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Hello,

I don't know if I'm the first to come up with an idea like this but here I go:

Farsight

O'Vesa

Commander w/ Puretide, MSSS

3 Bonded Suits w/ flamers

1 Bonded Suit w/ flamer

6 Fire Warriors

Riptide w/ Ion, Target lock

Riptide w/ Ion

Riptide w/ Ion

Riptide w/ Burst Cannon

So is this list a viable competitive list? It's pretty straight forward all the big dudes just shoot and the few troops I have kind of stand behind and stay on objectives or Farsight can make a drop with the flamer unit.

Some comments and criticism would be greatly appreciated!

I don't have my codex at work, but how are you getting four riptides?

Looks like he's allying in the farsight enclave list with the standard Tau.

Which is why he has the bonded suits as troops.

Yes, I have the farsight enclave with a Tau ally.

I like the list. It's a cool idea and would look awesome on the tabletop.

I don't think you have enough scoring though to make it a competitive list and the scoring you do have is a little frail for 1500pts. I don't think the riptides as cool as they are have enough killing potential to wipe out the amount of troops you'll see at 1500pts.

If you could I would try and add maybe a unit of fire warriors in a devilfish that way they have some additional protection and can be held back for objective grabbing.

Thanks for the idea.

I was going for as many Riptides as possible, and 5 is the absolute maximum I think. But if I do drop a riptide it will free up a lot of points and I do think a FW squad in a devil fish as an extra troop will really shine a lot more.

The idea with this many riptides is that I believe I can wipe out any unit on objectives. Especially since I can have the O'Vesa star pretty much clearing 2 units per turn. What amount of troops should I be expecting at 1500pt?

Going a little overkill with the suits, not to mention at 75$ a pop that's going to be a tad pricy.

Could you please specify upgrades. If that is all that are on the riptides, its pretty weak.

Sure, you have an O'VesaStar but without a VT in the Army you have no AA. Worse, you have Target Lock on an IA Riptide, you are far better of with a VT HBC Riptide in the Star. Brings me to my next point, you have a Pen and MSS, where is the C&CN? Its critical.

I think you will find unsupported Riptides do not ouptut a lot of damage on their own. Without the ability to reduce scatter or ignore cover those IA Riptides are pretty mediocre. A lot of points for a BS3 Large blast that gets hot.

I would put the sweet spot at this points level for the O'VesaStar at 3 riptides, 4 is pushing it, 5 unbalances your lists even more. IMO you will be sorely disappointed at how that unit performs on the table.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 lakemacleod wrote:
Going a little overkill with the suits, not to mention at 75$ a pop that's going to be a tad pricy.

Dollar for Point it sees in line with most army builds especially if he is using the Drones. Point for Point you pay the same for a White Scars bike army and many others.

I agree with Zagman, and would like to add that your support commander absolutely positively MUST have vectored retro-thrusters.

I'd drop one of the Riptides for some necessary upgrades:

Farsight
O'Vesa

Commander w/ MSSS, C&CNode, Penchip, vectored retro-thrusters, the 2-point thingy (forget the name), flamer

Riptide w/ burst, fusion, target lock, velocity trackers

Riptide w/ Ion, fusion, velocity trackers, ewo

Riptide w/ Ion, fusion, velocity trackers, ewo

3 Crisis w/ bonding, 5 flamers, 1 vectored retro-thrusters

1 Crisis w/ bonding, airbursting frag projector

10 Kroot

10 Kroot

1499


I think it's still one too many Riptides for 1500, but hey, who's counting?

Farsight deep strikes with the flamey-squad against armies without means of keeping you locked in CC. Against armies that can lock down your star, he stays with it for I5 hit and run.

Kroot outflank or screen your star, depending on need. Crisis suits either hide, or go after vulnerable scoring units, allowing your star to focus on threats.


Edit: only 1 VRT in the Crisis squad

Thud wrote:
I agree with Zagman, and would like to add that your support commander absolutely positively MUST have vectored retro-thrusters.

I'd drop one of the Riptides for some necessary upgrades:

Farsight
O'Vesa

Commander w/ MSSS, C&CNode, Penchip, vectored retro-thrusters, the 2-point thingy (forget the name), flamer

Riptide w/ burst, fusion, target lock, velocity trackers

Riptide w/ Ion, fusion, velocity trackers, ewo

Riptide w/ Ion, fusion, velocity trackers, ewo

3 Crisis w/ bonding, 5 flamers, vectored retro-thrusters

1 Crisis w/ bonding, airbursting frag projector

10 Kroot

10 Kroot

1499


I think it's still one too many Riptides for 1500, but hey, who's counting?

Farsight deep strikes with the flamey-squad against armies without means of keeping you locked in CC. Against armies that can lock down your star, he stays with it for I5 hit and run.

Kroot outflank or screen your star, depending on need. Crisis suits either hide, or go after vulnerable scoring units, allowing your star to focus on threats.

I actually really like this list but agree that there are is probably 1 too many Riptides in the list but hey, its your list. Something I would add to the list is drop the VRT on two of the Flamer Suits so that you can get hounds for each of your Kroot Squads, being able to re-roll the outflank side is absolutely essential.

I would also try to fit a skyray in there for Anti-air and the occasional Markerlight. Not sure how you would do this but I think that it would synergise with this list really well.

The Crisis squad only has one VRT. I should have made that clearer.

Hounds are a good idea, though. I feel silly for forgetting it. Could drop one of the flamers in the Crisis squad and the flamer on the Commander for one in each squad.

So, I'm just wondering about the rules first. If you only have one VRT in a squad, can they all hit and run?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And I think the list you put out is a much more competitive one. Dropping the unnecessary suit does free up all the points I need to make the army work but at the same time it doesn't kill the theme of "jaeger wall", which is what I'm building this list for.

Tau Skyfire wrote:
Something I would add to the list is drop the VRT on two of the Flamer Suits so that you can get hounds for each of your Kroot Squads, being able to re-roll the outflank side is absolutely essential.

I'd add positional relays to the riptides. There range is sufficient that you can hug the side you prefer for a bit. It's a few more points but guarantees you'll be bringing in your kroot on the side you want

Wings of Purity wrote:
So, I'm just wondering about the rules first. If you only have one VRT in a squad, can they all hit and run?

Yes, it's one of those "as long as one model in the unit has it" deals.

 necron99 wrote:

Tau Skyfire wrote:
Something I would add to the list is drop the VRT on two of the Flamer Suits so that you can get hounds for each of your Kroot Squads, being able to re-roll the outflank side is absolutely essential.

I'd add positional relays to the riptides. There range is sufficient that you can hug the side you prefer for a bit. It's a few more points but guarantees you'll be bringing in your kroot on the side you want

I guess it is just like taking Kroot hounds except it's even better. Something to outflank and take objectives is nice.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Zagman wrote:
Could you please specify upgrades. If that is all that are on the riptides, its pretty weak.

Sure, you have an O'VesaStar but without a VT in the Army you have no AA. Worse, you have Target Lock on an IA Riptide, you are far better of with a VT HBC Riptide in the Star. Brings me to my next point, you have a Pen and MSS, where is the C&CN? Its critical.

I think you will find unsupported Riptides do not ouptut a lot of damage on their own. Without the ability to reduce scatter or ignore cover those IA Riptides are pretty mediocre. A lot of points for a BS3 Large blast that gets hot.

I would put the sweet spot at this points level for the O'VesaStar at 3 riptides, 4 is pushing it, 5 unbalances your lists even more. IMO you will be sorely disappointed at how that unit performs on the table.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 lakemacleod wrote:
Going a little overkill with the suits, not to mention at 75$ a pop that's going to be a tad pricy.

Dollar for Point it sees in line with most army builds especially if he is using the Drones. Point for Point you pay the same for a White Scars bike army and many others.

Just wondering how would the Heavy Burst Cannon be more useful than the Ion Accelerator? I can see that it has a lot more shots but it does come with a higher risk when nova-charged, even with commander's super powers. The IA does have a higher strength that can lock onto fliers too, plus the low AP is a big bonus too.

Wings of Purity wrote:


Just wondering how would the Heavy Burst Cannon be more useful than the Ion Accelerator? I can see that it has a lot more shots but it does come with a higher risk when nova-charged, even with commander's super powers. The IA does have a higher strength that can lock onto fliers too, plus the low AP is a big bonus too.

The HBC is a far superior AA platform.

Here is a little math...

VS AV12 Flier. The HBC's advantage is greater against the more frail fliers AV11/10.




VS FMCs T6 for Example



And Just for Fun, Vs Stock Wraithknight T8




Basically, Novachared the HBC is superior vs Flyers, FMCs, and even many MCs which makes it a great home for an Earth Caste Pilot Array. It benefits greater from having an ECPA and becomes a reliable fire platform. Without being Novacharged it can still be moderately effective but the IA will generally win out.

Hmmm...If you put it mathematically it does seem the HBC has a better AA role. The question now is, is it worth it to take the Earth Caste Pilot Array? Or is the normal version good enough to get by? I can see that it can benefit a lot from it as I can reliably put out the nova-shots with less risk of shooting myself on the foot but it does take up a lot of points.