Tau are Rangdan/descendants/seed race

[beefeb]

Ive not seen this directly mentioned anywhere, but wanted to see what other Tau collectors/players thought....im not saying that the Tau are Rangdan...what im suggesting is that a small number of Rangdan escaped from the genocidal war by the Imperium of Man.  I suggest that the Rangdan turned one primarch against mankind (the purged legion), killing a legion in the process (the forgotten legion), prior to the Dark Angels and the Wolves exterminating them almost entirely.

 

I think the Rangdan that escaped seeded a planet with a successor race, the Tau, while the Imperium reeled after the Heresy, Scouring and internal struggles of the early year 30 to 34K.  The intention being to rebuild their empire using the Tau and other races to do the hard work for them, prior to their eventual return.  Heres some random thoughts / comparisons with some of the established lore around the Rangdans.  They are just bits i have gleaned from the internet, so subject to internet quality control levels!

 

Rangdans used multiple races for a variety of functions that they themselves could not.  They used psychically gifted races as they themselves were psychic blanks.  The Tau do this in the form of the Nicassar and others.  Rangan forces were reported to have elements of troops that feasted on the dead, their bones and their brains.  They were said to have made imperial forces fear their mimicry.  This is an obvious comparison to Kroot and their ability to take on the knowledge and abilities of other races through the consumption of flesh, bone, brains etc.  Rangdans were said to have large scale combat beasts of burden and berserker levels of fighting....the comparison here would be the Krootox, particularly the newest range coming this year.  

 

Rangdans were said to have beliefs abhorrent to that of mankind.....specifically here i would suggest that these beliefs were abhorrent to the emperor.  The whole ethical and moral belife system of the IoM is that mankind is the best...everything else should either die or be subservient to mankind.  I imagine that the Rangdan would view mankind as a possible slave race and so their views would be in polar opposition to each other.  The modern Tau have an 'overall good for all' belief system which veils the real value system of lesser races subservience to the Tau under the guise of the greater good.

 

The Rangdan used high technology, utilsing shield technology and weaponry with a blueish hue.  Most tau art i have seen has blue colouration in their plasma weaponry and power plants.  They have multiple instances of shield tech with ion shields, shield drones etc.  Their ships were described as rounded, organic, jellyfish like in appearrance.  Tau vessels and tech tend to be rounded and have a similar ocean going visual theme....Barracuda, manta ray, riptide etc.

 

Theres obvious discrepancies of course....physical stature being an obvious one.  Rangdans were large, Space marine equivalents......but that can easily be explained by Tau being a genetic seed and their creators wanting to create useful soldiers, but ones which are not so powerful as to be able to overrule them.  You cant have your creations getting uppity and going off on their own.

 

Thoughts?  Is it a possible, or have i totally gone off on a tangent?

 

 

[Emperor Ming]

Since Tau in their primitive stone age state are recorded by the Imperium in m35....

 

and since the ethereal's share a crystal like organ with the other creations of the old ones. 

 

But In the vastness of the far future, most things are possible

 

Mainly war

[beefeb]

12 hours ago, Emperor Ming said:

Since Tau in their primitive stone age state are recorded by the Imperium in m35....

 

and since the ethereal's share a crystal like organ with the other creations of the old ones. 

 

But In the vastness of the far future, most things are possible

 

Mainly war

 

thanks for the response.

 

the timescale isnt a problem, being m35....either Rangdan or old ones equally fit the timeline

 

the crystal organ....yeah thats a good point

 

i cant remember offhand, but somewhere in the HH stuff im sure i read that either the Rangdab fought the old ones, or there was a link that Rangdan were a remnant of the old ones or ally or something.  Ill need to go look.

[Karhedron]

The Rangda seem to have been so horrific that they were purged both from existence and history. The Tau seem to lack the necessary horror factor I would expect to see in an offshoot of the Rangda.

[WrathOfTheLion]

The Rangda had spores that would embed themselves into humans they'd conquered, which required the Imperium to remove ever single possibly tainted individual and system after the defeat of the Rangda. This was essentially their method of reproduction, so they had to destroy all the worlds that were conquered in order to keep them from coming back.

 

Even just a short amount of time after their initial defeat, they were able to come back in full force from their parasitic hosts, so I don't think they need to slow-roll a recovery. This required another war of course, and then the extermination of any conquered humans by the 1st and VIth Legions.

 

HH Book 9: Crusade has some sections on the Rangdan wars, in the history/lore part about the 1st Legion.

Edited January 30 by WrathOfTheLion

[Jings]

Worth noting the Tau got their Ion tech from thr Demiurg - confirmed Squats that joined the Tau. 

[Karhedron]

28 minutes ago, Jings said:

Worth noting the Tau got their Ion tech from thr Demiurg - confirmed Squats that joined the Tau. 

 

Traded with rather than joined IIRC. Also worth noting that the Votann used highly divergent Cloneskeins while posing as the Demiurg suggesting they did not want the Tau to realise their human ancestry (or not let the Imperium know they were trading with the Tau).

[Remain_Indoors]

I’d rather they weren’t. It’s an issue that comes up in a lot of sci-fi franchises, everything is made to be related to everything else and it just makes the universe smaller. T’au don’t need to be linked to the Rangdan any more than the Replicators needed to be linked to the Ancients in Stargate.