Chaos Tau

[Ravingbantha]

I've been thinking about some possible conversion projects lately, and I started tossing around the idea of Chaos tainted Tau. I've read several other posts on this subject on a few other sites, and it seems the general objections are...

1) The Tau barely register in the warp: As I understand it, so do humans, at least that is what the Eldar claim. Either way, I never knew the chaos gods to be too picky. Besides, they're not really interested in your souls. Khorne relishes in slaughter, he doesn't care if his followers are killing or dying, so long as there is bloodshed. So why wouldn't he accept any bloodshed offered by Tau? Nurgle only cares for testing new decay and corruption. So why wouldn't he be interested to see how his various plagues on the Tau? Slaanesh only seeks new pleasures, so why not seek to please his/herself with the delights of the Tau? And Tzeentch is the Changer and corruptor of all, so why not play with the Tau?

2) It's never happened before: same could be said of the Space Marines until Erbus fell and took half the legions with him.

3) The Tau have no psykers: Neither does Khorne, then again Erbus wasn't a psyker either, and let's not forget that the Death Guard didn't as well. In fact not even Tzeentch needs a psyker to worm his way in. How many stories are there about Tzeentch found a way to corrupt through technology.


Thoughts?

[Fueldrop]

Who would you have them follow?

She Who Thirsts is all about hedonism and lust, two things somewhat lost on the Tau with their breeding programs and focus on the group over the individual.

The Blood God is a poor choice, as the Tau are poorly suited for the kind of rip and tear warfare he favors.

The Changer of Ways might work, but the rational Tau are unlikely to be easily brought in by the promise of sorcery.

That leaves The Plaguefather, and I think he's a rather good fit. Like the Tau Uncle Nurgle is very big on connection to those around him and he loves all his children. Corrupting the greater good to be more in line with his own views? Probably not difficult. He's the god I'd suggest most likely to show an interest in corrupting the Tau.

[40kGamer]

Nurgle does sound like a good choice. I think Tzeetnch could work as well if you play off the conniving political manipulation of the whole greater good angle vs the sorcery side of things. A single corrupted Etheral would be enough to build the warband. Tzeentch is really good at getting things to happen where the participants don't fully realize who or what they are supporting.

[son_of_volmer]

Tau are blue and have bird-like feet, they could be a result of a Tzeentch experiment with Eldar.

My personal Tau army have tan-white skin their backstory is that they are from the future. They saw the universe burn and have done everything in their power to try and stop it. Harnessed every ounce of Tau psyker energy (past present and future) to get one more chance to stop the apocalypse. They came back, set the Ethereals up with all the sweet tech and then left. They're so messed up, none of the other tau want anything to do with them.

[Mr Mystery]

Trouble is, Taundont exactly have a handle on belief in Gods....

[Charistoph]

1) The Tau barely register in the warp: As I understand it, so do humans, at least that is what the Eldar claim. Either way, I never knew the chaos gods to be too picky. Besides, they're not really interested in your souls. Khorne relishes in slaughter, he doesn't care if his followers are killing or dying, so long as there is bloodshed. So why wouldn't he accept any bloodshed offered by Tau? Nurgle only cares for testing new decay and corruption. So why wouldn't he be interested to see how his various plagues on the Tau? Slaanesh only seeks new pleasures, so why not seek to please his/herself with the delights of the Tau? And Tzeentch is the Changer and corruptor of all, so why not play with the Tau?

Humans barely register in the Warp compared to Eldar, who are HUGE in the Warp. Tau barely register in the Warp compared to the average Human (not even a Psyker).

That having been said, there is a story about a stone that was Marked by Khorne and possessed to roll around crush people, so...

Tau are blue and have bird-like feet, they could be a result of a Tzeentch experiment with Eldar.

Hooves are bird-like?

[Ravingbantha]

Who would you have them follow?

She Who Thirsts is all about hedonism and lust, two things somewhat lost on the Tau with their breeding programs and focus on the group over the individual.

Slaanesh could make inroads with the Tau the same as with the Emperors Children (not like Space Marines are known for macking on the ladies), through martial pride. There's also the issue of the rouge element, every group, culture, or society has those rouge elements that refuse to conform to group norms. A society as repressed as the Tau, are the perfect place for a pleasure cult to rise up, to feed those repressions.

The Blood God is a poor choice, as the Tau are poorly suited for the kind of rip and tear warfare he favors.

Khorne doesn't care if you kill with a chain axe or a gun, he's about violence and bloodshed. However, if the Tau were to be engulfed in a long protracted war, the possibility of blood lust consuming them rises. And even though the Tau are not close combat oriented, that does not mean their enemies will respect that. Survivors from a particulary bloody assault could easily become swayed to Khorne. If the Blood Ravens can fall because Khorne swayed a Librarian, so could the Tau.

The Changer of Ways might work, but the rational Tau are unlikely to be easily brought in by the promise of sorcery.

True, but Tzeentch likes to worm his way into machinery corrupting the AI, something which Tau could rely heavily on. There is also the possibility of an Etheral, so desperate to fight the psykers of other races, he/she delves into dark areas without knowing it.

That leaves The Plaguefather, and I think he's a rather good fit. Like the Tau Uncle Nurgle is very big on connection to those around him and he loves all his children. Corrupting the greater good to be more in line with his own views? Probably not difficult. He's the god I'd suggest most likely to show an interest in corrupting the Tau.

Then there is the likelyhood that corruption comes from an external source adopted into the Tau Empire. The Tau seem to have an open door policy, and anyone of these races could bring in the initial influence that corrupts others.

Trouble is, Taundont exactly have a handle on belief in Gods....

Neither did the Human Empire before the fall of Horus, in fact (much like the Tau) they were spreading an Athestic message.

Humans barely register in the Warp compared to Eldar, who are HUGE in the Warp. Tau barely register in the Warp compared to the average Human (not even a Psyker).

That having been said, there is a story about a stone that was Marked by Khorne and possessed to roll around crush people, so...



Hooves are bird-like?

Exactly my point, if a Rhino or a sword could become daemon possessed, then why not a Riptide AI that slowly wispers to it's pilot?

[Sly]

I have allied Tau with my Chaos Marines, but I did not use any Tau miniatures. Instead, the Tau rules were used to provide rules for weird Dark Mechanicus conversions. Since Tau and Necrons provide more shooty-oriented Allies for CSM, and Chaos has no access to Skitarii or the proper Mechanicus, it seemed to me to be the best way to field some shooty Daemon Engine conversions.

[CoffeeGrunt]

The thing with Tau is that their souls are tiny blips, crumbs to the Dark Gods. Why would Daemons snuffle for crumbs when bounties of grapes cluster around Imperial worlds, not to mention the fine, rich fruit that Eldar souls are like? The Gods only watch the material world for the most important of deeds, and these are few and far between.

The entirety of the Tau defecting to a God would probably be less noticeable to them than an Imperial world. Their resonance with the Warp is so low that it'd be like trying to light a football stadium with a load of LEDs. That said, you could use the Farsight Enclaves as a beginning for them. IMO, the Ethereals are what repress Tau emotions through subtle control methods, as well as stringent secret police and an utter lack of personal privacy. There would be no clandestine meetings because that would require them to find a space to collect where no-one is watching, and with Drones watching the streets and a camera at every corner...

Perhaps the Farsight Enclaves would be the beginning of it. It's possible that Warp travel is what inflates a species' presence in the Warp and feeds their souls. Mankind didn't really start to have a large Psyker problem until several millennia after it had made Warp travel commonplace, after all.

[Ravingbantha]

You're assuming that all they are interested in is their souls. Souls are one thing, tools are another. The Imperium has weapons that can lay waste to an entire planet, so why build Las-Pistols and knives? Because every tool has a use. I could come up with dozens of scenerios as to why each f the gods would want to use the Tau.