2 LR lists vs tau

[Golindar]

Hi,

 

I've been running a 2000pt list with 2LRs pretty successfully against codex space marines. I imagine it would fare well against most MEQ armies. What I am afraid of is Tau and Dark eldar.

 

Though I have never played them, dark eldar I know can load up on enough dark lances to make landraiders a very high risk investment.

 

When I play Tau, if I don't go first, I can count at least one landraider being immobilized or destroyed before I do anything. It goes without saying that these high strength low AP weapons are bad news for a dual LR list. That being said, I'm trying to keep the list as all comers as possible. I know I could taylor a speed list to get into a tau players face in 2 turns, but that is not what I am going for.

 

Are 2 Land raiders just a wreckless move for an all comers list given that armies like Tau, Dark Eldar, and possibly gunline IG have an abundance of high strength low AP weapons? It is something that I am going to learn eventually as I get more games in against these armies, just wondering what some of the community can offer from their experience.

 

Some ideas I had so far were a landspeeder storm with scouts, drop pod dread, or maybe an attack bike squad with a couple of multi-meltas.

[spartan249]

AV 14 vs Tau or Eldar? Yes, wreckless.

 

That being said, there are ways to maneuver those raiders safely. Khan is one. Get them in the action right quick.

[Golindar]

Good point. I also think that with careful use of terrain, I could avoid total destruction on round 1 through cover saves. I like to run Lysander and bolster a ruin. If my Land Raider is more than 50% obscured from being on the side of a bolstered ruin, would I get a 3+ save?

 

What about extra armor? It might be worthwhile to throw extra armour on at least 1 LR, while hiding other vehicles behind the extra armored LR. That would dare your oponent to fire at the extra armor or give a vehicle cover save.

[Brother Navaer Solaq]

I have been debating about having two LR one LRC and the other LRS.

 

What armies have you played against? Other than codex space marines?

 

Still lurking around trying to understand the best option for me to take in my vanilla army.

[Jackelope King]

Single LR risks are the liability. Dual LR lists less-so. I play Tau, and I'd be much happier facing a nice swath of 4 or 5 normal transports over a pair of Land Raiders. The whole reason you take two is so that you can afford to rush both of them up, pop smoke, and then dump their cargo right on turn two, and hope at least one survives.

 

One thing you might consider is parking a Rhino in front of the Raiders during deployment to try to get them 50% cover against to get some additional survivability during an alpha-strike. Or park one directly in front of the other, blocking the Tau Broadsides' and Hamerheads' view of the front armor. If the angle of their shots dictate that they strike front armor facing, but the front armor has 100% concealment, you have a 3+ cover save.

 

I'm assuming that you're facing Railgun spam to take out those Raiders, and yeah, a unit of Broadsides can probably knock one Land Raider out of commission every turn. If, on the other hand, you face a very clever Tau player who rushes you with Piranha, you need bubble-wrap, because he'll try to park those skimmers right in front of your Land Raiders after turbo-boosting and trap them, forcing you to decide between cover and mobility. If you do have some hills or ruins you can hide a Land Raider behind, expect it to quickly become pinned in place by a skimmer squadron, forcing you to choose between killing the skimmers or shooting at all the other scary Tau guns you're staring down. And if you don't deal with that squadron, you'll start eating Meltagun shots at half range, and nobody wants that.

 

This is a zero-sum game for both yourself and an enemy Tau army: if he pops your Land Raiders and forces your Termies to foot-slog, he can shoot you to death before you can reach him, especially with a low model-count in most dual Land Raider armies. If even one of your Land Raiders survives and can assault his forces, it's basically game-over. And a note on assaulting Tau: you must, absolutely must know how to line up multiple assaults at once. Hit two units at a time, throw all your punches into wiping out one squad, then toss out at least one to the other. You need to be locked in combat during the Tau shooting phase, or your Marines will be shot to death.

[Vel'Cona]

Dual LR isn't a bad idea against Tau. As the previous posters have mentioned, it becomes a question of resources and a good bit of "dice logic." A solid way to circumvent some of the danger to your LRs is to use DP Dreads. IC Dreads in particular are great because they require nearly as many resources to eliminate as your LR, and if they deviate shots that way then there's less going for your big tanks. The Khan option is always there to get the Outflank move, but if you wanted to avoid using him you could always outflank a couple LSS (with full compliment of CC Scouts). Once again, this can help to distract some fire from your LRs or give you a nice second option for assaults.

 

Keep in mind that Termies aren't necessarily the hottest unit for fighting Tau, as the little blue men have plenty of AP2. Assault Marines or even Scouts can pretty much shelve 3/4 of the Tau army in a turn or two of combat. My general preference for fighting Tau is more dudes rather than bigger dudes.

[Golindar]

I used a 2LR list vs Tau on Saturday. I thought I would share with you the successes and failures.

 

We rolled annihilation for mission. I won the roll off, so I was able to get first turn. As you would expect, I deployed the full 12 inches and cruised another 12 on turn one. I tried to use terrain and somke as best I could, and on the ensuing turn I lost only one landraider. Unfortunately the same terrain that gave cover from railguns funnelled my other LR into a narrow gap and I was unable to move a full 12 the next turn. I used the librarian to gate the stranded Terminators behind some cover and closer to the Tau gunline. On the ensuing turn, my opponent destroyed my other LR and vindicator gun. Things were looking bleak.

 

With all the fire concentrated on the LRs and vindys, I snuck the rhinos close enough to the gunline to withstand the rhinos blowing up and subsequent rapid fire pulse rifles. The tac squads charged and decimated the front ranks. Meanwhile the terminators advanced to within striking distance of the broadsides. The gunless vindicator tank was able to tank shock like three squads sending the kroot running for the hills after a failed leadership. Realizing that the gunless vindicators were still dangerous (and were some ripe kill points), my opponent resorted to finishing them off with railguns, but it was too late. The game went full 7 turns of Lysander, 3 assault termies w/librarian, and about half a tac squad chasing down the remaining tau. In the end, I won by a kill point. I took some lumps early, but finished off strong. I might have got the terminators into combat faster had I deployed on a flank and avoided the bottlenecking terrain in the center of the board. An additional attack bike with multi-melta would have been a more serious threat to the broadsides (I only was able to take down the sheild drones). Null zone was not used all game, the vehicle shooting attack power would have been useful against this opponent.

 

Conclusion: 2 LR is viable vs tau

[Knights of Serath]

I have played Tau for a few years now. Your game sounds like most for us. He wasnt using his units correctly by the sound of it and his target priority sucked. i will say this Tau have a major flaw they are a BS3 shooty army. That sucks man. Because we cant rely on numbers like IG either instead we have to use supreme tactics and sacrifice half a pretzel to the dice gods occasionaly. Out other weakness is close combat. Even our CC unit sucks at CC so if you can get close it takes a miracle for us to stand up to you. I have a few other things to say but I have to go to school.

[The_Crippster]

I used a 2LR list vs Tau on Saturday.

 

Conclusion: 2 LR is viable vs tau

 

 

Funny, on Sunday I rolled 2 LR's vs Tau and both survived... I was lucky though, he has no broadsides.