40k second army: Eldar and Tau

[SirSlamb]

Well I hope a Flyer that can eclipse a whole city can dish out some firepower :P

[t12161991]

It's 2000 points unupgraded. It killed ~2300 points in 1 turn. The tanks were: 2 Baneblades, 3 Leman Russes, 2 Basilisks, 1 Leman Russ Demolisher.

Wow thats quite impressive. What sort of armaments does it have? A plethora of drone guided railguns?

It's got...

1 Twinlinked heavy railgun, 3 twinlinked longbarrelled ion cannons, 1 twinlinked missile pods, 16 drone controlled long barrelled burst cannons, 10 seeker missiles, and essentially ever upgrade in the Tau vehicle armory.

All it had to do was fly to my side of the board, within 36" or so of every thing in my army, and open fire. Did I mention the 10 structure points (basically wounds for vehicles)? And the 4+ invul save? And that it has a transport capacity large enough to fit the entire non-vehicle portion of my army?

[matthew_swifty]

Man, that is a seriously tooled up beast of a flying tank.

[Coyle_Ravane]

"Honey, I changed my mind about what I want for christmas......"
I Want one. or maybe two.

I haven't played with my Tau for a good few months, but here is a rough aproximation of my army list (2k):
Shas'el with plasma rifle, flamer, sheild generator, multi-tracker
Shas'vre with plasma rifle, flamer, sheild generator, multi-tracker.

6x Stealth suits
6x Stealth suits (I still use the old models, as the new ones are ugly)

Ethereal with honour blades, 11x firewarrior honourguard, bonded

3x: 12x firewarriors, bonded, devilfish with decoy launchers

10x kroot with shaper

8x pathfinders, devilfish with decoy launchers
4x pathfinders, 3x rail rifles, Devilfish with Decoy Launchers

Hammerhead with Railgun and decoy launchers.

I always thought it was annoying that ordinary firewarriors fight in teams of up to 12, while pathfinders are limited to 8. So I have a 12 man squad, it's just split in two, with the teams rail rifles and one guy to guard them being dropped off, before their devilfish swoops back for the ethereal and honour guard. giving me 4 teams of firewarriors in devilfish to do the main fighting with everything else supporting them. It works well too. although now that you can't fire burstcannons as defensive weapons anymore, the vehicle have lost something.

They may not be as maneuverable as Eldar, but the Tau aren't that far behind, and they have way better firepower.

[Coyle_Ravane]

Oh, and BTW, it's not £500 odd, it's more like £850.

Looking at Forgeworld Tau flyers, my list of things I want for xmas just got very, very silly.

[t12161991]

Oh yes... ever since I a) saw the model and b) saw the rules, I've been very, very, very tempted to start a allied Tau portion of my Apocalypse army... adding the Manta Strike Force would take me to 10k or so...

EDIT: For the hell of it, I just calculated the # of shots the Manta can put out in 1 turn. 1 110" range "D" or S7 AP3 10", 6 90" range S7 AP3, 2 24" S7 AP4, 48 36" S5 AP5, 10 72" S8 AP3. The last assuming it fire all it's seeker missiles. Everything but the 48 36" S5 AP5 shots is twinlinked, and everything has BS4.

A single "Manta Deathblow Cadre" starts at ~3500 points, and can go up to 5000 points or higher.

[Coyle_Ravane]

6 90" range S7 AP3, 2 24" S7 AP4,

What's with these? I'd assumed that with 6 Ion Cannons, even assuming they get counted as twinlinked, it's still going to pump out 9 S7 AP3 shots. Is one pair of Ion Cannons not actually Ion Cannons or something, I just assumed that's what they all were from the pictures.

[t12161991]

Err... mistyped above, it has 2 not 3. And they are longbarrelled ion cannons. Look in Imperial Armor: Apocalypse for full rules and stuff for em...

[popisdead]

Right now Tau really have to be balanced to win. Which is fine as they have excellent units/tanks. So expect a bit of everything working in tandem.

The trick wtih them right now is stacking marker lights which will enable their basic gunner 30" S5 guns to negate your cover save and hit you on a better BS.

I'd recommend dropping a lictor on pathfinders and protecting your flanks (from outflanking kroot) with crap gaunts.

Dakka fex's and genestealers outflanking will help lots,.. but IMO those are must haves


As for eldar they are paper thin but when used properly play just like Wood Elves. win big or loose big. Anything will kill eldar (T3 little armour, expensive troops) fast, but as they move so fast expect 2-4 units to focus on what you have that threatens the eldar most. They show up, really tear you apart, then move away fast.