Crisis Suits
Crisis suits are the bread and butter of the Tau army. I've gone over the Commander already and a lot of the options that are available to him that are available to Crisis Suits. Even though I'm not too into missile pods I think I'll be taking one on all of my suits. So base cost for each will be 37. You can then give them all the interceptor and skyfire combo. Now you have 6 autocannon shots per 3 man unit.
So now you've got a wound issue that's easily taken care of by buying drones. I'd do 1 gun drone and 1 shield drone. Total cost for the unit is 258 points. You have 6 drones, 6 missile pod shots and you can hit any unit that comes in from reserve in range or shoot down planes. I'd probably take two of these units and a third unit with gun drones only and twin-linked fusion blaster and vectored retro-thrusters. Fly-in, pop some tanks, gun drone some fools and peace out in assault. This would cost 213 points and you have 3 twin-linked meltas and arguably the best melta weapon in the game on a unit that can get in and out. The problem in my mind is how much better these units would be if you could take up to 7 in a unit or take them as troops if you have Farsight but meh. Can't change it now.
The suits are okay, they're a little survivable but if you get into close combat they're done. Hence why the fusion guys get thrusters so they can hopefully live long enough to flee.
I reaaaaaaaaaaally hate that Airburst and Cyclic Ion are only 1 per army and you can't twin-link either of them. I'd house rule it so that you can take multiple. They aren't fantastic enough to warrant such a dumb restriction (Which I thought we had gotten rid of wit hthe last codex?). Maybe 1 per squad but 1 per army is just dumb.
If you frequently face off against blobs definitely take these guys with twin-linked flamers and another flamer. Laugh hysterically when you get charged. Even better: if you get the Warlord that causes you to not scatter take a flamer death squad and teach them the meaning of hell. Can you even imagine what it would be if you could take 5 of these guys? 185 points for 5 TL Flamers and a backup Flamer. Jesus. This almost makes Farsight's bodyguard option viable (but the extra 10 points for dumb rules is just silly). Hmmm how much would that be to get 7 Flamer psycho's deepstriking for murder purposes only. I'll give them a gun drone each because I very much want to ruin that unit. It'll cost 413 points for 7 TL Flamers, 7 Flamers, 7 Gun Drones with TL Pulse Rifles and an extra 165 for Farsight. Little bit ridiculous against a blob of IG. The TL flamers are 8/9 chance to wound with no saves so you're gonna get like 25 wounds with just those. Then you have 7 more flamers. Annnnd gun drones. Hilarious anti-blob squad.
Note: I've always been confused about template weapons, can you only kill those that are underneath the template? If so then the above squad kinda sucks...kinda. If it's still like 5th you can burn to death a whole squad which is awesome.
Crisis suits are good Elites choices and pretty much necessary for Tau in either Ally or Primary Detachment. It'd be hard to go without.
Stealth Suits
They're purely for their cover saves. 2+ makes them neat objective campers but you can only take 6, they have crappy stats and are easily killed. If you let them just sit in one place they can do okay for the whole game but 24 shots, 12 hits, 8 wounds, 3 aren't saved. How much was that? 180 points. Woopee. What happens when that MEQ unit then charges you? Half your squad is dead with only the 7 remaining MEQ. The unit is exceptionally easy to kill when their cover save is denied and are not very effective regardless because the limit is stupid (6) and they are very costly for not much. It'd be reasonable to make these guys 18 points and let you take up to 15 but hey, good rules are for Plebes.
The Burst Cannon gets a lot of love but it's just 2 pulse carbines. Why is that amazing? I don't poo my pants when I see 12 Firewarriors with Pulse Carbines set up across the board but apparently seeing 6 Stealth Suits with Burst Cannons should. Even though they're literally the same effectiveness. Things that are the same: shots, strength, range, ap, BS. But cost is different. Waaaay different. 18 points for the 2 Firewarriors and 30 for the 1 stealth suit even though the 2 Firewarriors actually have more survivability and their Carbines are Pinning while the Cannon is not.. You're effectively paying 12 points per guy for an improved save that disappears against flamers, CC attacks and the fact that they have to be in cover to benefit otherwise their armor is better.
So in the end what are you paying for? A camping unit with a short-range weapon. You're also paying for the loss of a unit of crisis suits or a riptide. Now try to figure out what the realized loss is when you're actively trading away better units.
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| Riptide Prototype |
Riptide
This is the bad boy everyone's talking about. The first thing I said when I saw the new codex was that this is what the Dreadknight wanted to be. A viable gun platform. And what's even funnier is I've seen dozens of posts online saying literally exact same thing. This is what the Dreadknight could have or should have been for GK. Instead he's some punchy dude who's still very viable but not nearly as shooty. Regardless the Riptide is a bad-ass in that he gets Monstrous Creature and Jet Pack giving him mobility but also the ability to move and shoot, move and shoot and stay out of assault. He'll do fine in assault but honestly you'll be losing a lot by having his guns down for a turn.
As for his equipment you're going to want to keep the smart missile system. It's just good. Ignores cover will help kill those pesky stealth suits ;) And I'd switch the burst cannon for an Ion Accelerator and for support systems just guess what you'll take. Good guess: Early Warning Override and Velocity Tracker. Oh, what's that? Your unit just arrived from reserve? Here's a S8 AP2 pie plate as a welcoming gift. Very nice combo. The other support systems aren't much benefit to the Riptide and are a lot less beneficial than these two so it's not a good choice to take them.
It might be a good idea to buy a drone or two for him but unfortunately he can only take the weird shielded missile drone for 25 points. Pricey and not that good but it's to balance him out. How to get around this? Use an HQ to grab a tremendous amount of drones (2) and have that unit join the Riptide. Simple, and you can give the HQ 3 signature systems (puretide, multi-spectrum and C&C node) to buff the bejeesus out of your Riptide. That'll set you back a bit though. 389 points. Hilarious ally though. That and a minimum unit of Kroot would be wicked fun to bring.
The nova-generator is an okay rule. I can't stamp it good because you have the problem of damaging your most expensive unit with no saves allowed and he's already going to be withering tremendous amounts of fire so meh? The nova-charge profiles aren't too much different from the overcharge profiles and you still suffer gets hot so you have a 1/3 chance of not getting it then a 1/6 chance of hurting yourself shooting (which can get bad with 12 freaking shots). The other abilities are all nice but really annoyed that you can hurt yourself. It'd be better, and more in line with the units point cost, if the reactor just failed and you didn't get anything.
Really this guy boils down to whether you want sustained anti-infantry or slight anti-infantry and anti-tank. With accelerator you have a good counter to light vehicles and infantry with the overcharge. But if you really want this sort of unit look up. Crisis suits are better. Sad to say it but I won't be fielding many Riptides when I have battlesuits in the same slot.
Conclusions
Crisis suits are the uint you'll need to take. Of course the Riptide looks cool and has neat weapons but he is a fire magnet and has very little in the way of negating it. MEQ missile launches, lance weapons, force weapons, melta guns, pretty much anything you could use to kill a Tyranid will work just as well on this guy except you'll be able to see this guy from anywhere (Riptide model is enormous) while the Carnifex can hide. The crisis suits have the ability to negate line of sight and maneuver around unseen in addition to bringing more fire for cheaper to the enemies of the Tau. I see Riptide more as an ally.
In the end I think you'll field Riptide a few times. Realize that he's not all he's cut out to be and go back to your Crisis suits.
Stealth suits are bad.
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