I'm on a bit of a homebrew binge. Many of 40k's factions fit into the Black Crusade power level (Marines, Dark Eldar, and I made my Eldar rules for it) with Only War seemingly only fitting humanity. However, there is another low-power faction; the Tau Empire.

We have brave Fire Warriors rushing into battle with their fierce auxillery allies (the Kroot, Demiurg, Vespid, Nicassar, and Tarellians) at their sides. The technical Earth caste, diplomatic Water caste, and aerial Air caste would all be easy to build. The armor we'd be dealing with isn't much grander than Guard flak, and their structure is much the same (infantry with rifles and pistols, heavier support from gunships and tanks) so why not build this?

Would anyone be interested in this?

Well Kroot are already kitted out in RT, but it wouldn't be too hard to port them over, although you'ld have to decide on the power level you want them at.

Personally I think party balance is an over-rated concept in game design, although party survivability is a particular bugaboo in the 40k line. In every game I've been in a few characters have been so tough (Chaos Space Marines, Orcs) that in order for the GM to actually hurt them at all he has to employ foes capable of one-shotting the squishier members of the party.

So if someone in your Tau campaign had a battle suit (or Kroot?) it would up the stakes for the rest of the party.

But yeah, sounds like fun, go for it. Share with the rest of us.

Andor said:

I'd imagine a Tau battle suit to be similar to a Vehicle in Only War. I'd really love to see a Tau homebrew or even official rules for them though.

Musclewizard said:

There currently exist stats for nearly all Tau stuff in Deathwatch and its supplements… should be easy enough to port them over.

Also Tau are far from 'low-powered'. I'd put them with Eldar and Dark Eldar in the 'slightly better than basic human forces (Guard, Sisters, Inquisitorial forces minus Grey Knights)' camp.

 Alright then. Give me a handful of days.

Fire Warrior, Pathfinder, Kroot, Vespid, Nicassar, Demiurg, and maybe a Tarellian… Any other ideas?

I'd say:

Fire Caste Shas'la

Fire Caste Shas'ui (unit commander)

Fire Caste Pathfinder

Fire Caste Battlesuit Operator

Earth Caste Technician

Water Caste Diplomat

Air Caste Pilot

Kroot Carnivore

Vespid Stingwing

Demiurg Surveyor

I wouldn't include the Nicassar or the Tarellians. The Nicassar are used for deep-space exploration and are described as very unfit for ground operations and the Tau Empire is also trying to keep their very existence a secret, and the Tarellian seem to be more mercenaries that only have in common with the Tau their mutual opposition to the Imperium rather than actual allies.

JuankiMan said:

As has already been said, those two races aren't really suitable for PC options and i would remove the following too:

Vespid - Only the strain leaders are able to use the tech to communicate with tau, and they only give them that tech so that they have units of Vespid at their disposal. You either end up with a PC accompanied by dozens of Vespid, or completely breaking the canon and so either way it's not suitable.

Battlesuit Operator - Far too powerful for a starting class. Indeed the very fiction says that firewarriors ascend the ranks until they essentially become a commander's veterans and bodyguards - what we see in the tabletop as battlesuit pilots. By all means battlesuits could be included but should be part of the natural progression of very high level unit commanders or an alternate rank with Gm permission for regular firewarriors.

That cuts the list down to

Firewarrior: a straight up combat class

Unit Commander: a leadership class

Pathfinder: a stealthy, sniper/scout class

Kroot: an also stealthy, more melee centric class

Earth caste technician: a tech centric utility class

Air caste pilot: a vehicle based pilot class

Water caste diplomat: a social support class

Demiurg surveyor: a bit of a wildcard but could allow for some unique support options

and my own final addition…

Human Auxiliary: another combat class, but with a bit more versatility than a firewarrior

9 classes, with a good mix of part complementing options. Nobody should be getting battlesuits or rail rifles and the like at start, so well balanced and with plenty to work towards.

I'd see games focusing on smaller Tau expeditionary forces, far from supply lines that are forced to make greater usage of their allied and mercenary support options.

Forgetting about the Gue'Vesa Auxiliary was a big oversight on my part 

However, I don't see how a Crisis Battlesuit is more unbalanced than a Leman Russ main battle tank, but if party balance is an issue, he might start in an Eclipse Stealth suit, which is smaller and much less heavily armed and armored.

Just saying, I would totally play this.  Would it be an "OW" sort of theme, though?  Which of the games would work best with a small, independent Tau expeditionary force?

Also, looking at that crew… is anyone else seeing "You got your Star Trek into my Warhammer 40K! You got your Warhammer 40K into my Star Trek!"

Really.  A multi race, multi-species, multi-gendered bridge crew of a very high tech, clean looking, clean lined, bright space ship, with a crew more likely to be in the hundreds than the tens of thousands, which has a hot shot pilot, an absurdly competent engineer, a tribal warrior kind of guy, a guy of the race that is nominally considered the backwards enemy, and a ship's counselor?  And they go on away missions?  Seeing shades of Voyager and TNG here…

I dunno. Tau aren't really Prime Directive types. With the Greater Good thing it's more like a small band trying to bring order to a chaotic and hostile universe.

Which is actually pretty close to Andromeda, at least the first few seasons before Kevin Sorbeau took over behind the scenes and sucked 150 IQ points out of the show.

And Star Trek wasn't Prime Directive type either.

Really, that was abandoned as often as the plot dictated.

Do Tau ships have much fewer people in them than Imperium ships? Being more automated and such?

Gavinfoxx said:

Undoubtedly. Tau rely a lot more on automation than the Imperium and most likely most of it's security detail will consist on unmanned drones. Still, they're not like eldar ghostships, which are almost deserted.

Fire Warrior: Built around using his Pulse Rifle/Carbine and Photon Grenades as effectively as possible. Flak armour.

Pathfinder: Stealth abilities, Markerlights and Rail Rifle. Flak armour.

Earth-caste Technician: Not sure how to handle this guy. Any tips?

Air-caste Pilot: Seems a little niche for regular play.

Water-caste Diplomat: A reskinned Adept?

Kroot: Built to be sneaky and good at seeing things, plus brutal in a melee. Potentially has Unnatural stats?

The Nicassar could be our psyker with some Navigate abilities, but fluff seems to oppose that. A shame; there's art of them as squidheads, and I adore that.

Vespid need to be Strain Leaders, which kinda sucks. Probably not building them yet.

Question on Kroot Shapers; are they Psykers? Could that justify being a separate Spec?

Tarellians are my favorite xenos in all of 40k. Ideas for them?

Plushy said:

I think that the Techpriest can be a good term of comparison. Granted the Earth-caste is likely to be less belligerant and more geared toward controlling drones, but I think that there should be a reasonable degree of similarity.

Plushy said:

I can't speak about the other xenos, but the shapers aren't psykers, at least not in the general sense of the word. As far as I know (which isn't very far) their ability to select DNA strands comes from the Kroot unique biology, not from a psychic power. From what I recall their ability is similar to the Astartes ability to extract informations by eating an enemy's flesh.

Plushy said:

The Earth-Caste Technician could get some device that allows him to control Drones for combat purposes.
The Water-Caste Dipolmate could be handled like a RT Seneschal.
Kroots are done in RT and seem to work fine there. They get easy access to stealth and perception, going so far as (to start with?) Unnatural Perception.
Kroot Shapers are also handled in RT but I can't recall a lot about them, I think they are an alternative rank for Kroot but thats about it.
I'm not sure how fragile Vespides really are but maybe the Strain Leader could be handled sort of like a Sergeant but with more than one Comrade though I doubt that would work all that well.

I have no idea who or what Nicassar or Tarellians are.