[lt_sparky]

My most common opponent plays tau and beats me silly all the time. He makes a mockery of my "tough" Nurgle force. basically I need tactic and list help I dont want to completly change my list though so please keep that in mind. Firstly here is my list

HQ

Lord
termie armor
twin claws
icon of nurgle
=150

Elite

4 Terminators
heavy fammer
powerfist
icon of nurgle
=175

Troops

2 units of:

8 Plague marines
2 plasma guns
plague champion
powerfist
=264 (each)

heavy support

obliterator
obliterator = 150

=983
Ok now this was my original plan although it dosent seem to great after some field testing. I hold everything back for deep strike except for my plague marines obviously and move them up unfortunatly they take a beating as they move up so slowly and in the first 2 turns dont have much else to draw fire away from them. Some of you may now ask "why dont you get some rhinos?", well I have 2 reasons for that, 1: in a 100pt game I belive 100pts is alot (it adds to that after I add the extra armor) and 2: he has 2 broadsides, 2 sniper teams and a whole lot of missle pods and plasma rifles.
When the time is right I deepstrike either my lord of terminators because of their icons then i bring in the rest this is lovely untill the tau shooting phase then it all goes to hell.

This is what he fields but im not sure

comander, burst cannon cyclic ion blaster (in my opinion this is useless)
3 suits with a combination of twin-linked plasma rifles and twin-linked missle pods
6 stealths
8 firewarriors
8 firewarriors
2 broadsides
2 sniper teams

And thats it thanks for any help

 

[SPYDeR13]

I'm going to say that you might need more shots, you're army doesn't really lay down that much fire. I would take a few H.Bolters.

i know you're only playing 1000pts but you might need to make room for a faster moving unit like raptors or bikes.

 

[lt_sparky]

I'm going to say that you might need more shots, you're army doesn't really lay down that much fire. I would take a few H.Bolters.

i know you're only playing 1000pts but you might need to make room for a faster moving unit like raptors or bikes.

I would love to have some heavy bolter but nothing in this list can take them. As for the faster units im trying to move some things around to replace my lord with a biker lord and some other bikers.

 

[The Son of Horus]

The good news is that he's not using a mechanized army o' doom, which is really, in my opinion, pretty broken-- it takes advantage of game mechanics loopholes more than anything else-- but this isn't the place for that gripe.

Your plague marines should be able to walk right up to the Tau firing lines. With T5 (so the Tau wound them on 4's with their pulse rifles) and Feel No Pain, you should shrug off the vast majority of those shots.

I'd get rid of those obliterators for...well, anything else. They're not that good these days, and for the points, you can come up with something more effective in the anti-tank department anyway. You don't actually NEED anti-tank against your friend's Tau army, which is a nice change, so you can probably get away with dropping them in favor of beefing up your Plague Marine squads. The more the merrier, after all.

I'd stop deep striking the terminators. Let 'em walk in shooting. Between their armour and T4(5) they'll be fine. He's got two broadsides, and those are honestly the biggest threats to them. Deep striking just puts you in rapid fire range of the entire army and makes them the obvious target. Keep 'em with your advancing battle line and don't present any overly obvious target (i.e. don't have one squad that is out in front, and clearly able to assault sooner than the rest.) I'd switch the heavy flamer for a reaper autocannon, as well. I know the flamer is a hell of a lot cheaper, but... the reaper autocannon is a lot better. If you could bump them up to five or six-strong that'd be good too (you'll have some points when you get rid of the obliterators) just so your Lord has a bit more protection. Despite the fact that your armor and toughness should carry you through most of the firestorm, Tau put out a high volume of fire and Target Saturation hits on your Lord are a bad thing, even if he saves most of them-- it's just more armor saves he has to take in the end, and you want him at three wounds when he gets into the fight just in case.

 

[lt_sparky]

Thanks for the advise.

Your plague marines should be able to walk right up to the Tau firing lines. With T5 (so the Tau wound them on 4's with their pulse rifles) and Feel No Pain, you should shrug off the vast majority of those shots.

I could walk my plague marines up against firewarriors no problem but firewarriors isnt the only thing im facing here, it goes more somthing like this 3 str6 shots that hit on a 3+ (markerlight) and ingnore my armor save.

I'd get rid of those obliterators for...well, anything else. They're not that good these days, and for the points, you can come up with something more effective in the anti-tank department anyway. You don't actually NEED anti-tank against your friend's Tau army, which is a nice change, so you can probably get away with dropping them in favor of beefing up your Plague Marine squads. The more the merrier, after all.

They arent for anti-tank they are for anti suit and sniper drones just one hit from a lascannon, melti-melta, twin-linked maelta gun puts a broadside in the scarpyard. If im not mistaken by just taking out that broadside he earns all his points. As for not being worth the points these days I think they are better than ever despite loosing a few weapons.

Im reworking my list and I will probally make my termies walk and give them the auto cannon, and maybe perhaps mount my lord on a bike to close in fast. A rhino for one of my plague marine squads and mobile cover for anyone else and when its destroyed it will provide a nice 4+ save. Im cutting out one obliterator (sadly) To get some lesser demons as a meat shield to protect my army. When im finished with it ill post it.

 

[kharnthebetrayer]

This is what he fields but im not sure

comander, burst cannon cyclic ion blaster (in my opinion this is useless)
3 suits with a combination of twin-linked plasma rifles and twin-linked missle pods
6 stealths
8 firewarriors
8 firewarriors
2 broadsides
2 sniper teams

I may be wrong (I have never played Tau:grin, but that sounds like a lot of units compared to what you have.

Also, I run two Oblits in my 1500 point Chaos army and have been very happy about how they performed. However, I've only played my brothers space marines.:biggrin: He is not the greatest tactical genius either.:so_happy:

 

[Stormbolter88]

I think you should replace your plague marines with more terminators. For the same points you could field 2 units of 5-7 terminators, each with an Autocannon, as well as maybe a lightning claw for an aspiring champ, or Mark of Khorne for the whole squad. Then walk up to Tau while shooting your reapers, along with your obliterators and your HQ squad, and try to kill them in close combat.

Or you might replace a plague marines squad with a Chaos Chosen squad, they can infiltrate and equip with more plasma guns. I believe one chosen squad can have 5 plasma guns.

But then you'd need 2 token troop squads of something to satisfy the Troop requirement. Hmm I don't know, you have to see what's the cheapest minimum troops.

The thing about plagues marines is that they approach the cost of chaos terminators, they are good but proportionately expensive.

 

[CATzeentch]

Obliterators DESTROY meqs, but do decent against tau and crap against orks(Unless you get lucky with the twin-linked flamers).

I say you may want to give your lord a combi melta and just a single LC. Also give your Plague marines a plasma and a melta do deal with those pesky suits. And for your daemons, give your PM icons so you get them right where you want them.

 

[Someguy]

Against Tau you want to move very fast (ie faster than they do) and get into CC. It doesn't really matter what you have if you get in, you only really need a single marine to ruin a Tau player's day. Things like terminators, a beefed up lord and plague marines, all moving 6", are just the things to not use against Tau.

Also your strategy of feeding him one unit at a time isn't really a good one, as you have seen. It's near impossible for deep striking termies to ever get into CC with fireknife suits.

The oblitorators are fine. As you say, they instant kill suits.

His army is pretty tooled up with ranged anti MEQ. His army could have been designed specifically to beat you (apart from the rubbish shas'o). To counter it I'd suggest using things like a sorceror with Lash, havocs and bikes. Tau are control freaks so take things that will mess up their plans. Infiltrate so you can see where his suits are jumping back to. Throw a spawn at them to tie up a unit. Generally play dirty.

Oh and whatever anyone says, don't get into a rhino. He has a huge number of weapons that can nail it. His railgun will penetrate without even having to roll the dice. Being entangled is not cool.

 

[darkane]

hah! i love that you called us control freaks. But your biggest mistake is deep striking everything. One thing about tau is that we love to consolidate fire. and if you are only presenting a tau player with one or two targets that we can start hitting from 36" out you are not going to make it. If you send 3 units at the tau lines they have to decide if they are going to shoot at one unit or try to reduce the size of both.

It also appears that he has built his 1k point army specifically to beat you. if i was playing CSMs or SMs thats pretty much the same list i would use. those stealth suits and drones are highly underrated (as is most tau units) and chances are you wont even be able to shoot at them until half your unit is gone. remember those stealth suits are sending 18 shots your way.

get some movement there, he is banking on you lumbering your way across the board dont do that, show up with some bikers and a rhino then see how things roll!