I'm gonna have my players try to prevent and counteract a T'au subversion of an imperial periphery planet and i'm asking for ideas.
What tricks would the T'au pull in order to peacefully seize an agri-world?
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You would need to tell us about the agriworld, first. Broadly speaking, the Tau prefer to penetrate and erode via mercantile ventures.
Oh i'm sorry
I was thinking a medieval agriworld with one 'modern' imperial capital and an orbital palace for the governon.
Feudal world would produce some funny scenarios for players where the imperial citizens fawn over T'au candies, tools etc.
Probably offering tech and knowledge to improve crop yield, basic medicines, labor-saving tech. Tau infiltration is typically predicated on a diplomatic farce where the Imperium is briefly playing nice and/or neither major power really has the naked force on hand to seize control.
If the local aristos are too corrupt to care - especially if they benefit from improved productivity or gifts of their own - then you'd have a proper infestation.
Read about the T'ros Campaign. Pretty good example of how the T'au undermine Imperial rule.
has the right of it
Offer good deals, advanced technology and fair treatment?
To be fair "Show Up and not be a c**t" is all it takes to get a leg up on the Imperium.
Why would you resist your rightful liberation?
Stay in your contaiment general and stop spamimg
Shhh.
Big Blue Tiddies!
T'au appear to be fairly adaptive when it comes to matters of cultural and territorial assimilation, and would likely tailor a strategy to fit with a given world's social and technological baseline. This almost always begins with a limited degree of trading, usually through a Rogue Trader or other existing mercantile middle-man, preferably one that has means to ship goods from off-world, as this provides an excellent way to disseminate their technology. The Imperium's limit grasp of even its own technology means that there are relatively few people that could possibly identify such items as xenos in origin, and for the right price most merchants can be persuaded to find ways to bypass what limited screening processes might exist. This is harder on more developed or strategically important planets, but cold trade can still happen.
Once the T'au have gathered enough intel, they'll likely begin more proactive efforts, such as offering increased support to noble houses, military officers or important bureaucrats that would be sympathetic or amenable to cooperation, while curtailing potential opposition where possible, whether through political slander or assassination. Ideally, by the time the Fire Caste are ready to make any sort of offensive, the Water Caste should be able to provide a path of minimal resistance in order to more easily subdue resistance and (preferably) allow the planet to peaceably enter into the empire with much of the population and infrastructure intact.
An alternative approach that might be proposed is if the planet is politically unstable, such as a mistreated populace under a tyrannical governor. While T'au seem to prefer a top-down approach in most cases, if the T'au believed that it would ultimately be in their best efforts to ingratiate themselves with a native resistance force in overthrowing their own leadership, then the Waster Caste might coordinate with the Fire Caste more directly to provide limited support in key strikes.
Part of the issue is how the Tau would keep that subversion peaceful, there isn't really much of a 'trick' once the Tau get their hoof in the door because in most cases they are legitimately making the planet better off and it's just a matter of time until rational self interest get's them on board and the only thing that can really stop them is the Imperium sending their armies in.
If you want to keep the violence on the level of police raids it would have to be very early on where they have only managed to slip a tiny needle through the armour of faith, maybe some """poor""" nobility have all of a sudden started to throw extravagant parties that they weren't able afford before and their serfs seem surprisingly healthy and have a lot more free time yet their productivity as never been higher and it turns out they had been trading with gue'vesa posing as Imperial ships for Tau technology.
How about taking advantage of some kind of natural disaster to bring aid and relief? Imagine being a parent and seeing your kid dying of plague, and praying to the Emperor is doing nothing, and then the tau come up and with their xenotech immediately fix the problem. Maybe the tau even caused the problem in the first place, on purpose. They don't even have to expose the typical Emperor-fearing Imperial citizens to the sight of an alien, they can just send human infiltrators to slip in Greater Good propaganda.
There is a lot to work with. Tau approach is going to be subversion and replacement in various aspects of society:
Military
>Provide a limited quantity of advanced weapons to key players on their side (chosen nobles' private armies or insurgencies) to give them a great edge over their rivals.
>Create a pseudo-neutral police/military, ostensibly for peacekeeping, but in reality to weaken and replace the non-tau-affiliated forces by replacing them
>Covertly promote banditism in the less-polulated regions to destabilize the situation and possibly as a pretext for the previous idea.
>Support and facilitate internal conflicts as much as possible to weaken and decentralize the government, while presenting themselves as opposed to all conflict.
Economics:
>Secure the rights to exploit the planet's resources when possible, maybe through intermediaries, focusing on the ones the agri-world does not exploit itself.
>With those, stablish industry using the more advanced tech, and eliminate local competition and means of self-sustenance
>Bribe the key allies with modern tau tech, amenities and luxury goods.
>Introduce agriculture machines and chemicals that would enhance the world's production considerably, but harm it immensely if they are ever withheld.
>Start buying the planet's production one the expensive, increasing and increasing the offer to entice the planet to sell their product to them instead of tithing it to the Imperium.
Ideology:
>Propagandize separation of religion and state, saying it's okay to worship the Emperor while not being in the Imperium.
>Promote Tau ideology and way of life in all media, establishing new outlets if needed; cement the Tau image as paragons of civilisation that provides personal freedom and quality of life for its people (as opposed to being serfs on an agri-world)
>Create a human "messiah" that would spearhead the ideological shift and reforms to "free and improve lives" of the people
>Establish a knowingly separatist "cult"
Essentially make them the modern chinese, but competent
Here's my question...how do you stop them? Or how do you, as an Inquisitor, use the fact that the Tau are shipping people into their Empire to your advantage?
Counter their efforts with good old fashioned terrorism. Have your troops with tau guns kill some cool and improtant guy in the ruling elite and blame it on them.
Spike their shipments with drugs and addictive substances.
Infiltrate a suicidical extremist in their midst. Brainwash a local preacher to spew most ridiculous Tau propaganda that will make people question their legitimacy.
Spread counter propaganda that guesva are castrated, treated as food for the Ethereals.
Assassinate Tau ambassadors and movers through a third party.
Sabotage weapons to malfunction to give impression that Tau promise unreliable goods
And thats only the tip of shenanigans you'd pull to make goats frick off from your world
For the most part the moment the Tau are entrenched in the world only uncompromising military action can kick them out - this is due to the fact that, for the most part, the Tau are way better at diplomacy and subterfuge than the wider Imperium, even if the Inquisition can match or even exceed the common Water Caste agent-by-agent the latter has far better backing and is far more numerous.
That is if the Inquisitor's plan is to stop them in their tracks this very instant; a more prudent Inqusitor would know to slow their efforts until such a time where the Imperium proper can oust them from the world. From this perspective the Inquisition can generally approach the situation from two angles;
Within the Imperium:
>Identify cells of rebellion or Xenos incursions and give this information to enforcement such as Arbites or other confirmed loyalist parties
>Increase general vigilance of Xenos incursion among the populace and Adeptus to facilitate purges and other counter-infiltration campaigns (this one can backfire though)
>Directly acquisition resources from other worlds to bolster their efforts, from assassin guilds to, at the most extreme, Deathwatch personnel
Behind the Imperium's back:
>Negotiate with the Tau directly (Ordo Xenos Radicals) in order to stall them with either false information or trade deals
>Manipulate raiders and other self-serving criminals to make opportunistic moves on the planet, hoping to convince them into raiding Tau supply lines
>Assassinate and replace key officials who may be susceptible to Xenos influence, replace them with fanatics or other more trustworthy notables
>the Water Caste are better than the Inquisition
lmao the delusion
Read my post again - while the Inquisition can outpace the Water Caste they're fundementally a tiny, tiny independant cell fighting against the subterfuge of a massive enemy explicitly geared to be as good at diplomacy, espionage and merchantilism as possible - with the direct backing of their Empire. The rest of the Imperium simply cannot keep up with the Water Caste under the table so its the Inqusition's job to force the rest of the Imperium to take more direct action - the Water Caste know this and take pains to try and not turn the planet they're on hostile because they know they'll be kicked out by actual force.
Is there a source on Tau diplomats magically being better than Imperial diplomats that isn't some blatant tauwank?
No, just the usual "hurr tau better at everything" tau fans legitimately believe because one major loss would drive the faction extinct.
Both are kind of true in comparison to the common Imperium (not elites like Astartes, Magi-Orders and the like though). The Tau are small but extremely high quality from the ground up, which is their primary strength and what allows them to stand up to Imperial retribution to a degree. At the same time an extremely major loss would destroy the Tau, so they have to keep the winstreak up or avoid conflict in an extremely tenous balancing act.
At least that was the case before Warzone: Damocles, God I hate those books so much.
The T'au were made up of nearly 100 systems during the start of the 3rd sphere.
Ultramar in 40K is made up of what? 8 systems?
Five hundred worlds overseen by thirteen core systems, much in the same manner as the Tau Empire is a few hundred worlds overseen by the same dozen or so prime Septs.
A hundred systems.
We are entering the sixth sphere now.
You guys need to recall that the Ultramnar 500 realm was disbanded by Roboute shortly after the HH. It remained so until he came back and forcefully get it together again to stand a chance in the Plague Wars
Oh yeah hence my initial post of 'extremely major' rather than just major loss. The Tau aren't one war away from death and would need to be marked for extermination by the Sautekh (which he doesn't want to risk at the moment) or a full Leviathan class Hivefleet or something. Which still isn't in the cards because the Tau don't actually hurt or impede anyone and are patient enough to slowly (for the setting that is) take their due instead of taking massive risks - it's calculated just as much as luck.
>The Tau aren't one war away from death
Isn't it fairly common for billions of worlds to be gained and lost in any given major engagement? I don't think the Tau with their mere hundreds of worlds would be able to stand up to a major engagement of any kind.
>Billions
The entire Imperium is approximately one million worlds, total. A vast majority of these are significantly lower quality than Tau worlds in almost every way, with a very small minority being superior (and sometimes, but even more rarely, radically superior). Could the Tau defeat Leviathan or the entire 13th Black Crusade if it fell on them? Not at all. But they're also smart enough to not draw that kind of attention for the most part and can easily deal with something that would deal with most Imperial Sectors of similar size.
That's kind of the point - are they capable of fighting the galaxy in all out war right now? No. But they're rapidly growing stronger and are in a position, through luck and effort, to not have to. The Tau of the Second Damocles Crusade were at least twice as strong as the Tau of the First Damocles Crusade. The Tau of the Third Damocles Crusade will be at least twice as strong as that, and so on. The tragedy here being that it's too late, since the Necrons and Tyranids are getting stronger and larger at a much quicker pace.
Necrons and Tyranids will never, ever, ever be allowed to deal a significant and crippling blow to the Tau because Tau politics reflect the writer's politics. They will always be treated as if they cannot withstand a major loss, as an excuse for why none will ever be handed to them (unless it's immediately retconned into a success like the 4th sphere expansion), while simultaneously being magically handed the numbers and logistics to overnight recover from a major loss if one somehow gets written into the canon. It's why Tau fans all come off as little kids, complete with the whole attitude of
>nuh uh my aliens are better than your aliens at everything and have no weaknesses unless I specifically need to claim they have one, but it will never actually be reflected in the lore.
This. Tau are an absolute cancer and the Imperium is too "white fascist coded" for modern GW writers to ever let them have a win against the tau despite the original conceit of the tau being that they look unstoppable individually but if the Imperium ever actually bothered to launch a Crusade the Tau would get curbstomped. Therefore I can only pray that someone who manages to convince GW that necrons represent black people is allowed to have Shadowsun get Gauss Flayed and delete a bunch of their worlds. It's so jarring how they're written as underdogs and then handed every advantage while their disadvantages are just ignored.
Yes and no, it's weird and political - technically Ultramar proper, as in overseen specifically by the Ultramarines, is 8 systems, but the wider Ultramar Sector is about the size of other Imperial Sectors, which typically have a hundred or more actual worlds each and any number of smaller operations on asteroids, barren worlds or whatever. The core worlds like Konor that keep getting mentioned are literally Ultramar but aren't representative of the Ultramar Sector entire - sometimes the two are called the same interchangably. Welcome to Imperial politics.
A specific source? No; rather, it's a general trend that the Tau infiltrate Imperial space and if not militarily opposed tend to win via diplomatic victory rather than vice versa. More specifically we could talk about how the Water Caste work in comparison to the Imperium or how the Imperium is vulnerable to infiltration, I could go grab some general sources on either if you want but it's gonna take a while to gather.
Okay so for the most part the reason why Tau diplomats outmaneuver Imperial diplomats can be summarized into three sections. Biology, training and methodology.
>Biologically
Water Caste are designed to be diplomats. This is pretty standard Caste lore but if you want some specifics it began in The 'Castes' section of the 3rd Edition Tau Codex (Page 9) and is a continued trend up until the 9th Edition Codex (Page 13). Water Caste are quite literally just better at social sciences and communication than Humans, much in the same way as an Ork is stronger, an Eldar is faster, or how a well-built Human is stronger than a Fire Caste. So before anything else they have an objective advantage - mostly in aptitudes for linguistics, empathy and social intuition
Further, the Tau have been known to distribute bionics and other augments en-masse to their people, just not to the invasive degree of the Mechanicus - old examples being the mnemo-chips given to all Shas'la in the old old Fire Warrior Novel or if you'd prefer something more recent the full MIU-suite that Shas'vre and higher get to control Battlesuits. We have no reason to believe the Water Caste do not also explicitly cybernetically upgrade their agents for their roles, further widening the gap between them and unaugmented baseline Humans (something countered by the Administrautm's heavy use of less advanced but more invasive and probably just as effective cybernetics for their own Adepts, but it evens the gap.)
Part 2 coming up;
>Education
Tau do not really possess as much of a gap between the lower, middle and upper classes as the Imperium and invest extremely heavily into the education and improvement of their people via rigorous training. Every single Fire Caste is trained effectively from birth to be as perfect a warrior as they can be and the other Castes are no different.
In Farsight: Crisis of Faith it is revealed that all junior Water Caste spend a significant amount of time in institutions of higher learning mastering virtually every diplomatic skill from how to get away with lying to rhetoric, philosophy, empathy, and the like. This does not necessarily mean they have a better education than Adepts of the Imperium but rather that every single member of the Water Caste can at least be compared to an Adept at minimum - therefore while Imperials certainly have elites who can do better they lack 'weak links,' in their quality over quantity approach and produce a significantly superior, if smaller baseline.
However, something also seen in Crisis of Faith is that all Tau are expected to continue training throughout their lives and acquire experience in hopes of achieving a promotion, mirroring the Fire Caste's 'Trial By Fire' concept, the idea that you're ever finished learning or improving until retirement age is considered waste to such a degree where Tau that fall behind their station are removed from duty to be send back into education. Therefore, while certain Imperials definitely share the same idea, it gives them an edge over the many who fell through the net into comfortable positions.
Neither of these are unique to the Tau, what is unique (over the Imperium) is that these concepts are mandatory and unequivocally enforces. For every Adept you put in front of a Water Caste the Tau WILL be talented, highly educated, experienced and motivated, otherwise they simply wouldn't be here, whereas with the Adept you're rolling a dice for each one.
>Methodology
Put simply, the Imperium is not particularly interested in negotiation or subversion as an institutional standard - though some like the Missionary Galaxia and Ordo Famulous are certainly standouts in this regard, with the former being famous for subverting heathen faith towards the Emperor slowly rather than purging everything with fire.
However, the Water Caste is rigged specifically to integrate with and manipulate other species as first, middle and last measure, and is optimized top down for the task both philosophically and societally. Beyond biology and training, they are taught to work as a cohesive unit towards Empire-wide goals rather than for personal gain and firmly believe that their method of diplomacy and espionage is not only superior but is to be pursued as readily, consistently and effectively as possible - The Golden Ambassador in the 7th Edition Codex outlines their mission, to understand others as readily as possible and to then 'correct,' their way of thinking, this way the Water Caste manage to remain open-minded in a sense, empathizing with their prey without comrpomising their own ideals and long-term plans like sociopaths.
Imperial philosophy is far more direct and, ironically for their age, impatient, and are far more about subjugating and destroying their enemies as soon as possible out of a collective sense of hatred and disgust - leading them to more readily rely on military backup or diplomatically damaging rather than converting their enemies. This isn't to say the Imperium's methods aren't faster, but rather that in their haste to be done with the problem they typically don't take the time and care needed for smooth and diplomatic operations. This is highlighted in Warzone Taros, where the Tau did not even ask Taros to turn on the Imperium even when they effectively had the loyalty of the governors precisely to further diplomatic/merchantile adgenda rather than resort to warfare.
Finally, the Tau Empire is simply less corrupt and more cohesive with itself. Imperials are constantly at each other's throats, particularly the Nobility (Necromunda, Dark Heresy/Rogue Trader (Black Industries) and pretty much most Noble stories you can think of) and therefore a lot of their diplomatic talent is forced inwards to fix their own problems. The Tau, being of lower quantity and higher quality across the board (except at the extreme end), tend to not have as many wayward flocks, suffering populace, fragmented subfactions or interhouse intrigue to deal with, allowing them to focus their efforts on things like conversion rather than maintaining tenuous stability. That is to say that the elite Imperial diplomats simply have more on their plate and more getting in their way than Water Caste agents, holding them back from fully committing to counter-espionage in the areas the Tau target.
It's not so much that the Water Caste are magic and instantly win and I think any Taugay who posits as much is kind of missing the point, but rather it's a gradual accumulation of various factors that puts the Water Caste at a severe, but not insurmountable advantage, forcing most Imperial institutions to resort to violent measures where they cannot presently outtalk the Tau.
New farming tech, fertilizers, pesticides and crops, possibly new sort of livestock. Ir medicine or supplements to make the livestock more healthy or fat. Make the planet's production dependent on Tau. Nobles israelite it, more stuff to sell.
Maybe a model farm where Tau showcase their methods, that works as a base of subversion.
Slowly convince the planet Tau caste system is like imperium's class system, but only more fair. Maybe nobles like it too, less rowdy peasants.
Read about American economists messing about in Russia during its 1990 collapse.
Tau = America
Russia = Imperial world
Bribery, corruption and scams are so easy in the Imperium the Tau wouldn't bother with them, instead they offer some nice stuff and luxuries the Imperial elites badly want at a discount to get in the door, tack on some free stuff for the commoners, and then let the Imperials' corruption talk them into going to the Tau for the next phase.
The main drive would be propaganda to convince the populace that the Tau are good for them and the imperium evil. There are many forms this could take.
1. Flat lies. Just make shit up. If everyone has heard about how the Emperor fell and the planetary governor is holding his position just to keep personal power then it doesn't matter if the story has no basis in reality. It's what everyone knows and therefore will act in accordance with.
2. Inversions. The tau seized a grain depo to supply their troops. But what everyone has heard is the opposite: the imperial government took it from the tau, who were generally distributing it to the people.
3. Manufactured crisis. There are rumors of food shortages. Make sure to hoard what you have to survive the coming famine.
4. Poisoning the well. The Tau taint seedstock to poison crops. This can be combined with 2, to blame the imperium or 5 to garner favor.
5. The Tau do what the Imperium don't. Tau step-in various humanitarian roles to garner goodwill. The simple farmers won't think to ask, "will these policies continue after Tau victory?" if they can't see past their bellies.
6. Corner the market. Tau introduce genetically modified crops to the world which bare no seeds and aggressively spread to all available soil, crowding-out indigenous species. Supply of new seeds are free to any farms which have collectavized under a tau co-op.
7. Lamenting the martyrs. Every death of a tau-supporter is canonized in song as tragic heroism, to inspire more humans to die for the tau cause while demonizing the empire.
8. The tau's victories are our victories. Street preachers on every town square tell about the latest tau offensive and how the tau have nearly won the planet for the poor serfs!
9. Every problem's the imperium's fault. Poor harvest? Snap-frost kills grapes on the vine? This is because the imperial government didn't supply torches for heat like they promised and the hoard oil
Offer free medical care and a pension.
Literally tell them the truth about the Imperium at large.
>What tricks would the T'au pull in order to peacefully seize an agri-world?
T'au has wares, if gue'vasa has resources.