My main army is the Tau. I love the look of their units which is why I got them. But their fluff I just find so... offensive. Nothing bad ever happens to them. They are seemingly perfect in every way imaginable. Beat both a massed Tyranid hive fleet and then an Imperial Fleet are no problems at all. Yet in other sources an Imperial fleet like that is a credible threat to a Craftworld and other empires. For the Tau it is a light exercise. While I will continue to play them, I hope in later editions they are either greatly reduced in numbers and victories or out right gone by the Tyranids. That would please me immensely.

Well,the problem is,the Tau can't afford losing.
If the Tau get a major loss in the fluff,they're gone,that's how small their empire is.
As such,it's nearly impossible for them to lose,especially against the nids,that'd be worst case scenario for them,they'd be utterly wiped out.
They've kinda got the ultimate plot armor,they can only lose badly while attacking

We can get a major loss and lose a sphere of expansion, as soon as GW finally remembers the worldwide campaign results and lets Chaos completely overrun Cadia and start storming across the galaxy towards Terra.

On a galactic scale, the Tau Empire is like the city of Des Moines, Iowa compared to the entire North American continent.

The Tau losing even a small part of their ridiculously-tiny empire is a very crushing blow.

The difference in the fluff is the Imperium loses hundreds of worlds almost daily to different foes. They burn entire worlds to keep the Tyranids in check and yet a small Tau fleet can eliminate an entire hive fleet with no loses? The Imperium has one of the largest military forces and the Tau can fight them to a complete standstill.

In the Space Marine codex and Imperial guard they suffer horrendous defeats all the time. Entire fleets get eliminated and billions die. The Tau should have been dealt defeats by now. I would pay for GW to write in catastrophic loses for the Tau. And this is an army that I started with.

Well, yes, that's true. The Tau are presented as somehow having miraculous levels of warfare ability against enemies many hundreds of times their size. Mostly why the Tau still exist is due to deus ex machinas... or, rather, Xenos ex machinas. If it were not for the Tyranid invading, the Damocles Gulf Crusade would have continued and, eventually, they would have been destroyed.

Guerrilla-style warfare is all well and good, but it's slow as feth in defeating an enemy that is determined to destroy you.

There are defeats for the Tau. Damocles Gulf saw the Tau suffer great losses and pushed out of several worlds. Farsight suffers terrible losses against Orks and Chaos in his codex. The Warzone Damocles book apparently includes Shadowsun walking into a trap of the Imperium's making and barely escaping alive.

The thing is that the Tau have been able to avoid final anhilation from these defeats. They then absorb the lessons of what happened, learn from them, and come back for more victories.

 Psienesis wrote:
If it were not for the Tyranid invading, the Damocles Gulf Crusade would have continued and, eventually, they would have been destroyed.

This, I think, reflects a shift I've noticed in the tone of the setting. This is not the pre-Heresy Imperium, storming across the universe wiping out hostile aliens left and right, and yet at some point between 3e and 6e the Imperium has gone from being constantly under attack from a multitude of enemies and barely holding on to what they already had, to a force that was described in the write up of the Damocles book as 'the dominant power of the galaxy.'

(I say at some point between 3e and 6e as I'm less familiar with the tone of the fluff during 4e and 5e. As far as I can tell though this seems to be a shift since 6e.)

The Imperium should not be in a position to wipe out any interstellar power. Not now. Not the crumbling remnants of humanity teetering on the edge of oblivion in the fading light of their dying God-Emperor.

Dominate power of the galaxy doesn't mean it's not crumbling, rotten from the inside out. They have the largest fleets and trillions of troops. Hundreds of thousands of Space Marines. Could still hunt down an alien species near their territory.

What HoskuneAstetic said.

The Imperium *is* the 500-pound gorilla in the room. Against any one, single faction of the array of Xenos and Chaos, the Imperium would bury them. They either out-number or out-dakka any single other faction (including the Necrons, who are less-unified than even the Imperium) and, afforded the opportunity to bring the totality of their military might to bear, the Imperium could simply End any other single faction.

However, the setting being what it is, the Imperium will never, ever have this chance.

Sometimes I wish the setting wasn't so grim dark and actually give humanity a chance there would be no contest.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Sometimes I wish the setting wasn't so grim dark and actually give humanity a chance there would be no contest.

Yeah... but what what'd be the fun of Peacehammer 40k? You could paint Space Marines playing cards and visiting the zoo, since all of the threats to the galaxy have been wiped out.

If you're wanting to do something fun and grimdark with the Tau, maybe the next story advance for them (after the 3rd Expansion) would be, maybe, the theory about them being engineered by the Eldar true- instantly, all Tau become psykers and their society goes completely haywire because of it.

It's rather silly to hate on the Tau for their good track-record considering that this is a Universe that has Necrons in it.

Tau fluff is fine.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
It's rather silly to hate on the Tau for their good track-record considering that this is a Universe that has Necrons in it.

Tau fluff is fine.

Yep. The Fall of Orpheus is the one FW book who's fluff I dislike. Turns the Necrons into an uber-super-duper-awesome we can't lose mega army.

Damocles Gulf Crusade was in many ways the perfect example of how I think 40k fluff should be.

The Imperium could easily crush the Tau empire like a bug, if they could actually secure a moment's peace from the thousands of other threats facing them/annoying alien species nipping at their heels and get their gak together long enough to actually muster a reasonable force. The Tau on the other hand haven't gotten big enough/been around long enough for the rot to set in. They are still growing. Eventually they will stall out too and bad stuff will happen to them. It's not exactly like they're all about peace love and tolerance either... They're basically space North Korea with a bigger defense budget.

 Jinx Magiga wrote:
Well,the problem is,the Tau can't afford losing.
If the Tau get a major loss in the fluff,they're gone,that's how small their empire is.
As such,it's nearly impossible for them to lose,especially against the nids,that'd be worst case scenario for them,they'd be utterly wiped out.
They've kinda got the ultimate plot armor,they can only lose badly while attacking

I disagree. I think that the Tau empire is small compared to others, but they just don't have strength in numbers, but rely on the exceptional skill of the Earth Caste to make the best technologically possible weaponry. The Tau would not be wiped out by just loosing a major battle, I don't think that the space pope would go all in and throw the whole army in (this never happens in the fluff).

Why would Nids be the worst case scenario? Personally, I think that they would be easier. You send some Crisis suits that have Melta/Plas to go and do as much damage as possible to the big guys that aren't flying, and then take Bursttides for the bid flying baddies, and Iontides for the hordes. It wouldn't be easy, but IMO it wouldn't be hard by any means.

Take this post with a grain of salt. I am no Nids expert, just IMO

It's the fact those Tau will win when if that same amount of Tyranids invaded the Imperium they would suffer terrible losses. Lose ancient ships and irreplaceable technology. Probably burn a world or two. Yet the Tau do it with absolutely no loss of ships. I find their lack of defeats to be counter to the grim dark setting of 40k.

The Necrons should pose a credible threat as they are millions upon millions of years older than every other species. Even predating the Chaos Gods before the Empyrean was the realm of Chaos they fought the Old Ones. They are that darkness between suns.

I would also settle for the Tau homeworld to contain a Necron crypt that wakes up and harvests most of the species. That would please me too. I just find their invincible plot armor terrible.

I wouldn't mind if the Tau disappeared for good. >---->

I also have no problem with the Necrons being incredibly tough. I view them as a Borg type. Very hard but can be put down with enough concentrated firepower.

Also, they are MILLIONS of years older than everyone else. That is a crazy long time to be space faring before others have even evolved!

This isn't without historical precedence. Look at Switzerland or the Hussites. Small but fierce little nations that took on odds far greater than they had any right to. Their slow expansion also helps them in that they consolidate stronger in the systems they do take instead of setting up a pre-fab colony and forgetting about the place for a thousand years like the Imperium does.
Don't hate the Tau for being awesome. It's not unrealistic.
Now, the Grey Knights on the other hand, their fluff is just 12 year old...no, 9 year old fan fic level of quality.


Hussites.
http://minimumwagehistorian.com/2011/11/01/hussites-religeous-rebels-with-guns/

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Sometimes I wish the setting wasn't so grim dark and actually give humanity a chance there would be no contest.

Humanity is dead.
The Emperor failed to build his empire and now it crumbles from without and within. The world of 40k is populated by the twitching corpses of the greatest civilisations in the galaxy come to ruin. Frankly it is wonderful that way, I wish it was darker. If it makes you feel better regarding Tau, they are trying to build an empire in a galaxy about to end.

That said looking at some of the timelines of the Imperium it is easily possible they will lose a lot of territory and hold only their key strongpoints before rebounding and retaking all their lost territory. You just have to think in centuries and millennia.

 TheCustomLime wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:
It's rather silly to hate on the Tau for their good track-record considering that this is a Universe that has Necrons in it.

Tau fluff is fine.

Yep. The Fall of Orpheus is the one FW book who's fluff I dislike. Turns the Necrons into an uber-super-duper-awesome we can't lose mega army.

Kind of like their fluff from the 3rd edition codex.

I think that the Imperium can best be compared to the Byzantine Empire. For the early medieval period, it was still a super power, vast armies and areas of land were under it's control, but it stagnated, there was little change in tactics or innovation like with the Catholic Kingdoms of the West and the Muslims in the East. They thought that they were the rightful inheritors of the Roman Empire, that the Empire would always endure, these new Kingdoms mere upstarts and the Seljuk hordes a bunch of savages. But bit by bit, loss after loss, the Empire was chipped away, until eventually it had it's heart tore out by the Turks and collapsed.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
It's the fact those Tau will win when if that same amount of Tyranids invaded the Imperium they would suffer terrible losses. Lose ancient ships and irreplaceable technology. Probably burn a world or two. Yet the Tau do it with absolutely no loss of ships. I find their lack of defeats to be counter to the grim dark setting of 40k.

The Necrons should pose a credible threat as they are millions upon millions of years older than every other species. Even predating the Chaos Gods before the Empyrean was the realm of Chaos they fought the Old Ones. They are that darkness between suns.

I would also settle for the Tau homeworld to contain a Necron crypt that wakes up and harvests most of the species. That would please me too. I just find their invincible plot armor terrible.

Something like the Maynarkh Awakening near the Tau would probably be their worst case scenario.

Fluffwise, I can't recall a single engagement between the Tau and the Necrons, that the Tau won. Granted, there is not a lot of battles between these two.

Necrons are pretty much their worst nightmare. They outclass them in every way. The Sautekh dynasty alone has conquered more worlds than the entire Tau Empire, in 200 years. (I'm pretty sure of this, The Sautekh has 80 tomb worlds and 5 times as many alien worlds, to amount nearly 500 planets under it's command).

If impirium was not fighting 1000+ conflicts at anyone time, vs a miriad of foes. Yes they could flatten the tau with sheer colossal mass of men, ships and machines as well as entire titan legions.

But there spread thin across massive areas, not a concentrated force.

Not to mention the structure of the Imperium works against the collaboration of it's various branches. Worst of all, this is intentional.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
My main army is the Tau. I love the look of their units which is why I got them. But their fluff I just find so... offensive. Nothing bad ever happens to them. They are seemingly perfect in every way imaginable. Beat both a massed Tyranid hive fleet and then an Imperial Fleet are no problems at all. Yet in other sources an Imperial fleet like that is a credible threat to a Craftworld and other empires. For the Tau it is a light exercise. While I will continue to play them, I hope in later editions they are either greatly reduced in numbers and victories or out right gone by the Tyranids. That would please me immensely.

The Dark Eldar found the Tau very vey amusing provding suitable genetic material for experminatation and well fun.............the Tau came off very badly in that encounter (unless its been chnaged in the new Codex)

Jefffar wrote:
Not to mention the structure of the Imperium works against the collaboration of it's various branches. Worst of all, this is intentional.

It's less intentional and more incidental.
You can't have it united under one leader otherwise he'll go bonkers/corrupted and wreak havoc (Bucharis and that other chappie who went mental)
You need it decentralised and you also need everyone to watch each other.
Make no mistake. Chaos is the enemy.
The fact that is makes collaboration difficult is more of an unfortunate side-effect. Something which, ironically enough, is rectified somewhat by the fact the Imperium shares a common faith in the Emperor.

Is their plot armor ever explained why they beat every enemy without practically trying that would give other races pause?

A hive fleet invaded Iyanden, the Eldar are millions of years old with technology far out performing anything of the younger races and the hive fleet all but gutted that craftworld.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Is their plot armor ever explained why they beat every enemy without practically trying that would give other races pause?

A hive fleet invaded Iyanden, the Eldar are millions of years old with technology far out performing anything of the younger races and the hive fleet all but gutted that craftworld.

Actully, the tau had quite a bit of trouble with the tyranids, but managed to beat them because they (they tau) kept swtiching tactics and tech to confuse the tyranids. A few imperial ships also suddenly poped out of the wrap (they should have been there a while ago while the Imperium was fighting tau, but hey) and that helps the tau because it was harder for the 'nids to adapt to two different armies.

The space born battle is won without a single loss of a Tau ship.

Wait.
Really?
The Imperium can't go to the shops without a devastating fleet battle where some battleship heroically sacrifices itself and detonates its warp reactors...

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
The space born battle is won without a single loss of a Tau ship.

With who?

 Sasori wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
The space born battle is won without a single loss of a Tau ship.

With who?

The Tyranids. Under the command of O'Shaserra they engaged the Hive fleet and through some brilliant tactical genius decimated the Hive fleets ability to communicate with each other and picked the rest of with no losses to the Tau fleet.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Is their plot armor ever explained why they beat every enemy without practically trying that would give other races pause?

A hive fleet invaded Iyanden, the Eldar are millions of years old with technology far out performing anything of the younger races and the hive fleet all but gutted that craftworld.

Actully, the tau had quite a bit of trouble with the tyranids, but managed to beat them because they (they tau) kept swtiching tactics and tech to confuse the tyranids. A few imperial ships also suddenly poped out of the wrap (they should have been there a while ago while the Imperium was fighting tau, but hey) and that helps the tau because it was harder for the 'nids to adapt to two different armies.

And they sacrificed their Kroot auxiliaries to do it.

It's for the Greater Good.

The Tau will inherit the ashes once the major players have extinguished themselves. Then only the Necrons and Orks will be able to stand against them.

The Tau don't need plot armor. Have you played against them on the table?

 Commander_Farsight wrote:

 Jinx Magiga wrote:
Well,the problem is,the Tau can't afford losing.
If the Tau get a major loss in the fluff,they're gone,that's how small their empire is.
As such,it's nearly impossible for them to lose,especially against the nids,that'd be worst case scenario for them,they'd be utterly wiped out.
They've kinda got the ultimate plot armor,they can only lose badly while attacking

I disagree. I think that the Tau empire is small compared to others, but they just don't have strength in numbers, but rely on the exceptional skill of the Earth Caste to make the best technologically possible weaponry. The Tau would not be wiped out by just loosing a major battle, I don't think that the space pope would go all in and throw the whole army in (this never happens in the fluff).

Why would Nids be the worst case scenario? Personally, I think that they would be easier. You send some Crisis suits that have Melta/Plas to go and do as much damage as possible to the big guys that aren't flying, and then take Bursttides for the bid flying baddies, and Iontides for the hordes. It wouldn't be easy, but IMO it wouldn't be hard by any means.

Take this post with a grain of salt. I am no Nids expert, just IMO

Seeing as you don't know the nid fluff,i'll make a short explanation to you why that won't work,the nids out adapt those,yes,those crisis suits with Melta/Plasma may destroy the first wave of Synapse Creatures (should they get past the innumerable waves of gaunt on the ground or gargoyles in the sky,but the second wave will have adapted,their hides will be made out of different materials.
With those hides the nids could then take Melta/Plasma head on and their guard(Note- Hive Tyrants aren't just accompanied by tyrant guards,if necessary they can be accompanied by anything from rippers to dozens of carnifexes) would have been changed so that they could easily slay their previous assaillants.
In fact,during the last battle between Tau and Tyranids,their gaunts adapted to the point were Pulse weaponry didn't affect them,the only reason the Tau were able to hold them off was because their world still had older weaponry to push the waves that adapted back,that didn't last long though because the nids than adapted to those weapons aswell.

We even have records of Kroot and Hormagaunts fighting in the Jungles of that world,the first wave got tangled up in the plants and were easily slain by the Kroot,the second wave adapted so that they got through the thick jungle effortlessly,however they had adapted slightly too far and their combat abilities no longer were good enough to best the Kroot.
The third wave however made it through the jungle and slaughtered the Kroot with minimal losses,the only reason those were then driven back was because their limber bodies used to navigate through the jungle couldn't face the Pulse weaponry of the Tau,however,with the Kroot wiped out,they could focus completely on the Tau weaponry.

The nids however,because they were adapting so quickly (a mistake from that swarm,which as known from nid fluff,won't happen again) expended biomass at an incredibly fast rate,which,while doable for the swarms,left them without the ability to quickly replace Synapse Creatures,once the Tau realised that,they targeted those and managed to drive the swarm back.
Even then however,they only won because Imperials arrived and took out the remainder of the swarm. (which caused the Imperials to get arrogant,seeing as they managed to destroy a foe that the tau had struggled so hard to defeat,while in reality they took out the remainder of a greatly weakened swarm,later causing the Imperium to underestimate the Tau,but that is a story for another time)

That,however won't work again,the Tyranids have learned and while the Imperium might strike a deal because they don't want to use their thinly-spread resources to engage in a full blown conflict,the Nids would drown the Tau in their own blood

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
It's the fact those Tau will win when if that same amount of Tyranids invaded the Imperium they would suffer terrible losses. Lose ancient ships and irreplaceable technology. Probably burn a world or two.

And there is part of the problem with the IOM. Most of their tech is irreplaceable. Attrition will eventually grind them down. With the religious veneration of technology, things will not get better for the IOM. This is part of why I did not chose them for my first army.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Yet the Tau do it with absolutely no loss of ships. I find their lack of defeats to be counter to the grim dark setting of 40k.

And I think this ray of light in the darkness is part of what I like about the Tau. As someone just getting started in 40K (and yet to play my first battle) I really like that there is someone out there that is not all doom and gloom. The Tau have technology that keeps advancing, they don't wipe out everyone they come across, and the server a Greater Good (technically.) I nice change from pretty much everyone else. Plus they look so cool. I actually would love to see them become better allies with the IOM.

I can't wait to actually get them on the table.

Thanks,
Duncan

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Is their plot armor ever explained why they beat every enemy without practically trying that would give other races pause?

A hive fleet invaded Iyanden, the Eldar are millions of years old with technology far out performing anything of the younger races and the hive fleet all but gutted that craftworld.

Hive fleet Kraken however,was far stronger than the hive fleet that faced the Tau,both in numbers and tactics,moreso however,the Shadow in the Warp was what made it hard for the Eldar.
Being the highly psychic race that they are,the shadow hit them harder than any imperial attack could,making them almost unable to use their psychic powers.

One thing that should also be noted is that a large part of the Iyanden fleet left Iyanden along Prince Yriel,once Yriel returned however,the Tyranid Fleet was quickly destroyed.
The Previous nid codex also said this(which is either gone from the current one or i can't find it): "If the Kraken had struck further to the south,it would surely have wiped the fledgeling Tau Empire out of existence."

The tau also chemically castrate (or at least in other editions) those that join their Empire. Nor can an auxiliary ever attain a high rank, so much for the Greater Good and everyone working together. They are almost more fascist species in the galaxy, again looking through 6e codex I see their darker elements have been removed, which further distances them from the rest of the grim darkness of the 41st millennium.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
The tau also chemically castrate (or at least in other editions) those that join their Empire. Nor can an auxiliary ever attain a high rank, so much for the Greater Good and everyone working together. They are almost more fascist species in the galaxy, again looking through 6e codex I see their darker elements have been removed, which further distances them from the rest of the grim darkness of the 41st millennium.

First one, not true. The only evidence of that is the DOW dark crusade, which is dubious at best. Auxiliaries can achieve a high rank, it's just that the tau are the "first among equals" That means that they will still receive respect ect, it's just that two people of equal rank, and one is a tau, than the tau is higher.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
It's the fact those Tau will win when if that same amount of Tyranids invaded the Imperium they would suffer terrible losses. Lose ancient ships and irreplaceable technology. Probably burn a world or two. Yet the Tau do it with absolutely no loss of ships. I find their lack of defeats to be counter to the grim dark setting of 40k.

This is literally the point of the Tau fluff. They aren't grimdark. They contrast the current imperium and remind us of the imperium from the crusades.

Yep, the tau are a foil to the rest of the races.

I suppose you've never heard of the harvesting of Ka'mais(sp?)?

The Tyranids were hours away from destroying Ka'mais. Then, the Necron Tomb World on Ka'mais' moon awakened, and proceeded to rout the Tyranids.

Ka'mais set up an elaborate and bombastic welcoming party for their rescuers before the Necrons made planetfall.

The Necrons proceeded to kill every single Tau on Ka'mais.

And there is a story in the DE codex as well about an entire Tau world getting 'a cultural exchange' with the Dark Eldar.
The Dark Eldar pull some amusing tricks on the Tau before that though. They also defeated the Tyranids attacking the Tau.
http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/War_of_Dark_Revelations

I love it when the Tau naivety smacks them in the face. They have so much to learn about the galaxy. It's a cold scary place out there...

 dementedwombat wrote:
I love it when the Tau naivety smacks them in the face. They have so much to learn about the galaxy. It's a cold scary place out there...

I only hope when that naivety goes they get grimdark as well.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
The tau also chemically castrate (or at least in other editions) those that join their Empire. Nor can an auxiliary ever attain a high rank, so much for the Greater Good and everyone working together. They are almost more fascist species in the galaxy, again looking through 6e codex I see their darker elements have been removed, which further distances them from the rest of the grim darkness of the 41st millennium.

First one, not true. The only evidence of that is the DOW dark crusade, which is dubious at best. Auxiliaries can achieve a high rank, it's just that the tau are the "first among equals" That means that they will still receive respect ect, it's just that two people of equal rank, and one is a tau, than the tau is higher.

You may not like it but the first one is true as Dow is cannon, just not that ending, it just shows the lengths the tau are willing to go to if they feel it's the greater good

40K has no canon.

It has a fethload of cannons, though. There's even a giant Tau moon-cannon in Soulstorm.

When one talks about the "canon" ending of a video game, they're talking about what the designers of the game have written for their notes on that game and the sequel.

Case in point: Knights of the Old Republic: although you can make Revan either gender and choose to be Light-side, Dark-side or somewhere in the middle, the "canon" that surrounds that character dictates that he is male, is a reformed Light-side Jedi, saves Bastila, and destroys his former ally, Darth Malak.

Knights of the Old Republic 2: Canonically, the Jedi Exile is female, formerly Revan's lover, a Balanced-leaning-towards-Light-Side Jedi, and kills all three Sith Lords... despite the fact that you can choose to play the Exile as a male, and can reference Revan being male or female in certain conversations.

I never knew that about KOTOR...
Oddly enough I played Revan as male but the exile as female anyway...

 Psienesis wrote:
40K has no canon.

It has a fethload of cannons, though. There's even a giant Tau moon-cannon in Soulstorm.

DERE STILL AIN'T ENUFF DAKKA!

There is *never* enough Dakka!
Never...

I thought DoW's Tau ending was just speculation by a human narrator, anyways, wasn't it?

If it had been speculation by a Tau narrator, then we wouldn't be able to understand what-the-feth s/he was saying.

 Jinx Magiga wrote:

 Commander_Farsight wrote:

 Jinx Magiga wrote:
Well,the problem is,the Tau can't afford losing.
If the Tau get a major loss in the fluff,they're gone,that's how small their empire is.
As such,it's nearly impossible for them to lose,especially against the nids,that'd be worst case scenario for them,they'd be utterly wiped out.
They've kinda got the ultimate plot armor,they can only lose badly while attacking

I disagree. I think that the Tau empire is small compared to others, but they just don't have strength in numbers, but rely on the exceptional skill of the Earth Caste to make the best technologically possible weaponry. The Tau would not be wiped out by just loosing a major battle, I don't think that the space pope would go all in and throw the whole army in (this never happens in the fluff).

Why would Nids be the worst case scenario? Personally, I think that they would be easier. You send some Crisis suits that have Melta/Plas to go and do as much damage as possible to the big guys that aren't flying, and then take Bursttides for the bid flying baddies, and Iontides for the hordes. It wouldn't be easy, but IMO it wouldn't be hard by any means.

Take this post with a grain of salt. I am no Nids expert, just IMO

Seeing as you don't know the nid fluff,i'll make a short explanation to you why that won't work,the nids out adapt those,yes,those crisis suits with Melta/Plasma may destroy the first wave of Synapse Creatures (should they get past the innumerable waves of gaunt on the ground or gargoyles in the sky,but the second wave will have adapted,their hides will be made out of different materials.
With those hides the nids could then take Melta/Plasma head on and their guard(Note- Hive Tyrants aren't just accompanied by tyrant guards,if necessary they can be accompanied by anything from rippers to dozens of carnifexes) would have been changed so that they could easily slay their previous assaillants.
In fact,during the last battle between Tau and Tyranids,their gaunts adapted to the point were Pulse weaponry didn't affect them,the only reason the Tau were able to hold them off was because their world still had older weaponry to push the waves that adapted back,that didn't last long though because the nids than adapted to those weapons aswell.

We even have records of Kroot and Hormagaunts fighting in the Jungles of that world,the first wave got tangled up in the plants and were easily slain by the Kroot,the second wave adapted so that they got through the thick jungle effortlessly,however they had adapted slightly too far and their combat abilities no longer were good enough to best the Kroot.
The third wave however made it through the jungle and slaughtered the Kroot with minimal losses,the only reason those were then driven back was because their limber bodies used to navigate through the jungle couldn't face the Pulse weaponry of the Tau,however,with the Kroot wiped out,they could focus completely on the Tau weaponry.

The nids however,because they were adapting so quickly (a mistake from that swarm,which as known from nid fluff,won't happen again) expended biomass at an incredibly fast rate,which,while doable for the swarms,left them without the ability to quickly replace Synapse Creatures,once the Tau realised that,they targeted those and managed to drive the swarm back.
Even then however,they only won because Imperials arrived and took out the remainder of the swarm. (which caused the Imperials to get arrogant,seeing as they managed to destroy a foe that the tau had struggled so hard to defeat,while in reality they took out the remainder of a greatly weakened swarm,later causing the Imperium to underestimate the Tau,but that is a story for another time)

That,however won't work again,the Tyranids have learned and while the Imperium might strike a deal because they don't want to use their thinly-spread resources to engage in a full blown conflict,the Nids would drown the Tau in their own blood

However you are mixing up 2 different planets. The one you are discussing in the beginning of your post ends when the Tau pull out. Except for a single cadre who maganes to force the rest of the fleet to pull out. The Tau fleet then chases the Tyranids and is ambushed. The planet is little better then a giant rock.

When the IG and Tau team up is when the two forces are fighting and the Tyranids show up. By that time the Hive Fleet was so battered that the Imperial commander (wrongly) desided that the Tau were weak to be threateneed by such a small fleet.

The Tau appear to be a case however that the Tyranids feel is not worth the trouble. Rather then being unable to destroy them.

 Formosa wrote:


You may not like it but the first one is true as Dow is cannon, just not that ending, it just shows the lengths the tau are willing to go to if they feel it's the greater good

Eh no. The canon ending was the blood ravens won. Everyone else was killed.

The tau win was an 'alternative, non canon' ending from a third party, not gw.

In any case regarding the tau sad their great victories: what would be a major engagement for the tau, or a huge victory, would, if it was fought by the imperium, barely rate as a paragraph in the three thousand page tome 'battles of the eastern fringe, volume xlvii'.

Scale is the big thing. That hive fleet they bet without losing a ship? It might have been three ships for all we know. No doubt it was a crushing victory, for the tau, but for everyone else? Nothing major. So far all the tau have faced were isolated splinter fleets. The imperium deals with hundreds of these. A single character in the necrons codex controls more worlds (500 iirc) than the entire tau empire (130 at the time of the third sphere, let's say 150-200 now. Probably 150 - they lost dozens of worlds in the deist campaign).

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Is their plot armor ever explained why they beat every enemy without practically trying that would give other races pause?

A hive fleet invaded Iyanden, the Eldar are millions of years old with technology far out performing anything of the younger races and the hive fleet all but gutted that craftworld.

The explanation is that Tau learn a lot quicker than humans or Eldar. Everything a Tau scientist or engineer does, he does in a lifespan of 50 years. Meanwhile, humans who live twice that long or Eldar who literally live forever still haven't made a reliable, easy-to-use, mass-producible, powerful infantry weapon for their armies.

Tau are used to thinking outside of the box. Humans aren't. Eldar may not be capable of doing so. If they were, the galaxy would be a lot different by now.

Since the Eldar have been a dying race for over ten thousand years, maybe the story should continue with them actually dying off.

When you lived for 60million years, 10k is a mere blink in races eyes

The dark eldar moment, they have a lot to learn about the galexey and its inhabitants.

 EmpNortonII wrote:

The explanation is that Tau learn a lot quicker than humans or Eldar. Everything a Tau scientist or engineer does, he does in a lifespan of 50 years. Meanwhile, humans who live twice that long or Eldar who literally live forever still haven't made a reliable, easy-to-use, mass-producible, powerful infantry weapon for their armies.

Tau are used to thinking outside of the box. Humans aren't. Eldar may not be capable of doing so. If they were, the galaxy would be a lot different by now.

Actually, the advantage of the Tau is their tight cooperation and not their learning rate. No Tau scientist or engineer will develop anything in his lifetime, he will only add something to an already existing project or he will lay the groundwork for a new thing but he probably won't see his idea going into the development phase. It is like building a house: the scientists of the longer living races would do it alone, because they have time; the Tau, on the other hand, would build it piece-by-peace through several (quickly changing) generations. This method has the advantage of being highly diversified as each generation has something new to add into the original concept so obstacles in the development won't stand for very long.

It isn't that the Tau is better at thinking outside of the box. But each time a scientist dies with his unfinished project, a new scientist will bring a new box.

 Formosa wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
The tau also chemically castrate (or at least in other editions) those that join their Empire. Nor can an auxiliary ever attain a high rank, so much for the Greater Good and everyone working together. They are almost more fascist species in the galaxy, again looking through 6e codex I see their darker elements have been removed, which further distances them from the rest of the grim darkness of the 41st millennium.

First one, not true. The only evidence of that is the DOW dark crusade, which is dubious at best. Auxiliaries can achieve a high rank, it's just that the tau are the "first among equals" That means that they will still receive respect ect, it's just that two people of equal rank, and one is a tau, than the tau is higher.

You may not like it but the first one is true as Dow is cannon, just not that ending, it just shows the lengths the tau are willing to go to if they feel it's the greater good

As I said, dubious canon. These are from the same people who made khorn allied sorcerers. Is that canon, I think not. The tau ending isn't even canon because it was not the official ending. IIRC the SM won (of course ). From the canon we know that the tau not only make planets they conquer "paradises of efficiency" with cleaner air and water, we know that tau don't directly rule the planets, but they are still ruled by humans, it's just that those humans answer to the tau empire instead of the IOM.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AtoMaki wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:

The explanation is that Tau learn a lot quicker than humans or Eldar. Everything a Tau scientist or engineer does, he does in a lifespan of 50 years. Meanwhile, humans who live twice that long or Eldar who literally live forever still haven't made a reliable, easy-to-use, mass-producible, powerful infantry weapon for their armies.

Tau are used to thinking outside of the box. Humans aren't. Eldar may not be capable of doing so. If they were, the galaxy would be a lot different by now.

Actually, the advantage of the Tau is their tight cooperation and not their learning rate. No Tau scientist or engineer will develop anything in his lifetime, he will only add something to an already existing project or he will lay the groundwork for a new thing but he probably won't see his idea going into the development phase. It is like building a house: the scientists of the longer living races would do it alone, because they have time; the Tau, on the other hand, would build it piece-by-peace through several (quickly changing) generations. This method has the advantage of being highly diversified as each generation has something new to add into the original concept so obstacles in the development won't stand for very long.

It isn't that the Tau is better at thinking outside of the box. But each time a scientist dies with his unfinished project, a new scientist will bring a new box.

Even if they only live 40 years (which is complete nonsense BTW, considering they have been shown to live to 80, and over if we are talking about ethereals) that's still plenty of time to finish a project, especially since you would have a entire team working on it.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
From the canon we know that the tau not only make planets they conquer "paradises of efficiency" with cleaner air and water, we know that tau don't directly rule the planets, but they are still ruled by humans, it's just that those humans answer to the tau empire instead of the IOM.

Source?

Tau rule the planets they own without a doubt.
"Paradieses" are just thier NK style propaganda.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

Even if they only live 40 years (which is complete nonsense BTW, considering they have been shown to live to 80, and over if we are talking about ethereals) that's still plenty of time to finish a project, especially since you would have a entire team working on it.

No, the time the Tau got is pretty consistantly said to be less than other races.
They put their "heros" into a freezer to keep em around. Etherals live longer than lesser Tau. Since we don't know who created them it is impossible to know if their life expectancy isn't altered on purpose.

 1hadhq wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
From the canon we know that the tau not only make planets they conquer "paradises of efficiency" with cleaner air and water, we know that tau don't directly rule the planets, but they are still ruled by humans, it's just that those humans answer to the tau empire instead of the IOM.

Source?

Tau rule the planets they own without a doubt.
"Paradieses" are just thier NK style propaganda.

Tau codex. If that's not canon, I don't know what is.

 1hadhq wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

Even if they only live 40 years (which is complete nonsense BTW, considering they have been shown to live to 80, and over if we are talking about ethereals) that's still plenty of time to finish a project, especially since you would have a entire team working on it.

No, the time the Tau got is pretty consistantly said to be less than other races.
They put their "heros" into a freezer to keep em around. Etherals live longer than lesser Tau. Since we don't know who created them it is impossible to know if their life expectancy isn't altered on purpose.

I have seen only one time this has been said, an old WD. Puretide lived until 80, and they didn't have stasis back then. Now that is an extreme case (like a human living until 120), but that means that tau can probably live between 50-70 years. Now I could be wrong, but they are also mentioan in an old tau codex hat they sleep a lot less and "maintain their youthful vigor" throughout their life.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Even if they only live 40 years (which is complete nonsense BTW, considering they have been shown to live to 80, and over if we are talking about ethereals) that's still plenty of time to finish a project, especially since you would have a entire team working on it.

Well, they can't even get Shadowsun's super-stealth suit right and they are on it for something like 25+ years.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 1hadhq wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
From the canon we know that the tau not only make planets they conquer "paradises of efficiency" with cleaner air and water, we know that tau don't directly rule the planets, but they are still ruled by humans, it's just that those humans answer to the tau empire instead of the IOM.

Source?

Tau rule the planets they own without a doubt.
"Paradieses" are just thier NK style propaganda.

Tau codex. If that's not canon, I don't know what is.

There is no canon in 40k. Only legends, rumours, propaganda and half-myths.

True, but I like debates .


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AtoMaki wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Even if they only live 40 years (which is complete nonsense BTW, considering they have been shown to live to 80, and over if we are talking about ethereals) that's still plenty of time to finish a project, especially since you would have a entire team working on it.

Well, they can't even get Shadowsun's super-stealth suit right and they are on it for something like 25+ years.

Huh?

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
True, but I like debates .


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AtoMaki wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:
Even if they only live 40 years (which is complete nonsense BTW, considering they have been shown to live to 80, and over if we are talking about ethereals) that's still plenty of time to finish a project, especially since you would have a entire team working on it.

Well, they can't even get Shadowsun's super-stealth suit right and they are on it for something like 25+ years.

Huh?

They gave Shadowsun her experimental stealth suit shorty after she was waken from cryostatis. And that happened 25 years ago (in 975.M41, on the onset of the Confederation War), and since they gave her a full, working suit, they had probably worked on it for some time.

Also more idiocy... Longstrike taking out a Warhound titan with a railgun? Really now?

Least he,s not winning one on one fights with a emparor class dodging plasma bursts that could melt a titan in two, as Vulcan mega bolters tear the ground apart behind him.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Also more idiocy... Longstrike taking out a Warhound titan with a railgun? Really now?

This is somehow more ridiculous than a warboss on a god-damn bike one-shotting a much larger titan?

In the words of the codex "a headshot on a mighty warhound titan" and he apparently took out entire advancing columns of imperial armor. But shockingly enough other Tau actually died in this blurb of fluff.

Not that GW would ever advance the story but I get the feeling the Tau are meant to be the race next to take up the mantle of owners of the Galaxy, they are just starting out but as humanity and the other xenos races fall the Tau will just keep advancing.

Remember the Imperium is in it's dying days, relying on millenia old tech they can no longer repair to keep going, Tau are young and improving all the time, imagine their suits/weapons etc in another 1000 years...

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Formosa wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
The tau also chemically castrate (or at least in other editions) those that join their Empire. Nor can an auxiliary ever attain a high rank, so much for the Greater Good and everyone working together. They are almost more fascist species in the galaxy, again looking through 6e codex I see their darker elements have been removed, which further distances them from the rest of the grim darkness of the 41st millennium.

First one, not true. The only evidence of that is the DOW dark crusade, which is dubious at best. Auxiliaries can achieve a high rank, it's just that the tau are the "first among equals" That means that they will still receive respect ect, it's just that two people of equal rank, and one is a tau, than the tau is higher.

You may not like it but the first one is true as Dow is cannon, just not that ending, it just shows the lengths the tau are willing to go to if they feel it's the greater good

As I said, dubious canon. These are from the same people who made khorn allied sorcerers. Is that canon, I think not. The tau ending isn't even canon because it was not the official ending. IIRC the SM won (of course ). From the canon we know that the tau not only make planets they conquer "paradises of efficiency" with cleaner air and water, we know that tau don't directly rule the planets, but they are still ruled by humans, it's just that those humans answer to the tau empire instead of the IOM.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 AtoMaki wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:

The explanation is that Tau learn a lot quicker than humans or Eldar. Everything a Tau scientist or engineer does, he does in a lifespan of 50 years. Meanwhile, humans who live twice that long or Eldar who literally live forever still haven't made a reliable, easy-to-use, mass-producible, powerful infantry weapon for their armies.

Tau are used to thinking outside of the box. Humans aren't. Eldar may not be capable of doing so. If they were, the galaxy would be a lot different by now.

Actually, the advantage of the Tau is their tight cooperation and not their learning rate. No Tau scientist or engineer will develop anything in his lifetime, he will only add something to an already existing project or he will lay the groundwork for a new thing but he probably won't see his idea going into the development phase. It is like building a house: the scientists of the longer living races would do it alone, because they have time; the Tau, on the other hand, would build it piece-by-peace through several (quickly changing) generations. This method has the advantage of being highly diversified as each generation has something new to add into the original concept so obstacles in the development won't stand for very long.

It isn't that the Tau is better at thinking outside of the box. But each time a scientist dies with his unfinished project, a new scientist will bring a new box.

Even if they only live 40 years (which is complete nonsense BTW, considering they have been shown to live to 80, and over if we are talking about ethereals) that's still plenty of time to finish a project, especially since you would have a entire team working on it.

You know khorne affiliated sorcerers exist right? That's something that I should put in the fluff misconceptions thread, khorne sorcerers do exist, khorne hates sorcery and magic, but cares not from where the blood flows.

There are a myriad ways the Imperium could still survive just as much as it could die. But we've been at 999.M41 for years and that is not going to change any time soon.

As for the Ork statement it is rather stupid about such things as well. But there is no consistency in the fluff and writers just do what they want. Which is detrimental to the setting as well. Back flipping terminators and other non-sense. But for all of that the other sides still lose, and lose a lot. No major losses or defeats for the perfect Tau empire. Riptides able to kill multiple baneblades without damage. Able to jump over the walls of a Hive-City. They should really stop writing the Tau as a masturbatory fan-fiction.

 throwoff wrote:
Not that GW would ever advance the story but I get the feeling the Tau are meant to be the race next to take up the mantle of owners of the Galaxy, they are just starting out but as humanity and the other xenos races fall the Tau will just keep advancing.

Remember the Imperium is in it's dying days, relying on millenia old tech they can no longer repair to keep going, Tau are young and improving all the time, imagine their suits/weapons etc in another 1000 years...

Imagine the 1000 Regiments that were just mobilized per Codex Astra Militarum to end the xeno menace.
Suits? They better wear their best for their funeral.

I think should that situation arise the Ethereals would let slip another one of their powers (it is clear they are far more potent than the Tau citizens realise) and before you know it an X208 suit standing the size of a battleship and armed with a pulse mega cannon able to destroy a small star system would grace the battlefield

Now, I have this thing with the Tau. If you want to avoid what is possibly a contentious post - please skip this one.


Many of the original factions and ideas in the 40K universe were based on a series of comics from the 2000AD series. The original game designers were comic book readers and Bryan Ansell came up with the skirmish game 'Laser Burn' (the rule set) with the 40K universe and fluff being built up around it using the awesome ideas being churned out at the time by those chaps at 2000AD.

The Inquisition, the Space marines, Chaos and filthy xenos, they all fit the setting in what was a grim, miserable dystopian future which was a bit OTT. But it was this OTT theme that gave the game its charm.


Enter the Tau.

The Tau were a new addition which lacked the heritage of the previous races. In short they are serious and based on a serious concept (That of an Orwellian dystopian society). For many players though - particularly younger ones, the nuances of this are lost and so they just appear to be super-awesome good guys.

The Tau appeal to those who like Japanese artwork, but more than that, they appeal to those neurotic players who must have everything *just so*. I don't know how to explain this succinctly so I will try with the following:

Players who like to be the good guy - the hero
Players who MUST have everything perfectly identical and operating in even numbers.
Players who want to be the technological best and newest, because they want to be the best in every aspect (with regard to power and intelligence - superiority from a distance, don't even let them get close, bit of a playground mentality there for our fledgeling gamer)

Now, I say this because I see many of the gamers are of that mentility, and it works for them. Heck, I WAS one of them - I used to have to have EVERYTHING perfectly lined up, painted identically and in even ranks and files. If one was to die and take the squad to an uneven number, I would feel uncomfortable and not be happy until another died to make the squad even again - but then I would be disappointed that any had died at all. I see many Tau players now and they are much the same. Compare that to an Ork player where individuality is the golden mean, where everything is random and ramshackle and random is the flavour and you realise that the Tau cannot be allowed to lose - as that is one of the aspects that make them popular for many gamers.


As for me now, it's all about Chaos. The moment I started mis-matching my socks was the day I learned to embrace other armies.

1. Herosim is subjective. One persons hero is another persons villain.

2. Makes no sense. At all. Including the last paragraph.

3. Their technology is new, not the best. For perfect technology look at the Eldar and the Necrons. Eldar reached a point where they have cornucopia technology, able to terraform worlds and other wonders. Necrons are so advanced their technology appears like magic.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Is their plot armor ever explained why they beat every enemy without practically trying that would give other races pause?

A hive fleet invaded Iyanden, the Eldar are millions of years old with technology far out performing anything of the younger races and the hive fleet all but gutted that craftworld.

Iyanden was hit with at least a third to a half of hive fleet Kraken, a force so huge that even with Eldar FTL there was no way to get Iyanden out of the way of the fleet or it's net of warp shadowing by the time Kraken's target was determined.

Gorgon is about the size of a medium-large tendril of Kraken or Leviathan.

Had the Tau faced the Tyranids who attacked Iyanden the Zone of silence would be much bigger.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Void__Dragon wrote:
I suppose you've never heard of the harvesting of Ka'mais(sp?)?

The Tyranids were hours away from destroying Ka'mais. Then, the Necron Tomb World on Ka'mais' moon awakened, and proceeded to rout the Tyranids.

Ka'mais set up an elaborate and bombastic welcoming party for their rescuers before the Necrons made planetfall.

The Necrons proceeded to kill every single Tau on Ka'mais.

The best part is that the Necrons let the party go on for a few days as per the timeline before deciding to kill everyone.

Epic

Trolling.

 BlaxicanX wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Also more idiocy... Longstrike taking out a Warhound titan with a railgun? Really now?

This is somehow more ridiculous than a warboss on a god-damn bike one-shotting a much larger titan?

That, and rules wise, he could do it if it's void sheilds were down. Rail guns are freakishly powerful, in the fluff and in the rules. A railgun could definitly take down a small titain such as a warhound if it's sheilds were down.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 BlaxicanX wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Also more idiocy... Longstrike taking out a Warhound titan with a railgun? Really now?

This is somehow more ridiculous than a warboss on a god-damn bike one-shotting a much larger titan?

That, and rules wise, he could do it if it's void sheilds were down. Rail guns are freakishly powerful, in the fluff and in the rules. A railgun could definitly take down a small titain such as a warhound if it's sheilds were down.

Yeah I've seen rail guns take down titans before, so yeah it's doable.

Players who MUST have everything perfectly identical and operating in even numbers.
Players who want to be the technological best and newest, because they want to be the best in every aspect (with regard to power and intelligence - superiority from a distance, don't even let them get close, bit of a playground mentality there for our fledgeling gamer)

Back in the day, Chaos Armies had to have their troops appearing in numbers determined by the Sacred Number of their God.

So, if you were playing a Slaaneshi army, Hir number being 6, all of your units were in multiples of 6. Nurgle was 5, Khorne 8 and Tzeentch 7.

Of course, in those days, if you allied Khorne and Slaanesh, or Tzeentch and Nurgle, your army would fall upon itself in an attempt to slaughter the other half.

I will be completely honest here. I was originally attracted to Tau back at the end of 3rd edition for one reason and one reason only. They had the biggest guns.

Everything else about them I've grown to like in the ~12 years that they have been my only army. In fact I'm guessing certain aspects of my personality have actually been reinforced because of all the time I spent understanding Tau fluff throughout grade school and middle school.

Despite all the other things I have grown to like about them, I still continue to play Tau for one reason and one reason only. They still have the biggest guns.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Sometimes I wish the setting wasn't so grim dark and actually give humanity a chance there would be no contest.

I feel this mindset is misguided. As bad as the situation may seem for humans, their situation can change faster than any other faction. Think about some possibilities.

The obvious--- Return of one or more Primarchs. The Lion is the most likely, then probably the Khan and the Wolf. Think about what a game changer that is. Huge. Could happen at any time.

Starchild cycle is legit, and Cypher accomplishes it- reincarnating the emperor while possibly destroying or badly wounding the Chaos gods.

Panacea recovered from the Dark Eldar. Huge.

Think about the impact just a single, negligble seeming intact STC discovery can have. Say for a type of high-protien grain that can grow in 10% worse conditions than the one they currently have. Or a water purifier that is 1% more efficient. Across the economies of scale of the entire Imperium the difference something small like that can make are huge.

SM boarding party on a space hulk recovers a fully functioning STC from a colony ship. There are probably actions like this taken by random marine chapters nearly every week. Eventually one of them is very likely to turn up a working STC or Iron Man or some type of schematic that changes everything.

Abaddon gets dropped by assassins. Yneed counters She Who Thirsts, permanently, a new Lord Solar is born etc etc etc

Sure Humanity is taking a beating, but in one day, everything could change. Humanity is also much more durable than some of the other factions, since there aren't obvious points of weakness, like zapping the space pope or eviscerating Abaddon or what have you.

 dementedwombat wrote:
I will be completely honest here. I was originally attracted to Tau back at the end of 3rd edition for one reason and one reason only. They had the biggest guns.

Everything else about them I've grown to like in the ~12 years that they have been my only army. In fact I'm guessing certain aspects of my personality have actually been reinforced because of all the time I spent understanding Tau fluff throughout grade school and middle school.

Despite all the other things I have grown to like about them, I still continue to play Tau for one reason and one reason only. They still have the biggest guns.

Escalation with Forge World IOM super units says hello.

 Silverthorne wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Sometimes I wish the setting wasn't so grim dark and actually give humanity a chance there would be no contest.

I feel this mindset is misguided. As bad as the situation may seem for humans, their situation can change faster than any other faction. Think about some possibilities.

The obvious--- Return of one or more Primarchs. The Lion is the most likely, then probably the Khan and the Wolf. Think about what a game changer that is. Huge. Could happen at any time.

Starchild cycle is legit, and Cypher accomplishes it- reincarnating the emperor while possibly destroying or badly wounding the Chaos gods.

Panacea recovered from the Dark Eldar. Huge.

Think about the impact just a single, negligble seeming intact STC discovery can have. Say for a type of high-protien grain that can grow in 10% worse conditions than the one they currently have. Or a water purifier that is 1% more efficient. Across the economies of scale of the entire Imperium the difference something small like that can make are huge.

SM boarding party on a space hulk recovers a fully functioning STC from a colony ship. There are probably actions like this taken by random marine chapters nearly every week. Eventually one of them is very likely to turn up a working STC or Iron Man or some type of schematic that changes everything.

Abaddon gets dropped by assassins. Yneed counters She Who Thirsts, permanently, a new Lord Solar is born etc etc etc

Sure Humanity is taking a beating, but in one day, everything could change. Humanity is also much more durable than some of the other factions, since there aren't obvious points of weakness, like zapping the space pope or eviscerating Abaddon or what have you.

True, nicely put, yes in present form its so dark goths could call it new black however one or two of those and humanity may just suvive , a primarch back would send morale up, n add a genius officer.

Stc full data base = hey guys can you say dark age of tech.

Things are grim but as gw refuse to advance, humanity is locked into said doom.

jhe90 wrote:

 Silverthorne wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Sometimes I wish the setting wasn't so grim dark and actually give humanity a chance there would be no contest.

I feel this mindset is misguided. As bad as the situation may seem for humans, their situation can change faster than any other faction. Think about some possibilities.

The obvious--- Return of one or more Primarchs. The Lion is the most likely, then probably the Khan and the Wolf. Think about what a game changer that is. Huge. Could happen at any time.

Starchild cycle is legit, and Cypher accomplishes it- reincarnating the emperor while possibly destroying or badly wounding the Chaos gods.

Panacea recovered from the Dark Eldar. Huge.

Think about the impact just a single, negligble seeming intact STC discovery can have. Say for a type of high-protien grain that can grow in 10% worse conditions than the one they currently have. Or a water purifier that is 1% more efficient. Across the economies of scale of the entire Imperium the difference something small like that can make are huge.

SM boarding party on a space hulk recovers a fully functioning STC from a colony ship. There are probably actions like this taken by random marine chapters nearly every week. Eventually one of them is very likely to turn up a working STC or Iron Man or some type of schematic that changes everything.

Abaddon gets dropped by assassins. Yneed counters She Who Thirsts, permanently, a new Lord Solar is born etc etc etc

Sure Humanity is taking a beating, but in one day, everything could change. Humanity is also much more durable than some of the other factions, since there aren't obvious points of weakness, like zapping the space pope or eviscerating Abaddon or what have you.

True, nicely put, yes in present form its so dark goths could call it new black however one or two of those and humanity may just suvive , a primarch back would send morale up, n add a genius officer.

Stc full data base = hey guys can you say dark age of tech.

Things are grim but as gw refuse to advance, humanity is locked into said doom.

If you want a story where the Imperium starts not only stopping, but throwing back all that opposes it; look up the Tales of the Emprahsque.

Fair warning, it does take in a lot of /tg/ interpretations as canon, including Love can Bloom.

 Silverthorne wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Sometimes I wish the setting wasn't so grim dark and actually give humanity a chance there would be no contest.

I feel this mindset is misguided. As bad as the situation may seem for humans, their situation can change faster than any other faction. Think about some possibilities.

The obvious--- Return of one or more Primarchs. The Lion is the most likely, then probably the Khan and the Wolf. Think about what a game changer that is. Huge. Could happen at any time.

Starchild cycle is legit, and Cypher accomplishes it- reincarnating the emperor while possibly destroying or badly wounding the Chaos gods.

Panacea recovered from the Dark Eldar. Huge.

Think about the impact just a single, negligble seeming intact STC discovery can have. Say for a type of high-protien grain that can grow in 10% worse conditions than the one they currently have. Or a water purifier that is 1% more efficient. Across the economies of scale of the entire Imperium the difference something small like that can make are huge.

SM boarding party on a space hulk recovers a fully functioning STC from a colony ship. There are probably actions like this taken by random marine chapters nearly every week. Eventually one of them is very likely to turn up a working STC or Iron Man or some type of schematic that changes everything.

Abaddon gets dropped by assassins. Yneed counters She Who Thirsts, permanently, a new Lord Solar is born etc etc etc

Sure Humanity is taking a beating, but in one day, everything could change. Humanity is also much more durable than some of the other factions, since there aren't obvious points of weakness, like zapping the space pope or eviscerating Abaddon or what have you.

Except it could just as easily go south any moment, even faster than it can go north. The Chaos Gods are not only stated to be omnipotent within the warp and are outside time, should anything somehow manage to threaten them, they have time travel and could just as easily smack down any move made against them before it was ever made (and even then, I've heard that Chaos Gods have access to other universes, so food/entertainment isn't an issue for them), there's no real move the IOM could ever make to improve their situation, even if the God Emperor awakes/reincarnates. The Necrons are capable of gibbing Terra whenever they so wish, should that one Dynasty ever decide to weaponize the Celestial Orrery and snuff out all life in the galaxy- hell Necron ships are powerful enough that they could easily obliterate Terra itself if they ever gathered their Tombships into a full fleet, a small fleet of their "frigates" managed to dodge nearly everything thrown at them by Sol's defenses until they hit Mars. The Orks are everywhere and aren't going anywhere anytime soon (literally everywhere considering they likely inhabit a greater portion of the entire universe). Should a Warboss similar to the one that "strangled" the Emperor during the GC ever arise, the resulting WHAAAGH! would quite likely obliterate the Imperium. Then of course there's the Nids, who while have been the whipping boy of everyone else for a while, should their true numbers live up to the hype, they would shatter the Imperium by drowning them in bodies and shutting down all forms of FTL communication the IOM currently possesses and plunge humanity into another age of darkness and solitude, now at the mercy of Tyranids.

Abaddon's death by the blade of an assassin would also do little. Unless his soul is destroyed, the Chaos Gods would simply resurrect him, or if it is destroyed, they would find a new Warmaster of Chaos, with Erebus being a likely choice. Who also would be a far, faaaar greater threat to the Imperium, as it was largely his mind behind the mortal portion of the Horus Heresy. While there would be a period of well, chaos, in Chaos, they would reorganize themselves, and the new leader they pick might be a greater threat than Abaddon ever was.

Getting back to the tau never losing... I would like to point out that the hive fleet that invaded the farsight enclaves were split between an invasion of the eldar and tau worlds. If the complete nid fleet attacked the enclave, the tau probably would not have time to initiate their winning strategy. The tau victory came from evacuating the entire planet and letting the tyranids consume it. then a bio-virus was completed minutes before the last tau facility was over run with farsight's team barely escaping. The virus defeated the t yranids,not tau forces, and it was at the cost of losing theirr entire planet.


The tau also achieve victories, but usually after losing for months or years. In fact most victories would have been defeats were it not for O'Shava. The tau defeat the nids in space without losses? Yea I can see it. The tau lack ftl but they do have some of the best, most rapidly advancing, weaponry in the game. When you take into account the fleet hit and run tactics of the tau opposed to the close engagement of SM and tyranids. Unlikely, sure, but they were lead by farsight I beleive.

Damocles golf say tau forces pushed to the breaking point, nearly losing a core Sept world. Would the crusade have succeeded had their been more ships? Sure, would the tau have won if their ships possessed warp travel? Probably. War is full of ifs and buts.

Are the tau protected by plot armor? Yes. Does it make sense? It does actually. The tau are the smallest faction and as such are not seen as a threat by other races. They are also very centralised with the few planets they control being very close in proximity. Which is why they repel attackers so effectively. The IMO and other big factions have battles on many fronts in many different worlds within their vast empires.

So im saying the small size of the tau empire is why they seem to win all the time. Should the tau overextended themselves it would spell the end for them.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Silverthorne wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Sometimes I wish the setting wasn't so grim dark and actually give humanity a chance there would be no contest.

I feel this mindset is misguided. As bad as the situation may seem for humans, their situation can change faster than any other faction. Think about some possibilities.

The obvious--- Return of one or more Primarchs. The Lion is the most likely, then probably the Khan and the Wolf. Think about what a game changer that is. Huge. Could happen at any time.

Starchild cycle is legit, and Cypher accomplishes it- reincarnating the emperor while possibly destroying or badly wounding the Chaos gods.

Panacea recovered from the Dark Eldar. Huge.

Think about the impact just a single, negligble seeming intact STC discovery can have. Say for a type of high-protien grain that can grow in 10% worse conditions than the one they currently have. Or a water purifier that is 1% more efficient. Across the economies of scale of the entire Imperium the difference something small like that can make are huge.

SM boarding party on a space hulk recovers a fully functioning STC from a colony ship. There are probably actions like this taken by random marine chapters nearly every week. Eventually one of them is very likely to turn up a working STC or Iron Man or some type of schematic that changes everything.

Abaddon gets dropped by assassins. Yneed counters She Who Thirsts, permanently, a new Lord Solar is born etc etc etc

Sure Humanity is taking a beating, but in one day, everything could change. Humanity is also much more durable than some of the other factions, since there aren't obvious points of weakness, like zapping the space pope or eviscerating Abaddon or what have you.

Except it could just as easily go south any moment, even faster than it can go north. The Chaos Gods are not only stated to be omnipotent within the warp and are outside time, should anything somehow manage to threaten them, they have time travel and could just as easily smack down any move made against them before it was ever made (and even then, I've heard that Chaos Gods have access to other universes, so food/entertainment isn't an issue for them), there's no real move the IOM could ever make to improve their situation, even if the God Emperor awakes/reincarnates. The Necrons are capable of gibbing Terra whenever they so wish, should that one Dynasty ever decide to weaponize the Celestial Orrery and snuff out all life in the galaxy- hell Necron ships are powerful enough that they could easily obliterate Terra itself if they ever gathered their Tombships into a full fleet, a small fleet of their "frigates" managed to dodge nearly everything thrown at them by Sol's defenses until they hit Mars. The Orks are everywhere and aren't going anywhere anytime soon (literally everywhere considering they likely inhabit a greater portion of the entire universe). Should a Warboss similar to the one that "strangled" the Emperor during the GC ever arise, the resulting WHAAAGH! would quite likely obliterate the Imperium. Then of course there's the Nids, who while have been the whipping boy of everyone else for a while, should their true numbers live up to the hype, they would shatter the Imperium by drowning them in bodies and shutting down all forms of FTL communication the IOM currently possesses and plunge humanity into another age of darkness and solitude, now at the mercy of Tyranids.

Abaddon's death by the blade of an assassin would also do little. Unless his soul is destroyed, the Chaos Gods would simply resurrect him, or if it is destroyed, they would find a new Warmaster of Chaos, with Erebus being a likely choice. Who also would be a far, faaaar greater threat to the Imperium, as it was largely his mind behind the mortal portion of the Horus Heresy. While there would be a period of well, chaos, in Chaos, they would reorganize themselves, and the new leader they pick might be a greater threat than Abaddon ever was.

I feel like you are sucummbing to a bit of mary-sue wishlisting for your faction, Chaos. Chaos is essentially a parasite. Their abilities to time travel or affect other galaxies are very sketchy and poorly understood-- and warp entities can die, or be destroyed (eldar pantheon, for example) so a star-child event would be a mortal threat to chaos. You list necrons as a faction that could destroy humanity, when in reality they are far, far more likely to seek out and destroy Chaos. Cadian pylons, for example. As more dynasties wake up they will direct their war efforts against their two main threats-- Eldar, and Chaos. Humans are just pests to them, not a mortal threat. These new offensives will continue to attrite the number of Chaos Space Marines as warp/real space overlaps contract, then vanish, greatly restricting CSM access to the material plane. Eventually only a handful of true Chaos marines will be left in the galaxy, and many or most of the greater demons will be incarcerated in Tesseract Arcs, greatly reducing the power and influence of the Chaos Gods. Chaos, as far as I know, besides very poorly written and ambiguous day dreams about time travel and extra-galactic influence, have no aces up their sleeves. The return of the emperor, discovery of a full STC, return of the Primarchs, etc etc etc all are possibilities for the Imperium. The Imperium is battered but still a sword of damocles hanging over the heads of all other factions. Only one or two things have to happen for them to just roflstomp everyone.

Shaso_Keo wrote:
Getting back to the tau never losing... I would like to point out that the hive fleet that invaded the farsight enclaves were split between an invasion of the eldar and tau worlds. If the complete nid fleet attacked the enclave, the tau probably would not have time to initiate their winning strategy. The tau victory came from evacuating the entire planet and letting the tyranids consume it. then a bio-virus was completed minutes before the last tau facility was over run with farsight's team barely escaping. The virus defeated the t yranids,not tau forces, and it was at the cost of losing theirr entire planet.

Except that when the Imperium tries this the Hive fleet adapts so quick as to render the virus ineffective. It has never been able to stop a Tyranid invasion. And the Magos Biologis are some of the best gene-smiths in the galaxy. The Tau can do it! Sure no problem! Eldar can't do it and they've been around for millions of years!

Shaso_Keo wrote:
The tau also achieve victories, but usually after losing for months or years. In fact most victories would have been defeats were it not for O'Shava. The tau defeat the nids in space without losses? Yea I can see it. The tau lack ftl but they do have some of the best, most rapidly advancing, weaponry in the game. When you take into account the fleet hit and run tactics of the tau opposed to the close engagement of SM and tyranids. Unlikely, sure, but they were lead by farsight I beleive.

Yet the Imperium has many more ship class types with advance lance batteries and Nova cannons. Fast attack frigates and other hit and run tactics. They just don't brick up and plod across the table you would lose to move to quickly even for the Imperium. They are capable of tactics in the Path of the Eldar series the massive fleet kept to its formations and roles well. Yet the Tau can engage forces much larger then themselves. And everyone gives them a pass "Oh they're small so its okay"

Shaso_Keo wrote:
Damocles golf say tau forces pushed to the breaking point, nearly losing a core Sept world. Would the crusade have succeeded had their been more ships? Sure, would the tau have won if their ships possessed warp travel? Probably. War is full of ifs and buts.

It took a plot device (armor) to get the Imperium to divert its attention to some place else instead of being logically concluded. So once more the Tau were given plot armor to save them.

Shaso_Keo wrote:
Are the tau protected by plot armor? Yes. Does it make sense? It does actually. The tau are the smallest faction and as such are not seen as a threat by other races. They are also very centralised with the few planets they control being very close in proximity. Which is why they repel attackers so effectively. The IMO and other big factions have battles on many fronts in many different worlds within their vast empires.

So im saying the small size of the tau empire is why they seem to win all the time. Should the tau overextended themselves it would spell the end for them.

As I said above "They're small so it's okay they get a pass"

HoskuneAstetic wrote:

Shaso_Keo wrote:
Getting back to the tau never losing... I would like to point out that the hive fleet that invaded the farsight enclaves were split between an invasion of the eldar and tau worlds. If the complete nid fleet attacked the enclave, the tau probably would not have time to initiate their winning strategy. The tau victory came from evacuating the entire planet and letting the tyranids consume it. then a bio-virus was completed minutes before the last tau facility was over run with farsight's team barely escaping. The virus defeated the t yranids,not tau forces, and it was at the cost of losing theirr entire planet.

Except that when the Imperium tries this the Hive fleet adapts so quick as to render the virus ineffective. It has never been able to stop a Tyranid invasion. And the Magos Biologis are some of the best gene-smiths in the galaxy. The Tau can do it! Sure no problem! Eldar can't do it and they've been around for millions of years!

The entire fleet was destroyed in an hour when the super-virus was introduced. No time to adapt.

Farsight saw nothing at first, but soon, a black stain began to spread across the chitinous flanks of one of the Tyranid vessels. Within a matter of only a few moments, the affliction had spread to a second ship, followed swiftly by another and then another, until none were free of the malign tendrils. The bio-ships shuddered and writhed as the discolouration blossomed outwards to cover them entirely. One by one, the fleshy Tyranid vessels fell into themselves, rotting and falling away like a piece of fruit decomposing in a matter ofseconds. Before the hour was out, the bioships had disintegrated entirely.

An hour is plenty of time for the hive fleet to start adapting. If part of itself is corrupt it cuts it off to prevent damage to the whole thing. Every time the Imperium tried it they discovered their super-virus it was ineffective shortly after introduction to the Hive Mind.

An hour? I think you are overestimating 'nids a tad.

Yeah, it's not only an hour, unless you mean the Fleet's *first* inkling of an idea that maybe there's something not quite usual about that weird green stuff in those bullets/needles/bombs/torpedoes that the deli-tray keeps shooting at it.

It often takes years for a Hive Fleet to adapat and create an immunity to a given toxin, as it cannot telepathically transmit the gene-code to its already-produced organisms to make them immune. It has to either just create new ones with the new defenses coded in, which requires expendable biomass, or it has to devour all of its as-yet-uninfected organisms, create whatever genetic code is needed to make them immune to the whats-it, and then start pumping out upgraded bugs.

During this time, though, the Hive Fleet is relatively vulnerable... and if the toxin is extremely useful, it can't even reclaim its dead for use as biomass. It has to get more fuel from somewhere.

Hive fleets are pretty resoruceful, only race they cannot eat is necrons, though a diet of chaos may not be ideal.

Not even there adaption would take easily to a nugile world I'd think. Its decay and poison, desise, and sickness in pretty pure form.

jhe90 wrote:
Hive fleets are pretty resoruceful, only race they cannot eat is necrons, though a diet of chaos may not be ideal.

Not even there adaption would take easily to a nugile world I'd think. Its decay and poison, desise, and sickness in pretty pure form.

Probably would. There's a mention in the Tyranid codex of Tyranids adapting to Nurgle diseases pretty quickly.

pm713 wrote:

jhe90 wrote:
Hive fleets are pretty resoruceful, only race they cannot eat is necrons, though a diet of chaos may not be ideal.

Not even there adaption would take easily to a nugile world I'd think. Its decay and poison, desise, and sickness in pretty pure form.

Probably would. There's a mention in the Tyranid codex of Tyranids adapting to Nurgle diseases pretty quickly.

OK that surprises me, I know they where the ultimate bio weapon, but nugile is the lord of decay, a full chaos god, his servents still pretty deadly and disqusting,. If anything could hurt em it had to be that.

Nugile desises have shown to effect even fully augmented marines, and not much can manage that, OK dark eldar yes but the s&m space elves have too much interest in that kind of thing,

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Let the Tau get eaten by Tyranids.

Um...

[reply]

jhe90 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

jhe90 wrote:
Hive fleets are pretty resoruceful, only race they cannot eat is necrons, though a diet of chaos may not be ideal.

Not even there adaption would take easily to a nugile world I'd think. Its decay and poison, desise, and sickness in pretty pure form.

Probably would. There's a mention in the Tyranid codex of Tyranids adapting to Nurgle diseases pretty quickly.

OK that surprises me, I know they where the ultimate bio weapon, but nugile is the lord of decay, a full chaos god, his servents still pretty deadly and disqusting,. If anything could hurt em it had to be that.

Nugile desises have shown to effect even fully augmented marines, and not much can manage that, OK dark eldar yes but the s&m space elves have too much interest in that kind of thing,

What happens is, it depends on which force has the greater weight in the balance, and this remains true of any Chaotic/Warp force vs the Tyranid.

If the Tyranids are the stronger, then the Shadow In the Warp disrupts all the daemon-energy of the Chaos side, and so it loses its big, mutating advantage. This is basically what happened in the Nurgle scenario.

Now, if the Chaos side is stronger, then the bugs start to warp and mutate, and the Hive Mind has to cut them off, lest it be tainted by the madness of the Warp.

OK that makes sense, still there plot armour, nothing yet is a solid tyranoid killer.

 Wulfmar wrote:
The Tau appeal to those who like Japanese artwork, but more than that, they appeal to those neurotic players who must have everything *just so*. I don't know how to explain this succinctly so I will try with the following:

Players who like to be the good guy - the hero
Players who MUST have everything perfectly identical and operating in even numbers.
Players who want to be the technological best and newest, because they want to be the best in every aspect (with regard to power and intelligence - superiority from a distance, don't even let them get close, bit of a playground mentality there for our fledgeling gamer)

Now, I say this because I see many of the gamers are of that mentility, and it works for them. Heck, I WAS one of them - I used to have to have EVERYTHING perfectly lined up, painted identically and in even ranks and files. If one was to die and take the squad to an uneven number, I would feel uncomfortable and not be happy until another died to make the squad even again - but then I would be disappointed that any had died at all. I see many Tau players now and they are much the same. Compare that to an Ork player where individuality is the golden mean, where everything is random and ramshackle and random is the flavour and you realise that the Tau cannot be allowed to lose - as that is one of the aspects that make them popular for many gamers.


As for me now, it's all about Chaos. The moment I started mis-matching my socks was the day I learned to embrace other armies.

Anyone else here know exactly what this guy is talking about?

In Starcraft, if a unit took damage so one of its legs was red or something on that status picture, I'd kill it so they'd all be identical. Innumerable instances of that mark my passage through various gaming over the years. And of course, for christmas when I was 12-13 I wanted Tau for the exact reasons listed above.

Thank god I got Orks instead.

I also agree wholeheartedly with OP. Between these two posts I see the reasons that I really don't care for this faction in this game. If your gonna stick science fiction into my gothic space horror, at least make it *not* the best at everything - flawed factions are good factions. (Same largely goes for Necrons)

I think it's kind of funny because in day to day life I am one of the least organized people I know. I guess I'm just better at "picking my fights". There's some stuff I keep nice and orderly (mainly schoolwork related at the moment), but I have no problem with things not being in order.

I commented to that post simply because it paints a very odd picture of why people choose the armies they do. In the old days, Chaos armies had all kinds of crazy numeric requirements. And even then one half of your army might turn against the other half and try to eat them if they were troops of the wrong gods.

Starcraft is a good example!

I seem to remember Age of Empires being my bane. I would build a large city with all the buildings in neat rows. The walls around the city had to be the same number long on the X and Y axis (making a perfect square). All the technologies and upgrades are researched so there is nothing left out.

If a single piece of wall got damaged so that a slight amount of red showed on the health bar - I would have to repair it immediately otherwise I would feel... irked.

So, I would build castles along the inside of the walls and completely garrison them with archers. The hail of arrows would kill any enemy on approach to the walls before they could knock off a single HP.



Now, change the above (true story) to Warhammer Tau. You have neat little squads who are (in fluff terms) upgraded and superior. But you don't want them to be harmed, because they are yours and in your eyes are superior to the other race.

So you garrison the edge of the board and shoot away, the hail of pulse rifles would kill any enemy on approach to the Tau before they could knock off a single wound.

If a single piece model got killed so that a squad didn't number it's maximum (even numbered!) size - I would feel... irked.



It was only when I went off to university that I discovered that it really... really doesn't matter and frankly, who gives a monkeys. Seven years since leaving uni and I have extremely disordered and discordant army lists as it feels more organic.

I currently play games with two local clubs as well as running a club myself for younger players. I see my (previously described) behavior evident in so many of the Tau players.

Ah... ok.

 Wulfmar wrote:
Starcraft is a good example!

I seem to remember Age of Empires being my bane. I would build a large city with all the buildings in neat rows. The walls around the city had to be the same number long on the X and Y axis (making a perfect square). All the technologies and upgrades are researched so there is nothing left out.

If a single piece of wall got damaged so that a slight amount of red showed on the health bar - I would have to repair it immediately otherwise I would feel... irked.

So, I would build castles along the inside of the walls and completely garrison them with archers. The hail of arrows would kill any enemy on approach to the walls before they could knock off a single HP.



Now, change the above (true story) to Warhammer Tau. You have neat little squads who are (in fluff terms) upgraded and superior. But you don't want them to be harmed, because they are yours and in your eyes are superior to the other race.

So you garrison the edge of the board and shoot away, the hail of pulse rifles would kill any enemy on approach to the Tau before they could knock off a single wound.

If a single piece model got killed so that a squad didn't number it's maximum (even numbered!) size - I would feel... irked.



It was only when I went off to university that I discovered that it really... really doesn't matter and frankly, who gives a monkeys. Seven years since leaving uni and I have extremely disordered and discordant army lists as it feels more organic.

I currently play games with two local clubs as well as running a club myself for younger players. I see my (previously described) behavior evident in so many of the Tau players.

...Am I the only one who's completely lost trying to understand what point you're attempting to get across?

 Kain wrote:

 Wulfmar wrote:
Starcraft is a good example!

I seem to remember Age of Empires being my bane. I would build a large city with all the buildings in neat rows. The walls around the city had to be the same number long on the X and Y axis (making a perfect square). All the technologies and upgrades are researched so there is nothing left out.

If a single piece of wall got damaged so that a slight amount of red showed on the health bar - I would have to repair it immediately otherwise I would feel... irked.

So, I would build castles along the inside of the walls and completely garrison them with archers. The hail of arrows would kill any enemy on approach to the walls before they could knock off a single HP.


Now, change the above (true story) to Warhammer Tau. You have neat little squads who are (in fluff terms) upgraded and superior. But you don't want them to be harmed, because they are yours and in your eyes are superior to the other race.

So you garrison the edge of the board and shoot away, the hail of pulse rifles would kill any enemy on approach to the Tau before they could knock off a single wound.

If a single piece model got killed so that a squad didn't number it's maximum (even numbered!) size - I would feel... irked.



It was only when I went off to university that I discovered that it really... really doesn't matter and frankly, who gives a monkeys. Seven years since leaving uni and I have extremely disordered and discordant army lists as it feels more organic.

I currently play games with two local clubs as well as running a club myself for younger players. I see my (previously described) behavior evident in so many of the Tau players.

...Am I the only one who's completely lost trying to understand what point you're attempting to get across?

A story of how a person broke there desire for perfect order and formations?

It's basically "Dr. Strangemind or, How I Learned to Quit Worrying and Become a Chaos Cultist".

I think what you've missed is that this is in fact the point of the tau as a faction in 40k. They are the only species who look at things positively and this is reflected (and maybe magnified) in the fluff. What you seem to be asking for is for the tau to become the imperium, but with tau in instead if humans.
But at the same time yes tyranids should have consumed the universe already.

Yeah you are right . The imperium could just launch a bigger crusade than the Damocles crusade to wipe them out

It would have to be pretty big. Not great crusade big, but big enough that it would detract from the hundreds of other massive wars that the imperium is fighting, and the few dozen really major threats. At this time the Tau Empire is not a big enough threat to the imperium as a whole to warrant the cost of eradicating them. That, and I think that some of the TE extends past the astronomicon, making it so that the imperium can';t get there.

So does most of the Segmentum Ultima, but that hasn't stopped Mankind from living there.

 skink007 wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
It's the fact those Tau will win when if that same amount of Tyranids invaded the Imperium they would suffer terrible losses. Lose ancient ships and irreplaceable technology. Probably burn a world or two. Yet the Tau do it with absolutely no loss of ships. I find their lack of defeats to be counter to the grim dark setting of 40k.

This is literally the point of the Tau fluff. They aren't grimdark. They contrast the current imperium and remind us of the imperium from the crusades.

Except the the Imperium during the crusade was revealed to also be grimdark. Along with that, Tau have gradually become more grimdark. Even without that, they were Orwellian from the get-go.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Psienesis wrote:

Players who MUST have everything perfectly identical and operating in even numbers.
Players who want to be the technological best and newest, because they want to be the best in every aspect (with regard to power and intelligence - superiority from a distance, don't even let them get close, bit of a playground mentality there for our fledgeling gamer)

Back in the day, Chaos Armies had to have their troops appearing in numbers determined by the Sacred Number of their God.

So, if you were playing a Slaaneshi army, Hir number being 6, all of your units were in multiples of 6. Nurgle was 5, Khorne 8 and Tzeentch 7.

Of course, in those days, if you allied Khorne and Slaanesh, or Tzeentch and Nurgle, your army would fall upon itself in an attempt to slaughter the other half.

Man I sometimes really miss fielding an army that tried to slaughter itself.

 Silverthorne wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Silverthorne wrote:

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
Sometimes I wish the setting wasn't so grim dark and actually give humanity a chance there would be no contest.

I feel this mindset is misguided. As bad as the situation may seem for humans, their situation can change faster than any other faction. Think about some possibilities.

The obvious--- Return of one or more Primarchs. The Lion is the most likely, then probably the Khan and the Wolf. Think about what a game changer that is. Huge. Could happen at any time.

Starchild cycle is legit, and Cypher accomplishes it- reincarnating the emperor while possibly destroying or badly wounding the Chaos gods.

Panacea recovered from the Dark Eldar. Huge.

Think about the impact just a single, negligble seeming intact STC discovery can have. Say for a type of high-protien grain that can grow in 10% worse conditions than the one they currently have. Or a water purifier that is 1% more efficient. Across the economies of scale of the entire Imperium the difference something small like that can make are huge.

SM boarding party on a space hulk recovers a fully functioning STC from a colony ship. There are probably actions like this taken by random marine chapters nearly every week. Eventually one of them is very likely to turn up a working STC or Iron Man or some type of schematic that changes everything.

Abaddon gets dropped by assassins. Yneed counters She Who Thirsts, permanently, a new Lord Solar is born etc etc etc

Sure Humanity is taking a beating, but in one day, everything could change. Humanity is also much more durable than some of the other factions, since there aren't obvious points of weakness, like zapping the space pope or eviscerating Abaddon or what have you.

Except it could just as easily go south any moment, even faster than it can go north. The Chaos Gods are not only stated to be omnipotent within the warp and are outside time, should anything somehow manage to threaten them, they have time travel and could just as easily smack down any move made against them before it was ever made (and even then, I've heard that Chaos Gods have access to other universes, so food/entertainment isn't an issue for them), there's no real move the IOM could ever make to improve their situation, even if the God Emperor awakes/reincarnates. The Necrons are capable of gibbing Terra whenever they so wish, should that one Dynasty ever decide to weaponize the Celestial Orrery and snuff out all life in the galaxy- hell Necron ships are powerful enough that they could easily obliterate Terra itself if they ever gathered their Tombships into a full fleet, a small fleet of their "frigates" managed to dodge nearly everything thrown at them by Sol's defenses until they hit Mars. The Orks are everywhere and aren't going anywhere anytime soon (literally everywhere considering they likely inhabit a greater portion of the entire universe). Should a Warboss similar to the one that "strangled" the Emperor during the GC ever arise, the resulting WHAAAGH! would quite likely obliterate the Imperium. Then of course there's the Nids, who while have been the whipping boy of everyone else for a while, should their true numbers live up to the hype, they would shatter the Imperium by drowning them in bodies and shutting down all forms of FTL communication the IOM currently possesses and plunge humanity into another age of darkness and solitude, now at the mercy of Tyranids.

Abaddon's death by the blade of an assassin would also do little. Unless his soul is destroyed, the Chaos Gods would simply resurrect him, or if it is destroyed, they would find a new Warmaster of Chaos, with Erebus being a likely choice. Who also would be a far, faaaar greater threat to the Imperium, as it was largely his mind behind the mortal portion of the Horus Heresy. While there would be a period of well, chaos, in Chaos, they would reorganize themselves, and the new leader they pick might be a greater threat than Abaddon ever was.

I feel like you are sucummbing to a bit of mary-sue wishlisting for your faction, Chaos. Chaos is essentially a parasite. Their abilities to time travel or affect other galaxies are very sketchy and poorly understood-- and warp entities can die, or be destroyed (eldar pantheon, for example) so a star-child event would be a mortal threat to chaos. You list necrons as a faction that could destroy humanity, when in reality they are far, far more likely to seek out and destroy Chaos. Cadian pylons, for example. As more dynasties wake up they will direct their war efforts against their two main threats-- Eldar, and Chaos. Humans are just pests to them, not a mortal threat. These new offensives will continue to attrite the number of Chaos Space Marines as warp/real space overlaps contract, then vanish, greatly restricting CSM access to the material plane. Eventually only a handful of true Chaos marines will be left in the galaxy, and many or most of the greater demons will be incarcerated in Tesseract Arcs, greatly reducing the power and influence of the Chaos Gods. Chaos, as far as I know, besides very poorly written and ambiguous day dreams about time travel and extra-galactic influence, have no aces up their sleeves. The return of the emperor, discovery of a full STC, return of the Primarchs, etc etc etc all are possibilities for the Imperium. The Imperium is battered but still a sword of damocles hanging over the heads of all other factions. Only one or two things have to happen for them to just roflstomp everyone.

I think he was focused upon how they could all screw over the Imperium. As per the forces, Eldar's top 2 foes are Eldar and Chaos. Necrons look like Chaos and Eldar but you forget the fluff that reveals Nids to be their prime foe. Nids are.... really the only thing with them is they consider Daemons fellow predators and that they can't nom them. I guess Humanity and Orks because food. Orks fight everything but mainly Imperium. DE are all but mainly Imperium. So it'd be more likely that Necrons would focus on fighting Nids if anything. I don't quite get how a star-child that is composed of a minority species could really make a god though. Never quite got that one though. Really though, Necrons are more likely to kill everything else to be able to rule by themself and steal bodies or something to have flesh.

As per roflestomping, it's not that simple. Emperor gets up, suddenly Chaos gets more serious or Nids come in greater numbers or Necrons start to get up in increasing numbers. Primarchs get up? Well daemon primarchs get up. The Imperium is the top but they are the battered ones that are slowly falling apart and have been over the years.

Doesn't anyone remember the mass betrayal by the Dark Eldar. They turned on the Tau troopers when they were in a battle and began to torture every last one of them. Before the Tau fleet could arrive at the battle, every Tau and Kroot was murdered. That sounds like a pretty bad day for the Tau.

ashcroft wrote:
The Imperium should not be in a position to wipe out any interstellar power. Not now. Not the crumbling remnants of humanity teetering on the edge of oblivion in the fading light of their dying God-Emperor.

That's a misinterpretation common among fans.

The Imperium is dying, but it's dying like an elephant being slowly worn down by jackals. Sure, eventually it might collapse, but at any given time it can still stomp one of them flat.


I think people really don't pick this up out of the fluff. But Chaos has to run and hide in the Eye of Terror and the Malestrom all the time (for ten thousand consecutive years). And why is this? Because while the foes of the Imperium (aside from perhaps the Tyranids) can be very dangerous when their power is focused, the Imperium is vast. The Macharian Crusade carved a giant new chunk of the galaxy and only took seven years. That's old school fluff too, not something recent. The Imperium can still bring a tremendous amount of power to bear when it has the chance to. There's a reason why there have been 12 failed black Crusades. Why Chaos could, at best, run the Siege of Vraks to a pyrrrhic victory for the Imperials, and it took the distraction of the outbreak of the 13th Black Crusade to turn the tide against the Imperial Forces who were winning early on.

This is an interstellar empire with huge logistical backing. Its enemies are numerous and tenacious, but it's still the biggest dog in the fight by a vast margin.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

ashcroft wrote:
The Imperium should not be in a position to wipe out any interstellar power. Not now. Not the crumbling remnants of humanity teetering on the edge of oblivion in the fading light of their dying God-Emperor.

That's a misinterpretation common among fans.

The Imperium is dying, but it's dying like an elephant being slowly worn down by jackals. Sure, eventually it might collapse, but at any given time it can still stomp one of them flat.


I think people really don't pick this up out of the fluff. But Chaos has to run and hide in the Eye of Terror and the Malestrom all the time (for ten thousand consecutive years). And why is this? Because while the foes of the Imperium (aside from perhaps the Tyranids) can be very dangerous when their power is focused, the Imperium is vast. The Macharian Crusade carved a giant new chunk of the galaxy and only took seven years. That's old school fluff too, not something recent. The Imperium can still bring a tremendous amount of power to bear when it has the chance to. There's a reason why there have been 12 failed black Crusades. Why Chaos could, at best, run the Siege of Vraks to a pyrrrhic victory for the Imperials, and it took the distraction of the outbreak of the 13th Black Crusade to turn the tide against the Imperial Forces who were winning early on.

This is an interstellar empire with huge logistical backing. Its enemies are numerous and tenacious, but it's still the biggest dog in the fight by a vast margin.

In a war of attrition and minus distractions they have ships and manpower to grind down pretty much anyone. However not fiten they are not fighting 1000 minor wars and rebellions at anyone time.

HoskuneAstetic wrote:
My main army is the Tau. I love the look of their units which is why I got them. But their fluff I just find so... offensive. Nothing bad ever happens to them. They are seemingly perfect in every way imaginable. Beat both a massed Tyranid hive fleet and then an Imperial Fleet are no problems at all. Yet in other sources an Imperial fleet like that is a credible threat to a Craftworld and other empires. For the Tau it is a light exercise. While I will continue to play them, I hope in later editions they are either greatly reduced in numbers and victories or out right gone by the Tyranids. That would please me immensely.

You spent hundreds or thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours on an army you hate?

Re-reading the OP, I am calling BS on the OP. I don't think he plays Tau, I think he got whupped by Tau.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

I think people really don't pick this up out of the fluff. But Chaos has to run and hide in the Eye of Terror and the Malestrom all the time (for ten thousand consecutive years). And why is this? Because while the foes of the Imperium (aside from perhaps the Tyranids) can be very dangerous when their power is focused, the Imperium is vast.

I believe that the only forces that have managed to stomp through the Imperium while being practically unopposed are the Necrons and Hive Fleet Leviathan.

 Tyran wrote:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

I think people really don't pick this up out of the fluff. But Chaos has to run and hide in the Eye of Terror and the Malestrom all the time (for ten thousand consecutive years). And why is this? Because while the foes of the Imperium (aside from perhaps the Tyranids) can be very dangerous when their power is focused, the Imperium is vast.

I believe that the only forces that have managed to stomp through the Imperium while being practically unopposed are the Necrons and Hive Fleet Leviathan.

Orks are also known for their ability to smash multiple Imperial worlds with little effort.

Has anyone else wondered if maybe the Tau could finish what the Old Ones started (what with their being the one race in 40k that develops new technology) and put a control mechanism into the Orks? Mayhaps that could be how humanity manages to survive past the 40k time frame. Orks are nasty as they are- how much worse would they be with intelligent commanders and support from Hammerhead gunships?

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

I think people really don't pick this up out of the fluff. But Chaos has to run and hide in the Eye of Terror and the Malestrom all the time (for ten thousand consecutive years). And why is this? Because while the foes of the Imperium (aside from perhaps the Tyranids) can be very dangerous when their power is focused, the Imperium is vast.

I believe that the only forces that have managed to stomp through the Imperium while being practically unopposed are the Necrons and Hive Fleet Leviathan.

Orks are also known for their ability to smash multiple Imperial worlds with little effort.

Has anyone else wondered if maybe the Tau could finish what the Old Ones started (what with their being the one race in 40k that develops new technology) and put a control mechanism into the Orks? Mayhaps that could be how humanity manages to survive past the 40k time frame. Orks are nasty as they are- how much worse would they be with intelligent commanders and support from Hammerhead gunships?

Don't think the tau could possibly do that. There not green enough and an Ork saying that they need to work with and adopt tau culture or at least tau ideas would be killed instantly by the other orks. Also to me I think it is far more likely that the orks will kill off the tau than the IOM or the Tyranids just because you can have a huge warband of orks that can focus on the tau and wipe them out. If I remember correctly it was an ork WAAAGH led by an ork know as the beast that nearly conquered the galaxy.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
There's a reason why there have been 12 failed black Crusades.

Define 'failed'. The Ruinous Powers are not known for their forgiving natures, and where Abaddon to have failed in meeting their goals this many times... or even a couple of times... he'd have been turned into a chaos spawn (if he was lucky) and they'd have found someone else to do their bidding. The Black Crusades are only failures if you think that their sole goal is to conquer Terra, which it isn't.

There has been a shift in emphasis in the fluff over time. Back when the game was played 'normally' at a skirmish level the idea of massed forces being brought to bear on a single battlefront was far more relegated to the background, and the Imperium's huge numbers were mostly invoked to illustrate the equally huge casualties they would take to obtain their victories - and victory often meant no more than surviving and holding onto what they had (or the burned and blasted ruins of what was left of what they had) rather than extending their domain through fresh conquest.

But then the result of the 13th Black Crusade got rolled back, and that combined with the push to justify ever larger and more impressive forces on the tabletop has pushed the focus to this "Humanity Feth Yeah!" idea of the Imperium as a galactic superpower that can go on the offensive against other races rather than expending almost all of their efforts into just hanging on.

 Gunhead1 wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

I think people really don't pick this up out of the fluff. But Chaos has to run and hide in the Eye of Terror and the Malestrom all the time (for ten thousand consecutive years). And why is this? Because while the foes of the Imperium (aside from perhaps the Tyranids) can be very dangerous when their power is focused, the Imperium is vast.

I believe that the only forces that have managed to stomp through the Imperium while being practically unopposed are the Necrons and Hive Fleet Leviathan.

Orks are also known for their ability to smash multiple Imperial worlds with little effort.

Has anyone else wondered if maybe the Tau could finish what the Old Ones started (what with their being the one race in 40k that develops new technology) and put a control mechanism into the Orks? Mayhaps that could be how humanity manages to survive past the 40k time frame. Orks are nasty as they are- how much worse would they be with intelligent commanders and support from Hammerhead gunships?

Don't think the tau could possibly do that. There not green enough and an Ork saying that they need to work with and adopt tau culture or at least tau ideas would be killed instantly by the other orks. Also to me I think it is far more likely that the orks will kill off the tau than the IOM or the Tyranids just because you can have a huge warband of orks that can focus on the tau and wipe them out. If I remember correctly it was an ork WAAAGH led by an ork know as the beast that nearly conquered the galaxy.

A gene-altering virus that spreads through the air would render any Ork within choppa distance part of Waaaagh Tau- I see that as being the most likely distribution system.

... and Tau have gotten very good at killing Orks. Tau also benefit from not being well-known throughout the galaxy- every Ork knows that spikey 'umies an' beakies make for good fightin'!

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Gunhead1 wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Tyran wrote:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:

I think people really don't pick this up out of the fluff. But Chaos has to run and hide in the Eye of Terror and the Malestrom all the time (for ten thousand consecutive years). And why is this? Because while the foes of the Imperium (aside from perhaps the Tyranids) can be very dangerous when their power is focused, the Imperium is vast.

I believe that the only forces that have managed to stomp through the Imperium while being practically unopposed are the Necrons and Hive Fleet Leviathan.

Orks are also known for their ability to smash multiple Imperial worlds with little effort.

Has anyone else wondered if maybe the Tau could finish what the Old Ones started (what with their being the one race in 40k that develops new technology) and put a control mechanism into the Orks? Mayhaps that could be how humanity manages to survive past the 40k time frame. Orks are nasty as they are- how much worse would they be with intelligent commanders and support from Hammerhead gunships?

Don't think the tau could possibly do that. There not green enough and an Ork saying that they need to work with and adopt tau culture or at least tau ideas would be killed instantly by the other orks. Also to me I think it is far more likely that the orks will kill off the tau than the IOM or the Tyranids just because you can have a huge warband of orks that can focus on the tau and wipe them out. If I remember correctly it was an ork WAAAGH led by an ork know as the beast that nearly conquered the galaxy.

A gene-altering virus that spreads through the air would render any Ork within choppa distance part of Waaaagh Tau- I see that as being the most likely distribution system.

... and Tau have gotten very good at killing Orks. Tau also benefit from not being well-known throughout the galaxy- every Ork knows that spikey 'umies an' beakies make for good fightin'!

Possible, but I don't see the Tau having the tech to undo what the old ones did any time soon if ever. Also with Orks you have to be good at killing them or your not going to last long and don't forget one never hears about how much damage the Tau suffer after every fight with the Orks. On the Tau not being well-known that is true, but with Orks you can still have a every large Waaaagh on your door step even if your not the top dog around just because you were unlucky enough to be in the way.

Part of the tau problem is, I think, they're basically stuck out on the back end of nowhere, with no way to really make an appearance on the galactic stage. I mean the Eldar/Dark Eldar have the webway, Orks and Chaos are everywhere, Necrons have their methods (pick whichever version you prefer), etc. The tau... are kinda stuck off on the edge of the galaxy. I mean even the Kroot, their minions have a much greater presence/impact on the galaxy than the tau (and you have to wonder how it is the Kroot never shared warp technology with the tau. Aren't they supposed to be super-grateful for their assistance in defending Pech?) So its really hard for them to have any relevance apart from that small corner of the 40K galaxy without some creative finagling (case in point: What was the tau's involvement in the 13th Black Crusade? Every other faction had a presence in and around that area.) Size also tends to be a problem considering the threats they deal with (as others have noted) because they can't really afford serious losses. I mean Eldar lose craftworlds.. the Imperium loses whole worlds and sectors to various reasons... but I can't seriously think of the Tau ever seriously losing a major territory or holding to catastrophe yet (colonies and newly conquered territories yes, but not a major world that might be their equivalent of a sector capital, or a forge or hive world..) That makes it kind of hard to convey any sense of danger or threat to the tau, because they almost HAVE to win overwhemlingly just to break even.

I think the most egregious example of this was the Damocles supplement where they fought on Agrellan. First they wanted to bypass the world because they feared it and it was heavily defended, would inflict horrible losses... I was okay with this. That's part of the Tau's SOP and bent towards efficiency (they'd rather assimilate than destroy, and they could always take other means to conquer the world later, like water caste subversion.) But no.. space.. plot fiat... dictates not only that they cannot bypass the planet (for some reason) but they literally cannot bypass it without getting into a ground battle (How does that work? They have starships. Star systems are huge places. Do they have to land the ships and ford them across rivers as if this were Oregon Trail: 40K edition?) And once they are actually INVOLVED in a ground battle, Shadowsun Harrington (reference to Honorverse novels by David Weber. Prefer Grand Admiral Shadowthrawn if you prefer a more star warsie reference.) effortlessly and almost bloodlessly defeats all the threats on the ground. Which.. kind of makes their whole fear and desire to avoid Agrellan to begin with seem kind of stupid and pointless, and only again reinforces the preconception that the Tau cannot compete with the other factions without gratuitous amounts of luck/authorial fiat helping them out. This actually insults them, narratively speaking, because struggles and conflicts like that have heaps of potential for character/factional development.

Which also gets into what I see as the other big problem with the Tau. I mean apart from their Greater Good, their militant conquests... what do they really have going for them? Do we have any more development or speculation about their origins? No, but we get hints they may be using evil mind control worms. Do we see any significant development of their aspects of society and culture and personal interaction? Not much, although we get glimpses of it with the Farsight supplement (which I actually thought was good because it ADDED some character and complexity to the Empire.. there's potential for disagreement, diversity, and even internal conflict over ideology and how Tau might view the 'greater good'.) Ultimately, the Tau seem largely defined by who they are fighting against (especially the Imperium) and this is once more something that does them no favors. They seem to exist to grow, expand, be dynamic, and provoke the Imperium (and sometimes get threatened by the occasional Ork or Tyranid incursion.) Not.. .terribly interesting, and it only seems to further the factional polarization between the Tau and Imperium (because unless its Space Marines or Inquisitors or a GUARD HERO like Ciaphas Cain, more often than not the Tau kick the Imperium's ass to make themselves look good, and because the Imperium can afford the losses and the Tau can't.

I'm no longer eager to see the tau demolished.. heck I even kinda like the idea that the Imperium and Tau might have a sort of grudging respect, or might have even shaped one another's attitudes through their conflicts (Tau might be becoming more like humans in some way, which means regressing to that dreaded 'Mont'au' nature they have struggled to overcome. Again more development!) Or even teamwork. There's a certain irony in that in their competition (at the Tau's level at least) they might even have certain similarities. Anyhow, what I'd wish to see is the tau made more.. relevant. A more robust and legitimate threat and competitor out on the eastern fringe. Find out they have heaps more allies than previously assumed, or they make more extensive use of drones and robotics in warfare to bolster their limited numbers. Something like that. Make them something that not only can afford serious risk (and endure it, like every other faction), but can also present a credible threat on its own merits (and this can play into their style of warfare quite easily - its just a matter of scale and application, not idea.)

I don't think its a coincidence that the best bit of Tau development (and my favorite Tau-centric work) has been the Fire Warrior novel.