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I'm thinking of putting some "battle damage" on my fire warriors, but I was wondering what color do Tau bleed? One of my friends say they bleed blue, but I've heard red from other sources.

I think like most Xenos in the 40k world, they have chromatophores in their blood which means they bleed whatever colour suits your chosen colour scheme best

cf Orks, who have had black, dark green, brown and bright red blood in the past few years!)

Tau are blue apprently they have cobalt or copper(Probably cobalt) though i can't actually remember in their blood instead of iron which makes their blood blue instead of red.

It depends who you ask, From the Ultramarine novels, they bleed red, from other sources I've forgot( betting it's Xenology) they bleed blue because of Cobalt in their blood replacing Iron.

Iur_tae_mont wrote:It depends who you ask, From the Ultramarine novels, they bleed red, from other sources I've forgot( betting it's Xenology) they bleed blue because of Cobalt in their blood replacing Iron.

I was wondering whether it was that or infantry mans uplifting primer... probably xenobiology

It might be the fluff part of the Codex as well.

Iur_tae_mont wrote:It might be the fluff part of the Codex as well.

I haven't eve read the Tau codex so either i'm psychic or it's in The uplifting primer.

Well alot of people bring up the Tau having cobalt in thier blood( not a majority, but enough people to were a good chunk of 40k player know about it)

Tau's blood contains cobalt, making there blood a purple-ish color. If their blood was blue, they would have copper based blood instead.


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Also, if they had blue blood, they'de related to squids.

Based off everyones answers I'd say it would be pretty safe to go with a purpilish-blue color

i seem to remember reading somewhere that they have cobalt instead of iron so i think everyone so far are correct.

GW has, to my knowledge, never given tau blood a definitive colour. Different sources have given it a range of colours, and which you pick is up to you.

• Codex: Tau describes tau blood as "ruddy red".
• In the Fire Warrior game, tau have red blood.
• Whereas in the Fire Warrior novel, it's described as "cyan".
• In For the Emperor a footnote mentions that "the tau equivalent to haemoglobin contains cobalt, rather than iron, so their blood and viscera vary from dark blue to purple, depending on the degree of oxygenation". Unfortunately, the author doesn't seem to have done their research here; real-world coboglobin is not blue or purple, but colourless when oxygenated and amber when not. One wonders why they didn't opt for hemocyanin (copper based alternative to haemoglobin), which is conveniently blue when oxygenated.
• And in Xenology the viscera of an ethereal (the same one who was notoriously depicted with toes rather than hooves) is described as blue. The autopsy report also has a blue 'stain' in the corner.

There are likely many more sources I've missed, but these are the ones I had to hand. I looked through the Tau sections of the Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer and the fluff sections of Codex: Tau Empire but found no mentions of blue or red blood.

So to conclude, I'd advise just picking what looks best on the model. If the blood is going to be on skin, then blue blood might not stand out well enough against the blue-grey flesh. If it's on a weapon, then I'd pick red so it can be the blood of whoever your current foe is. If it's on the armour, then pick either red or any shade of blue that stands out.

I thought copper oxodized green, not blue.

Anyways, I'd make the tau skin light blue and the blood a dark blue. After all, blood color has a lot to say about skin color. Human blood is red, and human skin is some variant of brown (which is itself a shade of red).

I mean, you wouldn't expect something with green skin to eject neon orange blood when wounded. Likewise, blue skin should have a blood color that makes sense.

pretty sure its blue.

If their blood is blue, than their blood would be copper based.

Maybe GW just messed up.

Ailaros wrote:I thought copper oxodized green, not blue.

Anyways, I'd make the tau skin light blue and the blood a dark blue. After all, blood color has a lot to say about skin color. Human blood is red, and human skin is some variant of brown (which is itself a shade of red).

I mean, you wouldn't expect something with green skin to eject neon orange blood when wounded. Likewise, blue skin should have a blood color that makes sense.

Same here, just look at the Statue of Liberty for a good example. Also, Mc Coy's frequent reference to Spock's green blood is due to the hemoglobin-equivalent for Vulcans being copper based instead of iron. All that being said, it sounds like there's a lack of continuity in the 40K world on this topic (like that's new... ) so I'd go with whatever you felt looked good.

http://forums.tauonline.org/tau/8889-theory-tau-blood-blue-heres-why-updated.html

A Good read, even if it is about foul xenos.

Tau bleed Red, White, and Blue, for the glory of the Nation, er, Galaxy.

This is a seriously badass thread title.

it does sound like something Clint Eastwood would say dosen't it?

Ailaros wrote:I thought copper oxodized green, not blue.

Copper oxides range from orange to black. You're probably thinking of verdigris, which is generally copper carbonate/chloride/acetate. Also note that copper oxide and hemocyanin are not the same thing, much like hemoglobin being vastly different from rust.

Ailaros wrote:After all, blood color has a lot to say about skin color. Human blood is red, and human skin is some variant of brown (which is itself a shade of red).
I mean, you wouldn't expect something with green skin to eject neon orange blood when wounded. Likewise, blue skin should have a blood color that makes sense.

Human skin skin is darkened by melanin. Compare the skin colour of an albino to the colour of blood and you can see how little the blood is affecting the colour of the skin.
And if you look to the animal kingdom you can find creatures with almost any colour skin you want. I mean, would you expect the blood of Poison Dart Frogs to vary in colour as much as the frogs themselves?

Gavin Thorne wrote:Same here, just look at the Statue of Liberty for a good example.

A better example would be a piece of copper that hasn't been exposed to rain and sea for over a century. Any exposed piping within your house will likely by a red-brown colour. But if you were to cut it, you'd find that untarnished copper is actually paler pink.

Gavin Thorne wrote:Also, Mc Coy's frequent reference to Spock's green blood is due to the hemoglobin-equivalent for Vulcans being copper based instead of iron.

Dude. Star Trek is not known for its scientific accuracy.

Dude. Star Trek is not known for its scientific accuracy.

I completely agree with you, Trek being steeped in olde-timey science fiction and what-nottery, but in this case, there's supporting scientific evidence.

purplefood wrote:Tau are blue apprently they have cobalt or copper(Probably cobalt) though i can't actually remember in their blood instead of iron which makes their blood blue instead of red.

This. They are supposed to have Cobalt rather than Iron in their haemoglobin, lending their blood a blue colour.

Thanks. Now I gotta buy blue paint.

My Tau are white, so I bet blue would stand out pretty good on them. (No, I'm not planning of fielding units of wounded fire warriors, I just want one or two to look like they were hit in the arm or something, just for the realism)

I once made a Fire Warrior to look like he'd been hit by a bolter shell. I used the running legs angled backwards, his arms where flung out wide and his gun was flying out of his hands.

His head was angled back to and he had a big ol bleeding bullet hole in his chest and he was always the first model to be discarded when that unit took casualties.

Come to think of it I painted his blood red, course that was back when the army first came out and I first started playing so I wasen't really up to date on fluff at that point.

Horseshoe crabs have blue blood and it's copper based. They must aliens, it's a conspiracy I tell you!

I would say its red

Blue and heres why:
http://tauonline.org/?content=browse&article=428

All that matter is that they bleed when I shoot them

The tau physiology paper was very well written. I think GW should retcon them to have copper based blood, it makes much more sense.