Play Styles
As all of my different play style shout outs, you can mix and match any components you want from any of them or none of them. These are just some different ideas and things I've done with my Riptide.
In Your Backyard
For those of you who love to ruin your opponent's day with devious tricks and crazy tactics, then this is the one for you.
Don't put the Riptide on the table, but rather keep him in reserves and deep strike the behemoth straight into your foe's line. Guide him there using Homing Beacons via infiltrating Stealthsuits, your Ethereal, deepstriking Stealthsuits, or whatever dirty trick you want to pull.
Equip the fella with whatever you feel necessary for your idea of a "bad day," but more than likely he want get to shoot too much depending on where he deepstrikes, who you're playing against and who's nearby when he plummets from the sky. Luckily for you though, he's a brute when it comes to close combat, but he just can't hit.
Probably not the best use of 200 points around, but it sure could be fun in a non-competitive match or friendly game.
Death From Afar
The title explains it all (just in case it didn't, this is the option where you shoot stuff to death before they reach punchy distance).
Deploy the Riptide with your gun line, shoot stuff and then later prep yourself for the charge.
Deck out the big guy with an Ion Accelerator, a Drone Controller, two Shielded Missile Drones and whatever other secondary systems you like (maybe, a target lock, velocity tracker, SMS or plasma).
A more effective means of utilizing your Riptide and very potent against almost any target.
Tau Guardian
If you enjoy using your units in a cohesive defense pattern, then you may want to follow this style.
Deploy the big beaut with the rest of your gun line, especially this time.
Purchase and Early Warning Override, Counterfire Defense System, and your choice of weapon systems and drones.
Efficient and a perfect unit to do this with, but may not be the most effective use for your Riptide.
Bullet Magnet
A better way to protect your units is to absorb all of your opponents firepower with a bullet magnet. If you want to play defensively and don't like the Tau Guardian setup then this might be a better choice.
Same deployment as the other options except for the first play style.
Acquire a Stimulant Injector, drones, your choice of other secondary systems and primary weapon.
Probably my favorite way to use this model and a very potent mixture of defense and destruction.
Putting Paper to the Table
The Riptide is a very strong model and a very deadly one too, but he does come with a few weaknesses that you need to note before you put one on the table.
- Nova-charge can literally eat your Riptide from the inside out. Use extreme caution when utilizing this option and don't over do it. Use it primarily as a "in case of emergencies" measure.
- If you overheat with a blast weapon then it just flat out doesn't even shoot. Don't overdo this either. Yeah, you probably won't get wounded whenever it overheats, but it really sucks when it doesn't even shoot.
- Just because you don't suck at close combat, doesn't mean you should do it.
- You have a jet pack, so use it! I know it may seem weird that a huge thing like this has one, but don't forgot about those vroom-vroom things on the back of the model.
- He's not a character. You can't do precision shots, Look Out Sir checks, and definitely no challenges when this guy charges into combat.
Typical Tau Stuff
SHOOT STUFF! You are playing Tau, so make sure you shoot as much as you can, optimize your shots by picking the proper targets, and other typical Tau things.
If you're going to deploy him in your gun line, try to make use of the Ethereal's aura of heroic Leadership, Supporting Fire from Fire Warriors other gun line fellows and try to put him in front. He's a massive unit and can provide a whole lot of cover to your other units as well as absorb most of your opponent's shots.
Monster School
Monstrous Creatures are kind of a weird thing for Tau players to use especially when looking back at the 4th and 3rd edition codexes.
Since he is a Monstrous Creature, all of his close combat attacks are AP 2, he causes Fear (can be useful, but most people have high enough Ld to ignore this), has Smash (great for Instant Death), Hammer of Wrath (fun, but not really useful if you're not going to charge) and Move Through Cover (handy when traversing the battle field and helps to avoid Dangerous Terrain tests as results from jet packing around).
This really allows him to excel in combat against most Targets and he has a higher Imitative than those Thunder/Power things, so he can actually win in combat. Just watch out for things that can really get you though (Thunder shield Termies, Special Characters geared to take out huge things and Monster Hunters), but if you charge some Guardsmen, you'll win without any doubt.
Conclusion
Riptides can be a very effective part of any army, but more than one can be a little overkill and it might take some getting used to comparing it to older forms of Tau warfare. Just remember my list of five little doosies above and don't get overzealous with your Riptide; even the most powerful of fighters can perish from the smallest of threats (Achilles's Tendon anyone?).
P.S. Sorry I haven't posted anything in a while. Life's been keeping me busy for quite some time now. I promise I'll get some more posts up before long and even an Eldar ally guide (I'm currently looking through it as I'm typing this line of text). Don't worry I haven't fallen off the face of Earth.