1800 list for campaign against tau

[Battlepanda]

i need some help building an 1800 point list for fighting tau. i need a semi-competative list. the game is actually 2000, but i have a special commander that is 200 and an HQ. he is a reclusiarch with a blood chalice and everyone gets to re-roll to hit and to wound on the charge. because its tau i usually run very assault marine heavy(225, unit of 10 with 2 melta and a power weapon) there are 2 tau players. one that goees very battle suit and rail gun heavy and the other goes devilfish with 12 fire warriors heavy. any suggestions would be great.

[Something Wycked]

I'm not terribly familiar with your codex, but I know Tau, so I can still describe general Astartes tactics for you to use with your list.

 

The way you describe these Tau opponents (with little to no Kroot presence) can be both a blessing and a curse for you. The good is they won't have any assault capable troops and they won't have a melee screen protecting their vehicles and other "shooty" elements of the army; the bad is they will have a LOT of shooty elements to the army, and anything you leave in the open won't be there the next turn.

 

That said, your tactics need to be getting across the table ASAP (preferably on turn 1) and start locking down his heavy shooting units with assaults (or melta shots to rear armor for vehicles). Fast skimmers, drop pods, and bikes are your friend, especially anything with a scout move.

 

Unless your opponents play with terrain that can effectively obscure vehicles as they advance on him, the one with railguns will shoot any vehicles you bring to pieces; your vehicle choices should be few in number and/or focus entirely on fast skimmers or armor value 14's. If you can count on at least a little bit of cover for vehicles, you might be able to get away with transports hiding behind the terrain for their first turn, then going full speed to the next piece of cover or popping smoke as necessary to get across the board.

 

EDIT: I was pressed for time a little bit earlier so I wanted to focus more on your question of list building.

 

My battle plan would be 2-3 assault squads, placed behind cover at turn 1 so they won't get shot at. 3 or so drop pods with shooty troops in them (read: meltaguns) to drop in ahead of your assault squads to screen them as they sprint across the board. Skimmers to zoom across at full speed to give fire support. Termies might fit into this plan as well - either normal (with a missile launcher) or TH/SS. TP them in behind the screen so they're protected on the turn they drop in.

 

With everything coming in right in the Tau's face, they have a decent chance of panicking and not playing up to their full potential since they don't have their customary turn or two of firing safely across the board, making use of their 72" range.

[ninjaturtlethug]

A tactic I like to use is to have a jumpack equipped character lead an assault squad across the board, and then split into two right before assaulting, to lock two different units into combat. Keeping them together is overkill, a lone HQ should be able to handle any Tau unit in CC. Even vanilla marines have no problem sweeping up Tau like this.

 

You've got the speed so you can choose what you will be fighting. Use your assault troops destroy their battlesuits and heavy weapons so that your heavy hitting force can make it across the field. Or just go crazy with assault troops, in this case I like to have a landraider (for durability) in my backfield so that if they decide to turn their backs to shoot my assault troops I can make them pay for it. However, since your landraiders can deepstrike, its not a bad idea to fill it with terminators and land right in his crotch.

 

I normally don't recommend vanguard veterans (I play vanilla) But im not opposed to taking a barebones squad against Tau, having descent of angels makes them much more reliable at getting stuck in before they can be shot at, I would also recommend combat squadding them if you have the full 10, you might as well try to take out 2 units at once.

 

Tau often stay right on their board edge, if you can get them to flee close combat, you don't even have to sweeping advance them. I once assaulted a command suit squad with a lone scout sergeant, won combat, and they fled right off the board, it was glorious.

 

I wouldn't recommend paying for powerfists, use powerswords at most, and only on units that will be targeting battlesuits. Save those points and go crazy with melta weapons, Tau vehicles can have a cover save from anything over 12" away, so it's sometimes a good idea to use your close units to target these.

[spartan249]

Bikers, Assault Marines, and TH/SS terminators can raise some hairs and put the hurt down on krootless Tau.

 

Bikers bring the 24" movement on first turn, garnering the 3+ cover save alongside the 3+ armor save, and getting very close very fast. Granted, Tau have the ability to reduce your cover save, but markerlights can only stretch so far, and I highly doubt they are going to be able to nullify all the cover saves you have. This is why full bike squads combat squadded will be good, as markerlights will be reduced in effectiveness since they will affect only a few bikers.

 

Assault Marines are relatively cheap for the kind of devastation they can wreak, and BA have a huge advantage with these guys because they come as troops. Load up on these (I'm saying 4-5 squads of them) and jump them across the board. You're bound to lose one or two squads, but the rest will make it in and start tearing face. Adding one Sanguinary Priest into your Assault Marine phalanx could help them get across the board more reliably, so I would consider the investment.

 

TH/SS terminators laugh at Tau's already meager AP2 weaponry, and are very good at projecting a no-go zone around something you want them to stay away from. If you really wish to (or lack the models to field 50 assault marines and bikers), then get some of these guys in there.

 

In effect, something like this:

 

2000 pts "Smack Tau!"

HQ

Random Dude you have: 200 pts

Troops

Assault Marine Squad: 10 marines, 2 Mguns, Psword - 225 pts

Assault Marine Squad: 10 marines, 2 Mguns, Psword - 225 pts

Assault Marine Squad: 10 marines, 2 Mguns, Psword - 225 pts

Assault Marine Squad: 10 marines, 2 Mguns, Psword - 225 pts

Assault Marine Squad: 10 marines, 2 Mguns, Psword - 225 pts

Elites

Sanguinary Priest: JP, Psword, Mbomb - 95 pts

Fast Attack

Bike Squad: 8 bikes, 2 Flamers, Psword, Mmelta Abike - 290 pts

Bike Squad: 8 bikes, 2 Flamers, Psword, Mmelta Abike - 290 pts

 

Combat squad everything (unless it's annihilation... In that case, keep squads intact), advance, weather the storm, then rip them some new orifices.

[Kay]

omg, i wouldnt want to face that list if i were Tau player...

[thade]

That list is certainly overkill. :D When one of the posters above mentions that vanilla marines could mop Tau in CC, that was no exaggeration. I would be charging Tau every chance I got with anything that could reach...no unit in any marine codex would lose. Getting to them is the issue, as only luck and hard cover kept my land raider (stripped of weapons) on the table. Once there, a single surviving techmarine and two ill-equipped surviving vanguard models swept three units if Tau off the table over three consecutive turns. They buckle so fast in assault it's laughable.

 

Mind you it's hard to get there vs a savy Tau player; try your best to ground them (tl-auticannon dreads and ML devs are helpful) and this is one army where I'd almost recommend Heroic Intervention on vanilla flying Vanguard.