mouth and I can't figure out what I could have done differently.

This last game I did as well as I ever have and it still felt like I was playing a guy who had a 4000+ point list. I was playing Harlequins against full mech Tau and I had no scatter drop melta, drop haywire, and two units of haywire bikes and the only thing I managed to kill were the two Riptides (aka the only models in his entire list I could hurt with psychic powers) and spent the rest of the time stuck in hour-long shooting phases removing my models from the board.

So what are you supposed to do against a list that just parks in cover on their board edge for infinite 3+ cover saves on their AV13 tanks and fires at you from 30" away until you're tabled? You can't shoot them, maybe you'll manage to take off one 120 point tank the entire game, which means deep striking is pointless even if he doesn't have interceptor Riptides, you can't get into melee because nothing survives the fullisade of ignores cover bs that flies across the table at you every turn, and you can't play for the game because he just sits there and secured three objectives all game so he either wins by objectives or wins by tabling you.

How do you play AGAINST tau? By that I mean not "oh just build your list specifically to kill tau with a million ignores cover guns and three imperial knights to just rip them to pieces" I mean what do you do when you have your normal list and you come up against a Tau list?

Coming from a "traditional" (aka force org chart), instead of a pure mech army (assuming he was playing unbound?):

Fast moving assault troops: Either deepstriking, infil, etc. Anything to tie up shooting, or deny it (i.e. blocking LoS)

Better shooting: While some will argue this, the new skitarii rangers (for example) can really go toe to toe with tau firewarriors, and probably come out ahead. Obviously, this isn't the best way to go, but have some good shooting to go with your fast melee. Unless you're doing a full deepstrike army, then they'll just be focused down very quickly.

If he's doing a full cheese all vehicle army, then just play to counter him honestly. Get Lascannons/whatever anti tank you have to fight back.

 Wolfblade wrote:
Coming from a "traditional" (aka force org chart), instead of a pure mech army (assuming he was playing unbound?):

Fast moving assault troops: Either deepstriking, infil, etc. Anything to tie up shooting, or deny it (i.e. blocking LoS)

Better shooting: While some will argue this, the new skitarii rangers (for example) can really go toe to toe with tau firewarriors, and probably come out ahead. Obviously, this isn't the best way to go, but have some good shooting to go with your fast melee. Unless you're doing a full deepstrike army, then they'll just be focused down very quickly.

If he's doing a full cheese all vehicle army, then just play to counter him honestly. Get Lascannons/whatever anti tank you have to fight back.

His list was 2x Riptides 2x Devilfish 2x skyrays long strike and 2 squads of melta drop crisis suits.

Any fast troops he'd just pummel with ignore cover rockets until their transport is dead, or drown in AP2 blasts. Any deep striker needs to weather 2 AP2 large blasts. Skiitari can fight fire warriors, but not S6 AP4 large blasts.

2+ knights kill them. An invisible 12" move Death Star kills them. AV14 might stand a chance until the meltas drop. Serpentspam just barely out-cheeses them.

But if I don't have my own cheese list to put up? Everything in the tau Dex except for a handful of really obvious REALLY bad units just wins by default against everything that's not a super top tier WAAC list.

 Wolfblade wrote:
Coming from a "traditional" (aka force org chart), instead of a pure mech army (assuming he was playing unbound?):

Fast moving assault troops: Either deepstriking, infil, etc. Anything to tie up shooting, or deny it (i.e. blocking LoS)

Better shooting: While some will argue this, the new skitarii rangers (for example) can really go toe to toe with tau firewarriors, and probably come out ahead. Obviously, this isn't the best way to go, but have some good shooting to go with your fast melee. Unless you're doing a full deepstrike army, then they'll just be focused down very quickly.

If he's doing a full cheese all vehicle army, then just play to counter him honestly. Get Lascannons/whatever anti tank you have to fight back.

A lot of good suggestions here. I just beat a Tau player yesterday in a slightly-over-1000 point game doing pretty much exactly this. He was fairly new, mind you, but because of that we tended to give him very favorable rulings when it came to interpreting the rules, including letting him change some equipment after the battle started when he'd made a goof up. And I've beaten more experienced Tau players this way as well, mind you.

Bum rush with fast assault units in large numbers, while hanging back with a gunline and pummeling him. Leman Russes Battle Cannons, Lascannons, and other long range, high strength or large blast template weapons can go toe to toe with Tau stuff. Also, keep units in cover while they're approaching. Cover is doubly important with Tau, is is proper target prioritization. FMC's, jump infantry, and cavalry are all good for closing fast, grabbing the Tau player by the belt buckle, and not letting go until a large portion of their army is dead.

Tau can be a pain in the butt to fight, but they're very beatable, and Necrons and Eldar are a good deal worse.

Alcohol

At least you'll forget it.

Prioritize markerlight Generators. Bring only lascannon and drop melta. Redesign your list to saturate threats and then a. Stop playing on tables without terrain. Go pick through tourney missions and play games like that.

I play in a relatively competitive meta. Lots of players fly to GT's etc.

I cant say I have lost to Tau in quite a while. Been at least a year and I play relatively often.


They simply arent that good, once you assault them. Wraiths, Any Daemon unit, Wraithknight, Knight, etc. Their game is over.

the_scotsman wrote:

 Wolfblade wrote:
Coming from a "traditional" (aka force org chart), instead of a pure mech army (assuming he was playing unbound?):

Fast moving assault troops: Either deepstriking, infil, etc. Anything to tie up shooting, or deny it (i.e. blocking LoS)

Better shooting: While some will argue this, the new skitarii rangers (for example) can really go toe to toe with tau firewarriors, and probably come out ahead. Obviously, this isn't the best way to go, but have some good shooting to go with your fast melee. Unless you're doing a full deepstrike army, then they'll just be focused down very quickly.

If he's doing a full cheese all vehicle army, then just play to counter him honestly. Get Lascannons/whatever anti tank you have to fight back.

His list was 2x Riptides 2x Devilfish 2x skyrays long strike and 2 squads of melta drop crisis suits.

Any fast troops he'd just pummel with ignore cover rockets until their transport is dead, or drown in AP2 blasts. Any deep striker needs to weather 2 AP2 large blasts. Skiitari can fight fire warriors, but not S6 AP4 large blasts.

2+ knights kill them. An invisible 12" move Death Star kills them. AV14 might stand a chance until the meltas drop. Serpentspam just barely out-cheeses them.

But if I don't have my own cheese list to put up? Everything in the tau Dex except for a handful of really obvious REALLY bad units just wins by default against everything that's not a super top tier WAAC list.

What are you playing vs him? Some general advice is either AP2/Force weapons to instagib the riptides, snipers/ranged AP2 to kill the riptides + vehicles. Priority is Riptides, Crisis, Skyrays, then devilfish + whatever is in them. Best bet might even to take allied guard with a shadow sword. That should scare the pants off him, AND eliminate everything it hits (along with being super durable, I don't think he can kill it first turn unless he's VERY lucky. I'm talking, a lot of 6s on the armor pens from the sky rays, etc)

And Deepstriking. My worst fear is honestly blood angels DoA. I lose a turn of shooting, he deploys super close to me, and with some lucky reserve rolls, it can drop a lot of high priority targets very quickly onto the field (multiple units of deathcompany, etc)

Well, I don't play Eldar, but a couple of things come to mind...1) Eldar are complaining about Tau? Now to how to make it more challenging/fun. Play maelstrom, gunlines can't do didly in maelstrom, he will have to maneuver. . Also you're playing Harliquins, how the heck is he shooting you at long range? Use some Shadow Seers.

I suspect you may be targeting the wrong units in terms of order if the "only thing" you kill is Riptides...you need to kill Marker Lights, then the next easiest thing, etc. You may well Never target the Riptides because the game ends before you do.

In some ways you two are perfect counters to each other, you have one of the best CC armies, and he has a shooting expert force. Maybe try mixing things up...Deep strike and kill his Sky Rays..? or something else other than slogging into a fire storm.

You guys should also add some Blocks LOS terrain to make maneuver a worthwhile enterprise.

Good luck!

A lot of people have already posted good stuff --

Play Maelstrom (or ITC, or anything that prevents gunlines) -- Tau are not especially good at holding objectives, and it forces them away from a static gunline.

Leadership Attacks & Psychic Powers -- Riptides are not fearless (iirc), and you are Eldar. You can Psychic Shriek/Terrify/Horrify them and anything else that isn't mech. Getting into melee with the Riptides also works. This is even more so if you're Harlequins -- you have that mask that lowers enemy leadership. Ally in Iyanden if you want and throw a bunch of Spiritseers and Wraithguard/Wraithblades around.

Use stuff that's hardy against Tau Firepower -- Tau long range is dominated by S5-S7, AP4 or worse, shooting. Unless they take Plasma/Melta drop suits, but that's close-ranged shots. That means 3+ saves and/or T6+ can help against Tau, because it forces them to throw away their drop suits or dedicate railguns/markerlighted Riptides to that target.

Fast Assault -- Anything that can get into CC with Tau by turn 2 will do well.

Imperial Knights -- others have said why they are good against Tau.

Line-of-Sight Blocking Terrain -- while it doesn't stop smart missiles, that's not a significant portion of Tau's shooting. Make sure that there's enough terrain on the table to prevent easy sight lines. This is NOT just cover, it's LOSB.

Know what to target -- Markerlight units should die quickly, and they're not hard to kill. If you feel you can't engage the Riptides, don't engage them. They don't do that much damage without marker light support, and you kill the Pathfinders as fast as you can. If they're running an Ethereal, Kill the Ethereal.

The reason Tau can be tough is that they play the game a bit differently than many other codices, but every codex has something that they can use against them, and TAC lists need to have some game plan against Tau and gunlines in general. Mauler fiends, Thunderwolves, Grav-bikers, are examples of units that can do work.

I wasn't running Eldar, I was running Harlequins with DE allies-I have fought double hive-tyrant lists, triple knight lists, invisible Tigurius-star grav cent lists, and Serpentspam at least reasonably. My list is to some extent stuck (because fkin harlequins...) but nothing in it has a worthwhile answer to "I set up my figures on the board edge sitting on 3 maelstrom objectives and you will be tabled in 3 turns. I will never have to do anything in any phase except shooting"

The amount of terrain doesn't matter-you don't get cover saves. Bumrush doesn't matter-he can and will kill whatever's fast. Deep strike is useless-shooting does nothing to him and he gets to blow you away before you get to assault even if the Riptides die.

I mean, seriously? You recommend I bring Lascannons? It takes TWENTY-SEVEN Lascannon shots to down ONE tau tank. A 2k list can easily take three and two transports that are the same thing minus a main gun.

So let's see, my list is 16 las predators? Oh, with, this is seventh. I just need to go buy two 120$ imperial knights so I can play against one of the basic armies.

the_scotsman wrote:
I wasn't running Eldar, I was running Harlequins with DE allies-I have fought double hive-tyrant lists, triple knight lists, invisible Tigurius-star grav cent lists, and Serpentspam at least reasonably. My list is to some extent stuck (because fkin harlequins...) but nothing in it has a worthwhile answer to "I set up my figures on the board edge sitting on 3 maelstrom objectives and you will be tabled in 3 turns. I will never have to do anything in any phase except shooting"

The amount of terrain doesn't matter-you don't get cover saves. Bumrush doesn't matter-he can and will kill whatever's fast. Deep strike is useless-shooting does nothing to him and he gets to blow you away before you get to assault even if the Riptides die.

I mean, seriously? You recommend I bring Lascannons? It takes TWENTY-SEVEN Lascannon shots to down ONE tau tank. A 2k list can easily take three and two transports that are the same thing minus a main gun.

So let's see, my list is 16 las predators? Oh, with, this is seventh. I just need to go buy two 120$ imperial knights so I can play against one of the basic armies.

See, I disagree here, Tau is far from OP. Good? Sure. Maybe even great. But their weakness is that they suck in melee. You get anything into melee with them, it's all over for that squad. Your best bet is either saturating the field with very high toughness models (i.e. wraith stuff), or lots of high AV stuff. Or getting a better alpha strike off, which is really hard to do vs tau.

And if he's playing unbound, then so should you. (Unless he was running a Farsight enclave/bodyguards there, that's an unbound list)

Do you have his exact list? I could give you much better advice if you have it.

Something like:

Longstrike in hammerhead

2x drop melta suit squads one of which had a commander with half a dozen special rules. Every single model could splitfire.

2x skyrays with markerlights

2x IA riptides

2x Devilfish with fire warrior squads inside.

I have Harlequins and DARK Eldar. Don't have access to fast and high toughness, just either/or, and not from the Harlequins. My main anti-tank units are haywire, vs MCs I rely on psychic powers and a splinterboat which has worked well so far and worked well this game (both riptides were dropped turn one by a psychic shriek and mirror of minds). For everything else, I simply couldn't get around the 3+ cover saves that literally every vehicle had. I had 6x haywire blasts on my bikes, scourges dropping with haywire blasters, a drop squad with 3x meltas and a haywire grenade. Melee was a non-possibility after turn 1 he just bulled through the invuln save on one of my transports and used seeker missiles for the other two. The drop troops simply died on arrival after he just laughed away their shooting with his slowed 3+ saves on everything for 15 points a pop.

It's just fething frustrating losing to somebody who doesnt even have to play anything but one phase of the entire game. He didn't move a single model the whole time, just put things down on the board and shot. Nothing made it past the halfway line on the board, and he could just sit there securing 3/6 objectives so he just steadily soaked up points.

Maybe Tau was added to the game so GW could break into the lucrative 5 year old market.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, do you know how hard it is to find LOS blocking terrain? I don't have a 2-foot wall in my terrain collection, I've got buildings, and if the Tau can see one square inch of your model through the windows, welp, just need them 3+s to hit on the markerlights and then you might as well be standing in an open field doesn't matter if you have stealth or shrouded or night fight (lolblacksunfiltersoneverything) we get super good cover saves all the time and you don't get gak.

the_scotsman wrote:
Something like:

Longstrike in hammerhead

2x drop melta suit squads one of which had a commander with half a dozen special rules. Every single model could splitfire.

2x skyrays with markerlights

2x IA riptides

2x Devilfish with fire warrior squads inside.

I have Harlequins and DARK Eldar. Don't have access to fast and high toughness, just either/or, and not from the Harlequins. My main anti-tank units are haywire, vs MCs I rely on psychic powers and a splinterboat which has worked well so far and worked well this game (both riptides were dropped turn one by a psychic shriek and mirror of minds). For everything else, I simply couldn't get around the 3+ cover saves that literally every vehicle had. I had 6x haywire blasts on my bikes, scourges dropping with haywire blasters, a drop squad with 3x meltas and a haywire grenade. Melee was a non-possibility after turn 1 he just bulled through the invuln save on one of my transports and used seeker missiles for the other two. The drop troops simply died on arrival after he just laughed away their shooting with his slowed 3+ saves on everything for 15 points a pop.

It's just fething frustrating losing to somebody who doesnt even have to play anything but one phase of the entire game. He didn't move a single model the whole time, just put things down on the board and shot. Nothing made it past the halfway line on the board, and he could just sit there securing 3/6 objectives so he just steadily soaked up points.

Maybe Tau was added to the game so GW could break into the lucrative 5 year old market.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, do you know how hard it is to find LOS blocking terrain? I don't have a 2-foot wall in my terrain collection, I've got buildings, and if the Tau can see one square inch of your model through the windows, welp, just need them 3+s to hit on the markerlights and then you might as well be standing in an open field doesn't matter if you have stealth or shrouded or night fight (lolblacksunfiltersoneverything) we get super good cover saves all the time and you don't get gak.

Yeah, that sounds pretty brutal vs nonwraithdar dar. It's pretty tailored to killing dar actually imo. Skyrays have a lot of anti light vehicle power, while being vehicles themselves, and DE/Harlies are very cqc, so that helps them a ton. Which IA riptides are they? The largeblast one, or the flamer one? (might be thinking of the FW ones tho). They're called the XV109 (the flamer one) and the XV107 (large blast one), both being different than the "stock" riptide.

Also, if he can only see a small portion of your model, then IIRC, the rules say you get a better cover save, or something. I'd need to recheck that though.

Anyways, With whatcha got, your best would be bikes if ya got them, turboboost them as far as ya can, and assault with them just to tie up the riptides, and if you can, give them poisoned weapons/High strength/rending/instadeath/whatever, and more or less put them out of action. While those are doin that, maybe a ravager or whatever form of heavy weapons you have could try and focus down the skyrays, assuming they can be seen. And for crisis suits, slam a even just a warrior squad into them and you'll prolly get some decent results. Even better results if you give them a decent melee weapon.

But at the end of the day, I'm inclined to say he tailored that list, at least somewhat, to take eldar down. Your low saves and AV means skyrays can reliably shoot down anything, or pick off a tougher squad, riptides also can do it, but are actually better off with the heavy burst cannon than the ion accel, as only incubi have a 3+ iirc, meaning everything else that gets shot by them is BONED. It'll even kill most eldar vehicles decently (S6/AP4, heavy 8, or heavy 12 gets hot! with novacharge).

The only reason I would say it's not tailored completely is the crisis squads with meltas (they'd be better off with plas or missile pods), and the riptides since I don't know what kind of weapon they have (ion/HBC, or if it's one of the variants from FW)

edit: How was he getting 3+ cover saves on his vehicles? Disruption pods only ever add +1, so unless he was behind some massive cover for his tanks.

Smashfether and a storm shield gravity gun command squad with an attached librarian can pretty much solo a tau army if he went light on kroot and fire warriors. Without a balancing infantry section to flush out volume of fire command squad on bikes tend to roll up the entire tau battleline in a hurry. Bikers in general are more or less a hard counter for tau. Once the melta combat squads slag the sky rays the command squad becomes effectively invulnerable and will eat a riptide or tank per turn from 2 onwards

I like going up against tau.
With a limit of 2 formations/detachments,
I run 12 fast attack.
5 units of bikes, 5 beast packs, and 2 scourge.

It's all about target saturation. Try and marker like 12 different units. You just can't marker enough in time.
2/3rds of his firepower is over-kill, and half my units hit his lines.

BTW, armor of misery + tormentor grenade launcher is pretty good against Tau. They don't like taking Ld tests at -2, which ignore saves of any kind.

I also play Dark Harlies, and they will always have trouble against Eldar/Tau/Necrons mech because our best weaponry (haywire Blasters, Heat Lances) don't ignore cover.

Something I'd recommend is using Beta Strike. Almost everything important in a Dark Harlie army can Deepstrike or come from reserve with a massive 36'' move. You deepstrike down, with several threatening units, he will have trouble dealing with them. A great example is the Dark Artisan formation, I've been using it to great effect against Tau. T7 3+/4++ re-rolling 1's on FNP is very, very hard for Tau to take down. They just can't. If you place your objectives within striking distance of each other, you can have great board control with this unit. They also have a 12'' -1 Ld debuff, very useful for Quins.

Something you just have to try is Phantasm Grenade Launchers on your Raiders. Mask of Secrets + Coven formation means each Raider has a very potent chance to nuke an entire Riptide.

In my supposed Beta Strike i personally fit in an Autarch but you could have a unit of Harlequins with a Shadowseer behind an Aegis defense line with a comms relay, they'd be invincible with Veil of Tears up. Nothing will want to get close enough to scare them.

If you send me your list i could see what i could suggest in detail.

You think tau is hard, have you fought necron decurion?

First, I just wanted to point out to the OP that just because his very-specific list is very good against your very-specific list, and you're willing to change very little in your list, doesn't make all Tau OP against everything. So please calm down.

Now, I'm not very up on the newest edition of Dark Eldar, and am totally unfamiliar with the Harlies, but you said you can't change much about your Harlequins anyway, so I'm going to focus on the DEldar. Talos may actually be useful here, being fairly fast, fairly tough, and deadly up close. Incubi in Raiders could be useful for closing on his suits and engaging them in CC. Incubi are brutal in CC and Tau suits are mediocre at best. Incubi also have a 3+ save, making them some of the most well protected units in a DE/Harlie army. You complained a lot about marker lights, but he really doesn't have that many. His two Skyrays can light up a max of two units per turn, and then if he uses marker lights on his fire warriors, that's four units, but he has to get his fire warriors out in the open for that, which leaves them very vulnerable. Fire Warriors are easy to kill. Just about anything you point at them is gonna do some damage. He takes a lot of vehicles, so load up on Dark Lances. You might also want to look into DE flyers. I'm not that familiar with them, but they could potentially be very useful.

Why is his cover save 3+ on all his vehicles? Is that an equipment upgrade? If he's getting cover saves from jinking, he should be snap-firing all his weapons the next turn, meaning he needs 6's to hit. Basically, I don't know how he could possibly be getting 3+ cover on all his vehicles without taking a shooting penalty. You might want to brush up on Tau rules and make sure he's playing fairly.

If he's deploying in ruins and buying disruption pods, then they get the 4+ from the ruin improved to a 3+ by the D-Pods without jinking. They can even move in and out with no checks if they buy sensor spines for, like, 5 points IIRC.

At the end of the day, yes, you've been doing quite well against others probably due to haywire being silly strong vs vehicles and DE being brutal like nothing else vs MC's. If your list can stomp face, why shouldn't you have a hard counter?

 fallinq wrote:
First, I just wanted to point out to the OP that just because his very-specific list is very good against your very-specific list, and you're willing to change very little in your list, doesn't make all Tau OP against everything. So please calm down.

Now, I'm not very up on the newest edition of Dark Eldar, and am totally unfamiliar with the Harlies, but you said you can't change much about your Harlequins anyway, so I'm going to focus on the DEldar. Talos may actually be useful here, being fairly fast, fairly tough, and deadly up close. Incubi in Raiders could be useful for closing on his suits and engaging them in CC. Incubi are brutal in CC and Tau suits are mediocre at best. Incubi also have a 3+ save, making them some of the most well protected units in a DE/Harlie army. You complained a lot about marker lights, but he really doesn't have that many. His two Skyrays can light up a max of two units per turn, and then if he uses marker lights on his fire warriors, that's four units, but he has to get his fire warriors out in the open for that, which leaves them very vulnerable. Fire Warriors are easy to kill. Just about anything you point at them is gonna do some damage. He takes a lot of vehicles, so load up on Dark Lances. You might also want to look into DE flyers. I'm not that familiar with them, but they could potentially be very useful.

Why is his cover save 3+ on all his vehicles? Is that an equipment upgrade? If he's getting cover saves from jinking, he should be snap-firing all his weapons the next turn, meaning he needs 6's to hit. Basically, I don't know how he could possibly be getting 3+ cover on all his vehicles without taking a shooting penalty. You might want to brush up on Tau rules and make sure he's playing fairly.

I'm not "unwilling" to change up my list, have you seen the harlequin CAD? This is the flexible one:

3 mandatory troops choices. No optional ones.

2 mandatory FA choices. Choice of FA transports or bikers

1 mandatory HS choice.

And then you can have 7 elites (the three solo models are elites).

There's really not much you CAN change if you wanna play harlequins.

the_scotsman wrote:

 fallinq wrote:
First, I just wanted to point out to the OP that just because his very-specific list is very good against your very-specific list, and you're willing to change very little in your list, doesn't make all Tau OP against everything. So please calm down.

Now, I'm not very up on the newest edition of Dark Eldar, and am totally unfamiliar with the Harlies, but you said you can't change much about your Harlequins anyway, so I'm going to focus on the DEldar. Talos may actually be useful here, being fairly fast, fairly tough, and deadly up close. Incubi in Raiders could be useful for closing on his suits and engaging them in CC. Incubi are brutal in CC and Tau suits are mediocre at best. Incubi also have a 3+ save, making them some of the most well protected units in a DE/Harlie army. You complained a lot about marker lights, but he really doesn't have that many. His two Skyrays can light up a max of two units per turn, and then if he uses marker lights on his fire warriors, that's four units, but he has to get his fire warriors out in the open for that, which leaves them very vulnerable. Fire Warriors are easy to kill. Just about anything you point at them is gonna do some damage. He takes a lot of vehicles, so load up on Dark Lances. You might also want to look into DE flyers. I'm not that familiar with them, but they could potentially be very useful.

Why is his cover save 3+ on all his vehicles? Is that an equipment upgrade? If he's getting cover saves from jinking, he should be snap-firing all his weapons the next turn, meaning he needs 6's to hit. Basically, I don't know how he could possibly be getting 3+ cover on all his vehicles without taking a shooting penalty. You might want to brush up on Tau rules and make sure he's playing fairly.

I'm not "unwilling" to change up my list, have you seen the harlequin CAD? This is the flexible one:

3 mandatory troops choices. No optional ones.

2 mandatory FA choices. Choice of FA transports or bikers

1 mandatory HS choice.

And then you can have 7 elites (the three solo models are elites).

There's really not much you CAN change if you wanna play harlequins.

Then try Unbound.

Terrain.

Make sure there is lots of LoS blocking terrain that lets your army get closer without weathering as much firepower.

Synchronized assaults. Except for Longstrike, each Tau unit can only fire Overwatch once per turn weather it's to protect themselves or as part of supporting fire. So time your assaults so that you can jump on him with more than one unit a turn. Yeah he might wipe out one of the units, but the others will still get the jump on him.

Also the list I'm seeing he has like 4 markerlights plus possibly some drones in some of the other units. He should only be able to ignore cover for one or two shots a shooting phase that way.

 fallinq wrote:

the_scotsman wrote:

 fallinq wrote:
First, I just wanted to point out to the OP that just because his very-specific list is very good against your very-specific list, and you're willing to change very little in your list, doesn't make all Tau OP against everything. So please calm down.

Now, I'm not very up on the newest edition of Dark Eldar, and am totally unfamiliar with the Harlies, but you said you can't change much about your Harlequins anyway, so I'm going to focus on the DEldar. Talos may actually be useful here, being fairly fast, fairly tough, and deadly up close. Incubi in Raiders could be useful for closing on his suits and engaging them in CC. Incubi are brutal in CC and Tau suits are mediocre at best. Incubi also have a 3+ save, making them some of the most well protected units in a DE/Harlie army. You complained a lot about marker lights, but he really doesn't have that many. His two Skyrays can light up a max of two units per turn, and then if he uses marker lights on his fire warriors, that's four units, but he has to get his fire warriors out in the open for that, which leaves them very vulnerable. Fire Warriors are easy to kill. Just about anything you point at them is gonna do some damage. He takes a lot of vehicles, so load up on Dark Lances. You might also want to look into DE flyers. I'm not that familiar with them, but they could potentially be very useful.

Why is his cover save 3+ on all his vehicles? Is that an equipment upgrade? If he's getting cover saves from jinking, he should be snap-firing all his weapons the next turn, meaning he needs 6's to hit. Basically, I don't know how he could possibly be getting 3+ cover on all his vehicles without taking a shooting penalty. You might want to brush up on Tau rules and make sure he's playing fairly.

I'm not "unwilling" to change up my list, have you seen the harlequin CAD? This is the flexible one:

3 mandatory troops choices. No optional ones.

2 mandatory FA choices. Choice of FA transports or bikers

1 mandatory HS choice.

And then you can have 7 elites (the three solo models are elites).

There's really not much you CAN change if you wanna play harlequins.

Then try Unbound.

This ^ try unbound if all else fails. Should free up points in a lot of areas, and by the looks of it, he's already playing unbound with 4 elites (assuming non FW riptides, and both of those crisis suit teams are 3 models before the commander)

2 Riptides, 1 crisis bodyguard team, 1 crisis team...I think that's three elites.

Unbound is an option, but doesn't really get me much. I guess I could swap out the skyweavers for slightly more cost-efficient Reaver jetbikes from the DE, and drop the craptastic voidweaver, maybe calling it a venom, but I have never seen someone run unbound where I play. It's not really kosher.

the_scotsman wrote:
2 Riptides, 1 crisis bodyguard team, 1 crisis team...I think that's three elites.

Unbound is an option, but doesn't really get me much. I guess I could swap out the skyweavers for slightly more cost-efficient Reaver jetbikes from the DE, and drop the craptastic voidweaver, maybe calling it a venom, but I have never seen someone run unbound where I play. It's not really kosher.

This is one of the few cases I'd say it's fine, he's pretty much tailor built a list for anti eldar (not perfectly, but pretty close). I really doubt this list would be effective outside of something similar. Throwing it vs an IG army with tanks, or really anything with more than a few big dangerous tanks (i.e. a couple land raiders with some assaulty stuff, or a droppod/deepstrike/infil/bike/mech based army). Normally I'd say follow the force org chart, just because unbound is normally for cheesing even worse than normal. And yeah, he's following the force org chart, with what he's brought.

You can drop one or two of the harly troops for another DE unit/vehicle to saturate the board and hopefully get some more shots off at his tanks. Same with fast attack stuff, if DE stuff is cheaper/more effective, obvious choice there. Really unbound all comes down to whether or not it's a friendly game, and how others feel about unbound. Honestly I don't know enough about the harly book to say whether or not their good allies for DE, but I don't think they make up for DE's shortcomings (weak/fragile units, mostly short range iirc)

That's actually a pretty weak Tau list. Not much markerlights coming from that, the Riptides suck without support. Only real thread is the Commander-Team for it's rules.

As many have pointed out, fast units are good, but....you have acess to one of the quickest and easiest ways to kill off those big Suits, The Mask of Secrets + the Dark Eldar Armor...then add a little bit of Telepathy and they go down..if not, shoot a grenade at them. As for the vehicles, just two of them are really dangerous, the skyrays. They shine most when working with other parts of a Tau army though, either rob that from them, or rob the tanks to drastically weaken other units.

Harlies and DE alike have some good ways to deal with tanks, try haywire-scourges for example. Add some nasty little haywire-grenade throwing and they're doomed. The Hero's Path is a sneaky formation that should do you good service against Tau. Three characters, all capable of shredding tanks and infantry alike, with stealth and shrouded along with an Invul...okay, not as good against the missile system, but once they have jinked it's easy, especially when the skyrays have to jink.

You should concentrate on those at first, ignore the riptides as they're just fatal when having markerlights around. After that you can rip his commander team, as those guys will kill a tank or two (no way around that), but after that they're chargable, the morale-debuff + shriek works wonders here, or even better, if you manage to kill a member of them with a Death Jester, let them run into your open arms.

It's not that his army is strong, it's rather that you should try new ways of playing your own, as there are almost no matches that can't be won...unless you're fighting against a hard counter for your own list (and even then a loss isn't necessarily the outcome).


In my region, Tau are considered strong, but not top of the food chain...there are bigger fish out there. Try fighting an Adepta Sororita Army and you'll see that Tau are rather nice to fight against Eldar, regardless if clown, Sinister or Ascetic ;3

Here's the type of list that I'm going to run:
2x Real Space Raider Detachments
Archon, Webway portal
1 Court of the Archon, Lhaeamen
4x 5 warriors, blaster
5x3 Reaver Jetbikes, cluster caltrops
5x5 beast pack, 1 beastmaster +4 khymerae each
2x5 Scourage, 4 haywire blasters each
3x3 Incubi, each in venoms (no upgrades)
3x3 mandrakes

Harliquins:
Cast of Players
5 Troupe (all with kiss)
1 Death Jester
1 Shadowseer (level 2)

Just under 1850.

The idea is to just bum rush and take the hits.
Mandrakes, Incubi, reavers and beast packs all threaten a turn 2 charge. That's 16 units that he's got to deal with, ASAP. You just can't kill them all, some of them are going to make it into combat.
Archon joins the harliquins and comes down bringing help where it is needed. Shadowseer tries to keep the unit alive by limiting shooting at them.
4x Warriors get largely ignored, due to all the other threats.

Seriously, MSU will crush that tau build, he's only got a handful of units and just can't target enough of the enemy.

With veil of tears and riding crescendo, there is no reason other than bad luck to not be charging the tau with the quinns. You are completely immune to his guns outside of 24" and almost the same at 18-24". Attach a shadow seer to the haywire bikes and enjoy his frustration at not being able to kill them! I would be running 4-6 shadow seers all with veil to really put pressure on him to engage you. Adding SS to scourge units also works well

Believe it or not, Tau are inefficient at shooting without some kind of force multiplier (markerlights, cadre fireblades, etherials). Point for point, for instance (assuming they can get out of the 24"-30" zone of course), Guardsmen with lasguns will outshoot Fire Warriors. This isn't melee, mind you, this is shooting.

It's almost eerily as if somebody designed them that way on purpose...

From which it follows that you destroy the force multipliers if possible as early as you can.

Back in the day, in old WH, there were four phases of the game.

Movement
Shooting
Melee
Magic (Psychic)

Popular theory held that you had to win at least two of these phases to win a game.

While games don't always translate well, I'm a fan of Lizardmen. Lizardmen, like Tau, were an army that always loses two of these against almost any opponent. Unlike Tau, their strong points were magic and melee. Lizardmen are the anti-Tau... but like Tau, they were pretty much set to lose two parts of a four-part game.

You are currently winning half the game. You're just losing the other half hard enough to lose. Think about it.