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Ah, I had assumed we were discussing Matched Play (since that seems to be the default gameplay mode), but you're right that Narrative and Open play don't have that restriction.




So, now that we can reconsider the FW Hammerheads (though not with any particular focus, given the discrepancy between their stated point presumption and the actual point costs of the new weapons and the hammerhead's chassis), do any weapons stand out as worth taking?

Longstrike providing his buff seems required for these Hammerheads to actually contribute meaningfully, in the same way that ANY Hammerhead basically needs a Longstike buff, so for hypothesizing purposes I'll presume from now on that Longstrike can provide his buff.

Twin Fusion Cannon: To be honest, it seems underwhelming. For ~25 points more than a HRR Broadside, you get a 3+ to hit (2+ Longstrike) at much shorter range. You really don't want your Hammerheads generally within 12" of the enemy, so the extra damage roll from fusion seems mostly wasted... Seems generally decent if you expect a lot of in-your-face Enemy Armour (and we probably should expect that reasonably often), and can move reasonably far and (with some ML support) still fire very accurate Fusion. Still, it really isn't impressing me greatly, given that Multimeltas on sponsons are not uncommon, and they're indistinguishable...

Twin Plasma Cannon: More Missile Pod equivalent shots (roughly - more reliable damage stat, of course), with nearly table-length range and decent AP.

Two HYMP: More expensive chassis than the Broadside, with more wounds... The question is whether the native additional accuracy (and presumed Longstrike additional boost) is worth the extra points you put in, and whether the more than double number of wounds and higher toughness is worth the loss of Ablative Drones. Still, that's a lot of high S low AP med D shots with high accuracy... that does a number on almost anything's day, and it really does have the range to reach out and TOUCH whatever needs to be touched. The Hammerhead also has much higher potential mobility - it is limited to ML to maintain its accuracy advantage, but the Hammerhead's speed really helps for emergency re-positioning.

Twin Heavy Burst Cannon: Good god, the dakka. The problem is that low-mid to mid strength (5-6) weaponry with D1 is something we as Tau tend to have a plethora of - I'd rather have S7 or 8 if tank hunting (S6 is no better than S5 against T7&8, and S5 is absurdly plentiful), but even then, that is a LOT of high accurate anti-infantry/light vehicle fire...

Razerous wrote:

 Unusual Suspect wrote:
My Good News is, alas, limited to them correcting the point issue - no word on whether they correct the keyword problems that prevent the FW Hammerheads from benefiting from Longstrike.

The Twin Heavy Burst Cannon seems quite impressive, I must say. That's Riptide levels of firepower coming out of half a Riptide's point cost. *sigh*

Agreed. An XV9 + 4 drones is hidden win-sauce, you get a very effecient fielding of the 8pt dual pulse carbine gun drone + the dual THBC.

The big guy tanks the wounds, the little guys can tank the bigger multi-D wounds.

All for the low low price of 130-ish points.

He was speaking about the Hammerhead variant, not the XV9. But your point is correct

How are Kroot looking for Tau right now? I have 20 of them sitting in a case and would rather them not be wasted for this edition. Are they better or worse than Fire Warriors / Breachers?

MilkmanAl wrote:
That Tiger Shark ruling is crippling. Wow. You basically get to pay for the extra weapons but never use them. So it's now nearly 600pts for 2 bigass guns? We can do a lot better than that. That firepower is certainly on a durable frame, but man, an Y'Vahra is going to lay down way more damage than that for 2/3 the price.

The FW Hammerheads confuse and sadden me. We briefly mused over their increased costs earlier, but it's hitting home how much that sucks. They'd both be pretty decent tanks if they cost the same as their codex counterparts at baseline. Maybe we'd have a reason to run vehicles for the first time in 3 editions.

Where is this posted? Links to rulings and clarifications are appreciated.

They seem worse than FW, to me, but they're great for screening out early drops and the subsequent charges. 120pts is nothing to protect your big dudes. Some argue that Kroot Hounds do the same thing for cheaper, but the 2 main problems with that philosophy as I see it are: 1) Kroot Hounds don't shoot and 2) Kroot hounds are damned expensive monetarily and hard as hell to find.

 Retrogamer0001 wrote:
How are Kroot looking for Tau right now? I have 20 of them sitting in a case and would rather them not be wasted for this edition. Are they better or worse than Fire Warriors / Breachers?

I don't know. I have 30+ Kroot myself and a squad of hounds collecting dust as well. My best thought is to run them with an etherial and go get them into h-2-h asap as a defensive/ objective blocking measure. However, this would require a early mont'ka which then puts a commander potentially out in the open without cover. They will get shot and assuming you will lose ~half, or all if they flamer it, the unit before they even see combat. The benefit is that they will force a shooting priority choice early on which may give and extra round to your heavy support. Personally I may run them my next game because I want to see how aggressive I can get with the combat rules.

Statistically speaking I believe they are worse than Fire Warriors and Breachers.... However, it really depends on the function you are looking them to preform.
Forward moving, threatening blob? Then yes. However this can also be accomplished with Drones and Stealth squad just with less h-2-h potential but this cost more.
Objective taking unit threatening? Then probably breachers in a truck (yes its expensive) aside from that Vespid have that covered well.
Home objective holding? Fire Warriors or Drones.... Lots and Lots of drones. (God I hope they bring the drone box back and don't adjust their points.)

MilkmanAl wrote:
They seem worse than FW, to me, but they're great for screening out early drops and the subsequent charges. 120pts is nothing to protect your big dudes. Some argue that Kroot Hounds do the same thing for cheaper, but the 2 main problems with that philosophy as I see it are: 1) Kroot Hounds don't shoot and 2) Kroot hounds are damned expensive monetarily and hard as hell to find.

Hounds don't get the pregame move, which is important for several reasons, but mostly to reduce consolidation issues. Hounds are great for screening DS, and claiming objectives.

I think 10-man units of kroot look like a pretty good option for screening DS and other shenanigans. There are various ways to use them to hold enemy units back.

You can do some of the same stuff with ghostkeels and stealths, but it's a bit different. Your opponent might potentially drop his own infiltrators first, blocking yours, which he can't do to kroot.

On the other hand ghostkeels in particular are pretty fast, and fly. If you get to drop a ghostkeel early on you can actually put it right on the edge of the other guy's deployment zone (if he hasn't put anything there yet), ready to get up to all kinds of mischief (charging their artillery, shooting their characters and so on). This approach is not recommended against Tyrannids.

Kroot provides a lot of bodies on the Table for cheap
Unlike other Horde Armies however

Kroot are actually subjected to the effects of Morale
So, Kroot Blobs will magically disappear significantly faster than those belonging to other armies.

What are people's opinions on Shadowsun vs a FB Commander? Trying to decide if I want multiple Commanders or Sunny.

I prefer the Commander. He's a little tougher and has much better offensive output for a minimal increase in cost. 2 Kauyons is a nifty ability but doesn't warrant losing 2 fusion blasters, in my opinion.

How about this for a mostly suit list?

Vanguard Detachment 1

Commander (4 Fusion Blasters)

Ghostkeel (Cyclic Ion Raker, 2 Flamers, Homing Beacon)
Ghostkeel (Cyclic Ion Raker, 2 Flamers, Homing Beacon)
Ghostkeel (Cyclic Ion Raker, 2 Flamers, Homing Beacon)

6 Stealthsuits
6 Stealthsuits


10 Pathfinders
10 Pathfinders

Vanguard Detachment 2

Commander (4 Fusion Blasters)

3 Crisis suits (9 Flamers)
3 Crisis suits (9 Flamers)
3 Crisis suits (9 Flamers)

Total = 1998pts
5 CP's

On the fence between AT's for each Ghostkeel or the 3 additional Pathfinders.

Originally I had marker drones in there, but I think the pathfinders and stealth suits might be better screening units vs some stuff.

So, long time tau player here, with some additional observations....

From playing against the tau....let me explain...

A couple of friends in my gamer group also play tau, and one of my buddies wanted a small game to get into 8th. I offered to play against him (I have more than just tau).

He had a nice rounded list, with a variety of unit, as he was getting the hang of 8th (he is a good experienced player, had just not played 8th yet).

I played marines, as I had not given them a whirl yet in 8th, and wanted to see how they did.

A few observations;

* Crisis suits - a LOT more durable then we give them credit for. the bump to T5 is awesome. Most basic weapons and attacks are s4 - the bump to T5 really helps here. These suits survived a lot of basic bolter fire, and even survived CC (multiple times) to jump out and shoot. I was impressed.
* Pathfinders die - cover is a lot harder to come by, and smart players are going to erase your pathfinders. His fireblades were better sources of markers, as I could not target the characters in the back (tau snipers suck, but marine snipers are not much better)
* The bonding knife - this is a pretty big deal. Helped out the firewarrios multiple times.
* Sunshark - not bad at all. The bomb can indeed be useful against tough troops - and the missile pods and ion rifles don't suffer from him moving. Overall nice. I may have to give them more use.
* Psychic power - our lack of psychic powers is bad. really bad. In fact, smite is so powerful now, that honestly, I think the armies without access to it really need a buff.
Yeah, tau have markerlights, necrons have wbb, ad mech has canticles and de have drugs - some of these are decent, but some don't even come close to the power of smite).

More on smite;
Smite just wrecks things - even things that are normally hard to kill (THSS termies, necron wraiths, zonethropes, etc.). it is even effective when trying to kill those stealth suits hiding in cover at that objective. After playing with and without smite, I really think they need to adjust this.

Oh, and as a side note - dreds are indeed back - yeah, makes our broadsides feel like garbage. :(

Yaknow, people praise a bump to T5 and an additional wound as if crisis are so much harder to kill.

But personally? I find they were FAR harder to kill when it was nigh-impossible to get a firing line on my guys as long I maneuvered myself well.


Saying smite is OP though makes me laugh as my other army is TS, and I find psykers as a whole very lacking.

Kicking around a few ideas for a decent Tau list:

2 Y'Vahra
2 10-man Kroot Squads
1 Breacher Squad
2 Commanders (still deciding on loadout)
3-4 Gun Drone Squads

Looking for more suggestions, but flooding the board with infantry units and drones with Y'Vahra support seems decent. Still wondering if more Breacher squads with Devilfish support is worthwhile, or if I need more Commanders / Crisis Suits.

That's basically what I'm planning on running next time I play, except I have Strikers and some Pathfinders. What can I say? i love rerolling 1s.

MilkmanAl wrote:
That's basically what I'm planning on running next time I play, except I have Strikers and some Pathfinders. What can I say? i love rerolling 1s.

Honestly, not gonna waste my time with Markerlights this edition, the table needs to be redone as it's completely ineffective. I would rather run more drones or infantry.

I can't really blame you there, but I figure 80pts for rerolls of 1s and extra shooting in a pinch isn't an awful deal, especially given that I'm relying fairly extensively on Commander drops to take out heavy armor. I'm probably never going to take more marker sources than are necessary to reliably get 5 hits once at the beginning of the game (maybe 12-14 PF) since 1 hit is really all you need to get most of the benefit. I just want to be able to drop one huge thing with all the force multiplication I can muster and then move on to plinking things. Needs a rework, indeed.

 Retrogamer0001 wrote:

MilkmanAl wrote:
That's basically what I'm planning on running next time I play, except I have Strikers and some Pathfinders. What can I say? i love rerolling 1s.

Honestly, not gonna waste my time with Markerlights this edition, the table needs to be redone as it's completely ineffective. I would rather run more drones or infantry.

I only half agree with that. Going past 1 token per unit seems a waste so I have a few marker light drones scattered about and spit fire. With split fire the marker drones can target 4+ enemy units that way which means they are not completely ineffective.

For example my 2nd commander is sitting with 3 missile pods, 1 drone controller and 2 markerdrones as that is cheaper and more effective than a broadside. He stays in my deployment next to some sniper drones. The Drone controller stacks with the markmans adding +2 hit to the sniperdrones. The Marker drones let the missiles and snipers reoll 1’s

Same for deep strike, take a commander with 12 Vespid and 2 marker drones means a lot of shots reoll 1’s.The trick with marklights is to split fire and don’t go past 1 token per unit.

Broadsides on the other hand I am not finding very good. While my Fusion command is popping tanks with ease while so far broadsides have failed to kill a single tank in any of my games. Last game @ 600pts had 2 Whilewinds with 1 tech marine. Railguns didn’t kill a thing :(. Luckily my fusion command came to the rescue.

 BoomWolf wrote:
Yaknow, people praise a bump to T5 and an additional wound as if crisis are so much harder to kill.

But personally? I find they were FAR harder to kill when it was nigh-impossible to get a firing line on my guys as long I maneuvered myself well.

I will lament the loss of JSJ louder than most - but that is spilt milk at this point.

The fact is, the endless supply of bolters and S4 attacks we take less wounds than we did before due to T5 - I am saying, is should not be discounted.

Saying smite is OP though makes me laugh as my other army is TS, and I find psykers as a whole very lacking.

Perhaps that is because you are comparing it to all the powers of the past - again, that is spilt milk and the past.
We must look at what we have today, and as someone who plays armies with both good access and ZERO access to smite, AND who has used it and had it used against them - it is amazing.

Even necrons with their crappy overpriced spiders (they took a nerf) can deny - tau cannot do even that.

Play some games, watch what clever use of smite can do - heck, what even non clever use can do.

Armies without access to it are supposed to have a balancing factor - I am saying tau don't.

 Bryan01 wrote:
How about this for a mostly suit list?

Vanguard Detachment 1

Commander (4 Fusion Blasters)

Ghostkeel (Cyclic Ion Raker, 2 Flamers, Homing Beacon)
Ghostkeel (Cyclic Ion Raker, 2 Flamers, Homing Beacon)
Ghostkeel (Cyclic Ion Raker, 2 Flamers, Homing Beacon)

6 Stealthsuits
6 Stealthsuits


10 Pathfinders
10 Pathfinders

Vanguard Detachment 2

Commander (4 Fusion Blasters)

3 Crisis suits (9 Flamers)
3 Crisis suits (9 Flamers)
3 Crisis suits (9 Flamers)

Total = 1998pts
5 CP's

On the fence between AT's for each Ghostkeel or the 3 additional Pathfinders.

Originally I had marker drones in there, but I think the pathfinders and stealth suits might be better screening units vs some stuff.

I love the Ghostkeels as resilient delivery systems for the Homing Beacons; that had not occurred to me as I had been listhammering with Stealths. I didn't realize it was just wargear. My only suggestion is to shave some Stealths to convert those Ghostkeels into triple fusion. You'll need them against Vehicles, and you already have enough anti-horde.

ALSO, on a personal note: How should I listhammer against AdMech? I have a 1000-point game Monday and this guy is undefeated. I'm torn between a Missile Commander and R'Varna with minimal support or an infantry heavy list. It is Maelstrom.

 Talamare wrote:
Kroot provides a lot of bodies on the Table for cheap
Unlike other Horde Armies however

Kroot are actually subjected to the effects of Morale
So, Kroot Blobs will magically disappear significantly faster than those belonging to other armies.

No reason to run them in blobs. More units = more CP.

 The Shrike wrote:

 Bryan01 wrote:
How about this for a mostly suit list?

Vanguard Detachment 1

Commander (4 Fusion Blasters)

Ghostkeel (Cyclic Ion Raker, 2 Flamers, Homing Beacon)
Ghostkeel (Cyclic Ion Raker, 2 Flamers, Homing Beacon)
Ghostkeel (Cyclic Ion Raker, 2 Flamers, Homing Beacon)

6 Stealthsuits
6 Stealthsuits


10 Pathfinders
10 Pathfinders

Vanguard Detachment 2

Commander (4 Fusion Blasters)

3 Crisis suits (9 Flamers)
3 Crisis suits (9 Flamers)
3 Crisis suits (9 Flamers)

Total = 1998pts
5 CP's

On the fence between AT's for each Ghostkeel or the 3 additional Pathfinders.

Originally I had marker drones in there, but I think the pathfinders and stealth suits might be better screening units vs some stuff.

I love the Ghostkeels as resilient delivery systems for the Homing Beacons; that had not occurred to me as I had been listhammering with Stealths. I didn't realize it was just wargear. My only suggestion is to shave some Stealths to convert those Ghostkeels into triple fusion. You'll need them against Vehicles, and you already have enough anti-horde.

ALSO, on a personal note: How should I listhammer against AdMech? I have a 1000-point game Monday and this guy is undefeated. I'm torn between a Missile Commander and R'Varna with minimal support or an infantry heavy list. It is Maelstrom.

So your initial judgement was correct. The only units that can take a homing beacon (as of July 2nd) is stealth suits. "Wargear" doesn't exist anymore in the sense we're used to. You can only take support systems specified on pg. 49. The homing beacon is not listed there. Since its not listed you sadly can not take it on anything else unless the data sheet specifies you can take it.

I have another question for you though, you say that Breachers + Fish is a staple for your lists. In your batreps I've read are you getting them out after the fish has moved? I only ask because in my experience this combo is garbage. For 207-223 points (10-12 breachers in a fish) the fact that I have to drive my tank up to the enemy. Sit there for a turn, then on the start of my next turn get them out most of my opponents have either blown up the tank, or moved a majority of their units away from it. Yes the breachers get a 9" movement out of the fish (3" disembark + 6" movement) but unless I parked that tank directly on top of the enemies (or charged them) they're not going to have that many targets.

We're Tau, many of our enemies are coming to us anyway. Devilfish are very resilient; and they usually aren't high on the enemy's target priority list. Also, when playing objective missions, especially Maelstrom, they have to advance towards you even if they don't want to. Unless you're playing straight kill points all the time, it's a good combo. And 207 points (252 with Darkstrider) is pretty cheap for what they do and how long they can stick around.

Also just a procedural note, Breachers max out at 10, for some reason you can take a unit of 12 Strikes but not Breachers.

 The Shrike wrote:

I love the Ghostkeels as resilient delivery systems for the Homing Beacons; that had not occurred to me as I had been listhammering with Stealths. I didn't realize it was just wargear. My only suggestion is to shave some Stealths to convert those Ghostkeels into triple fusion. You'll need them against Vehicles, and you already have enough anti-horde.

I don't think Ghostkeels can buy a homing beacon...

 Vector Strike wrote:

 The Shrike wrote:

I love the Ghostkeels as resilient delivery systems for the Homing Beacons; that had not occurred to me as I had been listhammering with Stealths. I didn't realize it was just wargear. My only suggestion is to shave some Stealths to convert those Ghostkeels into triple fusion. You'll need them against Vehicles, and you already have enough anti-horde.

I don't think Ghostkeels can buy a homing beacon...

Yeah the poster above confirmed that as well; seems to be a typical GW oversight: listed as a support systems in the points section under "support systems" but not the "Support Systems" listed at the beginning of the Army Section. Semantics if you ask me, but we'll have to wait for an FAQ.

Ok so had my first 1000 point game last Friday with

2 Fusion Commanders each with 2 gun drones

1 Stealthsuit team with Multitracker X 2 and Drone controller

3 X 7 man Firewarrior Strike squad with Shasui

1 X 6 man Pathfinder team with Rail, Ion, Shauis, Pulse Acc Drone

1 X 8 gun drone squad

1 X Sunshark Bomber


Overall was very pleased. Played against game 1 against Eldar and one against Harlequins. Won both games and during both didn't start taking losses until Turn 3.

Things that were out of control awesome:

- Fusion Commanders - Two of these working together seem like they will almost always drop a T7, or less, vehicle/monster in one turn of shooting, which is nice. Just using one you chances are still pretty good.

-Pulse Accelerator drone buffing Firewarrriors. Having mass S5 shooting at 36' seems pretty effective area denial. My opponents did their best to avoid LoS and skirt that 36' bubble and had a major impact on them playing to the objectives.

- Stealth Team. Treated these more like the old crisis suits rather than a true infiltrator. Their value was to stick together with the gun drone squad and push on my opponent's flanks.

- Gun Drones - lol. Add in the drone controller and more lols. So cheap for so much firepower. They steamed rolled my Harlequin opponent pretty bad. Large squads and a drone controller will be the way to go. This will almost always be an auto take in one form or another.

-SunShark Bomber. Pulled it weight with those bombs. My Harlequin opponent had the opportunity to go first but elected me to do so and the first thing I did was fly that sucker over the troupe squads and, unfortunately for him, I deleted a troupe squad right off the bat. It also took a major beating when he assaulted it with his bikes. It Almost died but ran off and took another few infantry models along the way. He chased it and in doing so spread himself out and I basically moved up and wittled the rest of his forces away. So the bomb ability is likely good vs basic infantry but it can really shine against elite infantry units like troupes with their 4++ being negated. The bombs will probably be great against mass horde as well but will report back once i have that experience.

The last thing is is that I want to say that assaulting out of deep strike isn't all that scary to face. That roll isn't as easy as you would think to make. Because of it's general lack of reliance, I can imagine players eventually abandoning that tactic unless they have re-rolls on charging.

 The Shrike wrote:

 Vector Strike wrote:

 The Shrike wrote:

I love the Ghostkeels as resilient delivery systems for the Homing Beacons; that had not occurred to me as I had been listhammering with Stealths. I didn't realize it was just wargear. My only suggestion is to shave some Stealths to convert those Ghostkeels into triple fusion. You'll need them against Vehicles, and you already have enough anti-horde.

I don't think Ghostkeels can buy a homing beacon...

Yeah the poster above confirmed that as well; seems to be a typical GW oversight: listed as a support systems in the points section under "support systems" but not the "Support Systems" listed at the beginning of the Army Section. Semantics if you ask me, but we'll have to wait for an FAQ.

I don't think its semantics at all. The homing beacon is in the "other wargear" section. Yes the subheader of that is "support systems" but its the same way the weapons and drones are broken out. When a unit can take tactical drones, they can take either a gun drone/markerlight drone/ or a shield drone. When a suit takes a weapon from the ranged weapon list its from the list at the beginning of the army section. You can't give a crisis suit a rail rifle for example.

As for your reasoning on the breachers + fish my experience has been very different. I've mostly played against shooting armies though so most armies are not coming towards me. Also most of my opponents have prioritized the fish + breacher combo because they can be very threatening if allowed to get < 5". They don't always aim to blow it up, but dealing 6-7 wounds to it just to reduce its movement down to 6" really removes the threat. After that all they need to do is stay < 14" away from it in order to avoid a breacher disembark + move + shoot phase. If you're playing more aggressive armies I can see your results being different. Even though in my maelstrom missions they've not proven too useful. Since both of us are moving around for objectives.

To each his own I guess? Look I didn't expect them to be good either. And 9 games is a small sample size; but they've been great. My opponents are usually more scared of my crisis suits and commander (and even pathfinders) than the Breachers. Most of my games have been at 1k though. Perhaps at 2k they'll be exposed?

Shame about the homing beacon on Ghostkeels, still getting used to the new indexes.

My initial impression of breachers was that a full squad with dark strider in a Devilfish was a solid unit. I didn't have too much of an issue with the range, but others mileage may vary. The big hull of the d'fishes makes for a good screen as well for lists.

Unless I made a total mess of it, dark strider can buff stealth suits as well because they are infantry. Nice vs t3.