Tau Worlds population??? Also army size??

[Rogerio]

Hey i was just wondering about the size of Tau planets as ive never really seen any sources showing this sort of stuff. Im guessing that a Tau world would be relatively sparsely populated for some reason.

Also wondering about numbers they would use to invade a planet, maybe invading an imperial planet during one of the sphere expansions?? Tau fluff shows tha they value life very highly and would rather retreat than fight a meat grinder battle, im guessing this is down to a small population at least partly?

[Eetion]

Im not sure if any exact numbers have been given.

Although I keep hearing about one BL reference that an Imperial Hive outnumbered the inhabitants of an entire Sept.

The Tau dont do meat grinders, mainly due to combat doctrine, they dont see their troops as expendable. Better to move and strike than let things devolve into wars of attrition.

[Jo-Jo]

As Tau worlds will normally include the original inhibitor of said planet, it can be said that they could be one Hive World under Tau control, which can boosts the population massively.

If you talking about the Tau themselves, then I agree that on the outer edges of the empire they are thinly spread, but the closer you get to Tau itself, the denser I imagine it would get.

[Connor MacLeod]

Most sources I can recall tend to indicate in the 'millions' but Planetstrike indicates at least one Tau held world (And not neccesarily a Sept) had billions:

During the War of Dakka, Warlord Grog takes battle to the Tau-held world of Atari Vo in the most direct manner he can devise - by propelling a titanic dagger-shaped metoer he uses as his base through the atmosphere and plunging it burning tip straight into the Tau capital city. Several billion of ATari Vo's Tau populace die before Grog and his Dakka Elite step out of the meteor's shieldcore chambers..

We also know this from Kill Team:

"I come from a city that stretches three kilometres into the skies of Olympas," I tell the tau, trying to make it sound as impressive as I can. There's no point letting them think they're the only ones who can build a fancy city. "The lower levels are delved a similar distance into the rock. A billion humans live in that one city, and there are thirteen such cities on my world."

"That cannot be," argues Shas'elan. "That is more humans on one world than there are tau in this sept!"

so it should be possible to reach billions. Given the Tau's emphasis on population management or even outright control, as well as their tendency to plan the hell out of ****, I imagine population growth is slower than in the Imperium for the purposes of unity and efficiency. But that also means they tend not to get to the state of most Imperial Hive Worlds (which is not a bad thing.)

Bear in mind that the non-tau populations of the Tau Empire worlds can also add to that number, especially (I suspect) humans, although they aren't likely to get into Hive world numbers/densities even then (That whole population management thing again.)

[Connor MacLeod]

Also wondering about numbers they would use to invade a planet, maybe invading an imperial planet during one of the sphere expansions?? Tau fluff shows tha they value life very highly and would rather retreat than fight a meat grinder battle, im guessing this is down to a small population at least partly?

Some of the more recent Deathwatch stuff IIRC (Achilus Assault I think) mentions that the Tau have started using their human subjects in a more Imperium-like attrition role 'for the greater good'. There's also the stuff where they will sacrifice huge numbers to protect or save a single Ethereal (EG the Fire Warrior novelization) It isn't so much that the tau are altruistic (although there is some of that) as they are efficient - people are a valued resource for the tau, and its important for their own propoganda to encourage a sense of value in their minions, but they can and do sacrifice people for the Greater Good (tm) if the situation demands it.

[All Cing Eye]

In either WD or the Tau codex, it mentions the Dal'yth sept world is the closest Tau have to a hive world.

[Kakapo42]

In either WD or the Tau codex, it mentions the Dal'yth sept world is the closest Tau have to a hive world.

Erm, I think you might be getting a bit confused here. The densly populated sept that's the closest to a hive world is Sa'caea, not Dal'yth.

Tau worlds tend to be less populated than their Imperial equivilants, but are by no means sparsely populated. There are plenty of cities on the more well developed septs.

Tau also don't use that many units for an invasion, mostly small well equipped air-mobile units for making lightning strikes at strategic targets.

[Gorbad Ironclaw]

Less populated than Imperial worlds could easily still means billions of Tau on any given world. It really depends on what sort of Imperial world is the measuring stick. If it's Hive Worlds then there is no real limit to how many Tau you want on there.

As for invasion armies, are you looking for a realistic number or a "GW" number? Because those two will be different by orders of magnitudes.

[Rogerio]

@Gorbad, realistic numbers id say as with GW they seem to think that a regiment of 2000 guys could defend and area the size of an entire nation at times. When you look at the Tauros book there are only 10 regiments attacking an entire planet, Ok sure its a small planet but thats crazy!

[Clockwork-Knight]

Several regiments AND Space Marines support AND a few Titans. It would have been enough to defeat the planet's defence forces together with the Tau who have dug in, but the Tau's space fleet has managed to brutally disrupt the space convony that was neeeded to supply the ground troops. Hungry and thirsty soldiers (with too few ammo) make bad warriors.

[Rogerio]

Several regiments AND Space Marines support AND a few Titans. It would have been enough to defeat the planet's defence forces together with the Tau who have dug in, but the Tau's space fleet has managed to brutally disrupt the space convony that was neeeded to supply the ground troops. Hungry and thirsty soldiers (with too few ammo) make bad warriors.

You make a very good point, however all i meant was the scale of the battle for an entire planet is extremely small. I know that Tauros was only a minor colony but its still a planet, and the fact that it was being defended by only a few thousand Tau (100 Cadres i think it was??) seems extremely light on the ground for an empire trying to defend a newly captured planet.

How would the Tau be able to capture a huge civilised imperial world with dozens of cities and several billion inhabitants with a PDF of a million or so men??? they would have to deploy hundreds of thousands of troops to take a world of that magnitude and even then they would have to fight battles very selectively and on their own terms.

[Gorbad Ironclaw]

@Gorbad, realistic numbers id say as with GW they seem to think that a regiment of 2000 guys could defend and area the size of an entire nation at times. When you look at the Tauros book there are only 10 regiments attacking an entire planet, Ok sure its a small planet but thats crazy!

If you want realistic numbers we are probably talking about millions of troops involved. Especially so if you need to garrison newly conquered areas (likely). Having enough boots on the ground to keep areas/cities pacified in the face of an alien invasion and still having enough troops to conduct continuous offensive operations is going to require a very large number of troops. Of course, if they are only facing forces (it's not even real armies) the size that GW like to use then the troops needed for the actual fighting isn't going to be that high, but you will still need lots of troops to garrison captured territory.

[Connor MacLeod]

Several billion tau isn't that impossible for one of their worlds. The main limiting factor (I suspect) is going to be their own population management programmes and how willing or unwilling they are to mess up the planet they're on. Having huge populations is not neccesarily an advantage remember (look at what humans have done to our own planet - its still pretty habitable but we've screwed it a good many ways in the process.) Besides with drone assistance they don't have quite the manpower needs the Imperium has.

[Clockwork-Knight]

The Tau's prefered method of 'conquest' is by subterfuge. Members of the Water Caste (or their non-Tau agents) will first try to infiltrate the world and attempt to find sympathisers and collaborateurs who are dissatisfied with the current way that is or they'll come as traders who sell exotic xeno trinkets for a bunch of other gimmicks and information about the culture of the target planet and stuff. They make corrupt planetary governors depend on their wares and accept the Tau as trusted friends. Then the Tau come in and preach about their quasi-religion of the Greater Good taught by their wise philospher-priestkings, the Ethereals, which is all about living together, helping each another and all that mumbo-jumbo, which appeals to a majority of people living in the dystopic and nightmarish environment imposed to them by the Imperium and it's lackeys. After a while, you have a more or less loyal populace who want the shiny new fridges that the Earth caste technicians build instead of the tekno-arkane cold storage units that must be appeased by the correct rituals as taught by the tekno-sorcerers of Mars.

After the populace loves the Tau, the Tau march in, and secure it from the agents of the Imperium, who by then are too late to stop the insurrection, and must now fight against the original population of the world that paid fealty to the High Lords of Terra.

Marching in guns a blazing is only done if the Water caste members have failed to get the relevant people under their sway AND the Tau believe they could win. They will not do so against densely populated hive worlds unless their water caste infiltrators found out at least that the rulers and generals there are incompetent nincompoops.

[All Cing Eye]

Erm, I think you might be getting a bit confused here. The densly populated sept that's the closest to a hive world is Sa'caea, not Dal'yth.

Yep that's the one I was thinking of.

[KingDeath]

@Gorbad, realistic numbers id say as with GW they seem to think that a regiment of 2000 guys could defend and area the size of an entire nation at times. When you look at the Tauros book there are only 10 regiments attacking an entire planet, Ok sure its a small planet but thats crazy!

Taros seems to have only a single, truly important city which had to be conquered. This makes the small numbers somewhat more believable.
It gets realy stupid when the Iron Hands suddenly manage to conquer an entire rebelling Subsector(!!!) and put one third of it's population to the sword... (source, german White Dwarf 70, according to the Lexicanum ). Or when the biggest Whaagh since Ulanor consists of a few million Orks...
Thankfully some of the more recent publications seem to do slightly better when it comes to numbers.