Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Melissia wrote:Only because we readers mentally attribute human attributes to non-human things. It's not impossible to CREATE a non-human thing, it's just difficult to read about it without assigning human attributes.

Like being bipedal and upright, or having two arms with opposed thumbs on them.

I don't think GW have produced anything that isn't somehow inspired by or a reference to human history or endeavour, the Tau being no exception. But, hey, that's just my opinion.

augustus5 wrote:
The Tau do seem very much to be a socialist society to me. They set aside individual goals for the goals of the state. The etherials are very much like the ruling elites in a socialist society and the rest of the castes are the citizens who work for the goals set by that elite caste. There is little or no room for individual expression and no way for the lower castes to set their own goals.

By that definition, the Empire of Man is socialistic/communist TO THE EXTREME. All praise and glory to the flawless leader. All industry and effort devoted to fueling the war effort. Full castes of brain-washed elite units keeping the peace. Entire planets cleansed clean of life for stepping out of line. The average citizen in ignorant squalor, always readily punished for not serving the state ENOUGH.

Aslo *cough* comissars. Just saying.

Sephyr wrote:

augustus5 wrote:
The Tau do seem very much to be a socialist society to me. They set aside individual goals for the goals of the state. The etherials are very much like the ruling elites in a socialist society and the rest of the castes are the citizens who work for the goals set by that elite caste. There is little or no room for individual expression and no way for the lower castes to set their own goals.

By that definition, the Empire of Man is socialistic/communist TO THE EXTREME. All praise and glory to the flawless leader. All industry and effort devoted to fueling the war effort. Full castes of brain-washed elite units keeping the peace. Entire planets cleansed clean of life for stepping out of line. The average citizen in ignorant squalor, always readily punished for not serving the state ENOUGH.

Aslo *cough* comissars. Just saying.

You mean Stalinism. Socio-communism taken to the extreme would have no leader at all.

Old 40K Forum Argument 4B: Activate!

htj wrote:

Sephyr wrote:

augustus5 wrote:
The Tau do seem very much to be a socialist society to me. They set aside individual goals for the goals of the state. The etherials are very much like the ruling elites in a socialist society and the rest of the castes are the citizens who work for the goals set by that elite caste. There is little or no room for individual expression and no way for the lower castes to set their own goals.

By that definition, the Empire of Man is socialistic/communist TO THE EXTREME. All praise and glory to the flawless leader. All industry and effort devoted to fueling the war effort. Full castes of brain-washed elite units keeping the peace. Entire planets cleansed clean of life for stepping out of line. The average citizen in ignorant squalor, always readily punished for not serving the state ENOUGH.

Aslo *cough* comissars. Just saying.

You mean Stalinism. Socio-communism taken to the extreme would have no leader at all.

Old 40K Forum Argument 4B: Activate!

Again all of you guys are generalizing. The Imperium exterminatuses planets for three main reasons Tyranids, Daemons and genestealers. Not tax returns.

Here is an a world that got exterminatused for a very good reason:

"The battle of Sondheim V. A peaceful Agri-world in the Imperium of Man that has been up to that point far removed from any conflict for thousands of years suddenly sees the skies turn into a multihued mess as the Daemon prince M'kar the Reborn decides to turn it into his private playhouse and Daemons start running loose everywhere. But soon after this a tendril of Hive Fleet Leviathan descends upon the planet and the sky starts glowing in other weird colors as endless numbers of Mycenic spores rain down upon the planet. Gaunts, Genestealers, and Warriors start fighting Bloodletters, Horrors, Daemonettes and Plaguebearers, utterly undeterred by their Daemonic nature. Gargoyles and Furies gnash and tear at one another in the skies while Carnifexes, Tyrannofexes, Hive Tyrants, and all sorts of bio-titans fight Greater Daemons in the streets. Nurglings and Rippers devour one another while Zoanthropes fight psychically with Lords of Change. Now this may sound awesome, but imagine if you were just a normal Imperial Citizen cowering under his bed while watching two of the greatest horrors in the Galaxy have a go at each other. The entire Sky Sentinels chapter is sent to reclaim the planet, but the whole thing is so terrifying that they just decide to Exterminatus the place and blow up the hive fleet tendril."

As a Tau player i must say Taus are not exactly the good guys of the universe, i mean, they dont just float accross the universe in a yellow submarine singing and giving flowers to any one they find. But I agree that they are the lesser evil, ass fluff says when tau find another race they first send their Water Caste to negotiate, only in failing several times and under a constant treat of war they send the firewarriors to cleanse the violent ones and recluit the remaining.

Lets make an example: Somewhere in the universe a young race of non-violent cientist (lets name them Dakkers) make its first jump out they star sistem and have their first non-dakker contact with...

Orks: 'DA FIGHT!!!!!!!!!

(All rainbow) Space Marines: Mmmm...they have something that could be handy lets kill this ones and take a sample.(After investigation) Sweet!! This could solve all our problems, even repair the golden trone, revive the emperor and restore all the hair he has lost...oh yeah! I forgot that's heresy, just wipe them out.

I. Guard: Sir!! We have made contact with an unidentified xeno ship bearing a white flag and with no visible weapons, -A white flag??!! All right guys it seems that we got no choise but crush our ship agains them and give our lifes to the last man...FOR THE EMPEROR!!!!-

Chaos: Honestly man, we are the cool guys, now if you could just bow a little and show me your neck ill prove it to you.

The Hive Mind:....Ñom!

Eldars: Look let me make this clear to you, THIS is the cool table, THAT is where you belong...

D. Eldars: Look let me make this clear to you, THIS is the cool table...now get this leather clothes on and ill spank you later.

Necrons: Hi there good looking! May i say that your command bay is just gorgeus and...wait you are infested of life...let me take care of that for you.

Tau: Hi there!!! Wanna be friends?, sure?, really sure?, really really sure? really really really sure? We got cookies...no? last chance...ill count to 3. 1...2....2 and a half............3, ok this is my big cousin Shas'O, perhaps he will make you change your mind.

Anyway, i play a Farsight army so ill let the loyal tau players stand for them XD.

htj wrote:
You mean Stalinism. Socio-communism taken to the extreme would have no leader at all.

Old 40K Forum Argument 4B: Activate!

Agreed! Please note that I started the post with "By THAt definition", meaning that person's forum post.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Corporal_Reznov wrote:

Again all of you guys are generalizing. The Imperium exterminatuses planets for three main reasons Tyranids, Daemons and genestealers. Not tax returns.

Exterminatus is not the only way to wipe out a population. Look at Armaggedon: an entire population enslaved to death AFTER A VICTORY. For knowing too much about things the Empire would rather keep under wraps. Worked to death and sterilized in camps, new worker population transplanted from somewhere else to be keep production going. It's hard to get more Stalinist than that. It's actually a good parallel with existing totalitarian regimes punishing 'heretical' (counter-revolutionary) knowledge broadly and harshly.

the way i read tau are the good guys, and in thier own alien way they are tring to unite the galaxy in the bes tintrest of all speices... they however do not believe orks are capable of peace (and rightly so) so they so have some desire to comit xenocide none that are paricularly outside the realm of justified though

i think there are execlent points being made on all sides but i think in the 40k univers if you are on the outside you see tau as a threat that may change things, once in it you are likely going to be living in the tau's idea of a free world which yu may not like any better than the imperium

that said as a whole i think the tau are ovrall good and use violence only to spread what they believe if freedom for most species (whether they want it or not)

Corporal_Reznov wrote:Do you know how ridiculous that sounds?

How ridiculous is an omniscient narrator who confesses every second paragraph that he doesn't know much:

TSUA’MALOR. Deathwatch Core Rulebook pg352. wrote:“city, Beldar, is home to the Gue’Retha is a place which the Tau decline to name, but which human malcontents call the Lacuna. This underground research facility, it is rumored, is where the Tau conduct psychological experiments on the gue’la prisoners. The results supposedly help the Tau refine their methods of social manipulation, but no one can be sure since any heard to utter such thought vanish, quite possibly into Lacuna itself”

Corporal_Reznov wrote:Moving on, how can you be sure that this is only limited to that Sept.

If Tau find the ruins new, puzzling and want to explore them, they can't be commonly found on every Tau planet, can they

Corporal_Reznov wrote:

Kroothawk wrote:But Tau are an invention by human writers, wanting an idealistic and not subjugating race.

God-Emperor, Chaos gods, Orks gods and C'tan, please give me strength to sustain myself from these.....argh . The word "Subjugation" as described by merriam-webster.com is "the act or process of bringing someone or something under one's control" and its synonyms are vanquishing, domination. Its related words are defeat.

Yes, and the creators made it clear that Tau don't want to subjugate.

htj wrote:

Sephyr wrote:

augustus5 wrote:
The Tau do seem very much to be a socialist society to me. They set aside individual goals for the goals of the state.

By that definition, the Empire of Man is socialistic/communist TO THE EXTREME.

You mean Stalinism. Socio-communism taken to the extreme would have no leader at all.

Has anyone heard of the crazy idea that Tau are inspired by East Asian societies? That the Western form of Individualism is unknown in countries like Japan or China? And that Confucius wasn't an early Stalinist?

Kroothawk wrote:Yes, and the creators made it clear that Tau don't want to subjugate.

Though that won't stop them if you don't want to voluntarily join.

The difference between the Tau and most of the other codex races/groups is that the Tau are willing to let you live and serve under them, while the majority of the other groups will just plain wipe you out as readily as look at you. The Tau will still take your planet out from under you just like everyone else. It's just that the Tau will ask nicely first and let you stick around (clarification - stick around alive and largely unharmed) afterwards. And if you don't like what the Tau just did, then they might only send you to a reeducation camp (at least according to FFG - I'm well aware that a number of players are violently opposed to the idea of the Tau doing anything like that) instead of shooting you out of hand.

The only other notable exception to the "kill 'em all and take their stuff" attitude is the eldar - and only because you're utterly and completely beneath their notice. If you actually do have something that the eldar want (heaven help you if you unknowingly live on a Maiden World) then they'll slaughter you without a shred of regret just like everyone else. The good news is that you can usually avoid obtaining something that the eldar want by studiously ignoring all of those ancient ruins scattered around the galaxy (which is usually a good move anyway, given how many of them seem to be anti-C'Tan devices or something similar).


The Tau attitude toward everyone else really seems to be the 40K version of "The White Man's Burden", all nice and militantly grim-darked up just like the rest of the 40K setting.

@Sephyr.

My bad, reading comprehension failure on my part.

@Kroothawk

I don't think the Tau are based on Stalinist Russia, I was merely countering the definition of Communism as presented in Sephyr's post. Wrongly, as it turns out. Their being based on Eastern cultures is pretty obvious, as far as I'm concerned. I mean, they came from the Eastern Fringe of the galaxy. Dead subtle, that is.

TMonkeyGuru wrote:But I agree that they are the lesser evil, ass fluff says when tau find another race they first send their Water Caste to negotiate

Submit or die is the same thing that Darkseid says. So Tau are kinda like Darkseid, but not as cool.

I guess this is fan canon, but I'm of the idea that the tau is willing to tolerate a neutral group. So long as they are not openly hostile, the plan is to just wait them out or ignore them till they come around. The tau want people to join them. They don't want to kill everyone, so I don't like the idea that they instantly flip from "cookies and cake!" to "burn in plasma!!" on people who aren't attacking them.

I figure the long term plan is to just increase their presence. Start with a few traders who flood the markers with tau goods. Maybe send a few diplomats to advise the leaders. After the people get use to the tau presence and all the benefits, they start placing buildings "I am glad you like are cookies, but it's so hard to ship them. Maybe you can let us build one little factory?" It won't be long before they drop in a earth caste building crew to build cites.

Even when there is open conflict, there main goal is not to kill everyone, but to force negotiations.

nomotog wrote:I guess this is fan canon, but I'm of the idea that the tau is willing to tolerate a neutral group.

I don't. The ultimatum is surrender or die. Not surrender, coexist, or die.

So the fluff about them developing long-term trading partnerships etc; we'll just throw that out the window and paint them with the "submit or die" brush. Okie dokie.

Don't make me throw the kitten picture at you again.

Edited for quote:
Codex, page 8:

Members of the Water caste had established trade agreements with Imperial worlds on the frontier and exchanges of goods and technology were common.

The Tau have an entire population that is devoted to non-violent pursuits.
Codex page 9 you hardly need an entire caste dedicated to trade and diplomacy if you're going to give ultimatums; a fire caste warrior could easily do that kind of blunt work:

So it is that Water caste members are bureaucrats, politicians, negotiators and and administrators. They are the merchants and diplomats....Water caste members often accompany Tau expeditionary forces to negotiate safe transit through alien systems and smooth the passage of Tau merchants and colonists.

Melissia wrote:

nomotog wrote:I guess this is fan canon, but I'm of the idea that the tau is willing to tolerate a neutral group.

I don't. The ultimatum is surrender or die. Not surrender, coexist, or die.

I don't think the tau actually has the firepower to enforce a join or die policy. They have wars with the orks IoM and all kinds of openly hostile aliens. Diverting a battle fleet to destroy a planet that poses no threat is stupid. They have real threats that need that battle fleet. They can just let a water caste envoy soften them up over time.

nomotog wrote:I don't think the tau actually has the firepower to enforce a join or die policy. They have wars with the orks IoM and all kinds of openly hostile aliens. Diverting a battle fleet to destroy a planet that poses no threat is stupid. They have real threats that need that battle fleet. They can just let a water caste envoy soften them up over time.

Which is all well and dandy, and yet, that's still what they do.

If the Tau want a planet which does not want to be ruled by them and rejects all potential treaties to that effeect, they'll first attempt to subvert that planet's culture and plant sympathizers with which to create upheaval, and then eventually they'll invade and subjugate. Pretty much like what they did in the first Cain book.

In the long run the Tau Empire cannot accept the existence of truly neutral planets, at least not as long as they do not wish to abandon their philosophy of the greater good which sooner or later has to include everyone. In most other settings the Tau would be the villains, comparable to the Star Trek Dominion perhaps, which has a similar agenda.

Only in Warhammer 40k, where everyone else either wants to either
kill you ( for being different, or because of hunger, or because it's fun, because you are vermin, because you tried to modify your pocket calculator, because you look strangely at the commisar, because you weren't praying hard enough, because some terrible alien farseer decided that it's necessary, because some even more terrible alien warlord decided that your face would make a nice mask, because your screams would sound lovely, because you simply had bad luck, because the techpriest in charge forgot that dancing around a nuclear reactor isn't quite enough, because your planetary govenor is corrupt and now the entire planet is punished for his misdeeds, because after a 18 hour shift at the factory your tongue slipped...ah, so many reasons, because you didn't want to give your only son to some giant, mutant freaks whose idea of recruiting is lethal gladiatorial combat..., ah so many reasons to die in the dark 40. millenium ) or rape your soul for all eternity, the Tau, who "merely" wish to incorporate you into their alien culture ( of course, once again your own wishes and desires are secondary ) could be called good guys.

Melissia wrote:Which is all well and dandy, and yet, that's still what they do.

If the Tau want a planet which does not want to be ruled by them and rejects all potential treaties to that effeect, they'll first attempt to subvert that planet's culture and plant sympathizers with which to create upheaval, and then eventually they'll invade and subjugate. Pretty much like what they did in the first Cain book.

I get that it is canon, but I don't think it makes any sense. That's why I called my post fan cannon.

And I don't think yours makes any sense. It's an overly idealized version, what the tau WANT you to think sure, but it's not what actually happes.

I'll make a deal with you Melissia; you let me believe what I want about the fictional universe that my toy soldiers inhabit and I'll do the same for you.

Melissia wrote:And I don't think yours makes any sense. It's an overly idealized version, what the tau WANT you to think sure, but it's not what actually happes.

That's fair.

because some terrible alien farseer decided that it's necessary

It should be noted that this particular one applies just as much to the Tau (change the word 'farseer' to 'ethereal') as it does to everyone else. If the Tau leadership honestly believes that your death will serve the Greater Good, then they'll have you killed.

It's just that the Eldar Farseers tend to be much better at identifying exactly who it is that needs to die than anyone else, and therefore use the method significantly more often than anyone else. The Tau, being a notably non-psychic race, are forced to rely on more conventional methods of analysis to pinpoint such individuals. And such methods have a much more difficult time identifying specific 'assassination-worthy individuals'.

Melissia wrote:

nomotog wrote:I guess this is fan canon, but I'm of the idea that the tau is willing to tolerate a neutral group.

I don't. The ultimatum is surrender or die. Not surrender, coexist, or die.

Kroot didn't surrender and still prosper, Demiurg didn't surrender and still prosper. Actually, you will not even find so much as a fan-fiction of the Tau Empire massacring the population of a planet (only Farsight and his follower Brightsword).

Melissia wrote:Pretty much like what they did in the first Cain book.

You mean the planet the Tau left on their own account? Leaving a planet as the ultimate form of subjugation?

They didn't leave the planet IIRC. They actually stayed there and kept trying to convert more and more of the population to Tau beliefs so that there would be more rebellion.

Hell the entire conflict in the first Cain book was caused by Tau subversion (rabble rousing to convert people to their beliefs) combined with genestealer cults.

Kroothawk wrote:

Melissia wrote:

nomotog wrote:I guess this is fan canon, but I'm of the idea that the tau is willing to tolerate a neutral group.

I don't. The ultimatum is surrender or die. Not surrender, coexist, or die.

Kroot didn't surrender and still prosper, Demiurg didn't surrender and still prosper. Actually, you will not even find so much as a fan-fiction of the Tau Empire massacring the population of a planet (only Farsight and his follower Brightsword).

The faresight and brightsword are neat examples. In both cases, they got in trouble for their actions. They where acting outside of where they should have and got punished. Bright sword got recalled to face some kind of charge and farsighit has been made a rebel. (More fan canon, but I bet that the eternal caste now has a plan in case anymore commanders go rouge. Involving hijacking the ship controls and setting them a drift out in nowhere.)

Melissia wrote:They didn't leave the planet IIRC. They actually stayed there and kept trying to convert more and more of the population to Tau beliefs so that there would be more rebellion.

Hell the entire conflict in the first Cain book was caused by Tau subversion (rabble rousing to convert people to their beliefs) combined with genestealer cults.

Actually, they did leave in the end. They figured that the place was such a mess that it wasn't worth the trouble of trying to take over.

Or in other words, they were going to wait a couple of decades and then come back once the planet had straightened its issues (generally, genestealer related) out. It was a straightforward cost/benefit analysis. Let the Imperium pay the cost of cleaning up after the genestealers, and then swoop back in once the Imperium had been distracted and was looking somewhere else.

The discussion on the "Greater Good" can be better understood, if you look at the end of World War 2 in Europe:

In Western Europe, two major ideologies clashed: German and Italian fascism and French/British/American ideas of freedom, human rights and democracy. The allies won the war and the Western allies forced their ideology on Germany, with imprisonment of their opponents (anyone who fights freedom, human rights and democracy), massive reeducation and social manipulation with the effect that the German population finally adopted the other ideology. According to the argumentation in this thread, this makes the Western Allies evil and another subjugating empire trying to force their ideology on defeated enemies (implying that the support for freedom/humanrights/democracy is just another ideology on the same level as fascism).

The Western Allies were no saints, but they certainly were not as evil and on the same level as the Nazi regime.

So in 40k, fighting for the genocide of all Xeno scum and rule of the human master race (IoM) or trying to establish a peaceful union of Xeno races exchanging goods and knowledge for mutual benefit (Tau Empire) is not the same. Trying to convert a racist, aggressive and undemocratic society to a tolerant, peaceful and democratic one by reeducation and social manipulation is not something evil. Trying to imprison terrorists, racists and fascists is not a bad thing. Think about it.

Kroothawk wrote:The discussion on the "Greater Good" can be better understood, if you look at the end of World War 2 in Europe:

In Western Europe, two major ideologies clashed: German and Italian fascism and French/British/American ideas of freedom, human rights and democracy. The allies won the war and the Western allies forced their ideology on Germany, with imprisonment of their opponents (anyone who fights freedom, human rights and democracy), massive reeducation and social manipulation with the effect that the German population finally adopted the other ideology. According to the argumentation in this thread, this makes the Western Allies evil and another subjugating empire trying to force their ideology on defeated enemies (implying that the support for freedom/humanrights/democracy is just another ideology on the same level as fascism).

The Western Allies were no saints, but they certainly were not as evil and on the same level as the Nazi regime.

So in 40k, fighting for the genocide of all Xeno scum and rule of the human master race (IoM) or trying to establish a peaceful union of Xeno races exchanging goods and knowledge for mutual benefit (Tau Empire) is not the same. Trying to convert a racist, aggressive and undemocratic society to a tolerant, peaceful and democratic one by reeducation and social manipulation is not something evil. Trying to imprison terrorists, racists and fascists is not a bad thing. Think about it.

I am a little confused, are you trying to say that the tau practice democracy? Because they don't. They are a monarchy.

nomotog wrote:

Kroothawk wrote:The discussion on the "Greater Good" can be better understood, if you look at the end of World War 2 in Europe:

In Western Europe, two major ideologies clashed: German and Italian fascism and French/British/American ideas of freedom, human rights and democracy. The allies won the war and the Western allies forced their ideology on Germany, with imprisonment of their opponents (anyone who fights freedom, human rights and democracy), massive reeducation and social manipulation with the effect that the German population finally adopted the other ideology. According to the argumentation in this thread, this makes the Western Allies evil and another subjugating empire trying to force their ideology on defeated enemies (implying that the support for freedom/humanrights/democracy is just another ideology on the same level as fascism).

The Western Allies were no saints, but they certainly were not as evil and on the same level as the Nazi regime.

So in 40k, fighting for the genocide of all Xeno scum and rule of the human master race (IoM) or trying to establish a peaceful union of Xeno races exchanging goods and knowledge for mutual benefit (Tau Empire) is not the same. Trying to convert a racist, aggressive and undemocratic society to a tolerant, peaceful and democratic one by reeducation and social manipulation is not something evil. Trying to imprison terrorists, racists and fascists is not a bad thing. Think about it.

I am a little confused, are you trying to say that the tau practice democracy? Because they don't. They are a monarchy.

authocratic theocracy/hierocracy ( assuming that there can be theocracies which have, for example, democratic elements, which the Tau Empire seems to lack )