Early 2000s T'au art is fun. Just look at those two guards protecting Aun'va.

Those weapons are ceremonial and not very practical, but those shredded abs are definetly real. Heck, they even designed their armor to have an abs-window. These guys are so ripped, they'd melee me right into the ground.

Tau Ethereals

Aun'Va / Aun'shi

If/when they do another round of MtG/40k sets (Orks/Tau/Craftworlds/Drew-Karry), Tau should be 5-colour.

Representing the diverse alliances the Greater Good has created, it would give Tau some nice tools.

Hell, make Tau the only box with Partner Commanders, to further cement this.

Probably Shadowsun (Jeskai) as the face with a Kroot Shaman (Golgari) as the partner.

Farsight (Mardu) would be a secondary commander with maybe a Gue'vesa Advisor (Simic) as his partner (or something).

....

Aun'Va (V-tuber) would be an Colourless Artifact but have a 5-Colour activated ability, and no partner.

What I want to know more than anything about the Ethereal caste is how they actually work?

Like, what's their actual ability? Is it at all connected to the warp? How did the Ethereals come be? I'm sure the Tau origin story is no doubt Ethereal re-writing of history with the actual history long since destroyed but how did they actually come about? There's so little out there about it and as far as I know there hasn't been any material from an Ethereal POV.

Which sucks because of how important they are and without this information it makes a lot of what could be nuanced actions just come off as totally contradictory and genuinely stupid/blind.

I think it would better benefit the narrative at this point [in relation to the t'au] if gw sat down and hammered out some kind of explanation as to whats going on with them because the current limbo of indeterminate answers just leaves the t'au narrative hanging and more reliant on the characters of shadowsun and farsight then is healthy.

because what the hell can you do with the t'au if all of their actual leaders effectively don't exist because your trying to keep their nature ambiguous! it's why aun'vas corpse is still being puppeted around despite the inherent ridiculousness of the concept when new supreme ethereals have come and gone in t'au history before, because keeping aun'vas corpse on the stand means they don't have to create a new supreme ethereal with goals, motivation and history that might expand on what the deal is with the ethereals [or god forbid have a motive that kicks the entire t'au narrative into gear]!

Very conflicted on how Games Workshop are handeling Xenos races in 40k

On the one hand the last few years have been awesome! Barely any loyalist space marines, a lot of xenos races got range refreshes or at least something like T'au Darkstrider.

But on the other hand the way they're just removing models like The grand Ethereal Aun'Va, or Aun'Shi, commander Longstrike. 1 third of the Dark Eldar range is gone.. They're not getting the Azreal treatment that's for sure. Old space marines will be up for sale until they get a new model, if xenos are too old they'll likely just be removed.. Named characters or not doesn't even matter

Kinda bothers me how on the one hand they're getting love and on the other miniatures are getting removed without notice or word of being replaced..

if aun'va coupd beatbox

this is canon, is it not?

Hobby-Related Christmas Roundup

•T’au Rapid Insertion Cadre (so. many. battlesuits.)

•Ethereal with Honor Blade

•Floaty Alien Space Pope Aun’va

•A bunch of paint

•Chapter Approved

•Some Green Stuff

Timeline of the 41st Millennium: 745.M41

* The Fall of Tyran, the battle that marked the first major encounter between the Human species and the alien Hive Fleets. Inquisitor Kryptman would eventually investigate the incident and designate the new threat as the Tyranids.

* The First Tyrannic War. Hive Fleet Behemoth attacks the Ultramarines' homeworld of Macragge. At the Battle for Macragge, the Tyranids are defeated, but only at great cost - the entire First Company is wiped out, and the 3rd and 7th Companies suffer horrific casualties.

* Aun'Va makes the decision to place Commander Puretide's favoured pupils (including O'Shaserra) into stasis, allowing them to be recalled when needed in the future.

You used Nazi Germany as a comparison to the Imperium. I ignored this. You insisted and brought up Nazi Germany again. This time I addressed it by, once again, refusing to have the Imperium and its supporters equated with Nazis which you are doing, let us not be coy about it. Next, hiding Aun'Va's death is important because it proves that the Tau lie to their own population, hence we shouldn't believe that the people of Lurid IX weren't being lied to in regards to "the greater good".

Yeah Nazi Germany is about as good a comparison you can get. Obviously the Imperium is actually worse but that’s because the Imperium is so comically evil not even the most evil real world regime could ever actually match it.

Also what do you mean ‘supporters’? Supporters in-universe or do you mean people who, outside of the universe, real people, think what the Imperium does is good? Be very clear here since I’m beginning to worry that you’re actually saying you think the Imperium is moral.

As for the point; in-universe supporters are obviously worse than Nazi’s, they’re fucking xenocidal child-murderers. Outside of universe it totaly depends on the degree. I support Orks, for example, but would never call them moral, good or justified, I just think they look cool and are fun to read about. If that’s all an Imperial fan is then there’s nothing to say at all, that’s perfectly fine. If you’re saying someone who, outside of the setting, actually thinks the Imperium is moral, then yeah, that person is clearly worrying.

Again, I feel like I’m repeating myself, lying is nothing compared to trying to murder every other living being in the galaxy, not even remotely comparable. The people of Lurid IV would be FAR better off with a liar than with a regime which murders anyone not submitting to the Ecclesiarchy and trying to murder every other living thing in the galaxy.

You know what plot-development I would love for the T'au to see?

Dealing with the matter of Aun'va's death.

One way this could be solved is to have them just admit that Aun'va is dead, admit how he died, and admit they tricked the people with this AI-holo-version that is floating around. They can put a spin on it how it all was a ruse to fool the Imperium, and how they were definetly planning on telling the people (yeah sure, but hey they are doing it now) and that this was a way to preserve the old Ethereal's wisdom, even if they now stand at the start of a difficult process of selecting the next Ethereal Surpeme.

We already have an empire crumbling under the weights of its lies with the Imperium, and the T'au Empire was supposed to do things differently. I know the point of the T'au is not to be an utopia in an ocean of grimdark, but they are supposed to be the contrast. They are the ones looking at this whole mess and being smart about it.

Eventually Aun'va seemingly living forever will raise more questions that it will give answers, and this is a move none of the other factions will see coming. The news will come out one way or another, so it would only make sense that they are the ones who deliver it, lest they lose control of the narrative of their surpeme leader's death.

Good things aside, there is also a lot of very juicy grimdark potential here: will the Aun'Va-AI accept their demotion from head of state to advice-bot sitting in the corner? They can't just have him randomly detoriate while still in that position, or else this would just be the new Squats 2.0, cranky-crazy AI giving orders.

The other possibility is AI'Va themselves admitting they are a hologram made to decieve the T'au Empire. Like, imagine if your highest ranking member of goverment just came out and said "btw I died years ago, I'm a hologram those losers set up" and turned like half his image projectors off for a moment. All hell would break loose.

Depending on how the AI would go about it, this could either be a chance to renew their society through reforms, or shake up the Empire so badly that we might finally see the true colors of the ruling caste. There is a connection to the Warp there, but it is weird as well and I definetly want to see more about that mystery.

The Assassination of Aun'Va

T'au Ethereal Idea: T'au Crypteks

just a thought on how to spice up the ethereals a bit, because honestly the bigger problem with them is less "are they secretly/openly #evil and or just stupid?" and more so to do with how boring and underdeveloped they kinda are as a group. there's no spice to even make them engaging as antagonists, in part because no one at GW seems much bothered to really try and delve into them further.

so, my own stupid idea: the t'au ethereals as the effective political class of the t'au [the water caste more so being administrators] and spiritual leaders for the t'au, have competing political and spiritual philosophies. They keep it under wraps and buried deeply in their own living quarters and ethereal only spaces of course [to the point that even the imperium is only vaguely aware of it], less the empire start fracturing into disunity and disharmony, but it exists and is absolutely brutal in terms of debate with less savoury methods only kept from escalating through honour duels and the general need to be discrete. the big ones are

paradoxcists: believe that since the galaxy is inherently contradicting, then the only way to achieve unity, harmony and the greater good is through accepting those contradictions onto themselves so that the other t'au castes and client races of the t'au can remain "spiritually pure", thus attaining enlightenment through sacrifice of their own purity. hence paradoxcists. in overall practice its the largest sect of thought at the moment in the ethereal caste and dominates the t'au empires general policies and approaches to the wider galaxy, but also its individual adherents tend to vary wildly in their own beliefs and practices the only unifying trend of the sect being a belief in contradiction and a general conservative bent to keeping the empire basically on the course its already on. with the opening of the great rift its lost a lot of its popularity not helped by its largest political mover aun'va being dead.

honourists: believe that enlightenment can only be achieved through honing the body as well as the mind and thus tend to be martially inclined, they popularized the honour blade both in its use and its training methods and are one of the oldest sects of thought in the empire. they also believe that martial force needs to be carefully applied so despite their martial nature and general interest in and advocacy for the empires military needs they dont much get along with

martialists: the most militarist sect of ethereal thought whos beliefs essentially boil down to 'harmony can only be achieved through overwhelming force, suppressing disharmonious groups and good ol fashioned violence'. were a fringe group for a time even often a suppressed one among the ethereals, but since the damocles crusade and hive fleet gorgon they've been gaining more support and power in response to the general state of the universe and its myriad of threatening frightening things. since the opening of the great rift and the 4th sphere expansion going the way it did however, they've started being suppressed again out of concerns they're going to light needless fires/conflicts both internally and externally.

communilists: a sect that firmly believes harmony can only truly be achieved through diplomacy and thus disdain and avoid violent methods as far as they can, like the honourists they're one of the oldest sects of ethereal thought and are often referred to as 'traditionalists' by other ethereals due to their emphasis on diplomacy and disdain for violence being what originally united the t'au castes and brought them out of the 'mon'tau'. a belief in negotiation does not strictly mean a naive approach to the world however and communilists well rarely on the battlefield tend to have some of the trickiest and most intricate minds.

singularitists: a radical sect with a number of internal denominations prone to competition, singularitists are classified as such because they all believe harmony can only be achieved through a singularity event which they aim to help facilitate. important denominations include - nominal singularists, who passively believe in a singularity event and are the most accepted denomination due to not being prone to dangerous schemes like other denominations tend to - unitary mentalists, a smaller denomination who seek to engineer a singularity through biological means. once a small but tolerated denomination interested in hive minds observed in client races, the emergence of the tyranids and observation of 'genestealers' radicalized the unitary mentalists quite heavily and they are now regarded as particularly dangerous radicals that need to be heavily suppressed should their beliefs become known by their collegues. -warp unionists, a growing denomination quite secretive in their beliefs who regard the warp as a potential avenue to achieve singularity through. they aren't sure how to achieve this due to the t'aus poor understanding of the warp even among the ethereals in the know of it but have been developing methods to capture and control 'warp construct creatures' so that they can analyze how they work to further their understanding of the warp. with the great rifts opening they have been somewhat lionized in their beliefs and have particular interest in facilitating the worship of the 'tau'va goddess' among client races unlike their colleagues. - intelligence singularitists, the largest and most powerful sect of singularitists with an interest in artificial intelligence to achieve singularity. developed alongside the development of tau ai, they have grown exceptionally in power following aun'vas death due to deals cut with the paradoxicsts to provide help with the 'ai mock up' of the supreme ethereal. if you use singularitist your likely going to be referring to them.

synthesists: the largest liberal sect of ethereal beliefs that primarily believe in 'integration among castes' as opposed to separation to achieve harmony. the specifics vary wildly between individuals from moderates who simply believe in cohabitation between castes and sharing of useful skills between them, to the most radical of synthesists who seek to abolish the caste system entirely and promote 'intermixing' of castes.

elementalists: a reactionary sect primarily positioning themselves in opposition to the synthesists. elementalists believe in the the strict separation of castes with radical elementalists believing that new castes should be created to further compartmentalize the skills of the t'au to further harmony in the empire.

Let none doubt that the T'au Empire will bring unity to all - let none doubt that now is our time. Forward, for the Greater Good! -Aun'Va

Going to call this Ethereal done, I got more T'au to work on. After all I'm quite happy with him, the face especially, a big mold line ran across its face right over its face crystal and right eye so I had to very carefully remove that without losing detail, very annoying. But yeah I'm happy to add this relic to the army! Definitely kicking of Sept'ember the right way here.

FOR THE GREATER GOOD!

Farsight & Aun'va, lie setiawan

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/WP1P2

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