Can't beat this Tau army -- what would you do???

Hey everyone, I have two battle reports to show you. This is my friend's Tau army that keeps kicking my ass. I'm at a loss -- what would you do to beat it?

My army consists of:
- 1 archon & 4 blasterborn in a Venom
- 4 venoms with 5 kabalite warriors
- 2 Venoms with Wyches
- EDIT: forgot to me to 2 Ravagers with dark lances
- 3 warwalkers with bright lances
- Farseer on a jetbike with mantle of the lauding god
- 3 windrider jetbikes

1. Kiyose 418: The Killing Blow (1750 Points): https://youtu.be/27O8JuNtTHw

2. Kiyose 418: Progress Unbound (1750 Points): https://youtu.be/havMwo6BRvA

I feel like I should get danger pay clicking on a YouTube batrep.

Here I go...

Batrep 1 - Okay...this one looked weird to me because it appeared like he brought in Reserves on Turn 1 and so did you...? Also, it looked like some of his shots were...kinda iffy. Frankly, i do not understand how he drew line of sight to the Wych Venoms with his Broadsides and certainly not how he drew line of sight to the wyches afterwards. I didn't see any windows on that first floor. Maybe I'm crazy, but...what the heck?

Also, your deployment, frankly, looked really weird. There was a single objective point and it was practically next to your zone. If I were you I would have been camped out behind the beautiful Fortress of Redemption (I *love* having that sucker on the table when I'm playing DE) and would have let the wuss Tau come to me. Just pop some splinter rounds into the Broadsides that could see you and vice versa, do focused fire and pop, they're dead, feel free to walk another one up onto the roof to try to fight my whole army you fish-headed feeb.

This mission and board looked like it should all have been you and, yet, it ended up looking like a joke, and I'm not even sure why. Did he really have line of sight to all those units? Also, why did you come after him when you should have been forcing him to come to you?

Batrep 2 - Audio is terrible for your talking parts, and...well, you basically show almost none of the game, and by the looks of it you tied that game (I'll admit I stopped watching at the 4 minute mark) So...yeah, you got face stomped more or less, but I can't really offer any thoughts on it.

I have no idea why he is so proud of his strategy of spinning his vehicles around and pressing their backsides to terrain.

Especially since you only have one unit with lances in the entire army.

In a very general sense what is killing you is lack of long range firepower.
The thing is, with his list, it really shouldn't be *that* big of a problem since most of his threats should be able to die from focused Venom fire regardless. Are you managing to kill off things properly? It's very hard to tell (shocking insight: Thor dislikes most YouTube batreps Wink ).

4a. Please refrain from double posting. You may "bump" a post every 48hrs if you feel you are not getting responses. Double posts in project logs are acceptable. /Your friendly mod Vas

A bit more detail on the list (and what your opponent runs) would be helpful. Do your kabalites have Blasters and your Wyches Haywires? How do you arm your Archon? I could assume that all of your units have the standard accepted equipment, but... you know... that'd just be me assuming   

You do seem light on ranged anti-tank for a Dark Eldar army. But probably more importantly is that, at least in the first video (my sound decided to go fritz so I haven't watched the 2nd yet) I can't really get a feel at all for what your tactics were. The vid doesn't talk about your moves at all, what you shot, what you tried... it's a very one-sided commentary.
I also wonder at a couple of those shots he made... there's not much in the Tau army that has homing (ie, a few S5 missiles), and the range is not infinite... Shrug. Tau is pretty tough, though.

In general, I find Night Shields to work wonders. Even vs Tau, where their base range is 30", it's surprisingly effective. Knocking them down to 24", and then having 36" yourself puts you just out of range of their basic weapons (while still firing your own). Always have to remember to play to the objective, though. I've won games by not engaging.

While I haven't seen the Tau Special missions, I have seen the Tyranid ones, and those are pretty awful as a rule. The special rules (of the ones I've read in depth) are stacked completely against the Tyranids... making them come on piecemeal while the enemy is fully on the board, for example. Oh, sure, the Nid Troops come back... on the far short edge 4' from the nearest enemy... -_-

Anyway. Some of these missions may be less than balanced, and that alone could be part of the problem. As soon as I heard "and everything in this segment gets d3 markerlights..." I wanted to throw up.

jbwms713 wrote:

Anyway.  Some of these missions may be less than balanced, and that alone could be part of the problem.  As soon as I heard "and everything in this segment gets d3 markerlights..." I wanted to throw up.

  

"Tournament organizers are notorious for sticking a bunch of debris fields all over the board and thinking that's fair even as all the world marvels at how overpowered Tau and Eldar are."

I was playing in an escalation league, starting at I think 400 (it was a touch awkward), and the guy running it only allowed 5 pieces of terrain on the 4x4 board.  

When I tried to politely (exasperated as I was, as this was one of my first runs with the new Nid book) explain how certain armies are essentially shafted by this, he responded with "Well many tournaments run boards with this much cover".

He did promise to add more... eventually we got up to 7 pieces on a 6x4 board -_-




*Edit*

So I was finally able to watch the second batrep... and step one, it looks like you fared much better on that mission, coming very close to a tie. What was in combat with the Riptide at the end?

Again, the report is very sporadic.. only checking in every 2-3 turns (and largely from the Tau perspective) makes it very difficult for me, at least, to get a real feel for your game.

I wonder if maybe you're being too aggressive for the sake of being aggressive? It looked like you had a nice safe haven of LoS blocking Bastions to, basically, hide your army behind. But then the next time it shows you most of the vehicles are down... sometimes point denial is the best strategy.

Sorry for the late response. Wanted to get his full army list before posting anything. I also forgot to mention that I also have 2 Ravagers with dark lances

Here it is:


Tau Empire 1752

Commander with twin linked fusion blaster and plasma gun and Iridium armour and 2 Shielded Drones
2 Fire Warrior teams
9 Broadsides with Shield Drones
2 Riptides with 2 Shielded Missile Drones and Stimulant Injector
2 Devilfish with 2 Seeker Missiles, Disruption Pod and Point Defence System

1752

- We play all kinds of missions from all kinds of expansions. Honestly, I don't know where he pulls them all from -- but they're legit because I get to read the rules from the books he has, such as Death Worlds

- About line of sight: he has some sort of missile system that allows him to fire without using line of sight. These guns are 30" range and his Broadsides as well as Devilfish are all equipped with them

- As long as I'm out in the open, most of his army has 72" range guns that can destroy my Venoms easily, so as long as he can see me even a little bit -- I'm dead. So with that in mind, I lose all gun fights against him. Keep in mind he's also got a 2+ save with 2 wounds per broadside, AND the rest of his army can easily out-range dark eldar in all scenarios and situations

- why did i not force him to come after me? because the moment i would move out of cover to shoot at him, he always had line of sight, so he just had to shoot me. also the scenario forces me to have reserves come in, and unfortunately they came in piece-meal..

- yeah i'm aware that i lack long range firepower. but i don't have anything that can out-range him.. in fact only the imperial guard codex can (presently) out-range him.. most of his guns are 72", or else they ignore line of sight AND cover at 30" away

- about my list: all my warriors have 1 blaster with them, and all the wyches have haywire grenades. my archon has the venom blade and shadow field, and she has 4 blasterborn in her venom with her

- about the second video, i managed to engage my archon into close combat with one of his riptides. yeah i almost got a tie out of it.. in fact i almost got a win. however i did this by MASSIVELY manipulating line of sight and staying out of range of his guns that ignore line of sight (until i finally screwed up and he got me)

- no i wasn't being overly aggressive. what you might not see in the video is that i was making sure he could only see me with 1 riptide whenever i poked out to fire at him (did this by manipulating huge pieces of terrain), but of course he eventually found a way around this strategy PLUS a moment of lack of attention on my part screwed me over

- i'll post another bat-rep later, with a regular mission from the big rulebook to show you guys what a 'normal' game looks like. i'll make sure it's more thorough

we_r_the_4th_wall_in_40k wrote:

Commander with twin linked fusion blaster (18") and plasma gun (24") and Iridium armour and 2 Shielded Drones
2 Fire Warrior teams (30")
9 Broadsides with Shield Drones (36" for HYMP, 30" for SMS)
2 Riptides (72" for Ion Accelerator, 36" for HBC) with 2 Shielded Missile Drones (36") and Stimulant Injector
2 Devilfish (18") with 2 Seeker Missiles (72"), Disruption Pod and Point Defence System

...As long as I'm out in the open, most of his army has 72" range guns

I haven't looked at the videos but I've just edited in the ranges of the weapons usually found on the models you've listed above. Not much is 72", basically Ion Accelerator on Riptide and Seeker Missiles on the Devilfish (which are 1-shot). You should be investing in Night Shields and taking him out with Dark Lances. Don't forget that his Broadsides are only T4 so each lance shot instakills them.

Good advice from Count A. Don't forget to first remove drones with Venoms.

I'll second the Count on the range thing, I'm also not sure what 'getting him to come to you' involves with poking out to shoot him. When you have the objective - you can literally sit and wait, and it should all be on him to come and get it.

I just checked with my buddy and he said he made a mistake: the guns (heavy rail rifles) on the broadsides aren't 72" but rather 60".. so even if i shave off 6" using night shields, he's still got 54" whereas i have 36"

ultimately i feel that the broadsides are what are killing me. every time he fields them i die. again the issue is: when i come out of hiding to shoot, he kills my venoms with (yep) the broadsides, the riptides and, even if he has one shot for his long-range missiles on the devilfish.. man.. it's just a storm of firepower

every turn i come out of cover i lose 3 to 5 venoms (i only have 5..), or 2 ravagers and a couple of venoms

by the way, about the objectives.. if i have an objective in my table quarter, he also has one in his. the issue of taking more than one objective is big in these games. anyways like i said, next time i'll film and play a more 'normal' mission from the rulebook -- something generic like purge the alien

Unless you've missed something off his list he has no markerlight support. That means his Broadsides are hitting on 4+ and can't ignore cover. Even with the extra range they have on you there shouldn't be anything stopping you from getting your Ravagers and War Walkers in range to kill them off. Use Venoms to kill off any drones then use your Farseer to Guide a Ravager and Prescience the War Walkers. They should easily kill off 2 units of Broadsides per turn.

Well, the pods ignore cover, but the longer range rail guns do not. Plus, rail guns are about the optimal thing we want shot at us, high strength, low number of shots - cover, jink, and flickerfields are built to laugh off that sort of stuff.

I think the Count might be overstating what the Ravager would do to the Suits, since from what I saw your opponent had them pretty married to cover - but he does have a point that lances are a highly optimal Broadside killer once you peel off the drones, and that really is the best way to frag them at that point, cover or not.

I didn't watch the videos so no idea what the cover position is but even with cover you're still looking at 9 twin-linked lance shots which is enough to do 6 or 7 instant death wounds to the Broadsides. Even with 4+ cover that's a lot of dead Broadsides, and Tau morale isn't that good so there's a decent chance the survivors will break.

I'll try everything you guys said.. Just blast his Broadsides with Splinter Cannon, Dark Lance and Bright Lance firepower.. each broadside has 2 drones to act as ablative wounds and yes, he ALWAYS has enough terrain pieces at his house to ensure that each Broadside team is in cover, in the ruins of a building,..

We'll see what happens

His list was 1752 points? Then you won both games anyway as that is an automatic forfeit in any kind of competitive game.

He isn't playing any pathfinders? weird. But Here goes, his army can easily be destroyed. Your priority at this moment would be The broadsides and then the suites. Yes riptides are scary but that's the whole point, when i play with mine i want people to target it and I throw it in their face because it is sooooo good at soaking up that damage. So with that idea in mind you will probably want to adjust your strategy. What i would do against him.

1. Focus fire those pesky broadsides, 2+ armor is good but with your saturation of fire not even they will survive. His cover will not matter his armor is 2+ anyway and unless a unit is with shadowsun their cover will be worse. Use blasterborn against these to increase your odds (and saturation of firepower)

2. Tie up the riptides in CC, yes it has smash attacks but wyches have 4++ so it doesnt matter he will probably use the base 3 attack. You want the Ion accelerator out of commission first because of the range, the HBC does not have earth caste array so he will be nova charging anything but the weapon. 5 wounds for DE aint no thang. CC will take them out for one of their shooting turns which is all you need to remove broasides. and they dont have bonding knives so thats a plus for you.

3. No murkerlight support, AHAHA wow. Nothing to really say here other than his Seekers hit at firing BS and they take up a Weapon slot, THEY CAN NOT BE FIRED WILLY NILLY!

4. I would say the troops and devilfish are last priority. If you have 2 ravagers however you might as well shoot into them first turn but fire last to see how much damage you have dealt to the main targets. If he has not gone first blast them away because he has no cover, however if he has he probably has disruption pod and at least a 4+ cover, therefore worry about the broadsides.

Target priority..

1. Broadsides

2. Riptide ION

3. Riptide Ion. (no markerlights if nova charged will drift an average of 4")

4. Troops

My logic, Mass shots > MC > Scoring Utilize nightshields (the riptides are a tricky subject because it depends on how he is playing them so i tend to contradict myself OH WELL.

With no murkerlight support his whole army is BS3, which is fantastic for you.
Nightshields Nightshields Nightshields
And like all guides for DE shoot until something is dead and move on.
His army looks scary but it's kind of lackluster with his choices, the Broadsides and Riptides are nasty but not so much at bs3, he is only crippling himself feed off his weakness and slice him apart.

Option 2.
Assuming he is jumping out his Riptides and throwing them around your face you could just hang even further back and pump ALL of your shots onto them in one turn. With Nightshields you will effectively be out of range of everything except his seeker missiles (thats fine they are bs3 for a one time and he has 4, however they will all be used. I ALWAYS use all of mine.)
I'm assuming that after your first turn of shooting at least 1 of the riptides is dead. If not both. (you're rocking 7 venoms dude that many shots alone will wipe them out, i just rolled it.)
Badabing Badaboom now hug a corner and take out those broadsides. GG.

Don't even bother assaulting anything that is within 6" of something. especially since even his Devilfish can overwatch.

If he is rocking the TL RR on the broadsides your going to need to hug cover more and then i would probably disregard the riptides until they are gone.

If I was him i would hug Everything except the riptides in the corner and throw the riptides at you, Which at the same time is exactly what I would want me to do against me. Most players would spread out their shots, don't. But it looks like he is using the devilfish to move up his troops? (or is he using it for cheap cover?) Anywhoo. I'm assuming hes bunched up because there is no other way to play tau, which is why i'm starting DE. Take out his riptides and then move to one side and attack a flank. I'm just rambling at this point there are so many accounts to factor in that I continue to have more to add. Hopefully I was able to point out some of the more obvious tactics that he could use and their flaws. If not you know what to go for and can plan accordingly.

-Rumble

It's very rare that my DE/eldar lose to tau even with their allies and the lists are much stronger than the one he's fielding. First dont be reduced to being the aggressor. Prioritize first blood to make him the aggressor. We excel at secondary objectives although we also give them up easily too.

Then just as importantly HUNT HIS TROOPS not his tides. Don't forget the basics of this game because killing his troops and preserving your own will win you so many games. His is especially weak to this strategy so punish him for it.
Take units designed to excel at this task like beasts and warp spiders and watch his immobile army struggle to beat you with no scoring and little contesting. Spread objectives out to use your speed and emphasize his lack there of. Leave troops in reserve to forward this plan. This is all opposite of the post above but trust me it it's the correct approach. Don't let him think 2 FW squads are adequate. They aren't but he's beating you because your playing his game.

As secondary priorities:
Kill the broadsides. Note these are tooled against you so do the same.. bring a large beast pack and laugh as his single shot AT weapons bounce off 12 pt models screaming down on him to multi assault.

Kill riptides by dropping A drone to force Ld tests. Otherwise prioritize them low. With no marker support they become rather mediocre at damage output.. accept for denying objectives due to 4d6 jumps.

If you can pick up a wraithknight, they were designed to kill riptides. Oh and a couple of units of eldar jetbikes are absolute gold although you can win without either.

Do these things and he will be forced to adjust his list and strategy to beat you I promise.