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 Wyzilla wrote:

 EngulfedObject wrote:
Yea, people don't seem to research their favorite factions very thoroughly. I think it's fine to have your own headcanon (I know I do) but at the same time you have to acknowledge what's official.

Also, the reason why Farsight can live so long is because of his vampiric blade. The blade itself could be from Chaos, the Necrons, or even some unknown Xenos species.

>Favorite faction is Slaaneshi CSM's.

>Loves the fact that they're homicidal hedonistic eldritch psychopaths.

I don't see what's the problem here.

Don't take it personally. I wasn't referring to you. I meant people on this forum in general who don't seem to read up on the most basic fluff of their faction (like the Ethereal pheremone thing).

My reply to you was about the Farsight Enclaves. I know you like CSMs. I've only started posting recently but I've been reading stuff on the 40K Background forum for about a year now.

nomotog wrote:

 EngulfedObject wrote:

nomotog wrote:
I don't have it either. Someone dose though, maybe they will stop by and fill in where it comes from.

Though for my 2 cents I don't like the join or die take because it's just kind of lazy. Tau can do a whole lot more then threaten.

The Lexicanum already cites the 6th ed codex. I understand liking a faction but it's best to research them properly. The codex implies pretty heavily (or even outright states) that the Tau want all to join the greater good, one way or the other. They don't really give others a choice. Of course they use a carrot and stick approach but they will always use the stick when the carrot fails.

There's a pretty detailed description of the Damocles Crusade in the codex. The whole thing starts when the Ethereals launch an elaborate plan to incorporate the worlds in the Damocles Gulf.

This is directly from page 14 of the codex:

"To some of the High Council, the Imperium seemed so powerful that overt aggression might lead to a war that they could not win. The leaders of the Fire caste called for war, but it was Aun'Va, an Ethereal second in authority only to
Ethereal Supreme Aun'Wei, who determined the plan."

It then goes into detail of how the Tau try to entice the worlds to join them. So yea, it outright states that the Tau brought on the conflict since there was really only one way the Imperium would react. The codex also implies that the Tau and other species are all being mind controlled through pheromones by the Ethereals. It also say this about the Vespids:

"There have been whispers alluding to a hidden connection between the Vespids' calm acceptance of annexation and the interface helms given to their leaders, though no evidence to support such claims has ever been forthcoming."

The Tau have a sinister side, just like all other 40K factions. There is no truly "good" faction.

Unless they changed it, that was a response to first contact with the IoM. It went kind of like you would expect. The IoM blew up a tau trading vessel. The Fire cast wanted war because, you know that is kind of their job. Then the aun overruled them and they went with diplomacy that ended up flipping a lot of border worlds. Then you have the crusade.

Unless they changed it, the pheromones and mind control are imperial theories. The joke being that the IoM just don't understand how the tau can get along with each other, so they have to make up secret conspiracies to explain away what could just be basic niceness.

If your going to do the tau sinister side, then make sure it's sinister. Don't let it be direct like "join us or die". Subtly is key.

That is unless they changed things with the last codex.

Really? The IoM blowing up a tau trading vessel isn't mentioned in the 6th ed codex so that might have changed. I don't remember ever reading about that though, even back in 5th ed. The pheromone thing is HEAVILY implied in the new codex and also with the Farsight Enclaves supplement (and always was if you look at the fluff where the Ethereals first appeared and everybody magically made peace).

The IoM theory thing is probably from Xenology, which is actually an excellent read. But yea, the Tau being sinister is hard to dispute with the new codex.

 EngulfedObject wrote:

nomotog wrote:

 EngulfedObject wrote:

nomotog wrote:
I don't have it either. Someone dose though, maybe they will stop by and fill in where it comes from.

Though for my 2 cents I don't like the join or die take because it's just kind of lazy. Tau can do a whole lot more then threaten.

The Lexicanum already cites the 6th ed codex. I understand liking a faction but it's best to research them properly. The codex implies pretty heavily (or even outright states) that the Tau want all to join the greater good, one way or the other. They don't really give others a choice. Of course they use a carrot and stick approach but they will always use the stick when the carrot fails.

There's a pretty detailed description of the Damocles Crusade in the codex. The whole thing starts when the Ethereals launch an elaborate plan to incorporate the worlds in the Damocles Gulf.

This is directly from page 14 of the codex:

"To some of the High Council, the Imperium seemed so powerful that overt aggression might lead to a war that they could not win. The leaders of the Fire caste called for war, but it was Aun'Va, an Ethereal second in authority only to
Ethereal Supreme Aun'Wei, who determined the plan."

It then goes into detail of how the Tau try to entice the worlds to join them. So yea, it outright states that the Tau brought on the conflict since there was really only one way the Imperium would react. The codex also implies that the Tau and other species are all being mind controlled through pheromones by the Ethereals. It also say this about the Vespids:

"There have been whispers alluding to a hidden connection between the Vespids' calm acceptance of annexation and the interface helms given to their leaders, though no evidence to support such claims has ever been forthcoming."

The Tau have a sinister side, just like all other 40K factions. There is no truly "good" faction.

Unless they changed it, that was a response to first contact with the IoM. It went kind of like you would expect. The IoM blew up a tau trading vessel. The Fire cast wanted war because, you know that is kind of their job. Then the aun overruled them and they went with diplomacy that ended up flipping a lot of border worlds. Then you have the crusade.

Unless they changed it, the pheromones and mind control are imperial theories. The joke being that the IoM just don't understand how the tau can get along with each other, so they have to make up secret conspiracies to explain away what could just be basic niceness.

If your going to do the tau sinister side, then make sure it's sinister. Don't let it be direct like "join us or die". Subtly is key.

That is unless they changed things with the last codex.

Really? The IoM blowing up a tau trading vessel isn't mentioned in the 6th ed codex so that might have changed. I don't remember ever reading about that though, even back in 5th ed. The pheromone thing is HEAVILY implied in the new codex and also with the Farsight Enclaves supplement (and always was if you look at the fluff where the Ethereals first appeared and everybody magically made peace).

The IoM theory thing is probably from Xenology, which is actually an excellent read. But yea, the Tau being sinister is hard to dispute with the new codex.

I know it was in BFG on the tau, but that is rather old, so it could have been changed. How do the Tau meet the IoM in the new codex?

Pheromones has been played with for a long time. Pheromones, or psychic powers, or something else. There is clearly something up. I acrually wish they would maybe build it up more.

nWell the tau met humans before they met the IoM. There isn't much about the actual meeting AFAIK, so I think the BFG stuff is still canon.

nomotog wrote:
I know it was in BFG on the tau, but that is rather old, so it could have been changed. How do the Tau meet the IoM in the new codex?

Pheromones has been played with for a long time. Pheromones, or psychic powers, or something else. There is clearly something up. I acrually wish they would maybe build it up more.

Oh they kinda just stumbled upon the Imperium. I guess sooner or later you're bound to run into them.

From the 6th ed codex, page 14:
"The Tau Empire's first introduction to Humanity came not with the ruling Imperium, but with dissident elements that were operating on the fringe of that mighty dominion. The Imperium of Man is the largest realm in the galaxy, although much within its sprawling borders has never been explored or has been forgotten over its history. The region of space around the Damocles Gulf is just such an area, a wilderness where the Tau Empire had found room to take root.

The Tau first encountered free captains, pirates and lost human colonies that had regressed so that they had long forgotten their origins and any connection to their distant birth world. Those initial contacts ranged from friendly trade negotiations to instant hostility. It was some time before the Water caste came to grasp the fact that the humans they encountered were merely the lost remnants or willing outcasts of an incomprehensibly large galactic empire. Worlds claimed by dissident humans were soon annexed into the Tau Empire, but there was much debate about how to approach those planets still bound to the Imperium. In typical fashion, the high ranking caste leaders debated the situation before the Ethereals."

It then goes on to the stuff I quoted earlier and then about the Imperium's disproportionate retribution (which is "characteristically brutal"). And I meant no offense earlier, I realize fluff gets changed all the time and also depends on what source material you read so not everyone's on the same page.

Oh and they kinda did expand on it I think. The Farsight Enclaves supplement describes the whole Ethereal being killed and them not being under the influence anymore. But I kinda just skimmed through it so I'm not sure in how much detail it was described. Lots of cool stuff in there though, I totally suggest checking it out if you're a Tau fan. Though I guess it's anti-Greater Good

Ya that is about the same story from BFG. First they made contact with rouge traders then latter they found the planets still loyal to the IoM.

nomotog wrote:
Ya that is about the same story from BFG. First they made contact with rouge traders then latter they found the planets still loyal to the IoM.

So I guess it's the same just without the IoM blowing up a trade ship. I like the new version more though, the Imperium is slow to respond but is always a bit over the top when it does.

What about those Spider people ( I forget the name) told about during the Enclaves book, how they didn't want to join, so their whole race was practically exterminated. Farsight Lost his leg there, that's fairly interesting. Or how in Farsights supplement it tells of farsight's revelation about the truth of the Ethereals but doesn't tell anyone due to his fear of what may happen to their Empire. Overall Tau are an honorable society, and would likely be the best candidates next to Orks to rule the Galaxy. But the dark side of the Tau is the mysterious Ethereals, them guys are up to some bad juju

NauticalKendall wrote:
What about those Spider people ( I forget the name) told about during the Enclaves book, how they didn't want to join, so their whole race was practically exterminated. Farsight Lost his leg there, that's fairly interesting. Or how in Farsights supplement it tells of farsight's revelation about the truth of the Ethereals but doesn't tell anyone due to his fear of what may happen to their Empire. Overall Tau are an honorable society, and would likely be the best candidates next to Orks to rule the Galaxy. But the dark side of the Tau is the mysterious Ethereals, them guys are up to some bad juju

What about them? I don't know what happened in this story. I kind of want to guess they were the reek?

The ethereal role is not decided yet. It might as well turn out that Farsight was just corrupted by his daemon sword essentially becoming the first tau heretic.
I don't think it'd turn that way, however. It's cooler as it is or we're just getting the old story over again.

 Las wrote:

nomotog wrote:
I would question the idea of military expansion in relation to the tau. Most examples of expansion we get are diplomatic and not military. You know kroot, vespin, and even humans, at first. Tau are flexible in how they expand. It's not always at the end of a gun.

But the threat is ALWAYS there. Declining peaceful incorporation leads directly to the fire caste bringing the hurt. Seceding from the Empire is as out of the question as it would be for Imperial worlds. Any way you slice it, their expansionism is aggressive and predatory.

This statement seems a little disconnected from the real world.

As I've said, I'm American. I'm also proudly from a state that fought on the right side of the American Civil War.

You have to be pretty far out of your mind to think that the South was good and that the North was evil. After all, the reason there was a war was because the USA elected a president from a party that's stated purpose and reason for being was to end slavery, and before he even took office, the cry-baby southerners tried to take their (slavery)ball and go home.

The South initially tried to peacefully secede (leave the Empire). The North held onto several pieces of land the South claimed. What happened then? After the South tried to throw federal troops out, the North fought back, won, and then forced the South to rejoin the Union. Was the North evil? No. The south, by most definitions, left for evil reasons- ie, so they could preserve their freedom to buy and sell black-skinned human beings. The north forced states to remain part of it at gun and sword-point. Are they evil for it? No.

Logically, it follows that the Tau can't be evil for forcing worlds to stay part of it with threats of violence unless you also believe that Abe Lincoln was an evil man pursuing evil ends.


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 koooaei wrote:
The ethereal role is not decided yet. It might as well turn out that Farsight was just corrupted by his daemon sword essentially becoming the first tau heretic.
I don't think it'd turn that way, however. It's cooler as it is or we're just getting the old story over again.

It could be either.

We had a conversation going, once, about the purpose of the Tau, but stoogey Imperial trolls wrecked it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Matt.Kingsley wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Furyou Miko wrote:
No, actually. What I want is for you to give us as harsh and uncompromising a list of Tau negative qualities as you can find. Every little thing the Tau do that isn't completely, unarguably Good, I want you to list them and tell us every single way in which the Tau are evil.

Their society isn't evil. It's naive and uncompromising and undemocratic, but it isn't evil.

Hell- when was the last time in 40k that you heard of an army allowing a defeated enemy to flee a battlefield unmolested?

The Tau did that at the end of the Damocles Crusade.

Anrakyr and other Necron Overlords offer this as it's part of their honour system (though not all of them seem the lesser races as honourable, but Anrakyr certainly does). Before the battle begins he gives his foes the opportunity to flee without conflict and after their defeated he does the same thing.

So no, your precious Tau aren't the only ones who do that.

... but they're the only one that does that from the top down. It isn't an exception or a rogue decision from the usual actions of the race. The Tau's willingness to preserve life is beause of their faction's central leadership and because of their natural tendencies, not in spite of them. The only instance that I know of in which the Tau didn't (Taros) was when the Imperials assassinated the Ethereal leading the Tau and the Fire Caste was left to solve the Imperial problem the way Fire Caste solves problems.

It'd be great if someone wrote a story about what would happen if one of the less bloodthirsty groups of necrons encountered the Tau Empire. Sadly, we don't see a lot of Black Library books with few to no human characters. It'd be nice if someone at GW realized that xenos are capable of interacting with each other without some god-damned Space Marine watching.


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 Co'tor Shas wrote:

nomotog wrote:

 Las wrote:
Oh I definitely think the Tau are subjugated as well. Racial caste systems tend to do that. I do like me some grimdark, though.

The cast system was something in place before the Aun. Depending on how you look at it. You had the distinct 4 tribes (with some of the differences I get the impression they might not be the same species anymore.) and the Aun basically enforced them in writing. A quest to be asked is do the tau mind it? Maybe. I mean the tau are aliens and this could be totally fine for their way of thinking, but they are aliens in fiction written by people, sot your going to see the writer projecting their feeling on to them. It's fun to think about.

Yeah, there were definite casts already, what the atherials did was sort of "officialize" it. And there was a genetic difference between them even then, and that was been exacerbated over the years. They are defiantly different sub-species, if not distinct species all by themselves. Inter-breeding is strictly forbidden, so there is no real way to tell how different they truley are. Not only that, the caste system is quite intersesting, all castes but the Aun are equal, not like the indian caste system.

It is possible that interbreeding is no longer possible, because the castes are so different.

We know that some of them, in fact, had wings at one point. The genetic variation between them all seems too large for them to still be the same species. Tau might be better described as a genus.

... which makes the term "caste" seem misleading, since it's not a matter of social structure, but biology. The social structure follows from that, not the other way around.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Las wrote:


Well, THE fascist government, as in mussolini's Italy, allowed religious freedom and refuted the idea of racial theory. These policies were reversed at the behest of the Nazi regime but still. Plenty of precedent.

As for government, you're just describing a protectorate. Most gakky imperial power established them in their past. It's basically holding a society hostage for economic gain. If they step out of line, they get smacked down.

EDiT: btw, your whole "only ignorant cultures who can't accept this ideology deserve extermination"spiel is super creepy dude.

That's how the Ethereals think.

Put yourself in their place. You were born into a leadership role and know that you are responsible for the well-being of billions of lives. You know that the galaxy is a violent place. You know that there are numerous violent species out there that are wanting to destroy those you care about and are responsible to. You believe, deep down, that co-existence for as many as possible is important, but you don't want those you care about to die. At some point, you have to balance the desire to live peacefully with the knowledge that beings that are prone to violence will, eventually, kill those you care about. What do you do?

I also happen to like The Walking Dead, and it seems to have an underlying theme that reinforces how the Ethereals act. When Rick is naive about the intentions of others, things often go badly, and usually when he reacts with violence, it is in positions where he has no other reasonable choice... but he can seem quite bastardly for doing so, even when he has no other choice. Maybe I just thing he's usually right when being violent because I have the same name.


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 Furyou Miko wrote:
What's funny is that Rending was invented as a rule to represent the insane rate of fire from Assault Cannons being able to cut terminators in half... and then they didn't give it to any other chainguns, but they did give it to a fethload of things (sniper rifles, Retributor squads, I'm sure there are others) to represent improbable aiming skills.

I don't know much about Sisters except that Grey Knights like to kill them... but I can say something about sniper rifles.

With a sniper rifle, it is possible to get a lucky shot, yes. you hit someone in the eye or head and they go down. Ultimately, though, it's not because snipers themselves are awesome- it's the sniper rifle that is awesome. It's the bullet hitting the right spot that makes it deadly. The sniper rifle's round doesn't simply get better randomly- it hits a weak point. Sniper rifles (and assault cannons, I do believe) can't scratch a Land Raider, because it's a fething LAND RAIDER. It's an AV14 box all around. It has no weak points. A LR battle cannon isn't even capable of damaging the guns on its side sponsons. it's a rolling fortress, and the only way to kill it is to hit it with something so big that it busts through the armor outright to hit the juicy bits on the inside (or stripping hull points, because I guess someone in GW wants to turn vehicles into regular old units, eventually).

Here's the problem with Pask getting rending. Say you have a Land Raider (or Monolith, if that floats your boat, which is likely since Monoliths float) sitting in a field. An entire regiment of Lemar Russ Exterminators or Punishers rolls up and surrounds it. They spend the next TEN fething YEARS shooting the Raider. What happens? Nothing. The Raider sits there, now paintless, but undamaged, because Land Raiders don't have exploitable weak points, period.

Then Pask runs up to it and kills it after literally every single point on the tank has been hit with the exact same shells that Pask is using? No, not possible, naturally. If Pask is some sort of psyker or is blessed by the Void Dragon, then sure, that makes sense. But it doesn't matter how good of a shot you are if there is literally impossible to damage your target, at all, with the weapon and ammunition you are using. Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. if it is literally impossible for a LR Exterminator or Punisher to kill a Land Raider without Pask, then Pask must be doing something to the tank and its gun that no mere mortal can do.


For the record, I think hull points may be the single dumbest mechanic GW has ever come up with, ever. Hitting something three times with a weapon that scratches the paint but can't actually even bump the crew enough to let go of their controls... and that somehow kills it is ridiculous. You kill a tank by killing the crew... by hitting them or cooking off the fuel or ammunition (or something else) which then kills the crew. If the crew can't possibly be interrupted from doing their jobs by a weapon, it shouldn't be able to kill the tank. GW's designers need to play some WW2 Online.

Here's the problem with Pask getting rending. Say you have a Land Raider (or Monolith, if that floats your boat, which is likely since Monoliths float) sitting in a field. An entire regiment of Lemar Russ Exterminators or Punishers rolls up and surrounds it. They spend the next TEN fething YEARS shooting the Raider. What happens? Nothing. The Raider sits there, now paintless, but undamaged, because Land Raiders don't have exploitable weak points, period.

Give e'm ten years and they'll do break the LR, a turn doesn't last 10 years, so in the span of a turn, a standard Punisher fails to do any damage or hit any weak spot, meanwhile, Pask with his superior skills manages to do it.

 Bobthehero wrote:

Here's the problem with Pask getting rending. Say you have a Land Raider (or Monolith, if that floats your boat, which is likely since Monoliths float) sitting in a field. An entire regiment of Lemar Russ Exterminators or Punishers rolls up and surrounds it. They spend the next TEN fething YEARS shooting the Raider. What happens? Nothing. The Raider sits there, now paintless, but undamaged, because Land Raiders don't have exploitable weak points, period.

Give e'm ten years and they'll do break the LR, a turn doesn't last 10 years, so in the span of a turn, a standard Punisher fails to do any damage or hit any weak spot, meanwhile, Pask with his superior skills manages to do it.

Nope. It is literally impossible nor a non-Pask Punisher to hurt a LR. In-game, I think you can have 9 Punishers on the table, hitting 10 shots per turn each, for a theoretical 6 turns. 540 hits- in a regular 40k game- that have a 0% chance of doing damage.

What do you think are the realistic odds of a single Punisher shot inflicting damage on a Land Raider?

Just as importantly, how many shots from an M-16 do you think it'd take to kill an M-1 Abrams (with the latest TUSK)?

A long ass time, say what, ten years? Eh, obviously in any normal combat situation, it will do no damage. 10 years of sustained shooting is not normal conditions.

 Bobthehero wrote:
A long ass time, say what, ten years? Eh, obviously in any normal combat situation, it will do no damage. 10 years of sustained shooting is not normal conditions.

Does this hold true for M-16s as well?

Maybe, I dunno, we use 84mm to blow tanks in my country.

@Norton

If you're going to pull any analogy out of your ass and use it as an example for every possible scenario concerning a world under Tau control wanting to secede from the Empire, why don't we instead use India, or Poland, or Czechoslovakia or Hungary or The United States or Ireland or Indonesia or any other positive example instead of the freaking Confederacy. If any and all example of a state seceding from a larger entity is comparable ONLY to the CSA and the propagation of slave economies as you just stated, then by definition if you support the right for your own country to exist then you also think Lincoln was an 'evil man.'

Your bias makes real discussion impossible. The fact that you think your point is logical just because the American Civil War once happened is just downright hilarious.

Guys, why don't we just keep the discussion within the 40K universe? Once we start discussing things like communism, fascism, the American Civil War, the British Empire, slavery, etc everyone's just going to bring in their own bias and the discussion can only really go downhill from there. I've seen too many threads dragged down by people hurling insults about people's views.

I think the 40K universe has more than enough fluff to draw upon for us to discuss this topic.

Why are we talking about the Anti-tank capabilities of a primarily anti-infantry tank? The reason pask can nail a LR with a Gatling gun is because his experience in dealing with enemy armor gives him a list of weak spots in their armor to exploit. Maybe he's shooting into vision ports, external power cables or cracked welds in the armor.

 Las wrote:
@Norton

If you're going to pull any analogy out of your ass and use it as an example for every possible scenario concerning a world under Tau control wanting to secede from the Empire, why don't we instead use India, or Poland, or Czechoslovakia or Hungary or The United States or Ireland or Indonesia or any other positive example instead of the freaking Confederacy. If any and all example of a state seceding from a larger entity is comparable ONLY to the CSA and the propagation of slave economies as you just stated, then by definition if you support the right for your own country to exist then you also think Lincoln was an 'evil man.'

Your bias makes real discussion impossible. The fact that you think your point is logical just because the American Civil War once happened is just downright hilarious.

You could also compare systems that want to leave to the IRA, or Basque rebels, or the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka.

EVERY nation makes demands, at gunpoint, of its citizens. You don't pay taxes, you go to jail. I don't understand how the Tau are bad for doing it when it's the de facto position of literally every nation on Earth.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Why are we talking about the Anti-tank capabilities of a primarily anti-infantry tank? The reason pask can nail a LR with a Gatling gun is because his experience in dealing with enemy armor gives him a list of weak spots in their armor to exploit. Maybe he's shooting into vision ports, external power cables or cracked welds in the armor.

It's a Land Raider. It doesn't have weak points.

Besides, if it had said weak points, a regular old Punisher would, eventually, be able to hit it. There isn't so much as a one in a billion chance of a normal LR Punisher or Executioner being able to kill a Land Raider.

Pask is doing something unnatural. Only explanation that makes sense. Guns don't get better at punching through armor because someone else picks up the gun, which is what Pask does. Being better at finding weak points is what Tank hunter does.

No, you see, your explanation is flawed because shooting something for 10 years will damage the armor, as I've said, Pask is good enough to find weak points now. And there are weak points on AV14

 Bobthehero wrote:
No, you see, your explanation is flawed because shooting something for 10 years will damage the armor, as I've said, Pask is good enough to find weak points now. And there are weak points on AV14

I'm pretty sure that if you have a thick enough piece of steel, you get to the point where a small-calibre round just won't do anything.... ever.

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Las wrote:
@Norton

If you're going to pull any analogy out of your ass and use it as an example for every possible scenario concerning a world under Tau control wanting to secede from the Empire, why don't we instead use India, or Poland, or Czechoslovakia or Hungary or The United States or Ireland or Indonesia or any other positive example instead of the freaking Confederacy. If any and all example of a state seceding from a larger entity is comparable ONLY to the CSA and the propagation of slave economies as you just stated, then by definition if you support the right for your own country to exist then you also think Lincoln was an 'evil man.'

Your bias makes real discussion impossible. The fact that you think your point is logical just because the American Civil War once happened is just downright hilarious.

You could also compare systems that want to leave to the IRA, or Basque rebels, or the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka.

EVERY nation makes demands, at gunpoint, of its citizens. You don't pay taxes, you go to jail. I don't understand how the Tau are bad for doing it when it's the de facto position of literally every nation on Earth.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Why are we talking about the Anti-tank capabilities of a primarily anti-infantry tank? The reason pask can nail a LR with a Gatling gun is because his experience in dealing with enemy armor gives him a list of weak spots in their armor to exploit. Maybe he's shooting into vision ports, external power cables or cracked welds in the armor.

It's a Land Raider. It doesn't have weak points.

Besides, if it had said weak points, a regular old Punisher would, eventually, be able to hit it. There isn't so much as a one in a billion chance of a normal LR Punisher or Executioner being able to kill a Land Raider.

Pask is doing something unnatural. Only explanation that makes sense. Guns don't get better at punching through armor because someone else picks up the gun, which is what Pask does. Being better at finding weak points is what Tank hunter does.

Of course it has weak points. Unless the hinges, tracks, wheels, cabling, vents and the interior that you can blast into once the doors drop is made of indestructium then there are places where a very talented and very experienced tank killer can exploit.

Normal Punishers can't do it because the normal MO of their gunners is "Point gun at thing. Make thing go away". Pask has the know how to be precise with the gun.

 TheCustomLime wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Las wrote:
@Norton

If you're going to pull any analogy out of your ass and use it as an example for every possible scenario concerning a world under Tau control wanting to secede from the Empire, why don't we instead use India, or Poland, or Czechoslovakia or Hungary or The United States or Ireland or Indonesia or any other positive example instead of the freaking Confederacy. If any and all example of a state seceding from a larger entity is comparable ONLY to the CSA and the propagation of slave economies as you just stated, then by definition if you support the right for your own country to exist then you also think Lincoln was an 'evil man.'

Your bias makes real discussion impossible. The fact that you think your point is logical just because the American Civil War once happened is just downright hilarious.

You could also compare systems that want to leave to the IRA, or Basque rebels, or the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka.

EVERY nation makes demands, at gunpoint, of its citizens. You don't pay taxes, you go to jail. I don't understand how the Tau are bad for doing it when it's the de facto position of literally every nation on Earth.


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 TheCustomLime wrote:
Why are we talking about the Anti-tank capabilities of a primarily anti-infantry tank? The reason pask can nail a LR with a Gatling gun is because his experience in dealing with enemy armor gives him a list of weak spots in their armor to exploit. Maybe he's shooting into vision ports, external power cables or cracked welds in the armor.

It's a Land Raider. It doesn't have weak points.

Besides, if it had said weak points, a regular old Punisher would, eventually, be able to hit it. There isn't so much as a one in a billion chance of a normal LR Punisher or Executioner being able to kill a Land Raider.

Pask is doing something unnatural. Only explanation that makes sense. Guns don't get better at punching through armor because someone else picks up the gun, which is what Pask does. Being better at finding weak points is what Tank hunter does.

Of course it has weak points. Unless the hinges, tracks, wheels, cabling, vents and the interior that you can blast into once the doors drop is made of indestructium then there are places where a very talented and very experienced tank killer can exploit.

Normal Punishers can't do it because the normal MO of their gunners is "Point gun at thing. Make thing go away". Pask has the know how to be precise with the gun.

It's an AV14 box. The very idea is that to do anything more than scratching the paint, you need a weapon of incredible strength- Str 9 or greater. The thing just shruggs off anything else and keeps moving forward.

As people like to point out, the LR was a good piece of equipment during the Dark Age of Technology. It was built for front-line troops back in the day when the Predator was an IFV and the Leman Russ was just for PDFs.

In order to damage the wheels or treads enough that it stops moving, you need gear dedicated to killing heavy tanks, and even that is a crap-shoot.

A weapon that has less power than a pulse rifle isn't going to manage that, no matter what you aim it at.


The irony does not excape me that I'm trying to convince people that the Land Raider is, in fact, an excellent piece of equipment while pro-imperials try to convince me it's as shoddily made as everything else the Imperium cranks out.

We're not saying it shoddily made like the tau crap, we're saying its not invulnerable.

 Bobthehero wrote:
We're not saying it shoddily made like the tau crap, we're saying its not invulnerable.

... and it takes a really big gun to make it so. Otherwise, people'd be dropping the same with massed pulse rifle fire.

That's not what I'm saying. The odds of a normal Punisher just blasting away at a Land Raider of actually damaging it are so slim that using a D6 at all is too generous. It's just that Pask is so good at what he does that he knows where to point that hail of lead to hit the very, very, very few places where those bullets will do any damage.

Land Raiders are very good IFVs that can take a huge amount of damage but they aren't invincible. Their operation necessitates sections and parts that aren't 100% heavily armored.

The reason Pulse Rifle fire won't do jack is because 1) The rounds of a Punisher cannon are probably more damaging and 2) The Punisher dumps out an unholy amount of dakka. Ever seen a minigun fire? Imagine that but on a larger scale. In the hands of a skilled gunner they're bound to hit something.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
That's not what I'm saying. The odds of a normal Punisher just blasting away at a Land Raider of actually damaging it are so slim that using a D6 at all is too generous. It's just that Pask is so good at what he does that he knows where to point that hail of lead to hit the very, very, very few places where those bullets will do any damage.

Land Raiders are very good IFVs that can take a huge amount of damage but they aren't invincible. Their operation necessitates sections and parts that aren't 100% heavily armored.

The reason Pulse Rifle fire won't do jack is because 1) The rounds of a Punisher cannon are probably more damaging and 2) The Punisher dumps out an unholy amount of dakka. Ever seen a minigun fire? Imagine that but on a larger scale. In the hands of a skilled gunner they're bound to hit something.

Both of those are not true. The pulse rifle hits as hard with more AP and a squad of fire warriors at rapid fire range produces more shots. For it to be true, the Punisher would have to be so inaccurate (because most shots miss) that actually hitting those weak points would be luck, not skill, and the widly shot bullets would, on occasion, happen to hit those parts anyway, no matter who fires them.

... and I think being AV 14 all around means there are no weak spots. What happens when a group of Spacies?orks, etc charge a vehicle and hit on the rear armor value doesn't mean everyone runs to the back of it. They shoot in view holes and smash weak parts. The Land Raider is AV14 because there are no weak parts to smash.

I highly doubt that, The Punisher cannon is a minigun on crack. Unless the Pulse rifle is dumping out enough ammo to make an MG42 blush then they aren't putting out more Dakka. Also, AP has no bearing on the punch of a round. A Hotshot Lasgun has superior armor penetration capabilities than a bolter but the Bolter punches harder.

There's a difference between a group of stupid barbarians bashing a tank with crudely made axes and an experienced, skilled veteran Tank Hunter taking careful aim with a minigun.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
I highly doubt that, The Punisher cannon is a minigun on crack. Unless the Pulse rifle is dumping out enough ammo to make an MG42 blush then they aren't putting out more Dakka. Also, AP has no bearing on the punch of a round. A Hotshot Lasgun has superior armor penetration capabilities than a bolter but the Bolter punches harder.

There's a difference between a group of stupid barbarians bashing a tank with crudely made axes and an experienced, skilled veteran Tank Hunter taking careful aim with a minigun.

That's the idea. There's no such thing as "careful aiming" with a minigun because, in order for it to hit more than one target, it has to be designed so that the bullets land all around the area it is firing at.

There's a difference between a group of stupid barbarians bashing a tank with crudely made axes and an experienced, skilled veteran Tank Hunter

Like a Space Marine Chapter master with a Power Ax? A veteran of a thousand battles who has seen hundreds of thousands of foes fall upon his blade? With a power weapon that slices through Terminator Armor like it's swiss cheese? That guy can't find a weak point but a mere mortal can?

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Las wrote:
@Norton

If you're going to pull any analogy out of your ass and use it as an example for every possible scenario concerning a world under Tau control wanting to secede from the Empire, why don't we instead use India, or Poland, or Czechoslovakia or Hungary or The United States or Ireland or Indonesia or any other positive example instead of the freaking Confederacy. If any and all example of a state seceding from a larger entity is comparable ONLY to the CSA and the propagation of slave economies as you just stated, then by definition if you support the right for your own country to exist then you also think Lincoln was an 'evil man.'

Your bias makes real discussion impossible. The fact that you think your point is logical just because the American Civil War once happened is just downright hilarious.

You could also compare systems that want to leave to the IRA, or Basque rebels, or the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka.

EVERY nation makes demands, at gunpoint, of its citizens. You don't pay taxes, you go to jail. I don't understand how the Tau are bad for doing it when it's the de facto position of literally every nation on Earth..

No, they are not even close to comparable. Those organizations you mentioned are not elected governments or nation states. If you compel a society to become a protectorate through diplomacy backed by the threat of force, responding with violence when a legitimate government wishes to then leave is not something every country does. If that were the case, there would have been no Scottish Referendum this year. Just give it a rest.