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I have a tourney game this saturday where I know the mission is Omega level and therefore with Escalation. And I get to redesign my force beforehand. And I'm thinking that since Escalation seriously hinders a short ranged mech army, especially against a shooty opponent that I should ditch some or all of the rhinos.

My infantry start 12" on and advance 6" a turn. Putting them 24" on by the shooting phase of turn 2, and projecting firepower out to the edge of my opponents deployment zone.

Mech infantry squads deploy on turn two the earliest and get 24" on (with firepower to 36") by turn three instead. If they show up as early as possible. IF!

I'm thinking that foot-slogging to the center of the board and forming a firebase there, while including a storm bolter equipped squad & HB Retributors for extra range may be a more viable tactic.

I'm also thinking that death cult assassins to tie-up and distract my opponent early on and in their deployment zone will help.

I forsee two problems, with this approach since my opponent is Tau.
1) getting out manuevered by his Fish of Fury squads.
2) never having a shot out of my firebase because my opponent is JSJing all the time.

Suggestions/advice or experience with foot-sloggers is appreciated.

Suggestions/advice or experience with foot-sloggers is appreciated

Dont.

I've had success with part foot, majority mouinted or jumppack. In escalation, simplely let him go first, and use your reserves to dictate where you want to battle to take place.

*shrug*

"I'm thinking that since Escalation seriously hinders a short ranged mech army, "

I think it helps them tremendously.

When your whole army starts off the board, you get a free "refused flank". Just pick one side, come in off the board edge on the side of your deployment zone (so 12" or 15" up) and go to town.

I really like this idea.

The only question I have is how do I silence an opponent who says that I can't come on from 12" up the side of the board i.e. can you give me the YMDC version how that's legit (as from the Reserves and mission rules I'm not convinced).

Thanks.

The rule says you come in from a board edge in your deployment zone. Your deployment zone is made up of 2 or 3 board edges and an imaginary line or two.

Explain that they are mistaking "board edge" for "the edge the player stands in front of". Have them explain the difference between the deployment zone board edge in recon and cleanse. Pretty quickly they'll realize that any sort of argument about it not breing the "whole edge" mean that nothing can come in during cleanse.

Or just put your finger on the side and say:

1. Is this a board edge?
2. Is it in my deployment zone?
3. Any it's somehow not a board edge in my deployment zone?

The point about Cleanse mission deployment zones does the best job of shutting up my opponent, IMO.

Excellent!

Still though:
Death Cult Assassins?

I am assuming that the tau is using an army built for escalation that start off table.

Go last because you want the tau player to commit his hammerhead before your exorcist. If you glance the hammerhead it will not shoot next turn. So even if you are not killing it your exorcist will fire next round. If this is the other way around you may end up with hammerhead that kill all your tank really fast before you can stop them from shooting. Be cautious about drones deep strking or crisis suit deep strking to kill you tank. So don't advance them too much to not let them have a shot at the back of the tank.

You have some unit that have 4+sv, beware of the AP4 pie plate of the hammerhead and make those unit take a lot of space. Last game I played against them one of his unit was completely destroyed by one shot of railgun.

you have short range fire but this is also where the tau will kill you. Try to be the first to shoot which is difficult because they will move their devilfish and rapid fire their firewarrior and try to not feed your unit 1 by 1.

Use jump pack unit if you can.

Assasin migth be good because the tau have a lot of small unit

Kill markerligth unit because you will have to throw a lot too much save if they hit at the same time as a firewarrior unit. hitting and wounding on 2+ is not good when there is 24 shots.

the penitent engine won't start on the table in escalation so they migth not do a lot in that type of game by the time they show up.

The only game in escalation that I played against sister was bad for them and it was a grab the center of the table. They deploy all along the table 1st and 2nd turn they move, I enter the table in a corner and I destroy 1 excorsist and the first infantry unit. 3rd turn they move and feed me another unit and I kill the other exorcist and another infantry unit. All my army was still alive with no tank on the other side to stop me and the sister player only able to feed me unit one by one or let me live move to the center and hope to stay alive by the end of the game. I lost one crisis suit that deep strike and did his mission anyway of killing 1 of the tank.

You could always use the flying nuns of glory. Getting 2 Canoness equiped with Inferno pistol, eviscerator, Jump pack, Cloak, and then one with mantle. With a few faith points you can easily go vehicle hunting even if you end up going first and if you take a couple exorcists then you should be able to deal, at least marginally. Tau is actually one of our harder opponents so even pulling a draw is nice,

I play Tau and have met upp to 9 Death cult Assassins... I really think they are a waste of points.

While DCA's are good in CC and Tau aren't, you shouldn't expect to be able to get in combat with anything that has jetpacks (crisis, stealths), The units the DCA's want to kill.

Another reason is a Tau's small units IMHO because it gives them the ability to fire at multiply targets, it doesn't require much to kill a DCA. Also Rail/Ionheads with target locks can split fire shooting your tanks from 72" away while shooting his burst cannons/SMS on your assassins. With SMS he can even fire at you while you're hiding behind a wood!

I've never had a DCA get into CC with my Tau, and the main reason is SMS+target locks, and this was before devilfishes could take SMS...

I originally agreed with you for exactly the reasons you gave. However, as I know that I'm playing escalation I start with my DCAs on the table and my opponent does not start with his suits on. Thereby eliminating the problem you correctly identified.

That being said my targets the first turn with my DCAs become foot firewarriors, Pathfinders, Broadsides and Kroot. And I only like the FCW and Pathfinders as targets and they are likely to be in the center. Whereas the Broadsides that can kill the DCAs have one side and the Kroot who will kill them in CC are pushing them back.

Hmmmmm. I think I'll take fewer DCAs.

Thanks.

I take two DCA's in my Daemonhunters army currently as a counter-assault element. I'm not sure that they are needed; they don't usually end up being useful, and against other shooty armies, they just sit out of sight and try not to get killed.  (And I've gotten told that taking multiple assassins is cheesy...Go figure...)

Would free up 80 points that could be useful elsewhere.