Firewarrior Formations

[Vindicare]

ok, say i have 36 firewarriors, now i can either put them into

3 squads of 12 warriors
4 squads of 9 warriors
6 squads of 6 warriors

what would you say is most effective?

[strYker]

it depends on who you are facing:
if you are facing nids, i would go 6/6 because if one squad gets in CC your still fine.
also the bigger numbers means you can play kroot or just more fire warriors and if you play small numbers that means it takes up all the troop choices but if someone shoots you they can only kill 6 people instead of 12 or 9.

[Xtremedoomaas]

i agree with stryker. although i say go with 2 squads of 6 and either 3 squads of 8 or 2 of 12. that way u have some squads to take out better stuff and other littler squads to take out whats left over. put the littler squads up front so that way if some one does manage to get into close combat with you they can only kill a little squad of 6. keep all of your other squads more then 3" away other wise theyu can consolidate and kill the rest of your guys. if you are more then 3" away then if they kill ur little squad you can shoot and kill them before they hurt another squad.

[Maus154]

Unfortunately with the new rules Tau are going to get the hurt laid on the them in assault fall back stage. Now its ideal to have at least 6 inches between your squad formations, and dont expect to be able to fall back, even with jump equipped infantry (which by the way, need some help out with the new rule).

[isitused]

If you field units of 6 I would highly recommend an Enthrall. It only takes 3 dead tau to cause a unit to be below 50% and if they fail their test they can’t rally. It would be frustrating to have a bunch of 2 unit fire warrior units running away. As far as bonding go's I wouldn’t waste the points to bond a small unit of 6.
-GM

[strYker]

no, if they lose 3 fire warriors out of 6, that makes it 50% exactly, you have to be below 50% so they have to lose 4 fire warriors to make it below 50% and once your that low and if your in CC it doesnt matter, your screwed anyway.

[Splan]

Obvioulsy it does depend on who you're up against but I usually opt for squads of 9.

Nine is optimal in terms of moral checks from shooting casualties,
since you have to make a check if you lose 25%.

If you have 8 or less in a squad, that's a check if just 2 die.
If you have 9 fellahs, 3 need to go down before a check is made - the same number that you would have to loose even if the squad was 12 strong.

I find 12 a little unwieldy too, usually not all of them can draw a bead.

Although for FWs, bonding is better value if you have a full squad.

So, depending on the things, 4 squads of 9, leaving room for a couple squads of Kroot too. (btw 13 is a good optimal number for kroot).

It's all about the numbers...

[H0urg1ass]

Firewarriors have the best basic weapon for a troop type in the whole darn game, so I would suggest taking more than 36 of them. My proposed Tau army (I'm not done purchasing it yet...) has 50 Tau Firewarriors.

But, since you asked about 36 of them, then use squads of 9. That way you can have 4 marker lights instead of 3, which are insanely useful when you want to make sure that the opponents Land Raider goes down quickly.

Also, as it has been mentioned before, you have to lose three models in either squads of 9 or 12 to take a test, so there's really no difference in that respect.