Editing Warhammer 40,000/5th Edition Tactics/Tau (section)

===Elite===
*'''XV-8 Crisis Battlesuit:''' God's Gift To Tau. These guys are your mainstay. Their weapons are varied and versatile, and are specialized for various situations. They can take any combination of weapons and wargear unless otherwise stated. These guys will fill up your elites slots. The Crisis suits are famous for the Jump-Shoot-Jump - moving out of cover, shooting, and jumping back into cover, denying return fire and annoying the enemy, an excellent tactic. Each suit has three hardpoints which ''must'' be filled with weapons (see immediately below) and/or support systems (see 
"[[Warhammer_40,000/Tactics/Tau#Tau_Armoury|Tau Armoury]]" section even further below.) Typically a Crisis suit will have two weapons and a support system, but there is no rule against three weapons or even three support systems, or any other ratio you fancy. Obviously some combinations are more effective than others. Note too that if a single weapon system is selected twice, it counts as a single twin-linked weapon (filling two hardpoints) and comes at a price break. Their weapons include:
**'''Airburst Fragmentation Projector:''' A large blast that ignores cover. One per army. Absolutely rapes Imperial Guard, Eldar, Tyranids Dark Eldar, and Orks. Fairly good all-around in spite of middling range, mostly because Large Blasts are hard to come by.  low it up in the middle of a blobnid formation and enjoy the chunky salsa.
**'''Cyclic Ion Gun:''' Massive amount of shots with technically-not-but-sort-of-rending but low strength. Good on a suit with high BS and gret for mulching blobnids.
**'''Burst Cannon:''' Yet another S5 weapon. A mediocre choice considering that you already have dozens of S5 weapons and even other Burst Cannons fitted on Stealth Suits, vehicles, and Fire Warriors. There are better choices for commander weapons as a result. The only real reason to pack one onto a Crisis Suit or Commander is because you desperately need the extra short-range shooty (I.E. You're fitting it on a Crisis suit with a Flamer and/or fusion blaster), and for Commanders this is of debatable value. It is not a bad weapon by any stretch, just that Crisis suits have the opportunity for mounting much better ones in most circumstances.  
**'''Flamer:''' While not as strong as other races', this [[gets shit done|gets the job done]] against hordes of cover-campers and blob armies. Good if you deep strike a suit in and burn shit down. Even better when twin-linked.  It is also the cheapest weapon available to Crisis suits, and so a good way to cram a little extra power under a tight point budget, and remember that you get a price break for taking two of them to get that twin-link bonus.  
**'''Fusion Blaster:''' Your melta gun and absolutely guaranteed to cause at least a medium-quality glancing hit on a direct hit (guaranteed penetrating within 6 inches). This is not an instant-skill weapon, and you ''will'' need to get better with it, so learn it. Use it. Love it. Jump behind a Baneblade and use this weapon to pop it open to see the look on your enemy's face, also great against battlefortresses, and the bigger daemonic engines along with anything else with noticeably weaker rear or side armor and can be useful against titans and stompas in a pinch (void and power fields only have an AV of 12 and go away on a mere glancing hit). Because it's AP1, it has a reasoned chance of killing a Monolith or the like, <s>but because its Living Metal trait renders its Melta quality [[moot]] </s> (not anymore!), it's much more chonky than it'd be otherwise. Can be fitted on Stealthsuits, but only every third one, giving it a cap of two per Stealthsuit squad, tops.
**'''Missile Pod:''' The Tau answer to the Autocannon. Great for popping light to medium vehicles and insta-gibbing T3 guys. In other words; eats up Guardsmen, Eldar, Gaunts, Dark Eldar, and Cultists for breakfast. Despite what [[Dawn of War]] tells you, it's not terribly good for vehicle killing; you have other weapons (Fusion Blasters) if you really need to hate on vehicles.  It has the distinction of being the longest range standard-issue weapon available to Crisis suits, which makes it ideal for a Crisis team intended to dance around the battlefield and harass the enemy while using its jetpack to remain just out of their range to effectively retaliate.  
**'''Plasma Rifle:''' Lower Strength than the Imperial version, but doesn't Get Hot. Peerless for popping heavy infantry so it's great against Ogryn, Karskin/Stormtroopers, Grey Knights, Sisters of Battle, Spess Mehreens, Kay-oss Spess Mehreens, Tyranid Warriors, and Necrons. Really good for sniping Tyranid Synapse creatures, so jump a crisis team to a hive tyrant, blast him to bits, jump away; shoot some warriors and zoanthropes dead and watch the entire tyranid army collapse (if you aren't satisfied with the countless other ways the Tau can ruin the bugs' day). Decried as [[cheese]] by [[Faggotry|some]], it is both the most expensive standard Crisis suit weapon and the most popular with good reason.  
**A good setup is '''Multitracker''' + 2 weapons, as you can't fire both unless you have the Multitracker. A '''Shield Generator''' or '''Shield Drones''' are always good.

'''This is extremely important!!''' Tau Crisis suits are T4, which means they suffer heavily from rocket sniping. If you value your suits, take at least two shield drones on the Shas'Vre to absorb the inevitable St8 AP3 shot. Everything in the damn game has some version of a "fuck your crisis suit" weapon, be prepared. 

*'''Stealth Suits:''' A safe, decent choice, but Crisis Suits are better in most regards. These guys can always Infiltrate or Outflank, and their stealth fields offer SOME protection by potentially limiting the range that the enemy can fire at them (ah-la the Night Fighting rules even in broad daylight or half that in an actual Night Fighting scenario.) Plenty of burst cannons and the opportunity for a fusion gun, but at T3 and mediocre BS without targeting arrays, there are better choices, although a team won't exactly cost you the game. Great for fucking up the shit of Guardsmen, Orks, etc. If you do use them, use them wisely.