# Tau Tech: Based off a found STC Library?



## Malak Falco (Jul 1, 2010)

A few friends of mine actually like this idea when I put it forward but other than Tau technology seeming to favor what seems to be stock scifi conventions and has the sort of aesthetics you'd think of with future humans I can't think of what sparked the concept other than my writing causing it to pop in there as a bit of character relevant background.


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## gen.ahab (Dec 22, 2009)

No, it just the art style seems like it was designed by humans because of the fact that the stuff is actually designed by a bunch of british nerds, thank god for them. They did all that jazz on their own. Nice little tidbit though, I like your thinking.


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## Malak Falco (Jul 1, 2010)

What else strikes me is when the Tau are first discovered they're roughly what, stone age? Six thousand years later they have technology that would make the cogboys on mars commit twelve different kinds of heresy to be able to duplicate. Granted six thousand years ago from today WE were at the stone age and look how far w'eve come, but that's also my point. They seem to have gotten help in advancing as fast as they did.


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## gen.ahab (Dec 22, 2009)

They evolved faster due to the radiation(IDK) on their world and I believe the ethereals helped a bit. They aren't my region of expertise.


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## Malak Falco (Jul 1, 2010)

Thought hte necrons had the radiatio nissue (which is why they kept getting cancer even when they managed to colonize other worlds.)


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

It wasn't any sort of natural evolution. You don't "evolve" over 6000 years. It was their incredible technological advance. From wandering plainsmen to Space-faring explorers in a few thousand years.

The Ethereals bound the Tau into a society before they destroyed themselves.

As to the STC idea, I'm not sure.


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## gen.ahab (Dec 22, 2009)

Then again they were trapped in a warp storm and anyone who has heard CoTE go on one of his "TIME MEANS NOTHING" talks knows that, within the warp, time doesn't mean jack shit. So they could have been in there longer, to them anyway.


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## Malak Falco (Jul 1, 2010)

Aw crap.....


Who/what are these etherials, do they relate to the Old Ones, and does the tau lack of psychers have anythingto do with an attempt at making \a race daemons don'treally care about?


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## gen.ahab (Dec 22, 2009)

They are some form of blue commie space hippies.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

gen.ahab said:


> Then again they were trapped in a warp storm and anyone who has heard CoTE go on one of his "TIME MEANS NOTHING" talks knows that, within the warp, time doesn't mean jack shit. So they could have been in there longer, to them anyway.


Except warp storms don't cause you to go into the warp. They're just unnavigable and near-impossible to get messages through. Or anything with the warp, really.

Anywho, the Etherals are Tau (or at least appear to be Tau) that appeared around the end of the 37th millennium. At this time the Tau broken up into many factions and were slaughtering each other. Then the Etherals arrived and brokered peace between all the factions. Uniting them all under the idea of a "Greater Good".

Now they serve as leaders of the Tau and champions of the Greater Good.


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## gen.ahab (Dec 22, 2009)

Dow 2, the planet was trapped in a warp storm and the planet had aged many more years than it had been gone. Planets cought in a warp storm may just as well be in the maelstrom or the eye. Shot don't work right. You really don't need to be in the warp, just a bleed zone, for shit to go all wonkey.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

I don't recall Aurelia being stuck in there any longer than it should have been. After all, there wasn't really there (minus various daemons) to really keep track of time.

It was sealed away for a thousand years, though.


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## Angel of Blood (Aug 18, 2010)

I got the impression that the Tau worlds weren't so much in a warp storm as the space around them was blocked by warp storms, much like Terra and other planets before the great crusade began.


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## Baron Spikey (Mar 26, 2008)

Angel of Blood said:


> I got the impression that the Tau worlds weren't so much in a warp storm as the space around them was blocked by warp storms, much like Terra and other planets before the great crusade began.


Exactly what I was about to say.

6,000 years isn't that much time considering the race was united to one purpose- humanity has made technological leaps and then forgotten most of this progress throughout our history mostly because we are so divided and combatative. Imagine, though, how far along we'd be if in 4,000 B.C we'd actually united as a race of singular purpose as well, we'd be colonising other planets as we speak I imagine.


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## Malak Falco (Jul 1, 2010)

gen.ahab said:


> Dow 2, the planet was trapped in a warp storm and the planet had aged many more years than it had been gone. Planets cought in a warp storm may just as well be in the maelstrom or the eye. Shot don't work right. You really don't need to be in the warp, just a bleed zone, for shit to go all wonkey.


I was under the impression that the DoW games were considered non-cannon fluffwise.


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## locustgate (Dec 6, 2009)

Malak Falco said:


> I was under the impression that the DoW games were considered non-cannon fluffwise.


It is,but it still has the 40k mechanics. Same background, warp storms, chaos, bla bla bla. The characters and actions are noncannon, units still work.


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## Eremite (Aug 27, 2010)

Plus the Ethereals have been confirmed as a result of eldar meddling, taking Q'orl pheremone-glands and introducing them to tau. You also have to assume, then, if those first ethereals were raised and educated by the eldar to make sure they got the tau on the right path to being a thorn in the side of their future enemies and a willing tool for future manipulation. 

Though the eldar probably didn't give them any advanced technology, they no doubt guided their creations from behind the scenes to advance quickly.


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## locustgate (Dec 6, 2009)

Eremite said:


> Plus the Ethereals have been confirmed as a result of eldar meddling, taking Q'orl pheremone-glands and introducing them to tau. You also have to assume, then, if those first ethereals were raised and educated by the eldar to make sure they got the tau on the right path to being a thorn in the side of their future enemies and a willing tool for future manipulation.
> 
> Though the eldar probably didn't give them any advanced technology, they no doubt guided their creations from behind the scenes to advance quickly.


Sauce? I've only seen than in 40k conspiricy threads.


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## Cocakoala (Apr 27, 2009)

The Tau codex has some things in it when it describes the arrival of the Etherials. Strange Lights and sounds came from the hills or some such jazz the night they appeared and figures were saw and then when people took a second glance they had dissapeared. Something like that. And also somewhere It says that there was an eldar raid on some place where they stole some pheremones or something which are now inside etherials. Thats where the thoughts that Eldar involvement came from. 

It also quite nicely explains why the Tau advance so quickly. I think it is this and the fact they were organised.

Good idea tho. Nice to see another point of view.


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## Baron Spikey (Mar 26, 2008)

Eremite said:


> Plus the Ethereals have been confirmed as a result of eldar meddling, taking Q'orl pheremone-glands and introducing them to tau. You also have to assume, then, if those first ethereals were raised and educated by the eldar to make sure they got the tau on the right path to being a thorn in the side of their future enemies and a willing tool for future manipulation.
> 
> Though the eldar probably didn't give them any advanced technology, they no doubt guided their creations from behind the scenes to advance quickly.


Yeah that's not been confirmed except by the fans who made it up, which obviously doesn't count.


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## Barnster (Feb 11, 2010)

I've always subscribed to the view that it was simply the unabridged peace that caused the tau technological boom. Think of the technology leeps we have made in the last 65 years since the end of WW2 the last major hot conflict. You could even look at the USSR in the 20s and 30s, they went from a technological backwater to one of the worlds main powers, simply due to a united vision.

Also remember that T'au is within a globular star cluster, which put more urgency for the tau to get space faring technology, otherwise their doomed 

Eldrad Ulthuan said that the eldar looked at the tau with great interest, but there is no mention that they had any influence on their creation or direction. Just as there is no canon regarding o'shova's swords origin


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## Mathai (Sep 1, 2010)

I have always had two observations regarding the Tau, but they are purely my own conjecture and so only me thinking out loud.

The first is that Tau technology has always reminded me a bit of Eldar tech. Mainly in their tanks hover ability, but also in the mobility of their suits being remeniscent of Eldar Jetbikes (Both can move in assault without actually assaulting.) My own theory has alway been they found and assimilated some Eldar technology, and their own race's tendacies changing the machinery to not exactly the same as Eldar stuff.

My second observation is a bit more far fetched. I have noticed similarities between how the Tau came to prominence, and how the Skaven did in Warhammer Fantasy. Both races were introduced to a strange influence (Warpstone for Skaven, and whatever went on behind those massive warpstorms for the Tau) After the fact, both races were vastly evolved from before. The Tau just having more time to develop.


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## dougan_2 (Aug 27, 2009)

Could the warpstorm of done something to the time in the planet, like make it go on for longer inside for the same time it goes on outside. So like, could be 100 years to inhabitants on the planet and only 50 for the ones outside. Is it plausible? I have no clue. But it does say how the ethereals came out of the fog and like, rallied all the clans etc...


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## Karthak (Jul 25, 2010)

gen.ahab said:


> They are some form of blue commie space hippies.


Nah, not communist, at any rate. They have a caste system, and caste systems aren't compatible with communism at all.


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## gen.ahab (Dec 22, 2009)

It's a joke. Comes from the "for the greater good" crap. Obviously they arn't commies, but it is fun to call them such.


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## D'epinay Chevalier (Sep 30, 2010)

The Tau's technology may not be a result of direct intervention, but the ethereals seem like they are. I only say this because they appeared out of nowhere. Also the ethereals have some similarities to the shamans that guided humanity before they became the Big E. 

Tau are based off of imperialist Japan, and technology from anime. So they are most assuredly not commies and/or hippies.


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## D'epinay Chevalier (Sep 30, 2010)

this is more of a leap but Tau history could be taken directly from japanese history. Arrival of the portugese in japan = arrival of Imperials on T'au. The westerners getting kicked out = warpstorms. The Tokugawa Shogunate = the arrival of ethereals. The west forcing the japanese back into the world = end of warpstorms?


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## gen.ahab (Dec 22, 2009)

Really... No shit? It's a joke. If it were true it wouldn't be funny. 

P.S. Try not to double post.


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## D'epinay Chevalier (Sep 30, 2010)

i wasnt argueing with you about the blue commie space hippies, more supporting that its a joke than anthing


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## gen.ahab (Dec 22, 2009)

Sorry, bad day so far. A bit testy I suppose..... 5 hour bio-chem class will do that to you.


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## Child-of-the-Emperor (Feb 22, 2009)

gen.ahab said:


> anyone who has heard CoTE go on one of his "TIME MEANS NOTHING" talks knows that, within the warp, time doesn't mean jack shit. So they could have been in there longer, to them anyway.


Glad to see I made an impression. 



hailene said:


> Except warp storms don't cause you to go into the warp. They're just unnavigable and near-impossible to get messages through. Or anything with the warp, really.


Well warp storms are rifts which force the material world to essentially overlap with the warp. However it doesn't seem that T'au was actually engulfed by the storm, rather just isolated by it. So in this case, it essentially just completely cut T'au off from the galaxy (and thus prevented the Imperium from wiping the Tau out) rather than engulfing it. 

As for the Tau's rapid (and arguably mysterious) technological advancement. I would generally put it simply down to the influence of the Ethereals. They firmly united every sect and faction of the Tau race under the banner of the 'greater good' (with the 'assistance' of the pheromonal organ they uniquely possess). With their rulership and influence came total unity and cooperation. Just imagine having every single member of a race contributing solely to the betterment of their species, with that in mind its fairly easy to imagine how they have achieved so much in a small amount of time.



Mathai said:


> The first is that Tau technology has always reminded me a bit of Eldar tech. Mainly in their tanks hover ability, but also in the mobility of their suits being remeniscent of Eldar Jetbikes (Both can move in assault without actually assaulting.) My own theory has alway been they found and assimilated some Eldar technology, and their own race's tendacies changing the machinery to not exactly the same as Eldar stuff.


Drawing a comparison to Tau and Eldar technology by using the example that they both use hovering tanks is absurd. There are probably countless races and species in the galaxy that use such technology. It also doesn't bode well for this theory that almost all Eldar technology is based to varying degrees on the warp or psy-tech, where as the Tau's is not.


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## Drannith (Sep 18, 2010)

Barnster said:


> Eldrad Ulthuan said that the eldar looked at the tau with great interest, but there is no mention that they had any influence on their creation or direction. Just as there is no canon regarding o'shova's swords origin


There is a small amount of cannon in the codex but it doesn't really explain too much about it. I'll have to look into it more as that is an interesting point, I just glanced over most the fluff sadly.


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## Serpion5 (Mar 19, 2010)

Child-of-the-Emperor said:


> Drawing a comparison to Tau and Eldar technology by using the example that they both use hovering tanks is absurd. There are probably countless races and species in the galaxy that use such technology. It also doesn't bode well for this theory that almost all Eldar technology is based to varying degrees on the warp or psy-tech, where as the Tau's is not.


Imperium, orks, eldar, tau, necron, Old Ones (presumably) etc... 



I would say the tau tech is more to do with rapid growth and development, both on an evolutionary and industrial scale. 

Discounting humanity for a moment, because they are explained as being stagnant and stuck in the middle ages...


The necrontyr are a good parallel to the tau. Short lifespans mean a different mentality to a longer lived race. I imagine they would be more proactive and ambitious, eager to see as much contribution in their lifespans as they could.

When compared to the Eldar, a race of such longevity and patience to match, the tau would naturally appear to be developing new tech very fast. 

So... They haven`t figured out juvenat yet? :laugh:


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## Mathai (Sep 1, 2010)

Child-of-the-Emperor said:


> Drawing a comparison to Tau and Eldar technology by using the example that they both use hovering tanks is absurd. There are probably countless races and species in the galaxy that use such technology. It also doesn't bode well for this theory that almost all Eldar technology is based to varying degrees on the warp or psy-tech, where as the Tau's is not.


 
Heh, there may be many races that use hover tech in the galaxy, but only two that devote their entire fleet of vehicles to the use of it on the table top game. (I suppose the Necrons count as well, but they only have a single vehicle at this point so I think its fair to not include them) To me, everything in the fluff is judged by its impact on the table top strategy game that the entire Warhammer universe is based off of. There may be countless civilizations that use hover technology to the same degree as the Eldar and Tau do as you suggest, but they dont matter in the end because they arent interesting enough to be given an army. 

The Imperium has that technology, but from its rarity in the game it must not be an easy thing to replicate and mass produce for millitaristic use. And yet the youngest race in the game has managed to make it a viable means to base not only their vehicles entirely off of, but have also miniaturized the hover systems to be capable of being used in their various drones? The only human device I have ever seen at that size are Servo Skulls. I may have missed it, and will humbly say I was wrong if they do, but I've never seen any weapons on Servo skulls. Let alone energy shields. 

The only other galactic force of note I know of that has so complete a mastery over hover technology is the Eldar. Nothing else from the major forces in the galaxy even comes close, and nothing from any of the books I have read does either. I wont claim to have read even close to all the books, but the non table top entities from those I have read dont have the same mastery over hover either.

And yes, the Eldar use psy and warp craft in their technology, but does that mean they dont use hard science as well? Despite the how they do it, Eldar DO have melta technology and plasma technology. The same as the Imperium, the same as the Tau. All three use the same principals of science to produce the same effect. Both shuriken catapults and bolter guns have triggers and magazines for ammunition. There are apects to Eldar Technology that Tau cant comprehend, but at the same time there are things that are the same wherever you go. 

So yeah, I draw a line of similarity between the two forces when the youngest race has a technology that only the oldest of races uses anywhere near as often. Is it far fetched? I believe I implied so in my own post. Is It absurd?....No more than anything else in 40K :wink:


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

It is rather far-fetched to believe two races are somehow related because of one technological similarity.

I mean, heck, Orks and humans both use vehicles that use wheels and tracks in large numbers.


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## Mathai (Sep 1, 2010)

Not related, not exactly. I was just thinking that to get to a technological level that to me seems more advanced than even the Imperium in reletively short time, they needed something to springboard their technology to such a level. Like the Soviet Union when they stole the technology for Nuclear Weaponry.

Now, I'm not trying to say that this is how it must be. There are indeed alot of ways they could have done it, and those Ethereals might have been all the nudge the Tau needed to attain that technology all on their own. But imagine the advances that could be made by an intelligent race that doesnt have humanities innate fear of xenos technology if they were to discover a largely intact Eldar Falcon? Stable plasma technology, the most advanced anti-grav tech...all the little things that only the most advanced minds in the galaxy could make right there for your scientists to dissect and adapt to your own society with thousands of years to implement it.


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## Styro-J (Jan 20, 2009)

Well, they didn't come up with all that technology on their own. They picked up bits from all the planets and races that they met in their expansion. How they got out there in the first place? Beyond me.


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## Barnster (Feb 11, 2010)

Virtually all eldar tech is based of the warp and their use of wraithbone so they are not interchangably with tau tech.

Its not a large strech to imaging that the tau found "something" techy and reversed engineered it, maybe even if they just found the imperial ecosurvay equipment, its unlikely it was a falcon or alot of complex eldar tech, the tau empire is in the galaxy's backwater and a long way away from the old eldar empire

What I find most striking that a society with such a strict caste system has managed to be so creative, virtually all understanding in human creativity focuses on freedom or as a form of escapism, in a society of a constant status quo why strive?, and yet look at successful have they been. 

Or they just go around plagerising others people work as ther own, Or maybe they can look at an item and think alot more outside the box for wider implications 

Maybe GW never really thought the fluff would get devoured so in depth


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

The Tau caste system doesn't seek to maintain the status quo. Actually rather to the contrary. Each individual must excel to his or her utmost at his or her given task for the Greater Good.

It's as if Communism actually worked.


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## Eremite (Aug 27, 2010)

Baron Spikey said:


> Yeah that's not been confirmed except by the fans who made it up, which obviously doesn't count.


'fraid you're wrong. _Xenology_, an official GW publication, pretty much confirms it. It contains a Q'Orl legend - eldar who helped them to win a war and then demanded they surrender their queen. They refused, but the eldar took the queen anyway. 

The Ethereal dissection showed that the strange diamond ridge on their foreheads is a pheromone organ, the similarity to those in Q'Orl dissected later on referenced explicitly by the Magos in question, who had already noticed that Ethereals exercise some control over nearby tau using pheromones. It's pretty hard to deny the evidence, especially when we know from the Tau Codex the Ethereals came down from heaven with lots of lights and shizz. 

Eldar made the Ethereals - the Tau race are a long-term project of theirs.


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## Mathai (Sep 1, 2010)

The fact that the Eldar use the warp and psychically grown materials does make me think that my theory isnt the most likely of outcomes anymore, despite this growing theory that Eldar created Ethereals and so kick started Tau society in that way. But I still think its possible despite its imporobable nature. How to put it in as few words as possible (I dont wanna go into another rant again xp)...How about this, Nuclear Fusion.

The concept of nuclear fusion is the same no matter where you go, though the means to achieve it might go through different methods somewhat. The Imperium would use traditional science, Eldar would use their warp/psy tech, and Tau would use whatever the heck they do, but each method would still have to take the same scientific laws into account in order to achieve nuclear fusion. What the Tau would be assimilating would not be the direct process the Eldar used, but the theories that make fusion be plausible at all. And by the same process would produce stable plasma and antigrav tech and such.


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## hailene (Aug 28, 2009)

At one point, humanity had all the technology (or at least something similar) to all the Tau have. Does this mean that Humanity engineered the Tau? Unlikely.

I've always detested the idea of the Eldar playing with the Tau. After reading Xenology, it looks likely. The timing of it links up as well. They took the Q'Orl queen around the end of the m37 and the Etherals so happened to pop in around then.

The question is how the Eldar got there. Since Tau was still covered in warp storms. I suppose they created a webway there before hand.

The odd thing, though, is that they went through a wave of technological innovation even before the Etherals came into being. Very strange.


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