Old school T'au army

[Remus Ventanus.]

Hey guys.

 

So, my first army I ever had was Tau, way back in....3rd ed? Anyways, I always loved how the tau were back then. A few battlesuit types, lots of fire warriors, pathfinders, ect. Im not a fan of the 7th ed T'au, where it seemed like alot of battlesuit spam. I didnt play much 7th ed, so i may be wrong. 

 

So, is it feasible to field a tau army like it was in the old days. In my mind i want:

 

2 fire warrior teams (Maybe one being breacher)

pathfinders

hammerhead gunship

3 xv8 crisis suits

stealthsuits

devilfish

xv 88

 

and a few other things to make it up to 1500 points. I really dont want to use a riptide or stormsurge, i might get a ghostkeel but not sure. So, am i making a mistake by not getting the heavy duty battlesuits?

[Commander Dawnstar]

I might be totally off the mark on account of a lack of practical experience, but I think the bigger suits look far less powerful in 8th than 7th. Between the loss of templates and generally having to rely on a 4+ to hit it certainly feels as though their damage took a big hit to consistency, and the Riptide is essentially just a Hammerhead with +1 Wound and an Invulnerable Save in terms of resiliency. That's not exactly wonderful when you consider that an Ion Accelerator Riptide can easily cost more than twice as many points as a Railgun Hammerhead.

 

I'm hardly suggesting they're useless but they certainly feel less of a no-brainer than they did before.

[depthcharge12]

I am in the same boat as you as I picked them up in 4th and played them through 5th and early 6th.

 

Honestly you picked many of the winners this edition. Best units I've seen so far are pathfinders, cadre fireblades, pulse rifle FWs, commander suits, drones, hammerheads, and broadsides. Riptides and Stormsurges, from my understanding, have it bad this edition. XV8s are sort of middle of the pack, but you're reaaaaaaly going to need to think long and hard about how to equip them.

 

I'm postulating that Tau armies that have a solid fire base with mobile flanks are going to be the path to victory this edition. Lure your opponent in with a fire warrior base and then pop in behind and at the flanks to disperse and pick apart the army.

[Remus Ventanus.]

Awesome, that's the exact type of army I want. Finally get to fully utilize fire warriors

[Remus Ventanus.]

So, here a couple of pics:

 

My interpretation of shas la kais, from the cover of fire warrior. Need some skulls

 

 

My Shas ui. I dont have any xv88 paint, so i cant do the t'au sheme yet, but i got the white helm and shoulder done

 

finally, the broadside

[Remus Ventanus.]

Quick question:

 

My army is going to be the T'au sept, but i want to make my broadside look a bit different. Something that makes him stand out. Any idea what colors i can paint him that still make sense lore wise?

[Commander Dawnstar]

The 7th Edition Tau Codex has a pretty good section showing off the colours of the T'au Sept and how they might vary from one individual or unit to another. The sections blocked out in dull red on T'au Sept models are a form of person decoration, so maybe you can work something out with that or a similar colour to make your Broadside stand out a bit more.

Edited June 25, 2017 by Brightstar

[Remus Ventanus.]

The 7th Edition Tau Codex has a pretty good section showing off the colours of the T'au Sept and how they might vary from one individual or unit to another. The sections blocked out in dull red on T'au Sept models are a form of person decoration, so maybe you can work something out with that or a similar colour to make your Broadside stand out a bit more.

thanks alot! I dont have the tau 7th ed codex, ill check the web!

[Trevak Dal]

I never invested heavily in riptides I got two in a batch buy and it was one more than I wanted (I wanted an Ovesa model). They performed amiably for me, but the killers of my Tau have always been my crisis suits.

[Bomber]

I have a ton of Tau that haven't been updated since 5th.  Tons of crisis suits, fire warriors, broadsides and kroot with enough vehicles to get them around, have hammerheads (of both variety) etc etc etc.  Something like 7000 points.  I didn't play them at all in 6th or 7th with the need for the bigger suits.  I'm curious how playing some massed firepower with my pathfinders for markers will do.  From what I've seen not the best but defintiely better than big suits all over the place.

 

On a completely different note very odd to be talking about Tau here lol

[Remus Ventanus.]

Can anyone confirm or deny is all of these battlesuits are from the t'au sept...I think they are,and if they are it help me immensly.

 

 

My issue is that i love the standard tan color for fire warriors, and xv8 crisis suits, but i dont like it on broadsides and commanders....

sorry, here is the image 

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-SYQpzLnyVLQ/VhPoOide82I/AAAAAAAA5vU/7T6ROcJCOFY/s1600/BattlesuitChart.jpg

[Commander Dawnstar]

Of those only the Crisis Suit and Riptide obviously have the white cadre markings to signify that they're from T'au. The Stealth Suit has grey ones, the Broadside has them in red (probably Vior'la, but it could be Tash'var) and the Enforcer is somewhat ambiguous. I would speculate that the Enforcer suit is also from T'au as it still makes prominent use of white and there are certainly examples of individuals from T'au using ochre markings with divergent colour schemes, but that colour scheme is also somewhat similar to some stuff we've seen from Sa'cea. It's certainly reminiscent of this suit from D'yanoi although definitely not the same.

 

Really you should feel free to do whatever takes your fancy to set your individual suits apart. Maybe your Broadside pilot bears some divergent markings from a former team or cadre it fought as part of, was transferred from a different warzone without time to unify its paint job or even is one who follows the path of Monat and fights wearing colours that are somewhat akin to the colours of a Freeblade Knight. Perhaps it could even be something as simple as the plans for the battle expected to see them posted in a different kind of terrain and their colours were set accordingly.

 

Don't forget: Septs don't just have a single colour scheme. Make something else up if it feels right to you.

Edited June 26, 2017 by Brightstar

[Remus Ventanus.]

started painting the broadside. Still alot to be done but this is the color scheme i went with

 

[Trevak Dal]

GW promoted the Tau septs sort of like "chapters" but their uniforms are not specifically set just because like a space marines heraldy.

 

Tau from sa'cea typically have that sweet blue-gray armor with black-gray cloth because their home Sept is heavily urban so they fight a lot and specialize in urban combat zones.

 

But if they are fighting on a jungle world with pink ferns, flying veloceraptor-headed terradons and 10 foot tall blue haired furries, they would put on pink jungle camo.

 

Like the Enclaves. Supposed to be mostly red for being "hot blooded" but Tau are shades of blue to gray skinned and likely have blue blood.

 

I like the classic T'au theme, and went with dark blue shoulder pads and armor segments, with gray Sept colors (for the Enclave connection) but I also have been working on painting little tiny annoying four finger hand prints on the side of their helmets in a gray mixed with Guilliman blue.

Edited July 4, 2017 by Trevak Dal