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It's unfortunate, really, how the Imperial lose like 90% of the battles they fight against the tau in the fluff. I have yet to read anything where a battlesuit doesn't completley wreck everything, never less even get damaged by anything Imperial.

Stupid question, since this month is a tau release and all, but who'd you guys think would win the new Damocles Campaign on Prefectia? And better yet, who do you think would win the Damocles Campaign in general?

I just hope that when the time comes for the IG updates that GW releases another Damocles book which features at least like Maybe even just ONE battle suit getting destroyed. Weather its comprehensible for GW that the tau can actually lose to the Imperial Guard is yet to be seen, but for the love of all that is fair and balanced In fluff, let's see the IoM finally beat the Tau for once, Shall we?

And BTW - I know about the Zeist campaign, Voltoris, the Kappa Mortis Incident, etc, but that is just a drop of wins in an ocean full of defeats... So yeah, who wins the Kayoun campaign, and who wins the second crusade?

My impression was the Imperium won the original Damocles campaign. The forces were recalled but absent the Tyranids attack, there wouldn't be any more Tau.

The Tau win, because that's the whole point of the setting. The Imperium can never win, they can at best hope to delay their inevitable defeat and the extinction of humanity. Even when they do win a battle here and there they still lose the war. So even if the Imperium "wins" the new campaign, it will only be at the cost of the Tau conquering planets elsewhere that were left undefended and the Tyranids turning another hive world into a tasty snack.

 Silverthorne wrote:
My impression was the Imperium won the original Damocles campaign. The forces were recalled but absent the Tyranids attack, there wouldn't be any more Tau.

No, not at all. They would have done more damage (perhaps even taking Dal'yth it'self), but they were, far, far from defeating the tau as a whole. And the imperium wasn't doing too well in the waning days of the crusade either. Their orbital hold was beggining to weaken, and their momentum had been long run down. Even if they had won Dy'lath, that would have been the end of the crusade.

Edit: That being said, it was a brutal campaign, which hit the tau like nothing had ever hit before. It was there first look at what they imperium could bring to bear, and many things they had no effective counter for (titans, psykers, ect).

 Silverthorne wrote:
My impression was the Imperium won the original Damocles campaign. The forces were recalled but absent the Tyranids attack, there wouldn't be any more Tau.

I consider the first Crusade a win for Humanity, but that was during the second sphere of expansion. What about this one?

And Pregrine: I know, and that's what dissapoints Me. The Tau will have a campaign based on their wars with the Imperium because they are the Empire's greatest threat. When it's time for the next Imperial army to get new releases (most likely IG or the Sob,) there will likely be no mention of the tau at all. No campaigns set against the tau, no new missions or fluff based on the Imperium's retaliation against the Tau because the tau just aren't important enough to the IoM!!! That's the stupid part. Whenever there's a battle between the two powers, it's going to be a Tau win because the Imperium has "bigger" things to worry about. Seriously, with all the asses that the tau have kicked, I wonder why GW can't just progress the story a little, to the point where the Imperials kick the Tau out.of their space to show everyone why Humans are still the dominant species of the universe. Unfortunately, gak don't work like dat.

123ply wrote:
Humans are still the dominant species of the universe.

They aren't. They're a dying species, living out its last days in such unimaginable misery that it would probably be better to just get it over with and let the Tyranids eat them. They continue to exist for one reason, and one reason only: their sheer size allows them to lose war after war and still continue to exist. The only question which remains in 40k is not whether humanity will survive, but who will inflict the final blow.

If you don't understand this fact then you have really missed the entire point of the setting.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Silverthorne wrote:
My impression was the Imperium won the original Damocles campaign. The forces were recalled but absent the Tyranids attack, there wouldn't be any more Tau.

No, not at all. They would have done more damage (perhaps even taking Dal'yth it'self), but they were, far, far from defeating the tau as a whole. And the imperium wasn't doing too well in the waning days of the crusade either. Their orbital hold was beggining to weaken, and their momentum had been long run down. Even if they had won Dy'lath, that would have been the end of the crusade.

Edit: That being said, it was a brutal campaign, which hit the tau like nothing had ever hit before. It was there first look at what they imperium could bring to bear, and many things they had no effective counter for (titans, psykers, ect).

As an Imperial fan boy , I hate you and will disregard everything you said.

I'm kidding. I don't hate you but I can honestly say I consider my self an IoM fanboy. I really don't think that we would have been stopped on Dy'lath, I really do think the Imperium would have won. Based in what I read from the Warhammer wiki, it seemed like we still had more juice to go before we were to be stopped, but then again, the Tau did not yet have counters to some of our things like titans and super heavies as you said. The Tau now have crazy riptides, and the Stormsurge is defiantly going to waste a lot of armour everywhere they're mentioned. Because of inferiority if the Tau if you compared them then to now, I think the guard would have eventually pushed through Dy'lath. Though I could say things would have been different if that battle were to have taken place in current times where the Tau have developed immensely...

But that's just it. With the direction the Tau is going, it doesn't seem possible for even space marines to win anymore. We had so much trouble taking out crisis suits, now those guys have riptides and giant ghost battlesuits I can't see the Imperium winning anymore. Sure we outnumber you like 50 to 1, but we're stretched so thinly and ha e so much more to deal with that there would be never enough manpower to shred the Tau cheese. The only way to win is if GW and BL writers didn't underpowered the Guard. I remember in this ine short story, about 50 leman russet got crushed by a riptide and a team of broadsides. How in hell's name is that possible? Every story I read where the Tau fight the IG, everything we have is crap. Our tanks are the Leman Russ Cardboard variants, our infantry die in droves like they're unarmed, and even Lascannon and battle cannon shots for whatever reason don't do any damage to battle suits. It was even stated in a WD that the battlesuits' shields can stop even baneblade shells, yet somehow pulse rifles can shred Astartes power armour like it's flak armour.

I just want to see the IoM demonstrated as the power houses they are to be. I want to see Leman Russe withstand missles and rail guns like they should. I want to see Autocannon and missle launchers actually damage battlesuits like they should, and our infantry being, I don't know, infantry? And not just men who shoot at the air and get killed by it.

Such a rant, but if the Guard can wreck the Eldar constantly, along with just about every other race (except Tyranids. Tyranids will always kill the gak out of us but that's acceptable imo.) What makes the Tau impervious to losing?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Peregrine wrote:

123ply wrote:
Humans are still the dominant species of the universe.

They aren't. They're a dying species, living out its last days in such unimaginable misery that it would probably be better to just get it over with and let the Tyranids eat them. They continue to exist for one reason, and one reason only: their sheer size allows them to lose war after war and still continue to exist. The only question which remains in 40k is not whether humanity will survive, but who will inflict the final blow.

If you don't understand this fact then you have really missed the entire point of the setting.

They're dying, sure, but the fact is: they're still the dominant species. And they don't lose war after war, they infact win most of them... unless they're facing the tau or tyranids, then they lose.

123ply wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Silverthorne wrote:
My impression was the Imperium won the original Damocles campaign. The forces were recalled but absent the Tyranids attack, there wouldn't be any more Tau.

No, not at all. They would have done more damage (perhaps even taking Dal'yth it'self), but they were, far, far from defeating the tau as a whole. And the imperium wasn't doing too well in the waning days of the crusade either. Their orbital hold was beggining to weaken, and their momentum had been long run down. Even if they had won Dy'lath, that would have been the end of the crusade.

Edit: That being said, it was a brutal campaign, which hit the tau like nothing had ever hit before. It was there first look at what they imperium could bring to bear, and many things they had no effective counter for (titans, psykers, ect).

As an Imperial fan boy , I hate you and will disregard everything you said.

I'm kidding. I don't hate you but I can honestly say I consider my self an IoM fanboy. I really don't think that we would have been stopped on Dy'lath, I really do think the Imperium would have won. Based in what I read from the Warhammer wiki, it seemed like we still had more juice to go before we were to be stopped, but then again, the Tau did not yet have counters to some of our things like titans and super heavies as you said. The Tau now have crazy riptides, and the Stormsurge is defiantly going to waste a lot of armour everywhere they're mentioned. Because of inferiority if the Tau if you compared them then to now, I think the guard would have eventually pushed through Dy'lath. Though I could say things would have been different if that battle were to have taken place in current times where the Tau have developed immensely...

But that's just it. With the direction the Tau is going, it doesn't seem possible for even space marines to win anymore. We had so much trouble taking out crisis suits, now those guys have riptides and giant ghost battlesuits I can't see the Imperium winning anymore. Sure we outnumber you like 50 to 1, but we're stretched so thinly and ha e so much more to deal with that there would be never enough manpower to shred the Tau cheese. The only way to win is if GW and BL writers didn't underpowered the Guard. I remember in this ine short story, about 50 leman russet got crushed by a riptide and a team of broadsides. How in hell's name is that possible? Every story I read where the Tau fight the IG, everything we have is crap. Our tanks are the Leman Russ Cardboard variants, our infantry die in droves like they're unarmed, and even Lascannon and battle cannon shots for whatever reason don't do any damage to battle suits. It was even stated in a WD that the battlesuits' shields can stop even baneblade shells, yet somehow pulse rifles can shred Astartes power armour like it's flak armour.

I just want to see the IoM demonstrated as the power houses they are to be. I want to see Leman Russe withstand missles and rail guns like they should. I want to see Autocannon and missle launchers actually damage battlesuits like they should, and our infantry being, I don't know, infantry? And not just men who shoot at the air and get killed by it.

Such a rant, but if the Guard can wreck the Eldar constantly, along with just about every other race (except Tyranids. Tyranids will always kill the gak out of us but that's acceptable imo.) What makes the Tau impervious to losing?

Pehaps they could have continued, but they wouldn't have got very far. Look where Dal'yth is in the tau empire.
You would still have the vast majority of tau space to push trhough. Now this map is a bit bigger than what it was back then (this is mid-3rd, versus dal'yth which was late 2nd(?), but you get the picture.

It did, however, show something very important about the imperium. How much they underestimated the tau. They thought that crusade could kill the tau, but all that crusade's fighting was focused mainly in a single sept. It also shows how unprepared the tau were for an attack of that ferocity. They were used to dealing with local alien presence, an orks. They had never faced an enemy of that magnitude.

If any of the Imperium's big guns were to be brought to bear on the Tau (things like Arks Mechanici and Ramillies Star Forts) in full-scale Crusade (which the Damocles Gulf Crusade most definitely was not; it was a minor Crusade at best), then I highly doubt the Tau would be able to withstand Imperial wrath.

 Peregrine wrote:

123ply wrote:
Humans are still the dominant species of the universe.

If you don't understand this fact then you have really missed the entire point of the setting.

The point of the setting is the eternal stalemate, not the full-on doom of humanity. But both of those are superseded by the real point of the setting: Selling more Citadel™ miniatures.

 dusara217 wrote:
If any of the Imperium's big guns were to be brought to bear on the Tau (things like Arks Mechanici and Ramillies Star Forts) in full-scale Crusade (which the Damocles Gulf Crusade most definitely was not; it was a minor Crusade at best), then I highly doubt the Tau would be able to withstand Imperial wrath.

Well, yes, that's sort of obvious. Not only are the tau tiny, if the imperium could bring it's full force against an one oppnent, they'd pretty much win. It's just that they are getting attacked from all side, and cannot afford to do something like that.

I'm not doubting the imperium's power, just the power of what they have sent so far. The imperium severely underestimates the tau, and is continually out-maneuvered by them.

 dusara217 wrote:
If any of the Imperium's big guns were to be brought to bear on the Tau (things like Arks Mechanici and Ramillies Star Forts) in full-scale Crusade (which the Damocles Gulf Crusade most definitely was not; it was a minor Crusade at best), then I highly doubt the Tau would be able to withstand Imperial wrath.

Correct, though it's doubtful that the Tau will ever experience anything close to the Imperium's wrath, due to a pair of factors: The Tau Empire is a tiny, irrelevant piece of the galactic puzzle, and they're always going to have a certain amount of plot armor, as their empire being destroyed means GW won't be able to sell the Tau codex.

 Silverthorne wrote:
My impression was the Imperium won the original Damocles campaign. The forces were recalled but absent the Tyranids attack, there wouldn't be any more Tau.

This isn't the Damocles Crusade, this time the Tau have invaded Prefectia which is a world in the Damocles Gulf.

Imperium is almost definitely going to lose, especially since this is to support a Tau release.

As for the Imperium's ability to wipe out the Tau, obviously they could if they put enough resources together. However they CAN'T right now. As of 999.M41 the Imperium is bogged down everywhere, especially due to Armageddon, 13th Black Crusade, and the Tyrannic Wars. The resources aren't available to wipe out the Tau, and the Tau are taking advantage of that and expanding.

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

123ply wrote:

 Co'tor Shas wrote:

 Silverthorne wrote:
My impression was the Imperium won the original Damocles campaign. The forces were recalled but absent the Tyranids attack, there wouldn't be any more Tau.

No, not at all. They would have done more damage (perhaps even taking Dal'yth it'self), but they were, far, far from defeating the tau as a whole. And the imperium wasn't doing too well in the waning days of the crusade either. Their orbital hold was beggining to weaken, and their momentum had been long run down. Even if they had won Dy'lath, that would have been the end of the crusade

Edit: That being said, it was a brutal campaign, which hit the tau like nothing had ever hit before. It was there first look at what they imperium could bring to bear, and many things they had no effective counter for (titans, psykers, ect).

As an Imperial fan boy , I hate you and will disregard everything you said.

I'm kidding. I don't hate you but I can honestly say I consider my self an IoM fanboy. I really don't think that we would have been stopped on Dy'lath, I really do think the Imperium would have won. Based in what I read from the Warhammer wiki, it seemed like we still had more juice to go before we were to be stopped, but then again, the Tau did not yet have counters to some of our things like titans and super heavies as you said. The Tau now have crazy riptides, and the Stormsurge is defiantly going to waste a lot of armour everywhere they're mentioned. Because of inferiority if the Tau if you compared them then to now, I think the guard would have eventually pushed through Dy'lath. Though I could say things would have been different if that battle were to have taken place in current times where the Tau have developed immensely...

But that's just it. With the direction the Tau is going, it doesn't seem possible for even space marines to win anymore. We had so much trouble taking out crisis suits, now those guys have riptides and giant ghost battlesuits I can't see the Imperium winning anymore. Sure we outnumber you like 50 to 1, but we're stretched so thinly and ha e so much more to deal with that there would be never enough manpower to shred the Tau cheese. The only way to win is if GW and BL writers didn't underpowered the Guard. I remember in this ine short story, about 50 leman russet got crushed by a riptide and a team of broadsides. How in hell's name is that possible? Every story I read where the Tau fight the IG, everything we have is crap. Our tanks are the Leman Russ Cardboard variants, our infantry die in droves like they're unarmed, and even Lascannon and battle cannon shots for whatever reason don't do any damage to battle suits. It was even stated in a WD that the battlesuits' shields can stop even baneblade shells, yet somehow pulse rifles can shred Astartes power armour like it's flak armour.

I just want to see the IoM demonstrated as the power houses they are to be. I want to see Leman Russe withstand missles and rail guns like they should. I want to see Autocannon and missle launchers actually damage battlesuits like they should, and our infantry being, I don't know, infantry? And not just men who shoot at the air and get killed by it.

Such a rant, but if the Guard can wreck the Eldar constantly, along with just about every other race (except Tyranids. Tyranids will always kill the gak out of us but that's acceptable imo.) What makes the Tau impervious to losing?

Pehaps they could have continued, but they wouldn't have got very far. Look where Dal'yth is in the tau empire.

Spoiler:

You would still have the vast majority of tau space to push trhough. Now this map is a bit bigger than what it was back then (this is mid-3rd, versus dal'yth which was late 2nd(?), but you get the picture.

It did, however, show something very important about the imperium. How much they underestimated the tau. They thought that crusade could kill the tau, but all that crusade's fighting was focused mainly in a single sept. It also shows how unprepared the tau were for an attack of that ferocity. They were used to dealing with local alien presence, an orks. They had never faced an enemy of that magnitude.

Wow, I never noticed how close Dal'yth was to the fringe of their territory. I was under the impression it was deeper than that. Still though, if I remember correctly, the Tau have spent more of their forces on thay Sept world than they have on any other planet. If the Imperium were to win there, they would have survived the bulk of the Tau's firepower and moved on.

And Harriticus: the fact that the Kayoun book came out to help supplement the Tau is the reason I think the Imperials will lose on Prefectia. Buuuut, will they lose to the Third Sphere of Expansion, or will the Tau be denied of the worlds they believe they can claim?

Find out more on "CV40K," coming up next!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 asorel wrote:

 dusara217 wrote:
If any of the Imperium's big guns were to be brought to bear on the Tau (things like Arks Mechanici and Ramillies Star Forts) in full-scale Crusade (which the Damocles Gulf Crusade most definitely was not; it was a minor Crusade at best), then I highly doubt the Tau would be able to withstand Imperial wrath.

Correct, though it's doubtful that the Tau will ever experience anything close to the Imperium's wrath, due to a pair of factors: The Tau Empire is a tiny, irrelevant piece of the galactic puzzle, and they're always going to have a certain amount of plot armor, as their empire being destroyed means GW won't be able to sell the Tau codex.

Plot armour. Both the Imperium and the Tau's best friend.

123ply wrote:
With the direction the Tau is going, it doesn't seem possible for even space marines to win anymore.

That's because it isn't. The question is not will the marines win, it's will they take losses that are a crippling blow to the Imperium, or merely just a heavy burden.

I remember in this ine short story, about 50 leman russet got crushed by a riptide and a team of broadsides. How in hell's name is that possible? Every story I read where the Tau fight the IG, everything we have is crap. Our tanks are the Leman Russ Cardboard variants, our infantry die in droves like they're unarmed, and even Lascannon and battle cannon shots for whatever reason don't do any damage to battle suits. It was even stated in a WD that the battlesuits' shields can stop even baneblade shells, yet somehow pulse rifles can shred Astartes power armour like it's flak armour.

Yep, sucks to be a guardsman.

I just want to see the IoM demonstrated as the power houses they are to be.

They aren't a powerhouse, they're a dying civilization that loses to pretty much anything else in the setting.

They're dying, sure, but the fact is: they're still the dominant species.

They really aren't. Even ignoring the Tau the Necrons are vastly superior in every way if/when they finally bother to use their full strength, Orks are just plain unbeatable long-term, Chaos will always exist no matter what humanity does, and the Tyranids are just taking time to enjoy their meal instead of wiping out humanity in a single overwhelming wave of death. The only faction the Imperium can possibly win against is the Eldar, and only because the Eldar are another dying civilization that doesn't have the sheer numbers to match the Imperium.

And they don't lose war after war, they infact win most of them... unless they're facing the tau or tyranids, then they lose.

No, they don't win, and that's the whole point of the setting. Even when the Imperium achieves its immediate battlefield objectives it's just delaying the inevitable a bit, it's probably a pyrrhic victory, and while it was happening a dozen other planets were lost to various enemies. Asking why the Imperium loses is like asking why water is wet.

 Harriticus wrote:
Imperium is almost definitely going to lose, especially since this is to support a Tau release.

It boils down to this. Tau win because GW says so. If Imperium wins, it's because GW says so. Don't try to rationalize it.

Yea, just going to enjoy the ride. Tau are gonna win the campaign because what else can be grimdark except the eventual demise of humanity? It gets annoying.

It bears mentioning that in no Tau-Imperium conflict has the Imperium even come close to treating the Tau as a serious threat. The forces they have committed have been minimal, matching the Tau's threat level(which is to say almost non-existent).

The Tau are a flea biting the Imperial lion's big toe. They warrant nothing more than a idle itch compared to actual galactic threats. Realistically, the Tau don't even deserve a codex in the game if we were to base it on actual impact in the setting.

If the Tau were to ever lose a conflict, they'd just get extinguished. The Imperium crushes bigger and more dangerous empires every day without a second thought, the Tau empire is beneath their notice in the grand scheme of things. They only survive because of this, when/if the Tau actually get the Imperium's attention they will be snuffed out like a candle in a hurricane. So the Tau always win their fights. Which is about as impressive as the flea saying he beat the lion because he drank a little blood and the lion didn't kill him.

They've committed more to defeating them then they have to defeating any other enemy faction with the exception of Chaos and the Necrons.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
They've committed more to defeating them then they have any other enemy faction with the exception of Chaos and Necrons.

Incorrect. The 1st Daemocles Gulf Crusade had a total roster that was less than 10% of the forces that were engaged on Armageddon.

The Tau are small beans on the Galactic scale.

The Tau are below Orks, Chaos, Necrons, Tyranids, and the Eldar in terms of resources that have been committed to countering them. Largely because the Tau are in one location, while everyone else is basically everywhere.

Per the IG codex, the army en route to fight them is 10 times larger than the imperial army that fought on Armageddon.

In fact, the only imperial force on record that's bigger is the force fighting the 13th crusade.

Typical GW number inflation.

Even with that, its far from impressive. While Armageddon was big, it was just one planet. And they're sending barely many more troops to take on an entire race which has one podunk corner of the Galaxy.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Typical GW number inflation.

lol, okay. So we're going to ignore the figures when they don't suit our argument.

Even with that, its far from impressive. While Armageddon was big, it was just one planet. And they're sending barely many more troops to take on an entire race which has one podunk corner of the Galaxy.

This ridiculous statement aside, your assertion was that the Imperium has never taken the Tau seriously. If you think that 1000+ regiments, several titan legions and a dozen whole chapters isn't a serious response than you're simply wrong.

It wasn't a dozen chapters. It was a handful of representatives from a dozen chapters barely making up a complete company. So 12 chapters sent a combined total of around 100 marines.

1000 regiments is nothing. Literally nothing. The Imperium's birth rate is in the quadrillions. Thousands of regiments get raised every day with birth rates on that order of magnitude.

The tau philosophy is "To make an omlette, you gotta break a few eggs". This is the proverbial egg-breaking.

Such a shame considering they're on Ultramar's doorstep and Calgar simply can't be arsed to roll up and issue exterminatus right to their homeworld. Realistically the smurfs are a better deployment option (Over Raven Guard and White Scars) considering nothing of huge note happened to them since the First Tyranic War which was a complete failure; Everything else was small beans really.

 Grey Templar wrote:
when/if the Tau actually get the Imperium's attention they will be snuffed out like a candle in a hurricane.

Unless of course enough time passes that Tau technology has advanced to a point where the Imperium's advantage in sheer numbers is negated. Which is the whole point of the Tau, right now they are little more than a distraction, but they have the potential to destroy the Imperium. And the Imperium can not stop that certain death in the future because they have to spend everything they have on fighting for survival, and giving even the slightest thought to what the Tau might do tomorrow means dying today.

Also something that has not been mentioned yet, the situation with the Tau and the Farsight Enclaves. Would the Imperium decide to focus on invading and wiping out the fledging Independent faction or like they have in events past potentially seek a joint accord with the Farsight Enclaves agains the Tau Empire bretheren. From what I have read about Farsight it seems that it is only a matter of time before him and the Empire come to blows.

The reason for the IoM's stance as a "dying race on the verge of collapse" blah blah blah, is because they are the supreme power of the universe. How much territory does the Imperium control, now compare it to the territory that any other faction controls. If your race owns thousands, if not millions of worlds, it's no surprise that you're getting attacked at every angle by forces much more insignificant than you are. I mean, I've stated it before that the the Imperium is the biggest threat to the Tau, yet the Tau is the smallest threat to the Imperium.. and yes it is true that the Imperium has spent less troops on the tau than on any faction they have over all. Point aside, look at the new series coming out, "The Beast Arises." It's not even out yet but anybody who's heard of the series knows about how it's referring to a time where humanity was at its peak, and was attacked and almost destroyed by an ork waaagh that made the wars on Armageddon look like they were minor skirmishes. Humanity defeated the orks, who caused the greatest war since the Hours Heresy, and now they're back to having their numbers bolstered to such crazy amounts, and everything has been rebuilt (just about) to a point where it's as if that galaxy sized waaagh never even happened. The orks from this series were soooooooooooooooo much more dangerous than the Tau currently are, and Humanity won.

Really though, when I think about it, the Imperium will probably win this campaign. Not with the book which was just released, but with a future book, hopefully, kind of like what GW did with the Shield of Baal campaign: Where the Tyranids utterly dominated the guard in the first set, then the tide turned by the end of the second set of books.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gmaleron wrote:
Also something that has not been mentioned yet, the situation with the Tau and the Farsight Enclaves. Would the Imperium decide to focus on invading and wiping out the fledging Independent faction or like they have in events past potentially seek a joint accord with the Farsight Enclaves agains the Tau Empire bretheren. From what I have read about Farsight it seems that it is only a matter of time before him and the Empire come to blows.

Knowing the Imperium, they probably don't even know what the Farsight Enclaves are. If they did, I could see them going to war being more likely than them teaming up against the loyalist Tau.

I'm actually note sure if humanity necessarily controls more planets than any other race, specifically Orks. We know the Imperium is often described as being isolated states and planets surrounded by hostile space, and its been made clear many times the Imperium should not be thought of as a contiguous land empire of some sort. The fact that a map of the galaxy is represented as a 2 Dimensional plane is a pity since it doesn't really accurately reflect the idea of motion or nation building in space well but its also not like they can do better. But it should be kept in mind that the Imperium is very much states connected by travel and communication which can often between them have wide gulfs and areas of space in which they have no control. Back to the prior point, particularly looking at the map in the Ork Codex and their description numerous times as a more numerous race than humanity and as being stretched so far that the Imperium has never had space it discovered which was not already infested by Orks, I'd actually always gained the impression that the Orks, obviously, control more territory than any other species. The difference is that, like the reason they haven't overwhelmed the galaxy canonically, they're not a united faction. To be honest the extent to which the Imperium is 'united' is itself a highly contentious issue but, even with that, the Imperium is still vastly more united than the Orks are. That being said 'dominant' can mean many different things. For example the Tyranid and Orks both seem dominant to me since they've never been and seem to never be even close to under threat of extinction. No matter what happens they keep chugging on, keep remaining a major threat and never are 'in the twilight of their time' like the Eldar and Imperium are. The Orks achieve this even though the entire species has never once come close to being a united Hegemon unlike Eldar, Necron, Humans, Tau or Tyranids. In that ways the Orks as a species, to me, are 'dominant' since they seem incapable of suffering any real lasting harm. Of course, to be honest, in the setting the Chaos Gods are of course the conventionally 'dominant' group since their power is canonically and consistently stated to outstrip everyone else's and it is made clear that (barring Slaanesh potentially against Ynid) they do not have any actual potential threats to their existence at all. I might not like it but I definitely think the Chaos Gods can be described as 'dominant' before Mankind (a nebulous concept anyway since Mankind isn't fully united so you really just mean humans who submit to the Imperium and exclude humans who are independent, Chaos worshippers or members of the Tau Empire from the species).

As for the wider issue, the moaning about the Tau actually winning a campaign against the Imperium again, you'll have to forgive me since though I do sympathise with the fact that the Raven Guard were forced to Job hard for the Tau Empire (although I do not take issue with the concept of Shadowsun killing as major a figure as she did, she is the headline character of her faction and thus needs to be established as a threat to be fair to the Tau players who are as legitimate fans and players as any other faction's players and thus deserve the same treatment) overall I have no sympathy for complaints about the Tau victory. Are the Tau experiencing a rash of victories and good fortune? Yes. But so what? If we wish to do this numerically then the Imperium still wins far more narrative campaigns than any other faction put together. I hope these Tau victories will be a sign that GW will be more fair in distributing wins and awesome moments to all factions but, for now, I'm happy just to have at least one non-Imperium faction receiving even a modicum of the same positive coverage as the Imperium does.

Also...seriously? The Imperium won Macragge, 2nd Armageddon, Ichar, Piscina, Sanctus Reach, Damnos and that is only naming the ones off hand. The Tau do have a good record against the Imperium specifically, good for them since somebody needs it, whilst the Imperium has a fantastic record against Orks, Tyranids, Chaos, Necron and Eldar. I'm an Imperium Player and it is obvious that our Faction is far more supported and successful in the Fluff than any other faction. The Setting barely even parodies how horrible the Imperium is now (what drew me to it initially) and instead tries usually to play it straight as if I'd even for a second actually swallow their justifications. The Tau are having a good run, the Imperium are being used as the beat stick for it, but other factions have been used as a beat stick for the Imperium since the beginning. Nobody likes it but condemning one example of it is hypocritical. I'm all for condemning any case of it, Imperium or Tau, but then I'll condemn both. Personally I've chosen to embrace it in the vain hope that we'll finally see the other factions, specifically Xenos and Chaos, get some more shine to them.

Then on a side note to be helpful to the first post; I can link you many stories where Battlesuits get toasted if you want. Got a Mechanicus short story one where they blow up, a couple of Space Wolves ones where they blow up, a bunch about Ko'sarro Khan and Imperial Knights wiping them out and even the 13th Penal Legion assassinating a prior Commander Brightsword. Also the Farsight ones where the Orks are played up as a serious threat for the first time in like forever. To be honest I must disagree, I hope the Imperium loses this conflict since that will be the first of these narrative supplement campaigns where the Imperium simply loses. I become tired of playing a faction with such plot armour that they never lose a single narrative supplement or campaign, its boring to read when I always know who is going to win, thus I truly hope that the Damocles Warzone is finally a war the Imperium unambiguously loses. Having the Imperium actually suffer a shock like that would be enormously fun and advance the plot more than 'we were losing but then cool marines arrive and we win' which virtually every narrative supplement boils down to of late.

Than as a side note, about The Beast, a thing to note on it is that there is no way, at this point, to canonically state if the Imperium has recovered from it in full. I don't remember being told anywhere that this occurred or being given a list of things and places lost in the war. If anything I always assumed that the Warhammer Fluff made quite clear the Imperium of now is clearly inferior in size and power to what it was and, no doubt, the Horus Heresy and The Beast are apparently the two incidents which have hurt it the most in recent times. Than, as the flipside, the Orks literally seem not to have even noticed the fact that the Beast came and went. For them it was just another fight, a big and good fight, but the Orks are under no belief better fights aren't coming or that they've seen their heyday of some sort. So , if anything, Goro-Ulanor-Beast-Ghazghkull continues to show that the Orks keep on rolling regardless of what happens in the Galaxy.

As for this conversation about 'would the Tau survive, how many men does the Imperium send' I won't get into it since, to me, it misses the key underlying points anyway. The numbers are always going to be tricky and unreliable GW simply doesn't do them well. That means we can use them, and if we commit ourselves to even using a few we must commit ourselves to treating them all as valid, but at the same time we have to accept things are going to get strange then. The key point, anyway, is that of course the Tau Empire is minor now but, as is pointed out often, the Imperium began with Terra and Mars. A small beginning in no way precludes greatness, it is history that an Empire that is small and peripheral becomes the new hegemon, obviously since if only an existing superpower can become the new superpower than we have a circular situation. The Tau Empire is so a burgeoning small power. It is minor now but, like the Imperium, that in no way precludes it from achieving incredibly things and growing exponentially. The Tau's entire theme, as explicated often, is a young dynamic race which grows incredibly quickly compared to everyone else.

To be honest though, in the end all other things aside;

 Finlandiaperkele wrote:

 Harriticus wrote:
Imperium is almost definitely going to lose, especially since this is to support a Tau release.

It boils down to this. Tau win because GW says so. If Imperium wins, it's because GW says so. Don't try to rationalize it.

He's right. This is literally the underlying point to it all.

123ply wrote:
Wow, I never noticed how close Dal'yth was to the fringe of their territory. I was under the impression it was deeper than that. Still though, if I remember correctly, the Tau have spent more of their forces on thay Sept world than they have on any other planet. If the Imperium were to win there, they would have survived the bulk of the Tau's firepower and moved on.

Dal'yth was deeper than that. It's literally the only one of "several" worlds that managed to hold out against the Crusade.