Alpha Strike
The concept of the Alpha Strike is to do so much damage in the opening turns of the game that the opposing army is left reeling and ineffective. Many armies have the bulk of their firepower and mobility in a few vehicles. Eliminating those vehicles quickly will leave the armies with much less firepower and much less mobility. While there are some armies that have large numbers of heavy weapons in infantry squads, these are more rare and most armies have some form of vehicle, even if it is just light skimmers. With that in mind, let us concentrate on how to take out enough vehicles to cripple the enemy army quickly. First, we must estimate the amount of vehicles that we are likely to see in a given army, with a slight skewing toward vehicle-heavy armies. (Doesn't do much good to tool up your army to take out 1 Vehicle.) Based on the lists I've played against in the past year and what I've seen online, 2 Predators and 3 Rhinos seems a pretty reasonable number for most armies that lean toward vehicle-heavy. There will be some armies with 3 Predators, and there will be some with 5-6 Rhinos, but 2 and 3 is probably a reasonable average to assume. (Note: As is often the case, the images here do not belong to me. I will eventually have a lot of beautifully painted Tau, but not just yet, okay?)

Next we need to figure out the number of Seekers or Deep-striking Crisis suits or what have you (infiltrating XV25s with Fusion Blasters, Pirahna light skimmers with Fusion) that you would need to take care of business.

First off, what are the significant damage results? Armament Destroyed, immobilised, Vehicle Destroyed. (so, 3 results on Glancing hits, 5 results on Penetrating hits.) Chance to hit x Chance to Breach armour x Chance of significant damage result. Please note that this does not calculate the odds of actually destroying the vehicle, but significantly damaging it. Immobilizing or Destroying Armament may well be the equivalent of killing it, however, and they certainly make the vehicle significantly less useful. Technically, though, these numbers are about _crippling_ enemy armor in a short period of time.

Seeker Missiles
A Marker-lit Seeker missile is 5/6 x 1/6 x 1/2 (Glancing Hits) + 5/6 x 1/6 x 5/6= 5/72+ 25/216 = 40/216 = 5/27 or about 19% chance of a significant damage result versus a Predator. Versus a Rhino, a Seeker hit is much more effective since it has a higher chance of getting a Penetrating hit. On the other hand, Armament Destroyed Results aren't nearly as significant so it changes the odds a bit: 5/6 x 1/6 x 1/3 (Glancing Hits) + 5/6 x 1/2 x 2/3 (Penetrating Hits) = 5/108 + 10/36 = 35/108 or about a 32% chance of a significant Damage result against a Rhino.

Now, if they don't have vehicles, they may still have other targets that these weapons could be used on. Monstrous Creatures are a great example of a good target for Seekers and other Antitank weapons. Versus a Monstrous Creature, the damage potential is much more straightforward. They are typically Toughness 6 and have an Armor Save of 3+. Now our equation is 5/6 x 1/2 and their armor is automatically penetrated. This leaves us with 5/12 or about 42% chance of causing damage. Of course, it takes more than one Wound to kill a Monstrous Creature though.

So what does that all mean? How many Seekers do we need to achieve 2 Predator and 3 Rhino kills? Well, it takes just over 5 Seekers to significantly damage a Predator and just over 3 to do the same to a Rhino. That means that we'd need about 20 Seekers to take care of business. That's a lot of Seeker missiles. That would also do about 8 Wounds to Monstrous Creatures if they were targeted instead. (Note that this assumes the proper number of Markerlight _hits_ to launch the Seekers. With a BS3 Markerlight, that would require 40 Markerlight shots to get the 20 hits necessary.)

Fusion Blasters
Now let's look at the chances of a Fusion Blaster-equipped unit of some kind killing a Predator or a Rhino. Well, assuming BS4 (either due to Target Array or a markerlight hit or simply being a Shas' O) it would be...

Railguns
Finally, the Tau do have other antivehicle options in terms of Railguns on Hammerheads or Broadsides.

BS4 Railgun on a Hammerhead
Versus a Predator: 2/3 x 2/3 x 2/3 = 8/27 or about 30%.

Versus a Rhino: 2/3 x 1 x 2/3 = 4/9 or about 44%.

Given 2 Predators and 3 Rhinos, that means we'd need about 14 Hammerhead Railguns to cripple the average set of enemy vehicles.

BS3 Twinlinked Railgun on a Broadside. (I'm considering this one to be half as effective since a vehicle deploying out of LOS on the first turn may well be untargetable by these where it might be able to be engaged by a more mobile unit.

Versus a Predator: 1/2(modified effectiveness due to mobility) x 3/4 x 2/3 x 2/3 = 12/72 = 1/6 or about 16%

Versus a Rhino: 1/2 x 3/4 x 1 x 2/3 = 6/24 = 1/4 or 25%

That would leave us needing 24 Broadside shots to achieve our desired results.

Whew! That's a lot of numbers! It's important to know how to arrive at them, but now let's do a quick side-by-side comparison to see how our options add up against each of our tanks, ordered from most to least effective in each category...

Vs. Predators

Fusion 40%
BS4 Railgun 30%
Seeker 19%
BS3 TL Railgun 16%

Vs. Rhinos

Fusion 51%
BS4 Railgun 44%
Seeker 32%
BS3 TL Railgun 25%

Note that the above requirements in terms of raw numbers of Seeker Missiles or other Antitank weapons are for the _entire game_, or at least for the number of turns we want to allow the enemy to keep some of their vehicles. If we were after a 1-turn strike, the above numbers would be absolutely correct. We would need that many Seekers or Fusions or Railguns to nail all the enemy vehicles in a single turn. Allowing 2 turns gives us much more favorable numbers: 20 Markerlight Shots and 10 Seekers/turn or 6 Fusion-Equipped Battle Suits (or Pirahnas or Stealth Suits) or 7 Hammerhead Railguns or 12 Broadsides. Obviously, both the Hammerhead and the Broadsides suffer from an inability to do damage quickly in a list like this. That doesn't mean they are useless, just that they won't do the damage we need in the time we want.

Given that Railguns of either variety don't help us out much in terms of doing the damage quickly, why would we include them in a list? Well, in simple game terms, S10 is just really useful. You can instakill T5 characters and other multiwound models, you can penetrate a Monolith much more easily, you have a better chance at range against really heavy Tanks. It also has some not-so-simple game effects. Everybody knows how much damage a Railgun can do, and plunking down a couple of them at the beginning of deployment changes where the opponent can put things, or they risk dying on the first turn. Railguns have a definite place in the list, but we don't have to have tons of them to take care of enemy vehicles.

Hybrid Force
Now, some of these numbers are a little out of line with what we could reasonably bring. For example, 12 Broadsides simply isn't possible, while 20 Seekers is theoretically doable, but would pretty much require a complete dedication to that goal from a list. Even 11 Fusions may be too much, as the primary slots that can take Fusion Blasters are already in pretty hot competition for various other units. (Every Crisis suit that you take with a Fusion Blaster is one less suit you might be able to take another configuration on, or it's one less Stealth Team. On the other hand, if we combine some Seekers and Markerlights with some Fusion units and some Railguns so that we have some of each, it gets easier to shoehorn in. If we go half and half between Seekers and Fusion units, we'll need 10 Seekers and 6 Fusion Blasters. Those are much more manageable numbers. If we throw in a couple of Railguns since they are so generally useful, we might just have something there.

Here's an example of a Hybrid force given two turns to eliminate all enemy vehicles: Hammerhead, 2 Broadsides, 4 Fusions and 10 Seeker Missiles with 10 BS3 Markerlights to give us the 5 hits per turn that we need. So, what would that look like? Here's one option, featuring just the units that we'd need to take for this capability...

97 Shas 'El with Fusion Blaster and Plasma Rifle. HW Multitracker and Target Array. 122 Stealth Teamx3 each with Targeting Array, 1 with Fusion Blaster 175 Pathfinderx4+Shas'Ui with Markerlight and Hard-Wired Target Lock. DevilFish with 2xSeeker Missile.
175 Pathfinderx4+Shas'Ui with Markerlight and Hard-Wired Target Lock. DevilFish with 2xSeeker Missile.
180 Pirahnax2 Fusion Blaster, Target Array, 2xSeeker Missile each

175 Hammerhead Railgun, 2xBurst Cannon, Target Array, 2xSeeker Missile
160 Broadsidesx2, TL-Railgun, Advanced Stabilization System, SMS

1084pts. That leaves plenty of points left over for other options. (One thing you'll likely need is some anti-infantry, this only takes care of vehicular threats or some Monstrous creatures.) You may also want to further upgrade some of the choices here. I left them at the bare-bones needed to take care of our Alpha-Strike capability. Adding a Target Array to the Devilfish and some Shield Drones to the Broadsides would be just a few examples of upgrades you might want to choose to increase your non-Alpha-strike capability. You also have 1 HQ, 2 Elites, all 6 Troops and 1 Heavy Support slot left to fill so you can customize it however you want. This is also not the only possible list. You might decide to go with something like this...

165 7xShas'la FireWarriors, plus 1 Shas'Ui team leader with Markerlight, HW Target Lock and HW Drone Controller and 2 Marker Drones
165 7xShas'la FireWarriors, plus 1 Shas'Ui team leader with Markerlight, HW Target Lock and HW Drone Controller and 2 Marker Drones

163 Pathfinderx3+Shas'Ui with Markerlight and Hard-Wired Target Lock. DevilFish with 2xSeeker Missile.
180 Pirahnax2 Fusion Blaster, Target Array, 2xSeeker Missile each
160 Pirahnax2 Fusion Blaster, Target Array, 1xSeeker Missile each

175 Hammerhead Railgun, 2xBurst Cannon, Target Array, 2xSeeker Missile
160 Broadsidesx2, TL-Railgun, Advanced Stabilization System, SMS

1168pts. This variation costs slightly more, but it takes care of the mandatory 2 Troops Slots and it offers better Markerlight coverage. (4 BS4 Markerlights, 6 independent targets, as opposed to all BS3 and only 4 independent targets.) It also spreads the Seekers across more platforms, giving you better survivability.

Just as there is more than one way to skin a Catachan, there's more than one way to make an Alpha-Strike list. You could even (gasp!) take the same concepts and apply them to a non-Tau army, but I'll leave that as an exercise to the student. :) Just think of the damage you'll be able to do in the first couple of turns, and how hamstrung many armies will be when you have removed all their vehicles after the 2nd turn.

If you enjoyed this, email me and let me know

Return to Warpstorm!