Let's talk T'au Kill Team

[Panzer]

Alright I got my hands on the rules and gave them a quick read so I can give a rough rundown for you guys so you can start planning your Kill Teams already.

 

Units available

• Fire Warrior
• Pathfinder
• Fire Warrior Breacher
• XV25 Stealth Battlesuit
• Drones

Drones available

• Gun Drone
• Shield Drone
• Marker Drone
• Guardian Drone
• Grav-inhibitor Drone
• Pulse accelerator Drone
• Recon Drone

Fire Warrior

Leader option: yes (Shas'ui)

Gunner option: no

Other roles: Comms, Medic, Scout, Sniper, Veteran

Loadout options: Rifle and photon grenades, may replace Rifle with Carbine, Shas'la or Shas'ui may take pulse pistol, Shas'ui may instead replace its Rifle with a pistol (for whatever reason you'd want to do that  ), Shas'ui may take a Markerlight, one Shas'la in your kill team may take a DS8 Tactical Support Turret with either SMS or MS

 

Pathfinder

Leader option: yes (Pathfinder Shas'ui)

Gunner option: yes (up to three Pathfinder Gunner)

Other roles: Sniper (Gunner only), Comms, Demolitions, Medic, Scout, Veteran

Loadout options: Carbine, Markerlight and photon grenades, Pathfinder Gunner may replace their Carbine and Markerlight with either an Ion or Rail rifle, Shas'ui may take a pulse pistol

 

Fire Warrior Breacher

Leader option: yes (Breacher Shas'ui)

Gunner option: no

Other roles: Comms, Demolitions, Medic, Scout, Veteran

Loadout options: Blaster and photon grenades, Breacher Shas'la or Breacher Shas'ui may take a pulse pistol, Breacher Shas'ui may instead replace its Blaster with a pulse pistol (again, for whatever reason you'd want to do that  ), Breacher Shas'ui may take a Markerlight, one Breacher Shas'la in your kill team may take a DS8 Tactical Support Turret with either SMS or MS

 

XV25 Stealth Battlesuit

Leader option: yes (Stealth Shas'vre)

Gunner option: no

Other roles: Comms, Heavy, Scout, Veteran

Loadout options: Burst Cannon, one Stealth Shas'ui or Stealth Shas'vre may replace its Burst Cannon with a Fusion Blaster, a Stealth Shas'vre may take a Markerlight and Target Lock

 

Drones

Leader option: no

Gunner option: no

Other roles: none

Loadout options: the above listed Drones

 

 

Things of note:

• you can technically have two DS8 Tactical Support Turrets in your team since one mentions "one Shas'ui" and the other "one Breacher Shas'ui"
• For the Greater Good is still a thing and unchanged apart from the addition of not being able to Retreat when using it
• Bonding Knife Ritual gives -1 on Nerve tests when a model with this same ability is within 3" and not shaken
• SMS can still shoot at targets it can't see but when doing so it only hits on 6s
• SMS doesn't ignore the penalty for targets being obscured
• Pathfinder don't have any form of scout movement
• Stealth Suits still give a -1 to-hit penalty for shooting and melee which should be pretty strong!
• Stealth Suits don't have any form of infiltration deployment
• FLY keyword is still a thing
• Stats for units and weapons are unchanged
• The Markerlight table goes only up to 4+ due lack of Seeker Missiles
• The ignore cover Markerlight bonus got changed to giving +1 to-hit against obscured targets which is rather important in combination with the Recon Drone
• Drones can't be specialists, can't be part of a Fire team, can't gain experience (RIP the fun idea of a 99% Drone Kill Team in campaigns )
• Gun Drones don't have to target the nearest visible enemy
• Shield Drones have no 5++
• Saviour Protocols is still a thing and you don't have to roll for it
• Guardian Drone only gives the 6++ to nearby T'au Empire models which is rather useless to be honest
• Recon Drone lets ONE nearby Pathfinder ignore the to-hit and injury-roll penalty for targets being obscured
• Target lock lets you ignore only the to-hit penalty for advancing&shooting with Assault weapons. Nothing mentioned about Heavy weapons (makes you wonder why it comes with the Markerlight for the Stealth Shas'vre ...)
• You still have to decide whether you want to shoot a Markerlight or with your other weapons

Points

Of course I won't give a complete rundown on the points here since that's against the forum rules. However I can talk about it a little bit.

Weapons cost a lot less than you'd expect. The most expensive weapon is the Missile Pod which still costs a few points below 10p. Fusion Blaster cost almost half as much of a Missile Pod and are 1p more expensive than an Ion rifle.

The rest of the weapons (Markerlights included) are for free except for the SMS and Rail rifle which cost 1p more than the Fusion Blaster.

 

Fire Warrior and Breacher cost 1p more than in the Codex currently (I guess because the Kill Team stuff got written before they made the last point adjustments for 40k).

Pathfinder cost 2p more than in the Codex currently, however Markerlights are free so they end up being 1p cheaper than the 40k version. Pathfinder Gunner and Pathfinder Shas'ui cost 1p more than the regular version (note: Fire Warrior and Breacher Shas'ui don't cost more than their regular version ...)

Stealth Suits are almost 1/3rd cheaper than they currently are for 40k. Without Fusion Blaster or Target lock you could easily fit 5 of them in a 100p Kill Team. (totally didn't say how much they cost  )

Drones are overall cheaper. Each Drone costs the same amount of points which is a bit below 10p just like the Missile Pod.

 

 

Stratagems

Uplinked Markerlight: 2CP, same as in regular 40k

Breach And Clear: 1CP, same as in regular 40k

Recon Sweep: 1CP, same as in regular 40k

Stimulant Injector: 1CP, use when loosing a wound. For this and each other wound lost by that model for the rest of the phase you get a 5+++. Not for Drones

 

 

Tables

We got 3 different tables for some easy background generation and 2 table for easy specialists generation

• 1d10 for Background: Bond (Survivors, Stealth Experts, Prototype Weapon testers ...)
• 1d10 for Mission: Service to the Greater Good (Bait the trap, Mark the Target, Destroy the Economy Supplies ...)
• 1d10 for Squad Quirk: Philosphy (Honorable Warriors, Vengeful, Unyielding, Students of Kauyon ...)

• 1d10 for Specialists' Demeanours (Scholar of Puretide, Pragmatic, Precise, Hot-Blooded, Wize Veteran)
• D66 for T'au Invidual Name Generator Table

Feel free to ask if you have any more questions. Meanwhile I'm going to build my full Stealth Suit Kill Team lol

[Skaorn]

There is talk that, due to the different firing profiles on Pulse Blasters that you can choose from, that the long range penalties will apply to half range of each profile rather than at half range of it's maximum. Is there anything on this? Personally I think it would be -1 at just 7.6 to 15" and if it isn't mentioned then it's probably just an oversight.

[Panzer]

There is talk that, due to the different firing profiles on Pulse Blasters that you can choose from, that the long range penalties will apply to half range of each profile rather than at half range of it's maximum. Is there anything on this? Personally I think it would be -1 at just 7.6 to 15" and if it isn't mentioned then it's probably just an oversight.

 

No official statement but RAW that seems to be the case. It's a weapon with three different profiles so it has three different ranges. Makes Breacher a LOT less interesting imo since you'd have to be within 7"/5/2" to not suffer from the long range penalty. Pulse Accelerator Drone of course doesn't work with the Pulse Blaster either.

The only thing we can do to mitigate it is to get Markerlights on the target (only 4 to get the +1 to-hit and we have the Uplinked Markerlight Tactic available). Breach And Clear buffs them a little bit against targets in Cover as well but only the wounding part, not the hitting part unfortunately.

 

Considering our bad BS I'd probably try to stick with long ranged weaponry and Stealth Suits. Not because I want to stay far away but because you get more easily within half range to not suffer from the long range penalty. It only makes weapons like Carbines even worse compared to Rifles. As soon as you're in range for your Carbine it's only 3" closer until you get within half range of your Rifle...

 

 

Imo there are a few traps for T'au we should try to avoid.

• Guardian Drones due how useless a 6++ is
• Marker Drones due having only a single BS5+ shot so you would be mostly hoping on 6s (did I mention that it suffers from the penalty for moving&shooting with a Heavy weapon? Because it does now)
• Fire Warrior with Carbines
• Overcharging Ion Rifles (I honestly don't think anybody wants to overcharge anything with the amount of negative to-hit modificators there are in the game)

Things I'm on the fence about are Gun Drones and Shield Drones. Gun Drones still have a sick amount of shots for their cost but you'd be mostly hoping for 6s here as well and while Shield Drones suck as bodyguards in Kill Team they still can serve as mobile cover in narrow places.

 

 

Also for campaigns or if you want to pay a bit more for your specialists there are some neat combos. For example a Stealth Suit with Bursts Cannon as lvl2 Heavy specialist can  shoot twice for 2CP and gives every enemy model it targets (doesn't even need to hit!) a -1 to-hit penalty for the shooting phase while also advance&shoot without penalty. True surpressing fire and something my group will hate me for because I'll be going for that whenever I have a Stealth Suit specialist in my team lol

Then again that's also something that could screw us up big time since for example a Grey Knight Heavy specialist with Psilencer can do the same thing but with more shots, more AP and better BS for only few more points.

The Heavy skill tree is simply extremely strong. The Combat skill tree for melee as well btw. Definitely the two best for pure damage output I'd say.

[Doghouse]

I think I am going with Stealth and Pathfinders for my team. I'm not sure if to go with rail rifles or try and squeeze in more models at the moment. I am finding myself leaning heavily to a thematic build over tactical, for some reason each time I look at what would be  the most effective my brain kicks in with "You know what would be really, really cool?"

 

I'm tempted to go with two stealth suits and the rest as pathfinders. 

[Skaorn]

To be fair, Panzer, are Pulse Carbines on Firewarriors ever worth it lol

[MajorNese]

Copying my observations from the ATT topic:

 

Played 1,5 games (IG, TS) on friday. And well...unless you have really short ranges (zone mortalis or something similar), playing Tau feels a bit...random...

We played both games on the cardboard board, with containers/barricades and other smaller objects. At that size, essentially everything with 30" range will ALWAYS be in range. Which doesn't mean that you actually hit.

Above 15" (which you tend to stay, because being closer will inflict bolter-related body coherency issues), you get -1 to hit. For a target even slightly obscured (90% of the time, it is obscured on that range), another -1 to hit. Means you only ever hit on 6s, unless comms/sniper, or the enemy models are dangerously close. Congratulations, Orks are out-shooting you.

A few other observations:
Since range is an issue, pulse carbines or pulse blasters seem rather useless to me, unless Zone Mortalis or pathfinders. Why shoot slightly better on 5", when you could actually hit the target at 15" with a pulse rifle? Or start fishing for more 6s at 30"?

Readying models instead of moving is tempting, to shoot first. On the flipside, that is as effective as it is static/boring to play.

Rail rifles are necessary. Played against Thousand Sons, getting every possible buff and rerolls made it the only weapon capable of killing models with a (strat-rerollable) 2+ save. Seriously, it took 3 entire shooting phases to kill just one model.

Pathfinders are rather versatile, if squishy. A lucky roll with the markerlight strat means that one markerlight might be absolutely enough, but the pulse carbine will still be in range to contribute more potential 6s.

DV8s are nice. Still hit on 6s, but always readied and 4 dice means they might hit something over the course of the game. Don't even think about LoS - at BS5+, either the target will be obscured or above 15". They hit on 6s anyway, no need to expose them to enemy LoS

Stealth suits are pretty much the most mobile unit we have, as it survives being closer to the enemy for a while. Obscured and above typical rapid fire range, that's -3 to hit - even marines are then reduced to fishing for 6s.

 

 

Recon Drones are awesome. Cost as much as regular drones, but provide a to-hit buff to one model against obscured models (read: 90% of the time) and have 2 wounds instead of one. All drones cost the same, so just take the one you can.

 

One thing I might try would be the PAD. At 24" pulse carbine range, they can at least fish for 6s with two shots instead of the one from the pulse rifle. Or close to 18" with pulse rifles to get two shots without penalty. Combined with gun drones, that might be fun too - 7p for 4 shots at 24" might give us some ork-grade dakka, rather quickly offsetting the PAD costs.

 

Also note that the ion rifle isn't overheating any more than usual in killteam. They changed the rule, it only overheats on an unmodified 1 - no way to make it worse with penalties, no way besides rerolling 1s to prevent it.

[Panzer]

 

Also note that the ion rifle isn't overheating any more than usual in killteam. They changed the rule, it only overheats on an unmodified 1 - no way to make it worse with penalties, no way besides rerolling 1s to prevent it.

 

Ah that's indeed very good to know!

[Panzer]

And yes how easily Long Range and Obscured penalties stack is a serious problem for us. And not just for us, for Astra Militarum and Skitarii as well since they as well are just a shooty team with rather squishy BS4+ guys.

 

I'm honestly afraid to ever face an Ork team spamming nothing but boyz. They can easily swarm us, outshooting and outmelee us when in range easily.

To be fair, Panzer, are Pulse Carbines on Firewarriors ever worth it lol

 

Only when you play them as Vior'la in regular 40k. :P

[brother_b]

New to Tau. Actually I don't play Tau. My son wants to play Tau in Kill team. My other friend has about 10,000 points of Tau models lying around he doesn't use. I was able to grab some random stealth suits and other guys.

 

So, question.

 

Tau shoot worse than orks? Saw that comment up above. Is that true?

 

No option for CC? I know that Tau are horrible in CC but I've only ever played them one time. In Kill Team what am I going to do?

 

Thanks all!

[Happy-inquisitor]

New to Tau. Actually I don't play Tau. My son wants to play Tau in Kill team. My other friend has about 10,000 points of Tau models lying around he doesn't use. I was able to grab some random stealth suits and other guys.

 

So, question.

 

Tau shoot worse than orks? Saw that comment up above. Is that true?

 

No option for CC? I know that Tau are horrible in CC but I've only ever played them one time. In Kill Team what am I going to do?

 

Thanks all!

 

 

Tau shooting worse than orks is - shall we say poetic license? Technically not the case but in practice you may not notice any advantage to Tau shooting over ork shooting because both will be hitting on 6's a lot of the time. For cheap dakka that hits on 6's gun drones and DS8 turrets get a lot of shots for their points.

 

None of the Tau models available in Kill Team hit on anything better than 5's in close combat and none have any sort of AP. It is going to be a real struggle for T'au to kill anything in CC in Kill Team. The small play areas mean that CC will be happening a lot.

[Panzer]

New to Tau. Actually I don't play Tau. My son wants to play Tau in Kill team. My other friend has about 10,000 points of Tau models lying around he doesn't use. I was able to grab some random stealth suits and other guys.

 

So, question.

 

Tau shoot worse than orks? Saw that comment up above. Is that true?

 

No option for CC? I know that Tau are horrible in CC but I've only ever played them one time. In Kill Team what am I going to do?

 

Thanks all!

 

Well no they don't shoot worse normally but it can very easily happen that they don't shoot better while costing more. Let me explain why.

There are lots of negative to-hit modificators in Kill Team and there's the rule that 6s always hit in Kill Team. That means once you happen to face so many negative to-hit modificators that you'd be hitting on 6s you'd be hitting as good as any Ork which costs less points for what it does. And that happens rather quickly. It only takes Long Range (so >9" for Stealth Suits) and obscured (which basically always is the case on a proper board).

Part of that problem is that one of the things that is supposed to buff our accuracy, Markerlights, are shooting weapons which have to hit first as well so they suffer from the same penalties. Relying on 6s so your other weapons have a chance to hit a bit better is really a terrible strategy.

That means you either want durable units with FLY keyword like Stealth Suits or units with long ranged weapons (Pulse Rifle, Rail rifle, Ion rifle, Markerlights) and then dance around 9"-15" so you don't suffer from the Long Ranged penalty at least.

 

And no, no option for CC. T'au are the least CC capable faction in whole warhammer by design. Hence why we normally have the FLY keyword on all our battlesuits and tanks and why we can support Overwatch with units that didn't get charged. ;)

[MyD4rkPassenger]

Disclaimer, this is my experience after my first KT game.  I played a game on Saturday with my old shadow war pathfinders and I have to say going from SW to this was really disappointing.  I was hitting on sixes with everything and by turn 4 I had killed 2 of 7 necrons.  I ended up breaking and conceding the game since my ion rifle and my comms guy who was giving my sniper the bonuses were killed.  The rail rifle is 100% mandatory in my opinion, the sniper was the only model who got kills.  I may have been misplaying a lot, as it is a brand new game and I don't play a tau army, but something felt a bit off.  I'll play more games with them to get a better feel.

 

EDIT: I stopped using markerlights turn 1. I think out of the 5 pathfinders I tried to land hits with them I got one markerlight off due to the - hit modifiers.

[Panzer]

Yeah I don't think Markerlights are really worth it.

You barely hit with them and if you hit with them it doesn't really matter if you could have instead landed a Rail rifle hit for example.

I was thinking about taking a Markerlight carry and make him a Sniper specialist for more reliable hits but ultimately a Rail rifle Sniper specialists will give you the same outcome but better ... which is killing that one model you wanted the Markerlight on in the first place.

[brother_b]

Wow ok. Thinking about potential armies marines have that 3+, as do many armies at least having access to a 3+ option.

 

Having no experience with the army and basically getting free models I'll at least give it a try. It's nice to be prepared for the shooting woes though.

 

My son can always just play marines too so it'll be fine.

[golfdeltafoxtrot]

I’ve got a box of Stealth Suits and a Fire Warrior Squad unbuilt from some time ago and I’m planning to put them together for Kill Team. I’m not a regular Tau player so o was hoping to get a bit of advice on what to build from those who are more enlightened than me.

 

I feel like Fire Warriors with pulse rifles are probably the better option than pulse carbines or Breachers and that the DS-8 is a good investment. Am I right?

[9x19 Parabellum]

Not sure if this has already been covered but...

 

my rulebook says a Shas'la (or Shas'ui ) may "...take a pulse pistol".  It doesn't say anything about them giving up their primary armament to do this.

 

For composition, yeah, I'm thinking 1 or 2 breachers max for rear guard, like protecting your DS8 base of fire, but the rest should probably be Pulse Rifles.

 

Right now I'm thinking about:

2 Stealth with Burst

2 Breachers

4 Fire Warriors

1 DS8 (SMS)

1 Gun or Shield Drone (not sure which yet)

 

I probably don't need 2 breachers, but I like the models so much :-)

[Happy-inquisitor]

I’ve got a box of Stealth Suits and a Fire Warrior Squad unbuilt from some time ago and I’m planning to put them together for Kill Team. I’m not a regular Tau player so o was hoping to get a bit of advice on what to build from those who are more enlightened than me.

 

I feel like Fire Warriors with pulse rifles are probably the better option than pulse carbines or Breachers and that the DS-8 is a good investment. Am I right?

 

Looking through the rules I tend to agree with you - pulse rifles are your go-to choice and the DS8 turret is moderately threatening to targets who might think themselves safe. You need to bring a breacher to take the 2nd DS8 turret but I think that does not work very well - the way that the weapon range brackets on the pulse blaster appear to work is quite crippling.

 

Stealth suits look like they might be able to run interference in the mid-table with their mobility to keep nasty things away from your fire warriors. Give them some drone support to help with overwatch and eat nasty multi-wound hits and I think that could be an effective approach.

 

For heavy hitting I really think T'au need pathfinders. They are very fragile but both the Ion and Rail rifles have real utility so long as you put them on a specialist who can actually hit with them. The Recon Drone is the biggest bargain available to the T'au with its burst cannon and ability to let a pathfinder ignore the obscured penalties. 

 

Markerlights look situational at best. I would suggest taking them on models which can (they are generally free) but you probably only use them when their real weapon is out of range or  has no worthwhile target. 

[Guest Triszin]

Not sure if this has already been covered but...

 

my rulebook says a Shas'la (or Shas'ui ) may "...take a pulse pistol".  It doesn't say anything about them giving up their primary armament to do this.

 

For composition, yeah, I'm thinking 1 or 2 breachers max for rear guard, like protecting your DS8 base of fire, but the rest should probably be Pulse Rifles.

 

Right now I'm thinking about:

2 Stealth with Burst

2 Breachers

4 Fire Warriors

1 DS8 (SMS)

1 Gun or Shield Drone (not sure which yet)

 

I probably don't need 2 breachers, but I like the models so much :-)

pretty sure the pistol does not replace primary weapons, its just added as a secondary weapon.

[9x19 Parabellum]

 

Not sure if this has already been covered but...

 

my rulebook says a Shas'la (or Shas'ui ) may "...take a pulse pistol".  It doesn't say anything about them giving up their primary armament to do this.

 

For composition, yeah, I'm thinking 1 or 2 breachers max for rear guard, like protecting your DS8 base of fire, but the rest should probably be Pulse Rifles.

 

Right now I'm thinking about:

2 Stealth with Burst

2 Breachers

4 Fire Warriors

1 DS8 (SMS)

1 Gun or Shield Drone (not sure which yet)

 

I probably don't need 2 breachers, but I like the models so much :-)

pretty sure the pistol does not replace primary weapons, its just added as a secondary weapon.

 

 

Right, that's my point. I think SfPanzer was saying at the beginning in his analysis about "why would you give up a pulse rifle to take a pistol?"  My point is you don't, but maybe the German version is different.

[Panzer]

 

 

Not sure if this has already been covered but...

 

my rulebook says a Shas'la (or Shas'ui ) may "...take a pulse pistol".  It doesn't say anything about them giving up their primary armament to do this.

 

For composition, yeah, I'm thinking 1 or 2 breachers max for rear guard, like protecting your DS8 base of fire, but the rest should probably be Pulse Rifles.

 

Right now I'm thinking about:

2 Stealth with Burst

2 Breachers

4 Fire Warriors

1 DS8 (SMS)

1 Gun or Shield Drone (not sure which yet)

 

I probably don't need 2 breachers, but I like the models so much :-)

 

pretty sure the pistol does not replace primary weapons, its just added as a secondary weapon.

 

Right, that's my point. I think SfPanzer was saying at the beginning in his analysis about "why would you give up a pulse rifle to take a pistol?"  My point is you don't, but maybe the German version is different.

I said that because it gives you both options. I also have the rules only in english. ;)

 

Shas'la or Shas'ui may take pulse pistol, Shas'ui may instead replace its Rifle with a pistol (for whatever reason you'd want to do that )

 

[Doghouse]

I think it might just be a modelling option because I think you get an arm holding a pulse pistol. It could be them taking the what comes in the box rule to the extreme because, like you say otherwise it makes no practical sense to swap unless it is to let you duel wield pulse pistols? 

[Panzer]

No dual wielding unfortunately since it says "instead".

It's probably just an oversight without any proper reason.

[Doghouse]

Ah yes missed that.

 

What is the best way to go with teams? I'm a bit rusty on the gaming side of things but the game feels like bodies and anything that lets you put down more dice seems to be the way to go?

 

I'm currently looking at:

 

Stealth Shas'vre with burst cannon 

Stealth Shas''ui with burst cannon

2 Pathfinder Gunners with Rail Rifle

6 Pathfinders with Pulse Carbines

 

Which clocks in at 100pts.

[Panzer]

I think it's a bit early to call something "the best" but there are a few things that look promising:

 - Rail rifle Sniper specialist

 - Burst Cannon Heavy specialist (for the suppressor trait and double shooting tactic)

 - Comms specialist

 - Fire Warrior Shas'ui with DS8 turret

Oh and a Recon Drone as well of course. A Grav-Inhibitor Drone could be strong too depending on the terrain and the team you're facing.

[brother_b]

I think it's a bit early to call something "the best" but there are a few things that look promising:

 - Rail rifle Sniper specialist

 - Burst Cannon Heavy specialist (for the suppressor trait and double shooting tactic)

 - Comms specialist

 - Fire Warrior Shas'ui with DS8 turret

Oh and a Recon Drone as well of course. A Grav-Inhibitor Drone could be strong too depending on the terrain and the team you're facing.

 

I don't know what any of this stuff is but I'll check it out when my KT box gets here.

 

One of the stealth suits I grabbed appears to have some sort of flamer weapon. Is that not a good option? Can the stealth suits fly? If they can I was thinking would be nice to fly out of combat and then flamer any attackers.

 

Thanks for the feedback.