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With the turrest in the FW squads.... do you have to be stationary the turn before, or simply elect not to move and drop the turret ??

I don't think MPs are auto, simply being if your focusing on anit-infantry, having some s5 ignore cover shots could really benefit you (orks, DE, demons, harlis)

Poking at the Riptide Wing. I have yet to use it, because I only own 3 riptides... and the Retaliation Cadre is just too good to pass up in the DBC. I also feel like an asshat if I fielded 4 riptides, when Tau is getting so much hate right now haha.

You know what you can only take 1 turret per squad... Bummer. ^^^you have to be stationary the turn before.

 thefallenjackal wrote:
You know what you can only take 1 turret per squad... Bummer. ^^^you have to be stationary the turn before.

Ufff... yeah unfortunately that will never work for me. I play to mobile an army myself to be able to do that. =)


Automatically Appended Next Post:
On that mobile note, has anyone ran the DBC with the counterstrike cadre?

I recently have the devilfish to run it. (and the units!) and it seems pretty decent on paper.. despite its larger point size once you fully upgrade and loadout everything.

 thefallenjackal wrote:
You know what you can only take 1 turret per squad... Bummer. ^^^you have to be stationary the turn before.

False, you can drop the turret any turn as long as you remain stationary in THAT turn. I.e you can have a turn 1 turret, just don't move.

DirtyDeeds wrote:

 thefallenjackal wrote:
You know what you can only take 1 turret per squad... Bummer. ^^^you have to be stationary the turn before.

False, you can drop the turret any turn as long as you remain stationary in THAT turn. I.e you can have a turn 1 turret, just don't move.

That makes sense. Strike teams sitting in the back with turrets. Breachers in dfish move forward.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

DirtyDeeds wrote:

 thefallenjackal wrote:
You know what you can only take 1 turret per squad... Bummer. ^^^you have to be stationary the turn before.

False, you can drop the turret any turn as long as you remain stationary in THAT turn. I.e you can have a turn 1 turret, just don't move.

That makes sense. Strike teams sitting in the back with turrets. Breachers in dfish move forward.

The turret is pretty solid, it's basically a special weapon choice that requires you to be stationary the same turn but doesn't replace the regular weapon.

Also no, you don't have to be stationary the turn before.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
One thing I haven't seen discussed is the Ethereal formation with a heavy troop army. If you include Aun'va that formation becomes very hard to kill while you get the ability to put out a ton of fire power.

If you're planning on gettin the ethereals a Devilfish you can even grab that Skyray formation for added value.

 Tinkrr wrote:
The turret is pretty solid, it's basically a special weapon choice that requires you to be stationary the same turn but doesn't replace the regular weapon.

Also no, you don't have to be stationary the turn before.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
One thing I haven't seen discussed is the Ethereal formation with a heavy troop army. If you include Aun'va that formation becomes very hard to kill while you get the ability to put out a ton of fire power.

If you're planning on gettin the ethereals a Devilfish you can even grab that Skyray formation for added value.

Hard to kill? Any infantry-mowing weapon would drop this unit in a heart beat. Scatter Lasers, bolters, burst cannons, flamers all come to mind

Eh... First you have to GET to him and then you have to kill 7 wounds with three levels of saves. But sure.

 Jancoran wrote:
Eh... First you have to GET to him and then you have to kill 7 wounds with three levels of saves. But sure.

Not worth the 3+ victory points you'll give up on those t3 models.

DirtyDeeds wrote:

 Jancoran wrote:
Eh... First you have to GET to him and then you have to kill 7 wounds with three levels of saves. But sure.

Not worth the 3+ victory points you'll give up on those t3 models.

Luckily you wont be giving any up.

DirtyDeeds wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
The turret is pretty solid, it's basically a special weapon choice that requires you to be stationary the same turn but doesn't replace the regular weapon.

Also no, you don't have to be stationary the turn before.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
One thing I haven't seen discussed is the Ethereal formation with a heavy troop army. If you include Aun'va that formation becomes very hard to kill while you get the ability to put out a ton of fire power.

If you're planning on gettin the ethereals a Devilfish you can even grab that Skyray formation for added value.

Hard to kill? Any infantry-mowing weapon would drop this unit in a heart beat. Scatter Lasers, bolters, burst cannons, flamers all come to mind

They shrug off all the high AP and thus the High Strength stuff. Then with some shield drones they have a 4+ invul, a 6++ Fnp, and another 4-5+++ Aun'va save. Also don't forget they don't give victory points for drones or honour guard. Also, that's not counting cover and the like.

Ethereal council just sounds all sorts of bad to me.

Aun'Va's scepter thingie counts as a cover save, and its really the only protection they got (6+ FNP against S5 or weaker guns). It can be bypassed really easy with ignores cover or crap AP weapons. If it didnt say "exactly as though a cover save had been made" it wouldnt be so easy to ignore.
And Ethereals have gak armor, so i dont even consider that a level of protection. They either dont get armor, or dont get the scepter bonus (AP- ignores the scepter)

IF they could still be attached to another unit, i'd take a minimal squad because 1 less Ethereal i get all the powers and then some. But as it stands wow theyre easy to remove lol.

Also in regards to the turret thingie: you can move after its been deployed, but if you break coherency with it then it goes away (but can be resummoned next turn at no penalty other than 1 less turn of it shooting). Normally im a RoF guy, i'll use Bursts over a Melta when im after non-vehicles any day of the weak even if it does splat T4 models and pen termie armor, but in this case i'd rather use the MP variant because just about everything the SMS is good at killing, firewarriors already kill pretty damn hard. The MP adds 2 pretty much guaranteed wounds (assuming they hit), pen 4+ armor, and offer a level of anti-vehicle should that situation arise that the FWs can only glance to death.

Stingwings is a subject I would be interested to hear some input on. They've never really been a fan favorite with the Tau generals I have met. Yet I own 27 and do indeed love them.

The fact that they are hit and run is really good. Their weapon is good. they have decent armor and they have good leadership when their leader is around.

The question is, how to use them? well they seem to be paired in the new Formation with Kroot. Why? I think the answer is that the Kroot cannot take a full on squad of Marines but they CAN take on a much reduced one. The Infiltrate of the Kroot can sucker an enemy into range (or they can simply pursue the issue, either way) and then the Stingwings come in, whallop the enemy unit and the Kroot swarm the remnants. Kroot can do a number on a smaller squad through sheer volume of attacks and Hounds will run many enemies down. The kroot weapons do have AP so there's that too against softer armor.

The Stingwings are also very fast and can deep strike. As Line breakers with 4+ armor and hit and run, thats not really the worst I can imagine at the job for the price to get them there.

Anywho, just some musing on them. Ideas? As in, ideas that are insightful?

The wording on it is really wonky as it's not a cover save in itself and functions different, since a cover save can't ever completely negate things at a 1+. More so it's not a cover save as it's a re-rollable extra, meaning you can make an save/cover/Invul, FNP, and then the Aun'va save, I think it just functions in the same way a cover save behaves like an invulnerable save? Does the ITC have rulings on this?

As for their regular save, well don't forget, the two Ethereals with him in the unit can bring Shield Drones for the 4+ invul save, while also giving them a 6++, and the Aun'va save.

Don't forget Aun'va also makes all of your massive troop swarms basically fearless as they get the 10 LD in a 24" bubble, with a rerollable, and then there's also his Warlord trait of being able to take a massive amount of troops to ground while popping right back up next turn.

Basically, if you're going Ethereal Council, you're not playing basic Tau, you're playing Blue Tide.

The save for ethereals isnt a cover save. I wish that unfortunate turn of phrase wasnt there to cast doubt on it. Clearly it doesnt function like one.

oh well. The ITC rulings are easy to google so scope it out and see. I know we play it as "additional" here.

From the ITC FAQ:

The roll made for Aun'Va's Paradox of Duality may be taken in addition to any save the model may attempt. Additionally, weapons that ignore cover do not negate the Paradox of Duality roll.

So yea, Jancoran and I agree on something, it must be the end of the world as we know it D:

That being said, in the latest Signals from the Frontline they kind of, sort of, made fun of Jancoran, and I laugh D:

 Tinkrr wrote:
From the ITC FAQ:

The roll made for Aun'Va's Paradox of Duality may be taken in addition to any save the model may attempt. Additionally, weapons that ignore cover do not negate the Paradox of Duality roll.

So yea, Jancoran and I agree on something, it must be the end of the world as we know it D:

That being said, in the latest Signals from the Frontline they kind of, sort of, made fun of Jancoran, and I laugh D:

The FAQ podcast?

 Jancoran wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:
From the ITC FAQ:

The roll made for Aun'Va's Paradox of Duality may be taken in addition to any save the model may attempt. Additionally, weapons that ignore cover do not negate the Paradox of Duality roll.

So yea, Jancoran and I agree on something, it must be the end of the world as we know it D:

That being said, in the latest Signals from the Frontline they kind of, sort of, made fun of Jancoran, and I laugh D:

The FAQ podcast?

Episode 398, they weren't talking about you, just someone who thought a majority wasn't enough majority for rules guidelines voting, which sounded like the thing you were going on about for a while D:

Edit: But seriously what was up with that? Why try to blockade a vote instead of claiming unless there's enough a majority it should be played as the majority vote for a while and then be revoted on in the next vote when it comes up? That seems like a much more reasonable way that also provides a ton of data points :/.

Would Fish Tide be viable? 4 squads of 10 Strikers near an Ethereal Council, and then maybe a OSC for AV?

 Verviedi wrote:
Would Fish Tide be viable? 4 squads of 10 Strikers near an Ethereal Council, and then maybe a OSC for AV?

We don't really know yet to be honest, no one has really tried running Blue Tide yet.

I mean the amount of troops we can bring with an Ethereal formation is pretty insane. Even if you max out on troops with 6 slots, it's only 648pts, that's an insane amount of fire power at any range they are capable of putting out, especially with FNP saves, the ability to run and shoot (Hunter Con or even just Ethereal buff if you really want), and LD 10. Heck with the Hunter Contingent you could still deploy the missile turrets and then run parts of your squad with the special rule in order to advance almost 6" (you only need to be 2" within the turret with one member). I mean really, at 648 points, that's 72 shots at 30", with S5, and the BS skill increases based on number of units targeting one squad, that's not counting missile turrets, or the potential to triple that to 216 shots at 15" range.

I'm just saying 72 S5 shots, and 12 S7 shots at 30" for 708 points is nothing to sneeze at, especially with the potential of it becoming 200+ shots given the chance, since Fire Warriors probably aren't running with LD10 that's rerollable thanks to Aun'va.

Edit: I think the Ethereal Formation can lead to the "Long March" Tau where they slowly crawl across the board with the ability to go to ground and shoot at fool as needed, while also just having enough fire power to take out anything they need. Not only that but they don't really suffer from fear due to the extended Ethereal benefits, along with the extra saves and more. Add in the formation that gives them basic cover if in range (I think it's a Ghostkeel formation) and all of a sudden it's just that much harder to accomplish anything against this blob of stuff that moves across the board and covers most of it.

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Verviedi wrote:
Would Fish Tide be viable? 4 squads of 10 Strikers near an Ethereal Council, and then maybe a OSC for AV?

We don't really know yet to be honest, no one has really tried running Blue Tide yet.

I mean the amount of troops we can bring with an Ethereal formation is pretty insane. Even if you max out on troops with 6 slots, it's only 648pts, that's an insane amount of fire power at any range they are capable of putting out, especially with FNP saves, the ability to run and shoot (Hunter Con or even just Ethereal buff if you really want), and LD 10. Heck with the Hunter Contingent you could still deploy the missile turrets and then run parts of your squad with the special rule in order to advance almost 6" (you only need to be 2" within the turret with one member). I mean really, at 648 points, that's 72 shots at 30", with S5, and the BS skill increases based on number of units targeting one squad, that's not counting missile turrets, or the potential to triple that to 216 shots at 15" range.

I'm just saying 72 S5 shots, and 12 S7 shots at 30" for 708 points is nothing to sneeze at, especially with the potential of it becoming 200+ shots given the chance, since Fire Warriors probably aren't running with LD10 that's rerollable thanks to Aun'va.

Edit: I think the Ethereal Formation can lead to the "Long March" Tau where they slowly crawl across the board with the ability to go to ground and shoot at fool as needed, while also just having enough fire power to take out anything they need. Not only that but they don't really suffer from fear due to the extended Ethereal benefits, along with the extra saves and more. Add in the formation that gives them basic cover if in range (I think it's a Ghostkeel formation) and all of a sudden it's just that much harder to accomplish anything against this blob of stuff that moves across the board and covers most of it.

Best version of the "blue tide" that I think becomes viable is three fold.. lets assume 1850 points. .. well I was going to go into a lot of detail.. but I don't feel like typing that much so I will make it quick..

***10 man breacher team with vre and drone is 112 points.
***I don't recall the Council formation exactly.. I am going to guess its 250 points.

The Long March - Essentially your footslogging across the entire table.
Mass breacher teams.
bring 10x10 breacher teams. Your 5++ is essentially making heavy weapon and AP act exactly the same as small arms. Run as fast as you can into their face. You still have 700 points to work with. Council without Aunva in a devilfish for some extra survivability. I would also run the heavy armor formation (the one with 3 hammerheads). That way they can take some threat away from your command fish.

This list is pretty straight forward, but good luck killing 100 breachers before some of them get into your face. Especially with 5++ and 6+ FNP, LD10

Fast is Fast
1 CAD so that you can get your Council in a devilfish, take min kroot if you want too .. lets assume you did.
Take a council without Aun'va put in a devilfish.
Run 2 of the counterstrike cadre formations. First turn they are fast vehicles and every one of your troops is TL when shooting opponents off objectives. Really powerful. You can run breachers or strikers at will doesn't quite matter as much here.
This could pair up nicely again with the same armor formation for a very mecha tau list. Or you could snag some broadsides, or a unit of crisis troops in your CAD to take out some heavier targets.

Tidewall Aun'va
Council on a Droneport, gets you some marker drones too. buy like 4 shield lines, and put strikers on their w/ fireblades. Now they are moving 6" a turn and firing 2 rounds at 30" rerolling 1s. oh and your 6s to save hurt your enemies, nice!
In this version, you don't even need heavy armor as you can just take gunrigs and have your fireblades shoot them.. its glorious!

What do y'all think about the new Firebase support cadre making railsides relevant again? My thought in saying this would be that we no longer have to take x3 models per squad or x6 total to fill out the formation. So I've been outfitting just x1 BS per squad or x2 total and outfitting my riptide with the ion accelorator, TL fusion blaster, stimulant injector and go tank hunting. Being able to combine fire and take advantage of let's say just 2 counters the railsides are hitting on a 2+ and TL. Then they get the tank hunter rule so can reroll failed AP rolls, then the AP1 gives them the +2 on the damage chart. Basically swapping out a "glancing to death" tactic with the missilesides with a "1 shot 1 kill" tactic with the railsides but the biggest advantage is the point difference. With the savings I've been running this formation along side the OSC with 2 squads of x5 stealth to make up for the loss of volume firepower.

 thefallenjackal wrote:
What do y'all think about the new Firebase support cadre making railsides relevant again? My thought in saying this would be that we no longer have to take x3 models per squad or x6 total to fill out the formation. So I've been outfitting just x1 BS per squad or x2 total and outfitting my riptide with the ion accelorator, TL fusion blaster, stimulant injector and go tank hunting. Being able to combine fire and take advantage of let's say just 2 counters the railsides are hitting on a 2+ and TL. Then they get the tank hunter rule so can reroll failed AP rolls, then the AP1 gives them the +2 on the damage chart. Basically swapping out a "glancing to death" tactic with the missilesides with a "1 shot 1 kill" tactic with the railsides but the biggest advantage is the point difference. With the savings I've been running this formation along side the OSC with 2 squads of x5 stealth to make up for the loss of volume firepower.

I like this a lot actually, I am going to have to try it out!

I am so used to thinking of the firebase as it was always played, I never really thought to run it this way. Good catch! I think this plan is not that bad. with 60" range you can pretty much stay out of harms way and be able to help your riptide. personally I would run a burst cannon on the riptide, although riskier without being able to take ECPA currently.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Crazy concept as well, but thinking in terms of crazy flyrant lists... would it be decent to run a list with like 3 or more coldstar suits?

Assuming 190 points each.. here is what I am thinking.
@1989
4x CADS (300pts) -
Coldstar
2x5 Fire warriors, MP turret

Drone net (224pts)-
4x4 gun drones

Riptide Wing (565pts) -
2x Ion, EWO
1x HBC, EWO

Still have a couple extra points left over.. but figured.. drones would all go with a Coldstar unit.. that way when you drop to hold objectives you have essentially some bodyguard. Your riptide wing is your core tank buster elite killers.. while you have 8 firewarrior squads to take objectives and threaten light armor with MP turrets.

Meanwhile you have 4 Coldstars flying around which many lists may not be able to handle in terms of volume.. hunting rear armor and combining to take out larger squad threats.

What do you think.. I literally came up with this as I was typing it haha, kinda want to try it out.

**EDIT** I realize that this could be done in as few as 2 CADS.. and you can even drop the drone net and just run normal drone squads if you are trying to fit a "3 detachment" system.

 Grizzyzz wrote:

 Tinkrr wrote:

 Verviedi wrote:
Would Fish Tide be viable? 4 squads of 10 Strikers near an Ethereal Council, and then maybe a OSC for AV?

We don't really know yet to be honest, no one has really tried running Blue Tide yet.

I mean the amount of troops we can bring with an Ethereal formation is pretty insane. Even if you max out on troops with 6 slots, it's only 648pts, that's an insane amount of fire power at any range they are capable of putting out, especially with FNP saves, the ability to run and shoot (Hunter Con or even just Ethereal buff if you really want), and LD 10. Heck with the Hunter Contingent you could still deploy the missile turrets and then run parts of your squad with the special rule in order to advance almost 6" (you only need to be 2" within the turret with one member). I mean really, at 648 points, that's 72 shots at 30", with S5, and the BS skill increases based on number of units targeting one squad, that's not counting missile turrets, or the potential to triple that to 216 shots at 15" range.

I'm just saying 72 S5 shots, and 12 S7 shots at 30" for 708 points is nothing to sneeze at, especially with the potential of it becoming 200+ shots given the chance, since Fire Warriors probably aren't running with LD10 that's rerollable thanks to Aun'va.

Edit: I think the Ethereal Formation can lead to the "Long March" Tau where they slowly crawl across the board with the ability to go to ground and shoot at fool as needed, while also just having enough fire power to take out anything they need. Not only that but they don't really suffer from fear due to the extended Ethereal benefits, along with the extra saves and more. Add in the formation that gives them basic cover if in range (I think it's a Ghostkeel formation) and all of a sudden it's just that much harder to accomplish anything against this blob of stuff that moves across the board and covers most of it.

Best version of the "blue tide" that I think becomes viable is three fold.. lets assume 1850 points. .. well I was going to go into a lot of detail.. but I don't feel like typing that much so I will make it quick..

***10 man breacher team with vre and drone is 112 points.
***I don't recall the Council formation exactly.. I am going to guess its 250 points.

The Long March - Essentially your footslogging across the entire table.
Mass breacher teams.
bring 10x10 breacher teams. Your 5++ is essentially making heavy weapon and AP act exactly the same as small arms. Run as fast as you can into their face. You still have 700 points to work with. Council without Aunva in a devilfish for some extra survivability. I would also run the heavy armor formation (the one with 3 hammerheads). That way they can take some threat away from your command fish.

This list is pretty straight forward, but good luck killing 100 breachers before some of them get into your face. Especially with 5++ and 6+ FNP, LD10

Fast is Fast
1 CAD so that you can get your Council in a devilfish, take min kroot if you want too .. lets assume you did.
Take a council without Aun'va put in a devilfish.
Run 2 of the counterstrike cadre formations. First turn they are fast vehicles and every one of your troops is TL when shooting opponents off objectives. Really powerful. You can run breachers or strikers at will doesn't quite matter as much here.
This could pair up nicely again with the same armor formation for a very mecha tau list. Or you could snag some broadsides, or a unit of crisis troops in your CAD to take out some heavier targets.

Tidewall Aun'va
Council on a Droneport, gets you some marker drones too. buy like 4 shield lines, and put strikers on their w/ fireblades. Now they are moving 6" a turn and firing 2 rounds at 30" rerolling 1s. oh and your 6s to save hurt your enemies, nice!
In this version, you don't even need heavy armor as you can just take gunrigs and have your fireblades shoot them.. its glorious!

The formation is just 3+ Ethereals, with the option to take the special ones in it. So at minimum it's 150pts, but if you take Aun'va and four drones, you're at almost 250pts, so you weren't far off.

I think you had a good idea with the allied CAD but the Breachers seem rather odd as they don't give you that amazing fire power from a range as you hop across the board with the spiffy missile turrets that make up for not taking Broadsides or Suits. I mean think of it this way, you drop a Turret in your Hunter Contingent, then you move forward D6, keeping a weird triangle of stuff so the turret is in coherency as required, then you shoot. Next turn you drop the turret in front of the team, and do the D6 move again, moving the back units to keep the turret in coherency while pushing the front units up, basically you're Amoeba-ing across the field as opposed to just rushing in.

You'd still probably have enough points for a Riptide Wing or whatever too D:

Airburst crisis suits: do they make sense?

 Pretzalcoatl wrote:
Airburst crisis suits: do they make sense?

Yes, but I think it would be best to separate them into single or double suit units. Putting THAT much anti infantry killing power into one enemy unit is overkill. I know we have Target Locks, but the weapons only have an 18" range and you could limit your options.

 Pretzalcoatl wrote:
Airburst crisis suits: do they make sense?

Yes they are fantastic! I run a team of x3 with Target Locks and x2 Airbursting Fragmentation Projectors each and they have obliterrated everything I have faced so far. I run a Pure Suit army so having a team of these guys to take down Hordes and even the odds has been invaluable!

DirtyDeeds wrote:
Yes, but I think it would be best to separate them into single or double suit units. Putting THAT much anti infantry killing power into one enemy unit is overkill. I know we have Target Locks, but the weapons only have an 18" range and you could limit your options.

I have found this to be negated by Deep Striking them withing 12 inches of an enemy. You can also ensure they dont scatter thanks to the Counterstrike Cadre and the Pathfinders that come with it, put a Recon Drone in their Devilfish (to give it a Homing beacon) and then zoom up the table as fast as you can.

Airbursts have always been really strong, but only 1 in an army restriction made them kinda pointless. If you were running bursts they were usually useful but who does that lol.

Allowing us to take multiple airbursts and cibs is awesome. Ive ran several lists with a solo duo airbursting crisis suit and he does a lot of damage to troops - like, absurd amounts. I gave him a shield gen so he was 77pts, and man did he need it since he was drawing a lot of firepower lol. Even against marines it does damage since thats a ton of hits firing 2 large blasts - and since its Barrage you can indirect fire it too lol.

Low strength means they wont be doing jack to vehicles or high toughness models, but very few lists field nothing but armor/high toughness. Usually my airbursters die before ive cleaned up all the troops anyway - they always make their points back and then some.

There's always enough anti tank in Tau I feel so yeah not worried

That too.

Even though i usually run high RoF lists, i still dont have many issues with vehicles. AV14 boxes tend to give me problems if my meltas got shafted too quick. Other vehicles, nah.