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Ok, some suggestions or "opponent requests" I saw here are outright spiteful. (for example the dude with an issue with hammerheads-considering I run a minimum of 2 in every list I can confirm they are a not a great unit. I just love their looks.)

So, Lets make a guide of how to de-optimise your tau.
First, lets start by seperating codex entries, and the most common forgeworld, into "Tau tier list" (this is my personal tier list, others may disagree)


Tier S-the cream of the crop, best of the best, highly competitive picks
Riptide with IA, any riptide in a wing
Broadsides with HYMP (if its only one of them, Id rate it a tier A though.)
Stormsurge
Tau'nar
Buffmander
XV109 Y'vahra
Tidewalls

Tier A-strong units that can make a serious difference and can be used as proper workhorses
Riptide with HBC
"Proper" crisis suits (nothing janky like two flamers)
Ghostkeel
Formation drones
Tetras

Tier B-the guys who can do good work when properly used and/or in the right army
Cadre Fireblade
Ethereal
Fire Warriors (both breeds)
Barracuda (both breeds)
Pathfinders
Piranhas
Skyray

Tier C-the units that barely hold up, and require some specific scenario, opponent or setup to shine, or simply non-optimized
Aun'va
Coldstar Commander
Classic gunner commander
Darkstrider
Shadowsun
Farsight
R'alai
Rmyr
Stealth suits with the OSC
Kroot
Razorshark
devilfish in general
Sniper Drones
Hammerhead

Tier D-units that are simply not up to par.
Aun'shi
"Janky" crisis suits (flamers, AFP, punchsuits, etc)
Gue'vesa (yep, that's a unit. it exists.)
Sunshark
Non-formation drones
Remora

Tier E-units that one should never take, as they fail at their own job. (you had ONE JOB)
Stealth suits
Vespids
Broadsides with HRR (amazing the tier gap with weapon choice)
XV9 hazards

Tier F-you are literally shooting yourself in the leg here. taking one is basically a points handicap.
Drone sentry turret



Once you made up your tier list, or use mine for example, you can start working with it.
You are facing a more casual opponent? limit your high tier picks and aim for mostly lower picks. against opponents using some power units/formations of their own, up the average tier score.
Optimally, you want your list to be mostly tier A, B or C units. S should be reserved to the "heavy" opponents, and D to the most casual or "noob games" the exact balance of how much of each tier depends on the level of competetiveness you expect from your opponent. the tougher the opponent, the more the focus should be on As, the "weaker" the opponent, the focus should be on the Cs.

Avoid E/F tiers even in the most casual of games. people don't like a win when it feels like it was a free gift, and these units will make it look like you are throwing the game intentionally-because you are. most people can very well tell that these units cannot be relied on even before the gross numbers that math-hammering gives you (and by gross I mean that most of them fail to compare to their counterparts even on what is supposed to be their specialty, being only moderatly useful in the most impossible scenarios or generally being unrealistically able to ever cover up their cost no even when given free reign to do as they please.)

To be honest its just a case of dont take more than 1 riptide under 2k points and dont take any stormsurges under 2k points. Apart from that youre pretty much good to go, tau arent OP like people like to say (bandwagon alert) Eldar and necrons are far better, and marines share a similar spot in that they arent but can be due to a few units,weapons or formations. Id also avoid the ghostkeel wing and dont even think about taking a ta'unar under 3k its basically on the same level as a warhound, if you take it at smaller games its hilariously OP and makes you a bad person. Against orks who are in a different league I'd maybe suggest taking less broadsides with hymp and use hammerheads instead
This isnt because tau are broken but because orks are.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
To be honest its just a case of dont take more than 1 riptide under 2k points and dont take any stormsurges under 2k points. Apart from that youre pretty much good to go, tau arent OP like people like to say (bandwagon alert) Eldar and necrons are far better, and marines share a similar spot in that they arent but can be due to a few units,weapons or formations. Id also avoid the ghostkeel wing and dont even think about taking a ta'unar under 3k its basically on the same level as a warhound, if you take it at smaller games its hilariously OP and makes you a bad person. Against orks who are in a different league I'd maybe suggest taking less broadsides with hymp and use hammerheads instead
This isnt because tau are broken but because orks are.

Martel732 wrote:
Even a single Riptide is insurmountable for the have-not lists, though. The durability is crazy.

One Riptide won't kill a lot though. Broadsides or Crisis suits have much more firepower than a single riptide. And because of that, you don't have to kill it.

A single riptide is absolutely okay, it's the riptide-wing that makes it crazy. Ghostkeel-formations and stormsurges I'd also rate problematic against low tier armies. Everything else isn't that bad and rather squishy so it makes for a fun game.

And for the people who say, Tau shouldn't use markerlights... that's just dumb. Without markerlights and the big suits Tau are worse than imperial guard.

 BoomWolf wrote:

Spoiler:

Ok, some suggestions or "opponent requests" I saw here are outright spiteful. (for example the dude with an issue with hammerheads-considering I run a minimum of 2 in every list I can confirm they are a not a great unit. I just love their looks.)

So, Lets make a guide of how to de-optimise your tau.
First, lets start by seperating codex entries, and the most common forgeworld, into "Tau tier list" (this is my personal tier list, others may disagree)


Tier S-the cream of the crop, best of the best, highly competitive picks
Riptide with IA, any riptide in a wing
Broadsides with HYMP (if its only one of them, Id rate it a tier A though.)
Stormsurge
Tau'nar
Buffmander
XV109 Y'vahra
Tidewalls

Tier A-strong units that can make a serious difference and can be used as proper workhorses
Riptide with HBC
"Proper" crisis suits (nothing janky like two flamers)
Ghostkeel
Formation drones
Tetras

Tier B-the guys who can do good work when properly used and/or in the right army
Cadre Fireblade
Ethereal
Fire Warriors (both breeds)
Barracuda (both breeds)
Pathfinders
Piranhas
Skyray

Tier C-the units that barely hold up, and require some specific scenario, opponent or setup to shine, or simply non-optimized
Aun'va
Coldstar Commander
Classic gunner commander
Darkstrider
Shadowsun
Farsight
R'alai
Rmyr
Stealth suits with the OSC
Kroot
Razorshark
devilfish in general
Sniper Drones
Hammerhead

Tier D-units that are simply not up to par.
Aun'shi
"Janky" crisis suits (flamers, AFP, punchsuits, etc)
Gue'vesa (yep, that's a unit. it exists.)
Sunshark
Non-formation drones
Remora

Tier E-units that one should never take, as they fail at their own job. (you had ONE JOB)
Stealth suits
Vespids
Broadsides with HRR (amazing the tier gap with weapon choice)
XV9 hazards

Tier F-you are literally shooting yourself in the leg here. taking one is basically a points handicap.
Drone sentry turret

I quite agree with your tier list except for a few bits.
1. Darkstrider is E tier because of how zogging expensive he is in points. Can only join Fire Warriors and Pathfinders so the maximum firepower of the unit he is buffing is limited and Darkstrider cost about as much as a FW squad. For the points he costs you can just take another squad of FWs which gives you more shots, more wounds, more map control, and more targets for the enemy to contend with. Shooting the unit with Darkstider in it is more efficient for your enemy as eliminating the squad removes twice as many points for nearly the same amount of firepower. Love the concept, love his fluff, love the special rules, points completely ruin it for him.
2. Shadowsun is quite good when combined with Crisis Suits as she gives them Stealth + Shouded, her command-link drone can give her squad or other nearby squads reroll 1s to hit, and she can target two separate units with her fusion blasters.
3. AFPs are not janky . I have dropped in a 3 man squad of 2x AFPs each and THEY MAKE IT RAIN.... PAIN. Barrage, large blast, and Ignore Cover makes infantry cry while you drop hits like its Saturday night at a Kroot club. The ability to blind fire over walls makes the already difficult to shoot crisis suits even more difficult to gun down as they can abuse LoS blockers (every table should have plenty of LoS blockers). They aren't one and done type of crisis suit unit but the ones that linger around the mid field being a major PITA and work well to dig out entrenched enemies especially when the enemy guns down your markerlights first (as any smart opponent should).
4. Stealth Suits have a purpose with being homing beacons for your crisis suits by either hiding behind LoS blockers or deep striking in (apparently RAW Tau beacons seem to work the turn they arrive so they can benefit other units deep striking the same turn). Its very niche but it deserves a mention.

As to the subject of making Tau play down to be a bit more fair, I do want to say that using a CAD is a good idea. Hunter Contingent (or the Dawn whatever that FSE uses) is incredibly strong and can even make a suboptimal list way better because of the command benefits of the detachments. Most of the Tau formations are quite potent so be careful with using them as they do elevate the effectiveness of the units but a good deal.

totally disagree on Stealthsuits. Like big time. Just went to a Grand Tournament with them last night and they were amazing.

Like a lot of things on your list here, most of this comes down to how you use things, not whether you should. In the case of Stealthsuits, you are most definitely under rating them. Especially when youy consider how you made distinctions inthe list such as "non formation" drones. You are not accounting for how incredible Stealthsuits are when in the Optimized Stealth Cadre for example.

Non-Formation Drones is another one I dont agree with. With a Buffmander, non-formation drones work better than your Tier D designation. I might bump that up a bit.

Sniper Drones need an elevation to B methinks, on your list. They are a very good source of markerights which comes along with a really good unit of Snipers that can fire as many as three shots a round, have stealth and enormous range. This is significant!

Aun'Va is tier A. What he does for the force is huge.

Just my thoughts on this.

 Jancoran wrote:
totally disagree on Stealthsuits. Like big time. Just went to a Grand Tournament with them last night and they were amazing.

Like a lot of things on your list here, most of this comes down to how you use things, not whether you should. In the case of Stealthsuits, you are most definitely under rating them. Especially when youy consider how you made distinctions inthe list such as "non formation" drones. You are not accounting for how incredible Stealthsuits are when in the Optimized Stealth Cadre for example.

Non-Formation Drones is another one I dont agree with. With a Buffmander, non-formation drones work better than your Tier D designation. I might bump that up a bit.

I wanted to throw in my support for these two statements. Stealth Suits inhabit this weird space where they usually go utterly ignored but can still punch above their weight-class and provide some versatility. In particular, in the aforementioned Stealth Cadre, they can really do a tremendous amount of good work against a great many vehicles. Ignores Cover is one of those buffs that makes any unit worthy of a second look.

Likewise, generic Marker-Drones with a Buffmander are still a much better Markerlight source than almost anything in the Codex, outside of the Dronenet formation. Iridium Buffmander tanks the small-arms fire, and a simple Drone Controller upgrade ensures they are a very, VERY reliable source of mobile, Markerlights.

I wanted to throw in my support for these two statements. Stealth Suits inhabit this weird space where they usually go utterly ignored but can still punch above their weight-class and provide some versatility. In particular, in the aforementioned Stealth Cadre, they can really do a tremendous amount of good work against a great many vehicles. Ignores Cover is one of those buffs that makes any unit worthy of a second look.

Meh. We've done the Stealth Suit debate ad nauseam on these boards. They're usable in an OSC (as BoomWolf's post indicates), but seriously, there's a reason nobody takes them outside of that formation. Load 'em up, and enjoy a nice friendly game.

BoomWolf wrote:

Spoiler:

Ok, some suggestions or "opponent requests" I saw here are outright spiteful. (for example the dude with an issue with hammerheads-considering I run a minimum of 2 in every list I can confirm they are a not a great unit. I just love their looks.)

So, Lets make a guide of how to de-optimise your tau.
First, lets start by seperating codex entries, and the most common forgeworld, into "Tau tier list" (this is my personal tier list, others may disagree)


Tier S-the cream of the crop, best of the best, highly competitive picks
Riptide with IA, any riptide in a wing
Broadsides with HYMP (if its only one of them, Id rate it a tier A though.)
Stormsurge
Tau'nar
Buffmander
XV109 Y'vahra
Tidewalls

Tier A-strong units that can make a serious difference and can be used as proper workhorses
Riptide with HBC
"Proper" crisis suits (nothing janky like two flamers)
Ghostkeel
Formation drones
Tetras

Tier B-the guys who can do good work when properly used and/or in the right army
Cadre Fireblade
Ethereal
Fire Warriors (both breeds)
Barracuda (both breeds)
Pathfinders
Piranhas
Skyray

Tier C-the units that barely hold up, and require some specific scenario, opponent or setup to shine, or simply non-optimized
Aun'va
Coldstar Commander
Classic gunner commander
Darkstrider
Shadowsun
Farsight
R'alai
Rmyr
Stealth suits with the OSC
Kroot
Razorshark
devilfish in general
Sniper Drones
Hammerhead

Tier D-units that are simply not up to par.
Aun'shi
"Janky" crisis suits (flamers, AFP, punchsuits, etc)
Gue'vesa (yep, that's a unit. it exists.)
Sunshark
Non-formation drones
Remora

Tier E-units that one should never take, as they fail at their own job. (you had ONE JOB)
Stealth suits
Vespids
Broadsides with HRR (amazing the tier gap with weapon choice)
XV9 hazards

Tier F-you are literally shooting yourself in the leg here. taking one is basically a points handicap.
Drone sentry turret



Once you made up your tier list, or use mine for example, you can start working with it.
You are facing a more casual opponent? limit your high tier picks and aim for mostly lower picks. against opponents using some power units/formations of their own, up the average tier score.
Optimally, you want your list to be mostly tier A, B or C units. S should be reserved to the "heavy" opponents, and D to the most casual or "noob games" the exact balance of how much of each tier depends on the level of competetiveness you expect from your opponent. the tougher the opponent, the more the focus should be on As, the "weaker" the opponent, the focus should be on the Cs.

Avoid E/F tiers even in the most casual of games. people don't like a win when it feels like it was a free gift, and these units will make it look like you are throwing the game intentionally-because you are. most people can very well tell that these units cannot be relied on even before the gross numbers that math-hammering gives you (and by gross I mean that most of them fail to compare to their counterparts even on what is supposed to be their specialty, being only moderatly useful in the most impossible scenarios or generally being unrealistically able to ever cover up their cost no even when given free reign to do as they please.)

You forgot R'varna. Maybe a B?

Are drone sentry turrets that bad? they're basically drop pods in units up to 4 models, and as cheap as those.

MilkmanAl wrote:

I wanted to throw in my support for these two statements. Stealth Suits inhabit this weird space where they usually go utterly ignored but can still punch above their weight-class and provide some versatility. In particular, in the aforementioned Stealth Cadre, they can really do a tremendous amount of good work against a great many vehicles. Ignores Cover is one of those buffs that makes any unit worthy of a second look.

Meh. We've done the Stealth Suit debate ad nauseam on these boards. They're usable in an OSC (as BoomWolf's post indicates), but seriously, there's a reason nobody takes them outside of that formation. Load 'em up, and enjoy a nice friendly game.

Stealthsuits are just excellent. You can put them wherever you personally prefer on your list. I tabled eldar yesterday using them. I wrecked five vehicles in one round ( he was using hornets, forge world walkers and that damn warp hunter). Against orks, I sent them to the grave. Annihilated the marines that can drop in terminators and assault the turn they arrive. I find it hard to imagine that their high volume of strong fire and ablative ability arent more attractive than this. But different strokes I gusee.

Well, I did say its my personal list and wont fit everyone.

Each player should make his own tier list to match his local meta, armies played, terrain density, etc.

Something could be amazing in my FLGS and horrible at yours, and vice versa.

I'd say they should be a C at least (and certainly not more). 2+ cover saves and 4 shots is decent in my books, they are also jetpack and get access to a few nifty rules, excellent for harrassing and providing distractions as the opponent dedicates more firepower than he ought to.

 BoomWolf wrote:
Well, I did say its my personal list and wont fit everyone.

.

You did. And I am suggesting changes to yours. Certainly cant hurt to have input right?

True, but as said, local meta changes rating.

In yours, the versatile deployment and the cool cover save might matter more, here cover changes little (people love over ignoring guns), and the low point to firepower ratio means they don't make the cut, as dual burst crisis simply outguns them with similar durability value. (the stealth pays about 7.5 per shot, the crisis only pays about 5.2)
Our meta is big on throwing tons of bodies into the table. You need the shots, and the Infiltration rarely gives a good spot.

 BoomWolf wrote:
True, but as said, local meta changes rating.

In yours, the versatile deployment and the cool cover save might matter more, here cover changes little (people love over ignoring guns), and the low point to firepower ratio means they don't make the cut, as dual burst crisis simply outguns them with similar durability value. (the stealth pays about 7.5 per shot, the crisis only pays about 5.2)
Our meta is big on throwing tons of bodies into the table. You need the shots, and the Infiltration rarely gives a good spot.

Ignores cover is cool. Many iof my opponents use it as well (after all, I play in the ITC tournaments). My answer was simple: I put ATS on the stealthsuits. I eliminate the Auspex or whatever they are using and then they don't have it anymore. Killing one lynch pin guy can make something scary not so scary. Screamer stars are the same. Drop the dude in the middle. ATS lets you do it with that many shots. It may take a couple units to try but once he's gone that unit is a lot less scary. then you can open up with blasts.

Point is, I think its how people use things, not the thing itself that matters most. Formations prove that you can make things work.

4 shots apeice is beefy. Hitting on 3's with it is beefier when Wall of Mirrors goes off. So without the assistance of any markerlights its better than a pack of heavy bolters running around just about. I dunno. I do well with them.

Auspex doesn't ignore cover. Trust me I wish it did.

Martel732 wrote:
Auspex doesn't ignore cover. Trust me I wish it did.

It was an example of something you'd want tio snipe.

If you have the resources to snipe an auspex, you are probably already winning by leaps and bounds already.

Martel732 wrote:
If you have the resources to snipe an auspex, you are probably already winning by leaps and bounds already.

Point is, it's excellent with that volume of shots.

Most things in the tau codex are.

This thread...is about...Tau? So I mean...