What Do Tau Call Ogryns?

[jarms48]

Pretty simple question, is there anything official for this? Humans are called Gue'la, Tau human soldiers are called Gue'vesa, and Space Marines are called Gue'ron'sha.

 

So clearly it'd start with Gue'____ something. I found a fan website that uses the term Gue'va'garro. Does that sound right? I can't be sure because it comes from a sept called Wae'bo. Which sounds like a Weibo joke.

 

My friend who plays Tau suggested Gue'vesa Shio'he. Which he thinks could represent Ogryns in the Empire.

 

What are Ogryns called?

[apologist]

Nothing official, as far as I'm aware. In terms of back-constructing, some extant words are:

 

Gue'[X] – indicating human or related to human.

Be'gel – Ork

Y'he – Tyranid

Pech'vesa – 'Kroot helper'; compare 'Gue'vesa'.

 

It strikes me that 'Pech' is the kroot homeworld; but given that (as far as we're aware), Tau don't know the human homeworld, that might be irrelevant. There doesn't seem to be any particular scheme for other beings (e.g. ork/tyranid), so we can't draw much from that.

 

'Gue'' seems to mean human, rather than Imperial, as it is also used for Tau-allied humans (Gue'vesa). Given that, we need to decide whether the Tau consider Ogryns humans (in the same way as Space Marines are variant humans), or whether they regard them as their own entitity.

 

While Ogryn worlds are frequently isolated from the Imperium, the Tau have fought enough wars against the Guard to recognise that Ogryns are frequently fielded as part of Imperial armies. It's really down to whether they consider the Ogryns (and Ratlings, Squats etc.) as variants of humans – as Krootforms/Knarlocs are to Kroot – or as separate, allied species – as Kroot and Vespid are to the Tau themselves.

 

I think it's reasonable that the Tau can identify commonality between ogryns and baseline humans – their advanced near-future science seems to cover genetics etc. – and that they regard Ogryns as human variants. On that basis, and iIf you want to use 'canon' terms, then I'd suggest Or'es (strong, powerful) might be a good start. Perhaps Gue'Or'es?

 

If you decide that Tau don't recognise Ogryns as human, the world's your oyster. Gue'la, like Monkeigh, is a pun intended to look alien but sound familiar; so you could look to that approach, perhaps looking at giants of mythology and distort that. Gue'gynt,  or Gue'ogr perhaps? Or look to suggest brutishness and low intelligence through pop-culture caveman speech patterns: 'ur' and 'ug'.

[Xenith]

 

I think it's reasonable that the Tau can identify commonality between ogryns and baseline humans – their advanced near-future science seems to cover genetics etc. – and that they regard Ogryns as human variants. On that basis, and iIf you want to use 'canon' terms, then I'd suggest Or'es (strong, powerful) might be a good start. Perhaps Gue'Or'es?

 

 

Came here to suggest Gue'or'es, beaten to it. Strong human seems the simplest solution. 

[jarms48]

I like Gue'Or'es. I had another friend suggest Gue'gel or Gue'gel'vesa. For human beast.

[thesilverback]

Gue'gel - human beast sounds good, to me.