Tau: "Good" Guys? (WH40K)

[Lord Woodlouse]

Even the Chaos Gods have good aspects. For instance, the war god Khorne embodies mindless violence and destruction, but he also embodies chivalry and nobility.

In what sense?

[Falkenhayn]

This is why the Emperor was working to understand and seize control of the webway, or build a human version, in order to free humanity from its dependance on the warp, and permit a more enlightened social system to be constructed.

Really? Damn. What source is this from, or is it a conclusion you've come to?

[speaker-to-trolls]

The Tau are more progressive than the Imperium, in the sense that they are actually progressing toward something. I think that the Ethereals genuinely do have the rest of their peoples 'greater good' at heart, after all, without the kind of control they can exert the Tau are just too dynamic for their own good, they'd never have made it through (possibly even to) the atomic age. What they really think about other species I'm not qualified to say, however, all the information I have about how aliens live in the Empire is Tau propaganda.

Anyway, the fact that they're progressing makes them seem better than the Imperium, who seem to be just about getting by in life by being complete bastards. The other thing that makes them seem good is their optimism, which I guess goes with their progressive-ness. Most people in the Imperium are ignorant peasants who are looking forward to toiling away for the rest of their lives and their descendants doing the same, whilst those who can see the bigger picture look forward to keeping the darkness at bay, with an occasional ray of light such as the Sabbat Worlds Crusade inspiring a lucky generation to more than that. The Tau, being less experienced, look forward to a glorious manifest destiny where they'll bring hope, enlightenment and civilisation to the universe, in a way they might be no better off than Imperial serfs, but every Tau believes in their bright future.

There's all kinds of things which make them seem better, but when push comes to shove they're the abusive father who tells his family "It's only because I love you" rather than "This is your fault!".

[NecronLord]

I don't get the impression that the Tau Empire is intrinsically evil like the Chaos beings, C'Tan and Tyranids

None of those are 'intrinsically' evil, chaos can be good, at times, C'tan were brought into an enviroment where they were expected to be ruthless killers and given absolute power (how would you do resisting the old 'power corrupts' axiom for millions of years?) and the Tyranid Hive may not really be aware of other beings. They're evil because of complex enviromental factors.

are and you probably have a better chance of survival under the Tau Ethereals than under a Imperium police state,

There are liberal socieites within the Imperium, too.

Ork chieftains

Orks again, have little choice in what they do.

or Eldar lords.

The Craftworld Eldar are a very permissive society internally, despite a rigid path system. The Exodies are space amish...

And the sterilising of Imperiam humans on colony worlds sounds like a necessary precaution if the Imperium humans want to exterminate all Tau to last man, woman and child, when given a chance.

A necessery precaution for what?

The Tau are "evil" by our standards, but they're essentially "good guys" when in the deep, deep, deep, deep, deeep moral cesspit of WH40K.

Except, they're like that anyway. The others all ended up evil for very good reasons - the Dark Eldar are fucked up because the Old Ones made their brains hyper-emotional to use them as living weapons, then gene-locked their entire species so it couldn't change more than superficially...

[NecronLord]

Really? Damn. What source is this from, or is it a conclusion you've come to?

It's from the last Horus Heresy art book. Visions of Heresy or something. Has lots of stuff about the Custodes and Mechanicus probing the web via a warp-tunnel under the Palace the Emperor had constructed. Magnus the Red destablisied it enough to let demons in - that's why the Emperor ordered Russ to go and burn everything in the area; if Magnus had tried again, Earth would have kerploded.

[Ted C]

Even the Chaos Gods have good aspects. For instance, the war god Khorne embodies mindless violence and destruction, but he also embodies chivalry and nobility.

In what sense?

In the military idealism sense. This point is made very clearly in The Lost and the Damned, if you can get your hands on a copy.

The Chaos Gods are, on the whole, pretty bad, but they still contain bits of various ideals. Tzeentch embodies all kinds of change, good as well as bad; Slaanesh embodies love and ordinary pleasures as well as insane debauchery; etc. The negative aspects exceed the good aspects, but the good aspects are there.

[Lord Woodlouse]

Even the Chaos Gods have good aspects. For instance, the war god Khorne embodies mindless violence and destruction, but he also embodies chivalry and nobility.

In what sense?

In the military idealism sense. This point is made very clearly in The Lost and the Damned, if you can get your hands on a copy.

The Chaos Gods are, on the whole, pretty bad, but they still contain bits of various ideals. Tzeentch embodies all kinds of change, good as well as bad; Slaanesh embodies love and ordinary pleasures as well as insane debauchery; etc. The negative aspects exceed the good aspects, but the good aspects are there.

So would Khorne respect killing only military targets and leaving civilians alone?

[NecronLord]

So would Khorne respect killing only military targets and leaving civilians alone?

He'll go for worthy opponents first, but he's also a god of slaughter.

However, some of the creeds of his followers emphasise this aspect of him much more. There's lots of formal challenges and rules and whatnot on some demon worlds, IIRC.

[Ted C]

So would Khorne respect killing only military targets and leaving civilians alone?

Yes, but he would also respect mindless slaughter of everything that breathes. One of the problems with the Chaos Gods is that they embrace evil as readily as good. Since evil will step on good to get its way, evil tends to dominate their followings.

[SylasGaunt]

There are also Daemonic Weapons that function similarly. And they do have the ability to grant unnatrual life, something that is at best unproven in a Warscythe.

I don't mean by gameplay mechanics I mean that the Dawn Blade looks like a large warscythe with the gauss bits removed.

And yes, the Tau have no readily apparent psykers. But that doesn't mean they're necessarily unnatural. Orks, for all they're artifcially designed, also have a virtually no psyhic presence as a whole.

Uh as I recall the Orks have that whole massive collective psychic presence thing warping reality, making shootas go dakka, and making red things go faster.

Contrast that to the Tau who seem to be one step up from Pariahs in the No-Psychicness sense and who have no navigator gene.

Good for them? The Tau can't really be that dumb when it comes to Chaos. They've had ample evidence for at least the upper echelons to have an idea of what it really is.

Well if they do they didn't pass it on to the troops on the ground, the fluff piece in question is told by a Tau commander who fought off a chaos invasion.

And the official GW fluff choses to call it unknown. So while it's certainly possible, it's by no means proven.

So what the background books don't count anymore? Ethereals alone possess the pheromone producing organ in question and the Tau are supposed to have a highly sensitive sense of smell. And when does the 'unknown' fluff date from?

Another bit of evidence, though not nearly as conclusive as I'd like, is the matter of the enemy in question. It says in the new Tau codex that the Ethereals were killed by an unknown enemy. We know that the second phase colony of ke'lshan was invaded by Slaaneshi chaos forces so they would be known to the Tau. It's not all that conclusive though because I don't know the time period of the invasion.

A feat which probably wouldn't be hard for Tzeentch to manage, I'm sure.

Or the Deceiver to and that sword of his sure doesn't look like most Daemon weapons I've seen.

However he came to be free of the Ethereals, the fact is he rejected them when they came to reassert control. His enclaves have become entities unto themselves, at best in a Taiwanese relationship the the Empire proper.

Uhm I don't ever recall a mention of more Ethereals being sent to him since he pushed out of Tau space. In fact I recall his section of space being specifically forbidden to other Tau after he went rogue.

And as I've said, there's the fact that Farsight has better the Tau life span by something like an order of magnitude. That screams Chaos Taint.

It could also scream 'Necron substitute'.

Except for the fact that in most cases screwing around with Necron worlds results in them waking up and slaughtering everyone, that's true. But I think that last part is pretty important, don't you?

To quote the Tau Empire Codex:

In the ruins of a pre-human civilization, the Tau forces engaged an unknown enemy and the Ethereal caste leaders of Farsight's expedition were killed.

This is the same world where he found the Dawn Blade and it's described as a 'dead world'.

Well, now that's one to file for the absurd theories file.

How so? Many of the Necron Warriors who fall in battle are teleported away and repaired but not all of them and there's not exactly anymore squishy biological Necrons left to replace them with.

[NecronLord]

The C'tan can manufacture necrons effortlessly. The Deceiver's second fluff-appearance has him making a factory that creates them from an AdMech facility. They're not irreplaceable by any stretch of the imagination.

[Stormbringer]

I don't mean by gameplay mechanics I mean that the Dawn Blade looks like a large warscythe with the gauss bits removed.

It's possible. But looking similar is by no means conclusive proof. And a warscythe with out of the "phase bits" would be essentially useless.

Uh as I recall the Orks have that whole massive collective psychic presence thing warping reality, making shootas go dakka, and making red things go faster.

Contrast that to the Tau who seem to be one step up from Pariahs in the No-Psychicness sense and who have no navigator gene.

That's incredibly overstated. People act like Orks can't do anything, that their psychic gestualt is what makes it all work. That's pretty much bull crap. We've seen on plenty of occassions that ork equipment will work, if not terribly well, for humans and others.

Your average Ork is essentially a psychic blunt. They do have psykers but the Weirdboyz are relatively rare and Orks don't have Navigators either. Part of the reason they have their own gods is that they beat out even Tyranids for numbers. The galaxy is littered with Orks.

All in all, the Tau don't have to be anyone's puppets for them to be relatively warp-blind. They're certainly not even close to Pariahs! Daemons and Chaos can still touch them and screw with, more easily than with Orks I will add. The thing is that their race is not very psychic and Chaos tends to look for richer pickings.

Well if they do they didn't pass it on to the troops on the ground, the fluff piece in question is told by a Tau commander who fought off a chaos invasion.

And they would hardly be the first to cover up Chaos. The Imperium does it to a huge extent (even if later fluff has reduced the extremity of it).

So what the background books don't count anymore? Ethereals alone possess the pheromone producing organ in question and the Tau are supposed to have a highly sensitive sense of smell. And when does the 'unknown' fluff date from?

The background books do count for something. There are plenty of non-development team writers that have had an influence on the "reality" of 40K. However, unless it's material originating with the development team it's by nature less reliable. (Look at some of the utterly contradictory crap put out by the Black Library!)

The unknown fluff is actually from the Tau Codex, old version. It's also mentioned in some of the designers notes and teaser material that used to be on the old GW UK site.

The Xenology conclusion is the only concretely stated theory, so it has to be accepted. But that doesn't mean that it overrides GW fluff or that it's not some what suspect and fits ill with other material.

Another bit of evidence, though not nearly as conclusive as I'd like, is the matter of the enemy in question. It says in the new Tau codex that the Ethereals were killed by an unknown enemy. We know that the second phase colony of ke'lshan was invaded by Slaaneshi chaos forces so they would be known to the Tau. It's not all that conclusive though because I don't know the time period of the invasion.

And this is evidence of what exactly? That Tau are known to Chaos and Chaos to them?

Or the Deceiver to and that sword of his sure doesn't look like most Daemon weapons I've seen.

We've only ever seen a tiny handful of the daemon and chaotic weapons ever mentioned. And the Chaos Codex itself notes that Daemonic and Chaotic weapons come in all shapes, sizes, and types. They're an incredibly variable lot.

Uhm I don't ever recall a mention of more Ethereals being sent to him since he pushed out of Tau space. In fact I recall his section of space being specifically forbidden to other Tau after he went rogue.

That's not strictly true. He's officially off limits but there's some traffic back and forth. The mainstream Tau have some idea what's going on with Farsight, they're just utterly unwilling to discuss the matter.

And I believe there's mention that he's rejected attempts to bring him back into the fold. If there wasn't Ethereals in the bunch I'd be suprised.

It could also scream 'Necron substitute'.

And they've seemlessly replace a national factional leader when?

To quote the Tau Empire Codex:

In the ruins of a pre-human civilization, the Tau forces engaged an unknown enemy and the Ethereal caste leaders of Farsight's expedition were killed.

This is the same world where he found the Dawn Blade and it's described as a 'dead world'.

And a dead world could easily be a world caught in a warp-storm and irreversibly tainted. We've seen them described in detail plenty of times.

How so? Many of the Necron Warriors who fall in battle are teleported away and repaired but not all of them and there's not exactly anymore squishy biological Necrons left to replace them with.

Because there is absolutely zero evidence for it?

[Big Orange]

I don't get the impression that the Tau Empire is intrinsically evil like the Chaos beings, C'Tan and Tyranids

None of those are 'intrinsically' evil, chaos can be good, at times, C'tan were brought into an enviroment where they were expected to be ruthless killers and given absolute power (how would you do resisting the old 'power corrupts' axiom for millions of years?) and the Tyranid Hive may not really be aware of other beings. They're evil because of complex enviromental factors.

Well Adolf Hitler, Hermann Goering, Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich were evil because of so-called "enviromental factors". And humanity getting conquered by either the C'Tan, Chaos or the Tyranids will result in total extermination. They are intrinsically evil because they want to exterminate all life in the galaxy.

are and you probably have a better chance of survival under the Tau Ethereals than under a Imperium police state,

There are liberal socieites within the Imperium, too.

Like who? And if they're there, they sound like the rare exception rather than the norm. And living in the Third Reich or Soviet Union would be pleasant as well (if you're not on their shit list).

Ork chieftains

Orks again, have little choice in what they do.

Of course they were originally bred as cannon fodder for the Old Ones. And having no choice makes them amoral rather than immoral, but it doesn't change the fact that would want to be conquered by them.

or Eldar lords.

The Craftworld Eldar are a very permissive society internally, despite a rigid path system. The Exodies are space amish...

Same as the Imperium. And it seems that the Eldar are not evil by default anyway.

And the sterilising of Imperiam humans on colony worlds sounds like a necessary precaution if the Imperium humans want to exterminate all Tau to last man, woman and child, when given a chance.

A necessery precaution for what?

Well if the Imperium of Man has the long term goal of exterminating the Tau and humans massacred Tau colonists once Tau troops retreated in Dark Crusade, then that means that Imperium humans are a genuine threat.

The Tau are "evil" by our standards, but they're essentially "good guys" when in the deep, deep, deep, deep, deeep moral cesspit of WH40K.

Except, they're like that anyway. The others all ended up evil for very good reasons - the Dark Eldar are fucked up because the Old Ones made their brains hyper-emotional to use them as living weapons, then gene-locked their entire species so it couldn't change more than superficially...

Trust me, if any WH40K race was going to conquer the Earth tomorrow, I'd much rather it be the Tau than almost any other species - under the C'Tan, Chaos and Tyranids it would be certain fucking death. And I know the Tau have their own grubby little secrets and commit atrocities as well.

[Jason von Evil]

So would Khorne respect killing only military targets and leaving civilians alone?

*Just starts laughing uncontrollably*

Sorry, but I couldn't help myself. *Wipes eyes* Woo.

Anyway, the Orks have psykers, called Wyrd Boyz. IIRC, they drawn on the psi energy of all nearby Orks. Unfortunately, there's a chance using their powers will kill them.

[NecronLord]

Well Adolf Hitler, Hermann Goering, Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich were evil because of so-called "enviromental factors".

Yes, dumbshit, they were. They were not 'intrinsically evil' you think they were 'born evil?' What is this, the Omen?

And humanity getting conquered by either the C'Tan, Chaos or the Tyranids will result in total extermination. They are intrinsically evil because they want to exterminate all life in the galaxy.

Humanity being conquered by the C'tan will not result in total extermination. Indeed, there's a case to be made that the average standard of living will go up.

Like who?

Various. Springing to mind immediately is Pavonis, from Nightbringer, which has Trade Unions and some sort of right of protest.

And if they're there, they sound like the rare exception rather than the norm. And living in the Third Reich or Soviet Union would be pleasant as well (if you're not on their shit list).

Err. No. Neither was particularly pleasant even for the average citizen. 'If only the Fuhrer knew' was the catchphrase of civillian life in Germany, and there's rather worrying food queues if you're living in the USSR.

Same as the Imperium. And it seems that the Eldar are not evil by default anyway.

No. As a craftworlder, your leaders will hear you democratically when they have the chance, and will bend over backwards to protect your life and comfort, as well as giving you the option of leaving any time you like. Being a member of their society is pretty damn good.

Well if the Imperium of Man has the long term goal of exterminating the Tau and humans massacred Tau colonists once Tau troops retreated in Dark Crusade, then that means that Imperium humans are a genuine threat.

Humans aren't just a threat the the Tau. The Tau control dozens of worlds. The Imperium controls over a million, and some of its cities have larger populations than entire star systems of Tau. The Tau get away with what they do because the Imperium is busy with Tyranids nearby.

Trust me, if any WH40K race was going to conquer the Earth tomorrow, I'd much rather it be the Tau than almost any other species - under the C'Tan, Chaos and Tyranids it would be certain fucking death.

Absolutely incorrect on the C'tan. Supposedly those ruled by the Deciever will be getting to experience paradise. The rest will keep you alive and torture you in some way. Chaos doesn't kill everyone either, of course.

[DocHorror]

To be honest modern earth could be ruled by the Imperium, with the proviso that we all worship the Emperor in some shape or form.

The only contact with the Imperium we'd know would be a titular planetary Govenor who might or might not take an active role in the direct running of the each individual land mass and perhaps an Arbites precinect somewhere.

The Imperium is a big, big place and to be honest if every planet was a gothic repressive nightmare it simply couldn't function.

[Shortie]

In what sense?

In the military idealism sense. This point is made very clearly in The Lost and the Damned, if you can get your hands on a copy.

The Chaos Gods are, on the whole, pretty bad, but they still contain bits of various ideals. Tzeentch embodies all kinds of change, good as well as bad; Slaanesh embodies love and ordinary pleasures as well as insane debauchery; etc. The negative aspects exceed the good aspects, but the good aspects are there.

So would Khorne respect killing only military targets and leaving civilians alone?

More the other way around. A worthy foe might be given a second chance or some such, and just possibly a heroic last-stand defence could persuade a Khornate force to spare a city. But in general non-warriors are worthless. Think real noble chivalry, not the romance kind.

[SylasGaunt]

It's possible. But looking similar is by no means conclusive proof. And a warscythe with out of the "phase bits" would be essentially useless.

I didn't say without the phase bits I said without the gauss bits.

That's incredibly overstated. People act like Orks can't do anything, that their psychic gestualt is what makes it all work. That's pretty much bull crap. We've seen on plenty of occassions that ork equipment will work, if not terribly well, for humans and others.

Yes in the hands of humans.. who if I recall the IG regiments that make use of Ork weaponry use them on, surprise surprise, orks.

IIRC there was also a case of someone painting a Leman Russ red while fighting orks and it did indeed go faster.

Your average Ork is essentially a psychic blunt. They do have psykers but the Weirdboyz are relatively rare and Orks don't have Navigators either. Part of the reason they have their own gods is that they beat out even Tyranids for numbers. The galaxy is littered with Orks.

Which results in the massive psychic gestalt they all share. And IIRC Orks don't have Navigators but get enough of them trying to go to the same place and they don't need them, not so with the Tau.

All in all, the Tau don't have to be anyone's puppets for them to be relatively warp-blind. They're certainly not even close to Pariahs! Daemons and Chaos can still touch them and screw with, more easily than with Orks I will add. The thing is that their race is not very psychic and Chaos tends to look for richer pickings.

That would be why I said up from Pariahs. And it is odd because the Tau seem unusually lacking in this respect.

And they would hardly be the first to cover up Chaos. The Imperium does it to a huge extent (even if later fluff has reduced the extremity of it).

Except it's not covering it up in the piece in question is lifted from the memoirs of a General. The Tau do seem to cover up the size of hte Imperium but as far as I know they've never bothered covering up much of anything about Chaos.

The background books do count for something. There are plenty of non-development team writers that have had an influence on the "reality" of 40K. However, unless it's material originating with the development team it's by nature less reliable. (Look at some of the utterly contradictory crap put out by the Black Library!)

And nothing from the development team contradicts the pheremone argument.

The unknown fluff is actually from the Tau Codex, old version. It's also mentioned in some of the designers notes and teaser material that used to be on the old GW UK site.

Which all predate Xenology's release.

Though speaking of the old Tau Codex there's also the bit in there where they mention that nobody seems sure if the Commander Farsight running the enclave is the same Tau or if someone else has taken his title.

The Xenology conclusion is the only concretely stated theory, so it has to be accepted. But that doesn't mean that it overrides GW fluff or that it's not some what suspect and fits ill with other material.

Please explain how it fits ill, because thus far your only argument to that effect is that some Tau worlds don't have Ethereals and yet still keep in line.. though I'd love to find out where the 'never have ethereals on them' quote comes from.

And this is evidence of what exactly? That Tau are known to Chaos and Chaos to them?

Yes but the enemy that killed Farsight's Ethereals apperantly wasn't.

We've only ever seen a tiny handful of the daemon and chaotic weapons ever mentioned. And the Chaos Codex itself notes that Daemonic and Chaotic weapons come in all shapes, sizes, and types. They're an incredibly variable lot.

That's not strictly true. He's officially off limits but there's some traffic back and forth. The mainstream Tau have some idea what's going on with Farsight, they're just utterly unwilling to discuss the matter.

And I believe there's mention that he's rejected attempts to bring him back into the fold. If there wasn't Ethereals in the bunch I'd be suprised.

Yes but rejecting them doesn't necessarily mean face to face meetings.

And they've seemlessly replace a national factional leader when?

Well the Deceiver replaced an Imperial Govenor and a Necron Lord has replaced an Inquisitor with nobody being the wiser.

And a dead world could easily be a world caught in a warp-storm and irreversibly tainted. We've seen them described in detail plenty of times.

The chaos tainted worlds I remember were anything but dead. Then there's also the whole pre-human civilization thing though that could be the Eldar.

[Stormbringer]

I didn't say without the phase bits I said without the gauss bits.

Which is why I think you're a bumbling idiot. Warscythes are a phase weapon.

Yes in the hands of humans.. who if I recall the IG regiments that make use of Ork weaponry use them on, surprise surprise, orks.

And using it while no orks were around, or have you forgotten Cain's Exodus? For that matter, both the Catachans and the Armaggedon Ork Hunters both use Orks weapons on fellow humans at times. They still work if not as well as other races weapons.

The Ork Effect is massively overstated.

IIRC there was also a case of someone painting a Leman Russ red while fighting orks and it did indeed go faster.

If you can source it and prove it, go ahead.

Which results in the massive psychic gestalt they all share.

Except you miss that the average Ork is blunt. They have a negligible presence in the Warp, by design. The reason they have a massive racial is that they're fucking everywhere. They beat even the Tyranids for sheer proliferation.

And IIRC Orks don't have Navigators but get enough of them trying to go to the same place and they don't need them, not so with the Tau.

On very rare occasions they can make coordinated jumps. Mostly they just hop on something and go.

That would be why I said up from Pariahs. And it is odd because the Tau seem unusually lacking in this respect.

And I'm saying you're deliberately being a weasely fuck. They're not just a step above Pariahs. They're not even as naturally protected as Orks.

THEY ARE SIMPLY NOT STRONGLY PSYCHIC!

You seem to be dishonestly equating having a natural resistance to the warp. The Tau are as open to the depredations of the Warp as any. That's been proven in multiple encounters with Chaos.

Except it's not covering it up in the piece in question is lifted from the memoirs of a General. The Tau do seem to cover up the size of hte Imperium but as far as I know they've never bothered covering up much of anything about Chaos.

Unless Chaos encounters are routinely detailed, they have to be. As Firewarrior shows, they've had encounters with daemons. And they've lost ships in and to the warp with all that entails. They've had encounters with Chaos followers.

So there's no possible way barring massive self-delusion could they not know Chaos is out there. Which makes a cover up significantly more likely.

Which all predate Xenology's release.

And who on the games development team wrote it? Oh wait, it wasn't.

I have acknowledged that Xenology is a credible source but what you don't seem to get through your fucking skull is that Black Library products are lower on the canon food chain. So when a GW in house product contradicts a BL one, the BL loses. Period.

Furthermore, isn't the Xenology book written from an Imperial perspective? Which makes any claims in it extremely suspect (see: Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer).

Xenology is a credible source, but it's far from the last, iron-clad word on the subject.

Though speaking of the old Tau Codex there's also the bit in there where they mention that nobody seems sure if the Commander Farsight running the enclave is the same Tau or if someone else has taken his title.

But the fact that the Codex, which is written as authoritive omniscent, says that he's an individual character. So that blows that out of the water.

Please explain how it fits ill, because thus far your only argument to that effect is that some Tau worlds don't have Ethereals and yet still keep in line.. though I'd love to find out where the 'never have ethereals on them' quote comes from.

Yes but the enemy that killed Farsight's Ethereals apperantly wasn't.

Again, so what? There are hundreds, if not thousands, of minor Chaos Worlds and multi-planet holdings. Things like the Sanguinary Worlds pepper the Imperium and the wild regions beyond Imperial reach. Not to mention there are inhuman powers that serve Chaos as well.

The Tau aren't necessarily going to recognize an individual faction of Chaos worshippers. So "unknown enemy" don't mean, unknown but definitely not a Chaos Faction.

Yes but rejecting them doesn't necessarily mean face to face meetings.

Yes, because clearly the Tau and the Ethereals are going to write off a major chunk of their Empire to some one they consider a madman with out seeing him at all.

Well the Deceiver replaced an Imperial Govenor and a Necron Lord has replaced an Inquisitor with nobody being the wiser.

And replacing one imperial Governor out of a few million at least isn't exactly the same as replacing a well known, highy visible figure. Nor is an Inquisitor, who is by definition a secretive figure indeed. Nor, I will point out, have those figures set out to make the kind of trouble which give them an interstellar profile. Farsight kicked over an ant hill among the Tau, something the Necrons have not shown a predilection for doing.

The chaos tainted worlds I remember were anything but dead. Then there's also the whole pre-human civilization thing though that could be the Eldar.

Worlds destroyed by warp storms, such as the Angelus Sector, are dead worlds. Completely killed by exposure to the warp.

Not all warp-touched worlds are dead worlds. But a dead world can be Chaos tainted.

[Tasoth]

I had a strange idea one day about the Tau. They are indeed Evil and may quite possibly represent Extreme Order. In the caste system, everyone has their place where they are and no where else. You and your family for all eternity are Earth/Air/Water/Fire caste and there is nothing you can do about. Aliens are given a specific job and that is it. Kroot are close combat specialists and scouts, dhowager(mangled spelling) are navigators, so forth and so on. Even the Tau's extreme want to get the Kroot to stop their cannibalism can be seen as an extension of this as the act, last I recall, allowed the Kroot to absorb DNA and, at the whim of the shaper, start to change their DNA. This would make the Kroot to chaotic and that would need to be stopped.

Oh, and Old Tau Codex says the Tau do have a warp presence, it's just highly negligible, like pebbles in the bottom of a stream if you will. Chaos can still nab the blue bastards, but it's just unlikely for the most part.

[SylasGaunt]

Which is why I think you're a bumbling idiot. Warscythes are a phase weapon.

Except that Warscythes also have a built in Gauss Blaster moron.

And using it while no orks were around, or have you forgotten Cain's Exodus? For that matter, both the Catachans and the Armaggedon Ork Hunters both use Orks weapons on fellow humans at times. They still work if not as well as other races weapons.

Really? That's the first reference I've ever heard for Catachans using ork weaponry or Ork Hunters fighting anyone but orks. Source?

Except you miss that the average Ork is blunt. They have a negligible presence in the Warp, by design. The reason they have a massive racial is that they're fucking everywhere. They beat even the Tyranids for sheer proliferation.

Blunt just means non-psyker, they still have a rather more substantial psychic presence than the Tau who are by all indications unusually blunt.

On very rare occasions they can make coordinated jumps. Mostly they just hop on something and go.

Which is focused on their gestalt.

And I'm saying you're deliberately being a weasely fuck. They're not just a step above Pariahs. They're not even as naturally protected as Orks.

THEY ARE SIMPLY NOT STRONGLY PSYCHIC!

They are unusually lacking in the psychic department, at least compared to everyone else aside from the necrons.

You seem to be dishonestly equating having a natural resistance to the warp. The Tau are as open to the depredations of the Warp as any. That's been proven in multiple encounters with Chaos.

Do kindly point out where I claimed that. Do please try and point where I said they had a natural resistance to the warp as opposed to saying they were extremely lacking in psychic presence?

Unless Chaos encounters are routinely detailed, they have to be. As Firewarrior shows, they've had encounters with daemons.

How does that equate to a cover up of its existence precisely? I've failed to see any hint that the Tau cover up the existence of chaos beyond the fact they treat them as just another faction of crazy humans.

And they've lost ships in and to the warp with all that entails. They've had encounters with Chaos followers.

The warp is hazardous for the most part that's all losing ships there would tell them.

So there's no possible way barring massive self-delusion could they not know Chaos is out there. Which makes a cover up significantly more likely.

Where is it every suggested that they don't know Chaos is out there? They just don't place much of a distinction between chaos and the rest of humanity.

And who on the games development team wrote it? Oh wait, it wasn't.

I have acknowledged that Xenology is a credible source but what you don't seem to get through your fucking skull is that Black Library products are lower on the canon food chain. So when a GW in house product contradicts a BL one, the BL loses. Period.

Now point out the fucking contradiction please. If you can't produce one your entire fucking argument is a waste of time.

Furthermore, isn't the Xenology book written from an Imperial perspective? Which makes any claims in it extremely suspect (see: Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer).

Xenology is written as the personal log of an inquisitor. It's not even close to the IIUP.

Xenology is a credible source, but it's far from the last, iron-clad word on the subject.

Would you kindly then produce something that has another word on the subject?

But the fact that the Codex, which is written as authoritive omniscent, says that he's an individual character. So that blows that out of the water.

No it doesn't, it just says that there's someone named Commander Farsight running around. It's that same Codex that points out that it may or may not be the original Farsight, nobody knows.

Again, so what? There are hundreds, if not thousands, of minor Chaos Worlds and multi-planet holdings. Things like the Sanguinary Worlds pepper the Imperium and the wild regions beyond Imperial reach. Not to mention there are inhuman powers that serve Chaos as well.

And the Tau have encountered Chaos forces before, they're hardly unknown. Now granted there are other races out there like the Hruud or the Umbra, but very few of them are actually involved in anything truly important even on the scale of the Tau empire.

The Tau aren't necessarily going to recognize an individual faction of Chaos worshippers. So "unknown enemy" don't mean, unknown but definitely not a Chaos Faction.

Individual factions capable of going toe to toe with Tau tend to be the sort that have CSMs with them. Chaos factions don't have a habit of suddenly popping up on dead worlds. Necrons do have a tendency to pop up suddenly on dead worlds.

Yes, because clearly the Tau and the Ethereals are going to write off a major chunk of their Empire to some one they consider a madman with out seeing him at all.

And you bitch about me earlier. Farsight hasn't taken ANY of their Empire. It's stated quite clearly in both Tau codexes that Farsight established his enclaves OUTSIDE Tau space.

Furthermore even if the Tau sent Ethereals that doesn't necessarily lead to a face to face meeting since Farsight could just as well have told them to fuck off over the radio. Particularly since he doesn't seem to want any dealings with the Ethereal caste.

And replacing one imperial Governor out of a few million at least isn't exactly the same as replacing a well known, highy visible figure.

Since when was a planetary Governor not a highly visible figure? Especially given the population disparity between Imperium and Tau worlds? We're not talking about supplanting the guy and then having him become a recluse, we're talking about the Governor going about his business and the Imperium not having the slightest inkling about it until the Callidus assassin they sent to kill him for not paying his taxes gave him a good stabbing with a C'tan phase blade and accomplished jack and shit.. right before he killed her horribly and thus preserved his identity.

Nor is an Inquisitor, who is by definition a secretive figure indeed. Nor, I will point out, have those figures set out to make the kind of trouble which give them an interstellar profile.

Given the amount of infighting and backstabbery that goes on within the inquisition it's a damn impressive feat that it never got found out. Especially when it was playing the part of a Radical which meant it had other inquisitors actively searching for a way to catch it out.

Farsight kicked over an ant hill among the Tau, something the Necrons have not shown a predilection for doing.

Worlds destroyed by warp storms, such as the Angelus Sector, are dead worlds. Completely killed by exposure to the warp.

Not all warp-touched worlds are dead worlds. But a dead world can be Chaos tainted.

All the ones I recall seeing in the novels tend to be of the gribbly or nasty type. Not just dead,

[Lord Zentei]

Which is why I think you're a bumbling idiot. Warscythes are a phase weapon.

Except that Warscythes also have a built in Gauss Blaster moron.

Not neccesarily, no.

The ones the Pariahs carry have built-in gauss blasters, but that is not intrinsic to the warscythe itself. As it it described on page 14 in the Necron Codex, the warschythe is purely a close combat weapon, whereas the Pariah entry in the list specifically states that their warscythes have built-in gauss blasters, precisely because it is not a given that this should be so.

[NecronLord]

The bits in question from Xenology are extracts from the writings of Inquisitor Maturin Ralei of the Ordo Xenos. He's a Lord of the Necrontyr in the service of Mephet'ran, so while he's not entirely reliable, writing as he is, from an Imperial perspective, he can be assumed to be in on anything the C'tan are up to.

What's more, his specimens were detained and dissected (and more importantly, information the Imperium has, gathered) on the order of Mephet'ran. There's no reason for a Tau to be there if the C'tan (and only Mephet'ran has been active long enough to have catalysed Tau development) know all about them.

[GeneralTacticus]

A quick note for SylasGaunt - the Angelus subsector worlds to which Stormbringer refers were seen (briefly) in the Ravenor books, and they are, indeed, completely dead. A warp storm went through them some decades before the time period of the books and killed everything on the surface, leaving behind basically lifeless, warp-tainted rocks. The important bit is that the warp taint did not take the form of gribbly daemons trying to eat everyone who approached, but it was severe enough that fragments of glass taken from those worlds could give even total psychic blunts a look into the Warp, and in at least one case, appear to have allowed a daemon to slip through and possess a host without anybody, including the host himself, realising until much later.

Not having read most of the sources being referenced, I'm not going to comment on the rest of the discussion, but I thought I'd point that out.

[Lancer]

The bits in question from Xenology are extracts from the writings of Inquisitor Maturin Ralei of the Ordo Xenos. He's a Lord of the Necrontyr in the service of Mephet'ran, so while he's not entirely reliable, writing as he is, from an Imperial perspective, he can be assumed to be in on anything the C'tan are up to.

What's more, his specimens were detained and dissected (and more importantly, information the Imperium has, gathered) on the order of Mephet'ran. There's no reason for a Tau to be there if the C'tan (and only Mephet'ran has been active long enough to have catalysed Tau development) know all about them.

Ralei couldn't exactly have Darvus maintain his little xeno-zoo, but then say "oh, don't worry about the Tau, I already know all about them." without Darvus getting curious. If Darvus was to start poking around, at the very least Ralei's going to need a new Magos Biologos, and at worst he's going to have to start all over again now that his identity as "Inquisitor Ralei" has been compromised.