Editing Warhammer 40,000/7th Edition Tactics/Tau (section)

===Unit Usage===

<b>Burst Cannons Vs. Smart Missiles Vs. Gun Drones</b><br>
Smart Missiles are better than Burst Cannons, period. The real question is now whether to take Gun Drones or Smart Missile Systems. Pinning, detachability and passenger firing status but BS2 vs Homing, Ignores cover and extra range, it all depends on your views on secondary armaments. If you think of them as a source of more dakka take SMS, but if you think of them as defensive guns so that you don't get swarmed then take the drones, their strategies when detached discussed more under the "ABCD" strategy.

'''Wall of Death'''<br>
Piranhas are Fast Vehicles and possess AV 11 in their front armor. Even while this is akin to a death wish against S7, this makes them impervious to most handguns such as bolters and lasguns. One can use Piranhas as a mobile "wall" against squads of foot-slogging infantry. The infantry will be unable to pass through the Piranha squad, and the Piranhas can even fire with essential impunity. For added hilarity, do not forget your Flechette launchers. If used properly, Piranhas can even block enemy vehicles, by moving in a way said vehicle cannot turn or move without coming within 1" of it. The vehicle would have to move back, turn, and move out, avoiding the 1" proximity, disrupting their entire movement and possibly shooting phase. Just be careful when the vehicle shoots back. Oh what's that? Disruption pods give Stealth now? Stick these bad boys on your Piranha, and laugh as your opponent tries to get through a 3+ cover save as you flat-out right into his face. Or for even more hilarity, Seeker missiles. Now that Piranha doesn't even need to see those tanks to kill them.

'''The firing line'''<br>
Take 1 full squad of fire warriors behind a ADL with a Cadre Fireblade and Darkstrider. Then one unit of pathfinders next to it. Then use Aun'va and a minimum squad of Kroots with sniper rifles as expendable bodies and as CQC punching bags if necessary. You'll have at 19"+ 26 S5 shots from the Fire Warriors squad, and a little closer Darkstrider and the drones add six Pinning shots, and the foe will have a -1 T so you wound marines on a 2+! Within 15" it's 44 S5 -1T to foe. Give those Pathfinders some Rail Rifles, if necessary let Darkstrider switch to them and instakill MEQ and TEQ with 4T. If you face a lot of T5, Ion rifles can give you instakill when overcharged. That is if you don't mind the gets hot on your Tau!

'''ABCD: Annoying Bullshit/Cover Drones'''<br>
Crisis and, to a lesser extent, Stealth suits are famous for the Jump-Shoot-Jump tactic: the ability to jump out of cover, fire and jump back in, leading to endless annoyance for your opponent. But this also works in reverse, with the humble Gun Drone and, well, pretty much anything that can be obscured by them; the important thing being <u>the drones must be from a separate unit</u> instead of taken as upgrades by the bubble-wrapped unit. The ones that come "free" with vehicles such as the Devilfish can work, but the Piranhas' are better (the actual Piranhas costing less than its 2 Drones: 14+14+[[Derp|''12'']]), but a proper Drone team will last longer, although those DO grant a VP for their destruction. There are 2 variations of pretty much the same thing - putting some annoying drones in the way; both of them become useless when facing Ignores Cover, Blasts or enemy Jump Units.
*'''Mobile cover:''' ''aka Backwards Jump-Shoot-Jump''. Keep them near the unit you want to protect, both of them fire and then you move the Drones in the assault phase to grant your squishy units free 5+ cover, which turns into a decent 4+ cover save in the open for your vehicles equipped with Disruption Pods, up to a ''2+ Bullshit-Barrier'' for Stealth teams; great if you use this to get Jumping Fusion near enemy AV. Let's face it - you'd rather have those T4 4+ save Drones tank some hits than your valuable dudes with special weapons, even if Stealth teams are 3+/4+++. Incoming melta? Deploy ABCD ASAP, the more abbreviations the better.
*'''Drone wall:''' Properly placed (ie. abuse coherence), the same tactic can shield your dudes from charges with the added benefits of Supporting Fire and the fact that your enemy will probably kill those drones in ''his'' turn...so you can blow him to smithereens now that they have foolishly placed themselves within Rapid Fire range. This can achieve what Disruption pods can't - save you from meltabombs.

[[Image:Kroot_Trolling.jpg‎ |thumb|Just look at that grin on his face. An epic troll.]]
'''Kroot Konga Line'''<br>
Place a big line of Kroot in front of your firing line, stretching all across the board. This keeps enemy units from assaulting you and you can abuse Supporting Fire by having your whole army overwatch a single unit. Add Markerlights and Counter Fire Defense Systems to drink your opponents tears. (This works because only the overwatching unit needs Supporting Fire, not the unit being charged.)

'''British Firing Line'''<br>
If you've seen The Patriot, you'll know what this means. Basically, just push as many warriors out on the field with two pulse rifles Tau up in the front and put all of the carbines in the back. Camp like a bitch in terrain but make sure there is a bit of open ground. Exploit the Supporting Fire special rule ruthlessly. Send your Crisis suits out to kill any and all ordnance carrying enemies. Have Broadside suits camp in the back to pound the living shit out of any assaulting units using their Heavy Rail rifles, while said assaulting units are being chewed the fuck out of them. Laugh as you see said enemy cry as his precious troopers being chewed to bits by fire. As powerful as this is against an enemy who has to cross the tabletop, this strategy's main vulnerability is from enemies who can bypass the firing line altogether, either through Deep Strikes or Outflank maneuvers. You might want to hold a Crisis team back as a mobile reserve, jumping up and down the line to counter threats as they come up and lend extra fire power to prevent the line from collapsing.  

'''Out Dakka Anything'''<br>
The new codex reduces the costs of damn near EVERYTHING. This allows you to take more bodies than [[Khornate Knights|all the dead Sisters that the Grey Knights killed]]. In a 2,000 point battle, ten 12 man squads of Firewarriors, 6 FULL squads of suits with Plasma Dakka, the blueberry space Pope swinging his scepter around saying "Shoot them again!", and then whatever amount of dakka you want to take in whatever amounts allows you to fill something with enough pulse/plasma dakka to ensure it's dead. Be sure to bring your tearcups when facing large amounts of infantry, and even flyers wont be able to stand up to 1,200,000 pulse rifle shots a turn - '''''Note:''' That's still [[Dakka|not enough dakka]].''.

'''The Bruiser Squad'''<br>
Shadowsun with three XV9's, kitted out with whatever gun you want.  Got an annoying MC that's SOMEHOW survived a hammerhead/R'Varna combo?  An annoying distraction unit?  Or maybe a little god squad tucked in the corner.  This little unit is like your meched out Don Corleone and his crew.

'''The Gruesome Twosome'''<br>
O'Ra'lai, Shadowsun and her Command-link drone.  Float Ms. Tsundere behind Mr Big Bad Angry Tau Grandpa and use her drone to nominate him.  If you thought re-rolling the Riptide's "Gets Hot!" was good, wait until you get a load of giving that gift to O'Ra'lai weapons.  Yeah.

'''NEW Fish of Fury'''<br>
Devilfish transports make excellent cover for Jetpack jumping Crisis Suits.  Drive up the board with your suits immediately behind, jump out with your jetpacks, shoot the crap out of stuff, jump back behind the Devilfish with your Thrust move, stay hidden!  Watch your opponent foam at the mouth as he can't see your suits behind your vehicle.  Make sure you fit a disruption pod to the Devilfish... That'll probably ensure that they stick around for a while under heavy fire.  Also, don't forget to fire the weapons that are on your 'fish.

'''Tommy Gun Firewarriors'''<br>
Make a single Firewarrior squad vomit more shots than your opponent's army. Works best if you have Farsight allies. Take Cadre Fireblades with two Gun Drones for all of your HQ slots and attach them to one unit of Firewarriors (make sure to take a Shas'ui with a Gun Drone as well) then place them in a fortification or heavy cover. Each Fireblade will add an extra shot to all of your Pulse Rifles and Carbines when they don't move, turning your S5 single shot gun at 30", into 4 shots with only 3 Fireblades. At 15" that single squad will be vomiting 115 S5 AP5 shots a turn, and if you add 1 more Fireblade with drones it spikes up to 156 shots. Throw some backfield artillery and objectives to draw them in and they won't know what hit them when you open your 5th dice box. Just don't expect this to work on round two.

'''Those Fucking Stealth Suits and Tetras/Pathfinder Devilfish'''<br>
This tactic only really works well with the Farsight Enclaves list, since Crisis suits no longer compete with Stealth Suits for the elite slot. Fill out a full team of six stealth suits in the following way: 5x Burst cannons with Counterfire, 1x Shas'vre (trust me, the LD boost helps) with a fusion blaster, marker light, target lock and VRT, two gun drones (total 270 points).  Take a supporting team of Tetras or a Pathfinder squad with the recon drone and Devilfish.  All of your troop crisis suits and elite hazard suits should be in reserve for deep strike. Combining the Scout move of the Pathfinders/tetra and the Infiltrate of the stealth suits creates several homing beacons that cannot be easily destroyed, so when the enemy finally thinks that they are about to crush your paltry army, in come the reinforcements perfectly placed to dump liquid troll on your enemies army.  

Why that particular set up for the Stealth suits, you ask?

Consider this: A full stealth team totes the same firepower as a full squad of fire warriors double-tapping. That is 24 delicious shots of st5 ap5 hell that even TEQ's suffer from due to sheer volume of fire. Adding counterfire to that mix means that being assaulted becomes a troll heaven for you (this will wipe out entire squads expecting half the number of incoming hits).  Now, to get some good tank busting power, we add a fusion blaster, a marker light and a target lock. Remember that these bastards are both relentless and have a multi-tracker, so the Shas'vre can shoot BOTH the marker light AND the fusion blaster...and all this cheese is BEFORE you add a subsystem. Give him VRT for hit-and-run that effects the whole squad.  The gun drones? They replace the lost 4 shots by upgrading your Shas'vre, provide valuable ablative wounds... AND PROVIDE INITIATIVE 4 FOR HIT AND RUN! Combine all of this with Stealth, Shrouded, Deep Strike, Infiltrator, 3+ save majority and the ever important homing beacon.  It is a  huge amount of EXTREMELY effective special rules crammed into a very viable choice.

This DOES help if your commander rolled "counter-crisis" for his warlord trait too.

'''Riptide Limbo Contest''' <br>: Build your Riptides low and parallel to the ground (Try to make it look like they're at least flying backward while shooting weapons). Let your opponent giggle at the silly pose, then watch his laughter turn to tears when he realizes they can actually hide behind a devilfish this way.

[[Category:Warhammer 40000 Tactics(7E)]]
[[Category: Tau]]

{{Warhammer_40k_Tactics}}