Combat Patrol Summary with my Tau

So I just got back from JJ's Game Lounge from a combat patrol tourney and I have to say I do miss playing. If you've been following my projects you'd know I've started to build a Tau army.  I figured with the Combat Patrol tourney, I can get in a game with them since I have enough painted to field 400pts.  It was damn fun and Tau can be pretty freaking ridiculous! Here's a run down of my games.

So before we start, just remember, I haven't gotten the chance to play much as most of my time goes into making videos and doing things for the WGC when I'm not working my full time job.  After Adepticon and after some urging and suggestions from other WGC producers to take some times for myself, I wanted to do more painting and playing for a little while.

Last time I played 40k was with my wolves like.... 5 or 6 months ago? It's was about the time 6th Edition came out.  I believe I played one 1875 game and then an huge game months later .  Then I played that one fantasy game with Dallas' High Elves against Joe's Orcs and Goblins. There was the few Malifaux games and that went to null after they announced ME2 after adepticon.

So needless to say, I didn't get much actual play time at all before I got distracted with all the youTube stuff. A lot of times today, I missed out on scenarios points because I was more worried about trying to figure out the rules and how to play Tau. I also wasn't planning on writing about this so I didn't take any pics or anything like that. Thank god for Jay who decided to run around taking some photos while he ran the tourney.

Another thing to note is I screwed up and my original list had a Fireblade in it.  Pablo walked up and whispered to me, "Hey, you know the Fireblade has 3 wounds?".  Big oops on my part as for some reason, I thought he only had 2 wounds. Even Daniel who has been playing Tau in like forever didn't realize it either. I reported myself in to Jay and he let me change it up to the list below. This was after the second round and it wouldn't have mattered much as the FW didn't do too much in those first two rounds. I also realized I got cheated too in the second round with Matt so it evened out! lol

Here was my list:

400 Pts - Tau Empire Roster - Combat Patrol (400pts) 
Troops: Fire Warrior Team (12#, 130 pts)
   1 Fire Warrior Team, 130 pts ((C:TE, pg. 37, iPad, pg. 60).)
      11 Fire Warriors (Infantry; Combat Armour; Pulse Rifle x11; Photon Grenade; Bonding Knife Ritual; Supporting Fire)
         1 Fire Warrior Shas'ui (Infantry (Character); Combat Armour; Photon Grenade; Pulse Rifle; Bonding Knife Ritual; Supporting Fire)
Fast Attack: Pathfinder Team (5#, 55 pts)
   1 Pathfinder Team, 55 pts ((C:TE, pg. 38, iPad, pg. 61-62))
      5 Pathfinders ((C:TE, pg. 38, iPad, pg. 61-62); Infantry; Photon Grenade; Recon Armour; Markerlight x5; Pulse Carbine x5; Scouts; Supporting Fire)
Elite: XV8 Crisis Team (2#, 109 pts)
   1 XV8 Crisis Team, 109 pts ((C:TE, pg. 40-41, iPad, pg. 64-65).)
      1 Crisis Shas'ui ((C:TE, pg. 40-41, iPad, pg. 64-65).; Infantry (Jetpack); Crisis Battlesuit; Cyclic Ion Blaster; Missile Pod x1; Blacksun Filter; Multi-Tracker; Night Vision; Supporting Fire; Very Bulky)
      1 Crisis Shas'ui ((C:TE, pg. 40-41, iPad, pg. 64-65).; Infantry (Jetpack); Crisis Battlesuit; Plasma Rifle x1; Twin Linked Fusion Blaster x1; Blacksun Filter; Multi-Tracker; Night Vision; Supporting Fire; Very Bulky)
Heavy Support: XV88 Broadside Team (3#, 105 pts)
   1 XV88 Broadside Team, 105 pts ((C:TE, pg. 42, iPad, pg. 66).)
      1 Broadside Shas'ui ((C:TE, pg. 42, iPad, pg. 66).; Infantry; Broadside Battlesuit; Seeker Missile; Twin Linked High Yield Missile Pod; Twin Linked Smart Missile System; Blacksun Filter; Multi-Tracker; Drone Controller; Extremely Bulky; Night Vision; Supporting Fire)
         1 Missile Drone (Infantry (Jetpack); Missile Pod; Supporting Fire)
         1 Missile Drone (Infantry (Jetpack); Missile Pod; Supporting Fire)

Round 1

The scenario was a normal deployment and primary objective was to control your opponents deployment zone.

I paired against Bill who got back into playing and the new Eldar codex. If I remember correctly, he brought in 5 wraithguards, 7 or 8 Fire Dragons, a caster thingy (maybe a farseer?) and 5 rangers. I think anyways.  I don't know much about Eldar. All I know is I hate them and that they look good with a  pulse rifle or bolter stuck up in their face.

I got first move and throughout this tourney I realized how much of an advantage it is to get first turn with Tau. I proceeded to eat up his rangers with the broadside and missile drones and took out a wraithguard with the crisis suits and Pulse Rifle fire from the Fire Warriors.

He was hiding pretty much behind a large plateau with his wraithguards and Fire Dragons so he proceeded to run them from there into a large structure. He was too far away to get at me still.

After turn one it was pretty much the same. A lot of firing into cover which doesn't help much against tons of missiles coming at you, tons of s5 Pulse rifles coming at you, and tons of plasma, ion and fusion coming at ya.  A couple of turns of that paired with a lot of JSJ (Jump, shoot, Jumping), it was over but it was mostly Bill having really bad rolls on his saves as well.

Round 2

So for round two, I got to play against Matt who fielded Eldars too. This time I wasn't so lucky.

Quarter table deployment and the scenarios were... umm... control each others deployment zone? I think. I barely remember. He got first turn.

He brought in two shadow weaver canons, 6 wraithguards and a full unit of guardians I believe.  It was a weird one as there was a big plateau in between us and he was playing peek-a-boo around the corner and I was JSJing it around the corner with his Wraith Guards.

I was playing really defensively since it was the first time I was playing with Tau.  His canon's though were taking out everything left and right.  Two things I learned from this.  I should have deep striked my suits to handle those canons but I'm deftly afraid of DSing from my 5th ed days.  Every time I tried to DS with my SW and end up dying in a wall some where or off the table.  I just had really bad luck with them.  But Daniel after this round told me it's not a big deal anymore in 6th ed so I tried that in the next round.

The other lesson I learned was READ ALL THE OTHER CODEXES! lol  Matt was saying his monofiliment autowounded me at AP1 because I was int 3 or lower and I believed him.  The fact is after getting home and reading through my newly purchased Eldar codex was that he had to roll a 6 on wounding for that to happen.  So he was lobbing those things and wiped out my most of my firewarriors and broadside with the canons like no tomorrow. But that's ok, payback for having my illegal fireblade in on the list. lol

At the end I believe he tabled me or I had one crisis suit left and he won the game. I just wanted to deny him any more VPs and just took off with that last crisis suit while he chased after me.

Round 3

Round three I was paired up against Josh with his Chaos Marines.  But this time, my list fixed to be legal with what you see above.  I was a bit worried as he tabled Dallas' Necrons in the first round.  I was also worried as deployment was table halves.  Objectives were deep striked in after turn two and you score by having your warlord 6" from it.

I reserved my crisis suit unit. He brought in 6 havocs, 2 oblitz and 6 man squad of marines. He put all his havocs and oblitz in a ruined building towards the the back of the board and his marines smack dab in the middle of the board in another ruined building.

This scared the crap out of me cause he was really close and rolled for first turn, until that is, when I seized the initiative.

I marked up his warriors and my FW unloaded into them taking out a few of them.  Then I unloaded my broadside into his oblits and luckily taking out one of them.  His other oblitz took off running pretty far (roll of 10 or 11 I think).

He then unloaded his warriors into my FW and doing nothing to then and then his havoc proceeded to unload a series of fracking autocanons at my broadside but I didn't have a problem with making my saves. He rallied his Oblitz and las'd my broadside but I made my cover on that.

Second turn, my objective stays in reserves as do my Crisis suits.  I marked up his havocs with two lights.  I unload my FW into the marines again and whittle them down to his sergeant.  I gone dumb and spent two marker lights to "ignore his cover" on fracking space marines. /facepalm  What a waste but I unload my broadside on his havocs taking out 3 of them I believe.

His objective drops in and he tried to drop it on his sergant but scatters just shy of 6" from him.  About 1/8 of an inch over 6". He skipped up his Oblitz and las'd at my broadside again but made my cover again. His sergeant shot at my FW with a bolter and missed. Again, he unload autocanons at my broadside and I made my saves. Josh was really rolling horribly in this game.

Turn three I dropped my objective in front of my FW but it scattered to the back of my squad which was fine.  It was still within 6" of my warlord. My crisis suits DS'd in flanking to the right of his oblit.  I marked up his havocs, I completely WIFFLED on all my suits against his oblitz! A plasma, twinlinked fusion, cyclonic ion canon and missile pods and they either missed or he made his saves.  It's times like these I hate this game. haha.

My FW and Broadside took out the last of his havocs. Hindsight, I should have aimed my FW at his sargent to deny him the possible objective but I wasn't thinking much about the scenario VP as I mentioned.

On his turn his oblitz shot at my suits and takes one of them out.  Totally forgetting about the time limit and his objective, he left his sargent standing there and shot at my FW doing nothing again. Time was up right when I was about to start my turn and I think we drew that. I don't remember why though but we both completely forgot about playing for the VP. lol It was one of those fun epic round where it was full of close called, utter failed rolling or utter epic rolling so we were both caught up in the moment and forgot about everything else.

Round 4

Round 4 I got paired up with my Tau brother in arms, Daniel.  This as kinda of funny as we were both Tau and the objective was run our warlord and control the other's deployment zone.  Deployment was table quarters and unfortunately for me, he go first turn and I couldn't seize the initiative this time.

He brought in 10 firewariors, 5 pathfinders, 1 unit of three crisis suits with flamers and 1 unit or three crisis suits of missile pods.

I'm a bit fuzzy on the turns as we ended up mostly having fun and just shooting the breeze.  On the first turn though he started out as I would have.  He marked up my path finders and wiped them out with missle pods He creeped up his suits and tried to flame my FW I think on turn 2 but completely and horribly waffled his rolls and did nothing. But him having his pathfinders and having mine all gone really weighted the game to his favor.

At the end I took out his flamer unit and his FW leaving one to run away.  He took out my Pathfinders, FWs and able to kill two of my drones in my Broadside unit and failed my morale and ran off the board.



It was great fun playing with Tau and I can't wait to try some bigger games with them. Tau's range and high strength weapons really makes them something to be reckoned with along with all the little tricks they can do.  What attracts them to me as well is the versatility to create different list make up and still have a decent chance against other armies.  You're not locked into that "one list" just so you can have a fighting chance.

Thanks for JJ's for hosting and Jay for TOing the event.  Next up? Next month they are running an Apoc day with a couple of tables.  Maybe I should talk to Daniel about teaming up with his Tau. I believe he said he had around 3k or 4k worth of them so that would give us probably 10k on our side.

More Tau to come!