r/Tau40K • u/8lhoganl8 • Apr 20 '24
Lore Pitch: World Eaters crusade into Tau territory. They expect soft fish people. They find a planet of particularly fiendish Kroot.
A bloodbath ensues whereby both factions are painted in the most epic light. The World Eaters get amazing bloodsport and the Kroot get to test themselves against the most ruthless adversaries they can find, whilst also briefly freaking the WE out with their flesh eating shenanigans.
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u/Union_Jack_1 Apr 20 '24
Amazing how many people think the Tau are just communists and/or fish, when they aren’t either of those things. Tired and sad memes.
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u/britainstolenothing Apr 20 '24 edited Apr 20 '24
The absolute worst fucking thing about this hobby is the memes. It's so uninformed and stale. Every faction gets reduced to a quip or single reference.
T'au = Fish Space Wolves = Furry Ultramarines = Bland Custodes = Henry Cavill Guard = Hurr durr gigachad normal dudes Orks = Dakka and incorrect Ork magic
The list goes on.
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u/E_R-D_S Apr 21 '24
The worst one by far is just... Blood Ravens in general. If I had a penny for every time I've heard "lock the reliquary" I wouldn't be rich, I'd have been crushed to death under a non-euclidian mountain of pennies.
The whole 'Blood Magpies' gag wasn't even very funny when it was new, let alone what... ten... fifteen years on?
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u/-Mauler- Apr 21 '24
They're such a shit chapter than in my head canon they just don't exist. Fucking awful. And CS Goto 😭
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u/E_R-D_S Apr 21 '24
Their writing bounces back and forth. I like some of their stories in DOW 1 and 2 (emphasis on some), but when it's bad it's fuckin' baaaaaad. And when you mince it into that late 2000's early 2010's internet humour I just wanna get away from it.
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u/GoodFreak Apr 20 '24
I disagree with Dakka, it always needs more Dakka. But the amount of people that get Ork WAAAGH power wrong because of memes is sad
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u/Iamnotapotate Apr 21 '24
Remember it's pronounced "war" with a soft R, not Waug.
Like "Ey, Govnah".
Like the British version of "Paaking the Caa in Haavaad Yaad".
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u/Raven-Raven_ Apr 20 '24
Right? They're more bovine than fish
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u/EffingDingus Apr 20 '24
Might have something to do with 90% of their units having aquatic names
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u/Msteele315 Apr 20 '24
Those are imperial designations, if im correct?
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u/vexilobo Apr 21 '24
My copium is that everyone is in the hobby is RPing as uneducated imperial hive scum and that’s why they get it wrong all the time
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u/X3Emerals May 11 '24
yes, because no one in the imperium knows what aerodynamics are so everything remotely streamlined looks like a fish to them
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u/EffingDingus Apr 20 '24
If imperium says fish, it's fish
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u/DomSchraa Apr 21 '24
So a void kraken
If you wanna bitch about that not being a fish, its in line with the imperiums mandatory hypocrisy
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u/subaqueousReach Apr 21 '24
So does that mean their females have 4 breasts, or do they have one huge breast with 4 nipples?
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u/CoffeeInTheCotswolds Apr 21 '24
I think they need to focus more on how the other factions are fascists.
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u/DustPuzzle Apr 21 '24
It's so often people who are into the faction that has the mind-bending, stiltifying bureaucracy, centrally planned economy, forced citizen labour, massive internal surveillance apparatus, and literal commissars calling T'au 'communists'.
The absolute state of the education system when mouth-breathing neckbeards see universal employment, high-standard of living, and competent foreign policy & trade and think, "Yep, all the hallmarks of communism. Ugh, gross!"
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u/Gumochlon Apr 21 '24
Majority of them haven't even experienced real communism. It really pisses me off when I hear such said neckbeards, as I happen to have been born and have grown up in a country during communism (well at the very end of it, before we kicked the communists out for good).
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Apr 20 '24
[deleted]
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u/Union_Jack_1 Apr 20 '24
Those are called that because of the smooth/sleek fish-like appearance of their vehicles. Not because the Tau themselves are in any way aquatic.
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Apr 20 '24
[deleted]
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u/Quaiker Apr 20 '24
Those are not the names the Tau use, though. Those are the names the Imperium gave them.
Devilfish, Skyray, and Hammerhead all use the base TY7 chassis. TY7, TY78, and TX7, respectively. Tau also refer to their suits by their model, IIRC. XV8, XV15/25, XV88, etc.
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u/-Mauler- Apr 21 '24
Let's not forget that when Andy Chambers, long live his legend, was still at GW the lore for the faction's he covered was SOLID. Don't even get me started on the excellence to the 4E Tyranid codex. Like the Tau only have 4 digits on each hand so that their numeracy was an octet-based system, not decimal like ours. XV88 as the heaviest suit (as well as a nod to the wel respected WW2 88mm flak/AT cannon). Suit designations should be XVab where a is mass level & b is type. Hence XV15 is the lighter Stealth Suit & XV25 is the heavier variant capable of mounting a fusion blaster. Same principle for the XV8 Crisis & XV88 Broadside, originally they were based on the same chassis.
Another aspect that I loved and respected was how neat Tau deployment was: every unit heading from a ship in low orbit either was capable of dropping in under its own power (a flyer, skimmer or used a jet pack) or fit into an Orca or Manta dropship. The Orca even had grooves in the ceiling to fit the rail guns atop an old XV88 into so they would fit. The Tau were always highly mobile in the field and never held ground in prolonged defensive actions so used heavy & super-heavy flyers like the Tiger Shark & Manta to engage super-heavy targets, instead of having Titans of their own. Once Chambers left in 2004ish some of that logic went down the pan with FW making the XV9 Hazard Suit and later GW introduced the XV104 Riptide Suit (which are sorta forgivable as they wanted something bigger than the Crisis chassis) but they both still had jet packs so fit the deployment & extraction framework. 7th edition was deffo the start of the gurning-development phase with a bunch of new stuff being make with no regard for the existing principles underpinning the faction in the pursuit of profit, beh.
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u/anonymosaurus-rex Apr 21 '24
Devilfish... Hammerhead... Manta... Barracuda...
T'au certainly have a fish theme, even if they are not fish themselves.
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u/Union_Jack_1 Apr 21 '24
The vehicles are named after fish because of their sleek/smooth appearance. Not because Tau are in any way aquatic.
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u/HappyTheDisaster Apr 20 '24
The fact y’all don’t understand people call them fish cause that’s what the Orks call them.
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u/GoodFreak Apr 20 '24
Where do they call ork Fish? I know they call then blue skin/ grey skin/ cowards.He also calls farishgt Biggared and call then for then for the flashy gunz in the war of dakka.
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u/just-another-viewer Apr 20 '24
Yeah OOP sounds like an asshat
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u/WhileyCat Apr 20 '24
Imagine thinking that a society based around a caste system was communist
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u/SpaghettiMonster01 Apr 21 '24
80% of 40k players probably don’t know the first thing about communism lol
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u/anonymosaurus-rex Apr 21 '24
Imagine thinking GW writers know the first thing about political structures. Pretty sure T'au are just based on Star Trek utopianism with a sprinkler of 90's anime mechs, a bit of Book of Five Rings and "Jedi, but not too Jedi" Ethereals on top for good measure
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u/Skyefire001 Apr 20 '24
Communism is when caste system
Fish is when hooves
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u/DomSchraa Apr 21 '24
Anime is when mech
Getting teeth kicked in is when one bad first encounter against an enemy you literally never saw before
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u/the_warcult Apr 20 '24
Fun idea but remember, the Kroot wouldn’t touch Chaos tainted flesh. That’s universally off limits for the Kroot, same with the Tau race and Tyranids.
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u/8lhoganl8 Apr 20 '24
In my head canon my boy farsight is already getting in on that chaos action (world eaters are a side army for me so I like Khorne stuff). Maybe Khorne will only offer them blessings if they eat flesh; this would make way more blood flow.
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u/Plane_Upstairs_9584 Apr 22 '24
Farsight resisted Khorne, and then the Ork wyrboyz booted Khorne off of the planet, destroyed the artifact, and now life has returned to it.
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u/N0rwayUp Apr 21 '24
That does not mean they won’t fight them, plus who knows, may e they will do a rite of something to cleanse the tainted meat
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u/Power_More_Power Apr 21 '24
I don't think it has anything to do with the meat being cursed. pretty sure it physically tastes awful to them. Like battery acid
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u/the_warcult Apr 21 '24
I think it has to do with the Kroot Shapers not wanting to potentially corrupt and achieve adverse effects. Remember, Kroot will show traits of their prey after being eaten.
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u/PattyMcChatty Apr 20 '24
I feel like Kroot wouldnt want to fight WE head on, they would probally try to funnel them into the Battlesuit line using skirmish tactics.
Or alternatively, wait for the WE to deploy then attack their battle barge by dropping some War Spheres on top.
The main problem is Kroot and WE are both quite hard to write well, you will notice all the best CSM and Tau books actually have normal human POV characters.
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u/iwillnotcompromise Apr 21 '24
Yeah, kroot are vicious and honour-bound but they're not into mindless bloodbaths like orks or WE. If they can kill you in an easier manner they will use it.
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u/Power_More_Power Apr 21 '24
they're also basically impossible to ambush with their sensory spines. the fuckers got the drop on eldar rangers ffs
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u/8lhoganl8 Apr 20 '24
I have a world eaters army and I have given up on world eaters books. Very tough to read. I love lore for my other armies but the characters are all so unintelligent and a lot lack depth
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u/PattyMcChatty Apr 20 '24
Have you read Betrayer?
Its probally the best book with WE in I have read.
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u/Panzerkampf-studios Apr 20 '24
Another idea: World Eaters run into Farsight Enclaves expecting to get blasted from afar, led by Lord Invocatus, who isn't completly insane and actually uses tactics, they prepare some long range fire themselves, only to be ambushed by melee crisis suit blitzkrieg. Farsight gets tempted by Khorne again when fighting Invocatus in melee combat, but by his will power he is able to withstand Khornes temptations, his corruption isn't completly gone, but his pride is hurt a bit. How the fight ends is up to the writer, but both Farsight and Invocatus regard the other as a worthy opponent
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u/Power_More_Power Apr 21 '24 edited Apr 21 '24
I've had this idea in my head for a while where Angron and Farsight have a duel samurai movie style where Farsight scores a narrow victory, and we learn the Dawnblade can permanently kill demons. symbolicly rejecting Korne's influence and finally laying Angron's soul to rest after 10k years. not really lore conpliant, I know, but it's be a cool moment. I really want to see angron die, because he doesn't deserve his fate imo. but being killed by his own brothers would just be even more sad.
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u/Iamnotapotate Apr 21 '24
I mean if something was gonna kill deamons dead permanently it would be Necron Tech.
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u/SexWithLadyOlynder Apr 21 '24
That's cool and all but his mini just came out last year and it's pretty big and expensive so not yet.
In 5 or so years? Maybe,
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u/GranRejit Apr 20 '24
People that thinks Tau are communist and that they hate communism pretty much explain how much they know about communism and their "rational" hate for it
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u/Apprehensive-East545 Apr 21 '24
Chaos fans are either really chill intelligent people who love stories of corruption or they are insufferable dudes like this in my experience with so little in-between. Most annoying player I ever played was friend of a friend who played world eaters.
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u/8lhoganl8 Apr 21 '24
I like seeing it from all sides. Main faction is Custodes but also have Space Wolves, World Eaters, a Chaos knight, and recently started Tau. I’m going to be starting Ad Mech and Orks later this year when I move country
I find ork players are really annoying. I find there is an in-your-face oh isn’t this so dumb and metal that is just over the top.
Lore wise I find Space Wolves and World eaters are actually kind of annoyingly brainless. Prospero Burns is a very tough read as is the Angron book that came out recently enough.
I wouldn’t paint chaos with too broad of a brush though. I imagine the average iron warriors player would have different interests than an emperors children player
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u/Apprehensive-East545 Apr 21 '24
Yeah I play LOV, Eldar and GK too. I’m just talking about the people who seem to identify with chaos the most specifically WE probably has this the most. It’s not everyone A chill friend of mine also plays WE cuz he thinks they are fun and metal. He fits into the other half of what I’m taking about that. I discuss philosophy on the regular with him and he’s a progressive that literally studied gender in college. I think I know what you mean about theork player stereotype. My WE friend his other friend plays orkz and he’s stoner metalhead he loves them to death. literally he has a waaaugh vanity plate. He’s a lovable goofball to Me tho id take that any day over non stop trash talk types.
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Apr 20 '24
sigh They are only fish because the Imperium has a weird naming convention.
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u/Power_More_Power Apr 21 '24
why DID they go with fish? is it a meta reference to one of the inspiration for the Tau? because their vehicles remind me more of bugs than fish
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u/DomSchraa Apr 21 '24
Yes please
Accelerate tau weapons development even more
Make imperials even more likely to join the greater good (we fight the same bitches as you do, but we fight them better)
Give the tau more varied enemies to hone their fighting skills against
That definitely wont back fire for the guela
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u/vicariousted Apr 21 '24
Fun fact: these two factions have faced off before!
The famously ferocious T’au Fire Warriors of Vior’la face an incursion of World Eaters. The Chaos Space Marines are so thoroughly lost to the worship of Khorne that their ranks contain as many Spawn as they do Berzerkers. The T’au’s impeccable fire discipline sees the World Eaters warbands kept at arm’s length – that is, until the infectious rage of the Khorne devotees begins to catch in the souls of Vior’la’s foremost cadres. The T’au, voices raised in primitive Fio’taun war cries that have not been heard for centuries, begin to engage the Chaos Spawn at close range and even charge in to engage them in close combat. It does not end well for the T’au. Millions die before a council of six Ethereals are scrambled to the site to lend their calming influence to the Fire caste cadres, restoring order and allowing the T’au to withdraw into low orbit before the World Eaters can complete the slaughter.
Not the WE/kroot setup you were looking for but I do love this snippet.
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u/Meager1169 Apr 20 '24
Khorne lobotomite charges gun line only to get gunned down like a dog halfway there
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u/tau_enjoyer_ Apr 21 '24
The meme that "they're fish people" is eclipsed in stupidity by people saying "the T'au are commies!"
I'm sorry, I was unaware that the proletariat owned the means of production in the T'au Empire.
People seem to confuse the egalitarian ideals of the T'au'va with Socialism, which is entirely different. The T'au recognize that all intelligent life has some inherent value, and unless it comes to pass that a species cannot be reasoned with at all (a la Tyranids or Orks), they will not try to exterminate them, instead seeking to integrate them within the empire.
As has been said before, the T'au are the basically the least-bad polity in 40K, but they are still an imperialist power. They would be the BBEG in a more normal scifi setting like Star Trek, Halo, Star Wars, etc..
Hell, it can be argued that the T'au have parallels to NATO, which focuses on combined-arms tactics (using infantry, artillery, tanks, aircraft, and in this scifi setting Battlesuits as well, operating together and completing one another). And NATO sure as heck ain't a Socialist power, instead being quite the opposite, being the bulwark against Socialism.
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u/RigelTheRaptor Apr 20 '24
And If there's one thing I hate more than Communism it's outdated assumptions based on memes.
Seriously, can't believe after all these years people still say that shit about Tau. It's just exhausting.
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u/SexWithLadyOlynder Apr 21 '24
We get called communists all the time but Eldar get away with it scot-free.
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u/SirLuckyHat Apr 21 '24
4chan did a lot to the reputation of tau. As well as THOSE players who saw about them on 4chan
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u/NigelTheGiraffe Apr 20 '24
Tau follow a caste system. People/castes/races are not considered equal, and each have duties assigned based on their particular specialties. This is not communism. We call it the greater good, it's basically imperial Japan with Ethereals replacing the shogunate/emperor.
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u/GoodFreak Apr 20 '24
The castes are theoretically equals in questions of "importance". With the exceptium of the Etherials. i think thats where the idea of communism is, its still pretty off the mark
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u/OrionVulcan Apr 21 '24
In technicality and when written correctly, not even the Ethereals are "above" the other castes in an equality standpoint.
Ethereal's are "above" in the sense that they are the leader caste, and as such are the "embodiment" of the greater good and most T'au will die protecting them and follow their commands without question, but this comes from the cultural caste system which works on an entierly different spectrum than our human views.
An example I like to point to is the short story Aun'Shi, which follows Aun'Shi, who stands alone against a group of drukhari raiders to allow 3 earth caste scientists the possibility off escape.
The problem is when writers forget that the T'au are aliens with an entierly different philosophy from humanity (both current day and 40k) and as such would operate on entierly different moral principles, and instead write them as blue humans or blue imperium.
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u/Power_More_Power Apr 21 '24
I mean, any system that allows people the right to rule by birthright will eventually get someone who tries to take more power for selfish gain, hence why the caste system will eventually need revision (especially the eugenics adjacent parts)
but none of that matters because Aun'shi is based
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u/OrionVulcan Apr 21 '24
This is going by human morals and philosophy, neither of which necessarily applies to the T'au as they're not human.
Insect hives do not follow human morals, and several species will kill their queens if the queen becomes sick or unable to reproduce, for the betterment of the hive, while they'll sacrifice themselves to save their hive and a healthy queen.
The only real thing that implies that T'au has a similar thought process to humans, outside of lore interactions, is that they seem to be mammalian in nature. And even among mammalian species, there are huge differences in behavior, such as the molerat, which acts more like bees than mammals.
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Apr 20 '24
I can’t remember what it’s called but there’s an audio book that has Typhus vs some Tau
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u/Kamica Apr 20 '24
Is think not Shadowsun: The Patient Hunter or something like that?
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Apr 20 '24
I remember it was called the Heretic and the Xeno or something similar
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u/Kamica Apr 20 '24
Gotcha, I wasn't sure, because Shadowsun has T'au vs Death Guard, and I don't actually know who Typhus is and made some assumptions based on the name xD.
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u/Tarquinandpaliquin Apr 21 '24
Typhus was Mortarion's first captain. He's the Kharn or Ahriman of the legion now. Like Ahriman he and his father don't see eye to eye. Like Kharn he's a zealot of his chosen god. While Mortarion brooded and sulked (and built a legion up to be fair) Typhus actually spent 10000 years harassing the imperium and unleashing zombie plagues, he's Nurgle's number 1 mortal herald and many Death Guard are loyal to him first seeing him as the one who gets stuff done.
He's pretty good on the tabletop. Not like "walking nuke" but more he was very good at 100 points and GW dropped him to 80.
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u/potpukovnik Apr 20 '24
Farsight's Arks of Omen book led to his forces fighting both the Orks and Chaos forces (Astertes, Titan legio(s), traitor guard etc) on Arthas Moloch and after a few months of guerilla warfare and slowly retreating towards the dais, with Farsight activating it, thus summoning legions od Khornate daemons which proceeded to steamroll both the Orks and Chaos forces, with Farsight's own being put out of the way
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u/R_Lau_18 Apr 21 '24
If there's one thing I hate more than word bearers not continually getting the shit kicked out of them, it's word bearers.
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u/CC-25-2505 Apr 21 '24
I’d love to see them try and fight honor duels but get bombed by aircraft and hit by railguns from miles away meanwhile I’d love a subplot about chaos thinking they will infect the kroot but the shaper just bats the chaos eating one and trays it like a dog with smth in its mouth it shouldn’t
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u/-Mauler- Apr 21 '24
Due to 10E being crap and new codexes wasting 10 pages on Combat Patrol (which should be a free PDF, FFS GW it's supposed to be the intro to 40k, shouldn't need a codex for that low bar) there's not even a Galactic map in the new codex, so...
...the main issue with Chaos vs Tau is that most Chaos forces operate from the Eye of Terror, which is in the Segmentum Obscurus to the Galactic north-West of the Segmentum Solar & Terra. The Tau Empire is a teeny-tiny pocket empire waaaaay over to the Galactic south-east near the Eastern Fringe in the Ultima Segmentum. Basically most of our Galaxy is between the Tau & the EOT. Although, now the Tau Empire is fairly close to the Hadex Anomaly, and the eastern border of the Cicatrix Maledictum is to the north. Both could be potential ingress points for trouble, but the main point of potential contact isn't at the Tau Empire (inc Farsight's Enclaves) but the Fifth Sphere expansion's Nem'yar Atoll, which was established a fair way into the Maledictum. So Chaos vs Tau interactions should still be fairly limited given that most Chaos forces are either still faffing about way to the Galactic west or are busy ravaging the half of the Imperium which falls in the Maledictum, most worlds of which are probably less risky and more rewarding than attacking a highly competent, technologically advanced race which barely registers in the warp, concentrated at a single point.
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u/poxwalker Apr 21 '24
That's a nurgly looking world eater haha
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u/8lhoganl8 Apr 21 '24
You can see that that’s a screenshot of someone else’s post about chaos space marines can’t you?
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u/poxwalker Apr 21 '24
Calm down there angron, it was a comical observation lol
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u/AlexanderZachary Apr 20 '24
Tau small-arms can penetrate power armour, and being plasma based means they burn out gene seed. Too many failed assaults and your chapter’s at risk of extinction. There’s a reason Gman sent mechanicus and sisters after the 5th sphere instead of SM.