2k Tau list first game with new codex

[Chicop76]

My first game with Tau I was hoping for Necrons, but got Black Templar instead , so this is a battle with the oldest outdated codex vs. The newest updated codex. I havn't fought Black Templar and forgot some of the wtf factor behind them. Like they get closer the more you shoot them factor.

It's interesting to note that he said his list has done really well vs Tau in the past where it's been a close lost or utter victory. With that said I can say I might be up for a decent fight.

I forgot what he had really, but he did had 10 terminators with a few storm shields, two speeders, 2 devestator squads, dreadnought, 2 squads of marines, champion.

I did get to deploy first and go first, but it's objectives which will make it an even playing field.

Here is my list.

1850

212 points commander: Fusion Blaster, Plasma Rifle, pure tide, drone controller, sheild gen, iridium, 2x marker drones

74 Etheral 2x gun drones
286
108 12 fire warriors
104 Devilfish: SMS, Black Sun, Decoy, point d
498
108 12 fire warriors
104 Devilfish: SMS, Black Sun, Decoy, point d
610
108 12 fire warriors
718
108 12 fie warriors
826
213 riptide: fusion, ion, velocity, drone contoller
1039
248,  6 stealth suits, 2x fusion, marker and target, shasvre, bonding, target lock, drone controller, 2 marker drones
1287
113 points 8 pathfinders: x3 railrifle
1400
144 Hammerhead: sms, sub, black sun, decoy, point defense
1544
144 Hammerhead: sms, sub, black sun, decoy, point defense
1688
304 3x broadsides: 3x seeker, bonding, shasvre, 2 missile drones, 2 skyfire, drone controller
1992
+1 seeker on hammerhead.

I was making 1850 and changed it to 2k at his requst. The game was very brutal for him. He lost 2 devestator squads, 5 terminators, 2 rhinos, and about 10 marines by mid way of turn 3. We ended it since all he did was kill 4 fire warriors and a missle drone and wounded a broadside and my riptide. I would had easily kill off one squad with 24 rapid firingfire warriors and two devilfish. Anyway here is how everything performed.

First off I want to review my commander. Giving him marker drones is a very good ideal. With the combined marker fire power of my commander, stealth suits, and pathfinders I easily denied cover to his devestators and destroyed them with the pie plate of death. Withi 2 turns I easily wiped out both squads, I probably could had done it in one turn if I didn't roll bad both turns.

I didn't have the chance to use the seekers due to him fielding his vehicles away from the marker lights, but by doing so he put them in sight of my broadsides and other hammerhead.

Another thing I want to point out I think the puretide and iridum armour seems like a waste of points. The puretide is not bad, but it is situational. Great if a vehicle or MC is in sight. Stubborn only really work in combat which I had an Etheral nearby any way. I kept my commnader and my etheral in my stealth team which ran behind my two devil fish. He tried to focus kill my Etheral, but gave up due to the +2 cover saves the squad had, and I was making dem saves.

I usually infiltrate my suits, but they did work out well as a 5 shot marker plat form and blast anything that got too close.

What's weird this is the first game I didn't use my free assault moves due to friendly overwatch and etheral.

My pathfinders survived pretty well in ruins. It helped that they was tucked away in a corner. They was out of range of most of his stuff, but was in range to help cover the bulk of my army. The rail rifles performed really well. The range is rather nice and it helped me kill the devestator squads. Bs 5 shots was nice even though he did get cover saves. I think if I knew I'll hit I wouldn't had gave my pure tide higher bs which would had meant rifles ignoring cover and bs 5.  I might run two squads of path finders now since they did perform to my liking.

I also wanted to mention at one point in the game my commander was bs 9 which my opponet was going WTF and my stealth suits was bs 7.

The purtide did pretty well. I lay down pie plates killing a lot of guys. He ds his terminators and it was cool that he pie plated them when they came in. Due to bad rolling to wound and good saves I only killed one. He was a fire magnent and death dealer. I might add another one now. I would say much better than taking a squad of crisis suits.

My fire warriors was nice. They as able to kill off the remaining 4 terminators with a ton of shooting they had 24 shots from rapid fire and 12 additional from etheral with 6 more from the gun drones with a bs of 5. I detach the etheral from the stealths and put him with the fire warriors. With 25 saves to save against the terminators was shot dead.

[Scalphunta]

How did the Riptide perform? Is it worth it? Is it worth taking two or three?

[The Man They Call Jayne]

I love it. It is a fantastic unit. Today I killed a Defiler and a Hellbrute with its Nova Blast. It survived right until the end where it killed itself trying to super jump for the objective.

I havn't played BTs in a very very long time, but I suspect they would be very annoying with their whole kill us and we get closer deal.

[Chicop76]

IT PERFORMED WELLL. I FOUND MYSELF USING THE PIE PLATE OF DOOM. He works really well with marker lights denying cover saves.

I gave him the melta gun which saw no use in this game. The interceptor is worth taking on him. The skyfire I figured will be equally good since he can use his 4d6 assault move to keep up with the flyer and get within melta range.

i only used him for two turns and he ham the potential to kill a lot. The problem i had was i was rolling bad for him on wounds like 5 1s on one roll. my pathfinders helped pick up the slack though.

I would say I can justify playing two of them easy. I won't do 3 simply cause i like my stealth suits. I almost say I rather run them even over broadsides as well. the large pie plate does what 2 railguns do kinds and he has the ability to take out 3 vehicles with one shot.

I wanted to also point out my devilfish did really well. They provided cover and game me the oppurtunity to dump 24 fire warrirrors on some isolated marines for 48 rapid fire love. If they was assaulted by any surviers that would had been 64 shoots heading back to the assaulting squad on overwath with 8 of them re rolling to hit. not to mention my stealth suits and riptide was close enough to pitch in as well.

The old jump out and rapid fire is still good and both my devil fish was able to kill a few marines due to terrain blocking line of sight. i fell at least two transports should be taken especally with the over watch option. I am curious about taking the tank commander and take flechette discharges for tank shocking.

only thing I don't like about Tau vehicles you have to keep moving them for the +4 cover save due to jink and stealth. Which means you are only firing one weapon if unser 6". however it didn't impact my first game and help me stay together.

Also what i thought was cool was i was advancing with tau. All my models moved up except my pathfiders. When i got too close I fell back staying out of assault range. Sadly I never got assaulted due to me vaporizing everything that got too close.

[InsaneTD]

You can still fire the others weapons, it's just snap shots, which is were twin-linked secondaries is good.

[Matt1785]

Mmm, I have been trying to put a fluffy list together but have been having trouble with fitting in everything that I want.  Would you feel it is fluffy to have both a Fireblade and a Commander or is it better to have the Ethereal and Commander?  I am really leaning towards Ethereals at this point because I have always loved the idea of them... but just think them in the field is very uncommon.

I am bothered by the poinst of the Fire Warriors wit a Devilfish because I'm not sure I can fit them in for the points.  Obviously you didn't really need the Fish since he conceded.. but say you faced a different army that was in your face (Drop Pod) do you think you would have faired well?  Do you think that if the game dien't go so well for you getting to objectives would have been a problem?  I'm having a hard time NOT bringing DF in my lists because I'm afraid of not being able to capture, but the more you add, the less models you get.  Riptide I have been hearing good things about, which is good, because I plan to run at least one... and probably just one for the fluff.

Anyone had any experience with the Fireblade yet?  How did the Ethereal perform?

[Chicop76]

Answers:

1. The etheral did really well. At one point I almost wish I had ran two. The leadership 10 bubble would had helped my fire warriors on the right side of the field. Leadership 7 is rather low and ran on the first test, but I was lucky and was able to regroup them. The funny thing about it is they ran out side of assault range and consolidated even further from the marine squad. Paying the 10 extra points for better leadership gets expensive if done for every unit. Due to objectives I had to split my forces which caused me to almost lose a squad. Even with a higher leadership they would had still ran, but if an Etheral was there they wouldn't. 25% is too easy to cause a unit to flee. 2 nd etheral or a fire blade would had helped that unit out. Thinking about it more a Fire Blade would had been probably better which would had provided 24 extra shots from them and they wouldn't had ran. Something I been thinking about if I have to split troops for claiming objctectives or denying.

In that game I wanted to claim 2 objectives and deny the other 2 by blasting any scoring unit that got remotely close. I did that pretty well and my isolated unit was simply there to blast units of with the help of a hammerhead and broadsides. The problem with the fireblade will mean no markerlight commander. However I think it would had been ok since I forgot that he can enhance a whole squads marker lights. I might try a fire blade or darkstrider next game and see how it works out.

Also like I mentioned before the Etheral helped with mass fire. I am thinking of having him in a devilfish which he makes rapid fire jump out work really well. The terminators did deep strike, but with interceptor on the riptide and 42 bs 5 pulse shots from the etheral with gundrones plus fire warriors it put down the 5 terminators. I had a lot of other shooting I could had done and I can say I could had probably dealt with 15 terminators easily in my face. Not to mention over watch.

2. The two devil fish is why he conceded really. I unloaded 48 fire warriors on the objective. You can argue that I could possibly have 24 fire warriors in my army, but the two devil fish did a lot.

A. They protected my army. Giving my stealth +2 cover save and giving cover to the bulk of my army. He was gonna try to take them out until he realized the had a +4 cover save with 12 armour. The riptide which was laying waste to his army drew a lot of shots off my devil fish as well. I guess running riptide by the fish was a good ideal.

B. They also gave me the oppurtunity to fire at squads I couldn't see for two rounds. 16 twin linked shots helped get rid of a few marines going for an objective. They was postoned in a way where terrain blocked line of sight from my whole army and my devil fish was the only units in range that can shoot through walls.

C. Disembarking into terrain is helpful due to you not having to take a difficult terrain test. Both transport got my guys in terrain, it was a large piece of area/ line of sight blocking terrain, within rapid fire range, and rather close to the objective I was trying to get too. If they was on foot they would had got shoot at over the riptide. With that said I may had not been near the objective like I wanted too as well.

D. Not only that I can get my guys to an objective protected and in a timely manner. Taking 2 allows me enough fire power to force my guys on an objective I need to take.

E. In some cases like against orcks or nids I can sit back and shoot until turn 3 which they can embark on a devil fish and on tur 4/5 disembark on an objective that is 24-36" away. The problem with kroot is they have to survive with supporting fire against the blunt of an army. With devil fish options you can stay safely in your lines and wait for an oppurtunity to send your fire warriors on an objective. In 3rd and 4th I did this a lot and it has worked rather well. Now you have a lot of outflanking and flyers which I still seing if it is still a valid strategy. Also if you move doing the shooting phase your devil fish has a +3 cover save. I may or may not use flecettes. I havn't really seen the need to do so due to my play style. Not to mention I havn't Taued inawhile and going back to 3rd and 4th tactics.


4. The fluff question. I am still reading the fluff and only use to a handful of characters. To be honest I take it Etherals and Fireblades are not a common sight. Besides a handful of Etherals it seems like they really more like motivationalspeakers than combat warriors. Besides the specials it seems they are not a common sight on the battle field. With that said it does seem like a portion of them take a battle field role. Would you see on in every campain no, but battles of importance, or battles where the Tau seem like they would win anyway I wouldn't be surprised one pops his head out. I doubt they will be there for those losing battles, he is needed somewhere else for example. Anyway I believe if you playing Tau however it is cool to sport an Etheral. In 3rd and 4th they was in every game and in 5th till the new codex they was the guy you knew that can get you the easy win over Tau. Well until Aun'shi disapeared everyone played an Etheral lol. I would say to not use an Etheral would be like Eldar not using a Farseer. It just seems odd. With Etherals being good now I can see it being fluffy to use one.

On the fireblade I see them equally rare.
A. To make it through all the trials and battles for starters. You are basically forfeiting retirement to stay a firewarrior.
B. Who doesn't want the cool suits, Fireblades that's who.

If they fit in that category they basically a fireblade. It doesn't seem like a position that many want to achieve. That being said iand what I read, so far I would say if you are using a lot of fire warriors than it will probably be fluffy. If you using 2 squads atleast which is the min. That doesn't seem fluffy to me.

The big question you have to ask seeingthe background of the Etheral and Fireblade would you see them workingtogether. I will say not really. The Etheral I see as. Politician. If he participates in battle it will be to make his station look good. With that said he will probably be in armies with Tau's best, to ensure he comes back a live. Anyway I still have to read more, but I would say besides avoinding battle, most your etherals will try to be in a battle that elevates them or make the Etherals look good as a whole. One like Aun'Shi can fight those battles where the Tau can possibly lose.

Than if you look at a fireblade it's a fire warrior good at his job, not high ranking, and not sporting one of the main symbols of Tau's tech superiority. The Etheral would want the best and highest ranking and will probably be in armies with a Commander than a fire blade.

With all that being said I tink a fireblade and etheral working together can still be fluffy. Maybe the Etheral want to send a message and gain respect from the fire warriors akin to Aun'Shi. I can see Aun'Shi using fireblades without even thinking about it, although not to many Etherals are like Aun'Shi. Another thought is the Etheral might have a low station and want to garner support and prove himself. Screw up A etheral might only can get a Fireblade to command x Tau.

5. Never used fireblade yet. The issue I have is I move with my Tau which makes the Etheral nice to have for more rapid fire. The problem with fireblade is you have to keep the unit there.