[khanaris]

Please ignore this topic if you have any desire for the contents of the Black Library novel "Rogue Star" to remain a surprise.







































Anyway, Rogue Star deals with a human Rogue Trader's actions in the events that led up to the Damocles Gulf Crusade. It is very revealing on a few points of the fluff that had previously remained unknown. Hopefully, it provides points to shut up a few persistant arguments made about the Tau's place in 40k.

In no particular order:

1. Humans have encountered the Reek, and also exterminated them wherever found. The Reek are thus not unique to the Tau Empire.

2. The circle at the end of Tau Pulse weapons is actually a complicated gyroscopic stabilizer. This makes them very stable, with the bulk of the weapon seeming to rotate around it. Pulse Weapons are also extremely light-weight for their size.

3. The Damocles Gulf itself is almost completely devoid of stars and nebulae.

4. The Imperium has almost no strength out that far. The worlds on the far fringes are all but abandoned by Terra, and see little Fleet activity. It is implied that the Imperium doesn't really have the foothold to launch attacks against the Tau, even if they wanted to. They would be forced to carry almost all of their supplies from much further coreward. The Warp in the area is still very difficult to navigate.

5. Mantas are extremely quiet, and their handling is far smoother than any Imperial ships of equivalent size.

6. Railguns are extremely powerful in ship-to-ship combat. Imperial Shields are designed to redirect massive energy pulses and fast-moving projectile-based weaponry, but they can not really handle the huge masses fired by Tau heavy Railcannons, even those of the pre-Damocles era. Tau evidently did not get Ion weaponry until much later.

7. The Tau were playing diplomatic games long before the Damocles Gulf Crusade, and were aware of the Imperium well before the Imperium launched the attack. They had subverted the governments of almost every world within a 30-light-year span before the Crusade was launched. One world was taken by promising mercenary aide, another by providing xenotech, not all of it Tau in origin.

8. The Tau use a special design of battlesuit for ship-to-ship combat. It has large clamps on its arms and Fusion Blasters to burn through ship hulls (which they do very quickly). Imperial Shields do not stop them from approaching.

9. The Tau were able to learn to speak unaccented Imperial High Gothic before the Damocles Gulf Crusade, and did so whenever they negotiated with Imperial worlds.

10. The Rogue Trader mentioned that the Tau anti-grav systems were noticeably more advanced than those used by the Imperium. The Tau also use anti-grav for more banal systems, such as in supply crates. The anti-grav field has a shimmering appearance. The traders were very impressed with their level of technology.

11. Rogue Star describes two Imperial worlds, Arris Epsilon and Mundus Chasmata, in detail. Both worlds are probably part of the Farsight Enclaves now, as they are right on the edge of the Damocles Gulf.

12. Tau naval tactics were fairly solid against weak Imperial opponents even before the Damocles Gulf Crusade, but their shields were very weak and their tactics were not very good against the more experienced Rogue Traders' heavy cruiser.

13. The Tau were very careful with naval weapons they traded to humans. Those they gave away were equipped with both IFF systems that prevented them from being used against the Tau, and also with self-destruct systems.

14. Rogue Star also describes the planet Q-77. It feels "wrong" to the apparently more psychically-attuned characters.

15. An old argument, but fleet-level combat in this book takes place at both visual and sensor ranges. This is not just boarding actions. Gothic battles are not just sensor-driven affairs.

[Kasrkin]

Do we hear any more of the Farsight mystery?

[khanaris]

Nothing I could point to, although the Tau ships and military units encountered by the Traders were from Vior'la, not T'au. The entire region of space has a strange feel to it, though. To the traders, the whole region felt "wrong". So it is possible that the Necrons or Chaos did leave a mark of some kind. Not all of the technology mentioned seems to be Tau in origin, either.

[Tallon Karrde]

Originally Posted by Khanaris

7. The Tau were playing diplomatic games long before the Damocles Gulf Crusade, and were aware of the Imperium well before the Imperium launched the attack. They had subverted the governments of almost every world within a 30-light-year span before the Crusade was launched. One world was taken by promising mercenary aide, another by providing xenotech, not all of it Tau in origin.

This supports my view that the T'au are more of a scavenger species. Imagine if the Imperium reversed enginered T'au rail and plasma weapons.

[calmsword]

this is fantastic- and i don't think the two planets mentioned would be part of the farsight enclaves as those are far off on the other reaches of the damocles gulf, more likely their now part of the Third Sphere- this is really great Khanaris, are there any other details of the Reek? What other weapons that you keep mentioning weren't Tau are there? Anything you can speculate on?

[Khaldun]

And I may be sounding like an idiot here but...

what or who are the reek?

[khanaris]

The Reek are mentioned briefly in the new Tau Codex. The Tau evidently wiped out one of their colonies. Rogue Star, unfortunately, provides little more information than that, except that the Imperium also has wiped out Reek populations in the past. We still don't know much more than that, I'm afraid.

The other technology mentioned isn't actually related to weapons. There is a wierd green gem that gives one trader the impression that something is looking back at her from out of it. There is also a lot of small, multi-colored gems and jewelry that is confirmed as alien in origin. The only other reference is a wierd sentient floating sphere with the ability to pick up and move hundreds of small objects in its vicinity. It was only my impression that these were not Tau in origin, however. They just don't really sound like the Tau technology we know. But it was never really confirmed one way or the other who it belonged to. We do know that the Tau gave the Imperials Heavy Railcannons and samples of Pulse Weaponry.

The two worlds mentioned are among those Farsight would have retaken later, but you might be right in saying that the Enclaves are further out. Mundus Chasmata and Arris Epsilon (and Sigma Q-99) are directly across the Gulf from the Tau Empire.

[calmsword]

yeah, which would mean their north of the empire where the Gulf is thinnest- the Farsight enclaves are east across the thickest part of the gulf. Hm... gonna have to pick up the book, the gem sounds like eldar- who knows about the other one.
I'd like to know more about the Reek as they are 'hated' something the tau have never described a race with...

[QuickStrike]

The Reek... I really hope as with all of you guys that GW provides us with more flufff on the hated Reek. I don't even believe the Tau hate the Ork are Nids who have been long time enemies of the empire..

[khanaris]

I'm not sure I would make that much of the Reek with so little information. The Tau might hate them in the same way that you might hate mosquitoes. The entry on Aun'va might just be exaggerating.