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.

I am getting ready to paint my first T'au units, and I was just wondering if there is any presedence in the fluff to allow them to have a skin color other than blue. Any information would be appreciated. Thank you!

Well they would range in the full spectrum of Blue.

They are blue because of Cobalt in their blood, but if they bleed out, they become grey.

In the fluff I don't really think so, though if you wanted to it wouldn't be hard to justify it. IRL human skin color is dependent on the environment (grossly simplified) so your T'au (I hate that apostrophe, so cliche) could be from a sept, or a world in an existing sept, that has an environment that causes them to have a unique skin color like maybe the local food supply or unique radiation from its sun.

>T'au
Makes me cri everytime

T'au must be blue to be fluff friendly.

But they are your dudes are make them whatever you want.

Yeah paint them however you want, but in lore they are blue and usually red eyes.

 Hawky wrote:
They are blue because of Cobalt in their blood, but if they bleed out, they become grey.

And apparently, as they age, their skin tends to lighten up if Farsight's appearance is any indication. He's ancient by Tau standards (And I will not use that goddamned GW copyright friendly apostrophe crap. They will always be TAU to me. ), and he's no longer the darker shade of blue or blue-gray seen with most Tau.

Green orks paint themselves blue and renegade guardsmane paint themselves red.
Just do first, make it look cool, and justify latter. Maybe your sept have a strong custom of painting their warriors orange before going into battle (like some iberian tribes use to do), because the sept world had an orange sky, and it was seen as lucky.

Fluff honestly can come later if you want it like that.

Excellent informatiom, everyone. Thank you!

I am probably going to go blue skin to better stick with the fluff, but with the fourth sphere expansion dissappearing maybe some will turn up with new skin colors after that...

Grey and blue only, to my memory. No "warm" skin colors for sure.

 Mud Turkey 13 wrote:
I am getting ready to paint my first T'au units, and I was just wondering if there is any presedence in the fluff to allow them to have a skin color other than blue. Any information would be appreciated. Thank you!

It's less of a blue, more of a blue-grey.

They do vary a bit in shade but not as drastically as humans do.

For painting the flesh, by the by, I would suggest (if using GW colors):
The Fang(Base) for a darker flesh tone
Wash it with a mixture of 50/50 Lahmian Medium and Nuln Oil. The Lahmian dilutes the wash a bit without adding the glossiness or tidemarks that mixing in water can do.
Highlight the flesh with Russ Grey(for a darker flesh tone), Fenrisian Grey(a bit brighter than Fenrisian but still the right "look"), or Etherium Blue(the brightest of the blue grey colors available)

If you want to do a lighter flesh tone?
Celestra Grey(Base)
Wash with the same mix of 50/50 Lahmian Medium and Nuln Oil
Highlight the flesh with Etherium Blue or Ulthuan Grey. The second one is more of a white than a grey, but you can still use it for highlighting the elevated features.

In both cases after you've mixed it all together, do another wash of Nuln Oil but this time 75/25 Medium to Oil ratio.


Now, if you're just looking to add color?
Fire Caste, depending on the planet of origin, do still have some primitive tendencies. One of the older main rulebooks had a few where some of the unhelmeted Fire Warriors and Pathfinders had applied warpaint "stripes" over their eyes.
There were also a few that had a single vertical stripe running down the side of their head.

In both instances, they utilize the Sept colors.

 Kanluwen wrote:

Now, if you're just looking to add color?
Fire Caste, depending on the planet of origin, do still have some primitive tendencies. One of the older main rulebooks had a few where some of the unhelmeted Fire Warriors and Pathfinders had applied warpaint "stripes" over their eyes.
There were also a few that had a single vertical stripe running down the side of their head.

That is a pretty cool idea.

I think they only appear blue. If you want to paint them a different color you could use the fluff that an earth caste scientist has created a skin dye to help with camouflage

Any visible skin on a 40k battlefield would very quickly end up charred regardless of the starting hue. On topic, blue ranging through grey.

Or just dont paint any skin. I put helmets on everything and pretend the tau are not dumb enough to not wear protective foot wear.

The ridges on the feet can easily be extensions of their leg coverings and the hoofs can be plates when painted right.

 Lance845 wrote:
Or just dont paint any skin. I put helmets on everything and pretend the tau are not dumb enough to not wear protective foot wear.

The ridges on the feet can easily be extensions of their leg coverings and the hoofs can be plates when painted right.

Also some 40k planets are pretty tocic, pollution etc.
Wearing boots, face masks and sealed nbc gear could save your life.

Wait, have GW changed the species name from Tau to T'au? I thought T'au was the name of the homeworld planet and Tau was the race?

If so, that's dumb. And I will no more call them T'au than I do the Imperial Guard the Astra Milliwhatsit or the Storm Troopers the Militarium Tempestrous-thingymajigs.

Also, I think any tone ranging from grey through to blue to purple is perfectly fluff-friendly. The human skintone from a single planetoid varies greatly, so the Tau from across multiple worlds in the galaxy should have varience. It would be strange if there weren't, to be honest.

They were T'au from the get go..

But people got Lazy and stopped putting in the '

I remember when they did the first teaser in WD it had the '

GodDamUser wrote:
They were T'au from the get go..

But people got Lazy and stopped putting in the '

I remember when they did the first teaser in WD it had the '

Nope. Just checked GW website. It's Tau, like I always knew/remembered it as. T'au is the homeworld sept. Maybe it's an international difference?

 Anfauglir wrote:

GodDamUser wrote:
They were T'au from the get go..

But people got Lazy and stopped putting in the '

I remember when they did the first teaser in WD it had the '

Nope. Just checked GW website. It's Tau, like I always knew/remembered it as. T'au is the homeworld sept. Maybe it's an international difference?

That doesn't mean the original appearance WD had them as T'au.. if anything it goes in line with what I said

 Anfauglir wrote:
Wait, have GW changed the species name from Tau to T'au? I thought T'au was the name of the homeworld planet and Tau was the race?

If so, that's dumb. And I will no more call them T'au than I do the Imperial Guard the Astra Milliwhatsit or the Storm Troopers the Militarium Tempestrous-thingymajigs.

The race is still Tau.

They're renaming the faction to "T'au Empire".

No need to get salty.

GodDamUser wrote:
That doesn't mean the original appearance WD had them as T'au.. if anything it goes in line with what I said

...?

 Kanluwen wrote:
The race is still Tau.

They're renaming the faction to "T'au Empire".

Oh, I see.

No need to get salty.

Lol. Okay, buddy.

Tau are blue and Orks are green. The fluff police are on their way to arrest you now.


Canonically Tau are blue and Orks are green, but paint them however you want. Call them a genetic mutation that makes their skin purple.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Anfauglir wrote:
Wait, have GW changed the species name from Tau to T'au? I thought T'au was the name of the homeworld planet and Tau was the race?

Trademarking I guess?

If so, that's dumb. And I will no more call them T'au than I do the Imperial Guard the Astra Milliwhatsit or the Storm Troopers the Militarium Tempestrous-thingymajigs.

Exalted.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Anfauglir wrote:

Also, I think any tone ranging from grey through to blue to purple is perfectly fluff-friendly. The human skintone from a single planetoid varies greatly, so the Tau from across multiple worlds in the galaxy should have varience. It would be strange if there weren't, to be honest.

Also, the skin tone variance is due to evolution. Colder climates have paler people, and warmer climates have darker skin with higher melatonin to better protect against the sun. As with natural selection, those without the correct skin color to properly deal with the suns rays die out over many generations as their traits aren't favourable to the environment. But Tau, much like modern humans, are able to build technology to "evolve" in a single generation. Tau don't need to evolve darker skin as they have bodysuits, habitats and hell, even suncream, to better protect, as well as medicine to treat cancer. Likewise they don't need paler skin (which is theorised to have developed to help northern migrants to absorb Vitaman D more efficiently) because they can just take vitamin supplements.

 Anfauglir wrote:

GodDamUser wrote:
That doesn't mean the original appearance WD had them as T'au.. if anything it goes in line with what I said

...?

 Kanluwen wrote:
The race is still Tau.

They're renaming the faction to "T'au Empire".

Oh, I see.

No need to get salty.

Lol. Okay, buddy.

You're in here complaining about the Astra Militarum and Militarum Tempestus name change--something that happened quite some time ago.
The Astra Militarum book refers to them as such a handful of times, a few of which are with the caveat of "more commonly known as the Imperial Guard".
The Militarum Tempestus, while a name change, is also a rather significant fluff change for the Stormtroopers.

So yeah. No need to get salty.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Deadshot wrote:
Tau are blue and Orks are green. The fluff police are on their way to arrest you now.


Canonically Tau are blue and Orks are green, but paint them however you want. Call them a genetic mutation that makes their skin purple.

Orks actually, canonically, can vary in color. It depends on the environment the spores are in. They can be brown, red, or green for the most part.

Tau have actually had it mentioned that they can vary in color as well. The color we commonly associate with them(the blue-grey) is that of those hailing from T'au. Vior'la(Farsight's homeworld) is mentioned as being a bit darker in skin tone because of the environment.

I think I remember one Sept tending towards darker blues and even purples for some reason, but, regardless, their skin tones should always have a blue component due to their blue blood even if it's barely detectable.

I wonder if there's a Tau equivalent of the teenager, where they hare around in customised Piranhas, use each other's given names only, and don't bow to Ethereals? Maybe one of them could have got their skin dyed permanently orange or something?

 Kanluwen wrote:
You're in here complaining about the Astra Militarum and Militarum Tempestus name change--something that happened quite some time ago.

Implying that I a) aren't perfectly entitled to voice personal complaints about things which I don't like and/or think are dumb on a public forum, and b) somehow become less and less entitled based on the amount of time that's passed. Yeah... no.

The Astra Militarum book refers to them as such a handful of times, a few of which are with the caveat of "more commonly known as the Imperial Guard".

And this is relevant because...?

The Militarum Tempestus, while a name change, is also a rather significant fluff change for the Stormtroopers.

And? This makes the change worse in my eyes.

So yeah. No need to get salty.

The internet is commonly where people come to express their thoughts and feelings on stuff. It's not always positive. Sorry my "salt" is causing you discomfort/offense in this respect. Maybe you should either learn to get over it or leave the internet?