VLOG: Expanding the Tau Empire
July 23, 2015 by warzan
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Name of the detachment could be a ‘Band’ after a group of Gorrillas. Name their squads after things like ‘Silverback’ or maybe that would be their vehicles?
To Wiki!
Bring back AT-43!
The name for ‘Group of Apes’: ‘Grapes’….
The Grapes of Wrath?
collective noun for Gorillas – Whoop (or sometimes Troop)
I thought YES! You are giving AT-43 a fair spin :p would be cool if you could make a segment on the show where you test older, even defunct systems .. in the spirit the of “the system isnt dead system isnt dead just because its been abandoned” 🙂
And i must have started to stutter without anyway to edit .. sorry
Planet of origin: Argentum tergum in the Clyde sector
Detachment is led by a ceaser and is organized into troops. A troop can be either a Hear, See or Speak roughly correlating to Assault, Heavies and All Rounders.
Should have a berzerker rule when they go ape…
Prefered Enemey should be Bad Moons ork clans, on account that they look like nearly ripe bananas from a distance, but clearly are not when seen up close which triggers a rage in them (see previous go ape rule).
Have mist generators which makes them surprisingly stealthy.
Imperial Fists would have to run away as they are yellow also. That’s not a banana you want to peel in a hurry lol.
they could be minions? the natural enemy of the banana?
I thought I’d have a bash at this one:
“It has been postulated that the Gilaero are an offshoot of the Jokaero species. Where the latter are regarded as one of the most highly technologically advanced races in the galaxy who are also generally peaceful and only create for their immediate needs. The Gilaero like thier cozens, are a nomadic species wondering through the galaxy seemingly at random and possess in innate understanding of technology. Here all similarities end. Rather than being creatures capable of incredible acts of engineering, the Gilaero are regarded as fierce warriors who will offer their services as mercenaries for hire. Like the Jokaero the Gilaero’s origins are shrouded in mystery.
The Tau have since encountered the Gilaero and have both hired them to supplement the Tau fire cast and sheared the XV battlesuit technology with the Gilaero who have modified it to their own designs (some say this was achieved through the enslavement of several Jokaero).”
The names probably rubbish but others should feel free to run with any ideas ion there that they like.
it would make sense for them to be an offshoot, if they have similarities
Love the direction your taking with 40K, keep it up.
I’d say name them Cryptid.
Species: Mir-Ka (also Mirka, Mirchar, or Mirankar)
Planet: Kigoma
I think it would be interesting if women and men had different tones of hair (I know they are pre-painted so that saves you painting them, but maybe wash the fur with an ink) I think females are the warrior caste while males are the ‘pilot’ cast. So the technical stuff is male caste and the brute force is female.
To that end:
A warrior cast is a: Graueri (Gr-ow-er-eye)
A Pilot cast is a: Beringei (Bear-ing-eye)
A squad of warriors is a: Horn
A squad of Pathfinders is a: Claw
A squad of Assult Troops is a: Fang
A group of vehicles is an Aculae (stinger)
A group of flyers is a Talon
For reference:
Mirka is the tibetan word for unseen wildmen who hunt humans
Kigoma is the city Jane Goodall used as a base to study Gorillas
Graurei & Beringei are two species of Gorilla (lowland & mountain)
And there is some historical precedent for ancient African forces to name their ‘company’ sized groups after the anatomy of predators.
I second @apocryphal suggestion, that all sounds really cool
I used AT-43 Karman Wendigo’s as count-as Chaos Terminators in an Apocalypse game, they single handled held the entire left side of the board. Of course, there we kept out of sight of most big guns, and a squad of 15 in a formation doesn’t hurt.
The Karmans also have a unit with large guns mounted on their backs, perfect for Broadsides if you count the sold cannons as APFSDS rounds.
Race Name : Gora!!! ( Gorilla 😉 )
Vocabulary : Every name has just two syllables. For example Broadside -> Brode ; Stealth Suit -> Steit; Piranha -> Pra . The reason is they don’t like long words but rather short and punch talks ( literally sometimes ) since they were used to always run constantly thought the jungle and scream specific sounds when something important happened around them.
Planet – Jun’l : Obviosly mostly jungle un the centre and two icy poles with big oceans that cross the entire planet around with a lot of small rivers everywhere. A planet of big beast and vegetation everywhere, mostly reptileans and mamals… for some reason this make the Gora hate the Kroot since they look a lot like their natural predators… the Vespid just look odd to them ( there is no insects on their planet ) and the Tau are kinda fine.
Technology : Before the Tau came they had very basic prehistoric tools but they were used to write everything with runes and make maps of most the world they knew. They didn’t worship any gods or supernatural, for the Gora this just were and they didn’t care how they came to be but rather what they can do with the things they have around them, always trying everything they came to their minds and writting down everything they learn from those experiments. When the Tau came they realize imediately how much this beings knew compared to them and the Gora accepted the alliance in exchange for knowledge and tech, in a matter of a century their entire race got up to speed and understood the Tau tech to the point of being able to handle, repair it and even reproduce it, most of the improvements and tweaks the Gora made to this new tech were very obvious but a lot of them, since they had a brute force approach to testing things and they were very methodic about it.
Beliefs : They believe in reincarnation though consumtions of other beings, everythings that was eaten by something will be reborn as a decendant from those who ate them at some point. This gave the impression that they are cannibals and sometimes they serve their most valuable dead warriors during the after battle festivals.
Social Structure : Knowledge and creativity are key for survival since their physical strength tends to be mostly equal between males , females tend to be more agile and creative while makes are stronger and methodic. There are no leaders since they don’t care about opinions or decisions but rather facts, so most of the time small groups go and do what they want and them return with the stuff and things they learned from that exploration/experiment. They had matting seasons and they tend to be very brutal… let’s just leave it there.
The Warp and other beings : The Chaos gods can’t affect at all but this race tends to have a strong presence in the Warp, they will probably create a new entity at some point that is yet to take form.
A group of apes is called a shrewdness ( sorry a group of monkeys which technically not Apes is a Whoop (soz))
So the shrewdness could be its name.
The planet is a huge rain forest world. (Not a death world like the Catachan probably spelt wrong.) Verdant and humidity ridden trees grow to hundreds of feet in the race for sky light. This is where the Shrewd live a race of extremely advanced which was brought forwards and above the other species in an attempt by the Tau to keep the world in its state of complete jungle to use the chemicals that can be tapped from under the surface after thousands of years of mould and rot there are many gasses not deep below the surface. Also water is produced by the trees covering the surface except one huge ocean that stretches from pole to pole covering a third of its surface.
The shrewd hardly visit the darkness now which is what the forest floor is now referred to as. Many species cannot remain in the darkness because of the levels dangerous and noxious gases. No one knows what lurks in the depths of the ocean.
The Shrewd, speak in short barking grunts and the posture is often more important than the language or its content, in fact the posture can alter the meaning of some words altogether. They also use complex hand signals that are often used to make orders more important and urgent by mixing the two. The Tau support the Shrewd with technical and medical means and the Shrewd work in the lower canopy to local plants that indicate the presence of the gases the Tau seek.
The source of water is always rare even in comparison to planets that can support the imperium in any area of space so the discovery of such a huge source of both cannot be ignored by the forces of the time of 40k.
Anyway I still prefer Grapes.
I don’t like the idea of these apes coming from an “Imperial Gothic”-named planet. They are a Tau faction from within the Tau Empire.
How about planet Macauqe (Like Macragge, but a Maquaque is a type of monkey.)
The apes are mainly white so they could be from Macauqe. 😉
I’d argue that in 40k most planets are named by the imperial explorators. As the xeno names would probably look like xzyyyqkvvfu. Plus don’t all tau units go by imperial designations?
Somehow “journey to the west” popped into my mind when Lloyd mentioned monkey because the tau are from the eastern fringes of the galaxy. Monkey king learned the way of the Tao 😉
The “Kong”
THEY ARE FROM AN ALTERNATE PLANET EARTH ITS SO OBVIOUS!!!!!!!!!
and its a TROOP of APES so its perfect DAMN DIRTY APES!!!!!! DAMN DIRTY TROOP OF APES!!!!! DDTA army DDTAA !!!!!!! AWESOMENESS!!!!!!! AWEEEEESOOOOOMEE!!! ok this was one of the best vlogs so far, i am truly fired up 🙂 thanks guys
I prefer Troop to perhaps a Shrewdness, but a troop applies mostly to gibbon’s, soz don’t like being all rivet counterish and proper, so lets just stick with what anyone wants to call them. Call the planet Rhesus.
As far as the gorilla thing ,Planet name :D’Fossey VII, Race: Rwan-Dains: Military units: Troop, Platoon: Band, Sergeant: Silverback
[b]The Karmans[/b]
Karmans are an alien simian, once subservient to the old ones, their “creators” but soon emerged as an independent force on their own. Originally intended as a project of the Old ones to strip planets of resources rapidly through the “seeding” of rapidly industrialising societies, the Karman experiment failed after the race came to “Enlightenment”. After seeing the destruction their own evolutionary path was taking them, the Karman race entered a period of soul-searching meditation that birthed a new philosophy of Karma, from which they are named. In this philosophy, all a person’s actions cause a reaction in the universe, which contributes to the life vibe or energy of said person. This “karma”, either good or bad, will result in subsequent reactions in the universal balance (a bad action will result in cosmic retribution for example) or at rebirth and reincarnation. The wisest of Karman sages have progressed to a new understanding of time, able to predict the future and influence it by their actions in the past and in the present. They are even aware that they may be living in several simultaneous incarnations in any one period of time as they perceive it, a difficult concept to grasp. With their enlightenment, the Karmans realised that the path that their masters were taking was one of destruction. The final straw was the genocide waged by the Old ones against the race called the Krygs, which the Karmans were unwilling participants in. In the end, the Karman race decided it was time to march to war, to bring enlightenment to the galaxy and enforce peace. Karman warbands are composed of elite warriors encased in battlesuits, supported by fast moving skimmers that bring heavy fire on the enemy at breakneck speeds. Their tactics are fluid and ever evolving, strike fast and hard before melting away and repeating the same elsewhere, leaving their opponents exasperated and exhausted.
*This was not enough to save the Karmans from near extinction.
For tens of thousands of years the Karmans survived by their finger tips in a small star system we now know as the Damocles gulf.
That all changed when the tau empire arrived……*
The giant chunk of text is from Wikipedia with old ones replacing therins and the last bit is to link them with the tau.
His is my not subtle way of saying stay true to the Karmans source material, and tweak it into 40k.
Planet name: Greystoke (c’mon, that’s an awesome reference). That or planet Kong lol.
Species name: The Guu Rii Haa 😉
Special rule: Spanked the monkey, the money spanks back! If the Guu Rii Haa have taken a massive spanking and lost half their forces (that’s by model count), all remaining Guu Rii Haa gain the preferred enemy rule against all enemy units for the remainder of the game.
Guu Rii Haa Grenades. The Guu Rii Haa don’t use frag grenades, they use the tried and tested method of flinging… You know what… Instead of grenades… Still counts as frag grenades. Doesn’t effect models or daemons with the mark of nurgle (because they are way more gross).
Nice been trying to think how to bring flinging in 😉
I’m guessing if the don’t have frags they have kack grenades instead
Banana bombs?
Vanguard warriors should wear blue and yellow and be heralded by a spontaneous flock of crows…
… Who drop banana bombs!!
Gorillas live in groups called troops. Troops tend to be made of one adult male or silverback,
For other uses, see Gorilla (disambiguation).
Not to be confused with Guerrilla.
“Blackback” and “Silverback” redirect here. For other uses, see Blackback (disambiguation) and Silverback (disambiguation).
Gorillas are ground-dwelling, predominantly herbivorous apes that inhabit the forests of central Africa. The eponymous genus Gorilla is divided into two species: the eastern gorillas and the western gorillas, and either four or five subspecies. They are the largest living primates by physical size. The DNA of gorillas is highly similar to that of humans, from 95–99% depending on what is counted, and they are the next closest living relatives to humans after the chimpanzees and bonobos.
Gorillas’ natural habitats cover tropical or subtropical forests in Africa. Although their range covers a small percentage of Africa, gorillas cover a wide range of elevations. The mountain gorilla inhabits the Albertine Rift mountains cloud forests of the Virunga Volcanoes, ranging in altitude from 2,200–4,300 meters (7,200–14,100 ft). Lowland gorillas live in dense forests and lowland swamps and marshes as low as sea level, with western lowland gorillas living in Central West African countries and eastern lowland gorillas living in the Democratic Republic of the Congo near its border with Rwanda.
From wikipedia to help with ideas guys
A group of gorillas is a troop from the planet Virunga of the Albertine rift region of the galaxy for the names is my suggestions.
You need an Orangutan cheif, who wears robes and armour like an ethereal, have the same special rules but tweak its stats to be a little tougher. Have them as council members who act as liasions to the Caste’s.
some conversion work may be in order. 🙂
As for nameing i’m not very good, so can’t help with that haha.
This is exactly what I’ve done with my Karmans. I’ve simply been using them as stand ins for Tau, Crisis Suits, Broadsides, Pirhannas, and the flyer. And I often use them as Jokaero in my Inquisition, and ally them to Grey Knights, to represent Jokaero in larger force. I do like your enthusiasm and look forward to what you finally put forth as the background for your Apes!
The Hokeigh are devolved descendants of Jokaero that were stranded on a distant planet.
As everyone knows the Jokaero were great apes capable of amazing feats of engineering. As degenerate fallen descendants, these troops are merely Hokeigh Apes. 😉
A lot of creative posts! Wow, active community collective imagination.
Looks like a great fit for 40k.
there are so many amazing ideas already, I hope that my suggestions help to feed the fire
name: you guys have so many already, maybe post a poll?
race: I like the offshoot from the jokaero, makes a lot of sense from a fluff point of view.
Homeworld name: again, a lot of ideas already
planet location: perhaps in the zone of silence? a place that hasn’t been explored by the tau, and perhaps it was because of some piece of technology, or some mineral element that was present on their homeworld?
Other points: that first “flyer” definitely looks like a piranha, Lloyd, you need to fix your prescription their bud. That second “flyer” kind of resembles either a sunshark, or a razorshark flyer, might be able to pose it as one or the other.
I am so excited for this!! I love my tau, and was just mentally wishing you guys would do something with them, and now I am so very very excited to see that you are!!
You guys are going to get overloaded with vlogs very quickly, it might be time for a site cleanup, reorganize the layouts of some things, like the forums, the hubs, and how you display vlogs to keep things relevant to peoples specific interests.
Also, could you guys do notifications for followup comments through your notifications tab, instead of email? I keep wanting to follow these things up, but your site is graphics heavy enough that pulling them up on my phone just doesn’t work, and then it is a hassle to pull up my email to try and cross connect to where the notifications came from.
But seriously, Thank you for a Tau thing, they are such an underdeveloped race in so many communities (Advanced Tau Tactica notwithstanding)
Apocryphal mentioned the name Berengei which is a sub species of mountain Gorilla, there are some great names for their world if you look at the lists of some of the towns in Rwanda,Zaire and the DRC. Such as Zongo, Kutu and suchlike.
If you mangage to transfer the cool color scheme of those apes on the armour of the regular Tau, the whole force would look just amazing 🙂
Oh, maybe you are on to something there.
Probably need to be played as strength 4/ toughness 4. Maybe need a slight point mod for that +2pts ish?
Love the idea of them. As someone else has said Silverback is a good designation for the leader. I think their leader should be Kerchak, from the Tarzan books.
As back story they could be some kind of failed experiment by the Imperium pre the emperor’s time. Some kind of genetically modified cannon fodder to use in the machine wars who just rebelled.
Not sure on the gorillas myself. I love the idea of all the Tau allies but don’t much like those models.
Mantic Forgefathers would make amazing Demiurg proxies. Could use as Space Marine allies. Maybe Imperial Fists with their “Bolter Drill” rules. They also have dreads and Thunderfire cannons.
May have to start a whole army of the little buggers.
Oddly enough we have done just that. Using Salamander rules.
Damn dirty apes with Ray guns. Charlton Heston says you’re pretty much screwed at this point.
Don’t forget about the airbrush templates from Anarchy Models!
Groups of Apes are normally called a Congress. Yes, as an American I do find it funny and fitting.
How about thsi guy as a Tau Special Charater? http://wargameexclusive.com/shop/aliens/tau-deep-strike-veteran-ranger-big-shas/
Monkey troopers operates in gangs.And I think these flyers are called “bongos”.
I do hope you don’t intend to put them in stealth suits. The enemy never knew what hit them.
what a great idea, can’t wait to see what’s done with them