Tau Strategies...

[Prot]

TMG, I appreciate your offer but again, I never know what my opponent is bringing. In fact the idea that I even know what army is a first, but it's because I requested it. I know Tau are nasty, and I haven't played them in a long time.

 

I assume nothing but a lot of shots to the head and my tactic is: Put a helmet on Draigo and prey. lol

[TheMostGood]

Well, I can at least tell you what my friend's do against my Tau. That might give you some insight from a Tau player that vs Guard / Tyranid / BT / Necron / Eldar. 

They always go after my Markerlights first (duh). When they ignore them, or otherwise can't get to them I find that I do better (obviously). So getting them removed is priority number one. My favorite way of getting marker lights is a commander with 6 drones or more. It's mobile, hard to hit, and effective. Typically the commander will have a 2+ save. Sometimes I'll make him a buff guy so that he is a 2+/4++/FNP T5 beast with enhanced shooting for his unit.

I'll use pathfinders sometimes, but they always get killed quickly. To fix that i'll use the ADL or that one 70pt bunker thing for cover.

Expect at least 2 Riptides. A word on Riptides is that they are not that scary, at least, my friend's don't really care much about them. Most of them just ignore the Riptides once my MLs are gone. They ignore it unless there is nothing else to shoot at. GK are certainly different being a low model count army, but it's something to consider.

Whenever I field a Riptide, I always make sure to include the Markerlight tax that goes along with them. Each Riptide needs 3-4 Markerlights to truly be effective, so keep that in mind. 

Hammerheads are not that great right now. I have been using Sky Rays more, and they are pretty decent for their point cost and options. They can fire all 6 of their missiles if they want though, so be careful with your fliers or 3+ guys. The typical strategy is to FIRE EVERYTHING! and then use the two sky fire marker lights and SMS to do work. At that point it's a mobile markerlight platform that is almost not worth shooting at ha.

Most Tau players run Farsight as the main detachment, at least that's the general trend. Crisis suits as troops is very strong and reasonably cheap. They'll be able to hop around the board and go after Objs. I typically kit out a squad with missiles S7 AP4 with my commander for solid shooting. I'll run 1 or 2 Crisis suits in a squad with double fusion S8 AP1 18'' melta. Tau get extra inches when it comes to melta weapons, so keep that in mind.

Broadsides are strong, but they are at the same time pretty weak. Their actual model profile got larger, while still retaining all of their previous stats. 2W T4 models with 2+ saves can be ID pretty reliably if you hit them with the right thing. Most commanders will take the missile options on them. Very rarely will you see the railguns on those models, at least, I don't take it. If they take the missiles be careful with your fliers. They won't need sky fire to hit you with that number of TL shots going out. They are easy to catch in melee since they do not have jet packs.

Tau are obviously weak in CC, but don't take them too lightly. Crisis suits are S5 I2 WS 2 in a fight, but they'll get some solid hits off if you're not careful with who you are charging in with. It seems to surprise my friend's when we do CC and they ask my S and I'm like...umm S5! And they always forget that the suit hits that hard haha. 

I guess the last piece of advice I can give you is that despite Tau feverishly believing in the Greater Good, they will run at the first sign of trouble. Fire Warriors are LD 7 and Suits typically are LD 8. If they do not have an ethereal they will run quite often. Oh, if your friend brings Drones on his Riptide, it might not be a bad idea to shoot at the drones. They're only 4+/4++ (T6 though). If he loses just one drone he has to roll LD and that's on a 9. Having a Riptide run off the board is a real thing.

Speaking of Ethereal, be sure that your opponent understands the rules for him. His LD bubble is a 12'' UNIT buff, where as his Invocations of the Elements is a 12'' MODEL buff. So if he does Storm of Fire (extra pulse shot at 15''), it's a 12" model buff from the Ethereal, not unit. 

[Happy-inquisitor]

 

Speaking of Ethereal, be sure that your opponent understands the rules for him. His LD bubble is a 12'' UNIT buff, where as his Invocations of the Elements is a 12'' MODEL buff. So if he does Storm of Fire (extra pulse shot at 15''), it's a 12" model buff from the Ethereal, not unit. 

 

P35 Tau codex

 

"The Ethereal, and all friendly non-vehicle models from this codex in units within 12", benefit from the effects of the elemental power..."

 

All models in the unit benefit, unless you have local house-rules which say otherwise.  Also note that the 12" is measured from the hull of the tank if he is in one - and sensibly cautious Tau commanders put their Ethereal in a devilfish whenever they can.

[TheMostGood]

 

Speaking of Ethereal, be sure that your opponent understands the rules for him. His LD bubble is a 12'' UNIT buff, where as his Invocations of the Elements is a 12'' MODEL buff. So if he does Storm of Fire (extra pulse shot at 15''), it's a 12" model buff from the Ethereal, not unit. 

 

P35 Tau codex

 

"The Ethereal, and all friendly non-vehicle models from this codex in units within 12", benefit from the effects of the elemental power..."

 

All models in the unit benefit, unless you have local house-rules which say otherwise.  Also note that the 12" is measured from the hull of the tank if he is in one - and sensibly cautious Tau commanders put their Ethereal in a devilfish whenever they can.

 

I might have a misprint then. I usually reference pg 104 of the codex when playing since it is the area that has all the rules laid out. 

 

It says under Invocation of the Elements on that page that - "The Ethereal, and all friendly non-vehicle Tau Empire models within 12'' benefit from the power until the start of the..." Says nothing about units. This conflicts directly with the pg 35 rules, which seem to suggest it's a unit that gets the benefit.

 

So I suppose it would make the most sense for it to be the unit rather than the model in this case. Of course, this is GW we are talking about. Clarity and accuracy in their codex is not their forte. For example, the Sunshark Bomber doesn't come with a bomb on the model's loadout. However, the rules for it's bomb maker says that it has to roll the dice *after* making a bombing run to see if it can spawn another. 

 

You can't make a bombing run if you don't have a bomb to start with. :P Obviously most people don't play it that way. 

 

[Prot]

Well, I can at least tell you what my friend's do against my Tau. That might give you some insight from a Tau player that vs Guard / Tyranid / BT / Necron / Eldar. 

 

 

 

Thanks for the advice... the GK are well equipped but so small there seems little room for error so I am going into this with an understanding I might end up tabled, but any advice helps.

 

I have heard the drones on the Riptides are T6 with 4+ invulns, but are they just there to be ablative wounds? Knowing about the LD test is good info though.

 

I imagine multi assault is the way to go? If I can draw overwatch aggro on one squad, then that's good.

 

It's the 2+ saves I imagine I'll have a lot of trouble with. I just don't have access to plasma/melta of course, so I'm relying on hammers for that work and those suits look nasty... the NDK's can only do so much (I imagine I'll put them on Riptide duty if they make it... .(I only have 2))

 

Thanks!

[SyNidus]

Don't worry about hurting the riptide, if you multi-charge the riptide and a squishy unit, wipe out as many squishies and/or cause as many pens on any vehicles also engaged, stack those negative modifiers and watch that riptide fail morale and get swept off or run off the board.

[Prot]

I've got two lists I'm test driving tonight...

 

One is Draigo in the previous mentioned list (as mentioned there are some restrictions on playing in that store, so I'm a little inflexible there). The other list is Necrons, so I won't go into detail here, but I will probably test both lists, and see if there's any adjustments to make.

 

The thing is the "Tau Challenge" isn't until late this week... I have 2 more games previous to that one so I'm trying to find someone with a -very- shooty list to put me through my paces. I know it won't be the same as getting Ro-sham-bo'd by Tau and markerlights etc, but I have to do something, right? lol

 

So Friday's game I heard a person is possibly bringing out New-Dar so I'm really hoping to rip into that. But I was told by him last time that I beat him so bad he doesn't want to really face my GK so I'll see..... (as a side note, don't get the wrong idea. We had a good, fun game, but he said his 'Butt was still sore' from the last game.) He played marines, and didn't have a clue.... so it wasn't like I did anything special or tactically superior anyway.)

 

So if he's willing I'd really like a shot at them. Please don't judge me if he'd rather play my 'crons! :)

[TheMostGood]

 

Well, I can at least tell you what my friend's do against my Tau. That might give you some insight from a Tau player that vs Guard / Tyranid / BT / Necron / Eldar. 

 

 

 

Thanks for the advice... the GK are well equipped but so small there seems little room for error so I am going into this with an understanding I might end up tabled, but any advice helps.

 

I have heard the drones on the Riptides are T6 with 4+ invulns, but are they just there to be ablative wounds? Knowing about the LD test is good info though.

 

I imagine multi assault is the way to go? If I can draw overwatch aggro on one squad, then that's good.

 

It's the 2+ saves I imagine I'll have a lot of trouble with. I just don't have access to plasma/melta of course, so I'm relying on hammers for that work and those suits look nasty... the NDK's can only do so much (I imagine I'll put them on Riptide duty if they make it... .(I only have 2))

 

Thanks!

 

They are ablative wounds, but it's often not worth it. They are 4/4++, which means they can easily die to normal shooting. Only one needs to die to make your Riptide roll LD. I don't have my codex in front of me, but IIRC, the Riptide is not a character so you can't even use the drones for LoS rolls. ~20pts a drone makes them pretty costly for what they do. They also don't benefit from the Riptide's 4D6 jet pack move if they Nova Charge it. I don't know if it's an oversight from GW or not.

 

Multi-assault is probably the way to go. Tau overwatch is pretty scary, but don't let it stop you from rushing in. Once you catch them in combat, they'll fold pretty quickly. 

 

There's only a handful of Tau that have the 2+ saves. Riptides, One Commander Suit (if he has the upgrade) and Broadsides. In both cases catching them in CC will likely end them, even if you only have AP3 weapons. The NDK will be more than a match for the Riptides and ill mess them up in CC, especially if you activate force on them. He will more than likely try to get the Riptides out of there ASAP with his Nova jetpack, so you might want to try to corner him if possible. 

 

 

[Reclusiarch Darius]

In that you and I are in utter agreement. One of the things I'm absolutely loving about this army is how creative I have to be to grab victories. I have yet to face Tau with them and I reckon it will be quite a test. I'm still believe the best way to beat Tau is to play the opponent. They are well aware of their weakness, but that is why they will be even more anxious when you get into their face.

 

The point about the pulse rifles just makes me think we need to be focussing on taking down his infantry on the shunting/gating turn. 

 

If you've never fought Tau, you have no idea what you're talking about. I'd suggest going and getting some games in against decent Tau players. 

 

The pulse rifle firepower is annoying, but you can only focus down their Fire Warriors if they're in the open. Tau are normally meching up if they take Fire Warriors, to prevent artillery and other anti-infantry ruining them. 

When you shunt over, you want to have Draigo positioned closest to his Riptides, this is just so that he can tank the shots for at least one riptide using his Stormshield.

 

They can and will re position to get around his 'closest model' angle. Plus Tau usually have double plasma Crisis for this exact reason, to supplement the Riptides firepower against hard targets. Draigo is nightmare fuel for them though, he will eat 'Tides and Broadsides with impunity. If he survives into melee, they're screwed. 

You'll want to be rolling on telepathy to try and get invis. Terrify is also useful, as is dominate and psychic shriek.

 

I've found Telepathy exceedingly mediocre. 'Invisibility' can only shield one unit, at which point the Tau player just shoots your other stuff to death even harder and ignores the 'Invis' unit (assuming they don't either Deny on a lucky roll, or you fail to cast, or they just dump markerlights into you and boost around it). The Leadership-based powers are okay against battlesuits, but they usually have an Ethereal in a Devilfish for this exact reason (plus his buffs help Fire Warriors). 

Pyromancy presents some possibilities as well. The primaris is essentially an extra heavy Flamer. They've got a type of cleansing flame as well, and a 24" large blast. Molten beam would also be hilarious, especially for those tightly packed vehicles and units.

 

Pyromancy is awful and does nothing to Tau. Do not use it. 

Divination is likely to be meh, as is telekinesis.

 

Divination is meh? Yeah, because we're not interested in;

- Re-rolls to hit on melee and shooting

- 4+ invul for a unit within 12"

- Ignore Cover for the unit+psyker

- Counter-Attack and Overwatch at full BS (least useful against Tau, but if they try and bog you down in a Kroot screen it melts them)

- Re-rolls to hit, wound and save for the psker (this is hilarious on Librarians packing hammers)

- All shots against enemy unit gain Rending (huge, suddenly your storm bolters and incinerators can randomly murder battlesuits and even hurt Devilfish)

- Re-roll Reserves (again, you should be taking a Comms Array to do this automatically, but it's situationally amazing)

 

Telekinesis is an utter joke of a lore, same as Pyromancy

Another idea - He's going to keep his guys fairly close to take advantage of supporting fire overwatch. In this case, assuming you survive the first turn of his onslaught, multi-charge. Take your termie deathstar, Pick the closest target as your primary and then literally declare charge against EVERYTHING within 12" of the unit. Give him the chance to overwatch everything against the termies (or interceptors can do the trick).

 

This has a couple of benefits:

Firstly, it draws all his overwatch fire, leaving your NDKs to pick and choose the most important targets (read: riptide) and assassinate them. 

 

Secondly, if you survive and can contact 3-4 units, you've essentially won the game. Bear in mind, you want to charge as many vehicles as you can because each penetrating hit counts as 2 towards the combat resolution, you're bound to win and when you do, they'll have to roll their LD with a lot of negative modifiers. They will most likely fail this. Mind you, if you're using termies for this, they won't be able to sweeping advance. That's fine. Jet pack units will be off the table thanks to the 3D6 fallback and any infantry still on the table will be ineffective next turn (assuming they rally).

 

How has the Tau player not killed at least 5 Terminators, between Turn 1 shooting and Overwatch on Turn 2? Exceedingly unlikely. But yeah, in the dream scenario where the Tau player is a complete moron, you multi-assault and it's GG. 

Also, I know a lot of this sounds like theorycrafting. It probably is, but generally speaking my ideas work well because I base them not on the unit but how the player would think and react. Play the player, not the army.

 

It's 100% theorycraft, because you've never fought Tau. Hence why you're suggesting ludicrous ideas like 'take Pyromancy' or 'don't combat squad your Terminators, because Tau never take Interceptor on Riptides, or will they shoot you with the rest of their army for an entire Shooting phase, nor in your Assault phase when they have Supporting Fire, the best Overwatch mechanic in the game'. 

And yes RD has valid points, but his points work on the basis of a fully rational player who is able to remain very calm under pressure. And those are few and far between from my experience. 

 

No, I'm just not basing my strategy off the entirely unreliable idea that my opponent will panic and screw up. Because whilst that can and does happen, it's not going to happen if my army is being dismantled in front of my eyes. 

 

 

Expect at least 2 Riptides. A word on Riptides is that they are not that scary, at least, my friend's don't really care much about them. Most of them just ignore the Riptides once my MLs are gone. They ignore it unless there is nothing else to shoot at. GK are certainly different being a low model count army, but it's something to consider.

 

They are scary, and the majority of the reason this matchup is so tough. IonTides with Interceptor kill Terminators very effectively, and they melt Interceptors and Purifiers as well. DK's have to endure the main cannon plus plasma or fusion double-tap from nova charge. 'Sanctuary' helps, but it's entirely possible to die to a single Tide if you roll poorly for saves (it's still only a 4+). Not to mention Riptides can still Overwatch very effectively, especially with Supporting Fire helping them and markerlights. You are correct in that they should be ignored until you can charge them. Shooting Riptides is a total waste of firepower (2+ armour, 3+ invul normally, 5+ FNP). 

Hammerheads are not that great right now. I have been using Sky Rays more, and they are pretty decent for their point cost and options. They can fire all 6 of their missiles if they want though, so be careful with your fliers or 3+ guys. The typical strategy is to FIRE EVERYTHING! and then use the two sky fire marker lights and SMS to do work. At that point it's a mobile markerlight platform that is almost not worth shooting at ha.

 

If you see Skyrays, I'd just cut Ravens out of your list for more infantry. MissileSides already make Ravens a bit of a risky, Skyrays just seal the deal (as they can land a 'Scour' on your with their markerlights, then hit you with Ignore Cover krak missiles effectively). 

Most Tau players run Farsight as the main detachment, at least that's the general trend. Crisis suits as troops is very strong and reasonably cheap. They'll be able to hop around the board and go after Objs. I typically kit out a squad with missiles S7 AP4 with my commander for solid shooting. I'll run 1 or 2 Crisis suits in a squad with double fusion S8 AP1 18'' melta. Tau get extra inches when it comes to melta weapons, so keep that in mind.

 

On the plus side, Farsight armies don't normally have the points for melee screens, which means if you can survive their absurd Shooting phase, you can make melee without getting bogged down in sacrificial infantry screens. Also, they normally don't have vehicles either, so our guns are slightly more effective. 

Broadsides are strong, but they are at the same time pretty weak. Their actual model profile got larger, while still retaining all of their previous stats. 2W T4 models with 2+ saves can be ID pretty reliably if you hit them with the right thing. Most commanders will take the missile options on them. Very rarely will you see the railguns on those models, at least, I don't take it. If they take the missiles be careful with your fliers. They won't need sky fire to hit you with that number of TL shots going out. They are easy to catch in melee since they do not have jet packs.

 

We don't have any ranged way to insta-gib them, unless you get lucky with a gatling psilencer. Like the Riptide though, I wouldn't bother shooting them. As you say, they can't run away easily, and they melt in melee anyway. 

Tau are obviously weak in CC, but don't take them too lightly. Crisis suits are S5 I2 WS 2 in a fight, but they'll get some solid hits off if you're not careful with who you are charging in with. It seems to surprise my friend's when we do CC and they ask my S and I'm like...umm S5! And they always forget that the suit hits that hard haha. 

 

Against Marines maybe. Against us, they usually die before it even gets to I2. Broadsides will need hammers or DK's to melt, same for Riptides, but even if they kill a few Terminators on lucky rolls, it doesn't matter. You'll win every combat you survive to get into, so you'll Sweeping Advance them anyway (unless you're a Terminator, in which case you probably just kill them all anyway). 

I guess the last piece of advice I can give you is that despite Tau feverishly believing in the Greater Good, they will run at the first sign of trouble. Fire Warriors are LD 7 and Suits typically are LD 8. If they do not have an ethereal they will run quite often. Oh, if your friend brings Drones on his Riptide, it might not be a bad idea to shoot at the drones. They're only 4+/4++ (T6 though). If he loses just one drone he has to roll LD and that's on a 9. Having a Riptide run off the board is a real thing.

 

Ethereals are taken for that exact reason. Plus, they buff the pulse firepower of Fire Warriors to an insane degree, and their 6+ FNP power is sometimes great. 

Speaking of Ethereal, be sure that your opponent understands the rules for him. His LD bubble is a 12'' UNIT buff, where as his Invocations of the Elements is a 12'' MODEL buff. So if he does Storm of Fire (extra pulse shot at 15''), it's a 12" model buff from the Ethereal, not unit. 

 

No it's unit in both cases. Otherwise he'd be completely useless with his powers. 

I have heard the drones on the Riptides are T6 with 4+ invulns, but are they just there to be ablative wounds? Knowing about the LD test is good info though.

 

People don't take the drones normally. They're overpriced, don't shoot very hard, and they risk Leadership triggers. Riptides don't need any help staying alive anyway. 

It's the 2+ saves I imagine I'll have a lot of trouble with. I just don't have access to plasma/melta of course, so I'm relying on hammers for that work and those suits look nasty... the NDK's can only do so much (I imagine I'll put them on Riptide duty if they make it... .(I only have 2))

 

DK's priority number one is charging Riptides. Ignore everything else until they're a smoking ruin. After that, I'd go after the Broadsides. The rest of your army should focus on getting rid of any Crisis or vehicles. If they have infantry in the open, by all means light them up with incinerator, psycannon and storm bolter. But the battlesuits are the core of the army, and once they're dead the Tau player has no way to come back. 

Don't worry about hurting the riptide, if you multi-charge the riptide and a squishy unit, wipe out as many squishies and/or cause as many pens on any vehicles also engaged, stack those negative modifiers and watch that riptide fail morale and get swept off or run off the board. 

 

Or, you could just kill it. Much more reliable if it's just dead from 'Force'. 

So Friday's game I heard a person is possibly bringing out New-Dar so I'm really hoping to rip into that. But I was told by him last time that I beat him so bad he doesn't want to really face my GK so I'll see..... (as a side note, don't get the wrong idea. We had a good, fun game, but he said his 'Butt was still sore' from the last game.) He played marines, and didn't have a clue.... so it wasn't like I did anything special or tactically superior anyway.)

 

Good luck against Eldar. They're absurd now. It's really hard to write a bad list, unless you have a Guardian fetish and just footslog your entire army mindlessly. 

[SyNidus]

Perhaps it does sound like theorycrafting. And I have actually played against tau with my RG, and I don't usually have many more models in my RG than I do with GK. My suggestions are based on my experiences from that. As I said, you've got valid points and most definitely something that needs to be taken into account but given the circumstances, what other option does he have? He's got to close distance either way. And personally I've never found much use for divination although I keep hearing that it's good, I'll definitely have to give it a second look.

[Reclusiarch Darius]

Perhaps it does sound like theorycrafting. And I have actually played against tau with my RG, and I don't usually have many more models in my RG than I do with GK. My suggestions are based on my experiences from that.

 

Raven Guard are a completely different army though. They're pretty different from normal Marines too (it's really stupid how the Chapter Trait doesn't benefit Jump Infantry though...). Marines do have ranged units capable of taking on Tau, and you are far less capable in melee normally (barring specialists). 

As I said, you've got valid points and most definitely something that needs to be taken into account but given the circumstances, what other option does he have? He's got to close distance either way.

 

Yeah you do have to get into melee ASAP, but on the way there you've got at least one Shooting phase, possibly two if the Tau player moves out of charge range (which can happen). That's why target priority is important. IE, don't shoot Riptides, go after the other battlesuits and infantry (or vehicles if the infantry are being hidden inside them). 

 And personally I've never found much use for divination although I keep hearing that it's good, I'll definitely have to give it a second look. 

 

It's the best lore in the game. Even including the racial ones, which can get some pretty silly combos (Eldar for example have swiss-army knife powers that can be Blessings or Maledictions/Witchfires). Divination is consistent against pretty much any army in the game, and it's Primaris is great on small units with powerful weapons (ie GK, Marines) and gets truly crazy on large units (50-man Imperial Guard blobs firing lasguns en masse). 

[SyNidus]

True about marines playing quite differently, although my RG army relied on the same principle against the Tau, get in as close as possible and multi-charge. No doubt though, GK will have less MSUs to throw at the gun line as opposed to my RG. As I said, I'll definitely have to try my GK against a savvy Tau opponent and I know just the guy. He plays 4 Riptides though, which should be interesting.

[Reclusiarch Darius]

True about marines playing quite differently, although my RG army relied on the same principle against the Tau, get in as close as possible and multi-charge. No doubt though, GK will have less MSUs to throw at the gun line as opposed to my RG. As I said, I'll definitely have to try my GK against a savvy Tau opponent and I know just the guy. He plays 4 Riptides though, which should be interesting. 

 

Urgh, if he has 4 that means he probably has the Heavy Support variant that just mulches Marine squads. 

 

The upside is that with the advent of new Wraithknights and Knight-Titans getting an expansion, I think Riptide spam is going to be a lot less effective. They're still a great core unit, but the Tau players are probably going to start branching off into more Crisis or maybe even Stealth suits. Infantry are also coming back in a big way, with the release of Necrons. I'm hoping that'll shift the meta game away from 'spam Riptides until your opponent rage-quits'.