Tau questions

[Ironhide]

Except the stealths can't deep strike, while the suits can.

[mrrshann618]

Stealth suits can deepstrike, they have the same jetpacks that the crisis suits have.
Tau Empire codex pg. 35 under the "stealth Armor" entry

[Ironhide]

Well, crappola. Last time I'll try and go from memory. Knowing that is the case then, why would you want to use stealths to outflank then?

[mrrshann618]

For me, I have horrible luck on the deepstrike. Add in the fact that you do not get to assault (thus loosing your extra move if you land to close)
Outflanking gives you a safe way of 66% of the time comming in exactly where you are needed. The remaning 33% is you hoping that you are not screwed by having a single unit off potentially unsupported.

[Ironhide]

Don't have my book handy, but doesn't Tau have some special equipment that helps with deepstriking?

[mrrshann618]

Tau Pathfinder devilfish have an autoupgrade to allow a re-roll of a deepstriking unit in sight of the devilfish. There is also a piece of wargear that allows for a single unit to be dropped accurately. However only that unit is allowed to come in from reserves that turn.
I basically never use pathfinders and personally do not think that only getting one reserve in a turn is that rewarding to my play style.

[getupandgo]

Tau Pathfinder devilfish have an autoupgrade to allow a re-roll of a deepstriking unit in sight of the devilfish. There is also a piece of wargear that allows for a single unit to be dropped accurately. However only that unit is allowed to come in from reserves that turn.
I basically never use pathfinders and personally do not think that only getting one reserve in a turn is that rewarding to my play style.

You're mixing up the positional relay (at least I think that's the piece of wargear) w/ the pathfinder devilfish beacon. The beacon allows for any deepstrike rolls within LoS to be re-rolled.

As for why you'd have SS infiltrate, because you don't have the randomness, and there's no risk of a mis-hap. Even with re-rolling, you're still taking a chance. Infiltrate always works. Also, the threat of outflanking effects your opponents deployment. It's just greater flexibility. Also, try deepstriking with 18 models... There's not always enough space. Plus, I inherently dislike suicide squads...

[Ironhide]

I can understand that, but why keep such an expensive unit in reserves for possibly the majority of the game? If I was going to take that unit, I'd want it on the board at the beginning dealing out as much damage as I could.

[getupandgo]

I can understand that, but why keep such an expensive unit in reserves for possibly the majority of the game? If I was going to take that unit, I'd want it on the board at the beginning dealing out as much damage as I could.

Sometimes it is... That's why I like their flexibility. they have the ability to flank, DS, or start on the board, and can dish out firepower and avoid return fire.

[mrrshann618]

For me, the Tau comming in (on average) turn 3 actually benefits me. At this time the opponent has already committed forced to thier task and have started to implement whatever plan they have. Now enter a wildcard that can basically appear anywhere, and generally in the rear armor of most tanks.
By targetting a tank they felt was safe you distrupt any firesupport they have already committed.
By targetting a unit you all of a sudden have created a pincer move, they move forward into firepower or they turn around, loose momentum, and turn into firepower.

MOST opponents forget about them when it comes to the tactical planning stage and fail to allocate a contingency plan for when/if they show up. Those that do have voluntarily taken part of their force out of the fight and have less activly hitting your main force. This is one reason why I love my Stealth suits so much. They litterally play hell on my opponent. My Stealthsuits almost always outflank, far to often my opponent allows those paper thin rear armors to be targeted by such a unit (I only take 6 burst cannons with BS upgrades) This usually ends up haveing an average of 3 glances and 1-2 penetrating shots and generally makes it so that tank is "basically" out of the game

[Ironhide]

Okay, but do they make their points cost back? That is usually my deciding factor on picking units. If they can't kill more than 300 points worth of troops or vehicles, then they just aren't worth it.

[mrrshann618]

in many of my instances I often times make thier points back. I tend to use mine as a combination of cleanup and tank hunting. For the first turn or two I can easily get at least one tank (not rhino, I'm aiming for the tanks that sit back and shoot) Average Vindicator/Predator is 125-150 points. Otherwise I use them in a pincer move to clean up understrength units. They are suprisingly good at helping to clean up nob units. High volume of fire, high hit ratio, easy wounding, and really useful in getting every nob down to 1 wound before my plasmas or pie-plate railguns hit the unit to clean up the rest.

Tau are all about combined arms. Much like a firewarrior team they generally do not make their points back one their own. Heck my crisis suits rarely make their points back unsupported. On the other hand I have easily tabled 2 of the 3 ork players with such suprise and flanking tactics easily. The speed freak player I have a much harder time as he tends to be able to react to me much faster as his trukks seem to be indestructable (I have historically had extremely bad dice rolls against him). Against the few marines in my area the only army I'm consistantly having problems against is the Fleshtearers army as they are also simply to fast for my dice rolls to counter often times.