How to equip Tau Crisis Suits?

[Wayniac]

Forgive me if this is the wrong place for this kind of question - tactics seemed appropriate.

I am starting up 7th edition after not playing since 3rd and I am looking to collect a Tau (non-Farsight) army. I've been reading through some guides but I haven't been able to find any guidelines for equipping Crisis Suits. In my day Plasma/Missile Pod (Fireknife) for take all comers/MEQ, Burst Cannon/Missile Pod (Firestorm) for non-MEQ, and TL Fusion (Sunforge) for tankbusting were the most common configurations used, but I'm fairly certain this has changed in 12 years.

What are the ways to equip them now? I have two suits in my collection right now that are still on the sprue; I am inexperienced with conversions so I do not plan to magnetize them (too afraid that I will ruin the model) and I don't plan to play competitively. I was thinking either dual Missile Pods or maybe Plasma/Fusion, but I'm not sure if taking Twin Linked or just two of one weapon is the better option, or if I should specialize with two of the same versus variety, etc. I already put a third suit together for possible use as a Commander with dual Fusion guns because it looked cool, but I have the remaining two to figure out.

[ElectricPaladin]

First of all, magnetizing crisis suits is pretty easy in my opinion.

Secondly will have to wait because I need to make breakfast for my wife. But there are lots of options, which is why you should magnetize.

[Houghten]

It's a whole different ball game equipping suits in the 6th Edition Codex, for two chief reasons:

1) You get the multi-tracker for free (both points-wise and system-wise) now

2) You can equip two of the same weapon without twin-linking them

Plasma Rifle, Missile Pod, Multi-Tracker ("Fireknife") used to be the way to throw out a lot of high-Strength shots, but now you can just take a pair of plasma rifles or a pair of missile pods. Also, you can take Broadsides with twin-linked plasma rifles and a new thing called a twin-linked high yield missile pod, making them effectively slower, shootier Fireknives (for which reason I call them Broadswords).

Some things do still hold true from the previous codex, though. You still generally want to avoid burst cannon, unless you're doing an all-suit army. Your Fire Warriors put out plenty of S5 AP5 shots and at nearly twice the range.

Personally, I like a little bit of twin plasma rifle, juuuuuust a little bit of twin fusion blaster, and a scoop of high-yield missile pods. It's a bit like running a bunch of Fireknives, but with the weapons redistributed so the plasma rifles aren't wasted on 4+ bodies and vice versa.

When there are spare points, I also frequently spend that third slot on a flamer, because sometimes the 2d6" jetpack move whiffs and leaves me in assault range, at which point I want to be able to do d3 automatic hits on Overwatch.

You may also have heard about a thing called a "Buffmander." This is a Commander with no weapons of his own and two Signature Systems: Command and Control Node, and Multi-Spectrum Sensor Suite. He joins the unit of your choice and lets them re-roll hits and ignore cover, thus nearly freeing them from Markerlight dependency (though spending a couple to get BS5 still doesn't hurt).


---

Silly side note:

One thing I'd like to try in Unbound is a unit of suits all with twin cyclic ion blasters and another with twin airbursting frag projectors. Only I'm not sure whether or not Unbound actually lifts the "one per detachment" restriction on those when it discards the idea of detachments. Maybe they just become "one per army."

[DaveTycho]

First of all, pick what role you want for your crisis suits, ie anti-tank, anti-infantry, anti-marine. Once you decided what you want your team to go after, kit the whole team out with two of the same weapon, ie all with two plasmas, all with two burst cannons.

I wouldn't worry about support systems too much as I prefer to keep crisis teams cheap. Although if your fielding drones with your teams, have at least one guy (or better, a BS5 commander) with a drone controller. If those drones are marker drones, having a commander with the team is a must. BS5 markerlights due to the commander's drone controller is so good. If you do this approach, make sure that the whole team and commander also has target locks, so the markerlights can target one unit and the rest of the team can target another unit(s).

You can go for one twin-linked gun and one normal gun if you want, but it's costly and you wouldn't be able to get any war gear either if you want. You can go with mixed weapons for a take all comers approach, but I don't recommend it. Being able to field two of the same weapon now is just so much better.

Don't just go for one twin-linked weapon either. Paired weapons and lots of markerlights make this redundant.

Also to point out is that two missile pods is a pretty good all round weapon as you can take out light infantry/ armour with little problem; and can spam out enough shots to make marines fail a few armour saves too, all with a decent 36" range. If you don't have any missilesides or any other anti-air, a crisis team with two missile pods and velocity trackers are a decent stand in.

I have little experience with the airburster projector and the cyclonic ion gun, so I can't tell you if they're any good or not, but I'd leave them for commanders. I also can't tell you which weapon load outs are better either as they are all pretty good, although missile pods are probably better anti-infantry weapons than burst cannons because of the missile pods good range, higher strength and better AP. That doesn't mean burst cannons are bad, it's just that missile pods are a better fit for crisis teams. Besides stealth teams and piranhas are better suited with burst cannons, as well as forgeworld XV9's if you got any.

On a final note, one thing I noticed is that teams with two plasmas is curiously not as good as pumping out 4 ST6 AP2 shots at 12" per model sounds. It's not as plasma rifles are bad (they haven't changed), I think it's just with the the other tau guns getting better, riptide super guns and the changing meta of 6th ed making ST7 weapons better.

I hope any of this helps

[DaveTycho]

Silly side note:

One thing I'd like to try in Unbound is a unit of suits all with twin cyclic ion blasters and another with twin airbursting frag projectors. Only I'm not sure whether or not Unbound actually lifts the "one per detachment" restriction on those when it discards the idea of detachments. Maybe they just become "one per army."[/QUOTE]

In theory, I'd say you probably could do that. Maybe on the safe side go with one per model, and you still spam them out, than "one per detachment" as it says in the codex. Since you can also field several detachments of tau you get more than one of the airbursters and cyclonic ion guns that way too.

[Wayniac]

Thanks for the tips I think to start I'll probably go one with 2x Plasma (anti-MEQ) and one with 2x Missiles (anti-Everything Else), that seems like a good all-around option, and then I have the third that I'm likely to use as a Commander that has 2x Fusion. I've read about that "Buffmander" thing but honestly that doesn't seem that fluffy to me (a suit with no weapons??) and when I'm starting out anyways I likely wouldn't have anything for him to really buff (Not sure if it's the one I'm thinking of but was that part of the tactics used with the Riptide? Put a Buffmander with a Riptide, re-roll attacks or something?).

Not suit related but from what I'm reading it seems like vehicles got a buff so maybe the Fish of Fury tactic is coming back I wouldn't abuse that but I consider it very fluffy to have a highly mobile/mechanized Tau army so anything to make it worthwhile taking more vehicles is a plus in my book.

[ElectricPaladin]

Another fun buffmander variant is the one with all those same upgrades, plus a drone controller, and put him with a unit of four or five marker drones. With all the drones firing at BS4, twin-linked, you are almost guaranteed to put four or five marker tokens on anything that must die. Then you can use the rest of your army for the kill.

Anyway, my opinions on the non-special weapons:
• Burst cannons are too common in the army, as is 5/5 shooting. You don't need 'em.
• Fusion blasters are ok if you want a semi-expendable squad to go after vehicles, though honestly with railguns in the game I'm not sure why you'd bother.
• Plasma rifles are still the best.
• Missile pods are great, especially for taking advantage of the jetpack move (ie. with that much range it's much easier to jump in and out of cover).
• Flamers are still meh, except in overwatch.

IMHO, missile pod/plasma rifle and dual or twin-linked missile pods are still your best options, though perhaps not by quite as much as they used to be, now that the rest of the codex is so much more versatile.

[Halollet]

The way I load out my suits its to fill in the gaps in the rest of my army.

I usually equip mine with TL ML/ML to knock out transports so my FW can take out the passangers and I also run TL FB/FB and deep strike them in to take out really big tanks.

For suits, I say equip them with what your army doesn't have!

[Maximumwarp]

I'm just getting back into playing too (been away since 5th) and Hallolet has the best strategy. I'm going to do some magnetizing on my suit weapons so I'm able to fill gaps with them.

[WickedGood]

I really like the following set up:
Crisis Suit 2 X Fusion, Vectored Retro thrusters
Crisis Suit 2 X Fusion, Target lock
Crisis Suit 2 X Fusion, Target lock
2 X shield drones

I run this with a commander
2 X fusion
Puretide chip, Iridium armor
2 X shield drones

You run the commander at the front of the unit and the 4 shield drones immediately behind him. This is a very tough unit to crack. And it can engage 2 targets with 4 fusion each. Very good results.