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So I am planning on starting a Tau army. I am converting over from Chaos Space Marines. My biggest problem armies so far have been Eldar and Dark Angles bike lists. I wanted to know what are some good counters as Tau for these armies. I do see a lot of these armies with a smattering of Necrons.

I know Markerlights for one will be a a great help to avoid all the 2+ link shenanigans. But I was also looking at an R'Varna, those guns seem like a good way to make the bikes to think twice about where they will be moving.

I feel the amount of firepower I have should be able to down some Necrons.

Would appreciate any tips I can use to help fend off these guys.

Marker lights are a must. Ignoring jink will help against scatter laser bikes, wave serpents, and the like. A riptide with an ion accelerator is good on this.

Batman dropping in with suits is awesome. Each suit has 2 plasma or 2 fusion rifles, Shield drones are good for this unit, but not mandatory. Feel no pain support systems. Commander has multi-spectrum Sensor suite for twin-linked ignores cover melta.

Other commander grabs marker drones and drone controller and hides with a large squadron of marker drones. BS5 relentless jet pack marker lights. Mmmm...

Is it preferable to take shield drones over gun drones?

You basically place them in front of your crisis team and have them take the first hits, am I correct?

 Vash108 wrote:
Is it preferable to take shield drones over gun drones?

You basically place them in front of your crisis team and have them take the first hits, am I correct?

How much AP 3 are you going up against?

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

 Vash108 wrote:
Is it preferable to take shield drones over gun drones?

You basically place them in front of your crisis team and have them take the first hits, am I correct?

How much AP 3 are you going up against?

Enough from the DA bikes with plasma and grav where it is a problem. DA is the biggest opponent I play against with a lot of ap3 and ap2.
Eldar is mostly Scatbike spam, psychic and the occasional WK. Well and the D flamers.

 Vash108 wrote:

 Tactical_Spam wrote:

 Vash108 wrote:
Is it preferable to take shield drones over gun drones?

You basically place them in front of your crisis team and have them take the first hits, am I correct?

How much AP 3 are you going up against?

Enough from the DA bikes with plasma and grav where it is a problem. DA is the biggest opponent I play against with a lot of ap3 and ap2.
Eldar is mostly Scatbike spam, psychic and the occasional WK. Well and the D flamers.

Shield drones. Run buffmander with an entire squad of Markerlight drones so you can seeker missile/Ignore cover the tires off DA bikes

 Tactical_Spam wrote:


Shield drones. Run buffmander with an entire squad of Markerlight drones so you can seeker missile/Ignore cover the tires off DA bikes

Commander with his own marker drones and everyone else uses Sheild to bubblewrap, so to speak?

Do you usually want to load up on fire warriors or MSU them?

 Vash108 wrote:

 Tactical_Spam wrote:


Shield drones. Run buffmander with an entire squad of Markerlight drones so you can seeker missile/Ignore cover the tires off DA bikes

Commander with his own marker drones and everyone else uses Sheild to bubblewrap, so to speak?

Do you usually want to load up on fire warriors or MSU them?

If you can, run kroot and use Pathfinders instead. Path finders can drop some bikes fast with railguns. Also, buy a riptide

One problem with the R'varna is that you have a Riptide with even more guns and such but loses its precious jet pack.This means it becomes less maneuverable and can't do JSJ which means it'll die easy.I remember one time when my friend had 2 units of Kastelens right infront of my Riptide,failed the charge, then next turn I overcharde the jet pack move 12" then ran 4" and got a natural 18" jetpack roll.Even though it has some cool weapons but I still prefer Ion accelerator.

I want to make sure you're aware that there is most likely going to be a brand new Codex with new units coming in the next month or so.

Any tactics discussion might dramatically change in the next month. Also, if you buy a Codex today, you're likely have to just buy another one soon.

 TrenchCoatCreep wrote:
One problem with the R'varna is that you have a Riptide with even more guns and such but loses its precious jet pack.This means it becomes less maneuverable and can't do JSJ which means it'll die easy.I remember one time when my friend had 2 units of Kastelens right infront of my Riptide,failed the charge, then next turn I overcharde the jet pack move 12" then ran 4" and got a natural 18" jetpack roll.Even though it has some cool weapons but I still prefer Ion accelerator.

I figured the double wounds per biker/jetbiker would be worth it for the R'Varna at 60" would be pretty worth. It seemed more like a stand back and shoot type thing where the Riptide would be jumping around being a nuisance.

The TAU codex is likely out in a week or two so anything we know about tau may change dramatically

If you can wait, don't buy anything till the new codex arrives. As we're used to GW, any new codex generally messes up with models that already sold well and buff those that barely sells, but are new.

FW older things (Barracudas, Tetras, and other things in the Imperial Armour 3, 2nd edition) aren't liable to change anytime soon, so they're safer bets. Tetras are way better than the actual Pathfinders, so you could get those instead for now. They are good with Deep Strike units (Crisis are your workhorse)

Chances are very good that the release schedule will look like this...

10/3 - Stormsurge Battlesuit (set in stone)
10/10 - XV-95 Ghostkeel Battlesuit (set in stone)
10/17 and on - Striker/Breaker box, Enforcer/Coldstar box, Tau themed terrain piece and codex

The only question is whether the three remaining items will be 1, 2 or 3 weeks. Codexes are almost always released alongside models, so I doubt the four products will be stretched out along four weeks

Don't get anything yet, a new codex drops in just two weeks and tau codcies tend to see massive changes in them.

Wait to see what happens, then let the veterans figure out more or less what's going on (will take a week or so), then come back for answers.

I have a few things already when their 6th edition hit out of impulse. So i feel i have a humble start. Found them while cleaning up, figured id see it through.

O'Ralai
1 box Fire Warriors
1 box Pathfinders
1 Riptide
1 box Crisis suits
1 Broadside

Its a decent start. But wait till the 7th edition comes out like everyone else is saying. Tau is my first army and I'm excited about the new stuff coming out, but I don't know what the formation bonuses and combinations are yet and I don't want to buy a model that will sit on the shelf (like the Harlequins I bought).

My personal favorite setup for my Crisis Team is the "scalpel", which is particularly effective against Space Marines, but has also been effective again Eldar.

Commander (Buffmander) - Command and Control Node, Multi-Spectrum Sensor Suite, Neuroweb System Jammer, Puretide Engram Neurochip.
Optional: Drone Controller and 2x Gun Drones, Onager Gauntlet, XV8-02 Iridium, Shield Generator.

Crisis Team
Shas'ui - 2x Plasma Rifle. Option: Target Lock
Shas'ui - 2x Plasma Rifle. Option: Target Lock
Shas'ui - 2x Fusion Blaster, Target Lock
Optional: 6x Gun Drones.

This team can either wait in your deployment behind cover to spring forwards, or deep strike to gut back line targets.
The commander uses his buff abilities to allow the unit to function without marketlight support to free it up for the rest of the army.
In the light configuration, the Plasma suits remove heavy infantry and light vehicles while the Fusion suit removes vehicles.
The full configuration is similar, however you also have eight BS5 Gun Drones to shred normal infantry and one of the Plasma suits can threaten another small heavy infantry unit.
The Buffmander can also be upgraded to soak most of the incoming fire and have an at initiative one shot S10 power fist

Twin-linked all, ignore cover, screw you Gets Hot, and a choice of Counter-attack, Furious Charge, Monster Hunter, Stubborn or Tank Hunters.

This is very much a do or die unit, however, I have yet to face an army that doesn't recoil from its hit except from mass invisibility for Land Raider spam (have yet to face Knight spam).

 Nilok wrote:
My personal favorite setup for my Crisis Team is the "scalpel", which is particularly effective against Space Marines, but has also been effective again Eldar.

Commander (Buffmander) - Command and Control Node, Multi-Spectrum Sensor Suite, Neuroweb System Jammer, Puretide Engram Neurochip.
Optional: Drone Controller and 2x Gun Drones, Onager Gauntlet, XV8-02 Iridium, Shield Generator.

Crisis Team
Shas'ui - 2x Plasma Rifle. Option: Target Lock
Shas'ui - 2x Plasma Rifle. Option: Target Lock
Shas'ui - 2x Fusion Blaster, Target Lock
Optional: 6x Gun Drones.

This team can either wait in your deployment behind cover to spring forwards, or deep strike to gut back line targets.
The commander uses his buff abilities to allow the unit to function without marketlight support to free it up for the rest of the army.
In the light configuration, the Plasma suits remove heavy infantry and light vehicles while the Fusion suit removes vehicles.
The full configuration is similar, however you also have eight BS5 Gun Drones to shred normal infantry and one of the Plasma suits can threaten another small heavy infantry unit.
The Buffmander can also be upgraded to soak most of the incoming fire and have an at initiative one shot S10 power fist

Twin-linked all, ignore cover, screw you Gets Hot, and a choice of Counter-attack, Furious Charge, Monster Hunter, Stubborn or Tank Hunters.

This is very much a do or die unit, however, I have yet to face an army that doesn't recoil from its hit except from mass invisibility for Land Raider spam (have yet to face Knight spam).

Well that sounds like a lot of fun to throw on a Scat Bike blob. Too bad I can't stick O'ra'lai in with any DS groups.

I'd highly recommend waiting a month or so. Its insanely unlikely a new codex wont dramatically change how a race plays and as many have stated, Tau are getting one soon. Ghostkeels in particular (the "stealth riptide" unit) are going to put a major curveball in a lot of tactics. Easily the best unit Tau have to assault with...yes i said assault....and theyre dead killy in shooting as well on top of a WALKING 2+ COVER SAVE (at 12" or further) lol.

That being said....

ML support is your lifeline. Contrary to popular opinion that DOES NOT mean ML Drones via Crisis suit teams and Pathfinders. I bring a buffmander (commander with a bunch of supporty stuff) with a crisis suit team + ML drones for my primary force, i.e. to bulk up on the #1 target i want dead. Nearly every unit has a ML in it though, excluding Hammerheads/Riptides/Piranhas obviously. Getting a casual +1 BS on each squad is much, much more powerful than +2BS and Ignores Cover on a single squad. I literally never, ever use Pathfinders or multiple Drone-heavy squads. Only reason i justify that one squad is because of Commander Buffy making the Missilepods insanely deadly on top of 6 guaranteed markerlights. I wouldnt ever bring that many ML drones without a Drone Controlling BS5 guy in there.

Basically if my Shas'ui in my firewarrior squads didnt move, he doesnt shoot his gun he shoots a markerlight. If they didnt wipe the unit, then more likely than not the next unit will have a random ML to use.
Focus fire. Do not split up your shootings because Tau shooting is pretty meh without support. You cannot possibly marker up more than 1 target reliably without spending a ton of points in doing it, which counteracts the point. I shaved drones from my buffmander/crisis blob because i found 8 BS5 with rerolls markerdrones was overkill on a single unit lol.

I have next to no FW experience, but from what i hear Remoras and Barracudas are great. The Riptide variants are kinda cheesy imho, i always feel dirty fielding a Y'vahra lol.

As everyone else said, wait for the new codex to drop to see where you need to reinforce. More crisis suits never hurt anyone though...but you might want to wait till the new model.

Not sure if anyone has said this yet, but a new codex comes out soon...

Exalbaru wrote:
Not sure if anyone has said this yet, but a new codex comes out soon...

Don't think I have heard that yet.
I don't really plan on any big purchases until the new stuff hits. But I was going to attempt to play with what I had for now in smaller games.

 Vash108 wrote:

Well that sounds like a lot of fun to throw on a Scat Bike blob. Too bad I can't stick O'ra'lai in with any DS groups.

It is absolutely fine to proxy one model for another so long as it has been declared beforehand, is easy to tell apart, and you don't downbase. O'ra'lai would be a bit big for an Enforcer suit, but compared to a classic Crisis Commander on a flying base would be similar in height and base. Simply build your list with O'ra'lai as a normal Commander and make sure everyone knows.

 Vash108 wrote:

Exalbaru wrote:
Not sure if anyone has said this yet, but a new codex comes out soon...

Don't think I have heard that yet.
I don't really plan on any big purchases until the new stuff hits. But I was going to attempt to play with what I had for now in smaller games.

The real concern is that some of the rules and wargear that these tactics are built on will get changed or removed.

We are currently moving into week 2 of of the release, first week was the KV128 Stormsurge (meh?), this week is the XV95 Ghostkeel (nice), and next week we should start getting codex leaks.

Im in love with the Ghostkeel rules personally. I intend to use them to assault things from time to time, and not in a joking manner like Tau typically do. If they werent MC's i wouldnt do this, but they are so they have AP2 attacks plus they cause Fear and have a respectable amount of attacks.

 Vineheart01 wrote:
Im in love with the Ghostkeel rules personally. I intend to use them to assault things from time to time, and not in a joking manner like Tau typically do. If they werent MC's i wouldnt do this, but they are so they have AP2 attacks plus they cause Fear and have a respectable amount of attacks.

Yes I saw those, I am pretty interested in that unit. it seems like a good harassing unit as well.

If Necrons the player[s] use Orikanstar, try your absolute hardest to ignore shooting at that unit

I have seen it erase entire shooting phases against me multiple times

Mostly just Reclamation formation. Wraiths are a pain to deal with.