Me and my friend danny played a game on saturday and given that we're still fairly new to the game and Danny has only played two games with the Tau, we'd like some suggestions for different tactics we could use and also for pointing out things we did wrong.
So, without further ado. Here goes: ( I forgot to take two of the pics so there is a very dodgy bodge up one. Sorry 'bout that! )


Imperial Guard Army 1800 pts

Regimental HQ 525 pts
1 Supreme Commander
Commisar
12 Infantry Stands
8 Chimera's

Mech Infantry Detachment 425 pts
1 Command Stand
Commisar
12 Infantry Stands
8 Chimera's

Flak Battery 150 pts
3 Hydra's

Artillery Battery 250 pts
3 Basilisks

Rough Rider Platoon 150 pts
6 Rough Riders
Commisar

Sentinal Squadron 100 pts
4 Sentinels

Shadowsword 200 pts


FW Tau Army: 1775 pts

Firewarrior Cadre 300 pts
6 Firewarriors
3 Devilfish
3 Pirana

Firewarrior Cadre 300 pts
6 Firewarriors
3 Devilfish
4 Gundrones

Stealth Suit Contingent 175 pts
4 Stealth Suits

Battlesuit Cadre 250 pts
4 Crisis Suits

Battlesuit Cadre 250 pts
4 Crisis Suits

Tetra Contingent 100 pts
4 Tetra

Hammerhead Contingent 200 pts
3 Hammerheads

Hammerhead Contingent 200 pts
3 Hammerheads


Terrain:

Danny set up the terrain and i agreed on it.

Setup:




TURN 1



Imp - I get first turn and sustain fire with the basilisks, on the Firewarior Cadre (1) directly opposite them. Didn't realise they had drones and only scored one casualty ( the proxies were emtpy bases, i should have remembered! Dur )

Tau - The Firewarrior Cadre (1) with the drones doubled to behind the hill

Imp - Mechanised Company Advances behind the ruin

Tau - Failed to advance with Hammerheads (8) so moved to support Fire warrior Cadre (1)

Imp - Shadowsword doubles to fire at the Hammerheads and misses!

Tau - Crisis Suit Cadre (4) advances onto the hill

Imp - Rough Riders advance behind the mechanised company

Tau - Tetras put on overwatch in woods ( waiting to see what i'd do )

Imp - Sentinels on overwatch ( trying to force danny to move something useful )

Tau - Crisis Cadre (3) doubles to near the city in the centre, is shot at by the sentinels on overwatch and can't return fire as there is only one unit that can see and he's surpressed by the new blast marker.

Imp  - Hydra's Advance behind the next ruin across, ready to support centre or right flank.

Tau - Stealth Suits failed to advance, but moved to near Crisis Cadre (3)

Imp - Regiment HQ advances and deploys into the buildings, opening fire on Crisis Suit Cadre (4) on the hill, killing two and breaking the unit.

Tau - The Hammerheads (8) near the bottom pop up and kill a chimera from the mechanised company.

Imp - Nothing left to activate

Tau - Firewarrior Cadre (2) marches and unloads near the Centre with the Stealth suits and the Crisis suits.

End Phase:
Crisis suits pass.


TURN 2



Tau - Hammerhead contingent (7) advances and kills 2 basilisks, breaking them . The lone remaining one retreating behind the nearby buildings.

Imp - Shadowsword advances and opens fire on Hammerhead Contigent (7) killing one and breaking the others who retreat behind the wood.

Tau - Crisis Cadre (3) advance and fire at the Regimental HQ, with 8 shots and only manages to kill 1 chimera

Imp - Regimental HQ try to advance but fail, then with a re-roll secure the building they are in also opening fire on Crisis Suit Cadre (3) killing two stands and breaking them. The Crisis suits retreated behind the hill in the south.

Tau - Hammerhead contingent (8) moves out onto the hill and fires at the regimental HQ, killing 4 infantry but no chimeras.

Imp - Hydra advance and fire at Stealthsuit contigent (5) killing 3 and breaking them, they retreated behind the woods.

Tau - Crisis suit contingent (4) tries to advance but fails init test so moved into woods.

Imp - Sentinels failed init test, regrouped.

Tau - Tetra advanced and killed a sentinel

Imp - Rough Rider platoon Advances behind the centre objective

Tau - Fire Warrior Cadre (2) marches to between the wood and the hill

Imp - Mechanised Company advances and fires at the Fire Warrior Cadre(1), but stays in the chimera's so that the FW's can't damage them. Kills one gundrone

Tau - Fire Warrior Cadre (1) fail to march so they regroup.

End Phase:
Basilisk fails to rally
Crisis suit Cadre (5), Hammerhead Contingent (7) and the Stealthsuit Contingent fail to rally. All rolling ones!


TURN 3





Imp - Won strategy and used the Mechanised Company to Assault the devilfishes on the right, trapping 4 stands of firewarriors inside the devilfishes ( not sure about this rule, will ask in the right place ) and wiping the formation out in one go.
Maintained initiative with the Shadowsword who advanced and then fired on the hammerheads on the hill killing one and breaking them. ( They went back to hiding behind the hill )

Tau - Crisis Cadre (4) failed to advance so regrouped instead and stayed where they were.

Imp - Rough riders failed initiative, they were going to assault the tetra.

Tau - Doubled to the objective being held by the Shadowsword and fired at the roughriders and failed to kill any.

Imp - Hydras advance and fire at the pirana's killing all three.

Tau - FIre Warrior Cadre (2) marches into centre, towards hydra's.

Imp - Regimental HQ advances and fires at the tetra, killing all of them.

End Phase:
Basilisk Finally rallies!!!
Hammerhead Contingent (7) behind hill rallied.


TURN 4



Imp - Won strategy again and got the regimental HQ to double close to Fire Warrior Cadre (2) and shot at the devilfishes killing none.
Maintained the initiative with the Mechanised Company and advanced,close firing on Fire Warrior Cadre (2) again, this time destroying two devilfish.

Tau - Firewarrior Cadre (2) bravely assaulst the hydra's, losing two of their own, destroying 2 hydra's and then dying valiently under 35 dice of support fire.

Imp - Roughriders fail to do anything, again.

Tau - Crisis Cadre advances and finishes off the hydra's

Imp - Shadowsword advances and kills one of the crisis suits breaking them again.

Tau - Hammerhead Contingent (7) pops up and kills a chimera from the Regimental HQ.

Game Ends




And here's a pic of Danny looking slightly stunned half way through:



I won with:
BTS - both Fire Warrior Cadre's
Hold the Line
They shall not pass

Awesome battle report... looks like you had a lot of fun!

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Quick point, Reg HQ & Mech companies have 7 Chimeras each not 8.

Will re-read report to try and help with tactics.

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Great fun thanks for posting.
Not actually having played any games myself though it seem exceedingly strange that there were no retains, was this deliberate?

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This is absolutely most stunning tactical maps yet with all those different colored arrows, marked units, kills and blast markers. Excellent work!

(why did those IG companies cost that 525/425...?)

Thanks for the replies!  

Just a few things first, Danny was using pretty much all the models he had so was restricted to what he could choose. He also had horrendously bad luck for pretty much all the game and my usual luck was incredible for a change!

E&C, it was fun ta. Moreso for me though . . .
I was actually quite worried about the lack of decent mobile anti tank in my list but it was not too bad actually. Not sure about the hydra battery though.
Are the pics clear enough as they seem to have been made smaller? Here is the direct link to them:
My Photobucket

Tiny-Tim and rpr, both the Mechanised Company and the Regimental HQ both had Commissars with a chimera each which is why they cost 425 and 525 respectively.
The joys of MSPAINT!  
Would have used Publisher but don't have it . . .

Justiniel, maintaining initiative? I did mate once or twice. With the shadowsword and the mechanised company i think. ( on different turns )


The sorts of things that i need help with ( i think ) is army selection, positioning of commissars / command squads and target priority ( and remembering to use the commissars special rules . . .  )
I think Danny needs help with the uses for units ( particularly crisis suits ), army selection again and the sorts of units to buy next for a nicely balanced army. Plus what units go well together as he doesn't see the crisis suits to be as good as i do.

Will try and get him on here sometime.

Stupid question - Did I miss something?  Who won the game?

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author of Syncing Forward and other stories...

It's a dog-eat-dog world, and I've got my Milkbone underwear on.

Great report. I really liked the one line system used.
Not to say that a good prose is bad, they are as good. Just different.

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It would be nice to get lightspeed,
so far we can only reach slight speed.- Erik M
092b85658e746a91d343e53509d357744e56f641

..ie you exchange on troop stand for one with a commissar?

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It would be nice to get lightspeed,
so far we can only reach slight speed.- Erik M
092b85658e746a91d343e53509d357744e56f641

And they are free... unless the addition cost was the Chimera? Which, as has been noted, you don't need.

Character upgrades are added to units (not to the formation) and give them additional abilities and attacks.

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Guns don't break formations. Blast Markers break formations.

A very minor mistake, and I'm sure it didn't affect the game too much!

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Currently doing a plastic scenery kickstarter

Moscovian, i did mate:
BTS - both Fire Warrior Cadre's
Hold the Line
They shall not pass

Will edit that methinks.


To pretty much everyone, oops! I thought i had to add the commissar as an extra stand then buy transport for it. Well, i guess i have 50pts more to spend then . . . Any ideas what on?

Eric M, I just wrote up some quick notes we both made ( and to be honest i am not the best at imaginative writing )