Pure DW army against Tau

[Drizzt79]

Hallo everyone

 

I'm new to the forum, new to wargaming, and just wanted to ask for an advice for a battle against tau.

 

I'm running a pure DW army, no primaris (I'm not sure why but I hate them, probably there is something shady going on with them...hidden agents of chaos probably

[Thanatos31]

I literally played that game on Saturday at 2000 points.

 

Went up against two players 1k each. One brought a normal battalion (riptide & broadside were his biggest suits) the other one brought 3 commanders, and some xv80 suits and around 20-30 drones.

 

It was a very tough game, I lost , as I couldn’t shoot down enough drones and they fled the close combat.

 

Anyhow -lesson learned - drones are a fun Way for the tau to take a lot of damage. Weather it’s a wonderful 12 damage turned I to 2 mortal wounds that then get ignored , or the bubble wrap that prevents any killing of the commanders that have 3 melters and destroyed my razorback and Corvus in one shooting phase.

PS: our terminators are never cheap unfortunately

[Drizzt79]

Yes tau drones give a cheap protection to suits (too cheap), nullifying the effect of our multidamage weapons like Lascannons or meltas.

So perhaps a ton of assault cannon shots could take some of them out first. It’s a pity the price hike to 44pts for the tlasscannons btw, but on the bright side stormshields are now 5pts. I Will have 5/6 of them on 22 veterans.

For the commander problem (4 fusion blasters….crazy) I would deep strike a specialised terminator unit with 3 assault cannons + powerswords and 2 stormbolters+ powersword…adding my librarian in term armour for some mortal wounds as a cherry on the cake….or a kill team with fragcannons through the beacon angelis.

 

ATM I have 3 potential lists for that battle, having a hard time in deciding which is the right one.

 

Another variable is who is playing first. Tau starting firts is a huge advantage for them

 

Anyways I'm having fun with Deathwatch since its a very difficult army to play, need to use your brain a lot to have some chance to win

Playing tau or IG is much more simple....but who wants it simple??

Edited December 18, 2017 by Drizzt79

[Saxxon the Dragoon]

Anyhow -lesson learned - drones are a fun Way for the tau to take a lot of damage. Weather it’s a wonderful 12 damage turned I to 2 mortal wounds that then get ignored , or the bubble wrap that prevents any killing of the commanders that have 3 melters and destroyed my razorback and Corvus in one shooting phase.

PS: our terminators are never cheap unfortunately

Deathwatch frag cannons are your friend, no seriously try to take at least 2 squads with 4 frag cannons each and put a captain with each for the reroll to hit and put them in razorbacks with assault cannons. BURY THE MECHS IN SAVES. seriously, frag fire cannons do 2d6 shots EACH, so for each squad thats 8d6 frag cannons shots, plus the twin assault cannon from the razorback, and with a captain you can reroll failed hit rolls of 1. 8D6+heavy 12+rerolling 1's means that even the most optimistic rolling is going to wipe out whole swaths of drones and probably failed armor rolls on the mech suits. and after the drones have been wiped out, you can switch from frag to shell ammo. Running 2 squads+2 razorbacks+2 captains like that would make even a tyranid player flinch at that kind of firepower.

 

If people are running riptides in 1k games, thats more than a little power-gaming, so dont be afraid to powergame yourself.

[Thanatos31]

my experience goes more along of this:

• Not having 1st turn;
• the razorbacks dont survive the deepstriking 4 commanders with 3-4 melters each ( maybe also lucky dice )
• Now I have 2 squads of 1Wound marines stranded on the battlefield,
• long range Battlesuit and Firewarrior fire is incoming, as they inch forward 6inches; Some are saved by Stormshields, most die due to volume of fire and 1s and 2s on the dice
• the commanders make sure to jump away if they survive the shots I fire at them - the shield drones have 5+ FNP save
• at this point in turn 1 I have to choose between the closer threat with melters or the long range fire by rockets and rifles and other Tau weapons (feels like every suit has like 43 different weapons)
• turn 2 theres still enough enemy gunfire on highly mobile jumping TAU units, staying out of range of the mid/close range fire power the glass cannon DW has
• by turn 3 I am left with isolated 2-3 model units, if there's armor left its getting picked off at this point ; no chance to get to objectives in time
• -  overall it is just prolonging the inevitable tabling or loss due to VPs.

That being said - this was also the result of not preventing the deepstriking commanders due to poor deployment on my end ( leaving some pockets and bubbles open for him to put his commanders) 

[Drizzt79]

@thanatos31

 

Yeah 4 commanders is quite a fearful force.....with 3 fusion blasters the cost is 139

 

Against that we need primaris....and a vindicare (so no 100% dw...)

For 135 points you can have 3 incessors with double assault bolter, or for 177 with double plasma ....and 3 incessors are better than 1 commander believe me! In my antitau army I got two squads for antisuit purpose.

Plasma for the incessor is assault d3, so avg 12 shots. With a captain close you can overcharge and get str8 2 damage each.

For the invul saves I use my vindicare to kill one of the drones...just to soften them up a bit.

Just deep strike after the commanders and the magic is done.

 

For the kill team, you have to invest, and protect the investment...3/4 frags, add 3SS+bolter veterans and 2/3 termies (cheap loadout)

Deepstrike a librarian terminator and use the beacon angelis to take the alpha kill team where needed

 

Keep the rest cheap: 2 razorbacks 1vn dreadnought (TLC + missile launcher)

 

And btw kill the markerlight teams as soon as you can

 

I think that by playing first we have the advantage

Edited January 10, 2018 by Drizzt79