Oh how we love the Tau

http://www.belloflostsouls.net/2015/10/breaking-tau-xv95-ghostkeel-rules.html

Little blue freaky things.

Fly straight up to it and shoot it dead.

No surprises here.

Wow. The more I see about Tau units make me think they are quite OP... 125 points for a heavy weapon platform with 2+ saves..

Eh, no more OP then any of teh new stuff tho. so it's really not unexpected or worth complaining about.

I just played a tau opponent and he conceded in his second turn. I don't see how their new suits will change anything. You beat them by staying out of their range or by rushing in and crushing them in combat with units like grotesque. I have a tau army as well myself and I would tell you that from the other side of looking at things, I'm not too impressed with the new suits.

What's the Tau kill range? Isn't it more than ours?

@Cptmetal: Yes, it is. 48" range on many of their missiles. 30" range on their base weapons. They can out shoot us, and are almost as maneuverable as we are. (More, in some cases.) The only thing we really do better than them is assault.

lessthanjeff wrote:

I just played a tau opponent and he conceded in his second turn.  I don't see how their new suits will change anything.  You beat them by staying out of their range or by rushing in and crushing them in combat with units like grotesque.  I have a tau army as well myself and I would tell you that from the other side of looking at things, I'm not too impressed with the new suits.

I'm not in the "I hate Tau" camp, and normally win my games against the Tau, but they are usually some stiff work for me.

I play Tau too. The Stormsurge doesn't impress me, but the Ghostkeel seems solid, and the Supremacy is just a god among plastic army men.

CptMetal wrote:

What's the Tau kill range? Isn't it more than ours?

It depends on what you and your opponent are using. For facing fire warriors, markerlights, and broadsides (which are usually the biggest threats in my opinion) we have the advantage in range and mobility. i move up venoms, disintegrators, and lances so they're just barely in range of a few of their models, fire and kills what's there leaving nothing within 36". Then the broadsides or markerlights have to move up to hit you and are snapshooting while the fire warriors and smart missile systems are completely out of range. One of my local tau opponents frequently runs triple riptides, but I don't find that they kill enough to justify their points.

The only missiles they have at 48" are seeker missiles and I don't see many of those getting added on to models. Maybe a single skyray? Most of their missiles are 30 or 36".

Hmmm.

I think your situation sounds a little atypical. Between cover, assault moves, and deep strikers, I don't generally have the luxury of staying 36" away in my games against Tau, and I don't think most other folks do either.

Sure, I do get deepstriking suits. Usually one or two with fusion blasters, not missile launchers. Assault moves are done after shooting, so you can still outrange them and those are only on the crisis suits not the missilesides. The one staple I see in every tau list is the tau firebase support cadre which eats up a third of the enemy army off the bat. The only mobile units I generally see are the commander with 6 attached marker drones and riptides. The other pieces aren't relentless and don't have jump pack moves to cause problems with outranging.

So you think your experience with Tau is typical of what other Dark Eldar players are experiencing? Even though most DE players here are saying that Tau are a very stiff match for them?

No, I'm just wondering what units you're seeing instead. I looked through a few pages on dakka dakka to see if the armies I was facing seemed atypical, but most of them featured a lot of the same fire warriors, pathfinders, and missile side mixes. I suspect a lot of players don't bring their units up to maximum range and approach dealing with them in the same way I do, which is why I was offering that as tactical advice for outgunning the gunline army.

Thanks lessthanjeff - I don't play Tau on a regular basis so I'm very glad for every piec of advice I fome across. You never know who your next tournament opponent is after all.

No problem, I hope it helps! I may play many armies, but the dark eldar are still my favorite.

The tau players in my area all do similar things. They love to bunch up to take advantage of Supporting Fire. They love to run Pathfinders to attempt to spam Markerlights. They love to drop in their Crisis Suits and Riptide(s).

I am building a Corpsethief Claw, rocking Stinger Pods, just for all those tau in their litle castles. They love their drones, and especially in the case of Riptides and Broadsides, the drones give you more hits than you would normally get.

Pathfinders, and other foot slogging infantry, and MCs, I deal with with a Scalpel Squadron. Dropping them in, moving the rest of your army into place, then shooting their Markerlights off the table, and then crippling his biggest threats. He runs his Riptide with the 2 Shielded Missile Drones. Shoot at them, with drones closest, with Ossefactor(s), kill a drone, roll a d6 to determine additional S6 wounds, then flip a coin (heads for Riptide, tails for other drone).

One of the Tau guys likes his Hammerhead(s), and I like the impact a Dark Artisan has upon his strategy. WWP on the Haemy, Spirit Probe on Cronos, and TL Heat Lance on Talos.

I also like to run a Scarlet Epicureans formations, but add a unit of 15 Wyches from a Realspace Raiders Detachment, and have the haemy join them. The 5+ cover, or 4+ w/ Night Fighting, and FNP makes them much more survivable. Haemy lets them treat PFP as +1 turn, granting FNP(6+), and the Spirit Probe on Cronos Grants standard FNP. Make haemy your Warlord, watch your tau opponent shoot at it, get annoyed by cover then FNP, devote markerlights to attempt to strip away cover, devote bigger guns to get your warlord. Put on you best troll face when he triggers Haemy's WL trait giving you d3 Victory Points. Meanwhile, he has neglected much of the rest of your army, allowing them to close in on him.

I think this fits in here nicelyand gives me an outlet to vent some frustration. Yes, I got tabled yesterday in a 850pt Highlander style tournament in my last game. It ended 30 - 2.

Iridium Puretide Chip Commander
3 Suits with plasma

Sniper Drones

Riptide

2 Broadsides (missles)

2 units of Tau FWs


He got first turn and killed my Blasterborn and a Raider. I then made his Sniper Drones run and his Broadsides, too after killing one.

He then shot down my Ravager and made my Venom jink, gg.

I think I killed 1 Broadside, half his Sniper unit (Markerlights) and 3 Firewarriors all game. Oh, and put a wound on his commander.

All this high volume / high strength / ignore cover rolled into one army seems pretty imbalanced when you have nothing but jink/cover else as defensive measures. I know some of you guys have more success against Tau but for me, with a TAC list, I don't see it. Even with a Coven army - no formations in this comp hurts too much, but when you open formations you also get stuff like Firebase Support Cadre so...

At least he got trounced by grav spam the game before...

/whine

The highlander format is insanely bad for Dark Eldar. Not to say tau aren't powerful. But playing with one hand behind your back doesn't help.

What is the Highlander format exactly?

It varies but as I understand it "there can be only one" of each unit.  No spam.

Also when you slay the opposing warlord there is a miniature lightning storm on the tabletop, and anything Egyptian gain a scottish accents for some reason.

Yes, we have one coming up in vancouver and it is essentially:

- no formations

- must be battle-forged

- only one of every unit, the exceptions are (to make CAD) troops and dedicated transports where you can take multiples if you have exhausted all options. So, if a DE player had takena unit of Warriors and one of Wyches, then they could take another of Warriors. Ditto with Venoms and Raiders.

If you're interested:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1p229VZRpNcFD1eh28BV_LEHJgZlnIboJFBgeCcMtBGM/edit?pli=1

https://www.facebook.com/events/171552623183856/

In my experience, DE aren't any worse off in a Highlander format than in a regular one. But that isn't saying a whole lot at the moment.

Mushkilla wrote:

The highlander format is insanely bad for Dark Eldar.  Not to say tau aren't powerful. But playing with one hand behind your back doesn't help.

Thank you Mushkilla


The tournament was comped like Gobsmakked lines out, except that only certain transports were allowed as duplicates, and then only 2 max. Venoms were not one of them, but Raiders were.


The other 3 games were alright - I won against grav spam White Scars (so sorry for your bad matchup - not!), won against Dark Angels and then lost against another Dark Angel player but that was because of imperfect micro management. Only the Tau game stood out, the Tau player even apologized and was a good sport. Still, stupid Tau!