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Basically I don't really like the GW suits nor do i have funds for forge world (i have one of forge world and one of GW)
I was just wondering what the best way to use tau is without many battle-suits. I have had a lot of success but have only played space marines and grey knights really.
This is what i have:
24 fire warriors
12 pathfinders
2 battle-suits with interchangeable weapons
One riptide with IA
2 sky rays/hammerheads
2 devilfish (can use as sky rays or hammerheads)
A load of drones
4 stealth suits
11 kroot (one fell victim to some conversions)

I was just wondering if anyone has any non battle-suit orientated tactics to play.
I usually get the fire warriors up close and destroy some units after popping out of their transport. Heavy guns at the back. Stealth suits causing disruption down their end, riptide being a riptide and my commander with twin meltas causing as much damage as possible.

Fire warriors can definitely put out the fire, adding an ethereal or cadre would really help them out. Kinda like you do already, run them up in the dfish and pop out and kill. If you added an ethereal and used storm of fire you would double their shots at half range.

If your not playing terribly competitively the hammerheads can be a lot of fun and add some punch. Adding longstrike to one of them will be good too. An ionhead with longstrike is quite a shooter.

Maybe also look at adding pirhannas and adding more kroot. All them can give more board control.

I am aware that you said you don't want to include suits, but an entertaining squad could be a full squad of kroot with krootox and hounds, and include Shadowsun as well. Remember that kroot can benefit from markerlight support as well, so include some skyrays as well.

 Hawkeye888 wrote:
Fire warriors can definitely put out the fire, adding an ethereal or cadre would really help them out. Kinda like you do already, run them up in the dfish and pop out and kill. If you added an ethereal and used storm of fire you would double their shots at half range.

If your not playing terribly competitively the hammerheads can be a lot of fun and add some punch. Adding longstrike to one of them will be good too. An ionhead with longstrike is quite a shooter.

Maybe also look at adding pirhannas and adding more kroot. All them can give more board control.

yeah, I'm planning on converting a shadowseer into an ethereal because im not a fan of the models.
a few people have said kroot but i personally dont see the big deal, can you shed some light???

Im of the same opinon regarding crisis suits.

At 750pts i don't have any. at 1000 i have 2 and it probably won't increase much more unless they bring out better models.

at 1000pts i have

Shadowsun
2x Crisis suits w/2x fusion blasters and 1x PEN
Riptide
2x 12 FW
2x 5 PF
Longstrike
980

It usually works pretty well unless someone spams Wave Serpents or knights or something. but i've got an answer to everything in there

The kroot aren't amazing your correct there. But they can fill a lot of roles.

With a hound you gain acute senses and can outflank on your preferred side. This is useful for grabbing an objective, or harassing the backfield.

You can infilitrate onto an objective or busy area and then use them to soak up fire or tarpit. If you can get them into forest and the enemy does not have ignores cover they can be rather stubborn.

For combat effectiveness they are pretty cheap and don't have terrible shooting. Adding the sniper rounds could pick out the special weapons or squad sergeants. And they can beat up on less then good CC units.

60 points for ten of them is a good deal too. If they die, well then your firewarriors didn't. And that's a win.

and with Shadowsun attached to the squad, they all have shrouded and stealth, or a 4+ cover save in the open.