New to Tau

[sneakyben]

Please could I get some general tactics advice for my Tau...

I have the following models (I WILL NOT BE PURCHASING ANY MORE! :D)

6 crisis suits painted as 2x commanders with body guards (I like the extra wounds and higher BS skill etc)

2 riptides

24 fire warriors

12 pathfinder with EMP... 1 shas'ui with blacksun filter and 2 ion rifles

16 marker drones

4 sheild drones


All of my suit/riptide weapons are magnetised, so I can swap about as required...


I typically play 1500pt games, so I am after some tips regarding things like:

weapon load outs (local club has a good spread of different armies, so no one thing that is done to death)

army composition BASED ON THE MODELS I HAVE! :D

what tactics to use with the different units, and how to get them to work together

...

I am sooooo used to fighting a static, grind-it-out IG infantry gun-line, so I thought I would ask for some tips so I can run my tau more effectively

[Sly]

Just as a note, you have too many Drones for the suits, and none matching the Riptides... you might want to purchase or see what conversions you can make, to get some bits so you can run up to 4 of them as Shield/Missile drones for the Riptides, and 4 as Sniper Drones. The most you'd want to field now is 12 for the Suits and 4 for the Riptides, so you have 4 left over that you could run as Sniper Drones. Convert one Fire Warrior to the controller for the drones and for a few bits you get another good squad.

[sneakyben]

Just as a note, you have too many Drones for the suits, and none matching the Riptides... you might want to purchase or see what conversions you can make, to get some bits so you can run up to 4 of them as Shield/Missile drones for the Riptides, and 4 as Sniper Drones. The most you'd want to field now is 12 for the Suits and 4 for the Riptides, so you have 4 left over that you could run as Sniper Drones. Convert one Fire Warrior to the controller for the drones and for a few bits you get another good squad.

Or I could run them as separate squads (?)

[Gleipnir]

Commander(Warlord) w/ 2 Crisis bodyguards w/ 2 shield drones each

Commander w/ special issue systems(twin linked, ignore cover, puretide chip and a drone controller) and a pair of flamers plus 2 Crisis bodyguards w/ 2 marker drones each

Fire Warrior Team 6 man (X4)

Pathfinder Team 4 man w/ 2 ion rifles and Night vision

Pathfinder Team 8 man

Drone Squadron 12 Marker Drones

Riptide w/ Ion Accelerator and interceptor

Riptide w/ Ion Accelerator and interceptor

I would run the second commander as a floating force multiplier adding him to the Drone Squadron for twin linked markerlights at BS5, riptides for armorbane or monster slayer twinlinking and ignores cover and to give himself a better toughness and only add him back into his bodyguard team when all other options are less desired.

Little light for anti air so a quad gun aegis line to park your 8 man pathfinders behind within 6" of your riptides to provide supporting fire wouldn't hurt, as with all things Tau moving your troops onto objectives while taking advantage of supporting fire is key. Biggest nightmare would be seeing a couple of heldrakes or mechanized heavy opposition

You really could benefit from having 2 shielded missles drones w/ the riptides(would allow you to add a commander plus two drones to each riptide and all 6 models would use the higher toughness value of the riptide making for a tough nut to crack) and a Broadside or two packing Heavy Missile Pods to really take advantage of all those markerlight hits and provide for anti-armor/air.