T'au Empire Retaliation Cadre Detachment Guide (11th Edition)

Retaliation Cadre rewards getting close and hitting hard. In broad terms it grants your battlesuits a bonus to Strength at close range and a bonus to armour penetration (AP) at very short range, turning already-dangerous Crisis and heavier suits into short-range demolition when they drop in the enemy's face. The doctrine is aggressive posturing: you accept the risk of positioning suits near the opponent because the closer you are, the more your shooting punches above its printed profile. Paired with T'au's markerlights, a Guided Retaliation unit at close range can shred elite infantry and crack vehicles that would shrug off long-range fire. The obvious tension is survivability - suits that get close are suits the enemy can reach - which is why the detachment's reserve and repositioning tools matter so much. The exact strength/AP bonus values and the range bands that trigger them are errata-sensitive, so confirm the current Retaliation Cadre rule wording in the Faction Pack.

Retaliation Cadre's stratagems are the reason it is scary: coverage highlights hit-and-fade and reserve manipulation as its signature tricks. Expect a cheap Strike and Fade-style tool that lets a unit shoot and then fall back or reposition, and reserve plays that let battlesuits arrive close to the enemy or return to reserves to redeploy - a Starflare Ignition System-style ability to pull Crisis suits back off the board and drop them again elsewhere. The playbook is to drop suits, unload boosted close-range fire, then use hit-and-fade to escape the counter-punch - repeating the cycle so the opponent never gets a clean swing at your suits. Save your reserve and fallback stratagems for the moment the enemy commits to killing a suit unit, denying them the trade. Specific stratagem names, CP costs and the exact reserve distances are updated by dataslates, so verify the current versions in the Faction Pack before you plan a combo around them.

Retaliation Cadre's enhancements typically sharpen a Commander or battlesuit Character leading the aggressive push - buffs to close-range damage, survivability for the unit that drops in first, or mobility that makes the strike-and-fade cycle smoother. Evaluate them by which one best protects or amplifies your key deep-striking piece, since the whole plan hinges on your first suit unit surviving to do its job and then getting away. An enhancement that adds resilience to your lead Commander is often worth more than a marginal damage boost, because a dead Commander breaks the cycle. Put the enhancement on the Character you intend to lead the assault, not a backfield support suit. As always, enhancement names, costs and effects change with errata and balance updates, so pick from the live list in the current Faction Pack rather than assuming prior-season options are unchanged.

This detachment is built around Crisis Battlesuits - your flexible, deep-striking core that benefits most from the close-range strength and AP bonuses. Commanders lead the charge, carry enhancements and enable reserve plays. Heavier suits like the Riptide and Broadsides add durability and big guns, though Broadsides prefer to sit back. Stealth Suits and Pathfinders provide markerlight support and forward positioning so your drop units arrive Guided. Do not neglect a Kroot or Fire Warrior screen back home - an all-in suit army that pushes forward can leave its objectives and backfield exposed, so you still need bodies to hold the ground you are not personally standing on. The list-building tension is balancing enough forward suits to threaten the enemy against enough backfield to score. Confirm current datasheets and points, since suit profiles and costs are periodically revised by dataslates.

Take Retaliation Cadre when your collection is battlesuit-heavy and you enjoy aggressive, high-risk-high-reward play - dropping suits into the enemy's space and daring them to respond. It is a strong pick for players who like the tactile satisfaction of deep-strike combos and hit-and-fade tempo, and it punishes opponents who cannot efficiently answer a close-range suit threat. It is riskier than a static gunline: mispositioning a suit unit can hand the opponent an easy kill, so it rewards experience with reserves and threat ranges. Under 11th edition's DP budget you can run Retaliation as your anchor and, points allowing, add a 1-DP specialist such as the Experimental Prototype Cadre if you also lean on battlesuit characters - though check DP costs and Unique Tag restrictions in the Faction Pack. For the markerlight and target-priority fundamentals underneath the flashy plays, read the T'au Empire army guide.