Editing Nobledark Imperium Notes (section)

= Tau Empire =

The first alien race the Tau encountered were the Poctroon, which have been described as kind of looking like Kerbals. However, about the same time the Tau made first contact with the Poctroon, the Poctroon began dying from a plague created by a Poctroon Nurglite cult. The Tau did everything they could to help, but having virtually no warp presence whatsoever they could never figure out the root cause of the disease and its unreal nature of the disease frustrated the Earth Caste and Poctroon doctors trying to cure it. Billions dying on such a grand scale from some variation on Nurgle’s Rot is felt by psychics for 500 light years in every direction what with it being a half-psychic virus. The Tau have no psychics of their own and so it fell on deaf ears with them.

The Imperium did have psychics listening. Not long afterwards a human in dark green robes turns up. This was the official “first contact” between the Imperium and the Tau, aside from a flyover by a Mechanicus Explorator probe in the equivalent of the Tau’s Neolithic/Bronze era which according to the Tau didn’t count. The Bio-Priestess, Mertilda, had seen Nurgle’s Rot before and knew the effects it could cause if left to spread. She had seen the dead rise up to consume the living and would have none of it. Despite the combined efforts of the AdBio, Earth Case, and Poctroon doctors, only 2% of the Poctroon population survived, surviving in the remote areas that were infected last. However, that’s still 2% more than would have survived otherwise. The adept remained on the Poctroon homeworld for a another 30 years, taking samples of local wildlife and monitoring for secondary outbreaks, before setting off back to Molech.

This was when the Imperium really became aware of the Tau as an emerging power on the Eastern Fringe. In the years since, the events on the Poctroon homeworld have been kind of propagandized in the greater Imperium. The Tau Empire, while not lying about the Imperium’s assistance, really play up the efforts of the Earth Caste in curing the plague while downplay the AdBio’s significance. The Imperium tends to be slightly more truthful, but tends to paint the Tau as having no idea what they were doing instead of people who did everything they could with the tools they had. In truth neither would have probably succeeded without the help of the other, the Tau having no knowledge of the root cause of the plague and the AdBio not having the manpower (a lack of manpower in the Imperium was probably intentional or laziness) and supplies necessary to effectively treat so many plague victims, and the people who were actually involved in the incident would be incensed that their efforts at saving lives were being turned into political bargaining chips.

It's also worth noting that the Tau of that time had a prominent member of the Ruling Council known as Aun'o'T'au'Acaya'Va'Denta, commonly abbreviated commonly to Aun'Va. Everyone assumes that the current Aun was named in his memory, but some in the Inquisition are getting slightly suspicious as there is a hell of a resemblance to the current Aun and the ancient predecessor.

However the Tau were not able to recruit as many races as they did in canon because the Imperium has more options for diplomacy with alien races beyond "die xenos scum" and had snapped up a lot of the independent Xenos races that the Tau would have otherwise absorbed in canon. In canon, the aggressive actions of the Imperium towards many xenos races, like the Tarellians, only serves to drive them into the arms of the Tau. Here it’s not the case. Nevertheless, they did manage to get several races on their side, including the Poctroon, the Kroot, and the Vespid. Notably, the Demiurge and Nicassar were not among these. Not that this stopped the Tau from carving out a relatively large interstellar empire. By the time of M41, if not earlier, the Tau Empire is larger than in canon, approximately the size of Ultramar. Being two of the most well-developed semi-autonomous member states, the two are rather close.

One of the biggest contributions of the Tau to the Imperium is the “Tau Drive” (name pending), the system of “skimming” the shallows of the Warp that the Tau use in canon. The Tau Drive is much slower than the average speed of warp travel (somewhere between a third to a fifth), but it’s much more efficient and predictable, meaning your estimated time of arrival can actually be predicted as opposed to being “whenever Tzeentch decides you’ll get there”. Tau are close to Ultramar politically, and so Ultramar was the first major region of space outside the Tau empire to get access to the Tau Drive. Tau drive technology revolutionized civilian travel and supply travel in Ultramar, turning into an unpredictable and dangerous journey into a much more predictable and reliable, if slightly longer, trip. Since then, Tau drive technology has slowly but surely been spreading throughout Imperial space, though it is still rare outside of the Segmentum Ultima. Widespread adoption of Tau drive technology would surely revolutionize civilian travel in the Imperium as a whole just as it has in the Segmentum Ultima. The only question is if the Imperium will survive long enough for the Tau to see their efforts bear fruit.  The Tau Drive would be useful in another way: in-system travel.  You cannot safely enter or exit the Warp in-system (events of it happening in video games are non-canonical just as the games themselves are).  But, with the Tau Drive, you would be able to appear just outside a star system and then arrive at your in-system destination practically no time.  Excellent both for normal long-distance travel and for military attacks or liberation fleets.

Before they joined the Imperium, the Tau had an A.I. rebellion. It has been suggested that this was the result of Chaos deliberately subverting the more advanced Tau A.I., because they realized that if the Tau managed to make A.I. work then everyone would realize that A.I. wasn’t inherently dangerous, and Chaos can’t let people have nice things. However, as with the case of the Men of Iron, the less advanced models of Tau A.I., the ones who couldn’t comprehend the overwhelming enormity of Chaos, sided with the Tau. The Tau still have their drones, and the most advanced of the A.I. that sided with the Tau serve as advisors to the head Ethereals (but do not have any official power, the Tau learned from that mistake).

The Tau hate, ''hate'', '''hate''' the Dark Eldar, possibly more than any other group in the galaxy. The Tau weren't stupid enough to agree to a "cultural exchange" in this timeline. However, the Dark Eldar took advantage of the numerous catastrophes the Tau Empire faces (including the A.I. rebellion, the Schism, and the tyranid invasion) to raid the shit out of them with impunity. The only Tau-Dark Eldar cultural exchange in this timeline is the liberal application of Tau pulse fire to Dark Eldar faces. The Tau saw themselves as winners of the War in the Webway (in spite of the fact that overall it was a loss or at best a pyrrhic victory for the Imperium) because the Tau saw it as revenge for years of Dark Eldar raiding.

One of the few rules that the Imperium enforces for all of its member worlds, including the Survivor Civilization and non-human powers, is to always pay the Imperial Tithe. For the Survivor Civilizations it functions more like a mutual protection pact than anything else. You send troop out into the galaxy to help someone else, or else provide equivalent munitions and supplies for the war effort, so that when a rainy day comes along and your planet is being attacked by Orks/Chaos/tyranids/Rak'gol the Imperium has someone to send to help you. The Tau Empire always, always send troops, often in excess of what is requested of them by the Administratum. They see it as a point of pride and a way of culturally posturing to the greater Imperium, by demonstrating how much more skilled Tau soldiers are than other species. Hence the reason why there are [[Your Dudes|so many Tau regiments all over the Imperium]] despite the Tau Empire being restricted to the Segmentum Ultima. The Imperium likes to use Tau regiments against foes who have found a counter, no matter how soft, for the traditional Guardian + Guard combo. Tau are well-known for their skill at combined arms, even compared to other members of the Imperium. There are no bans on combined arms in this timeline because there was no Horus Heresy, but combined arms tactics in most regiments are still rudimentary due to their sheer size. Tau armies, being smaller and more elite yet supplemented by copious amounts of drones, are much more skilled at combined arms and punch a lot harder than their numbers would suggest.

There are Tau Inquisitors. The Tau are heavily invested in improving their standing within the wider Imperium, and they know that having Tau in the Inquisition would mean a huge opportunity for political advancement in the Imperium. Additionally, failing to have Inquisitors of their own would mean dealing with more non-Tau Inquisitors, and the Tau would probably sooner listen to a Tau Inquisitor than an offworld one in a politically sensitive matter. However, the Tau have a little more trouble with becoming Inquisitors because of the Caste System. Ethereals in general  get a free pass among the Tau because they're supposed to be commanding and investigating. The Tau have an unofficial sixth caste, the "Void" Caste, named specifically for Tau who do tasks outside the traditional five-caste structure. The term has meaning on multiple levels. Their affiliation with their previous caste is "voided" and they walk outside the traditional caste system in the name of the Greater Good. The derogatory name for them being Outcaste (barring Void Caste being used as an insult in and of itself) which has the connotations of being forcibly kicked out of society rather than being placed outside for a constructive purpose. The term "Outcaste" isn't just applied to Tau Inquisitors, Farsight is officially termed an "Outcaste" by the Empire. Despite doing great work for the Empire, Void Caste Inquisitors are often encouraged to stay in the Empire as little as possible because the Tau fear for their culture.  Ironically, due to the truths and horrors Inquisitors are constantly faced with, it is likely that Tau Inquisitors wouldn't give shit about the Tau and would probably view them as just an annoying [[that guy|dude]] they sometimes have to deal with.

The Tau in the Nemesor Zahndrekh's accidental fifedom are unknown to the Tau Empire due to distance. They would probably get classed as proto-Tau or possibly Casteless. Or Yokel-Tau if the classification is done by a Water Caste and it's been a long day.