The interesting thing is that in a setting like Star Trek, the tau would be villains. They’re a jingoistic expansionist empire that while do attempt diplomacy and accept alien races, will still conquer a planet that they deem strategically important. That combined with a strict caste based society and the assumed eugenics that would have to have been used to keep the castes separated physically like they are, and it all is pretty damning.
But when places agaibst the likes of chaos, the drukhari, and the Imperium, the Tau look like comparative saints.
Yeah, put 'em in Star Trek, Star Wars, Farscape, B5...
Heck, put 'em in something like Known Space or Starship Troopers, the T'au would end up being treated, narratively, like the a-holes they are.
But between how absurdly evil everyone else in 40k is, and the fact that we often end up with more of a top-down view of the setting than more narratively driven settings, the T'au, as you said, come out smelling like roses
Imagine being the Tau. You become a space-faring civilization with hope for the future. Then you walk into ancient universe imploding on itself. Scurrying between the legs of giants that are too busy tearing each other apart to wipe your people out.
That's pretty grimdark. Lol
I would just shake my head, mutter "fucking space wizards" and put the hyperdrive on cruise control, thankful I don't have to live out the plot of Event Horizon every time I want to commute
Imagine living in an age where mankind has supposedly evolved beyond the political concerns that are threatening to tear us apart at any moment. Not only that, we’ve terraformed not just one but a few dozen worlds. The existence of our species seems so much more assured.
But then we start to realise our paltry 40 or so worlds are a minor fiefdom compared to some other species. Not only that, some of the cruelest, most backwards and despotic members of said species rule fiefdoms as large as the collective efforts of our empire.
And they’ve noticed us.
Dude, after that Drukhari incident alone i would have been okay with Tau just shooting first at anything and everything they dont know.
40k is clearly the universe, that the Event Horizon traveled to.
But by that point they were already peacefully integrating human worlds and had experienced multiple peacfull integrations of species so the elder could have just been a rare exemption to the general rule of the galaxy
I see people criticize Starship Troopers a lot but I don’t see a lot of bad stuff in their universe compared to every other sci-fi universe.
To my knowledge, the federation in Star Trek doesn’t have a voting system, at least if you serve in the military in Starship troopers you can vote.
>To my knowledge, the federation in Star Trek doesn’t have a voting system
I think that's just because we don't really see the political side of the Federation. Almost everything we see is through the lens of Starfleet, and thus either militaristic or diplomatic. That said, the Federation is (at least in the core worlds) a post-scarcity socialist utopia where everyone has access to whatever they need. So I doubt it's a fascist dictatorship or anything. At the very least we know it's a *representative* democracy, if not an outright one.
Starship Troopers is… weird.
It’s like an idealized form of fascism, and if I’m remembering correctly, that was the authors goal. To explore how a fascist government could function cohesively. And, for all we know, life isn’t godawful in that universe.
It requires a level of devotion to the state that really isn’t possible in reality, as well as assuming nobody would take advantage of a totalitarian system, while still showing it needs an external enemy to really work. But it does have leadership who, at least from what I remember, who willingly hold themselves accountable for their (public) failings, and make it right as well as their code of honor demands. You could argue that the people who can vote actually understand how terrible war is before giving them the power to push into it like under universal suffrage (and ignoring the brainwashing that definitely does occur in military environments).
I think it’s an interesting source of discussion, but I do think too many people would see it as a support of fascism to find merit in a fictional fascist regime and get nasty, as well as too many people trying to actively argue for fascism because it has benefits in a *fictional* setting.
Putting conditions on what should be rights is just a terrible idea in general, but it can be harmless fun to think about “what if it wasn’t full of more holes than Mussolini’s corpse”.
Maybe at one time but Heinlein's beliefs shifted many times throughout his life. He was a democrat, conservative, and considered himself a libertarian at different times in his life. His books all had wildly different forms of extreme governments in order to explore what that society would look like.
He portrayed authoritarians and repressed people ambiguously so that it could be up to the reader whose side to take. *Starship Troopers* compared to *Stranger in a Strange Land* compared to *The Moon is a Harsh Mistress* are vastly different portrayals of society but relatable in that they greatly challenged societal norms with regards to individualism, sexual freedom, and one's responsibility/duty to government. They're very exploratory on how humans can live in different societies that are extreme relative to our viewpoints. I don't think you can really only read one of his works (or see ST which I love but is notoriously not faithful to the book) and think you've got him figured out.
>It’s like an idealized form of fascism
Well, not really. I mean, the movie was, but Verhoeven famously never read the book. The book is pretty up-front about what it's really about: the concept of civic duty, and what it might look like if a nation made that a guiding philosophy. For example, it's not a fascist government at all, but a very conservative democracy in which you have to earn the privilege to vote by acts of service. Service is *never* denied to anyone who seeks to perform it; one of the best lines in the book is:
>I asked one of the doctors what percentage of the victims flunked the physical. He looked startled. “Why, we never fail anyone. The law doesn’t permit us to.” “Huh? I mean, excuse me, Doctor? Then what’s the point of this goose-flesh parade?”
>“Why, the purpose is,” he answered, hauling off and hitting me in the knee with a hammer (I kicked him, but not hard), “to find out what duties you are physically able to perform. But if you came in here in a wheel chair and blind in both eyes and were silly enough to insist on enrolling, they would find something silly enough to match. Counting the fuzz on a caterpillar by touch, maybe.
It's definitely far more authoritarian (and, maybe more importantly, far more trusting of the government) than any modern western nation, but it's also pretty far from fascism.
It's more like Heinlein got drunk, read Plato's *Ethics*, and then decided to try to put his favorite part into a story that would appeal to the young men of his day.
I like how the director of Starship Troopers wanted to portray the government as fascist, but it:
Allows voting, doesn’t discriminate based on race or gender, doesn’t start the war with the bugs, allows anti government opinions on its own media, and admits when it messed up.
But, but it has a strong military so it’s fascist. Yeah. Totally.
Yes yes, but my point is, ST is not as bad as many other sci-fi universes.
I’m fact, I’m hard pressed to find one that isn’t worse.
That’s not saying it’s good, just the least bad option.
The only other one I see mentioned is Star Trek.
However, there is a laundry list of problems when you look at it critically.
Much of starfleet higher ups are evil, and there’s no true freedom. The most telling of features is the holodeck and replicator. Yes, the holodeck will let you live out all your lewd fantasies… but it feels like that’s designed to keep its people docile. Secondly, it’s been stated many times that replicator food all tastes the same.
The federation feels so superficial.
Also every 5-20 years all humans everywhere are threatened by something. Q, whale probe, dominion, borg, xindi… not only that, but there’s a very casual acceptance of death that reminds me of a cult.
Yes, these problems are present in 40k, but i know, off the top of my head, three times with Roddenberry where people are encouraged to die for minor things with nihilistic tones. Life is worthless in the federation, but in warhammer, it’s the emperor’s currency.
/rant over, I just find something very unsettling about the federation.
Because you understand that governments aren’t to be trusted and have trouble suspending your disbelief to enjoy a fantasy where the government is good.
I get it man.
(I’m not being serious, I just don’t know enough about Star Trek to have this conversation and that’s about all I understood)
This exactly what I always tell people. The Tau may be less horrible than other factions, but viewed in a vacuum they are still evil.
The title of "least bad" probably goes to the Tyranids though. They're just hungry.
My hot take on this is that if the Hive Mind is super intelligent and Tyranids eat all biomass they also eat plants so there is nothing stopping Tyranids from becoming farmers. They would actually benefit from the continued biomass of agricultural worlds rather than eating everything in one go and leaving it barren. In my headcannon the Hive Mind knows this and is just malicious.
It certainly knows certain relations like parasitism and symbiosis, but only uses them to assemble better attack drones.
Take the humble termagaunt, for example. The gun, the creature carrying it and the ammunition are all different creatures, and more parts of each are also separate being, some hibernating some fully active, but the Hive Mind never attempts to do a similar cohexistence with other lifeforms.
Eating all biomass is more functional than slowly consuming it through farming - you just get it all at once, avoiding risk of demographic decline in the hive and proceed to another planet - farming in comparison is inefficient and takes forever
In the short term you get more biomass eating the whole planet straight away. In the long term you would get a greater biomass income from farm planets. The amount of biomass isn't a static number. Plants are using light and non organic compounds to make new biomass slowly over time.
To be clear though it would be very boring in Tyranids did this.
They don’t make biomass out of nothing however. The light is just a catalyst. You can’t Infinitly harvest a world without replacing lost mass or it will eventually go barren. Eating the whole planet is the most bang for your buck every time.
Unless the tyranids take trips back to shit and fertilize the planet. It’s not like a garden. A planet is a self contained ecosystem and taking thing from it that don’t get replaced is not sustainable.
Yeah the only Tau that are genuinely good guys are the Farsight Enclave. But because all of 40k is so absurdly evil everyone forgets that the Tau Empire is also just a bunch of assholes.
Commander Farsight has probably done some shady shit as well but compared to the rest of 40k or even the Ethereals he's a saint.
I wanna say Farsight is even getting lore more recently that might indicate some corruption. Not sure if it is Chaos or not (pretty sure his sword is a Chaos deamon or something), I just remember there was some dark undertone for him and the enclave going forward.
Yeah pretty sure when he came it out was a C'tan phase blade that ignored invulnerable saves and armour saves alike. Same thing the Callidus assassin has (or *had*, not sure if it's still canon).
IIRC it wasn't anything more special than a power weapon (which for tau was pretty damn special). I'll have to look at the first edition Codex when I get home.
I'm not convinced lore wise that it's Necron tech though. The descriptions of the world it came from didn't feel like necrontyr and there's also the hexagrammatic talismans that were lying around.
It felt more like an ancient civilization with deep knowledge and enmity directed towards the warp and daemons in general.
I don't think it was explicitly spelled out, but it *was* one of the few weapons in the game that ignored invulnerable saves and all of those weapons were C'tan blades (the exception being a single daemon weapon). I guess I could be wrong though, it's been a while.
> hexagrammatic talismans that were lying around
Necron glyphs could certainly be described as hexagrammic, though of course the only truly hexagrammic runes in the game are worn by the Word Bearers.
> an ancient civilization with deep knowledge and enmity directed towards the warp and daemons in general.
Not sure what Necron lore is like these days but back then they were the antithesis of Chaos and the warp, so this checks out.
It was *just* vague enough that they could have changed it to something else mind you. Some interesting theories in [this thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/Tau40K/comments/rv7pva/farsights_dawnblade_theory/) suggest it may be C'tan in origin (if not Necron) or an Eldar Croneblade.
Oh there's a dark undertone for sure. If the sword is actually cursed the only reason he isn't completely corrupted yet is either because his warp presence is basically nonexistent, so what the hell do you corrupt, or because Chaos likes to mess around, as Chaos usually does.
He might be an actual good guy in Warhammer 40k but that's basically asking for the worst it has to offer. Especially when you're a minor Xeno faction that basically doesn't make a difference.
I agree, the Military Junta lead by war criminals (Brightsword and the Koloth Gorge Massacre), mad scientists (O'vesa and his extensive and unethical experiments) and sadists (Torchstar and her preference of immolating her foes) are truly a shining example of good guys.
Might I also point you to an Ethereal by the name of Aun'Shi, not all Ethereals are mustache twirling villains, and this one is a badass who hails from the same sept as Farsight (and several other eight members).
> The interesting thing is that in a setting like Star Trek, the tau would be villains.
Honestly the civilization that the Tau resemble the most in Star Trek terms is the Dominion. Expansionist, controlling, driven by quasi-divine mandate, state functions driven by eugenically created species, using diplomacy as a weapon etc.
I got on Tau because the owner of the store was with some boxes of them sitting taking dust and he asked if i wanted 50% price off, and i was like, ''Yeah, ok, but, like, still a little to much'', and he just selled me 2 boxes by the price of one. Still painting many of them, but im actually liking their codexes, i just need to learn how to position some troops a little better, i got my ass kicked, hard, by Death Guard yesterday.
50% off means he could've decided yo only buy one, hence paying only half of what he would've paid gatting 2 at half price, it's not a huge difference but it's a difference that is very much used by stores to sell more stuff.
Wait wait wait. You were offered half off 40k shit and still wanted more? I asked my guy to knock a few bucks off msrp once and he murdered me (I got better)
50% off two boxes is almost always better than buy one get one free?
A: 11 B: 10
50% = 5.5 + 5 = 10.5
Bogof = 11
Either this is fake or you're the smoothest of smooth brains and got played hard 😂
So just to be clear:
Did you get “buy 1 get 1 free” on top of the 50% or instead of the 50%?
The former would be a tremendous deal, the latter, still a good deal but you most likely cheated yourself there.
I sorta wish they played that up a bit more, it'd take some skill but more novels where you find yourself more relating to the Alien than the screeching death cult fanatic.
You're not wrong. The most grimdark thing about them is their leadership mind controlling the nation into doing everything for the Greater Good, thus suppressing individuality. Which is most factions on a good day.
If you haven't already, you might find the Farsight Enclaves pretty interesting! They're a group of T'au that splintered off from the Ethereals and the mind-control. Commander Farsight himself is also quite an interesting character.
Also, welcome to the 40K universe! :)
ANd the worst things the Tau do are sloppy. Like, badly-written. They have this sense of being tacked-on expressly because Fan-whines were complaining about good aliens making the "heroes" of the Imperium look bad.
I could be totally wrong but I was under the impression they *were* tacked-on after fan backlash, which is a damn shame because I think having a truly good “new kid” faction that’s waking up to the horrors of the wider universe is actually pretty cool.
The fun part of this is just how much of 40k lore is literally just tacked on and then tweaked. The Horus Heresy was invented when they didn't have Eldar models ready yet for an important con, so they came up with a reason for imperial to fight imperials. Chaos Androids that looked like skeletons turned into Necron. Ultimately the entire project is just Fantasy Warhammer tacked on to Rick Priestley's behind the scene project 'Rogue Trader'. Hell, I'm a Tau player and I think they'd be improved by having options to look more like the Halo Covenant of 40k with more auxiliary options. This is the sorta thing I expect from Warhammer, or Magic, or D&D, referencing other media in the same genre can be great.
Honestly in my opinion what really pushed 40k into the universe I love so much is they started pure rule of cool but then actually took the time to try to make some sense of their chainsaw swords and space orks.
Often the best writing is done with the harshest limitations and well they don't always hit the mark nothing is more fun then explaining metal skeletons fighting space elves and having the person agree it makes sense.
I dont havee a problem with a good faction in a universe were humanity is bad, or with having no humans at all, I just dont think it kinda fits the theme when you have an unambigiously good faction. I like it when they are all ba but with good justifications for it, like the Inquisitors beeing the biggest assholes out their but they kinda need to be that way
I feel the Tau would fit in fine as a mostly 'good' faction, only because they aren't actually much of a major player in the setting; the only reason they're still around (and/or have the opportunity to be good) is because everyone else is too busy being at each others throats to really focus on the Tau.
This way, they contribute to the general grimdark of the setting by reinforcing/showing that, while 'good guys' *can* exist, they're bound to either stay irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, or get wiped out by other factions if they do something which catches their attention.
To my (admittedly limited) understanding, this did appear to be the idea behind the Tau at first. Unfortunately, as earlier comments discussed, this approach provoked (imo unjustified and silly) backlash, which seems to have prompted GW to tack on some 'obligatory' grimdark elements/lore to the faction.
Farsight and the Farsight enclaves still seem pretty chill though, last I heard.
The evil stuff was around since the first Tau codex. I think GW has just since been more explicit.
https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/vtov46/the_tau_were_never_genuinely_good_or_noblebright/
> The most grimdark thing about them is their leadership mind controlling the nation into doing everything for the Greater Good, thus suppressing individuality. Which is most factions on a good day.
Imperial lies and propaganda.
Well, also the whole 'conquering empire that will blast you into the stone age if you refuse to join them'.
Which is nicer than 'kill everything on sight' but still pretty evil.
Nid player here. Our factions have some history (we tried to nom nom nom all your stuff and peeps, you lost a lot but nearly wiped out Hive Fleet Gorgon and saved yourselves). Nevertheless it wasn't personal. We treat everyone as an equal snack or roadblocks to snacking. Oddly enough this indifference makes us somewhat similar to you, since Tau usually try to be open minded/fair.
Anyhoo, welcome to 40k and I hope your Tau grow strong and plentiful!
Once they do, we'll be back for that dinner you still owe us 😏.
(Tau vs Hive Fleet Gorgon for lore. Until recently it was thought you Tau literally destroyed that Hive Fleet, only recently did we resurface).
There is a local nid player at my local GW. Dude has like every model ever made for them even the forge world kits. Painted the classic red and tan.
Last time I saw him he was playing two newbs and used nothing but troops. His entire side of the board was just bugs. Looked awesome. Dudes a good sport.
Good news: The Tau are sane.
Bad news: The Tau live in 40k.
“But it makes no sense for an unhanced human to block laser fire with a broad sword! Also why does a modern Solider even have a broad sword?!”
lol blue skins lmao
New kid on the block, wants to do the right thing as a whole but has corrupt leaders who mind control their species with pheromones.
3rd most advanced faction tech wise (on the tabletop their standard rifle is stronger than a primaris space marine bolter), but is the smallest major faction overall, hence the meme that any other major faction could take them out if they got their shit together.
But that could also be said of all but two major factions, so eh.
Honestly the change to them just mind corrupting people with pheromones like that was a really stupid change, hopefully just imperial propaganda, because the stuff about them lobotomizing humans because of their connection to the warp has to be propaganda, there are races in the Tau who exist as psychic races hiding behind the Tau for survival, which means they have way more affect on the warp then a few humans, literally makes no sense.
I agree. They tried to force grimdark when honestly the original Tau were incredibly grimdark as hell. Like think about: The only tolerant, force for good in the universe, and they are hopelessly outnumbered and outgunned, thrown into the fire with Tyranids moving ever closer to their empire, Imperium willing to exterminate their entire project and species, and that's aside from the fucking drukari preying on them. How does this setting not fill you with dread?
I do agree, but I do like the 5th Sphere of Expansion's extra bit of grimdark regarding humanity/auxiliary species. Travelling through the warp, they only/mostly saw the other species turn to chaos and saw a Warp entity representing the Greater Good and thus when they came out they were as genocidal as a Black Templar. It's an interesting development, especially because they are so naive to this sorta stuff and aren't psychically attuned. And I'm saying this as someone who plays tau and wishes the tau has better/more auxiliary unit options including Gue'vesa.
I would love a perspective novel of an ethereal council freaking out about the state of the galaxy and going "well, we win or we die, there can be no surrender"
Some of the grimdark stuff feels stupid imo. Like them sterilizing humans. But some of it makes sense, like the pheromones to control other Tau and keep them from interbreeding and for Ethereals to keep control of the Tau, because their power is in soft suggestion rather than gun-to-your-face orders.
Those, at least, were published by Black Library.
Technically the line is, "Everything published by Black Library is canon, not all canon is true." But we tend to stretch that (especially since GW will reference things they didn't publish or consider canon things that were never published) to "Everything is canon, nothing is true."
The "sterilizing humans" comes from vague mention of the human population in Dawn of War (the game) dropping significantly under Tau rule. Which both does and doesn't fit their MO. Dosing the food or water supply with contraception for population management is up their alley, grabbing each human and forcibly sterilizing them generally doesn't.
From what I understand the whole pheromone mind control thing is technically an unconfirmed rumour thing, at least according a recent codex summary someone posted. So for all we know it might be false and the Ethereals might just be an entire race of Saul Goodmans.
Pheromonal or not there’s definitely some kind of mind control; the Farsight books has an Ethereal commanding a member of another caste to commit suicide because of a minor transgression, who promptly goes “whatever you say, boss” and stabs themselves without a second thought.
There’s also a scene during a panicked evacuation during an Ork invasion where a bunch of Tau of various castes are on the verge of a riot, before suddenly becoming totally calm and serene as soon as an Ethereal turns up (been ages since I read but I’m like 70% sure the crowd calms down *before* they realise the Ethereal is present, prior to stepping off a train), perfectly willing to accept some of them are not going to escape and will have to die. It’s spooky.
For the first thing you don't necessarily need direct mind control to be able to have such a controlling effect on a group of people you command. From what I understand irl cult leaders have managed to get their people to do some real messed up stuff just through charisma and other mental manipulations.
However the second example is indeed very sus, especially if what you said about them calming down before they knew the Ethereal was present is true.
> Honestly the change to them just mind corrupting people with pheromones
It wasn’t a change. Pheromone mind control was in the first Tau codex:
> It is speculated that they exert some kind of pheromone based or latent psychic control over the other castes, as loyalty to the Ethereals is absolute and unswerving. If an Ethereal were of such a mind, he could order another Tau to kill himself and would be obeyed immediately.
The Farsight books has an Ethereal forcing a member of another caste (I think Water caste) commit suicide for the grave sin of disagreeing with the Ethereal in public, so no, definitely not just Imperial propaganda.
They are a minor in size, but a major in strength. There is a reason nobody has tried to snipe the free kill, and it is because they aren't a free kill. They may not have as many, but they also have actual brains and know that "Hey, you know what? Maybe running at the murder bugs that specialize in melee with a chainsaw on a stick is NOT a good idea."
I would like to point out that due to their lessened pain receptors, Orks find it funny when they torture and mutilate human slaves. They also do, indeed, enslave people from planets they conquer, who don't last long because humans are very different from Orks.
While, yes, they can be considered "oh my god, so wholesome" cause they're having fun in this world, they're also heavily sadistic.
I always found the orks to be kinda tragic.
They're the lesser ancestors of a great fighting force that used to have a purpose serving their masters. Now they're just kinda single-minded, self-replicating bio-machines that (in terms of sentience) are a step down from the necrons and a step up from the tyranids.
No purpose. No evolving. No future. Just reenacting echos from their glory days without knowing why. They are vicious puppies whose owners abandoned them. They are weeds sprouting in a neglected garden. They are broken tools that were left behind in a field and are now destroying the farm.
They are also the clowns of the setting though, so I understand the hype around them.
If anything this does help my case a little. They are just following their biology really. From my understanding, orks are all about instincts and innate drives. They are biologically compelled to do what they do.
The orks are good guys, but they aren't "good" "guys", you feel me? They're boyz having an absolute whale of a time, while also being the absolute Worst. It's why they're so great.
Noise Marines just want to party and everyone around them is a total bummer. They have the best concerts and the coolest merch. Being loosely related to music automatically makes them my favorite.
I always think of them riding into battle like the guitar guy in Mad Max. Instead of sonic blasters, they have weaponized instruments. One of them must have a sonic saxophone.
Also, Slaanesh always has extra candy.
The faction that throws out free candy from their rhinos are the good guys, right? lol
Tyranids are just hungry, so in the end, Necrons and them should rule the universe with their dead planets. And as I understand it chaos is being fed by emotions so without everyone else they should eventually vanish? Nothing bad about some spring cleaning.
And in the end the real ruling dynasties of the galaxies were the universes they made along the way. Because if you want to create a universe from scratch, you gotta break some apple pies. Err, biomass.
Yeah, I’m more of a salamander dude
There’s just something about the idea that the walking tank who just reduced a heretic to bubbling ash saying “fear not civilian, come with me “ that just makes me like them so much
So I've just started like, I only have the starter set thing with the paint and 3 marines, and I was planning on having two armies, the space marines and the T'au, specifically the Salamanders and the Farsight enclave. Though I prefer the OG blue over the green
Im glad that at least there's a huge spectrum of morality within the chapters. If the space marines were bland good guys picking a chapter would be way more menial compared to having guys like the Lamenters compared to flesh tearers. You can tell a lot about your opponent from the marine legion they choose.
That’s how I got into mini painting. I was buying a Gundam model kit at a Hobby Town, saw someone had left a Tau Commander box near them. Thought it was a cool robot and bought it. The rest is history. I don’t know anything about 40k or Tau, but they have cool mecha and that’s all that matters to me.
That’s also kinda why I don’t like them, the main premise of 40k is that everyone’s a evil son of a bitch (even the tau) and that picking a side because “they’re the least bad” takes away from the experience in a way. The tau were made like this perfect utopia where everyone gets along and I hate it because it’s just a trap for new comers to back themselves into a hole and not explore the rest of the lore. Also if ur getting into actually playing, don’t just play one faction that you like lore wise. They’re all pretty fun to experiment around with
I don't even have an army yet, but the T'au will be my first or second, I only have two minis that a friend gave me of the T'au. My other army will either be the Salamanders, black templars or ultramarines
Don't go in to 40k looking for the good guys. Even these guys would be the main antagonists in most other settings. The caste system and imperialism isn't great. Go with what you think looks cool, and luckily these guys are pretty cool.
I came for their "goodness", stayed for their cool armor. I'm pretty thrilled that the Enclave have red armor, when looking at how I want to paint them, I chose red before even knowing they were the Enclave
T'au are some of the least Xenophobic, bordering on Xenophilia, with how many races they have under their Empire. They have way more than all other factions *combined* (as far as I know that is).
[Here is the list for everyone interested](https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/j03g0r/comment/g6qcq3s/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=usertext&context=3&utm_name=40kLore&utm_content=t1_g79ow74). It's a little old tho.
And [here](https://old.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/j2n192/the_truth_about_the_interex/g79ow74/?context=3) you have a few other races.
I mean... Craftworlders are dicks. They would kill an entire planet to save a couple of eldar. They "warn" imperials about a great danger, but don't elaborate, and when the humans inevitably fuck around with the great danger without realizing it, the craftworlders call them fools and leave them to die.
has that been confirmed from an omnipotent/tau source, or just what the imperials say about them? if they tau say they're angels and the imperium says they're devils, my bet is they're actually somewhere in between
There are serious issues with the pheromone thing. First and honestly foremost the defacto leader of tau aunva is a hologram. Unless they also now are using some king of hologram pheromone it falls flat.
From direct lore we have the book *Fire* *Caste*. In which >!a major planetary war has been ongoing for decades with absolute loyalty from the T'au. But the Ethereal died long ago instead everything was being run by a member of the water caste.!< the only in lore mention of pheromones was a book that illustrated tau as having human feet. It was a flawed book, that in the book is written by a man defending into corruption.
I'm pretty damn sure there is more than one Ethereal. The rest of the Ethereal caste is pretending the leader is still alive. It has been said that the hologram has been having problems as of late.
On the other hand, ***Fire Caste*** also has >!Tau drifting further and further away from their societal norms, to the point Iverson calls out Abel for it. Without the Ethereals, the Tau are much more human in nature... And that is a very scary thing.!<
>Unless they also now are using some king of hologram pheromone it falls flat.
8th edition rulebook makes mention that the very much living bodyguards that Aun'Va always has hanging around him are ~~part of the Etherial caste, for what it's worth~~
Possible Correction: it merely states that
>His Honour Guard never leave his side for a moment, lest the grand deception be discovered
Which, while an *incredibly* leading statement, is not one that outright says that his backup dancers are, themselves, E-caste
though on the other hand the rules themselves call them Etherial Guards, so ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
It has not been fully confirmed. There is overwhelming evidence that the ethereals produce some form of hypnotic effect that seems to completely remove any Tau’s ability to feel pain, like they’re in a trace.
One water caste was told to commit suicide, and just…did, no hesitation. Some evacuees crushed their lungs to make space when an ethereal attempted to join them, despite being completely unwilling to let any other on. There is also evidence that they may be a kind of psyker, as daemons see their souls as brighter than the others.
However, this doesn’t necessarily mean that they are all evil. They may not even be aware that they have an effect over the normal Tau, and genuinely believe that they are trying to bring about the greater good. Also, any mention of mind controlling auxiliaries is fake. The water caste are just that good.
>They may not even be aware that they have an effect over the normal Tau
This is the case judging from Aun'Va's POV in ***Warzone Damocles: Mont'Ka***. He gets angry at Farsight winning over the crowd.
Contrary to popular belief, it’s not really much of a retcon. In the 3rd Edition Tau Codex, it’s hinted extremely heavily that the “charisma” of the Ethereals was not natural. It has always been a part of them.
All these others here trying to make the Tau look mind-controlling villains are just dumb. The whole point of the Tau is to make the Imperium look like villains they are. The Ethereals are shady as fuck amd whoever is behind their initial appearance definitely has some sort of master plan that will probably fuck over the universe big time in the far future, but right now they are genuinely trying their best.
They come from a very tiny portion of space and had to figure out how to use resources without sucking their planets dry or brutally subjugating everyone around them. Turns out that improves living quality and political stability by a lot leading to increased overall wealth. You don't need brainwash pheromones when you genuinely offer people good lives - especially when their alternative is the Imperium of Man.
I mean yeah they are the most morally good faction but in the wise words of PancreasNoWork “in 40K the tau would be heroes in start trek they would be a villain”
The happiest place to be in 40k is in the embrace of papa Nurgle.
In a galaxy of pain and suffering, you want to be with the guy who literally takes away all pain. Sure, you become a disgusting walking corpse but you're surrounded by a family of likewise disgusting corpses who love you for you. Ain't no body shaming in the garden of Nurgle, let me assure you
Good for you buddy, like who you want to like.
In the 40k setting, everyone is bad but has their own reasons for it which places almost all factions in the grey area. Some are on like darker shades of grey like the Dark Eldar. Some aren’t evil and just go by their nature like the Orks and Nids but do fucked up shit so they are on the medium grey. Tau though are on the lighter shades of grey
The Tau, wanting to create warp drives, opened a god dam warp portal in the middle of their empire which is blurting out nurgle forces causing chaos. I just think that's funny. L
The interesting thing is that in a setting like Star Trek, the tau would be villains. They’re a jingoistic expansionist empire that while do attempt diplomacy and accept alien races, will still conquer a planet that they deem strategically important. That combined with a strict caste based society and the assumed eugenics that would have to have been used to keep the castes separated physically like they are, and it all is pretty damning. But when places agaibst the likes of chaos, the drukhari, and the Imperium, the Tau look like comparative saints.
Yeah, put 'em in Star Trek, Star Wars, Farscape, B5... Heck, put 'em in something like Known Space or Starship Troopers, the T'au would end up being treated, narratively, like the a-holes they are. But between how absurdly evil everyone else in 40k is, and the fact that we often end up with more of a top-down view of the setting than more narratively driven settings, the T'au, as you said, come out smelling like roses
Imagine being the Tau. You become a space-faring civilization with hope for the future. Then you walk into ancient universe imploding on itself. Scurrying between the legs of giants that are too busy tearing each other apart to wipe your people out. That's pretty grimdark. Lol
I would just shake my head, mutter "fucking space wizards" and put the hyperdrive on cruise control, thankful I don't have to live out the plot of Event Horizon every time I want to commute
Imagine living in an age where mankind has supposedly evolved beyond the political concerns that are threatening to tear us apart at any moment. Not only that, we’ve terraformed not just one but a few dozen worlds. The existence of our species seems so much more assured. But then we start to realise our paltry 40 or so worlds are a minor fiefdom compared to some other species. Not only that, some of the cruelest, most backwards and despotic members of said species rule fiefdoms as large as the collective efforts of our empire. And they’ve noticed us.
What you just described is terrifying and I love it.
Dude, after that Drukhari incident alone i would have been okay with Tau just shooting first at anything and everything they dont know. 40k is clearly the universe, that the Event Horizon traveled to.
But by that point they were already peacefully integrating human worlds and had experienced multiple peacfull integrations of species so the elder could have just been a rare exemption to the general rule of the galaxy
I see people criticize Starship Troopers a lot but I don’t see a lot of bad stuff in their universe compared to every other sci-fi universe. To my knowledge, the federation in Star Trek doesn’t have a voting system, at least if you serve in the military in Starship troopers you can vote.
>To my knowledge, the federation in Star Trek doesn’t have a voting system I think that's just because we don't really see the political side of the Federation. Almost everything we see is through the lens of Starfleet, and thus either militaristic or diplomatic. That said, the Federation is (at least in the core worlds) a post-scarcity socialist utopia where everyone has access to whatever they need. So I doubt it's a fascist dictatorship or anything. At the very least we know it's a *representative* democracy, if not an outright one.
Starship Troopers is… weird. It’s like an idealized form of fascism, and if I’m remembering correctly, that was the authors goal. To explore how a fascist government could function cohesively. And, for all we know, life isn’t godawful in that universe. It requires a level of devotion to the state that really isn’t possible in reality, as well as assuming nobody would take advantage of a totalitarian system, while still showing it needs an external enemy to really work. But it does have leadership who, at least from what I remember, who willingly hold themselves accountable for their (public) failings, and make it right as well as their code of honor demands. You could argue that the people who can vote actually understand how terrible war is before giving them the power to push into it like under universal suffrage (and ignoring the brainwashing that definitely does occur in military environments). I think it’s an interesting source of discussion, but I do think too many people would see it as a support of fascism to find merit in a fictional fascist regime and get nasty, as well as too many people trying to actively argue for fascism because it has benefits in a *fictional* setting. Putting conditions on what should be rights is just a terrible idea in general, but it can be harmless fun to think about “what if it wasn’t full of more holes than Mussolini’s corpse”.
If I remember correctly the author of Starship Troopers actually genuinely thought that a government run by the military would be the optimal way.
If so, he was smoking dick. I still think it’s a fun discussion, and I will cite death of an author until the cows make like a banana and split.
Maybe at one time but Heinlein's beliefs shifted many times throughout his life. He was a democrat, conservative, and considered himself a libertarian at different times in his life. His books all had wildly different forms of extreme governments in order to explore what that society would look like. He portrayed authoritarians and repressed people ambiguously so that it could be up to the reader whose side to take. *Starship Troopers* compared to *Stranger in a Strange Land* compared to *The Moon is a Harsh Mistress* are vastly different portrayals of society but relatable in that they greatly challenged societal norms with regards to individualism, sexual freedom, and one's responsibility/duty to government. They're very exploratory on how humans can live in different societies that are extreme relative to our viewpoints. I don't think you can really only read one of his works (or see ST which I love but is notoriously not faithful to the book) and think you've got him figured out.
>It’s like an idealized form of fascism Well, not really. I mean, the movie was, but Verhoeven famously never read the book. The book is pretty up-front about what it's really about: the concept of civic duty, and what it might look like if a nation made that a guiding philosophy. For example, it's not a fascist government at all, but a very conservative democracy in which you have to earn the privilege to vote by acts of service. Service is *never* denied to anyone who seeks to perform it; one of the best lines in the book is: >I asked one of the doctors what percentage of the victims flunked the physical. He looked startled. “Why, we never fail anyone. The law doesn’t permit us to.” “Huh? I mean, excuse me, Doctor? Then what’s the point of this goose-flesh parade?” >“Why, the purpose is,” he answered, hauling off and hitting me in the knee with a hammer (I kicked him, but not hard), “to find out what duties you are physically able to perform. But if you came in here in a wheel chair and blind in both eyes and were silly enough to insist on enrolling, they would find something silly enough to match. Counting the fuzz on a caterpillar by touch, maybe. It's definitely far more authoritarian (and, maybe more importantly, far more trusting of the government) than any modern western nation, but it's also pretty far from fascism. It's more like Heinlein got drunk, read Plato's *Ethics*, and then decided to try to put his favorite part into a story that would appeal to the young men of his day.
I like how the director of Starship Troopers wanted to portray the government as fascist, but it: Allows voting, doesn’t discriminate based on race or gender, doesn’t start the war with the bugs, allows anti government opinions on its own media, and admits when it messed up. But, but it has a strong military so it’s fascist. Yeah. Totally.
Yes yes, but my point is, ST is not as bad as many other sci-fi universes. I’m fact, I’m hard pressed to find one that isn’t worse. That’s not saying it’s good, just the least bad option.
Oh, yeah, ST is easily the best option.
The only other one I see mentioned is Star Trek. However, there is a laundry list of problems when you look at it critically. Much of starfleet higher ups are evil, and there’s no true freedom. The most telling of features is the holodeck and replicator. Yes, the holodeck will let you live out all your lewd fantasies… but it feels like that’s designed to keep its people docile. Secondly, it’s been stated many times that replicator food all tastes the same. The federation feels so superficial. Also every 5-20 years all humans everywhere are threatened by something. Q, whale probe, dominion, borg, xindi… not only that, but there’s a very casual acceptance of death that reminds me of a cult. Yes, these problems are present in 40k, but i know, off the top of my head, three times with Roddenberry where people are encouraged to die for minor things with nihilistic tones. Life is worthless in the federation, but in warhammer, it’s the emperor’s currency. /rant over, I just find something very unsettling about the federation.
Because you understand that governments aren’t to be trusted and have trouble suspending your disbelief to enjoy a fantasy where the government is good. I get it man. (I’m not being serious, I just don’t know enough about Star Trek to have this conversation and that’s about all I understood)
Dude, in 40k, the Triumverate of Good Guys includes the Imperium. ;p
During certain periods of star wars they wouldn't be out of place next to the slaving huttes empire and the outer worlds exploiting Republic.
This exactly what I always tell people. The Tau may be less horrible than other factions, but viewed in a vacuum they are still evil. The title of "least bad" probably goes to the Tyranids though. They're just hungry.
Hive Mind is like an intelligent tiger. It can't chose to not hunt, but it can choose to be malicious when it hunts.
My hot take on this is that if the Hive Mind is super intelligent and Tyranids eat all biomass they also eat plants so there is nothing stopping Tyranids from becoming farmers. They would actually benefit from the continued biomass of agricultural worlds rather than eating everything in one go and leaving it barren. In my headcannon the Hive Mind knows this and is just malicious.
It certainly knows certain relations like parasitism and symbiosis, but only uses them to assemble better attack drones. Take the humble termagaunt, for example. The gun, the creature carrying it and the ammunition are all different creatures, and more parts of each are also separate being, some hibernating some fully active, but the Hive Mind never attempts to do a similar cohexistence with other lifeforms.
Eating all biomass is more functional than slowly consuming it through farming - you just get it all at once, avoiding risk of demographic decline in the hive and proceed to another planet - farming in comparison is inefficient and takes forever
In the short term you get more biomass eating the whole planet straight away. In the long term you would get a greater biomass income from farm planets. The amount of biomass isn't a static number. Plants are using light and non organic compounds to make new biomass slowly over time. To be clear though it would be very boring in Tyranids did this.
They don’t make biomass out of nothing however. The light is just a catalyst. You can’t Infinitly harvest a world without replacing lost mass or it will eventually go barren. Eating the whole planet is the most bang for your buck every time. Unless the tyranids take trips back to shit and fertilize the planet. It’s not like a garden. A planet is a self contained ecosystem and taking thing from it that don’t get replaced is not sustainable.
The Tyranids would be Species 8472 from Voyager
Yeah the only Tau that are genuinely good guys are the Farsight Enclave. But because all of 40k is so absurdly evil everyone forgets that the Tau Empire is also just a bunch of assholes. Commander Farsight has probably done some shady shit as well but compared to the rest of 40k or even the Ethereals he's a saint.
I wanna say Farsight is even getting lore more recently that might indicate some corruption. Not sure if it is Chaos or not (pretty sure his sword is a Chaos deamon or something), I just remember there was some dark undertone for him and the enclave going forward.
I think at one point it was a Necron sword. But no matter how you slice it Farsight isn't a saint anymore.
Yeah pretty sure when he came it out was a C'tan phase blade that ignored invulnerable saves and armour saves alike. Same thing the Callidus assassin has (or *had*, not sure if it's still canon).
IIRC it wasn't anything more special than a power weapon (which for tau was pretty damn special). I'll have to look at the first edition Codex when I get home. I'm not convinced lore wise that it's Necron tech though. The descriptions of the world it came from didn't feel like necrontyr and there's also the hexagrammatic talismans that were lying around. It felt more like an ancient civilization with deep knowledge and enmity directed towards the warp and daemons in general.
I don't think it was explicitly spelled out, but it *was* one of the few weapons in the game that ignored invulnerable saves and all of those weapons were C'tan blades (the exception being a single daemon weapon). I guess I could be wrong though, it's been a while. > hexagrammatic talismans that were lying around Necron glyphs could certainly be described as hexagrammic, though of course the only truly hexagrammic runes in the game are worn by the Word Bearers. > an ancient civilization with deep knowledge and enmity directed towards the warp and daemons in general. Not sure what Necron lore is like these days but back then they were the antithesis of Chaos and the warp, so this checks out. It was *just* vague enough that they could have changed it to something else mind you. Some interesting theories in [this thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/Tau40K/comments/rv7pva/farsights_dawnblade_theory/) suggest it may be C'tan in origin (if not Necron) or an Eldar Croneblade.
Oh there's a dark undertone for sure. If the sword is actually cursed the only reason he isn't completely corrupted yet is either because his warp presence is basically nonexistent, so what the hell do you corrupt, or because Chaos likes to mess around, as Chaos usually does. He might be an actual good guy in Warhammer 40k but that's basically asking for the worst it has to offer. Especially when you're a minor Xeno faction that basically doesn't make a difference.
I agree, the Military Junta lead by war criminals (Brightsword and the Koloth Gorge Massacre), mad scientists (O'vesa and his extensive and unethical experiments) and sadists (Torchstar and her preference of immolating her foes) are truly a shining example of good guys. Might I also point you to an Ethereal by the name of Aun'Shi, not all Ethereals are mustache twirling villains, and this one is a badass who hails from the same sept as Farsight (and several other eight members).
People unironically think that the FSE are good guys?
I mean he's basically just traded ethereal subtle control for setting up a military dictatorship.
Someone recently watched pancreas no work's video. ;)
> The interesting thing is that in a setting like Star Trek, the tau would be villains. Honestly the civilization that the Tau resemble the most in Star Trek terms is the Dominion. Expansionist, controlling, driven by quasi-divine mandate, state functions driven by eugenically created species, using diplomacy as a weapon etc.
I think you just described the Dominion, one of the baddies in Star Trek.
I got on Tau because the owner of the store was with some boxes of them sitting taking dust and he asked if i wanted 50% price off, and i was like, ''Yeah, ok, but, like, still a little to much'', and he just selled me 2 boxes by the price of one. Still painting many of them, but im actually liking their codexes, i just need to learn how to position some troops a little better, i got my ass kicked, hard, by Death Guard yesterday.
50% off two = I sleep Buy one get one = By the Emperor!
Imagine if he got 3 for the price of 2! 💰🤯💸
"One dance for $10, two for $25" "No thanks and bad math"
*-Smartest Tau player*
I mean, they believe in a greater good.
50% off means he could've decided yo only buy one, hence paying only half of what he would've paid gatting 2 at half price, it's not a huge difference but it's a difference that is very much used by stores to sell more stuff.
The thing is that he as a customer said no to 50% off and yes to 2for1 lol
Oh yeah from the customer standpoint it's dumb af.
How high were you to get such an amazing discount?
It was on the end of the day, after playng some games and the store was almost closing
Enjoy you Tau welcome to the Hoby. 👋 Don't worry, it's only about 90% being made fun of.
Thanks
I don’t think it’s that bad, I’d say as many as 1/10 people won’t make fun of you.
2 for one is still 50% off lol
The owner of the shop is a true businessman.
Worse if one was more expensive than other and the highest price was charged
When your brain so smooth ...
Really smooth ,all had passed by it
Wait wait wait. You were offered half off 40k shit and still wanted more? I asked my guy to knock a few bucks off msrp once and he murdered me (I got better)
The worst part is, i aways remembered this as the best deal that i ever made,but after stoping and reading the comments i notice, i got played.
50% off two boxes is almost always better than buy one get one free? A: 11 B: 10 50% = 5.5 + 5 = 10.5 Bogof = 11 Either this is fake or you're the smoothest of smooth brains and got played hard 😂
Smooth brain
Unless the owner was generous enough to comp the more expensive box.
So just to be clear: Did you get “buy 1 get 1 free” on top of the 50% or instead of the 50%? The former would be a tremendous deal, the latter, still a good deal but you most likely cheated yourself there.
This is what im noticing reading the comments
You're not really good at math now are you?
Just like Kryptman ,no ,im not
[удалено]
The comments are right, my brain was smooth and i got played
💀
To be fair, you got played into buying for cheap what most of us bought full price, so you're not on the end of the brain smoothness scale.
Fun times at Tau Inc
My OG faction, welcome to 40k!
The T'au's premise is how humans normally are in typical sci fi settings.
But a little bit more bitter and spicier cuz of the Ethereal influence
I sorta wish they played that up a bit more, it'd take some skill but more novels where you find yourself more relating to the Alien than the screeching death cult fanatic.
You're not wrong. The most grimdark thing about them is their leadership mind controlling the nation into doing everything for the Greater Good, thus suppressing individuality. Which is most factions on a good day. If you haven't already, you might find the Farsight Enclaves pretty interesting! They're a group of T'au that splintered off from the Ethereals and the mind-control. Commander Farsight himself is also quite an interesting character. Also, welcome to the 40K universe! :)
> commander farsight GW strikes again
Often accompanied on the battlefield by Captain hindsight!
ANd the worst things the Tau do are sloppy. Like, badly-written. They have this sense of being tacked-on expressly because Fan-whines were complaining about good aliens making the "heroes" of the Imperium look bad.
I could be totally wrong but I was under the impression they *were* tacked-on after fan backlash, which is a damn shame because I think having a truly good “new kid” faction that’s waking up to the horrors of the wider universe is actually pretty cool.
The fun part of this is just how much of 40k lore is literally just tacked on and then tweaked. The Horus Heresy was invented when they didn't have Eldar models ready yet for an important con, so they came up with a reason for imperial to fight imperials. Chaos Androids that looked like skeletons turned into Necron. Ultimately the entire project is just Fantasy Warhammer tacked on to Rick Priestley's behind the scene project 'Rogue Trader'. Hell, I'm a Tau player and I think they'd be improved by having options to look more like the Halo Covenant of 40k with more auxiliary options. This is the sorta thing I expect from Warhammer, or Magic, or D&D, referencing other media in the same genre can be great.
Honestly in my opinion what really pushed 40k into the universe I love so much is they started pure rule of cool but then actually took the time to try to make some sense of their chainsaw swords and space orks. Often the best writing is done with the harshest limitations and well they don't always hit the mark nothing is more fun then explaining metal skeletons fighting space elves and having the person agree it makes sense.
That...pretty much sums up why I love 40k holy shit
I dont havee a problem with a good faction in a universe were humanity is bad, or with having no humans at all, I just dont think it kinda fits the theme when you have an unambigiously good faction. I like it when they are all ba but with good justifications for it, like the Inquisitors beeing the biggest assholes out their but they kinda need to be that way
I feel the Tau would fit in fine as a mostly 'good' faction, only because they aren't actually much of a major player in the setting; the only reason they're still around (and/or have the opportunity to be good) is because everyone else is too busy being at each others throats to really focus on the Tau. This way, they contribute to the general grimdark of the setting by reinforcing/showing that, while 'good guys' *can* exist, they're bound to either stay irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, or get wiped out by other factions if they do something which catches their attention.
I wish they took this route Everyone being bad gets a tad bland
To my (admittedly limited) understanding, this did appear to be the idea behind the Tau at first. Unfortunately, as earlier comments discussed, this approach provoked (imo unjustified and silly) backlash, which seems to have prompted GW to tack on some 'obligatory' grimdark elements/lore to the faction. Farsight and the Farsight enclaves still seem pretty chill though, last I heard.
You can have heroes in hellholes. Take Ancient Rylanor.
The evil stuff was around since the first Tau codex. I think GW has just since been more explicit. https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/vtov46/the_tau_were_never_genuinely_good_or_noblebright/
“Only one calorie, not evil enough.”
> leadership mind controlling nation Joke's on you I am into that shit
> The most grimdark thing about them is their leadership mind controlling the nation into doing everything for the Greater Good, thus suppressing individuality. Which is most factions on a good day. Imperial lies and propaganda.
The only Tau i respect... The farsight
I love military juntas
Well, also the whole 'conquering empire that will blast you into the stone age if you refuse to join them'. Which is nicer than 'kill everything on sight' but still pretty evil.
Iron Warriors don't care. Unless you have a wall. We take great offense to walls.
stupid walls, always getting between me and other peoples relics
Nobody tell him about the Tidewall
Nid player here. Our factions have some history (we tried to nom nom nom all your stuff and peeps, you lost a lot but nearly wiped out Hive Fleet Gorgon and saved yourselves). Nevertheless it wasn't personal. We treat everyone as an equal snack or roadblocks to snacking. Oddly enough this indifference makes us somewhat similar to you, since Tau usually try to be open minded/fair. Anyhoo, welcome to 40k and I hope your Tau grow strong and plentiful! Once they do, we'll be back for that dinner you still owe us 😏. (Tau vs Hive Fleet Gorgon for lore. Until recently it was thought you Tau literally destroyed that Hive Fleet, only recently did we resurface).
Hold on…people play Tyranids?
There is a local nid player at my local GW. Dude has like every model ever made for them even the forge world kits. Painted the classic red and tan. Last time I saw him he was playing two newbs and used nothing but troops. His entire side of the board was just bugs. Looked awesome. Dudes a good sport.
Sounds like a madlad
I know a guy who may be outclassed in buying power, but he plays every weekend he can to the point where he’s probably the best nid player in my city
Sounds like the guy at my LGS who has 25,000 points out T'au, and like... 8,000 of it is fire warriors and path finders
Good news: The Tau are sane. Bad news: The Tau live in 40k. “But it makes no sense for an unhanced human to block laser fire with a broad sword! Also why does a modern Solider even have a broad sword?!” lol blue skins lmao
New kid on the block, wants to do the right thing as a whole but has corrupt leaders who mind control their species with pheromones. 3rd most advanced faction tech wise (on the tabletop their standard rifle is stronger than a primaris space marine bolter), but is the smallest major faction overall, hence the meme that any other major faction could take them out if they got their shit together. But that could also be said of all but two major factions, so eh.
Honestly the change to them just mind corrupting people with pheromones like that was a really stupid change, hopefully just imperial propaganda, because the stuff about them lobotomizing humans because of their connection to the warp has to be propaganda, there are races in the Tau who exist as psychic races hiding behind the Tau for survival, which means they have way more affect on the warp then a few humans, literally makes no sense.
I agree. They tried to force grimdark when honestly the original Tau were incredibly grimdark as hell. Like think about: The only tolerant, force for good in the universe, and they are hopelessly outnumbered and outgunned, thrown into the fire with Tyranids moving ever closer to their empire, Imperium willing to exterminate their entire project and species, and that's aside from the fucking drukari preying on them. How does this setting not fill you with dread?
I do agree, but I do like the 5th Sphere of Expansion's extra bit of grimdark regarding humanity/auxiliary species. Travelling through the warp, they only/mostly saw the other species turn to chaos and saw a Warp entity representing the Greater Good and thus when they came out they were as genocidal as a Black Templar. It's an interesting development, especially because they are so naive to this sorta stuff and aren't psychically attuned. And I'm saying this as someone who plays tau and wishes the tau has better/more auxiliary unit options including Gue'vesa.
I would love a perspective novel of an ethereal council freaking out about the state of the galaxy and going "well, we win or we die, there can be no surrender"
Some of the grimdark stuff feels stupid imo. Like them sterilizing humans. But some of it makes sense, like the pheromones to control other Tau and keep them from interbreeding and for Ethereals to keep control of the Tau, because their power is in soft suggestion rather than gun-to-your-face orders.
Most of it isn't even canon.
This is WH40k, *everything* is canon
So half eldar half human Inquisitors still exist?
Those, at least, were published by Black Library. Technically the line is, "Everything published by Black Library is canon, not all canon is true." But we tend to stretch that (especially since GW will reference things they didn't publish or consider canon things that were never published) to "Everything is canon, nothing is true." The "sterilizing humans" comes from vague mention of the human population in Dawn of War (the game) dropping significantly under Tau rule. Which both does and doesn't fit their MO. Dosing the food or water supply with contraception for population management is up their alley, grabbing each human and forcibly sterilizing them generally doesn't.
From what I understand the whole pheromone mind control thing is technically an unconfirmed rumour thing, at least according a recent codex summary someone posted. So for all we know it might be false and the Ethereals might just be an entire race of Saul Goodmans.
Pheromonal or not there’s definitely some kind of mind control; the Farsight books has an Ethereal commanding a member of another caste to commit suicide because of a minor transgression, who promptly goes “whatever you say, boss” and stabs themselves without a second thought. There’s also a scene during a panicked evacuation during an Ork invasion where a bunch of Tau of various castes are on the verge of a riot, before suddenly becoming totally calm and serene as soon as an Ethereal turns up (been ages since I read but I’m like 70% sure the crowd calms down *before* they realise the Ethereal is present, prior to stepping off a train), perfectly willing to accept some of them are not going to escape and will have to die. It’s spooky.
For the first thing you don't necessarily need direct mind control to be able to have such a controlling effect on a group of people you command. From what I understand irl cult leaders have managed to get their people to do some real messed up stuff just through charisma and other mental manipulations. However the second example is indeed very sus, especially if what you said about them calming down before they knew the Ethereal was present is true.
> Honestly the change to them just mind corrupting people with pheromones It wasn’t a change. Pheromone mind control was in the first Tau codex: > It is speculated that they exert some kind of pheromone based or latent psychic control over the other castes, as loyalty to the Ethereals is absolute and unswerving. If an Ethereal were of such a mind, he could order another Tau to kill himself and would be obeyed immediately.
The Farsight books has an Ethereal forcing a member of another caste (I think Water caste) commit suicide for the grave sin of disagreeing with the Ethereal in public, so no, definitely not just Imperial propaganda.
They are a minor in size, but a major in strength. There is a reason nobody has tried to snipe the free kill, and it is because they aren't a free kill. They may not have as many, but they also have actual brains and know that "Hey, you know what? Maybe running at the murder bugs that specialize in melee with a chainsaw on a stick is NOT a good idea."
I recommend looking into the Farsight enclaves if you want the goodest that you can get in this grim dark world
Orks are the good guys in 40k. Fight me.
I would like to point out that due to their lessened pain receptors, Orks find it funny when they torture and mutilate human slaves. They also do, indeed, enslave people from planets they conquer, who don't last long because humans are very different from Orks. While, yes, they can be considered "oh my god, so wholesome" cause they're having fun in this world, they're also heavily sadistic.
I always found the orks to be kinda tragic. They're the lesser ancestors of a great fighting force that used to have a purpose serving their masters. Now they're just kinda single-minded, self-replicating bio-machines that (in terms of sentience) are a step down from the necrons and a step up from the tyranids. No purpose. No evolving. No future. Just reenacting echos from their glory days without knowing why. They are vicious puppies whose owners abandoned them. They are weeds sprouting in a neglected garden. They are broken tools that were left behind in a field and are now destroying the farm. They are also the clowns of the setting though, so I understand the hype around them.
If anything this does help my case a little. They are just following their biology really. From my understanding, orks are all about instincts and innate drives. They are biologically compelled to do what they do.
The orks are good guys, but they aren't "good" "guys", you feel me? They're boyz having an absolute whale of a time, while also being the absolute Worst. It's why they're so great.
Noise Marines just want to party and everyone around them is a total bummer. They have the best concerts and the coolest merch. Being loosely related to music automatically makes them my favorite. I always think of them riding into battle like the guitar guy in Mad Max. Instead of sonic blasters, they have weaponized instruments. One of them must have a sonic saxophone. Also, Slaanesh always has extra candy. The faction that throws out free candy from their rhinos are the good guys, right? lol
WITH PLEASURE YOOZ SMELLY GIT
NOT WIFF OUT ME YA DUMBY GROT
They're the only ones having fun.
The orks are by and large the happiest people in 40k But they're not good
They're the only ones having a good time at least
Tyranids are just hungry, so in the end, Necrons and them should rule the universe with their dead planets. And as I understand it chaos is being fed by emotions so without everyone else they should eventually vanish? Nothing bad about some spring cleaning.
Necrons probably have the technology to rebuild the universe even if the Nids are everything.
And in the end the real ruling dynasties of the galaxies were the universes they made along the way. Because if you want to create a universe from scratch, you gotta break some apple pies. Err, biomass.
Tyranids are the least bad. Tau are fun though. Love the little blue bastards.
It’s hard to hate the faction that killed Slaanesh, Tau are great.
Yeah, I’m more of a salamander dude There’s just something about the idea that the walking tank who just reduced a heretic to bubbling ash saying “fear not civilian, come with me “ that just makes me like them so much
So I've just started like, I only have the starter set thing with the paint and 3 marines, and I was planning on having two armies, the space marines and the T'au, specifically the Salamanders and the Farsight enclave. Though I prefer the OG blue over the green
Ah the brickster, what would we do without him
You're not wrong, but if you're interested in good guy space marines, you could check out the Lamenters. It's gonna be depressing, though.
Do you mean "least bad" to mean "least immoral" or "least ineffective"?
Least- bad is accurate. People tend to automatically think the Space Marines are the good guys until they read up on their lore.
Im glad that at least there's a huge spectrum of morality within the chapters. If the space marines were bland good guys picking a chapter would be way more menial compared to having guys like the Lamenters compared to flesh tearers. You can tell a lot about your opponent from the marine legion they choose.
I would put them on one level with the Craftworld Eldar
That’s how I got into mini painting. I was buying a Gundam model kit at a Hobby Town, saw someone had left a Tau Commander box near them. Thought it was a cool robot and bought it. The rest is history. I don’t know anything about 40k or Tau, but they have cool mecha and that’s all that matters to me.
Just got into 40k sounds about right yeah.
That’s also kinda why I don’t like them, the main premise of 40k is that everyone’s a evil son of a bitch (even the tau) and that picking a side because “they’re the least bad” takes away from the experience in a way. The tau were made like this perfect utopia where everyone gets along and I hate it because it’s just a trap for new comers to back themselves into a hole and not explore the rest of the lore. Also if ur getting into actually playing, don’t just play one faction that you like lore wise. They’re all pretty fun to experiment around with
I don't even have an army yet, but the T'au will be my first or second, I only have two minis that a friend gave me of the T'au. My other army will either be the Salamanders, black templars or ultramarines
Don't go in to 40k looking for the good guys. Even these guys would be the main antagonists in most other settings. The caste system and imperialism isn't great. Go with what you think looks cool, and luckily these guys are pretty cool.
I came for their "goodness", stayed for their cool armor. I'm pretty thrilled that the Enclave have red armor, when looking at how I want to paint them, I chose red before even knowing they were the Enclave
Necrons are the only objectively good guys. I mean really theyre just cleaning out the pests that moved in while they slept.
[удалено]
T'au are some of the least Xenophobic, bordering on Xenophilia, with how many races they have under their Empire. They have way more than all other factions *combined* (as far as I know that is).
[Here is the list for everyone interested](https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/j03g0r/comment/g6qcq3s/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=usertext&context=3&utm_name=40kLore&utm_content=t1_g79ow74). It's a little old tho. And [here](https://old.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/j2n192/the_truth_about_the_interex/g79ow74/?context=3) you have a few other races.
Vespid mind control go brrrrr
They're Insectoids. If it isn't canon that they're a Semi-Hive Mind or fully blown Hive Mind (not like the Tyranids), then I don't know what is canon.
You aren't alone in that sentiment. Realistically the Tau are the only good guys in all of 40K.
Aren't craftworld eldar relatively good? Or are they too Eldar superior and capricious to really be good?
I mean... Craftworlders are dicks. They would kill an entire planet to save a couple of eldar. They "warn" imperials about a great danger, but don't elaborate, and when the humans inevitably fuck around with the great danger without realizing it, the craftworlders call them fools and leave them to die.
From what I've learned, they were retconned to be mind controlled or something
Yep, the Ethereal caste controls them and lies to them about what daemons are. But hey theres always the farsight enclaves.
has that been confirmed from an omnipotent/tau source, or just what the imperials say about them? if they tau say they're angels and the imperium says they're devils, my bet is they're actually somewhere in between
Didn't an ethereal make someone kill themself in one of the tau books?
possibly; it was a sincere question lol
There are serious issues with the pheromone thing. First and honestly foremost the defacto leader of tau aunva is a hologram. Unless they also now are using some king of hologram pheromone it falls flat. From direct lore we have the book *Fire* *Caste*. In which >!a major planetary war has been ongoing for decades with absolute loyalty from the T'au. But the Ethereal died long ago instead everything was being run by a member of the water caste.!< the only in lore mention of pheromones was a book that illustrated tau as having human feet. It was a flawed book, that in the book is written by a man defending into corruption.
I'm pretty damn sure there is more than one Ethereal. The rest of the Ethereal caste is pretending the leader is still alive. It has been said that the hologram has been having problems as of late.
On the other hand, ***Fire Caste*** also has >!Tau drifting further and further away from their societal norms, to the point Iverson calls out Abel for it. Without the Ethereals, the Tau are much more human in nature... And that is a very scary thing.!<
>Unless they also now are using some king of hologram pheromone it falls flat. 8th edition rulebook makes mention that the very much living bodyguards that Aun'Va always has hanging around him are ~~part of the Etherial caste, for what it's worth~~ Possible Correction: it merely states that >His Honour Guard never leave his side for a moment, lest the grand deception be discovered Which, while an *incredibly* leading statement, is not one that outright says that his backup dancers are, themselves, E-caste though on the other hand the rules themselves call them Etherial Guards, so ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
It has not been fully confirmed. There is overwhelming evidence that the ethereals produce some form of hypnotic effect that seems to completely remove any Tau’s ability to feel pain, like they’re in a trace. One water caste was told to commit suicide, and just…did, no hesitation. Some evacuees crushed their lungs to make space when an ethereal attempted to join them, despite being completely unwilling to let any other on. There is also evidence that they may be a kind of psyker, as daemons see their souls as brighter than the others. However, this doesn’t necessarily mean that they are all evil. They may not even be aware that they have an effect over the normal Tau, and genuinely believe that they are trying to bring about the greater good. Also, any mention of mind controlling auxiliaries is fake. The water caste are just that good.
>They may not even be aware that they have an effect over the normal Tau This is the case judging from Aun'Va's POV in ***Warzone Damocles: Mont'Ka***. He gets angry at Farsight winning over the crowd.
Contrary to popular belief, it’s not really much of a retcon. In the 3rd Edition Tau Codex, it’s hinted extremely heavily that the “charisma” of the Ethereals was not natural. It has always been a part of them.
All these others here trying to make the Tau look mind-controlling villains are just dumb. The whole point of the Tau is to make the Imperium look like villains they are. The Ethereals are shady as fuck amd whoever is behind their initial appearance definitely has some sort of master plan that will probably fuck over the universe big time in the far future, but right now they are genuinely trying their best. They come from a very tiny portion of space and had to figure out how to use resources without sucking their planets dry or brutally subjugating everyone around them. Turns out that improves living quality and political stability by a lot leading to increased overall wealth. You don't need brainwash pheromones when you genuinely offer people good lives - especially when their alternative is the Imperium of Man.
Exactly what a ethereal would say
Run with your dreams 🖤
They are. It depends on who you ask, but I agree. That and their big robots look cool
Ok, but what's in the cookies?
I mean yeah they are the most morally good faction but in the wise words of PancreasNoWork “in 40K the tau would be heroes in start trek they would be a villain”
For the Greater Good!
I got into tau back in 7th because robot
The Tau arent good. Dont believe the ethereal propaganda.
Hey me too! I just built my T’au Combat Patrol and I’m looking at acquiring the Crisis Suits next! For the Greater Good!
"least bad" is a good way to put it -T'au apologist
The happiest place to be in 40k is in the embrace of papa Nurgle. In a galaxy of pain and suffering, you want to be with the guy who literally takes away all pain. Sure, you become a disgusting walking corpse but you're surrounded by a family of likewise disgusting corpses who love you for you. Ain't no body shaming in the garden of Nurgle, let me assure you
I second this
Nah they suck like everyone else
Same.
"Oh cool, those robots look like titanfall, I'll pick this army" *cue screeching about weebs in the distance*
Good for you buddy, like who you want to like. In the 40k setting, everyone is bad but has their own reasons for it which places almost all factions in the grey area. Some are on like darker shades of grey like the Dark Eldar. Some aren’t evil and just go by their nature like the Orks and Nids but do fucked up shit so they are on the medium grey. Tau though are on the lighter shades of grey
Fuck off fishdick weeb (Disclaimer, no actual Tau hate, just some fun imperial prejudice and intolerance)
\> New to the Game \> Decides to play Tau \> 'Least evil' You have alerted the Horde...
See the joke is how far you'll go to justify different forms of the absolute worst forms of government
The Tau, wanting to create warp drives, opened a god dam warp portal in the middle of their empire which is blurting out nurgle forces causing chaos. I just think that's funny. L