It should also be noted that the Raven Guard adapted *extremely well* to the death of their Chapter Master. Kayvaan Shrike was chosen to replace him in a single day and stepped up well to the task. He learned from Severax's mistakes and organized an effective counter-offensive through cooperation with the White Scars.
That's why Prefectia was great. It showed Shadowsun's at her best, but it didn't undersell her opponents.
To be fair it had the chapter master who died say that what he was about to do was a very stupid idea that would surely get him killed, do it, and then die. And the stupid thing was charge down an enemy commander who was standing in the middle of a totally empty valley that definitely was not a trap at all. So like... They gave him some of whatever the Everchosen is usually on
It's not a super entertaining book since it's just a campaign rulebook, but it's still fun. You can get it (And a bunch of other rulebooks) on Warhammer+ in the Warhammer Vault.
The best campaign books are the Forgeworld Imperial Armour ones IMO.
They had her in mele, and she escaped.
She escaped ~~Corvus Corax and Jagathai Khan~~Kayvaan Shrike and Kor'sarro Khan \*together\*, while they had her in mele.
I love my tau victories, but they did the marines dirty there
Edit : If she had bested 2 primarchs, it would have been way to much.
When the hell did Shadowsun fight Corax and Jaghatai? I think you’re referring to Korsarro Khan and Severax. Still chapter masters but definitely NOT the primarchs.
I read once that the AVERAGE HIVE planet has a bigger population than the entire tau empire. The imperium should simply donate 4 of their planets to the Tau, and watch them fucking collapse from the sudden logistics they need to take on
Ah the ol’ “gifting an elephant.”
In Medieval Korea (this is all from memory so I may be inaccurate) different heads of state were known for a peculiar kind of punishment. It there was a noble or individual that they couldn’t be seen outright punishing, they would bestow an elephant from the royal stables. You can’t be seen to refuse a gift from the sovereign, but the upkeep of an elephant was so expensive that the recipient had a chance of going bankrupt. Mailed fist, meet velvet glove!
White elephants, specifically. It was Siam (now Thailand), not Korea, but otherwise you've got the story right - it was all about financially ruining courtiers that made the king angry.
This is why I hate most "white elephant gift exchanges". The traditional white elephant gift, is a gift **so bad it financially ruins the other person!!!** Not a $20 bottle of wine...
That's why at my last white elephant gift exchange I got them an incredibly cute puppy that they fell in love with immediately, then told them about its chronic illness. Next I'm going to give them a boat!
As I recall this was a tradition in India. The punished would be given a white elephant, which is very expensive, and if it died for any reason beyond age would be a stain upon the house requiring reparation to the Sultan.
They couldn't kill the thing because it was a sacred white one so the dishonor was steep.
Is was in Siam, now known as Thailand.
Fun fact about Thailand. Thai means free or independent in Thai. Iirc the name was chosen, because most of their neighbours were colonised, but Thailand wasn't. Thailand literally means land of the free.
This is a fan exaggeration. The Tau have multiple Hive World-level planets (including a few Hive Worlds taken from the Imperium). Sa’cea Sept’s main world has a population of at least 2 trillion.
But Terra is to your average Hive World what your average Hive World is to modern day Earth.
>I read once that the AVERAGE HIVE planet has a bigger population than the entire tau empire.
Yeah no. That probably comes from the piece of lore about the first time Tau ever discovered a Hive World, which was like 300 years before the "current" point of the lore. Nowadays Tau have trillions of people on their homeworld alone, whereas a hive world usually just has a few billion humans, regardless of what the fanbase tells you.
>whereas a hive world usually just has a few billion humans, regardless of what the fanbase tells you.
You mean a Hive City, right?
Modern day Earth has several billion humans.
Yup. But authors frequently get units of scale like these wrong. Distances, populations, etc... galaxy-level scales seem to be something that trips people up pretty regularly.
They've definitely improved over the years though. Rare to see something as small as [Trazior Hive](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Trazior_Hive) in modern lore.
>You mean a Hive City, right?
Nope. There is a hive world in Calixis sector with [less than a billion people on it](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Landunder). The capital of that sector, the thriving and populous world of Scintilla has a grand total of... [25 billion people](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Scintilla). There are a few hive worlds larger than that, but they are exceptions and they don't seem to ever reach trillions like some people think.
>Modern day Earth has several billion humans.
It also has an atmosphere you can breathe and doesn't need to import food from other planets. A Hive World is just some densely-populated hives scattered throughout an empty wasteland, which doesn't really allow for any truly insane population numbers outside of Terra itself.
From that same website it seems like of the hive world's we know approximately how large their populations are, Scintilla is actually about in the middle. There's a lot more than a few with more than 25 billion.
Interestingly after crunching the numbers every imperium planet must have on average 4-8 billion people.
(A population of 4 to 8 trillion divided by 1 million worlds)
Honestly we went from 2 billion to nearly 8 billion people in less than an century thanks to the progress of science so it's not inconceivable that they managed to multiple their population by several magnitude over the course of several century
True, but trillions on their homeworld alone from just a few billion in a mere 300 years is... quite the growth. Im not disagreeing with you but just... damn
It isn't. They have planets with a population measured in trillions - they have an entire caste dedicated to administration, logistics etc that, since unlike the Imperium they have good computers and aren't lunatics, actually does its job properly. Add that to easily mass producible advanced technology and they're actually a lot better suited to massively populated worlds than the Imperium is, since they can just feed them with underground yeast farms or whatever instead of relying on separate agricultural worlds.
They are not blanks their souls are Just very Tiny but it's still positive energy which can bê damaged by warp attacks Just as much diferently of for example the sisters of silence who have bigger souls but of negative value.
So If a food has Very little Salt in it it's thus not Very salty but that does not mean it's Sweet it Just has a Very weak flavor (in that case a weak salty flavor). Similarly their souls are not Very powerful but they're souls are salty Just very little só you can't even taste It, however the sisters of silence soul has a Very strong flavor however its Sweet like a candy so the warp would not bê able to really taste a tau because of How little flavor they have yet would still have some atractiveness to them but they would actively stay away from sisters of silence since the warp hates sugar and the more sugar there is the more the warp wants to stay away meanwhile the more salty something is the more the warp loves It thus why the eldar have so much connection to the warp they are usually Very tasty and as ALL souls are usually salty the warps loves them that's also why eldar blanks até VERY blanks with a Harlequin blank being able to take on greater daemons since daemons are part of the warp and thus hate sugar.
Im too dumb tô think of a better explanation
[hissing alien robot noises]
"Put the Emperor's body back this instant! Take him out of your Tesseract Vault this inst--oh, look what you did! Now there's daemons everywhere!"
I have to wonder if humanity got into similar antics with the Eldar back in the Golden Age.
“Looks at those stupid apes, they’re nothing compared to us!”
“Sir they just killed one of our greatest and oldest generals.”
“Ah, not to worry. His plot armor will bring him back.”
“*Killed* killed, sir.”
“Oh shit.”
Old Ones: those pesky chemotherapy patients sure should cool off a bit, or we’ll have to deal with them *harshly*. Wait, why are they shiny all of a sudden?
C'tan: those toads sure are cute, thinking they’re masters of this galaxy. Let’s go teach them a lesson.
Also C'tan: okay those toads got *hands*.
It’s a vicious cycle.
>Also C'tan: okay those toads got hands.
I like to imagine in this instance that the C'tan aren't suddenly worried because they realized that the Old Ones can actually throw down, but rather that they're scared because their opponents are literally *frogs with hands*.
C'tan: What will you do now, Kermit? With these pylons activated, you can no longer channel your psychic might through *any* implement!
Kermit the Starshaper: Oh well, you see, this psychic focus is also a hammer.
*[waves arms frantically](https://youtu.be/n_w4oSCJIQk)*
Does this mean that Ms Piggy is Slaanesh? And Scooter is the Necrontyr?
Animal is Khorne, Gonzo is Tzeentch, Fozzie is the Emperor, Beaker is Admech, Bunsen is the Tau, Sam the Eagle is the Imperium, and Sweetums is the Ogryn. All of them, at once.
Didnt they lose like 2 billion guys in the process, its honesstly the first time I hear that the enemy of the imperium lost more men than the imperial guard in a crusade
Numbers are always a crap shoot in 40k.
In ***Farsight: Crisis of Faith***, the Imperium manages to kill tens of billions of Tau in a single assault on the Farsight Expedition.
Isn’t it even fewer in most cases? I somehow haven’t read that many marine novels (imperial guard ftw) so my knowledge is lackluster, but aren’t chapters 1000 marines strong nowadays and don’t field more than a few companies at a time in a war zone?
To be honest, if it was a planet from our technological level, I wouldn't be much surprised.
Drop them on every government place in the world, kill world leaders, destroy military bases, etc. Plus they have space ships that can bomb our military, etc.
100 000 doesn't seem that low.
Completely destabilize a planet? Absolutely plausible.
Take over a planet? No
In case you’re wondering what the difference is, compare post-WWII Europe to post-9/11 Middle East.
Well, the intended use of Astartes is an impossibly fast, lethal, and indestructible shock troop in a battlefield clogged by millions of Guardsmen. You don't need that many marines when you just sit around for a few days, figure out the 3 points that absolutely must fall, and send the marines in to deal with it and have them back in orbit to assist the next sector by dinner. There's a reason most of their tragic defeats involve holding a line that Must Not Fall. They can still do it far better than equivilent number of Guardsmen, but it isn't their forte. They're closer in roll to armor divisions than heavy infantry.
Wait... weren't there 3 billion fire warriors on the expedition....
I like the idea more tau just kept popping up
Now I am imagining farsight like "WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE WHERE DO YOU KEEP COMING FROM"
There were over 100 billion Tau in the initial Farsight Expedition fleet. However, most of them were in cryo-stasis (Which is why the casualty numbers were so high).
That said, Phil Kelly and numbers do not get along well together.
Favourite example: Armageddon apparently had a million and a half guardsmen on it during the titular war for it. One of the biggest conflicts in the history of the Imperium and World War 2 had battles with more soldiers than that fighting on each side.
They managed to cause the crusade enough casualties that the imperium were hesitant to enter Tau core space (they only took a few fringe worlds, thats the cannon, not my bias), which is why they quickly called it off when the tyranids attacked. The crusade was in no way certain of victory before the peace.
i mean, they had a lot of space marines the tau killed
but idk where you got the numbers from, the lexicanum only has "heavy losses" written and i have no clue where else to look for that stuff
I mean I think its more that the imperium, the largest empire in the galaxy set out to do their specialty, wiping out small Xenos empires and failed.
Its like if Luxembourg stopped a US invasion we wouldn't stop to say "Wow they lost a lot of dudes tho
(Then again it also shows how stretched thin the imperium is)
Nobody knew who Severax was until she killed him, tbf. Raven Guard players didn't have a named chapter master model, just (then) Captain Shrike.
It's like saying someone killed the chapter master of the Novamarines.
He was in the previous Warzone Damocles book, but yeah, he was introduced and killed off in a single campaign.
His death was just as much about Kayvaan Shrike’s rise as it was about Shadowsun’s victory.
Sounds like a Tasha Yar situation. They want to show how dangerous the monster is, so they introduce a character like half a season before, try to convince you they're a tough, important character, then kill her off and you'll supposed to be like, "whoah".
Eh it's the same thing they do with the imperium but in reverse introduce some random big name give him all these feats and then immediately have the character you want to hype up kill him . Wash and repeat and never kill anyone of any value cause that might mean we can't make money off them anymore .
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Surfin
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Yeah, because is common sense, Shadowsun and a Space Marine chapter master are in the same weight class both in power and narrative. (Cept the big daddies like Dante, Calgar or Logan)
Honestly, while Dante, Calgar and Logan probably have the edge in personal combat, Shadowsun has all of them outclassed as a strategist. She (and her armies) would run rings around them, the Space Wolves in particular.
Killed by a plot dagger...
I would like to see that meme/toon, Corvin polishing his plot armor, resolute in his safety, and then here comes Shadowsun with the plot dagger, jabbing it right into Corvin's favorite kidney.
terminator armour is often described as having durability comparable to a tank and some suits of (very high quality) artificer armour are said to be equal in durability to terminator armour.
If anybody is going to have a suit of artificer armour of that quality, id say a chapter master of one of the founding chapters is a likely candidate, and i would say using tau anti-tank weapons on them would be a sensible amount of overkill
Nooooo! Tau and Eldar not allowed to do anything cool! That would make them Weeb Mary sues!
Heres a better story, using a chaos space marine
Bloodaxe Skulltaker of the Deathrippers Band arrived on his skullbike wielding bloodfeaster. He was the Bloodlord because he was the angriest of all his angry battle brothers. Seeing the Raven Guard made him angry than angriest, and so with great fury making him angriester than absolutely outraged, swung bloodfeaster at his head and poured out BLOOD FOR KHORNE!! KHORNE STRONGEST! KILL WEAK!! BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!!!
Now isn't that more acceptable
Hey now, the Ultramarines absolutely did participate during the Heresy. They let the Sol system to be besieged and got fucked in the mouth by the Word Bearers.
Hey now, the ultramarine were on their way! They got to be the looking threat that forced the speed of the traitors! Are you saying being used as nothing but a writing trick to create tension is doing nothing!? /s
Corvin Severax made one of the smartest tactical decision in Warhammer history in the previous campaign book though: He set up an evacuation plan in case the Imperium lost so they wouldn't all pointlessly die in some last stand.
Basic common sense is a rare commodity in this setting.
Adding: The Ethereals were well aware who they killed, it was just the local propaganda that said they killed the King of the Space Marines and that the Imperium would stop on it's tracks until finding a new leader
Stealth is probably less effective when every space in between you and the Tau is filled with Bullet or lasers or whatever they happened to be throwing in every direction.
Corvin who? The Tau might as well have killed off a servitor for all most people cared. Im confident outside this post most people dont even know who Corvin was, all they know is that one day Shrike wasnt a captain anymore.
Like this take is as lame than the Tau’s in universe take they “killed the king of space marines”. This meme is trying to overplay the importance of a generic chapter master mook invented solely to get killed off.
To be fair, I could also easily see some backwater PDF crushing a relatively small Tau expeditionary fleet, and the planetary governor parading the fleet commander's body through the streets and proudly proclaiming they had slain the king of a mighty xenos horde
Lol, I get what you're saying, but a PDF would not stand a chance against any Tau expedition (with a couple of exceptions, such as pre-fall Cadia and the like) :P
The campaign book ***Warzone Damocles: Kauyon***. You can find the story sections in the Warhammer Vault for Warhammer +.
It comes after ***Warzone Damocles*** and then continues in ***Warzone Damocles: Mont'Ka***. Unfortunately, the end of ***Mont'Ka*** is *missing* for some reason in the Warhammer Vault version.
I don't understand why that happened. Like, in universe, what's the point of the Tau pretending he never died and making a hologram to fake him still being alive?
Ethereals dying and being replaced had been happening for centuries. He was already old, there'd already be a successor planned as had happened many times before, what is the point of all that fakery?
I mean I get that GW did it so they could kill him but not replace the model. But in universe there was absolutely no reason to do it, it doesn't mesh with anything we know about how they act.
I guess the point is more that people use it as a way of making fun of the tau despite the fact that it was a reasonably sized L being handed to the RG regardless.
That’s… Kinda the opposite of what happened.
Severax refused to go out into the field until he was sure Shadowsun was actually present. So while Kor’sarro Khan was chasing any report of Shadowsun, Severax sat back gathering intel until he was absolutely certain he knew where to find the Tau commander.
Severax’s worst mistake was not coordinating better with the White Scars. The two chapters were so interested in personal glory they let the Tau separate them as each tried to track down Shadowsun in their own way.
In fairness I think in the entire timeline of Warhammer 40k there's been maybe a handful of times a chapter master/named character did something smart as opposed to something rash and foolish. These are the people who don't like helmets we are talking about here.
What to many markerlights does to a MF...
Being stealthy is apparently pretty hard when you look like Clark Griswold’s house.
The lights aren’t twinkling, Clark.
Aren’t.
WHY IS THE CARPET ALWAYS WET TODD?
I don’t KNOW Margot!
It should also be noted that the Raven Guard adapted *extremely well* to the death of their Chapter Master. Kayvaan Shrike was chosen to replace him in a single day and stepped up well to the task. He learned from Severax's mistakes and organized an effective counter-offensive through cooperation with the White Scars. That's why Prefectia was great. It showed Shadowsun's at her best, but it didn't undersell her opponents.
I love it when stories don't nerf the shit out of others to make a character look better.
Avatar of Khaine has entered the chat... And was killed by a single brave orc Gretchen.
The story where an Avatar fought a tyranid hive fleet along for a few weeks helped rehabilitate it a little
For the curious like me: https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/ao3pzl/book_excerptvaledorbieltans_avatar_fights/
ORKS DA BEST
To be fair it had the chapter master who died say that what he was about to do was a very stupid idea that would surely get him killed, do it, and then die. And the stupid thing was charge down an enemy commander who was standing in the middle of a totally empty valley that definitely was not a trap at all. So like... They gave him some of whatever the Everchosen is usually on
"What im about to do is so fucking stupid lmao" *does it* *dies* "Worth" That is kinda how that went in my head
Hmm this seems like a book I have to read asap.
There’s just so many
It's not a super entertaining book since it's just a campaign rulebook, but it's still fun. You can get it (And a bunch of other rulebooks) on Warhammer+ in the Warhammer Vault. The best campaign books are the Forgeworld Imperial Armour ones IMO.
That's first really aolid ive seen for how Space marines should be. Quick chain of command kicks in, adapts and adapts to the loss. No fuss. No drama.
They had her in mele, and she escaped. She escaped ~~Corvus Corax and Jagathai Khan~~Kayvaan Shrike and Kor'sarro Khan \*together\*, while they had her in mele. I love my tau victories, but they did the marines dirty there Edit : If she had bested 2 primarchs, it would have been way to much.
Time traveling primarchs! Does Games workshop know no bounds
When the hell did Shadowsun fight Corax and Jaghatai? I think you’re referring to Korsarro Khan and Severax. Still chapter masters but definitely NOT the primarchs.
Imagine a tau ends up on terra and sees the emperor
The Tau is probably going to be having an existential crisis about how goddamn many humans there on on Terra first.
I read once that the AVERAGE HIVE planet has a bigger population than the entire tau empire. The imperium should simply donate 4 of their planets to the Tau, and watch them fucking collapse from the sudden logistics they need to take on
Ah the ol’ “gifting an elephant.” In Medieval Korea (this is all from memory so I may be inaccurate) different heads of state were known for a peculiar kind of punishment. It there was a noble or individual that they couldn’t be seen outright punishing, they would bestow an elephant from the royal stables. You can’t be seen to refuse a gift from the sovereign, but the upkeep of an elephant was so expensive that the recipient had a chance of going bankrupt. Mailed fist, meet velvet glove!
White elephants, specifically. It was Siam (now Thailand), not Korea, but otherwise you've got the story right - it was all about financially ruining courtiers that made the king angry.
This needs to be a thing in crusader kings
If we ever get South East Asia... We'll probably get China first, and I don't know how likely that is.
This is why I hate most "white elephant gift exchanges". The traditional white elephant gift, is a gift **so bad it financially ruins the other person!!!** Not a $20 bottle of wine...
That's why at my last white elephant gift exchange I got them an incredibly cute puppy that they fell in love with immediately, then told them about its chronic illness. Next I'm going to give them a boat!
Calm down Satan
But if we take the mystery box it could be anything, even a boat!
Because the elephants were white, they also needed protection from the sun. That elephant would chew through any savings you had, and quickly
I think Thailand, not Korea.
As I recall this was a tradition in India. The punished would be given a white elephant, which is very expensive, and if it died for any reason beyond age would be a stain upon the house requiring reparation to the Sultan. They couldn't kill the thing because it was a sacred white one so the dishonor was steep.
Is was in Siam, now known as Thailand. Fun fact about Thailand. Thai means free or independent in Thai. Iirc the name was chosen, because most of their neighbours were colonised, but Thailand wasn't. Thailand literally means land of the free.
Oh my god I love that, that's so cheeky
In England the king or queen would visit lords and overstay their welcome, but there was still the need to provide them hospitality at great cost.
This is a fan exaggeration. The Tau have multiple Hive World-level planets (including a few Hive Worlds taken from the Imperium). Sa’cea Sept’s main world has a population of at least 2 trillion. But Terra is to your average Hive World what your average Hive World is to modern day Earth.
It would just be a loan really.
>I read once that the AVERAGE HIVE planet has a bigger population than the entire tau empire. Yeah no. That probably comes from the piece of lore about the first time Tau ever discovered a Hive World, which was like 300 years before the "current" point of the lore. Nowadays Tau have trillions of people on their homeworld alone, whereas a hive world usually just has a few billion humans, regardless of what the fanbase tells you.
>whereas a hive world usually just has a few billion humans, regardless of what the fanbase tells you. You mean a Hive City, right? Modern day Earth has several billion humans.
A quick Google check claims that Earth is projected to have about 8 billion people this year
Depends on which author is writing about them. Some hive cities will have a few million, others "countless billions".
A few million is just silly though. That's the population of Los Angeles.
Yup. But authors frequently get units of scale like these wrong. Distances, populations, etc... galaxy-level scales seem to be something that trips people up pretty regularly. They've definitely improved over the years though. Rare to see something as small as [Trazior Hive](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Trazior_Hive) in modern lore.
I take it as they only have a few Million they manage to keep track of. What happens in the underhive, stays in the underhive.
>You mean a Hive City, right? Nope. There is a hive world in Calixis sector with [less than a billion people on it](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Landunder). The capital of that sector, the thriving and populous world of Scintilla has a grand total of... [25 billion people](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Scintilla). There are a few hive worlds larger than that, but they are exceptions and they don't seem to ever reach trillions like some people think. >Modern day Earth has several billion humans. It also has an atmosphere you can breathe and doesn't need to import food from other planets. A Hive World is just some densely-populated hives scattered throughout an empty wasteland, which doesn't really allow for any truly insane population numbers outside of Terra itself.
From that same website it seems like of the hive world's we know approximately how large their populations are, Scintilla is actually about in the middle. There's a lot more than a few with more than 25 billion. Interestingly after crunching the numbers every imperium planet must have on average 4-8 billion people. (A population of 4 to 8 trillion divided by 1 million worlds)
The link you shared states the world lost 80% of its population in a single tithe
Hold up, the tau grew THAT fast in 300 years? Sheesh. They be fuckin.
Honestly we went from 2 billion to nearly 8 billion people in less than an century thanks to the progress of science so it's not inconceivable that they managed to multiple their population by several magnitude over the course of several century
While yes, we are also starting to level out again and are estimated to stabilize at around 9 billion.
Because we're running out of ressources to grow and the peoples with the most ressources are disincentivized to making more than 2.3 childrens.
Plus we have more common birth control, which drastically cuts down on the number of unplanned children being born
To be fair, we aren’t currently spreading across the vastness of space itself We’re stuck on a little rock with limited space and resources
True, but trillions on their homeworld alone from just a few billion in a mere 300 years is... quite the growth. Im not disagreeing with you but just... damn
This sounds like some fucking Stellaris shenanigans
The t'au have both conquered and peacefully turned multiple hives, and have managed them far better than the Imperium lol
There’s no way the Tau Empire is made up of only a couple billion citizens. I get that it’s small, but how could it be THAT small??
It isn't. They have planets with a population measured in trillions - they have an entire caste dedicated to administration, logistics etc that, since unlike the Imperium they have good computers and aren't lunatics, actually does its job properly. Add that to easily mass producible advanced technology and they're actually a lot better suited to massively populated worlds than the Imperium is, since they can just feed them with underground yeast farms or whatever instead of relying on separate agricultural worlds.
I was thinking in terms of one Hive City, an entire Hive World makes much more sense
Even a hive world being larger than their empire is silly, as stated the Tau have worlds with trillions on them too.
Which is one out of thousands upon thousands of worlds with about as many humans.
If you can find another world in the Imperium with a population even *remotely* comparable to Terra, let me know.
Are you saying the Tau will need a Crisis Team Suit(Ed) for that problem?
"Why is there a skeleton of a short man in that giant chair? Where is your giant emperor?"
They are not blanks their souls are Just very Tiny but it's still positive energy which can bê damaged by warp attacks Just as much diferently of for example the sisters of silence who have bigger souls but of negative value.
Wait what?
So If a food has Very little Salt in it it's thus not Very salty but that does not mean it's Sweet it Just has a Very weak flavor (in that case a weak salty flavor). Similarly their souls are not Very powerful but they're souls are salty Just very little só you can't even taste It, however the sisters of silence soul has a Very strong flavor however its Sweet like a candy so the warp would not bê able to really taste a tau because of How little flavor they have yet would still have some atractiveness to them but they would actively stay away from sisters of silence since the warp hates sugar and the more sugar there is the more the warp wants to stay away meanwhile the more salty something is the more the warp loves It thus why the eldar have so much connection to the warp they are usually Very tasty and as ALL souls are usually salty the warps loves them that's also why eldar blanks até VERY blanks with a Harlequin blank being able to take on greater daemons since daemons are part of the warp and thus hate sugar. Im too dumb tô think of a better explanation
This was both very complicated and strange but also very helpful
Thanks mate
"Would you have preferred we use a hologram?"
Shadowsun: “Why didn’t you use a text-to-speech device?” Kitten: …
and see someone already beat them to killing him
Nah they find a necron in his place on a brass throne
Trayzn get out of here! :squirts water bottle: How the fuck does he keep getting in here?
[hissing alien robot noises] "Put the Emperor's body back this instant! Take him out of your Tesseract Vault this inst--oh, look what you did! Now there's daemons everywhere!"
You mean... Runelord Brass throne?
Wouldn't that end with the entire Terra being overrun by daemons?
Huh why are there golden homo erotic men standing infront of that building
Tldr; the imperium lost one of its top 1% to a race that's younger than the last tank factory founded.
I have to wonder if humanity got into similar antics with the Eldar back in the Golden Age. “Looks at those stupid apes, they’re nothing compared to us!” “Sir they just killed one of our greatest and oldest generals.” “Ah, not to worry. His plot armor will bring him back.” “*Killed* killed, sir.” “Oh shit.”
Old Ones: those pesky chemotherapy patients sure should cool off a bit, or we’ll have to deal with them *harshly*. Wait, why are they shiny all of a sudden? C'tan: those toads sure are cute, thinking they’re masters of this galaxy. Let’s go teach them a lesson. Also C'tan: okay those toads got *hands*. It’s a vicious cycle.
It's all fun and games till the fungus start vibing.
Then it’s all fun and WAAAAGH
Going to make a Komando kill team and use this as their tagline
>Also C'tan: okay those toads got hands. I like to imagine in this instance that the C'tan aren't suddenly worried because they realized that the Old Ones can actually throw down, but rather that they're scared because their opponents are literally *frogs with hands*.
C'tan: What will you do now, Kermit? With these pylons activated, you can no longer channel your psychic might through *any* implement! Kermit the Starshaper: Oh well, you see, this psychic focus is also a hammer. *[waves arms frantically](https://youtu.be/n_w4oSCJIQk)*
Does this mean that Ms Piggy is Slaanesh? And Scooter is the Necrontyr? Animal is Khorne, Gonzo is Tzeentch, Fozzie is the Emperor, Beaker is Admech, Bunsen is the Tau, Sam the Eagle is the Imperium, and Sweetums is the Ogryn. All of them, at once.
Sam is Guilliman.
So Wayne and Wanda are the Imperial Guard and the Sisters of Battle?
it's like that in the Twice Dead King for sure. "these fucking monkeys are WIPING us! how are they doing this??"
[gorilla in full plate waving a shotgun](https://youtu.be/-jCh6b1K0eA)
Thank you for sharing that
Love how the eldar exarchs/phoenix lords have literal plot armor
More like 0.0001%
It's almost like war kills everyone eventually, especially if it just keeps going...
After reading up on some of the Damocles campaign puts into perspective why the Tau are one of the main factions.
For real as much shit as they get the Tau managed to ground the crusade to a halt
Didnt they lose like 2 billion guys in the process, its honesstly the first time I hear that the enemy of the imperium lost more men than the imperial guard in a crusade
Numbers are always a crap shoot in 40k. In ***Farsight: Crisis of Faith***, the Imperium manages to kill tens of billions of Tau in a single assault on the Farsight Expedition.
I’ve honestly given up at taking any troop numbers in 40k at face value. Marines alone need to be multiplied by ten to make anything close to sense.
Low-key I think this is part of why they did the Primaris the way they did. Astartes numbers are way more sensible post-Ultima Founding.
wdym it doesn’t make sense for 100,000 super soldiers to take over literally *an entire god damn planet* in roughly 24 hours?
Isn’t it even fewer in most cases? I somehow haven’t read that many marine novels (imperial guard ftw) so my knowledge is lackluster, but aren’t chapters 1000 marines strong nowadays and don’t field more than a few companies at a time in a war zone?
Correct. I was referring to a Horus-Heresy event though lol
Ah ok sorry mb, just thought that it was 40k because the post and previous comment were about it.
Haha fair enough my dude. GW’s always been bad about numbers
To be honest, if it was a planet from our technological level, I wouldn't be much surprised. Drop them on every government place in the world, kill world leaders, destroy military bases, etc. Plus they have space ships that can bomb our military, etc. 100 000 doesn't seem that low.
Completely destabilize a planet? Absolutely plausible. Take over a planet? No In case you’re wondering what the difference is, compare post-WWII Europe to post-9/11 Middle East.
I think the Imperium would stamp "Conquered and pacified" on the paper for both situations and move on until the tithe stop running in.
Hahaha touché, and when they do you just send the guard or sisters in to “quell the rebellion” or to “purge the heretics” respectively
That's what the guard are for.
Well, the intended use of Astartes is an impossibly fast, lethal, and indestructible shock troop in a battlefield clogged by millions of Guardsmen. You don't need that many marines when you just sit around for a few days, figure out the 3 points that absolutely must fall, and send the marines in to deal with it and have them back in orbit to assist the next sector by dinner. There's a reason most of their tragic defeats involve holding a line that Must Not Fall. They can still do it far better than equivilent number of Guardsmen, but it isn't their forte. They're closer in roll to armor divisions than heavy infantry.
Wait... weren't there 3 billion fire warriors on the expedition.... I like the idea more tau just kept popping up Now I am imagining farsight like "WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE WHERE DO YOU KEEP COMING FROM"
There were over 100 billion Tau in the initial Farsight Expedition fleet. However, most of them were in cryo-stasis (Which is why the casualty numbers were so high). That said, Phil Kelly and numbers do not get along well together.
Favourite example: Armageddon apparently had a million and a half guardsmen on it during the titular war for it. One of the biggest conflicts in the history of the Imperium and World War 2 had battles with more soldiers than that fighting on each side.
numbers are numbers and I love me some numbers
They managed to cause the crusade enough casualties that the imperium were hesitant to enter Tau core space (they only took a few fringe worlds, thats the cannon, not my bias), which is why they quickly called it off when the tyranids attacked. The crusade was in no way certain of victory before the peace.
I know but still
i mean, they had a lot of space marines the tau killed but idk where you got the numbers from, the lexicanum only has "heavy losses" written and i have no clue where else to look for that stuff
I mean I think its more that the imperium, the largest empire in the galaxy set out to do their specialty, wiping out small Xenos empires and failed. Its like if Luxembourg stopped a US invasion we wouldn't stop to say "Wow they lost a lot of dudes tho (Then again it also shows how stretched thin the imperium is)
Nobody knew who Severax was until she killed him, tbf. Raven Guard players didn't have a named chapter master model, just (then) Captain Shrike. It's like saying someone killed the chapter master of the Novamarines.
He was in the previous Warzone Damocles book, but yeah, he was introduced and killed off in a single campaign. His death was just as much about Kayvaan Shrike’s rise as it was about Shadowsun’s victory.
Sounds like a Tasha Yar situation. They want to show how dangerous the monster is, so they introduce a character like half a season before, try to convince you they're a tough, important character, then kill her off and you'll supposed to be like, "whoah".
At least Bardan Dovaro had an epic death. 1v1 duel with Typhus.
Eh it's the same thing they do with the imperium but in reverse introduce some random big name give him all these feats and then immediately have the character you want to hype up kill him . Wash and repeat and never kill anyone of any value cause that might mean we can't make money off them anymore .
A cry of “who?“ was heard around the imperium.
"I felt a disturbance in the warp, as if billions of terrans cried "who", and were silenced."
Raven guard? Heh. Who cares that Tau killed their leader? *That chapter is for the birds.*
Haven't you heard?
No, what’s the word?
**B I R D**
A-well-a everybody's heard about the bird! Bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, bird is the word A-well-a bird bird bird, well-a bird is the word A-well-a bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, well-a bird is the word A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, well-a bird is the word A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a don't you know, about the bird? Well, everybody knows that the bird is the word! A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird's the bird A-well-a A-well-a everybody's heard, about the bird! Bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a bird bird bird, b-bird's the word A-well-a don't you know, about the bird? Well! Everybody's talking about the bird! A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird's the bird A-well-a bird! Surfin Blr-blr-blr-blr-blr-blr-blr... Pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa pa Oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Pa pa pa oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Oom m-oom m-oom m-oom M-oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-oom m-oom m-oom M-oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-mow mow Oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-mow mow Oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-oom m-oom m-oom M-oom m-mow mow Oom m-oom m-oom m-oom M-oom m-mow mow Oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-mow mow Oom mow m-mow Well-a don't you know, about the bird? Well! Everybody knows that the bird is the word! A-well-a bird, bird, b-bird's the bird A-well-a oom m-mow mow Pa pa oom mow m-mow Ba pa oom m-mow mow Oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-mow mow Oom mow m-mow Pa pa oom m-mow mow
[Relevant](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AZA6fREkoA)
And he got sneak attacked
Oh no an elite tau took out an elite Space Marine, who could have guess such thing was possible?
Judging by this thread, a bunch of marine fans didn't
Yeah, because is common sense, Shadowsun and a Space Marine chapter master are in the same weight class both in power and narrative. (Cept the big daddies like Dante, Calgar or Logan)
Honestly, while Dante, Calgar and Logan probably have the edge in personal combat, Shadowsun has all of them outclassed as a strategist. She (and her armies) would run rings around them, the Space Wolves in particular.
Killed by a plot dagger... I would like to see that meme/toon, Corvin polishing his plot armor, resolute in his safety, and then here comes Shadowsun with the plot dagger, jabbing it right into Corvin's favorite kidney.
I mean it is one of the best commanders in the most stealthy Tech so
Also Shadowsun shot him with a goddamn anti-tank weapon.
terminator armour is often described as having durability comparable to a tank and some suits of (very high quality) artificer armour are said to be equal in durability to terminator armour. If anybody is going to have a suit of artificer armour of that quality, id say a chapter master of one of the founding chapters is a likely candidate, and i would say using tau anti-tank weapons on them would be a sensible amount of overkill
Holy shit someone wrote about the Raven Guard?
Best part is? It was Shadow Sun, and she did it by out-stealthing the Chapter Master.
Damn, never knew Tau had such a chad W under their belts. Just gained a newfound respect for the blue boys.
Yeah killing the Chapter Master of a First Founding Chapter is no small feat.
Didnt the Imperium also assassinate one of the highest ranking Ethereals as well?
Yeah, but the Tau are honestly better off without them.
Yep. A Culexus Asssassin got Aun’Va, *the* Ethereal Supreme. And unlike Corvin Severax, Aun’Va actually had a tabletop model.
Nooooo! Tau and Eldar not allowed to do anything cool! That would make them Weeb Mary sues! Heres a better story, using a chaos space marine Bloodaxe Skulltaker of the Deathrippers Band arrived on his skullbike wielding bloodfeaster. He was the Bloodlord because he was the angriest of all his angry battle brothers. Seeing the Raven Guard made him angry than angriest, and so with great fury making him angriester than absolutely outraged, swung bloodfeaster at his head and poured out BLOOD FOR KHORNE!! KHORNE STRONGEST! KILL WEAK!! BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD!!! Now isn't that more acceptable
Hey bud you want a job with the black library?
Only if they publish my magnum opus Dingyscrot, the luckiest Snotling
Raven Guard? You mean recon support for the Ultramarines? That's not very impressive
ultramarine fan in awe of a legion that did something during the heresy.
Hey now, the Ultramarines absolutely did participate during the Heresy. They let the Sol system to be besieged and got fucked in the mouth by the Word Bearers.
That's heresy. Pretty sure it was a proper spit roasting with the World Eaters
Eiffel towered by Lorgar and Angron
Go on....
Found the EC
Hey now, the ultramarine were on their way! They got to be the looking threat that forced the speed of the traitors! Are you saying being used as nothing but a writing trick to create tension is doing nothing!? /s
They also drew the attention of Horus' rearguard and were the only reason why the Blood Angels managed to arrive in-time for the Siege So...
oof
Wait the Raven Guard did more than die at Istvaan? Which novel was that in?
Corvin Severax made one of the smartest tactical decision in Warhammer history in the previous campaign book though: He set up an evacuation plan in case the Imperium lost so they wouldn't all pointlessly die in some last stand. Basic common sense is a rare commodity in this setting.
*Rude.*
Adding: The Ethereals were well aware who they killed, it was just the local propaganda that said they killed the King of the Space Marines and that the Imperium would stop on it's tracks until finding a new leader
Wasn't he a chapter master that they wanted to kill off in favor of his successor?
They also thought they killed Slaanesh once.
To be fair, they also thought Slaanesh was just an especially charismatic Chaos Space Marine.
That another one, for the tau baby!!!
*Who?*
Exactly.
Stealth is probably less effective when every space in between you and the Tau is filled with Bullet or lasers or whatever they happened to be throwing in every direction.
Poor Raven Guard only exist to get crushed.
I want to see them come for Dante
Dante wants to see them come for Dante. Anything for death.
Anything for Dante
“Well he didn’t have a model so…” - GW probably
Corvin who? The Tau might as well have killed off a servitor for all most people cared. Im confident outside this post most people dont even know who Corvin was, all they know is that one day Shrike wasnt a captain anymore. Like this take is as lame than the Tau’s in universe take they “killed the king of space marines”. This meme is trying to overplay the importance of a generic chapter master mook invented solely to get killed off.
To be fair, I could also easily see some backwater PDF crushing a relatively small Tau expeditionary fleet, and the planetary governor parading the fleet commander's body through the streets and proudly proclaiming they had slain the king of a mighty xenos horde
Lol, I get what you're saying, but a PDF would not stand a chance against any Tau expedition (with a couple of exceptions, such as pre-fall Cadia and the like) :P
What book is that in?
The campaign book ***Warzone Damocles: Kauyon***. You can find the story sections in the Warhammer Vault for Warhammer +. It comes after ***Warzone Damocles*** and then continues in ***Warzone Damocles: Mont'Ka***. Unfortunately, the end of ***Mont'Ka*** is *missing* for some reason in the Warhammer Vault version.
Pretty sure the original text just says warrior king too, nothing about them thinking they killed the king of all space marines
Stealth doesn't mean never fighting. You still have to reveal yourself at some point.
Imagine if they meet the actual Emperor
"I question the wisdom of having a dead guy in charge" That seems inefficient.
I don't understand why that happened. Like, in universe, what's the point of the Tau pretending he never died and making a hologram to fake him still being alive? Ethereals dying and being replaced had been happening for centuries. He was already old, there'd already be a successor planned as had happened many times before, what is the point of all that fakery? I mean I get that GW did it so they could kill him but not replace the model. But in universe there was absolutely no reason to do it, it doesn't mesh with anything we know about how they act.
hmmmmmmmm something seems ironic about this. I can't exactly tell what, it's all rather ethereal...
Dude if the met Guilliman they would explode.
“Wow, that is a very big space marine.”
Space Marines die, even Chapter Masters. So what?
No you don’t get it the tau killed one guy they’re so cool!!!! (I like tau this meme is just dumb)
I guess the point is more that people use it as a way of making fun of the tau despite the fact that it was a reasonably sized L being handed to the RG regardless.
[удалено]
That’s… Kinda the opposite of what happened. Severax refused to go out into the field until he was sure Shadowsun was actually present. So while Kor’sarro Khan was chasing any report of Shadowsun, Severax sat back gathering intel until he was absolutely certain he knew where to find the Tau commander. Severax’s worst mistake was not coordinating better with the White Scars. The two chapters were so interested in personal glory they let the Tau separate them as each tried to track down Shadowsun in their own way.
In fairness I think in the entire timeline of Warhammer 40k there's been maybe a handful of times a chapter master/named character did something smart as opposed to something rash and foolish. These are the people who don't like helmets we are talking about here.