Tau VS SM help

[roberto2391]

Well as a NOOB to 40K I need some help I started at roughly at the same time as my best mate and he choose fish and I chose SM, the only problem is on our 6\"by3\" board my men have to move thought large spaces of open ground making them easy targets for his rail guns. I have tried many different tactics:

1) Waiting for him to come to me, this normally ends with his battle suits killing my close combat men or wiping them out with his 4 flamers.

2) I have tried rushing him with every thing but by the time i get there my squads number about 3 from 5 and all my heavy support is dead.

3) Tactically placing my lascannons to pick off his battle suits, but they end up being killed by his Kroot or stealth suits.

4) I have tried waiting and throwing grenades at him but this only kills one or two men. Meaning I have to fight in CC, and his 2+ saves make them hard to kill how ever many attacks I throw at them. We also have a regular debate as to how far grenades can be thrown.

5) The most resent tactic that has failed is where I move my men to cover and wait for his battle suits and try and deep strike with my terminators but this ends up fail as his Kroot wipe out both lots of my terminators and then his battle suits using there 2 plus saves end up killing the rest of my men in a couple of goes.

Any advise is welcome if it means I can beat him, here is a rough list of what I have in my army:

1 rhino
1 predator
1 razor back

1 librarian
1 commander

Techmarine + servitors
1 dreadnought
5 assault terminators
5 terminator squad all armed with combi bolters and power fists (from ebay)
5 scouts 4 with snipers 1 with rocket launcher
About 80 normal men (lost of close combat men)
5 man Assault squad
2 bikes
4 heavey weapon men:
1 with a heavy bolter
1 with a lascannon
2 with plasma cannons

And as I have created my own chapter I have slected the following traits:
Take the fight to them
Eye to Eye
That’s about it. Sorry about spelling and grammar but I am dyslexic so hay. Any way all help is welcome

Roberto2391

Post edited by: roberto2391, at: 2007/09/05 14:17

[Aun O Vader]

first things first, stop him cheating. battle suits only have a 3+ save as standard. they can buy the iridium armour upgrade but they become less maneuverable. XV-88s are also 2+ saves, but they can\'t move and shoot their railguns.

You can\'t throw grenades anymore either, they can only be used in cc and don\'t do damage (except krak and melta bombs against vehicles).

terminators shouldn\'t go down that easily against kroot, unless he is using a lot of them. my personal preference against SM armies is to hope they don\'t have assault cannons and heavy bolters. those combined with assault troops with jetpacks are my personal nightmares.

I think a solid tactic is to use a couple of squads of jump troops or infiltrating cc specialists. combined with a fire line of heavy bolters, autocannon and assault cannons this can really mess his plans up. oh yeah, and get a whirlwind, they\'re just horrible against tau.

I\'m at work at the moment so can\'t check my books, but thats good for starters.

[DarthXander]

You need to prioritise your targets and plan well.
AunO showed me the true power of the Greater Good at last years Games Day when he handed my head to me on a platter...

So my advice;

Heavy bolters, with AP4 he can kiss good bye to most of his units.
Assault Marines, with 12\" move and 6\" assault they have an effective range of 18\", you should have them in CC by turn two, load them up with plasma pistols for suit hunting and a power weapon for CC.
Play a refused flank, simply deploy along only one edge only and hopefully some of his units will spend the entire game shuffing across the board toward you.
Make some terrain to put on your board so you have a little cover
Stop him cheating by saying his suits have 2+ saves!

Good luck and may the Emperor be with you.

[roberto2391]

Is it a good idea to add an callidus assassin to my army with a C\'tan phase sword?? and am i able to play an inquestion lord in my army as Sm??

Post edited by: roberto2391, at: 2007/09/05 13:56

[Silver]

DarthXander wrote:

Heavy bolters, with AP4 he can kiss good bye to most of his units.

Indeed. Consider the fact that they have 6 more inches range than the pulse rifle. So in other words - you can outshoot the Tau with these babies.

DarthXander wrote:

Assault Marines, with 12\" move and 6\" assault they have an effective range of 18\", you should have them in CC by turn two, load them up with plasma pistols for suit hunting and a power weapon for CC.

I\'d suggest you use a powerfist instead of a powerweapon. Although this makes them strike last, don\'t expect the Suits to do much damage in close combat. So, by retaliating with powerfists, you have a chance to auto-kill them if they fail 1 inv. save. Trust me, getting past all those 2 wounds/model is a pain.


DarthXander wrote:

Make some terrain to put on your board so you have a little cover
Stop him cheating by saying his suits have 2+ saves!

Indeed! An OFFICIAL 40k gaming board should have 33% terrain!
Oh and yeah - to make sure he doesn\'t cheat, check his armylist before the game starts. Let him check yours, if he\'s picky.


roberto2391 wrote:

Is it a good idea to add an callidus assassin to my army with a C\'tan phase sword?? and am i able to play an inquestion lord in my army as Sm??

Sadly no. You can take SM allies to an Inquisition force led by an Inquisitor, but not vice versa. Of course, you can include Grey Knights and Grey Knight Terminators in your army, but they\'re not very useful against Tau - it would be overkill.

Use your regular Terminators instead - even Assault Terminators are overkill. Take regular Termies + 2 Assaultcannons (unless you play Dark Angels, where you take 1 Assaultcannon and the rest be Lightning Claws)




Astronomican\'s dearest suggestions:

1) Buy a Whirlwind and use Heavy Bolters to smush the fishes
2) Use 8-10 Assaultmarines with plasmapiatols + powerfist to hunt the crisis
3) Don\'t let your friend win through cheating!
4) Use terrain and use Lascannons to destroy the Hammerhead!
5) You set up on the long side of the board, not the short one!
6) You\'re allowed to start the game 24\'\' away from his troops!

Cheers,
-Silver

Post edited by: Silver, at: 2007/09/05 14:06

[roberto2391]

Ok with some advise and help from you guys I won my first battle against my mate, it was not a massive victory but I won thanks to a 10 man close combat squad wiping out 3/4 of his units and heavy support wiping out the rest of his men, however this was only a 400 hundred point battle so I am working on a tactic for his full 1500 point army. And there was no cheating on his half just one hell of a lot of bad dice rolls compared to my constant 3-5 rolls.

Post edited by: roberto2391, at: 2007/09/07 14:47

[LordKAlleKlovn]

my personel fear playing against sm is the assault cannons and cc troops. I allways uses kroot allies, pathfinders, and stealths infiltrating and they do alot of harm... but your sm armour save of a 3+ ( 2+ for terminators ) u can take a lot of pounding before u loose.....

But as said.... The greater good always overcomes the empire and thats about it!

:lol: I hope u dont loose the next game mate.... its so cool to win for a change ;)

[TsvitokSoldat]

I have one idea not suggested. If you want to do some damage right up or perhaps make sure the Tau Player can\'t simply sit back and let you march into the fiery plasma death that so rightfully scares enemies of the Tau\'va. Try Infiltrating Scouts into Heavy Bolter Range of the Firewarriors, take a heavy bolter with them, they get Scout Movement as well so they can easily infiltrate, set up in approximate range then blast away at the Tau, which is especially nice when the Firewarriors can either march up to try and hit you in Pulse Rifle Range, or they can move out of range. It helps to crowd them in a corner while you move up your Assault Squads. If they respond with Crisis Battlesuits, remember that they have 3+ not 2+ saves unless its his Shas\'O/El and Bodyguard.

If they dare get close enough, rapidfire with bolters and concerntrate on the Bodyguards.

If he charges with Kroot, Focus on them, your scouts can\'t do much against Battlesuits really, but a good volley against a Kroot Carnivore Squad will rip up a fair lot of them (wounding on 3\'s without armour saves...)

If the Battlesuits are a real issue, close combat will always do wonders, so will Plasmaguns, Cannons, Heavy Bolters, massed Bolterfire, anything really to try and take them down, they are his most important units, felling them will do more good than you can imagine.

Stealth Suits can be countered by anything that gets them in decent range, their main strength is the fact they are obscured and can use Jetpacks.

Vespid are a problem if they hit you hard enough, a good roll with Vespid can crush a Tactical Squad in a single shooting phase, hit them before they hit you.

If the Battlesuits are hitting your tanks hard, abandon them and let your Marines hold up in buildings and cover around it, if the Tau Player is incompetant he will be stupid and go for the Tank, if not he will lose his Battlesuits trying to go for your Squad, its better to lose a Tank or a Man, than all of them.

If he tries attacking with Kroot, remember to stay away from them in cover. They get Cover Saves comparable to your Marines Armour Saves in a Building. Lure them out and if needed make them want to assault you, sacrifice a squad so you can annihilate more of them (always use a low cost or nearly dead squad for this).

Other than that, use the tried and true method of Assault, Assault, Assault. The Tau are a solely shooty-shooty army.. They can\'t stand up in a drawn out session of CC, Terminators and Assault Marines are your best options. Terminators need to be Normal, so you can shoot and assault rather than just Assault. If you aren\'t careful and use Assault Terminators you will have Battlesuits hoping around you shooting you to bits.

[TsvitokSoldat]

For some reason my Comp has a hatred of this site, it constantly double posts on it...

Btw, I didn\'t mention this, but try two infiltrated Scout teams able to support each other. Arm them with a Heavy Bolter and Bolters. If you want to really get fancy arm a second squad with Snipers and a Heavy Bolter. It would be extreme if you could get Devastators into range quickly, but nevertheless, try this meat-mincer tactic.

Post edited by: TsvitokSoldat, at: 2007/10/10 09:28

[Silver]

Best thing to do is to take a unit of 10 Assaultmarines, arm them with 3 plasmapistols (incl. 1 for the sarge) and a powerfist.

Led by a jumppack chaplain with powerweapon & powerfist and termie honors, this unit will take care of all enemy Stealth- and Crisis Suits in no time!

Next, Drop-pod a 5 man Terminator unit with 2 Assault cannons and Firewarriors are taken care of!!!!


Equip your standard Space Marines with many Lascannons per 5 man squad...and the Hammerhead/Broadsides are taken care of!!!!


A Landspeeder or two will take care of any Kroot near you.