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hey so im a new tau player and im looking for tips on them. i am normally a khrone daemonkin player but manage to pick up the following below for dead cheap.

anyway i dont have the codex yet but im looking and tip and things i need to know on how to play them.

i got
1xCadre Fireblade
1 squad of fire warriors
1x squad of xv25 stealth batlesuits
1 squard of xv8 battlesuits
and a hand full of drones

One recommendation I'll get out of the way is that if you decide to get a Riptide, 1 should be the upper limit on Riptides for a non-Apocalypse game against people you still want to be friends with. 3 is right out.

Other than that, I don't play Tau, so I'll get out of the way and let Dakka pros give more advice.

Both the crisis suits and the drones have multiple assembly possibilities - the best long-term suggestion for that is to use magnets so you can switch between loadouts as and when your lists change. If that sounds too daunting, stick the weapons on with blu-tack (or equivalent) so your opponent can see what they are armed with and have as many games as you can with a variety of loadouts before gluing them.

On Drones: Gun and Shield drones are good for bulking out units. Fire Warriors don't overly benefit from them, as they cost about the same, but Crisis Suits benefit from the expendable ablative wounds (especially against anything S8 or above), and particularly invulnerable saves from Shield Drones. Marker Drones are usually added to a Commander with a Drone Controller, making a mobile, highly-accurate markerlight providing unit.

On Crisis Suits: Paired weapons (i.e. two of the same weapon, not a Twin-linked version) are normally best, which makes best use out of the firepower (with exceptions for the unique ones, which you obviously can't pair). Given the amount of S5 shooting from the Fire Warriors and the Stealth Suits, I'd suggest Plasma Rifles for heavy infantry, or Missile Pods for light vehicles. Fusions are good for heavy vehicles, but your suit likely won't survive the retaliation.

For getting to a Battle-forged army, you could either split the FW into two small squads (depending on how many of them you have), buy another unit of FW / Breachers / Kroot, or go with a Farsight Enclave (which makes the Crisis into Troops).

 Quanar wrote:
(with exceptions for the unique ones, which you obviously can't pair)

Has something changed recently? AFPs & CIBs aren't unique weapons anymore. Unless you are talking about fusion cascades and such from forgeworld (which come on Hazards, and come with their own rules).

If I may make a recommendation, definitely magnetize. With that said, dual missile pods, Target Locks, and dual Marker Drones attached to a Mark'o (Commander with Missile Podx2, Target Lock, & Drone Controller, with 2 Marker Drones) is a wonderful distraction unit, especially if you should decide to get a Riptide or Stormsurge (but synergizes with anything in your army). (Just don't forget the #1 protection to the Tau army - range.)

I cant uses magnets. The models are 2nd hand so there already built

What are they equipped with (if you know, since you stated you don't have the codex), and are you planning on playing casual, or building for a tournament style list?

It always strikes me as crazy when people say only one RIpttide, but if I was to show up with two stormsurges and no riptides that's just fine. In my opinion the Stormsurge is the dedacto mainline unit of the Tau. Riptides are there to support them in competitive lists.

Also if you have super wussy friends even a single Riptide might lose you friends. If they hate Tau your going to lose friends. Basically you chose Tau and chose wrong in many many peoples eyes. So better get used to have the hate of the community directed at you.

What do your friends play? How competitive are they?

 carldooley wrote:
Has something changed recently? AFPs & CIBs aren't unique weapons anymore.

Ah, my mistake, sorry.

 Quanar wrote:
On Drones: Gun and Shield drones are good for bulking out units.

Friends don't let friends use Shield Drones. Gun drones or marker drones only, no exceptions.

 Drasius wrote:

 Quanar wrote:
On Drones: Gun and Shield drones are good for bulking out units.

Friends don't let friends use Shield Drones. Gun drones or marker drones only, no exceptions.

Only thing I don't like about shield drones now is they don't match their users toughness, or have their users armour save anymore. I understand they did this because they can be taken by Iridum armoured commanders who didn't exist before the 6th edition codex, but they still have their uses to take hits from S8 AP3 weapons that tend to get gravitate towards shooting at Crisis Squads.

 Gamgee wrote:
It always strikes me as crazy when people say only one RIpttide, but if I was to show up with two stormsurges and no riptides that's just fine. In my opinion the Stormsurge is the dedacto mainline unit of the Tau. Riptides are there to support them in competitive lists.

Also if you have super wussy friends even a single Riptide might lose you friends. If they hate Tau your going to lose friends. Basically you chose Tau and chose wrong in many many peoples eyes. So better get used to have the hate of the community directed at you.

What do your friends play? How competitive are they?

i have one that plays guardsman, one that plays necrons and one that plays space marines. none of us play competitively. just friendly games between us.

In that case only the IG player could be a problem since Tau tend to mess them up badly.

MOAR ripstormsurgetides. *drops mic*

 Pouncey wrote:
One recommendation I'll get out of the way is that if you decide to get a Riptide, 1 should be the upper limit on Riptides for a non-Apocalypse game against people you still want to be friends with. 3 is right out.

Other than that, I don't play Tau, so I'll get out of the way and let Dakka pros give more advice.

What? no. If your want to play tournies or competent players, than bring more riptides if you want.

Get yourself the Supremacy armored suit from FW and you will never play a game again if fielded regularly.

If they use the ITC it's banned from being used though. So it won't work for tournament play unless its a local one.