Tau Lament

[benzo12]

I have to disagree. I've been playing Tau for three years now and I have only lost two games the last two years (around 40 games). So far I've won against Orks, GK, BT, SM, 'Nids and BA.
I run three suits plus the commander, 90 kroots, 2 railheads, three broadsides and three warfish with crew.

I really don't know HOW you win with Tau. All I do is play and try to make the best of the situations i happen to face. One advice I can give, though, is to plan every move maticusly and react properly to the things that don't go as planned.

To be fair, That seems like a fairly large army, Tau seem to fair a lot better in largescale armies, particularly Apoc.

What pointcost is that all up?

[Luke Licens]

Is it bad that I came here expecting a witty song about unfortunate fishmen?

Well, I suppose I can correct that deficiency...

[url]http://youtu.be/Twyrmr4sMow[/url]

[Kall3m0n]

To be fair, That seems like a fairly large army, Tau seem to fair a lot better in largescale armies, particularly Apoc.

What pointcost is that all up?

It's around 1800p. Although I change the list a little to match the opponents' list-points.

[Mr. Furious]

Tau is a challenging army to general but when it all comes together they are a lot of fun.

Its possible to do well with Tau. Watch the BOLS bat reps and try to emulate the lists and take some cues from the strategy to get the most out of the old codex until the new one arrives.

[Captain Ismer]

Another useful thing to keep in mind is target priority. It's called a "scalpel" army for a reason - if you don't know exactly what you need to remove each turn, you're more or less wasting firepower, and you're going to suffer for it.

Hamstring their mobility first by taking out fleet infantry, transports, jump packs, ect. Your strengths are in long range shooting, so keep your opponent at that range as long as possible. Then pick a unit that presents a lot of threat (and isn't impossible to kill) and focus it down until its dead. Then pick a new unit to focus. Ect.

[LordGrise]

I play Tau exclusively (my only army) and my luck has been about fifty fifty. A couple useful bits of strategy I incorporate every time:

First, set your guys up in two positions, separated by at least eighteen inches, that can cover each other. Your opponent must decide which half he wants to go after with the bum rush, and that gives you more space to gun them down. Your crisis suits do not have to stand there and take it, so don't.

Second, markerlights. Raise BS a notch, REDUCE COVER SAVES (down to nothing if you have enough of 'em), call in seeker missiles on armor or transports. Make 'em walk in. My first target priority is always anything that can generate a big blast; my second is transports. One markerlight hit is a BS5 railgun for me.

I run railheads (big blast anti-swarm), broadsides (10/1 = anti-armor), and sniper units for the markerlights, with warfish and crisis suits for interference. Keep in mind the snipers can use their own markerlight hits, and BS4 rail rifles (6/3 heavy 1 pinning) instant kill a lot of troop models. They can also be secondary anti-armor, esp against side armors. I've killed Rhinos that way more than once.

I want tetras in the worst way, and will either be ordering a flight and soaking up the exchange rate, or kitbashing a couple of piranhas for stand-ins in the next month or so. Keep the faith, man; FW recently released a free download for all the FW Tau stuff, so as to make them available for regular games. I take this as a good sign: things are starting to happen for us...

[Panxer]

Tetras are pretty cool for the points. My only reservation is that they are vehicles, and in my experience, get chopped out before turn 3, and then, no more marker support. Models wise. I have a deep dislike and resentment for GW right now for ditching the Tau codex for 2012, so I'm going to be modding out my piranhas, calling them tetras and keeping my money for the sake of my psyche and my wallet.

Has anyone had any experience with Tau turrets?

[nimrod451]

I started Warhammer with a Tau army and have to admit i gave up..

.. The tau's strength is in their Jump Shoot Jump and Marker lights. I realized after i gave up on them how key Markerlights are.. I liked Crisis suits a lot though..

..kroot bubble wrap was a must to protect some of our units too.

[Mr. Furious]

Tau is a finesse army and can be frustrating. I started out with Tau and when I was angry and frustrated with my inability to win games, an experienced player lent me his Space Marines for a few games and it made a world of difference.

Space Marines are very balanced and leave a lot of room for a player to make mistakes and recover from them enough to do well. See if you can borrow someone's Space Marines for a little while or build yourself a small list to play for a bit. Once you play for awhile with a more balanced/forgiving army you may find that you're a lot more successful with your Tau.

Nobody likes to hear that they need a new army but it sounds like you're in a rut that some time with a Space Marine list could help you out of.

My 2 pennies.....

[ZenPaladin]

"Tau are a scaple army"

Truer words were never typed. The Tau can't torrent effectively. Most shooting armies rely on the quantity of cheep powerful attacks to do the job. Tau need to have the right gun fir the right job right on time and can't aford to have crapy dice.

Do target those transports first. Do be prepaired to lose units of kroot and firewarrirors and gun drones as speed bumps. Do use markerlight with the utmost care to ensure that what has to die does so on the needed turn.

Don't be afraid of larger unit sizes! You can't MSU the Tau well. They will take a single wound and then fail leadership and flee! Make use of target locks to split the fire of larger squads. Multiple fire bases also work well.

My friend wined that my Tau were easy mode. We played a switch army game. Turn one I drop poded a dread right in his line. He used 0 markerlights on it. Yes he fired his broadsides at it but the dice were not with him. It didn't die or get immobilized.

He quit the game after that shooting phase. He had no bubble wrap to protect his broadsides he and I both knew it was over for the Tau. It's an uphill battle for sure. But with good play and a little luck the Tau can always put up a decent fight.