1,500pts & Add-Ons for 1,750pts

[Pathofskulls]

Its been a year since I played, well almost a year, thought I'd get back into the game, course in my time away I've forgotten a few things, so those first as a bit of catch up for myself. Disruption pods are what we want on our vehicles right? And flamers auto hit, just need to roll to wound right?

I only wish tau didn't have so many cool models, making lists would be far easier, and I wouldn't want to buy more models. As such I believe I'm only missing 3 models to complete my army, the first of which is in my 1,500pt army and I intend to proxy, until I determine if it is a proper fit. The second of which is added in at 1,750pts and I don't intend to proxy cause I love the model too much. The third is also in the 1,500pt list, ha almost forgot about it.

Now with the high number of space marine/chaos players I've seen in my area, well do wish me luck as these games will be most pleasant.

1,498pts

1+ Commander
Shas’o - plasma rifle, fusion blaster, shield generator, hard-wired multi-tracker = 132
Tank hunting/terminator hunting

Ethereal = 161
hard-wired drone controller, shield drone
Honor Guard x 8
pulse rifles
Ethereal eliminates need for bonding knives, well more or less, its cheaper. Not to mention pulse rifles at a marine BS + range/rapid fire range = pain

Crisis Battlesuit Team
Shas’ui x 2 - fusion blaster, missle pod, multi-tracker = 108
These two are my tank hunter purely, although if no tanks are available they'll shoot up anything in range

Shas’ui - flamer, burst cannon, multi-tracker = 42
In the event of a nid or ork player a flamer is always nice

Stealth Team
Shas’vre - markerlight, hard-wired multitracker, bonding knife = 210
Shas’ui x 5
My favorite unit, JSJ. Oh when my Shas'vre fires that marker light, can this unit benefit from it or not? I can't recall entirely

1+ Fire Warrior Team
Shas’la 2 x 8 = 160
pulse carbines
I like mobility, or the capability to move

Pathfinder Team
Shas’la x 8 = 116
rail rifle x 2
Markerlights, very useful, rail rifles very painful

Transport
Devilfish = 115
multi-tracker, disruption pod, seeker missle x 2
Transport for any models that need it, and carries some brief anti-tank

Piranha Light Skimmer Team
Piranha 2 x 1 = 130
fusion blaster
Some small fast anti-tank, not guranteed to hit, but they'll try their best

Hammerhead Gunship = 165
railgun, burst cannons, mult-tracker, disruption pods
Main anti-tank

Sky Ray Missile Defence Gunship = 160
sms, multi-tracker, disruption pod
This is my OT of 40k anti-tanking




@1750
Broadside Battlesuit Team
Shas’vre = 105
advanced stabilisation system, twin-linked plasma rifle, hard-wired multi-tracker
Can blast tanks or terminators out of the water

Shas’o = Shas’vre - plasma rifle, fusion blaster, shield generator, hard-wired multi-tracker, hard-wired target lock, bonding knife = 102
Add to second Crisis Team
Needed to make room for the special character

Shadowsun = 175
Wicked model, and 2 guns that can fire at 2 different targets, even if she did a suicide against 2 land raiders or similar tanks sitting next to each other it'd be worth it

[Pathofskulls]

What an overjoyous response, ok, continuing on, whilst sitting in a rather boring class this morning I thought to myself as I do sometimes, how I do love stealth suits... so I made another list, more stealth suits at the cost of having to remove Shadowsun from the early lists, and pushing her back to 2000k game, also had to push the Piranha's back to 1,750pt list.

Shas'o = 112
plasma rifle, fusion blaster, hwmt
Shas'vre Body Guards x 2 = 128
fusion blaster, missile pods, multitracker
The body guards are simple, no need to go overboard on them, this unit has one distinct purpose in mind, get to tanks, blow up tanks, kill any terminators along the way.

Fire Warriors x 8 = 80
pulse rifles

Fire Warriors 2 x 8 = 160
pulse carbines

I do prefer movement over solid sit back and shoot, I realize pulse rifles have a greater range and all, but since 5th, movement is a bit more important then it used to be.

Pathfinders x 8 = 116
railrifles x 2
Marker lights and some more marine killing action who's to complain? Ok yeah they are bit expensive, but markerlights = no cover saves.

Devilfish = 125
sms, disruption pods, seeker missiles x 2
I know everyone's a fan of these, pick up a unit move it, and the seeker missiles well I can attempt to pop light tanks with them.

Sky Ray = 160
gun drones, multitracker, disruption pods
I know no one likes these, not sure why, but I do, again its got the flare of popping light tanks, and the possibility to pop bigger ones plus when all's sad and done, the drones can detach and I can ram this puppy into some of the remaining tanks.

Hammerhead = 165
railgun, burst cannons, multitracker, disruption pods
Everyone's favorite tank

And my all time favorite Tau unit, which if these were troops and cheaper I'd totally run an army made out of them... course everyone would hate me I think.

Stealthsuits 3 x 4 = 454
Shas'vre = markerlight, bonding knife, hwmt
2 Teams have a fusion blaster amongst them.
Alright Everyones favorite unit >.> I had an extra few points rather then waste them, why not carry some extra heat, for those close encounters with terminators. I actually kind of like this list more then the first one.

Now this list does lose the speed of the piranhas, however, piranhas are probably a little more flimsy then the Stealthsuits so its not a huge loss. At 1,750pts I intend to give my HQ a shield generator, add in a nice 100pt broadside with plasma rifles & team leader & a hwmt, and a targetting array and those 2 piranha's from before. That should be enough anti-tank at that level, and this should be enough anti-tank at this level unless I encounter a more mobile army then this, but clever tactics should be able to pull through, or so I hope.

Comments suggestions much appreciated.

[Swamp_slug]

Since no-one else has commented I'll critique.

Carbines aren't generally worth it. The range is too short for its firepower and if you run your fire warriors in a Devilfish then you can easily get into 12" to rapid fire pulse rifles.
The fire warriors should ideally be in Devilfish. You have to buy one for the pathfinders so one squad can use that devilfish, the other squads should either be in Devilfish as well or swapped for Kroot.

I like the Sky Ray, it is a support tank, and is fairly good at its job, but is probably a little overcosted for its utility. I would however, drop the gun drones for SMS as you are effectively adding an easy kill point to your army and with SMS the sky ray can sit out of LOS and still be effective as the pathfinders can call in seeker missiles.

Speaking of your pathfinder unit. I thin the rail rifles dilute their purpose. They are primarily a markerlight support unit and while the rail rifle is a very good weapon I think it was poorly implemented when they added them to pathfinders as they are the best source of markerlights.

Your HQ should either be Fireknife or Helios suits. They should also have targeting arrays and hard-wired multi-trackers as a BS3 plasma rifle/fusion blaster will only hit half the time. It is much better to make them BS4.
Likewise your commander should be a Shas'el with a targeting array as you get BS5 for 15pts less. The Shas'el is weaker in melee, but then Tau shouldn't be in melee in the first place.

If you run Crisis suits with Fusion Blasters with the aim of tank hunting then you will need to deep strike them otherwise you run a high risk of them dying before they get into range.
Also consider adding at least 1 unit of Deathrain Crisis Suits as they are accurate, don't need markerlight support and able to deal with light and medium armour freeing your other anti-tank weapons to deal with AV 13 and 14.

Fusion blasters on stealth suits is also a bad idea as it dilutes their purpose. If they go after infantry then they waste the fusion shots, if they go after tanks then they waste the burst cannons. Much better is to get fusion piranhas as they have the speed to get in range, can make it BS4 cheaply and don't lose focus. They can also be used for board control.

[Pathofskulls]

Carbines aren't generally worth it. The range is too short for its firepower and if you run your fire warriors in a Devilfish then you can easily get into 12" to rapid fire pulse rifles.
The fire warriors should ideally be in Devilfish. You have to buy one for the pathfinders so one squad can use that devilfish, the other squads should either be in Devilfish as well or swapped for Kroot.

Kroot are more useless then carbines, imo plus the model is ugly. Kroot are speed bumps and not much more. Carbines are worth it when properly used, they can pin, not as easy to do, but they can still do it, and unlike the pulse rifle, they can move and shoot their full range, while I agree FoF is good, the devifish costs far more then similar transports for other armies, which lends itself as a disadvantage.


I like the Sky Ray, it is a support tank, and is fairly good at its job, but is probably a little overcosted for its utility. I would however, drop the gun drones for SMS as you are effectively adding an easy kill point to your army and with SMS the sky ray can sit out of LOS and still be effective as the pathfinders can call in seeker missiles.

If I had the pieces to model a second set of SMS I would, however I don't so drones it is. And as far as sitting out of LoS, I can do that anyway and still detach the drones and have them fly about shooting things, and annoying people with pinning tests.


Speaking of your pathfinder unit. I thin the rail rifles dilute their purpose. They are primarily a markerlight support unit and while the rail rifle is a very good weapon I think it was poorly implemented when they added them to pathfinders as they are the best source of markerlights.

Again I know where your coming from, but if you count up my markerlights, between the stealthsuits, the 6 in the pathfinder squad and the 2 on the sky ray I've got a fair number of the things, the primary objective for the marker lights will be troops as I will want to bolster my squads as they fire at other squads.


Your HQ should either be Fireknife or Helios suits. They should also have targeting arrays and hard-wired multi-trackers as a BS3 plasma rifle/fusion blaster will only hit half the time. It is much better to make them BS4.
Likewise your commander should be a Shas'el with a targeting array as you get BS5 for 15pts less. The Shas'el is weaker in melee, but then Tau shouldn't be in melee in the first place.

Shas'el is nice, but shas'el has one less wound and one less point of leadership in addition to the slightly lower bs. Mind you the body guards don't have plasma, fusion & missile pods for them. Allowing the unit to move forward, firing weapons until they get within melta range, once there, I can figure on two shots hitting. As far as D/S goes, I tend to avoid that, between possibility of losing the unit on the d/s and landing poorly I'd rather not prematurely lose the unit.


Fusion blasters on stealth suits is also a bad idea as it dilutes their purpose. If they go after infantry then they waste the fusion shots, if they go after tanks then they waste the burst cannons. Much better is to get fusion piranhas as they have the speed to get in range, can make it BS4 cheaply and don't lose focus. They can also be used for board control.

Their main target remains infantry, but with the fusion blaster, they now have capability to take on terminators to some extent. Additionally what else am I going to do with the 4 extra points? I have plenty of anti-troop fire power. The only fault I find with piranha's and the reason why I only have 2 and I've only given them fusion blasters is they are expensive and extremely fragile. Open-topped speeders with crappy armor. To invest the points in them to make them good, is to throw away points that could be better spent on a broadside, while I do intend to use them at 1,750pt games I don't intend for them to be major pieces, more of a distraction, take a transport and then likely die. Once my opponent sees what they can or can't do he'll likely dispose of them for me.

[Lost Nemesis]

Kroot are more useless then carbines, imo plus the model is ugly. Kroot are speed bumps and not much more.

A few other misconceptions in your post, but this is a big one. I'd recommend you do a few searches through the forum on Kroot and their uses; you should be most surprised. You'll likely just have to change the way you use them, as the unit itself is superior in almost every way to Fire Warriors.

Also - nice to see you posting some more, been a while since I've seen your name pop up! ;)

[Pathofskulls]

A few other misconceptions in your post, but this is a big one. I'd recommend you do a few searches through the forum on Kroot and their uses; you should be most surprised. You'll likely just have to change the way you use them, as the unit itself is superior in almost every way to Fire Warriors.

IF they've become more then speed bumps in 5th cool for the people who use them, I'm just not in huge favor of the model itself, nor do I know how I would ever paint the model to fit into my army supposing I could find the points to slide them in.


Also - nice to see you posting some more, been a while since I've seen your name pop up!

Found some free time on my hands between school and my girlfriend.

Thinking on this for a bit, seeing as I do have 16 unfinished kroot, I will search the forum, see what I can learn, see if they can fit into my army, in addition I will also post up pictures of the completed models in my army on the painting forum, maybe there someone can help me decide how to paint my kroot so that they do compliment my army, should I decide to use them instead of more stealthsuits :(