Tau vs AMTL 3.2.3
Tau
Crisis + SC
Broadsides
Broadsides
Recon
Recon
Hammerhead Rail x6 + Skyray
Hammerhead rail x6
Hammerhead fusion x4
Fire Warriors
Mech Fire Warriors
Barracudas

AMTL (from memory)
Reaver with Plasma Destructor, Gatling Blaster, Apocalypse Launcher, Legate
Reaver with Corvus Pod + Turbolaser Destructor, Apocalypse Launcher
Warhound 1 with Turbolaser Destructor, Vulcan Mega Bolter
Warhound 2 with Turbolaser Destructor, Vulcan Mega Bolter
Warhound 3 with Vulcan Mega Bolter, Plasma Blast gun
Hypaspists
Thunderbolts
Thunderbolts
Forge Knights



Tau win roll for table sides and select corners to put distance between them and the titans.
Turn 1
AMTL win strat
AM- Reaver 1 doubles and shoots previously hidden Hammerhead Rail 1 (BTS)= 3 auto kills with Plasma Destructor = BROKEN(never to recover)
Tau- Recon 1 calls co-ord fire on Reaver 1 with Hammerhead Rail 2 and Hammerhead Fusions= all shields stripped, +2DC +5BM
AM- Reaver 2 advances and shoots HHF for 2 kills = BROKEN
Tau- Broadsides 1 double into woods and lose 2 units from 4 failed DTT(6,6, 1,1,1,1,!!) and shoot Reaver 1 +1BM = Reaver Broken and flees behind wood
NOTE:- So then, 3 formations still couldn’t kill the Reaver from shooting with Markerlights
AM- Warhound 1 doubles and shoots Broadsides 2 for 1 kill = +2BM
AM- attempt to retain with Thunderbolts 1 and fail
Tau- Recon 2 fails and rerolls advance to shoot Warhound east for -2 shields +1 BM
AM- Forge Knights march into woods in front of broken Reaver1
Tau- Broadsides 2 marshall and shoot Warhound 1 for no damage +1BM and remove 2BM
AM- Warhound 2 doubles and shoots broken HHR (BTS) kills 1 due to BM
Tau- Mech FW sustain and shoot Warhound 1 +1DC +1BM= broken and flees to cover. FORGOT TO CRIT IT!
AM- Warhound 3 doubles and shoots recon 1 kills 1 +2BM
Tau- Crisis march into woods
Tau- Barracudas go on CAP
END phase
Reaver 1 (+2shields and no BM) and Warhound 1 rally
HHF, HHR bts, Recon 1 fail to rally....

Turn 2
Tau win strat
Tau- HHR double away to the safety of cover from oncoming Reaver, Forge knights and Warhound 3. A little cat and mouse but it was pointless.
NOTE- This was a mistake on my part as I should have attacked the Reaver but I would have had to double to do so and there was no marker light with the formation and the resulting move would have put me in charge range of the Forge Knights.
AM- Knights engage recon 1 no kills on either side sees the Knights win the roll off by 1 = Recon BROKEN and flee
AM- retain with Warhound 2 – on OW
Tau- Broadsides 1 sustain on Knights in wood all hits saved +1BM
AM- Thunderbolts 1 ground attack HHR bts – Barracudas CAP and shoot down both Thunderbolts
Tau- Broadsides 2 go on OW
AM- Thunderbolts 2 intercept Barracudas which shoot one down with flak
Tau- Recon 2 double way from oncoming 2 Warhounds
AM- Reaver 2 doubles and shoots Mech FW kills 1 devilfish +2BM . Hypaspists de-Bus from corvus pod touching Reaver and in buildings for cover
Tau – FW advance into wood
AM- Warhound 3 advances and shoots Broadside1 for 1 kill = BROKEN
Crisis- March away to buildings beside AMTL blitz
AM- Warhound 1 adv to shoot HHF for 1 kill from BM
Tau- Mech FW double and shoot Hypaspists for +1BM
AM- Reaver 1 marshall moves and regroups +3 shields (4)
END phase
Warhound 1, Hypaspists, Reaver 1(-2BM) all rally. Forge Knights fail
HHF, HHR bts, Mech FW all fail Broadside 1 and recon 1 rally(2BM)

Turn 3
Am win strat
AM- Hypaspists engage Mech FW and WIPE THEM OUT
AM- retain with Reaver 2 adv and shoot HHR and kill 4 = BROKEN (never to recover)
Tau- Broadsides 2 adv and shoot Warhound 1 +1 DC = Broken
AM- Warhound 2 doubles and shoots Recon 2 +4 kills = BROKEN
Tau- Recon 1 doubles and Markerlight Knights +1 BM
Tau – retain with Broadsides 1 and sustain on Knights for 2 Kills = Broken
AM- TB2 Fails
Tau- Barracudas ground attack Warhound 1 for no damage or BM – fearless
AM- Reaver 1 adv shoots Crisis +3 auto kills from Plasma destructor = BROKEN (only SC remains)
Tau- FW adv to block route to blitz for Reaver 2 and Warhound 2
END phase
HHF, Recon 1, Crisis rally. HHR bts fails, Recon 2 fails
Knights, Warhound 1 rally +2 shields
1-0 to AMTL

Turn 4
Tau win strat
Tau- Recon 1 march to block movement of Warhound 1 so it can’t move to Tau blitz
Tau- retain with HHF which moves to take blitz
AM- Reaver 2 sustains on FW 5 kills = BROKEN
Tau- Broadsides 1 sustains on Warhound 3 – 2 shields -1DC and crits
NOTE- the stagger result is pathetic when almost all other WEs get extra damage or are destroyed. Who came up with this crap?
AM- Knights adv shoot HHR 1 kill from BM
Tau- Barracudas ground attack Warhound 3 between AMTL objectives and kill it
Tau- Broadsides 2 adv and shoot Warhound 2 +1BM (from 4 hits...)
AM- Thunderbolt 2 ground attacks HHF and breaks it (denying Blitz)
Tau – Crisis hides from Reaver 1
AM- Hypaspists double and shoot remaining 3 FWs and WIPE THEM OUT with BMs
AM- Warhound 2 doubles and shoots HHR bts and WIPES IT OUT for BTS objective
AM- Warhound 1 shoots Recon 1 and WIPES THEM OUT
AM- Reaver 1 adv shoot Broadside 2 +1 BM (no plasma this turn)

END
Tau 0- AMTL 2 BTS, TNSP
Tau only had the following left on table.... 1 Crisis unit, 3 Broadsides, 5 broadsides, 1 HHR(broken), 1 HHF(broken), 2 Recon units (broken), 2 Barracudas

Tau only killed the Warhound, three Thunderbolts and a couple of knights. Not bad for the supposed shootiest army....

tough game, but hey, it went to 4 turns.... were you using the not lance rule on the hammerheads?

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Yes he was but he did use most of them on shields from what I can see.

The stagger crit for warhounds is the original rulebook one, I thought it was fixed already? Or is that just EpicUK?

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Ouch, that must smart. Any chance of some photos of the set up and terrain in the future as would be very interesting to see how this happened.

But I do agree that the Plasma Destructor against non-RA forces is brutal. May main issue with the list has always been that you can have almost activation parity at the start of the game.

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Do you play titans can see over terrain, or was there not as much terrain as we use in Europe? I'd be interested to see how the hheads were exposed

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Dobbsy you know your dice are awful right? Maybe you should burn them ceremonially and get some new ones.

I would also question the terrain rules as it seemed trivially easy for the Reavers to get line of sight on the first turn. A few other points might be it is noticable to me especially in the first turn you target formations that have already activated a lot as opposed to trying to disrupt your opponents plans by going after formations before they activate.

Also never target the Reavers early against AMTL go after the Hounds and support. Only bother with the Reavers after you have reduced the AMTL activations.

Two things quickly before I dig in:

1. The Warhound crit was updated prior to 3.23 release. The PDF has it taking an extra point of damage as it staggers around.

2. Don't forget the god machines rule. If a scout or battle titan dies, all friendly formations in LOS take a BM.

Ok, after reading through your report I'm also curious about the terrain. It did seem a bit easy to gain LOS.

It also looks like you split up your firepower with a lot of shields dropping on all the scout and battle titans but very little actual damage being done. That's playing to the AMTL strengths since a hit against shields that doesn't lead to damage is effectively wasted.

What I think I'd have done differently (yes hindsight and all) is to either concentrate everything on the reaver until it was dead (gain BTS) and then focus on the warhounds. The alternative would be to concentrate on killing the warhounds first and ignoring the reavers entirely.

In general when you face AMTL you need to decide if you take out the battle titans or pick off the smaller units. if you take on the battle titans, focus until it's dead and move on. If you go for the smaller stuff, ignore the bigger titans; they can't kill everything and a couple battle titans aren't enough to prevent you from getting objectives. Forge knights, just break the formation once that happens they vaporize.

The second thing to remember that the weapon have set fire arcs. Arm weapons are forward arc and the carapace are Fixed forward. If a titan sustains it can't turn to bring weapons to bear.

Last of all, Reavers and Warhounds are vulnerable to crossfire. A reaver or warhound with 6+RA are much softer to kill.

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-Vaaish

Damn I think it may have died then. Ce la vie.


As we played corners his Reaver set up hard against his centre table deployment edge and charged diagonally over the hill towards the centre line, bringing my HH formation into view from behind the back of the wood it was behind. Having 7 tanks it takes up a lot of space so several of them were visible.

I've asked Atension to send me the pic of the table.


I actually put as many seeker missiles on them as possible first but there's only so many 5+ or 6+ hits that will land.... At some point you need to hit them as much as possible and you lose a lot of shots on shields first. Tau don't shoot with that many weapons in one action.


Yeah the Reaver BTS was a big threat and exposed so I figured two HH formations and a recon formation would get it. It didn't but it broke and ran away behind terrain (woods block LOS) where I could not get any other formations into range. When I committed those three, the small formation of Fusions were promptly hit and broken by his other reaver. The HHR formation was then in a position where I either committed them to a double without Markerlight support hence no seekers in Turn 2 (after Reaver had rallied and unlikely to kill the Reaver with shields back) and expect to lose them in retaliation from the ForgeKnights or the Reaver when it moved. Instead I moved them away to fight the next turn in the idea of cat and mouse. But that just got them killed by a doubling Warhound before they acted later game.


Yep fully understood this but I also figured two HH formation and a recon would do it - they almost did.


Yeah getting into crossfire usually sees my recon formations dead or broken next action. In past experience, it's not that easy to cross the enemy battle line undamaged. That is throwing away recon units.

I did try to put road blocks in the way as much as possible - this is why the game was only 2-0 or it would have been worse. Broken formations were the reason for this as I just blocked routes for the titans as much as possible. Thankfully broken units have ZOC too.

That would have netted you a BM on every AMTL formation in LOS then. Can certainly help to break the larger titans to keep them from doing useful things.




Sorry, that's not what I meant. I mean instead of focusing fire on one titan until it was dead (warhound, reaver, whatever strikes your fancy) your report made it sound like after your initial crack at the reaver your units spread their firepower around.



It might mean you have to sacrifice a small unit to claim, but if you kill a 725 point unit turn one, the AMTL options get pretty slim. Not saying it's super easy in the least but you get big payoffs against the Reavers especially if you are confident you can kill it that turn.

Still, I'm thinking that Tau might be better served going for the small formations and ignoring the big titans. I'm pretty sure you could have wiped out the three warhounds and the forge knights. That would have left AMTL with three formations capable of holding ground and there's no way those three activations could tag everything before games end.

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-Vaaish

Vaaish here's the table we played on at the end of game. Can you see any Tau on the table?

BTS Hammerhead was hidden behind central wood at the top of the pic. Reaver began at the centre of the bottom of the map and doubled to the open area on the hill to it's right (with the rabbit ears wood on it ) to gain LOS on the HHs.

Thanks, and I don't doubt it was a bloodbath

IMO it feels far more open than what I normally play with. Lots of really long open firelanes that titans love in the pic you posted. We tend to have more hills, dense cities, and other things to block LOS. I'll try to remember to take a shot next time we play.

I went back and read through the Tau army list this afternoon, and playing titans I'd be absolutely terrified of hammerheads since they remove the RA save. A single formation of them should basically evaporate a Warhound once the shields are gone and should have the firepower to strip them. Even more so with markerlight and against a crossfire target.

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-Vaaish

Yeah I just wish my BTS HH formation had had the chance I doubt Warhound 1 deployed in the left side of the table would not have existed given what was deployed on that side - Recon + Broadsides + HHR bts. It would have allowed me to move around more.

I'd prefer to have every single fire lane blocked with terrain but I always feel it's a bit beardy when you play people so I go with roughly the 2 pieces of terrain per two square foot as suggested in the book. I think we even had more than that on this table.

Thanks for the photo it helps a lot. Playing corners did the Tau have the top left side? I'll be honest looking at the terrain playing Tau I would have been more inclined to go for the long bottom edge. Might have been able to hide more formations behind the woods and hills.

However, again having your BTS broken on the first activation is always going to put you on the back foot so I feel for you.

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The terrain doesn't look all that sparse to me in terms of number of pieces, perhaps some of them a bit small and not useful for hiding all a formation behind - depending on how you played the buildings etc.

Playing corners does give you better angles for shooting though since the frontage is wider.

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Dobbsy, if the table is still around (or easily reconstructed) it might make for an interesting rematch to agree on a standard deployment and see if there's any differences.

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