Tau Inspirations, Army, society, w/e

Its been a bit quiet on the forums as of late, so I figured I could post a topic everyone could have an opinion about.

What influences on the Tau society and military structure as well as look do YOU feel is present in the army?

Personally I believe the caste system and the FW look resembles the class system of feudal japan.
Had the lords at the top (Aun-Etheral)
The Samurai next in line (Shas-Fire caste)
The navy tied with the samurai (Later on in history I suppose Kor-Air)
Then the merchants (Por- Water)
And on the bottom the peasants and artisans (Fio-Earth)

I also see their military doctrine to be the exact reverse of the samurai. Instead of the close combat emphasis, its about shooting. The FW armor looks similar to the samurai armor as well. The honor system to a Ethereal resembles the samurai's to their lord, even the small cases were tau would commit suicide. Even women in the military (there were women samurai though most would guard the home while the men were at war). And their suits resemble anime mechs in some fashion.

Their history of catching up to the rest of the galaxy real quickly resembles the changes the Japaneses did to catch up to the westerners. It was remarkably fast.

However there are many aspects that don't match up with the Japanese. The tau are more willing to assimilate other people into their empire. Other than Okinawa (SP?) I cannot think of any other nation that was massacred or enslaved bye the Japanese when conquered. Even then Okinawans probably did feel enslaved.

I personally modeled my army off the clone troopers from the Star Wars movie Attack of the clones. I felt the armor looked about the same (including the helmets) and the weapons looked about the same too. They also fired blue rounds like the tau on the cover. Painted them white with black under clothes. Red is a sign of leadership, Blue is the sign of elite (like the Arc Troopers) and Yellow is the sign of pilots (as in FW in vehicles not air caste). I thought that with the honor blades the Ethereals resembled jedis as then inspired those to fight harder and had a good CC prowess. They also lead many of the campaigns while fighting in them. Would this make Aun'Va yoda?

Moving on I also thought the covenant from the Halo series resembled the Tau also. (though Halo came out after Tau) The collection of races, the Prophets on their floating chairs (like Aun'Va).

Any thought? Speculations? Own army influences? Own comparisons?

the big difference between feudal japan's cast system and the tau is that the tau still view everyone as of equal importance. from the space pope to a fio worker helping to stamp out gun drones. in that way they are either socialist or technocratic really.

my army is a Farsight Enclave, so what its modelled off is going to be a little different than most. basically I have based my paint scheme and some of my conversions off of the anime "mobile suit gundam". why? well Farsight just looked too much like a rip off of Char Aznable. Red suit, Carrying big energy axe and rifle.

I'm not sure how their military sytem can be compared with other systems, because there have been many. Long-range fire has always been used throughout the ages, catapults, bows, ballista's, cannons. But only when the rifle came, the support role changed into a big offensive role. The Tau use only long-range fire, but the range is a lot longer than any race has. (it must be very frustrating to by fired at, not being able to return fire )

Their social system is really one of equality between the casts. It's a lot different from the caste system used in India where there is a big difference in status and richness among the casts. It has similarities with comunisms, but there is a big difference. In the communist system the largest group of citizens were the workers (farmers, miners, etc) but with the tau, the number of citizens are more equally spread. there are less Aun, and probably more Shas, but other than that the casts are equally 'big'. They are all equally rich and well educated and healthy, so they are equal in all aspects and feelings of jealousy are not common due to this equality. It's a different equality we know in the western-civilization where is everyone is equal for the law (in theorie ofcourse), but there can be many big differences in health, money and education. This will make it impossible to divide people to casts based on activity (you can still divide people into categories of religion, money, health, but these are all things the Tau cannot be categorized by)

As magnus pointed out, the feudal japan did not have an equality, a farmer was not equal to a samurai, although honor was something they could all have, but it is honour in a different way, a more extreme way. Ofcourse it's easy to think japan, because of the big anime/manga influences.

There is a lot of stuff to think about...


Shas

It seems that they have made the Tau a kind of utopian society, something that I don't feel is really achievable. Then again, if the society started that way, it would be stable (in theory). The reason I don't feel it's achievable is due to the nature of progress (in humans anyway). Fast progress (like what the Tau experience) is often due to heated competition and ambition. The need to be better.

I guess the Tau as a whole could feel this against the rest of the galaxy, and maybe pooling of resources (physical and mental) could be what has gotten them to move up so fast.

I also follow the though of Tau being the 'anime' army. Jumping battle suits gives them the mobility shown often in anime robot battles, they have the missle pods (classic robot anime) and some big guns. Also, the antenae... just can't get away from the anime feel.

My army was created generic of what was depicted in the first codec. Shadow gray, black, and bleach bone cloth. Recently I've taken to giving my Commander Battle suits metalic paints (mixing mithril silver with a color) to make them stand out.

I was merely talking about the division of class not how they are treated. Even then I highly doubt an ethereal is treated like anyone else in the society. the other caste are but the ethereal is held in high regard. Most would die to save a single ethereal than a single fire warrior. Just saying.

Like the space pope bit though

I wouldn't view it as communism, but utopian defiantly. Except there is a leader. I would say the Tau are their own type of society all together, based on their history and social up-bringing. It wouldn't work in our society in the present, maybe thousands of years from now like ST. Their type of society hasn't existed in human history yet, which makes it an alien society

I wish there were more texts (like an imperial xenology:tau type book) to discuss how things run in the empire, i.e. do they use money? How does say a fire caste member court another? Cultural stuff like that would be interesting and help fluff wise (as well as making fan fiction stories)

We've been given a rather idealized view of Tau society in the limited fluff we have available, and we really don't know for sure how equally the castes are treated.

As far as I know there isn't any demographic information on the castes. Everyone seems to assume that the 4 main castes are roughly equal in population but I don't know of any source that claims that (and would doubt it if I did), but logically one could expect the Fio to be by far the most numerous, followed by the Shas, then the Por, the Kor and finally the Ethereals being the least populous.

As for similarities the Tau have with other sources, the Minbari from B5 with their 3 castes (worker, warrior, and religious) are a good match. As is the Dominion from DS9 (Warrior race, diplomat race, worshiped as gods leader race).

Really, the fluff for the Tau is woefully lacking and really needs to be interpreted liberally to be at all realistic. I have gone on at some length about this before, here

http://kovashtauva.com/index.php?act=ST&f=21&t=3501&st=

and would be happy to continue that discussion.

I also agree with the similarities the Tau have to the covenant in Halo, except the covenant seem to have better luck finding close combat races to use. Paint a ghost light brown and it's a Tau jet bike. I had been hoping to use some of the new Halo action clix figures as Tau auxiliaries in casual games, but wizkids totally screwed up that product line.

I think, that is perhaps because GW wanted to portray the tau as an idealised society.

seriously, between the imperium and T'au i know where i would rather live!

No kidding!

A reasonably free and open society.

Expectation to work in and advance in an area you like/are good at

cool tech toys

drones to do all the unpleasant work

a drone with a plunger, magnificent!

A drone with a plunger and an expert system program running giving it the knowledge of skills of the 20 best plumbers in the world....



edit: OK, I'm getting a perverse urge to convert a model for this guy now

This post has been edited by Nevermore on Oct 26 2007, 04:41 AM

My personal view on the Tau is that the seem "good" but infact they are just another form of tyranny and oppression.

Also note Hindu(?) Caste system which had casts in the following importance I think.

Priest (Ethearel), Kings, Warriors, workers etc etc I think thier are more castes and these may be simplified but yer main point is that the priests where more important than the kings as far as I understand things >.< I may be wrong ofcourse.

Hindu casts still has a "hierarchy", in fact it is very strict. and believe that if they act within their role that they will go up a rank in their next life.

I don't believe there has been a cast system in earth's history that actually views all casts as equal.

True, in Fire Warrior there are hints of ineqaulity among the castes.

You could say that, some people have accused democracy of the same crimes.

True, in Fire Warrior there are hints of ineqaulity among the castes.

I really do not consider a game that involves a single rambo firewarrior with a force field taking out a dreadnought canon...

I ment the book. Not the video game.