<![CDATA[Latest posts for the thread "(near) Suitless Tau...could this possibly work? [1,500-2,000 pts]"]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/14.page JForum - http://www.jforum.net (near) Suitless Tau...could this possibly work? [1,500-2,000 pts] So other day I was musing about how sad I was that I feel like I can't really take my Tau (as they're configured mainly for 4th edition and Tau certainly aren't a powerhouse IMHO in 5th as it is, let alone with an army config that is un-optimized), when I came to this realization: When I do play Tau, anytime the game is close or I lose, I always end up losing ALL of my suits and Kroot for the most part, while I almost always have a few vehicles still flying around at the end of the game.

So in a brilliant flash I thought: Could it be possible for Tau to do okay with an army that had absolutely no infantry including Battlesuits? Unfortunately some people pointed out to me that you *have* to take a Commander (grumble), so my concept can't be completely pure, but I could still take an extremely cheap Shas'el and just use him for harassment or as a suicide deep striker.

The idea is this. In a 2,000 point army you would have:

3 Hammerheads, all with Railguns, SMS, Multi-tracker, Target Lock, Disruption Pods & Flechette.
4 Devilfish all with minimum 6 man Firewarrior units. The Devilfish would have SMS, Multi-tracker, Targeting Array, Disruption Pods and Flechette.
3 Piranha Squadrons each with either 2 or 3 Piranhas. All would have Fusion Guns & Targeting arrays, while one in the squadron would have Flechette and at least half would have Disruption Pods.
And finally a cheapy Shas'el, probably with Missile Pods and twin-linked Flamers (for a crazy flame and then assault attack when necessary).

There's still quite a bit of points left over in this list (about 60 actually), but unfortunately due to the high cost of Piranhas, it means I'd probably have to beef up a few Firewarrior squads and maybe add some drones and equipment to the suicide Shas'el (or even make him a Shas'o).


The concept for this army would be to essentially annoy the heck out of the opponent. Again, the commander would either spend the game popping out shooting missile pod shots or deep strike as a suicidal distraction.

All shooting aimed at the rest of the army would be generally 'obscured' thanks to the Disruption Pods which from experience makes the army a tough nut to crack...now the brilliance of this concept is that when the army gets threatened by an assault oriented enemy (or a close-ranged shooting enemy), it can simply pick up and start moving 12" a turn (or 24" a turn for the Piranhas) and get out of dodge. And on those turns the tanks move 12", they can still keep firing one weapon...even out of LOS with the SMS, which can make them very annoying as they run away. And if any enemy is trying to assault them while they run they're needing 6's to hit and are taking Flechette damage for their troubles.


But what really makes me like this idea on paper is that this is essentially what I have to do when I'm playing normally with Tau...at some point I have to get the vehicles out of the corner becasue the enemy is closing in. the problem is, I always end up leaving the suits/Kroot/whatever behind because there's just no way to get them out.

This army wouldn't have that problem. The whole thing can skeedadle when needed and in the pinch when the enemy is on me if I really need to stand and shoot I still have all those fusion guns on the Piranhas to crack open enemy armor and then all the gun drones from the Piranhas combined with disembarking Firewarriors can still lay down a pretty nice hail of fire when called upon to do so.

But the question is: I know this army can take a lot of punishment potentially, but can it actually dish out enough damage to win any tournament games? The funny thing about it is besides the Railgun on the Hammerheads, it doesn't have any long range shooting (as the Firewarriors will generally stay inside their vehicle until they're needed. So actually one of the tougher matchups now would be against a super-shooty army like a pure shooting Space Wolves army, for example.


So have you seen any army like this played before, and if so, how did it do? If not, do you think it could work in a tournament environment, or at least better then a standard mixed Tau army does? Could the concept be improved with something simple (keeping in mind that I think the need to keep everything mounted and mobile is a key)? And would it work better at lower point values?

Basically for 1,850 or 1,500 you just scale down the number of Devilfish/Firewarriors & Piranhas the army has. I think you can get away with only 3 Firewarrior/Devilfish in 1,850 and probably down to 2 if necessary in 1,500 (although I'd probably stick with 3, just to keep enough Anti-infantry firepower in the army).

I'm interested to hear what people think.

]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2556796.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2556796.page GMT (near) Suitless Tau...could this possibly work? [1,500-2,000 pts]
It works...ok, but I felt like its firepower was pretty pathetic, and most of the scary assault units in the game laugh at Flechettes, but I guess with DE around now they have a third army the can annoy (in addition to orks and nids). This army may work better with Pulse Carbines instead of rifles - stand behind your wall of vehicles and go pinning casualties and have an 18" threat range while still moving backwards or forwards. Rifles are nice and all but situations where you're double tapping and not still getting assaulted aren't as common as I'd like.

This army ends up like most other Tau armies in the end. 12" isn't that far to move to get away when you're backed into a corner. With Kroot you can at least sacrifice them to block the way to the vehicles to get away.

I also don't know what you do against a drop army with Melta if you don't have Kroot. 4 piranhas and drones may be enough to keep them away but really you need the Piranhas to live to win, you end up playing like any other Tau army - hope to contest enough in the end to win.

]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2558925.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2558925.page GMT (near) Suitless Tau...could this possibly work? [1,500-2,000 pts]
lambadomy wrote:This is similar to what I was testing at 1500 points for the last sprue posse tournament. I think the list was 3x Hammerheads, 3x Devilfish and 2 squads of 2 fusion piranhas. I think one of the hammerheads had an ion cannon.

It works...ok, but I felt like its firepower was pretty pathetic, and most of the scary assault units in the game laugh at Flechettes, but I guess with DE around now they have a third army the can annoy (in addition to orks and nids). This army may work better with Pulse Carbines instead of rifles - stand behind your wall of vehicles and go pinning casualties and have an 18" threat range while still moving backwards or forwards. Rifles are nice and all but situations where you're double tapping and not still getting assaulted aren't as common as I'd like.

This army ends up like most other Tau armies in the end. 12" isn't that far to move to get away when you're backed into a corner. With Kroot you can at least sacrifice them to block the way to the vehicles to get away.

I also don't know what you do against a drop army with Melta if you don't have Kroot. 4 piranhas and drones may be enough to keep them away but really you need the Piranhas to live to win, you end up playing like any other Tau army - hope to contest enough in the end to win.



That's pretty much what I was afraid of...that you're still ultimately hoping to squeak out a win in any mission...and the Gun Drones on the Piranhas kind of counteract the durability of the rest of the vehicles in Kill Point missions, allowing the enemy to wrack up a few easy KPs while you're going to really have to work to get any of yours.

Still, I really do want to try it. Yeah, 12" isn't that far to get away from stuff, but you get to keep shooting at stuff while you move like that so obviously your priority would be to lay into whatever targets have the speed to keep chasing you around the board...and barring that using a Piranha squadron moving above 6" as a screen to give yourself a turn to get breathing room for the rest of your slower vehicles.

Against a drop heavy army I'd say that you reserve the whole force and try to give them first turn...that should reduce the drop thread considerably, and once drop armies are down they aren't very mobile so from that point on it should actually be relatively easy to dictate the battle to them.

Maybe at the next tournament if you're not running your Tau I could give it a try? I only have 2 Hammerheads and no Piranhas, so maybe you could bring some stuff by and I could borrow it for the day just to see if its something that interests me enough to warrant some purchases?

]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2559429.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2559429.page GMT (near) Suitless Tau...could this possibly work? [1,500-2,000 pts]
We could also just play a game outside of one of the tournaments for you to try it out.]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2559820.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2559820.page GMT (near) Suitless Tau...could this possibly work? [1,500-2,000 pts]
I find the idea interesting; I just worry that it doesn't have enough offensive punch to win games. Maybe you can get one squad of Pathfinders in there? Markerlights make so many things better - your few railguns will hit more often, and negate cover while so doing, or you can have enough accuracy to concentrate firepower on a unit that HAS to die (15 or so termagants in cover, scoring an objective, for example).

Missile-wolves would be a lousy matchup. But I don't know that you have enough firepower to even annoy a Kan-wall - they can almost just walk across the board, refuse to assault your vehicles, and wait for the game to end. How many bad matchups are you willing to accept?

I have the parts for a Pirahna lying around my bitz box (it was the color scheme testbed for DD1); I'll try to bring it along, next time I see you.]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2567910.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2567910.page GMT (near) Suitless Tau...could this possibly work? [1,500-2,000 pts] lol]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2567967.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2567967.page GMT (near) Suitless Tau...could this possibly work? [1,500-2,000 pts]
Janthkin wrote:You COULD take an ethereal, and stuff him into a transport. You know, if you REALLY want to avoid suits 'n stuff.

I find the idea interesting; I just worry that it doesn't have enough offensive punch to win games. Maybe you can get one squad of Pathfinders in there? Markerlights make so many things better - your few railguns will hit more often, and negate cover while so doing, or you can have enough accuracy to concentrate firepower on a unit that HAS to die (15 or so termagants in cover, scoring an objective, for example).

Missile-wolves would be a lousy matchup. But I don't know that you have enough firepower to even annoy a Kan-wall - they can almost just walk across the board, refuse to assault your vehicles, and wait for the game to end. How many bad matchups are you willing to accept?

I have the parts for a Pirahna lying around my bitz box (it was the color scheme testbed for DD1); I'll try to bring it along, next time I see you.



No, Commanders are 1+ or else I would totally take an Ethereal and put him in a Devilfish.

I am worried about the offensive output...but that's really what I want to test. I totally agree that a long-ranged enemy army would be brutal as I'd actually only have the Hammerhead Railguns to fire at them...but at least that means I'm also getting the obscured save from them as well.

I was thinking about a Kan Wall, and that's actually an army I'd like to face. The first priority would be fore the Railguns to take out the Lootas while the Devilfish start plinking away at the advancing horde of Shoota Orks from 24" away. Once the Lootas are gone the only thing I'd have to worry about would be my vehicles being charged by multiple Kan & Dreads at once, because I know from experience you have to get quite a few attacks going to take down a vehicle in CC going over 6".

And as for not being able to take down the Kans and Dreads, basically I would try to wipe out a KFF through all the firing from the Hammerheads (big blast + SMS), Gun Drones & Devilfish. Once I kill one of the KFF I should be able to rush in with all the Piranhas and nuke a bunch of Kans and/or dreads and as long as I'm moving more than 6" and positioned so that I can't be ganged up on by too many boyz/Kans/Dreads I might have a chance...like I said, I'd actually like to try!

I don't know about Pathfinders. I'd love to get markerlights into the army, but since they're a heavy weapon I'd really be losing the whole concept I'm going for: not being tied down to a particular area of the board. I guess I could just assume I'm going to lose that unit and leave them in terrain to die...in fact I suppose it could be a nice diversion while the rest of my army moves away. But I think I'd like to try the pure mobile concept first before seeing what changes desperately need to happen.

Neroku wrote:If you have multiple flettechet launchers in squadrons cause multiple wounds? Let's say I take 5 piranhas all with flettechet would it cause 5 4up wounds per model? That would hurt lol


I don't personally believe that interpretation is correct. I think only one Flechette roll is made per attacking model no matter how many vehicles have the upgrade, so I'd army my Piranhas that way.


]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2568511.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2568511.page GMT (near) Suitless Tau...could this possibly work? [1,500-2,000 pts]
Play test. A lot.]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2570137.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/353457/2570137.page GMT