Email in: Tau Army List Help (1500pts)

Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Email in: Tau Army List Help (1500pts)

Posted by Unknown

"Hey Kirby!

I’ve just recently started visiting your blog after constantly seeing references to it on Bell of Lost Souls and so far i have read a few pages worth of your articles on warhammer 40k and the competitive scene. I am originally a Tau player but since i constantly go to tournaments in my surrounding area, i have drifted away from Tau to Blood Angels. I have decided to play my Tau once again but being fully aware of their position in 5th edition i have hit a tough spot, especially after playing the new Blood Angels for quite some time. I think my main problem is a lack of opinion on Tau Empire play style, so i decided to email in a example army list of a Tau army I often find myself using as a plea for help. I plan on attending a tournament a few weeks in the future, and any criticism would be greatly appreciated

Hq
Shas’el fireknife with HW multi-tracker and targeting array – 97pts

Elites
3 fireknife Crisis suits with multi-tracker – 186pts
3 fireknife Crisis suits with multi-tracker – 186pts

Troops
6 fire warriors – 60pts
10 Kroot – 70pts
10 Kroot – 70pts

Fast
8 pathfinders + warfish with targeting array, multi-tracker, and disruption pod – 216pts

Heavy
3 Broadsides with team leader, HW targetlock, HW drone controller, 1 shield drone, Advanced.S.S, – 265pts
Railhead with SMS, multi tracker, distruption pod – 175pts
Railhead with SMS, multi tracker, distruption pod – 175pts

Thanks again for your help!

Chewy"

Glad you've enjoyed the site and come over from BoLS :). The list itself is pretty good with only tweaks recommended. You don't necessarily need that 3rd Broadside but it is of course valuable. You could change one of the Hammerheads into another Broadisde squad and thus run 2x2 instead. The Warfish can be chopped back to a barebones Devilfish with DPods thanks to the FAQ and those points can go into Kroot Hounds. You could also forego the Pathfinders entirely (buy a Devilfish for the FW) and use the points saved there and if you drop a broadside to get some Piranhas for blocking. Either PF or Piranhas work though.

The Crisis Suits are obviously fine and where the majority of your firepower is going to come from. You could run them as 3x2 instead of 2x3. This makes it harder for your opponent to kill them (more targets) but lessens the effect of the Markerlights from Pathfinders. If you did this I would probably recommend going with the Piranhas over Pathfinders as discussed above.

If you're still looking for Tau advice in 5th I'd look at the Armies in 5th posts on them and the How To for Tau. They give you some excellent insights into Tau play in 5th edition. You've got the basics of the list down pat, just need to make sure you are playing them right now and practice, practice, practice!

Comments (6)

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chumbalaya 79p · 715 weeks ago

That list looks like a pretty solid, standard Tau list. BA certainly have more flexibility in list building, but a well-built, well-played Tau army.

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SageoftheTimes 77p · 715 weeks ago

1.5k and higher demand pathfinders, Kirby. Warfishes are pointless now, though (35p for that was bad before). I'd consider finding some points to drop somewhere for a bit more crisis suits, possibly. Decent list besides that, though. Very nice to see people who know their lists ask Kirby.

2 replies · active 715 weeks ago

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Kirby 118p · 715 weeks ago

Yes and no to PF. As you move up in points you have the firepower to not need it. Just shoot through cover/low BS. Lower points you want more guns obviously so PF are less useful as they aren't cheap. I think a single squad is fine at points between 1500-2000 but not necessary if you're buying more guns.

Check this by Dan: http://kirbysblog-ic.blogspot.com/2011/02/email-i...

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Garnet · 715 weeks ago

Tau have good guns, but they rarely have a lot of guns; pathfinders are pretty essential for making sure those guns pull their weight. Look at that list. There are seven guns that can reliably kill Marines, ten if you want to use the Broadside's railguns on them, and at 1500 points there are going to be rather a lot of Marines coming up the field in dire need of killing. Bumping those crisis suits from 4+ to 3+ or even 2+, and stripping out any cover saves that blunt the effectiveness of those few plasma rifle shots, is going to be essential.

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Neil · 715 weeks ago

Having played a fair bit with a similar list (well, obviously it's a similar list since Tau are monobuild these days..):

Pirhanas seem to be either totally useless or game winning depending on the game.

Drones on the broadsides can be a trap. I can't count the number of times my broadside have taken some bolter fire, failed a save on a drone and run off the table (I had 2 broadsides with 2 drones). This wasn't a problem in the first iteration of my list (I had a commander with 2 gun drones and target lock to babysit). In fact at a tourney last weekend I changed my gameplan for the last two rounds and joined my non-target locked commander to them just for the extra warm body after they lost a drone and ran off the table in two of the first three games..

In other words, run two drones (for a unit size 5) or none.

Also, a hard wired multi tracker on the team lader broadside 9who allready has a multi tracker) is a cheap place to get in a few extra SMS shots I've found.

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Garnet · 715 weeks ago

Unless you're facing a lot of horde-heavy lists, two railheads may not be a cost-effective use of your points. Personally, I'd drop the second tank, run two two-unit Broadsides, and see about funneling the rest into some more crisis suits. Assuming you bought a broadside team leader with shield drone and ASS you'd still have 85 pts left; pull the SMS and the targeting array from the devilfish and you're up to 115. If you strip out some of the Kroot and combine the remainders into a single larger squad, you can field a 3 man unit of Deathrains, with added flamers for backup horde control.