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I have been trying to convince my friend that the tau are of no major threat to the Imperium. But every time I say this he just brings up the taros campaign. So my question is that what really happend in this campaign as I have never gotten a chance to read it.

The tau flatted the IG in the battle, but everyone mostly talks about how they killed a titan.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Taros_Campaign

If you want to convince your friend they don't pose a large threat, just show him the map. The tau are literally a speck on the map.

http://www.joachim-adomeit.de/wh40k/spacemap/map.html

Now if you want to convince your friend the tau don't matter, give up, but I don't think you want to do that so no worries.

Taros was backwater, desert mining-world, with a human population of around 10-12m. The local governance was slowly converted by the Tau who eventually annexed the world as their own. The imperium said "aw hell no" and cobbled together a loose invasion force consisting of a few regiments of guard, some naval forces, one company of space marines, and light titan support. The space marines raided the planetary governors palace in order to assassinate him, but unfortunately it turned into an ambush scenario until the marines could retreat. Following this the war boiled down to hit and run tactics, with the tau focusing on supply lines, and especially water. With water running in short supply, the Guard forces stage an emergency deep-strike operation to capture a water processing facility using the Elysian forces; this turns into an ambush as well, with all Elysians being lost or captured. There's one actual "stand-up" brawl, and, from what i remember, the Tau lose it. The Tau manage to kill a single warhound titan with air support, so the mechanicum pulls their support. The Imperium stages a last ditch assassination attempt using an Eversor which manages to kill the local ethereal. The guard forces are subsequently pushed off-world. Defeat was caused by mismanagement and bureaucratic bickering

Taros Campaign represented a major front for the Tau that received heavy attention, whereas it was just a minor operation for the Imperium. That's the main difference, and why the Tau pretty much wiped the floor with Imperial Forces there. The Imperium is much more concerned about stuff like the 13th Black Crusade, Hive Fleet Leviathen, 3rd War for Armageddon, etc. than Taros.

The Tau are a major problem for the Imperium along their Eastern Fringe borders with the Tau Empire itself though.

Kunjax96 wrote:I have been trying to convince my friend that the tau are of no major threat to the Imperium. But every time I say this he just brings up the taros campaign. So my question is that what really happend in this campaign as I have never gotten a chance to read it.

Taros is mine world with 12.000.000 people were Tau send their large force.
Imperial forcess there fought so badly that PDF were better organised then Astartes there.

If your friend again bring up Taros you just bring him up Nimbosa, Zeist, Lagan, Kronus and Kaurava.

Brother Coa wrote:

Kunjax96 wrote:I have been trying to convince my friend that the tau are of no major threat to the Imperium. But every time I say this he just brings up the taros campaign. So my question is that what really happend in this campaign as I have never gotten a chance to read it.

Taros is mine world with 12.000.000 people were Tau send their large force.
Imperial forcess there fought so badly that PDF were better organised then Astartes there.

If your friend again bring up Taros you just bring him up Nimbosa, Zeist, Lagan, Kronus and Kaurava.

weren't the PDFs under tau control?

Oh I forgot to mention, Forgeworld has a whole book on the subject.

Thanks for this. I was getting sick of all his tau fanboyisim. Now i can just throw this information back at his face.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Thanks for this. I was getting sick of all his tau fanboyisim. Now i can just throw this information back at his face.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oops

Brother Coa wrote:

Kunjax96 wrote:I have been trying to convince my friend that the tau are of no major threat to the Imperium. But every time I say this he just brings up the taros campaign. So my question is that what really happend in this campaign as I have never gotten a chance to read it.

Taros is mine world with 12.000.000 people were Tau send their large force.
Imperial forcess there fought so badly that PDF were better organised then Astartes there.

If your friend again bring up Taros you just bring him up Nimbosa, Zeist, Lagan, Kronus and Kaurava.

100 marines conquer an entire system; sigh, i love 40k, but the sense of scale is just...


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Kunjax96 wrote:Thanks for this. I was getting sick of all his tau fanboyisim. Now i can just throw this information back at his face.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Thanks for this. I was getting sick of all his tau fanboyisim. Now i can just throw this information back at his face.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oops

There's nothing to really throw in his face, taros potrays the Tau as incredibly capable, if hampered by their lack of size

nomotog wrote:
weren't the PDFs under tau control?

I meant: Any PDF in the Imperium is better organised then Astartes chapter there...

By throwing things back in his face I mean all the other times the Imperium has beaten the tau such as nimbosa.

Kunjax96 wrote:Thanks for this. I was getting sick of all his tau fanboyisim. Now i can just throw this information back at his face.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Thanks for this. I was getting sick of all his tau fanboyisim. Now i can just throw this information back at his face.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oops

If I was you, I wouldn't want to get into a fanboy fight. You can throw all that in his face, but he can come back and throw a bunch of stuff in your face. Like how a pulse rifle is better then a heavy bolter, or how a railgun can hull most tanks in a single shot at unlimited range.

Kunjax96 wrote:By throwing things back in his face I mean all the other times the Imperium has beaten the tau such as nimbosa.

Yea, that's true, not much he can do against plot-armor and Marine cheese

Retribution wrote:100 marines conquer an entire system; sigh, i love 40k, but the sense of scale is just...

Isn't it possible that other forces are simply not mentioned there?

There's also a bit where 1.000 Sisters liberate 100 worlds, but no way I'm interpreting this in a way that means they had zero support from Guard and/or Frateris Militias. Such fluff bits can be somewhat misleading, which is why I only tend to regard the Force Composition Charts of various battles as a proper and complete record of who fought whom.

In a battle against this friend I have beaten him. He has brought up railguns are better then lascannons. But every time he does this I just say that I have beaten him. That shuts him right up.

Lynata wrote:

Retribution wrote:100 marines conquer an entire system; sigh, i love 40k, but the sense of scale is just...

Isn't it possible that other forces are simply not mentioned there?

There's also a bit where 1.000 Sisters liberate 100 worlds, but no way I'm interpreting this in a way that means they had zero support from Guard and/or Frateris Militias. Such fluff bits can be somewhat misleading, which is why I only tend to regard the Force Composition Charts of various battles as a proper and complete record of who fought whom.

Smurfs need no support !

Retribution wrote:
Smurfs need no support !

QFT, I would like to see Matt Ward write fluff were they fight against Tau

Kunjax96 wrote:I have been trying to convince my friend that the tau are of no major threat to the Imperium. But every time I say this he just brings up the taros campaign. So my question is that what really happend in this campaign as I have never gotten a chance to read it.

The Taros campaign was a small backwater world of no real importance to the Imperium. The entire campaign was an afterthought to the Departmento Munitorium. It even says so in the book. The Tau never really engaged in an open battle against the Imperium, they basically defeated the Imperium by conducting hit and run attacks against the supply lines, setting ambushes , and basically 'tarpitting' the Imperial forces. The five regiments of guard that were completely destroyed was the result of losing a single transport vessel in orbit to a sneak attack by the Tau fleet. The lost titan was the result of a Tigershark swooping in out of nowhere unleashing its railguns and flying away (that only worked once btw). If your friend actually bothered to read the book, they lost the space battle pretty easily. Seriously, the Tau are not a threat to the Imperium, they are a minor nuisance. Pretty much every official fluff source (Black Library included) makes it pretty clear that the Imperium could destroy the Tau Empire without much trouble if they didn't have more important things to worry about.

To the Tau, this seems like a major victory, but IIRC, the campaign book even mentions that nobody of even minor importance within the Imperial government/military structure will ever hear of Taros or what happened there, and given the huge bureaucracy that is the Imperium its unlikely that anyone will even realize that the planet was lost. To put this into into better/real world perspective, the Imperium is like the United States in the mid to late 19th century, and the Tau are Native American tribes (Apache, Comanche, Sioux, etc.). They are not a serious threat to the Imperium, they are just a minor nuisance along the frontier that is nipping at its heels and providing minor logistical issues. Meanwhile, the US is fighting a Civil War, a war against the Mexicans, a war against the Spanish, and hell, the Indigs were even being bothersome to us during the First World War. None of the natives actions was really consequential, and the US gov't had bigger fish to fry which is (in part) why the problems persisted so long. Same story with the Imperium, they are fighting Ork Waaghs left and right, Black Crusades, extra-galactic biomass consuming alien hordes, undying legions of robots, etc. etc.

P.S. this is coming from someone who has played Tau almost since release (my first army :sniff: )

chaos0xomega wrote: The lost titan was the result of a Tigershark swooping in out of nowhere unleashing its railguns and flying away (that only worked once btw

Just want to jump in ask ask because it's been bugging me for awhile. Why dose it only work once?

nomotog wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote: The lost titan was the result of a Tigershark swooping in out of nowhere unleashing its railguns and flying away (that only worked once btw

Just want to jump in ask ask because it's been bugging me for awhile. Why dose it only work once?

Because its a hit and run attack. Once the first plane comes in and does its thing, the rest of the Imperial forces are going to be putting up AA suppression. IIRC, in the case of Taros, the Adeptus Mechanicus withdrew their titans immediately so the Tau never had another opportunity, and the Imperium became more aware of Tau air superiority afterwards, so they always operated with top cover and heavier anti air capability.

Lynata wrote:

Retribution wrote:100 marines conquer an entire system; sigh, i love 40k, but the sense of scale is just...

Isn't it possible that other forces are simply not mentioned there?

There's also a bit where 1.000 Sisters liberate 100 worlds, but no way I'm interpreting this in a way that means they had zero support from Guard and/or Frateris Militias. Such fluff bits can be somewhat misleading, which is why I only tend to regard the Force Composition Charts of various battles as a proper and complete record of who fought whom.

This is true the marines would fall apart without support. They are not equipped for a war of attrition. When somebody says that 100 marines conquer a system, they likely mean they are what turned the battle to an Imperial victory thus stealing the glory of the 10,000 Guardsman who died holding off the enemy before they dropped down and kicked face.

Also if your friend gets all fanboy on you as said show him the map, point out he has no warp drive, and that the blue alien's he loves so much live 40 brainwashed years and only have BS 3 WS 2

Also if your friend gets all fanboy on you as said show him the map, point out he has no warp drive, and that the blue alien's he loves so much live 40 brainwashed years and only have BS 3 WS 2

The Tau are a regional threat. To the Imperium of Man as a whole they are barely more than yet another mino xenos species. Of course one has to consider that the Imperium is not a centralised state but consists of thousands of semi autonomous sectors ( thanks to the distances involved and the rigours of warp travel ). For the sectors which border Tau space our blue friends are actually a major threat which cannot be simply ignored, because the wider Imperium is, as always, occupied with other things ( or better, the thousands of sectors which are the "wider imperium" all have their own problems which have to be dealt with ).

While the Imperium of Man is of course easily able to squash such smaller threats, if it could only concentrate it's forces, this course of action is not always possible, as the ( at least temporary ) loss of entire sectors ( Sabbat worlds for example ) to equaly "minor" threats has proven. So, it's all a matter of perspective. If you are a Highlord of Terra then you might care more about some new haircut at the court than about the small empire of some xeno idealists. If you are a sector govenor whose sector lies near the Tau border then you better reserve a suitable amount of your time to the task of taking precautions against this annoyingly advanced xeno scum which constantly seems to threaten your right and just rule.

KingDeath wrote:The Tau are a regional threat. To the Imperium of Man as a whole they are barely more than yet another mino xenos species. Of course one has to consider that the Imperium is not a centralised state but consists of thousands of semi autonomous sectors ( thanks to the distances involved and the rigours of warp travel ). For the sectors which border Tau space our blue friends are actually a major threat which cannot be simply ignored, because the wider Imperium is, as always, occupied with other things ( or better, the thousands of sectors which are the "wider imperium" all have their own problems which have to be dealt with ).

While the Imperium of Man is of course easily able to squash such smaller threats, if it could only concentrate it's forces, this course of action is not always possible, as the ( at least temporary ) loss of entire sectors ( Sabbat worlds for example ) to equaly "minor" threats has proven. So, it's all a matter of perspective. If you are a Highlord of Terra then you might care more about some new haircut at the court than about the small empire of some xeno idealists. If you are a sector govenor whose sector lies near the Tau border then you better reserve a suitable amount of your time to the task of taking precautions against this annoyingly advanced xeno scum which constantly seems to threaten your right and just rule.

Nah, most of the Imperial worlds on the Tau Frontier are Tau trading partners, its not like they have much to worry about. Most of the former Imperial planets now under Tau rule (like Taros) have defected willingly and without a fight.

Rather than make the same post twice, I refer you to my comments here.