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What stopped Greece and Carthage from stamping out Rome before they became powerful enough to threaten them? Because they had larger problems and concerns. Probably because people like you were in power, people who didn't register them as a threat and devoted their attention to concerns they felt more pressing. What reason does chaos have to pay attention to the tau? Their hatred and attention is devoted to man, the tau don't even register in the warp. What does chaos have to gain from attacking the tau? Any domain of man of both easier and more profitable to assault. The orks are fighting the Tau on one front yes, but the tau empire continues to expand and grow regardless. The necrons motives are about as clear as mud and vary from faction to faction but the necrons are just that: factions. They are not united in any common goal and there is no united power that is either capable or willing to destroy the tau at this point. The tau have thus far avoided major tyranid invasion mostly on luck but as a whole they have fared significantly better than other races in their encounters with the bids, both due to a certain amount of luck and their style of battle. How they will fare against a major tyranid invasion is open to debate but they have overcome all other obstacles so far and evolve and adapt considerably faster than other tyranid opponents. If anyone is capable of adapting a new technology to push back nid invasions its probably the tau.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also the War of Dakka you are referring to is being fought against the Farsight Enclaves. This is a renegade faction led by commander farsight and is not a part of the tau empire. While commanding sizable amount of forces and planets, farsight does not have any official connections with the tau empire.

O'Shovah303 wrote:
What stopped Greece and Carthage from stamping out Rome before they became powerful enough to threaten them? Because they had larger problems and concerns. Probably because people like you were in power, people who didn't register them as a threat and devoted their attention to concerns they felt more pressing. What reason does chaos have to pay attention to the tau? Their hatred and attention is devoted to man, the tau don't even register in the warp. What does chaos have to gain from attacking the tau? Any domain of man of both easier and more profitable to assault. The orks are fighting the Tau on one front yes, but the tau empire continues to expand and grow regardless. The necrons motives are about as clear as mud and vary from faction to faction but the necrons are just that: factions. They are not united in any common goal and there is no united power that is either capable or willing to destroy the tau at this point. The tau have thus far avoided major tyranid invasion mostly on luck but as a whole they have fared significantly better than other races in their encounters with the bids, both due to a certain amount of luck and their style of battle. How they will fare against a major tyranid invasion is open to debate but they have overcome all other obstacles so far and evolve and adapt considerably faster than other tyranid opponents. If anyone is capable of adapting a new technology to push back nid invasions its probably the tau.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also the War of Dakka you are referring to is being fought against the Farsight Enclaves. This is a renegade faction led by commander farsight and is not a part of the tau empire. While commanding sizable amount of forces and planets, farsight does not have any official connections with the tau empire.

Well basically both didnt have the time or resources to deal with Rome, a minor power at best. Carthage was busy fighting the Greek cities on Sicily and Macedon was mostly involved in Greece and Asia Minor. But by the time they tried it was to late, although one tried, we got the nice expression of a phyrric victory from him But in all seriousness, Rome had a huge advantage in manpower (around the time they started to encounter major powers they already did), the Tau dont, so the comparison isnt that valid. Chaos might just be the one most interested in Tau/Necrons/Tyranids just because they dont register in the warp. The Tau would not feed the Chaos gods, so their expansion at the cost of the Imperium would not benefit them. Best remove them and let tasty humans re/colonize their planets. If Tau numbers go up Human numbers in the region would go down and thats something that cant be overlooked over a longer time.

The Tau greatest strength might be that they dont register as a threat yet. Double that for the nids, they seem to be attracted by the Emperor's beacon, so the Tau having no warp presence might help a bit with the invasion side. But if they ever encounter a major nid hive fleet their chances would not be that great. The only way the Imperium has stopped them is with huge sacrifices in life and planets. Even the Iyaden Eldar had great difficulty holding them off. One could argue that the craftworld has better tech and a larger military then most Tau worlds and even Sept worlds. Yet they barely made it and by the speed Tyranid fleets are starting to enter this galaxy their time for developing new tech could soon be up. The Zeist campaign and the Damocles Crusade showed that the Tau arent on par with the Imperium in terms of brute strength. How would they possibly counter a hive fleet like Behemoth, Kraken or Leviathan?

Yes, Rome had manpower by the time it faced Greece and Carthage, citizen soldiers called to battle in times of war. Not even a true professional standing army at that point and they didn't have plasma rifles or space craft either. I never said it was a perfect comparison. Very few comparisons are. The point was that a once small and minor player rose to defeat nations that were once vastly larger than they were in a remarkably short period of time. I have far more points going for my comparison than I have refuting it. Wars are rarely won by numbers alone. History has shown that the more advanced nation generally prevails. The tau are a great deal more advanced then the imperium. The general troops and tech of the imperium are vastly outclassed technologically and the factions that are capable of rivalling the Taus tech are few and far between. They have superior technology and more importantly they are capable of reproducing it on a large scale. The imperium is not capable of producing their high technology anymore. They don't even understand how it works anymore. How can you continue to fight and advanced race when you can't keep up with their tech and you have too many threats pushing in your own borders to muster the kind of manpower you would need to overrun them? I'm not arguing that the tau will wtf pwn the imperium of man, I'm just saying they are a far greater that than people give them credit for and they aren't just going to blow over if you send a crusade in their direction.

Sure the tau empire could take a fleet like behemoth or kraken. Ultramar basically stood alone against behemoth and they triumphed. It was costly but they were still victorious. The tau are both more advanced and more willing to adapt then ultramar was and I would say they could handle it at least as well, probably a lot better. Especially since they actually have experience fighting tyranids now, an advantage ultramar lacked. Leviathan is a completely different beast entirely though. They are large enough to engage everyone at once. And they have the numbers to wear down the imperium through attrition, let alone the tau.

The only reason Ultramar weathered Behemoth was because an Imperial Battleship sacrificed itself by deliberately imploding its Warp Drive and pulling the entire Hive Fleet in space with it into the Warp. Behemoth would have overrun Ultramar otherwise.

And the Imperium doesn't have to fight its own battles if it doesn't want to. The Imperium is perfectly capable of manipulating 'lesser' races like the Eldar do. It shouldn't be too hard to 'seed' the Tau Empire with Genestealers and re-direct a Hive Fleet or two down on them.

 Admiral Valerian wrote:
The only reason Ultramar weathered Behemoth was because an Imperial Battleship sacrificed itself by deliberately imploding its Warp Drive and pulling the entire Hive Fleet in space with it into the Warp. Behemoth would have overrun Ultramar otherwise.

And the Imperium doesn't have to fight its own battles if it doesn't want to. The Imperium is perfectly capable of manipulating 'lesser' races like the Eldar do. It shouldn't be too hard to 'seed' the Tau Empire with Genestealers and re-direct a Hive Fleet or two down on them.

Tau system sensors and Defences are a bit more advanced and coordinated than the Orks. Also why on earth would the Imperium want to feed the nids an Small Empire? If the nids win what size nid force would come out of the other side.

Also for every genestealer cult the imperialist plant, there's probably a hundred naturally occurring cults on Imperial planets.

Manipulating xenos isn't the Imperiums thing. It was an exception by a wacky inquisitor. Which hasn't quite gone to plan once the fights over the Imperials are going to hurt.

 Eetion wrote:


Manipulating xenos isn't the Imperiums thing. It was an exception by a wacky inquisitor. Which hasn't quite gone to plan once the fights over the Imperials are going to hurt.

It's a last resort thing. And its not like the Eldar's manipulations don't backfire, considering every conflict they've deflected to the Imperium ends up making the Imperium even stronger.

 Admiral Valerian wrote:

 Eetion wrote:


Manipulating xenos isn't the Imperiums thing. It was an exception by a wacky inquisitor. Which hasn't quite gone to plan once the fights over the Imperials are going to hurt.

It's a last resort thing. And its not like the Eldar's manipulations don't backfire, considering every conflict they've deflected to the Imperium ends up making the Imperium even stronger.

d you assume they don't know that. If Gazzy didn't 'lose' the 2nd war for Armageddon, what might have he done, he came back for another go.
The Eldar ultimately act in their own interests. It doesn't matter to them if the Imperium emerges victorious, weaker or stronger following their manipulationd providing it changes the strand of fate where the Eldat lose a life etc

And it was way beyond a last ditch attempt. It was somethin. Neither done or tried before by a crazy inquisitor who's plan A was a program of scorched Earth to deny the nids. It was done once and probably never again for the repercussions it has.

O'Shovah303 wrote:
Yes, Rome had manpower by the time it faced Greece and Carthage, citizen soldiers called to battle in times of war. Not even a true professional standing army at that point and they didn't have plasma rifles or space craft either. I never said it was a perfect comparison. Very few comparisons are. The point was that a once small and minor player rose to defeat nations that were once vastly larger than they were in a remarkably short period of time. I have far more points going for my comparison than I have refuting it. Wars are rarely won by numbers alone. History has shown that the more advanced nation generally prevails. The tau are a great deal more advanced then the imperium. The general troops and tech of the imperium are vastly outclassed technologically and the factions that are capable of rivalling the Taus tech are few and far between. They have superior technology and more importantly they are capable of reproducing it on a large scale. The imperium is not capable of producing their high technology anymore. They don't even understand how it works anymore. How can you continue to fight and advanced race when you can't keep up with their tech and you have too many threats pushing in your own borders to muster the kind of manpower you would need to overrun them? I'm not arguing that the tau will wtf pwn the imperium of man, I'm just saying they are a far greater that than people give them credit for and they aren't just going to blow over if you send a crusade in their direction.

Sure the tau empire could take a fleet like behemoth or kraken. Ultramar basically stood alone against behemoth and they triumphed. It was costly but they were still victorious. The tau are both more advanced and more willing to adapt then ultramar was and I would say they could handle it at least as well, probably a lot better. Especially since they actually have experience fighting tyranids now, an advantage ultramar lacked. Leviathan is a completely different beast entirely though. They are large enough to engage everyone at once. And they have the numbers to wear down the imperium through attrition, let alone the tau.

I would argue against 'minor' player and 'vastly larger'. The only valid point would be against Carthage, but then again they were both minor, but Carthage did have larger territories. This example only gives credit to the 'wars are won by numbers alone', basically the second Punic war shows that. Rome might be the worst to compare the Tau too, they always had numbers on their side. They lost more than once but just kept sending in the next wave. If anything the Imperium is Rome and the Tau are Parthians/Saassanids. A better comparison would be Alexander and the Tau, massive difference in numbers, but better tech/tactics. The Tau might be more advanced, but its not such a huge advantage that the huge difference in population can be ignored. Not yet anyways. One could question if the Tau could just keep expanding, if they become larger more Orks/Chaos forces/Necrons/Tyranids would start to move against them. Just by the virtue of them being just another large empire in the way. Off course the Tau are stronger in tech, I give them the credit for that, but they are still being defeated/driven back by the Imperium for now. Numbers and Space Marines count in favour of the Imperium in the foreseeable future. The Tau would ahve to bide their time untill they reach a point where their tech negates that advantage. To act now, like they are trying is just drawing attention and the Ultramarines and succesors halt them, but if they keep pushing the Ultramarines might start pushing back.

We have to take into account that the hive fleet might split up, attack multiple sectors at once. Tau travelling speed isnt that great and they dont have the numbers to protect everything. How much would have to be sacrificed just to get a strong response up and running? Ultramar lost countless PDF forces, large numbers of Ultramarines and a number of ships from the Segmentum Tempestus fleet. This combined force would have probably made a great crusade against the Tau Empire, just look at the huge number of ships involved and the ground forces. This was around the same time as the Damocles crusade, one could argue that the Imperium had assembled a force big enough to crush the Tau just to stop a single Hive Fleet. In the end they only succeeded by sacrificing their flagship using tech the Tau not even posses just to survive. I think you overestimate the advantage tech would give the Tau against the nids, because the Eldar already showed that advanced tech is not the only deciding factor against the nids.

 Eetion wrote:
It was done once and probably never again for the repercussions it has.

You underestimate the ruthlessness of the Inquisition.

 Admiral Valerian wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
It was done once and probably never again for the repercussions it has.

You underestimate the ruthlessness of the Inquisition.

Given the Inquisior who did has been condemned by his peers, he has drastically wreaked imperial capabilities in the area. It would be a brave inquisitor to take up a flawed plan.

O'Shovah303 wrote:
The tau are a great deal more advanced then the imperium. The general troops and tech of the imperium are vastly outclassed technologically and the factions that are capable of rivalling the Taus tech are few and far between. They have superior technology and more importantly they are capable of reproducing it on a large scale. The imperium is not capable of producing their high technology anymore. They don't even understand how it works anymore.

Sigh, this argument always pops up sooner or later in a Tau vs. Imperium thread, and it's always just as wrong as the last time. You gravely underestimate the skill and capability possessed by the Adeptus Mechanicus. Dreadknights are still produced. Power Armour is still produced. Ordinatii are still produced. Imperator Titans are still produced. Battleships are still produced. Terminator Armour is still produced. Most crucially, Warp Drives are still produced. The reason the Imperium hasn't armed all of its soldiers with the most advanced stuff is that the Imperial Guard numbers are many magnitudes greater than the Fire Caste. Look at the Skitarii, Adepta Sororitas or Stormtroopers (who, for the record, have better guns than Fire Warriors) for some rather well-equipped Imperial soldiers (who probably outnumber the Fire Caste as well).

The biggest problem for the Tau, however, is the massively sub-standard form of FTL travel the Tau have to rely on, coupled with their short life spans, which means that they simply can't keep on expanding, and without having a warp presence they're gonna have some problems building warp-reliant tech to solve this problem.

Regarding the "oh, but the Tau are united behind a single cause" argument, the Farsight supplement, from what I've read online, tells us that someone in the Tau Empire is smuggling weapons to supply Farsight. Seems as though there's Tau that aren't exactly pleased with the way the Greater Good is going, after all.

It's also a matter of unimaginable scale. A single Imperial Sector may actually out-populate the entire Tau race.... and there's hundreds, if not thousands, of sectors of Imperial space.

*If* all of the other threats in the galaxy did not occupy the Imperium's attention, the Tau empire (which is smaller in scale to the Imperium than Rhode Island is to the entire continent of North America) would cease to exist, probably within a decade. The Tau simply do not have the manpower. They could have a kill ration of 1000 to 1, and they would still lose.

This, of course, will never happen, as 40K is a setting, not a story, so things will never advance in any meaningful way. While the Imperium may lose planets to Tau, Orks, Tyranids, whatever, and the Tau gain some, there's always more planets to write into the background. In the galaxy of 40k, resources are limited only by what the authors write in.

The Tau generally more advanced.

It's a case of accessibility.

It's all well and good having superior high end equipment, but if it's not accessible to the forces there's no point. Power armour, Terminators, dread knights. All fearsome. But ultimately so small in number as to be almost negligible.
e Stormtrooper regiments weapons are not superior to pulse rifles. Game rules give them a better ap they used to have ap 5 but severely lack strength and range over the pulse rifle. In essence the pulse rifle is a mini plasma gun.
The Tau side arms are a world above the standard issue imperial counterparts.
Their entire armed forces wear equivalent armour to storm troopers.
Their plasma weaponry isn't prone to overheating.
The Tau can mass produce anti gravity devices in drones and Tetras where the JetBike is a lost relic.

I Will absolutely admit that the Imperial high end tech is league's above the Tau. But also that isn't the equipment you have to judge them on. On any confrontation it's Pulse rifle v flashing lasgun that you use to make your bench mark.
POwer and Terminator armour is advanced armour, their equivalent choice would be the Crisis and Broadside suits of the Tau.

In the end Imperial tech is few in number, held by small number of forces and individuals. The Tau in Any confrontation Will likely have the technological superiority.

Its no good Inquisitor Bob having a refractor field cod piece and digital weapons if the Guardsmen actually doing the fighting can't make use of that technology.

That and every piece of Tau technology is being enhanced, upgraded, refined and improved. Not just simply made by workers on a production line because it's all they know how to do or have ever done.

 Eetion wrote:
The Tau generally more advanced.

It's a case of accessibility.

It's all well and good having superior high end equipment, but if it's not accessible to the forces there's no point. Power armour, Terminators, dread knights. All fearsome. But ultimately so small in number as to be almost negligible.
e Stormtrooper regiments weapons are not superior to pulse rifles. Game rules give them a better ap they used to have ap 5 but severely lack strength and range over the pulse rifle. In essence the pulse rifle is a mini plasma gun.
The Tau side arms are a world above the standard issue imperial counterparts.
Their entire armed forces wear equivalent armour to storm troopers.
Their plasma weaponry isn't prone to overheating.
The Tau can mass produce anti gravity devices in drones and Tetras where the JetBike is a lost relic.

Lasguns are superior to Pulse Rifles the same way the AK47 is superior to the M16: ease of production and reliability, and in the case of the Lasgun virtually unlimited ammunition. Think about how much ammunition the Imperium would have to ship around if the Lasguns weren't refuleable with pretty much anything.

Imperial Plasma weaponry is "prone to overheating" because they've decided to turn the dial up to 11, whereas the Tau have it set to 7 or 8. You might note that when the Riptide turns it up to 11 it gets hot as well.

The Imperium has anti-grav tech as well, most commonly Land Speeders, but Land Trains and Servo-skulls use them as well.

There's probably more Guardsmen in Carapace Armour than there are members of the Tau race. Plenty of heavy infantry regiments get Carapace Armour as standard and I'd imagine that most Skitarii get it as well.

Any Crusade against the Tau would include Astartes, at which point the quality advantage swings rather steeply toward the Imperium. The Marines themselves are the result of some pretty high-tech stuff.

Yet that assumes something on the ease of manufacture on the pulse rifle. we honestly don't know production times or reliability. but fact is the Fire Warriorshave superior range and stopping power.

And even though the Imperium still makes servo skulls and landspeeders yet lack the insight to make jet bikes. Why? Because of complete lack of innovation.

Yes plenty of infantry regiments get carapace, but its dependent entirely on the world and function of the regiment. Flakk is and always will be the most common function. Every single Tau is equipped that way.

The Marines are formidable but not invincible. The Avenging Sons were sent packing in short order in the Taros campaign.

The idea that there is no innovation in the Imperium is a myth. Every lynchpin in the Imperial Guard, from the Lasgun up to Leman Russ tanks, is built to require low maintainance and to be rugged and reliable. Building hover tanks or jetbikes for one regiment just isn't economical when you could use the same resources to build ordinary bikes and tanks for a hundred regiments.

It really doesn't matter that every single Tau warrior has at least Carapace-level armour when there's potentially more Servitors in the Imperium than there are Tau. Being able to distribute Carapace Armour to a greater proportion of their army doesn't make Tau tech superior, it just highlights how outnumbered they are.

Then there's the matter of the Damocles Gulf crusade, which the Imperium nominally lost because the Tyranids decided to appear. Seriously, the Tau were struggling to take down Warhound (i.e scout) Titans. They haven't (to my knowledge) faced Warlord Titans yet, let alone Imperator Titans. Then there's the Nimbosa Crusade, which illustrates what happened when three Chapters joined forces against the Tau.

The Imperium is lacking innovation. How much grief and testing occurred for simple weapon load outs on the Predator tank initially, 200 years only for them to come to the conclusion that it was probably meant to be able to do that.
He'll it took 500 years to bring the lightning fighter into production when they had the STC data. Pure innovation that isn't it.


When you have a warrior class, even just a 1% population of Fire Caste gives a vast number of local troops. and yes Nimbosa was a disaster, But the Imperial Guard didn't fare too well against the Tau either. I'm not denying the Marines are a threat. The Tau are not invulnerable. But it's not the Marines who will be doing the majority of the fighting.

Legio thantaros took part in the Damocles crusade, who were in turn countered by Mantas. Since then the Tau have developed the Rail Cannon toting Tiger Sharks and the Rip Tides as counters.

I'm not debating that Tau can be out numbered, but the Imperium must be able to deploy those assets.

This boils down to the Tau infantry being equipped with superior equipment as standard.
Since Damocles the Tau have adapted and upgraded to meet nee threats posed by the Imperium adapting their technology and equipment. The Imperium has not.

Because the Imperium does not have to. The Damocles Gulf Crusade was, by the commanding officers own account, too weak to feasibly take Dal'yth, and yet they did. That was 14 capital ships, and the only reason the Tau have Dal'yth today is because the Imperium gave it back when Kryptmann recalled the Crusade to fight the Tyranids. The Black Templars alone have more than 14 capital ships, add other Chapters and their assets and it's just silly.

The Black Templars are also spread out and never localised at one place.

The campaign on the ground had long since ground to a halt. Neither side had the advantage.

And once again marines are a rarity. They would not be doing the bulk of the fighting. Also with regards to the space fleet that's another area of vast improvements that the Tau have made since Damocles.

It won't be a roll over, the Imperium Was stung at Typha 4 and Taros.
The New generation of Tau vessels are much more formidable than the generation of vessels at Damocles.

Allow me to get to the point...this will essentially be a repeat of WWII's Eastern Front. The Tau will be the Germans with their superior technology, and the Imperium will be the USSR with vast fleets and numerous soldiers. Now how did it end again?

Well. Let me slightly alter your analogy to better reflect the Example.

The Tau are Nazi Germany. Imperium are Russia. The Chinese are the nids launching am all out assault. The Necrons are the US assaulting from Alaska in para troop hit and run assaults. Oh and Russia is undergoing a massive civil with vast tracts of territory lost to Cossacks or Chechens that's the Orks. Oh let's not forget those slaving Eldar/dark Eldar from I dunno hidden terrorist cells. And finally we have Chaos, the bowels of hell opening in the far north of the country.

Now consider the forces available to the eastern front.

 Eetion wrote:
Well. Let me slightly alter your analogy to better reflect the Example.

The Tau are Nazi Germany. Imperium are Russia. The Chinese are the nids launching am all out assault. The Necrons are the US assaulting from Alaska in para troop hit and run assaults. Oh and Russia is undergoing a massive civil with vast tracts of territory lost to Cossacks or Chechens that's the Orks. Oh let's not forget those slaving Eldar/dark Eldar from I dunno hidden terrorist cells. And finally we have Chaos, the bowels of hell opening in the far north of the country.

Now consider the forces available to the eastern front.

Now it starts to sounds like warhammer fantasy.

That analogy gives way too much weight to the Tau, it'd be more like Belgium invading the Soviet Union while the Soviets were fighting China. It's the same effect that's let Sweden successfully wage war against Russia in the past; we won until the Russian army got back from eastern Siberia, at which point we were slapped silly. Similarly, the Tau took Nimbosa while the Imperium was away fighting Tyranids and then promptly lost it when the Imperium came back with a proper Crusade. Bear in mind that's after the Damocles Gulf, so after the Tau have had a chance to adapt.

 Eetion wrote:
Well. Let me slightly alter your analogy to better reflect the Example.

The Tau are Nazi Germany. Imperium are Russia. The Chinese are the nids launching am all out assault. The Necrons are the US assaulting from Alaska in para troop hit and run assaults. Oh and Russia is undergoing a massive civil with vast tracts of territory lost to Cossacks or Chechens that's the Orks. Oh let's not forget those slaving Eldar/dark Eldar from I dunno hidden terrorist cells. And finally we have Chaos, the bowels of hell opening in the far north of the country.

Now consider the forces available to the eastern front.

Did you even read the OP? I said the Imperium has nothing to distract it in this thread.

 Admiral Valerian wrote:

 Eetion wrote:
Well. Let me slightly alter your analogy to better reflect the Example.

The Tau are Nazi Germany. Imperium are Russia. The Chinese are the nids launching am all out assault. The Necrons are the US assaulting from Alaska in para troop hit and run assaults. Oh and Russia is undergoing a massive civil with vast tracts of territory lost to Cossacks or Chechens that's the Orks. Oh let's not forget those slaving Eldar/dark Eldar from I dunno hidden terrorist cells. And finally we have Chaos, the bowels of hell opening in the far north of the country.

Now consider the forces available to the eastern front.

Did you even read the OP? I said the Imperium has nothing to distract it in this thread.

Indeed I did. You said 'A real Imperial Crusade where they are not fighting multiple opponents like at Jerichos reach and likewise the Tau are not distracted'
Now to me that's a case of no hive fleet behemoths forcing withdrawal no ork interference. A straight up crusade into Tau space 'winner takes all situation'
However what constitutes a real crusade and the consideration. Of what is available to it must still be held. Any 'proper' crusade must still be confined to the situation the Imperium is in. Otherwise what's the point?
Imperiums bigger, redistribute forces from fighting the Black Crusades, levitation and at Armageddon, along with every guard regiment and fleet in the segmentum. Crush the Tau.

But that wouldn't be a 'proper' crusade would it. Because it's completely unfeasable for them to do. Prevailing strategic and political situations must still be considered.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also with regards to Nimbosa. That was 1 world and one of the most important worlds annexed by the Tau during initial stages of Kraken.
So the Tau lost nimbosa they still came out with a net win in world's gained.
And ask yoursel if the Imperium would have Bern bbetter served using those forces against Kraken?

To summarize given enough time the tau could have a massive orgy to increase population and advance technology to survive a crusade and perhaps even defeatn one out right. If a crusade was called with the IoM en-mass the tau would be the willie cyote looking up at the sky as a grand piano came down ending in *splat*.

Wh 41k tau win (?)
WH 40K tau go splat.

The problem is the amount of men and material the Imperium is willing to commit to a "proper crusade" varies. How BIG a proper crusade are we talking about? Sabbath Worlds size? Nimbosa sized? Jericho Reach sized without the distractions of other factions? Black Crusade sized? (If the latter, the tau would be smooshed like a bug)

For the most part though it'd be hard for the Tau to survive any serious undistracted attack by the Imperium due to sheer numbers alone. However, without defining EXACTLY just HOW undistracted and HOW serious the Imperium would be about such a venture, it's really meaningless to try to discuss further than that.

TiamatRoar wrote:
The problem is the amount of men and material the Imperium is willing to commit to a "proper crusade" varies. How BIG a proper crusade are we talking about? Sabbath Worlds size? Nimbosa sized? Jericho Reach sized without the distractions of other factions? Black Crusade sized? (If the latter, the tau would be smooshed like a bug)

For the most part though it'd be hard for the Tau to survive any serious undistracted attack by the Imperium due to sheer numbers alone. However, without defining EXACTLY just HOW undistracted and HOW serious the Imperium would be about such a venture, it's really meaningless to try to discuss further than that.

Sure there is reason to discuss. Its fun and passes long bus rides.

Just because the IOM is a declining Empire, don't count it out. Rome, as it was falling, still managed to defeat the biggest threat they ever faced, Atilla the Hun. It was their swan song, but they managed to do it. Don't count out the Empire just yet. Also, with the Tau, don't discount innovation. Innovation can explode during the course of a single war. Look at the technology at the beginning of WWII compared to the end. Went from bolt action rifles and biplanes to assault rifles and nuclear bombs. Heck, maybe the Tau develop some super anime-esque mega beam buster cannon that wipes out armies at a time. Who knows. What I'm saying is that no one can say X faction is doomed to win/lose because there are too many variables and nothing is set in stone. Heck, the Byzantine Empire made a huge comeback from decline with Alexios I. Could happen.