2,000 pts - pure Tau

[The Dave]

So here's version 2.3 of a Tau list I've been running that doesn't use Kroot or Vespid. It is currently 13-2 (W/L) with the two losses coming from Orks (in fact, the same player). I don't normally keep track of wins and losses but it dawned on me that the only losses I had were to the Ork player. First off, here's the list:

HQ
Ethereal (Blacksun Filter, Warlord)
Cadre Fireblade

TROOPS
12 Fire Warriors <-- Ethereal and Cadre Fireblade go here, and form the core of my lines
8 Fire Warriors (Devilfish with Disruption Pods)
8 Fire Warriors (Devilfish with Disruption Pods)

ELITES
Riptide (Ion Accelerator, TL Plasma Rifle, Stimulant Injector, Early Warning Override)
Riptide (Ion Accelerator, TL Plasma Rifle, Stimulant Injector, Early Warning Override)
3 Crisis Suits (one with 2 Burst Cannons, one with 2 Burst Cannons and Vectored Retro Thrusters, one with a Burst Cannon and Airbursting Fragmentation Projector, 6 Gun Drones)

FAST ATTACK
7 Pathfinders
7 Pathfinders
7 Pathfinders

HEAVY SUPPORT
3 Broadsides (TL High-Yield Missile Pods, Smart Missiles, Early Warning Override, 6 Missile Drones)
3 Broadsides (TL High-Yield Missile Pods, Smart Missiles, Early Warning Override, 6 Missile Drones)

2,000 pts
3-6 scoring units, 86 models

As I stated, I have played about 15 games with this list (with minor variations here and there) and I'm at the point now where I'd just rather throw as much dice as possible at my opponent, because that seems to work best. This brings me to the Crisis Suits. I have tried numerous combinations of units from dual Plasma, to dual Plasma with Flamers (for wall of fire counter-charge shenanigans), to Plasma/Fusion, to dual Fusion, to dual Missile Pods, etc etc. I have yet to find the unit more useful than another Riptide or another Broadside unit, which the Broadsides are what I'm thinking I'd rather change them to. Your guys' thoughts on what to do here would be appreciated. Which suit configuration (with whichever wargear) do you think is best, or should I try more Missile Broadsides or an Ion Head (Hammerhead with Ion Cannon)? FYI the current iteration of the Crisis unit in the list above is something a friend and I worked up. It's fun but again it is clearly outclassed by a Riptide or Broadside.

However this brings me to another issue I've been having. Because Broadsides were given the new S8 "Heavy Rail Rifles" instead of actual Railguns (S10), I have chosen to completely avoid them and go with the Twin-Linked High-Yield Missile Pods instead. Overall, the only weapons in my current list that can bust through AV14 are my Riptide's Nova-Charged Ion Accelerator (S9 Ordinance) or his melee attacks (3 S10 AP2 Smash attacks on the charge). It's obvious I need Fusion weaponry in here, and this may tie-in to the Crisis Suit conundrum above, but like I said my suits have never proven themselves once. They either get shot to pieces (being T4 with a 3+ save), or are assaulted and cut down before they get where they need to go. Now, I have run Longstrike in a Hammerhead (with the S10 railgun) but he only really breaks a Land Raider once per game it seems (and maybe the math supports that). It's just not consistent enough at all, and honestly it feels like a waste of points. I've played a few games now where an opponent's Land Raider charges up the field and lets its cargo out to assault my lines (with Dirge Casters too, those dirty traitors!), completely unharmed. It wouldn't be fair to let Tau do everything really well all the time, and AV14 being their only real weakness (aside from Orks which I'll get to in a minute), isn't that bad, but I'm wondering if there's a way to deal with LR's that I haven't considered.

As for the Orks, they are the two black spots on my otherwise clean record with my Tau so far. I just can't figure out what to do against them. In the two games I played, I lost one from not being able to stop them from grabbing all the objectives and making it to assault with nearly everything, and I lost the second because...wait for it...they out-shot me. Game two saw NO close combats. I was out-shot by Lootas, Shoota Boyz, Dakkajets, and Big Gunz. My mind was blown lol. Again, maybe they're one of the armies Tau just has issues with, but without tailoring my list to include dozens of flamers and large blasts, I don't know if my current list can cut it, pending a 3rd Broadside unit should the community here think it's necessary.

Looking forward to feedback on all points.

[chicop76]

Funny that my crisis suits I want to get rid of them as well. I am currently at the point of using one man two gun drone suicide jumpers.

Crisis Suit 2 fusion, target or drone controller, 2 gun drones. I deep striked with my crisis suits and riptides before and it workd rather well. However at the time I didn't realize I could overcharge to fire 2 fusion shots instead of one.

I honestly think you should drop them. I am going to with the hell jumper ideal and see how it works. The thought behind it is that it takes out something that cost more than itself. The drones add more durability and the option to split fire at two targets. I am going to run 2 units like this 1 solo body guard and 1 solo elite.

Let me go top down with several suggestions. I am revamping my list as well. Which I will mention what I am doing as well. I only lost 2 games with my Tau. I thought it was 3, but it was my daemons playing against my own Tau list, so I don't think beating my own list would count. Howeaver if someone did ran that list than I am beter prepared against it. The two loses was against Necrons and Grey Knights. I would call that Tau version one, Tau version two destroyed both armies and it does a lot better than version one. My version one is similar to this list, so I am giving you my version two and my version 3 in progress re write. Version 3 suggest taking allies which are either Eldar or Farsight allies.

-HQ-

I really wouldn't make your Ethereal a warlord. Bad enough people want to kill him, but being a Warlord puts a huge kill me sign on top of his head. I have used the blacksun filter and it makes sense. I find it funny that pathfinders can take it, but with marker lights you do not need to use them. I took the filter of mine since he is with my broadsides, simply so he doesn't die.

I personally don't like the fire blade. I rather take 2 ethereals instead. I have to look if you take two you can still quadruable tap with all units near by. Anyway I find I use the stuborn aura to keep units from falling back. Also I have use run shoot and it does work rather well. The run shoot basically adds d6 movement for a possible 12" which means you can possibly rapid fire at targets 28" away. With 2 ethereals this can allow you to easily rapid fire units turn one which normally if you move up gives you a raid fire range of 21", oh not 28" I meant 27" which is still enough distance to rapid fire units on the other side. That means all you need is a run move of 3-4" to be able to get into tripple tap love range. You can however easily do so with the Tau in the transports. The irony is your back running squad could enter the transport the next turn. Alos if the front transport squads are still alive they can fall back inside the trans ports.

Another thought is to take darkstrider. If you take darkstrider and stick him with fire warriors you now can outflank or scout with firewarriors. Also due to strider's effect that squad will have basiacally strength 6 guns, they can instant kill paladins which is funny. I done the rail rifle outflank squad which is rather nasty due to 6 strength 6 ap 1 shots. The problem I seen is not the fact they can get assaulted, which due to strider makes tha hard to do. The problem is unless in cover a + 5 armour save is not enough to take shots back. Regular Tau are more durable. However I thought about adding shield drones, but again another issue is the unit is expensive to begin with. I think the outflank would be useful and you can use the +4 invulnerable save when you come in.

The reason why I don't run strider is simply due to my commander. My commander which is my version 2 has never let me down. All he has is support gear. Version one had a drone controller and I stuck him with my broadsides and took 6 marker drones which meant I have 8 marker drones which is 16 points cheaper and 8 points more than pathfinders. However version 2 I run the missiles. Not to say the drones didn't work. I just needed more strength 7 attacks. However version three I am thinkingof addding the 8 marker drones back since I will have my basis covered, I use target lock so I can have my sides shoot seperately from the marker lights. The ideal is I paint targets with my pathfinders and follow with this unit. The end result is 4 painted targets and broadsides that can shoot at 3 of the painted targets. Version 3 may give me the ability to paint 6 differant targets per turn.

Well I was getting ahead of myself my commander have ignore cover, twin linked, MC hunter, and tank huner, stubborn, furious charge, and counter attack. I stick him with my sides and this unit rains terror on my foes. Adding this commande has really boosted my broasides potential, also by adding target locks I can fire at 4 differant units with just one unit. Not to many units can take out 4 units at once. For example this unit can take out 4 rhinos rather easily since it I ignoring cover and re rolling on miss armour pens. The twin link is useful since my missile drones can easily down a flyers and my broadsides can fire at something else.

Version Three Commander is going to use the same tactic as above, but tae Iridium Armour and stim injector. The reason being my broadsides with my commander take a lot of incoming fire. I now put my commander up front to ease te stress that unit takes. I put my Ethereal with them simply due to this unit has never died, minus almost running off the table twice. The wo times was due to rolling over 10. Taking my commander as a shield as well will cut down on the fall back rolls. Depending how version 3 do I might also add a +4 invulnerable save as well.

-elites-

I run 2 riptides and I only came close to losing them both one game. I lost one and had the other down to one wound. Interesting enough most games I inflict more wounds upon myself than the enemy does to me. With that being said I do not see why you are spending 70 points on them. They are durable enough to where you really do not need fnp on them. As a fact that's about enough points to bring your squads of 8 fire warriors to 12, so you can easily have 3 12 man fire warrior squads.

Version one I was running plasma, but in version 2 and higher I decided to go with fusion. This is what I noticed. The riptide shoots 72" which means it is shooting any unit you need to shoot on the board. Which means by doing so you losing plasma shots. The plasma is only useful if you are 12" away which you for the most part try to avoid combat half the time. Which means with fusion you can fire it once or twice to take out tanks. If you need to smash than go ahead and smash. The fusion I found allows you to avoid smashinf landraiders full of storm shield/ hammer terminators. Also the strength 9 ordance barrage pie plate is beautiful, you ca snipe out characters with that and with side armour 12 front armour 14 vehicles you can easily take it out.

-troops-

I think you need more firewarriors, especially if you are running an ethereal.

I have run kroot and they have worked really well. I have run sniper kroot which have seen lots of use and also use the ethereal with them for triple tap. 60 shots from a unit of 20 kroot is a beautiful thing. Version 3 I am droping the sniper rounds which will free up 30 points. I noticed if against t3 models I rather use the regular kroot rifle. Now against marines and other badies it's been useful, last tournament not so much since I use the basic rifle over the sniper shots. I will still have snipers though. I found that against t8 and higher crap you really need them.

-fast-

I think you are running too many pathfinders, however keeping in mid my commander ignore cover and my riptides can ignore cover at times, and smart missiles can ignore cover, and seeker missiles can ignore cover. I find for the most part I only really need the added bs. I droped my pathfinders to 3 squads of 5 and in version 3 they will drop to 4 man squads. The reason being when I used to take 3 8 man squads, heck at one point I took 3 10 man squads with rail rifles. The problem I found I had tooo many lights. I found I wasted a lot of unused lights. Also by adding units that ignore cover and incrfeasing the bs of differant units it made them really redundant. However I find that painting more targets is much better than being restricted to painting only 3 targets. Hince why I am thinking of making my army have 6 differant marker light units.

-heavy-
The hammerhead never worked as well as I like it. The problem here is it's almost 200 points to make it awesome. It seems like a big take me if you run into armour 14. Until than everything else simply out performs it. Even against mass armour 13 it didn't seem to make a real differance. I may come back and add the unit, but I see it as a unit I need to drop.

Broadsides I kinda went into my rant into HQ section. However I have ran high yield in version one and switch back and forth in version 2. The weapon system that has won out for me is the rail rifle. Here is the reasons why.

1. It is double the range of the high yield missiles. This is why I lost against crons and greyknights was due to being out ranged. Also I had issues where I was forced to move this unit constantly to get into missile range. 1 out of 3 missions really favor the high yield. The low range can allow armies like eldar to stay out of range and pelt you from afar. Look at your list the only thing that you have that shoots outside of 36" range is your riptides. It's good, but without pathfinder support the shooting becomes ok, still better than a hammerhead.

2. Armour 2 laughs at the missles while the ap 2 is not a joking matter. With the ability to instant kill units like paladins I will say I rather the rail guns.

3. You can pen armour 13, although you need a 6 you would rather have rail guns vs barges. Just saying

4. The high yield, missile drones, and smart missiles are at a lot of time pure over kill. Target locks at least allow you to blow away 2-3 units in one go instead of one. Even crisis suits you'll find rail guns are better.

5. The other reason why I take them and do not bother with stealth suits is that what if you face Tau moment. I fought 7 Tau armies thanks to the new band wagon army trend. I have ripped them to shreads everytime. My two riptides are enough deterant to stop the farsight bomb. Also I can easily kill two ritides due to the units I am running or easily kill two broadside units. Also the fact I can out range other Tau players is a huge success factor. Hince the final verdit why I take rail rifles.

Not saying do not run high yield. If I have two broadside units I probably would run one high yield and one railgun. However knowing me I would try out 6 rail guns. Also keep in mind that my rail guns do really well do to my support commander.

I added in the skyray and it is very helpful. I though any marker user can use the missiles and found out they changed it and you can't no longer do it. The skyray adds anti air, which is useful against those dirty crons. Also it's really useful for taking out flying MCs. As an extra bonus it does add marker light with skyfire. I typically place this unit behind my sides since you really can't move them. Also this brings up another version 3 issue. I am seriously thiking of taking my sides and my skyray and putting them on a skyshield, by doing this you save points. For example all your drones become missile shield drones. You are getting 3 force fields on your sides at cost with an extra slot and you getting a force shield on your tank. Nedless to say I have also learned not to put too many units on a skyshield. As an added plus you can field units under the shield as well. Which makes placing terrain like a one story building rather nice in front and underneath the shield. Remember you place fortifications first than terrain.

Also I been using sniper drones. I am thinking of attaching my ethereal to this unit which the filter would come in handy. I would like to run 9 drones, but since I already have 6 it will do. What is nice with the ethereal they can fire 18 times also they can fire rather far away as well. The unit with bs 5 can deal out decent damage and it's not hard t triple fire units since the doule tap range is rather far. The stealth is nice and I can place them out of los and have the drones jsj out of terrain if need be. I also have 2 bs 5 marker lights in the unit. For example if I am shooting at a wraith knight I can paint him tice and possibly lower him down for another unit to take out the knight. I am pretty confident if a wraithnight is within double tap range I can easily kill it with my sides and my snipers.

However I might still keep my sniper kroot. One can not have too many snipers just in case.

[The Dave]

Holy cow, thanks for the wall of text! I think I'll have to reply line-by-line to be effective though, so here goes nothing!

Funny that my crisis suits I want to get rid of them as well. I am currently at the point of using one man two gun drone suicide jumpers.
Crisis Suit 2 fusion, target or drone controller, 2 gun drones. I deep striked with my crisis suits and riptides before and it workd rather well. However at the time I didn't realize I could overcharge to fire 2 fusion shots instead of one.
I honestly think you should drop them. I am going to with the hell jumper ideal and see how it works. The thought behind it is that it takes out something that cost more than itself. The drones add more durability and the option to split fire at two targets. I am going to run 2 units like this 1 solo body guard and 1 solo elite.

I'm not a fan of suicide suits; they are a bit too expensive for that IMO.

-HQ-
I really wouldn't make your Ethereal a warlord. Bad enough people want to kill him, but being a Warlord puts a huge kill me sign on top of his head. I have used the blacksun filter and it makes sense. I find it funny that pathfinders can take it, but with marker lights you do not need to use them. I took the filter of mine since he is with my broadsides, simply so he doesn't die.

The Ethereal is Leadership 10 and Cadre Fireblade is Leadership 9. 6th Edition states your warlord must have the highest Leadership value between all of your HQ choices (or you can pick one if there's a tie). Trust me, I'd rather make it my Cadre Fireblade, but it's simply not allowed.

I personally don't like the fire blade. I rather take 2 ethereals instead. I have to look if you take two you can still quadruable tap with all units near by.

You cannot. The Ethereal's Storm of Fire ability clearly states you can only be affected by one. Plus the reason for cadre Fireblade is not just one extra shot at close range, it turns the unit into 26 S5 AP5 shots at 30" (ignoring night fight thanks to the Ethereal) with him included. It's a nice ability, and it's the ONLY way to get quadruple shots at 15" (with him and the Ethereal).

Anyway I find I use the stuborn aura to keep units from falling back.

For combat, you wouldn't want stubborn at ALL (you'd rather have your guys get completely wiped so that you can shoot them in your turn), and for shooting Stubborn has zero effect on the morale check because shooting wounds don't modify your leadership like wounds from combat do. The Failure Is Not An Option ability is the one that grants all units within 12" his Leadership 10, and then he can grant Storm of Fire on top of it. Usually I'll throw on Feel no Pain 6+ from Sense of Stone if I am not able to use Storm of Fire.

Another thought is to take darkstrider. If you take darkstrider and stick him with fire warriors you now can outflank or scout with firewarriors. Also due to strider's effect that squad will have basiacally strength 6 guns, they can instant kill paladins which is funny. I done the rail rifle outflank squad which is rather nasty due to 6 strength 6 ap 1 shots. The problem I seen is not the fact they can get assaulted, which due to strider makes tha hard to do. The problem is unless in cover a + 5 armour save is not enough to take shots back. Regular Tau are more durable. However I thought about adding shield drones, but again another issue is the unit is expensive to begin with. I think the outflank would be useful and you can use the +4 invulnerable save when you come in.

Hmm, I actually own Darkstrider. I might have to give him a try (I haven't yet). Outflanking 12 Fire Warriors to get S5 shots on side/rear armor, or barely protected units could be cool.

The reason why I don't run strider is simply due to my commander. My commander which is my version 2 has never let me down. All he has is support gear. Version one had a drone controller and I stuck him with my broadsides and took 6 marker drones which meant I have 8 marker drones which is 16 points cheaper and 8 points more than pathfinders. However version 2 I run the missiles. Not to say the drones didn't work. I just needed more strength 7 attacks. However version three I am thinkingof addding the 8 marker drones back since I will have my basis covered, I use target lock so I can have my sides shoot seperately from the marker lights. The ideal is I paint targets with my pathfinders and follow with this unit. The end result is 4 painted targets and broadsides that can shoot at 3 of the painted targets. Version 3 may give me the ability to paint 6 differant targets per turn.

I have tried the Commander + Broadside configuration several times, and either he was extra overkill, or he was too afraid to take wounds for the unit despite the armor. He's a waste of points IMO.

Well I was getting ahead of myself my commander have ignore cover, twin linked, MC hunter, and tank huner, stubborn, furious charge, and counter attack. I stick him with my sides and this unit rains terror on my foes. Adding this commande has really boosted my broasides potential, also by adding target locks I can fire at 4 differant units with just one unit. Not to many units can take out 4 units at once. For example this unit can take out 4 rhinos rather easily since it I ignoring cover and re rolling on miss armour pens. The twin link is useful since my missile drones can easily down a flyers and my broadsides can fire at something else.

I have also tried three units of two Broadsides to try and spread my fire, and the reason I went back to two units of three Broadsides was because I always felt like I needed the extra Broadside (and his two missile drones). It works great, and like I said I may want another Broadside unit.

Version Three Commander is going to use the same tactic as above, but tae Iridium Armour and stim injector. The reason being my broadsides with my commander take a lot of incoming fire. I now put my commander up front to ease te stress that unit takes. I put my Ethereal with them simply due to this unit has never died, minus almost running off the table twice. The wo times was due to rolling over 10. Taking my commander as a shield as well will cut down on the fall back rolls. Depending how version 3 do I might also add a +4 invulnerable save as well.

Like I said above, I've run it like that before and didn't like it. I also don't like potentially giving them Slay the Warlord if I roll poorly or they shoot at the unit correctly. It has happened before (despite moving to the 2+ look out sir when he's down to one wound).

-elites-
I run 2 riptides and I only came close to losing them both one game. I lost one and had the other down to one wound. Interesting enough most games I inflict more wounds upon myself than the enemy does to me. With that being said I do not see why you are spending 70 points on them. They are durable enough to where you really do not need fnp on them. As a fact that's about enough points to bring your squads of 8 fire warriors to 12, so you can easily have 3 12 man fire warrior squads.

Stimulant Injectors help with his Nova Charge fails, and they also mathematically extend him from 5 wounds to 6 (and sometimes 7). It's rare that I lose a riptide in a game too, but when I do he is whittled down slowly over 2-3 turns, so having Feel no Pain for a few of those wounds has proven useful. I am usually against such an expensive upgrade but it actually has been working out. I'm not entirely opposed to dropping it though, but like I said I might do so to add 3 more missile Broadsides and 6 more missile Drones.

Version one I was running plasma, but in version 2 and higher I decided to go with fusion. This is what I noticed. The riptide shoots 72" which means it is shooting any unit you need to shoot on the board. Which means by doing so you losing plasma shots. The plasma is only useful if you are 12" away which you for the most part try to avoid combat half the time. Which means with fusion you can fire it once or twice to take out tanks. If you need to smash than go ahead and smash. The fusion I found allows you to avoid smashinf landraiders full of storm shield/ hammer terminators. Also the strength 9 ordance barrage pie plate is beautiful, you ca snipe out characters with that and with side armour 12 front armour 14 vehicles you can easily take it out.

I have never ever had a game where the Riptide was close enough to a Land Raider to use the "melta" rule from the Fusion Blasters. Also, the Nova Charge version of the Ion Accelerator is not Barrage, it is just "Ordinance", so you cannot snipe with it. Casualties come from the front of units just like its Overcharged shot.

-troops-
I think you need more firewarriors, especially if you are running an ethereal.

Yeah, I know, I hear it a lot. But honestly the rest of my army provides enough target saturation and threat overload (sorry JY2 lol) that they usually survive unscathed.

I have run kroot and they have worked really well. I have run sniper kroot which have seen lots of use and also use the ethereal with them for triple tap. 60 shots from a unit of 20 kroot is a beautiful thing. Version 3 I am droping the sniper rounds which will free up 30 points. I noticed if against t3 models I rather use the regular kroot rifle. Now against marines and other badies it's been useful, last tournament not so much since I use the basic rifle over the sniper shots. I will still have snipers though. I found that against t8 and higher crap you really need them.

I was trying to go with a pure Tau theme, but I admit sniper Kroot are appealing. I will have to give them a try too but I'm not sure what to drop.

-fast-
I think you are running too many pathfinders

I disagree. I have run these units a LOT and in my opinion they are perfectly numbered (3 units of 7). You should hit with 3-4 out of 7, and that's enough for a BS upgrade and removal of cover, or any combination thereof from multiple units.

Broadsides I kinda went into my rant into HQ section. However I have ran high yield in version one and switch back and forth in version 2. The weapon system that has won out for me is the rail rifle. Here is the reasons why.

1. It is double the range of the high yield missiles. This is why I lost against crons and greyknights was due to being out ranged. Also I had issues where I was forced to move this unit constantly to get into missile range. 1 out of 3 missions really favor the high yield. The low range can allow armies like eldar to stay out of range and pelt you from afar. Look at your list the only thing that you have that shoots outside of 36" range is your riptides. It's good, but without pathfinder support the shooting becomes ok, still better than a hammerhead.

You shouldn't be moving Broadsides. Deploy them closer, and you'll be fine, or at least that's how it has worked for me.

2. Armour 2 laughs at the missles while the ap 2 is not a joking matter. With the ability to instant kill units like paladins I will say I rather the rail guns.

No, I think Armor 2 (which is usually expensive and in fewer numbers) is pretty scared of 36 shots per unit. Nothing lives when my Broadsides shoot at it. I wouldn't change 12 S7 shots for 3 S8 ever. While S7 can't hurt a Land Raider, you'd be hard pressed to do anything significant to one before it's in your face. The odds are against you.

3. You can pen armour 13, although you need a 6 you would rather have rail guns vs barges. Just saying

Nah, I'd rather do a ton of glances to it, which my Broadsides have done reliably. Again, 12 S7 shots per Broadside unit over 3 S8 is clearly the right way to go. I'm not even asking if I should switch to the Heavy Rail Rifle; it's absolute garbage.

4. The high yield, missile drones, and smart missiles are at a lot of time pure over kill. Target locks at least allow you to blow away 2-3 units in one go instead of one. Even crisis suits you'll find rail guns are better.

Crisis Suits can't take Heavy Rail Rifles. Anyways, if you think the missile Broadsides are overkill, why would you stick a commander with them? And like I said after having used them a ton, I'm a huge fan of a 3-man unit with missiles. It's super fun, and very effective (and hasn't ever been so much overkill that I thought they weren't worth it). I'm contemplating adding another, not changing their weapons.

5. The other reason why I take them and do not bother with stealth suits is that what if you face Tau moment. I fought 7 Tau armies thanks to the new band wagon army trend. I have ripped them to shreads everytime. My two riptides are enough deterant to stop the farsight bomb. Also I can easily kill two ritides due to the units I am running or easily kill two broadside units. Also the fact I can out range other Tau players is a huge success factor. Hince the final verdit why I take rail rifles.

I think Tau vs Tau is dull. I usually don't play against the same race, but at my store I have a huge pool of opponents so it's never a problem.

I will take the tips I liked above and try them out. I'm hoping we helped each other out lol. Thanks for the reply!

[chicop76]

No prob.

A suicide suit is around 60 points. How is that a lot of points. If it deep strikes and takes out a landraider it easily made back it's points.

You miss the point of the stubborn. For example I tied up hellhounds all game long due to stubborn. I even won combat a few times. Anyway I agree I would like the unit to break when he assaults. It means I can lite him up. However I don't want the unit to break on my turn, so the reason why I do stubborn is it is my turn and I switch to stubborn. Since breaking on my turn means he get to assault another unit in the following turn.

At the start of the game I either doing triple tap, +6 fnp, or run shoot. Stubborn comes when I got assaulted following turns and I don't want the unit to break on my turn.

Deploy the broadsides closer is youjr solution to hammer and advil when you are 48" away from the enemy edge and they have 12" as a buffer to be out of range. Also if you are going first it's even worst since you do not know if they are going to deploy close or deploy as far back as they can. Like I said the only two games I lost with Tau was due to be not having enough long range fire power. I still have to move my broadsides twice so they can be in range.

Like I said I ran my sides many differant ways. High yield helps in some ways that rail doesn't, a lso rail is more potent than the high yield. For example a pen from a high yield need a 6 to make an vehicle explode while rail need 4 or higher. I am killing more models via explosions that way. Also it gives me more range and I don't have to move them at all.

I didn't say crisis sujits can take them I am saying they are instant killed by the suits.

Honestly my commander helps out the missile drones. I am thinking of running a skyshield with sides on it.

I play rather aggresive with my Tau. I like to move up for turn 1 rapid fre and than continue moving up or fall back while rapid firing. It's really effective. My Riptides tend to make it in the enemies deployments and selectively assault units. I have used the 4d6 assult move to set me up for turn 2 melta smash shooting. For example in hammer and advil it's not unccom for my riptides to be on the short edge of my enemies deployment zone. I play really aggresive with them.

Not like I like Tau vs Tau. In a tournament you really don't have a choice.

I gaurenttee that my railsides will kill units like paladins off a lot quicker than high yield missile sides. Same with a winged daemon prince, etc, wraithknights,