Tau: Mech vs bio builds (vehicles vs infantry/monstrous)

[pitrogg]

Can any Tau player advice me on how to efficiently play Tau different than spamming hammerheads?
The hammerhead build seems to be extremely powerfull, steamrolling everything even after Ethereal was nerfed and doesnt heal or buff vehicles anymore.
In comparison to this crisis suits or riptides seem to be much weaker. They need more resources, are slower, less tanky and deal same or lower damage.
Is there a way to play infantry/gundam robots and still be competetive?

[Jey]

It depends against what.

If you face Tyranids with hordes of Carnifex, you definitely want Hammerheads (with a touch of sky ray and tidewall gunrig, perhaps).
All your other units are simply too weak to resist.

Against other factions, you definitely can use (and are probably better using) other units.
Like Hammerheads are nice and all, but if you face swarms of heavy destroyers or tankbustas, you'll probably regret it quickly.
Whereas pathfinders will slaughter those effortlessly.

Ghostkeel are interesting in a mirror match or against AM (a bit less against SM due to Meltas). Even against Necrons they can be interesting, but the power of the heavy destroyers against them is a bit too high to be really the most efficient unit.

Note that if you reach T7, you get access to the Riptide that will really provide you with very tough frontline units. In this case, you can fight against Carnifexes with other units (though, usually Tyranids will also have their Exocrine by then, so having a frontline blocker will be less important)

[adder007usa]

Riptides are amazing, honestly. Their nova reactor ability means that if there's something that needs to die NOW, you have the ability to do so. This can be critical when facing Tyranids; as they say, "Shoot the big ones".

I've also found crisis suits are excellent for taking out stuff in cover (since their flamethrowers ignore), and skyrays are great for the smartmissile bursting. Also, don't underestimate your commander and ethereal abilities: A pair of commanders throwing mont'ka and rin'yon strategies constantly increases the dps of your units to stupid levels, and those riptides stay much healthier when being healed (Both the ethereal AND the builder drone heals work on them!)