Actual Mechanized Tau list

[Galron]

This is my current actual Mechanized Tau force. The idea especially in the age of Voltan(sounds like a marvel movie) is for a fast moving army with a lot of moving parts to keep the opponent on the back foot. There is no one lynchpin for the opponent to concentrate forces on and enough light firepower to burn through armor of contempt by sheer forcing saves. Tau do not hold still and hold the line, they flow and strike and fall back when the tide turns and hit from a different angle. 

Borkan- the bonus vs small arms on the vehicles is essential and the extra range is very helpful
coldstar-High output burst cannon, missile pod, plasma rifle, shield gen + advanced missile pod and overdrive power systems+ WLT: Seeker of perfection
Fireblade- WLT through unity devastation, Puretide engram chip
 

krootx10 - their job is the home objective unless your opponent is playing a push forward army or one that has rear line stuff that needs to be engaged
breachers x10
breachers x10
strike x10
strike x10
strike x10

Crisisx3 - all with 1 plasma, 1 missile pod + shield gens. one with irridium

Stealth team x3

kroot hounds x5
tetras x2
 

Hammer head

Skyray 
Skyray 

devilfish x5

Ignore the center terminator blocks that people like me field for chaos and field two wings on the flanks and chip damage the hell out of everything and try to avoid getting into combat, although thats a given for tau I think. I would be tempted to drop the SMS on the skyrays for the cool new burst cannons. It only gives up 7 points to take no prisoners, although bring it down could be an issue. Obvious no psychic issues and its going to take a lot of mortal wound spam. Any slow armies are going to have a hard time getting to grips with anything important.

 

Edited September 14, 2022 by Galron

[Malakithe]

Bork'an Breachers can fire at 12" with the 'close range' profile which is nice. Strike teams getting rapid fire at 20" My list is somewhat similar though not as Devilfish heavy but the concept of weight of dice is there.. Im seeing a lack of Markerlights in your list.

[Galron]

Cant figure out where to put them aside from the tetras. Their job is to range around and get ML shots on the biggest threats so the bigger guns can concentrate fire on it(it been awhile since I read ML rules) while the rest go after fast scoring units. I think it would be a fun T7 overload list that small arms would have a hard time with. 

If pathfinders were cheaper I might could consider dropping a strike squad but right now they are too over priced for what they do.

[Malakithe]

Too expensive? They are barely over Breachers. They are basically better Strikes that can do the ML and still shoot after and have the pregame move. Pretty good I would say.  Alternates would be a few units of Stealth teams and deploy them anywhere.

Ive never considered Tetras...how do they perform?

Edited September 15, 2022 by Malakithe

[Galron]

Fast and a little more durable than pathfinders for a little less. 

I can drop a strike squad and a devilfish and add a pathfinder unit and another stealth team + a marker drone somewhere.

So I gain 3 bodies and 10 extremely fragile dudes but lose a t7 chassis.

[Malakithe]

12 hours ago, Galron said:

Fast and a little more durable than pathfinders for a little less. 

I can drop a strike squad and a devilfish and add a pathfinder unit and another stealth team + a marker drone somewhere.

So I gain 3 bodies and 10 extremely fragile dudes but lose a t7 chassis.

Pathfinders have the advantage of being able to move, do the ML, then shoot, then they have the strat allowing them to move again in order to hid them. 

Im looking at the Tetras now. They have the ability that lets them roll 2 more D6 for ML. Does that mean they get 3 ML per model? The only downside I can see to Tetras is they are super fragile and you have to expose them. But on the flip side they are just as fragile as Pathfinders or Strikes. Setting them up in Outflank will ensure they dont get popped though. They have some crazy movement too...I wonder why I havent seen them used more.

[Galron]

I think they are out of production.

[Malakithe]

30 minutes ago, Galron said:

I think they are out of production.

I just looked and I can still get them from FW

[Galron]

Ah ok. Not sure then. I love mine and have seen other local players using them. 

EDIT: 

So in prep for a tournament I decided to play Tau again. 

I am keeping the main theme of the original list with some slight variation.

Borkan battalion

Commander Goshawk with his master of perfection, coldstar, HO Burst, advanced prototype burst, Overdrive system, shield gen and a plasma gun.

Fireblade with Master of Kauyon

Kroot x 10

2x 10 Breachers

2x 10 Strike

Stealth team + 2 marker drones

4 kroot hounds

2 Riptides with Ion +2 shield rocket drones

Hammerhead

4 Devilfish

Sunshark Bomber

Should give me a pretty decent highly mobile force with a great deal of firepower. I deny assassinate, take no prisoners. I have decent ability to get behind his lines, a lot of high power shooting for big things, I get a redeploy, also aside from Strike and Fade I am not too CP hungry. Its not pure mech but I think it accomplishes alot of what I would want a mech list to accomplish. Fast moving, lots of troops, lots of tricks and not dependent on any one unit.

Edited October 4, 2022 by Galron

[Galron]

Giving this list a go this weekend. Nothing competitive but should be fun. Apparently I am facing a Magnus 1k sons list.

2k Borkan

Commander Goshawk with his master of perfection, coldstar, HO Burst, advanced prototype burst, Overdrive system, shield gen and a plasma gun

 

 

10 Breachers

10 Breachers

10 Strike

10 kroot

 

4 Stealth

Ghostkeel with 2 fusion and Ion cascade

Ghostkeel with 2 fusion and Ion cascade

firesight marksman with the lantern

 

5 vespid stingwings.

 

2 Hammerheads each with a seeker

Riptide with 2 plasma, early Warning, Ion Accelerator, 2 missile drones, velocity tracker.

 

 

3 Devilfish

 

I was going to swarm the board with firewarriors but I wanted to play some guys I converted like the vespid who never see the board. I might swap out an Accelerator for the heavy burst cannon on the riptide. Depends on which one I have finished painted in my box. I wanted 3 hammerheads but found out I am short one somehow. :/ Its ok, I have another devilfish kit I havent built yet and I will 3d print a new turret....eventually

Edited March 10, 2023 by Galron

[Galron]

Had a fun game vs the 1k sons. I thought it ended closer than it ended up.

He had Magnus, Ariman, a chaos lord on disk, 8 x5 rubrics and 10 rubric terminators

I know he took bring it down and am not sure what else but they inolved some kind of psykic actions on the objectives. I took engage, aerial beacons and abwhore the witch(duh). The deployment was quarters.

 

He got first turn and pushed forward agressively. Magnus teleported over to the quarter next to mine and glamoured and smited and stuff. I had a devilfish closest to the deployment edge along with a ghostkeel. I used them very aggressively as well. Devilfish was down to 2 wounds and they nuked a kroot squad that was there to absorb smites. Magnus failed his charge even with the reroll. My first turn had me markerlight Magnus and hit him with two hammerheads and a riptide and took him out. I also took out a rubric squad. I also got two Aerial beacons with my firewarrior squads.

 

His T2: the terminators jumped in on top of the left side objective. So at this point he had control of all three no mans land obectives. He managed to take out my markerlight dude and finished off my injured devilfish. On my turn I dropped my vespid behind a building but in close range of one of his rubric squads on the right no mans land objective. My coldstar jumped behind his homefield objective which had a lone rubric squad. Stealths smoke and mirrored off. The right breachers and two devilfish+ vespid cleared both rubric squads on the left. My breachers disembarked on the center objective and killed like one rubric holding the center. On the left side each hammerhead took out two rubric terminators and my hostkeels killed two more while the firewarriors on the left killed off the rubrics on that objective. Cold Star kills the rubrics on his home objective.

 

His T3: He moved Ariman and teleported the terminators and moved another rubric squad back towards his home objective. He moved another rubric squad over to my left side objective and tried shooting my firewarriors there and failed.  His teleporting glamored terminators were a pain. They nuked my commander. My turn 2: My stealths and vespid moved to the final to aerial beacons and did those actions. Thankfully the stealths are camo'd and kind of blended into the terrain plus were right up next to his edge of the board so he didnt even notice them. My Firewarriors on the left and both ghostkeels are needed to finish off that squad of rubrics and I finally take that objective. Both hammerheads and the riptide wiff on hitting the 4 remaining terminators(Something killed one but I dont remember what). My devilfish drops down on the center objective and kills one rubric on that objective.

 

His T4: His terminators move towards the left objective. I think it was a case of trying not to be useless when he failed his teleport power roll. Ariman and lord are in the center and the take out the devilfish on the center objective who then blows up. I did 6 mortals to a rubric squad but unfortunately wiff the damage rolls on the two commanders doing 1 damage each. For some reason he ignored the vespid. He also manages to kill my other devilfish which also blows up killing five firewarriors. My T4: My stuff starts moving in on cleaning him up. I wiff badly again on shooting the rubrics but thankfully at least one hammerhead hits the terminators and took out two. Vespid managed to not wound any of the rubric squad on his home objective but the stealth team manage to kill 4 and one wound. Vespid then charged and did nothing.

 

At this point he wipes the vespid, charges a hammerhead I moved onto the right objective to move block Ariman and the lord. He used his reroll on something else and the Lord ends up killing himself with a perils. Ariman charges and kills the Hammerhead and moves into the firewarriors. The game was effectively over as I clean up the rest of the board. I killed off everything except Ariman.

 

Was a fun game athough it took much longer than expected. Maxed out beacons and abhore the witch. Didnt do so hot on engage but did better in the latter part of the game, guessing about 10 points. Primary was meh so I still havent figured out how I won. I always had at least one objective, but didnt get three until turn 4 and never got all of them until the end of 5. He on the other hand did the psychic actions on 4 objectives, brought down 3 devilfish and a hammerhead, and had 3 at the beginning of 2, 4 at the beginning of 3, 3 at 4, and 2 at 5. He did the math and said I still beat him on points pretty handedly.

Edited March 13, 2023 by Galron

[Uncle Mel]

Always satisfying if hammerheads take out something big! As you saw, also perfect against those pesky termies!