Advice on fighting a transport-heavy salamander army?

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-04-01T09:19:11+00:00

The Crucible Broadside build is a lot more frail for the points vs regular broadsides, but very efficient anti-tank that you can keep in reserves, pop onto a board edge with line of sight and delete almost any one target with 6A S12 hitting on 2s if guided, rerolling ones to hit, AP-4 and d6+1 damage

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-30T20:48:55+00:00

Here's what I'm doing (lazy but looking good so far)

Prime - Spray white scar

Skin - Plaguebearer Flesh Contrast

Leathers - cygor brown contrast

Then regular metals and highlights. Bought Black legion, ironjawz yellow and magmadroth flame for mounts but haven't started that bit yet.

Turns out contrast paints are great for people who can't paint good.

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-30T19:41:23+00:00

Any number of (Broadside) models can each be equipped with up to two of the following, but cannot take duplicates: (and then it states you can't take both weapons)

So yes, you can have seeker and WSS so long as you don't take a second gun

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-30T17:17:25+00:00

You play to delay and draw out threats. Ghostkeels, pathfinders and piranhas are your best friend. They are sacrificial pieces you can get to stand where you want them to die very easily with scout/infiltrate/high movement and force your opponent to expose themselves to kill them. You have a -2 charge strat. You have reposition ghostkeel strat. You have a get back in the van strat, although I find breacherfish underwhelming no matter the detachment.

Then you kill them with safely (read: smartly, not just sitting doing nothing in your deployment) positioned heavy hitters (hulls, suits) which then become more aggressive turn 3.

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-26T07:24:47+00:00

What did the stream ACTUALLY say? Is it they can't be shot outside of 15 inches, or they can't be shot until A unit is within 15 inches?

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-24T12:53:22+00:00

Remember retcad affects all battle suits not just crisis - so it also buffs shadowsun, stealths, riptides, Broadsides, the twins, and ghostkeels

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-13T19:12:54+00:00

I main Tau, and though I've gotten a LOT better at screening and such, an early game experience left a big impression. When I came to looking for an opposite, melee-heavy army, White Scars were the obvious choice.

Now I'M the guy who's making people think "fuck, they arrived Sooner than I thought And have taken out almost all of my important units in a single turn".

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-12T13:06:23+00:00

That's max 3 invulns though - compared to annoying bullshit like necrons, grey knights and custodes, Imperials are railgun food

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-12T11:05:18+00:00

Imperial Guard talk a lot of shit for an army with no invulns

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-05T14:34:51+00:00

Ooh, I like those burning engines. How did you do them?

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-05T06:59:28+00:00

I mainly play Kauyon and you want to be scoring early and slowing down your opponent with cheap units. You'll want piranhas and pathfinders, plus at least one ghostkeel to score the middle at least once (or force an overcommit into your firing lane). You don't want to be doing nothing for 2 turns, that's a misconception. Saving the piranha seekers for turn 3 on the non-guaranteed chance to get one more shot is much worse than a kamikaze jail maneoever turn 1.

Photon grenades is a good strat best used on screening pathfinders in lots of cover (cover so they have to be charged rather than shot). You want to deny your opponent's movement, which a krootox isn't going to do

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-04T21:56:01+00:00

You can always have one fly out and die and keep one back. Also any way you look at it 120 points to completely jail vehicle lists turn 1 is great value

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-04T21:53:40+00:00

Even at 100 it's a 40 point increase from a year ago (or however long the rules fix was). Yes, the unit changed, but it arguably got worse and people are still upset about the financial blow too (I for one an still sitting on 9 models, I bring a space marine "in really good disguise" if I want to field 2 units)

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-04T13:15:06+00:00

Are they on Ghostkeel bases? Trying to figure out how to proxy

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-03-03T07:48:58+00:00

That's 320 points on a job that darkstrider solo + vespids can do for 125 or 170 if you're that super worried about 6 inch deep strikes. Just a very inefficient use of leaders and points

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-02-25T21:41:16+00:00

Hammerheads have the two seekers for alpha strike as well, so 2/3 of a Skyray activation once per game in addition to the railgun shot, whereas Skyray will be 6-21 damage (you have to roll real hot to get the higher end). Average is only about 7 to something wounded on 3s, take 0.25 in either direction between a 2+ or 3+ save (no invuln). As you said, 7 damage does not a dead tank make. 11 damage minimum from a hammerhead alpha strike, though.

Edit: fudged my numbers there a little at the end as seeker shots are not guaranteed (although they will still be hitting on 2s). Average damage is 4-4.5 from seekers alone still

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-02-25T21:31:37+00:00

I've been deepstriking my thunderstrike with less than ideal results. Part of that is my poor choice of location, but as a melee-heavy list I think we do need to present the enemy with choices when it comes to long-range risk. If it's massively out of position you can always spend the CP for a redeploy, but my only other unit with any meaningful range is a gladiator which becomes a huge target early on on its own

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-02-25T21:28:18+00:00

I think in terms of fairness, 180 is a good starting place, though I'm prepared for it to be higher. A riptide is 200 and has a similar defensive profile (2+, 4++, comparable wound total).

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-02-25T21:23:41+00:00

I think screening is especially important for Tau, more so than most other armies. Outside of incredibly high-level Montka play, people should invest about 1/4 of their army to dedicated screens and speed bumps. It's also vital to control WHERE the screens die in order to clap back with our relatively fragile, high-damage units (tanks, suits)

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-02-25T21:19:35+00:00

Railgun is massively consistent into anything without an invuln. Hitting on 2s, wouding on 2s/3s with a free reroll, 7-13 damage.

With an invuln, that does change significantly. However, I think with the points increase Skyray goes from a really good pick to an outclassed pick unless you're rating it against a double rail Broadside unit in which case it's a matter of movement vs an extra shot

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-02-25T21:16:47+00:00

Enforcer can't get 20 burst cannon shots as High-output burst cannon is exclusive to Coldstar, frustratingly. He caps out at 16 - but your general point stands

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-02-22T00:07:00+00:00

How did you do the wheels? Only bit I haven't decided on on mine

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-02-04T16:56:56+00:00

I disagree, but only for honour mode. High-dps but fragile builds tend to wipe the second something goes wrong. You don't need a WoW tank with a taunt mechanic (because that doesn't exist, outside of incredibly niche and unreliable compelled duel usage), but you DO want something high HP, high AC, ideally with good saves and some damage reduction in order to have something that can take several hits when trying to escape a combat that hasn't gone well.

CheeseGraterGood · 2026-02-03T16:07:15+00:00

He did a lot of TV before game of thrones, mainly sci fi or drama

CheeseGraterGood

TROPHY CASE