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-That he did take for himself Anglachel the cursed blade, and by its evil brought about many deaths.

-That he did flee the realm of Doriath to escape judgement, though he ought to have trusted in the wisdom of Thingol.

-That by so doing did he cause the departure of Morwen and Nienor from that same realm, and bring about their loss.

-That he did take up with outlaws, and condone the killing of innocents who happened upon their lair; and that by this course was Khim son of Mim slain, and emnity wrought which brought to pass his own betrayal.

-That he did alter the pattern of war waged by Nargothrond the Fair, betraying its location and bringing about its fall.

-That he did seek to contend with the Worm of Morgoth, becoming bewitched and seeking not to save Finduilas the Radiant from her fate.

-That he held his name as secret, depriving his ensorcelled sister of the chance to recover her mind.

-That he did slay Brandir the Blameless, prince of Brethil, for speaking only the truth.

Notably, I don't hold him responsible for the things he did: the death of Saeros, the killing of Beleg, and his marriage to Nienor. Those have the feel of fate about them, twisted by Morgoth. But the rest? That's Turin's own choices, and I hold him full guilty.

I really don't understand why Tolkien liked him so. He's not a hero, or even an antihero - just a blundering oaf with a talent for breaking things. Philosopher@Large once said that she wrote Beren by thinking 'what /wouldn't/ Turin do?', and I think that sums him up perfectly. (Fight me.)

As for noticing women... well, if he'd recognised that Nellas even /existed/, his whole story goes away, since she was the witness that could have exonerated him. But I'm not sure noticing Finduilas would have helped any. He still would have taken Nargothrond to war, and it was Glaurung's gaze that led him to ignore her, not his own disregard.

The Anfauglith: well, dunes can be of things other than sand. What's the difference between sand and dessicated soil anyway? I see Tolkien does use the word 'sand' itself, but I still don't think it's what we'd think of (golden beaches and red deserts).

You're right about 'dun-coloured', though. Hmm... Ard-Galen could have been reddish clay or something, or founded on sandstone; either would have allowed a tan-grey colour dust to form. Given the lack of rainfall out there, there's probably only a few designs that would let it grow anyway, I bet we could narrow it down.

/Or/, Tolkien wrote the Nirnaeth before he ever concieved of Ard Galen, and never changed the 'desert' to account for its history. Y'know. Just saying.

hS

If all goes well, I'll be transferring to London South Bank University to study film. Super exciting... and super nerve-wracking.

Late to the party, as usual, but now I'm here! Who wants to talk about how Túrin could have averted his fate simply by noticing the beautiful Elven women throwing themselves at him left and right? {= D

(Also, hS, it kinda looks like the Anfauglith actually is sandy? O.o Still not a pretty desert, but there are definite mentions of sand and dunes and dun-colored gear blending in there. )

~Neshomeh

The Horus Heresy/Star Wars opening crawls. (Spoiler alerts are in effect for various Horus Heresy novels)


Episode I: THE PHANTOM MENACE

Turmoil has engulfed the Imperium of Man. The worship of the Emperor of Mankind as a god is in dispute.

Hoping to resolve the matter once and for all, the Emperor sends the Ultramarines to bombard the small Word Bearers planet of Khur.

While the Council of the Terra endlessly debates this alarming religion, Lorgar Aurelian has secretly dispatched his Word Bearers, the guardians of truth and the Word in the galaxy, to settle the conflict...."


Episode II: ATTACK OF THE CLONES

"There is unrest in the Council of Terra. Several Legions have declared their intentions to leave the Imperium.

This separatist movement, under the leadership of the Warmaster Horus Lupercal, has made it difficult for the limited number of Loyal Legions to maintain peace and order in the galaxy.

Primarch Corax, the Lord of the Raven Guard, is returning to the Emperor to ask for aid in rebuilding his shattered Legion...."


Episode III: REVENGE OF THE SIXTH

"War! The Empire is reeling from a revolt on Mars. There are heroes on both sides. Chaos is everywhere.

In a stunning move, the Thousand Sons Primarch, Magnus, has swept into the Imperial Palace and violated the Edict of Nikaea.

As the Thousand Sons Primarch flees back to his seat of power on Prospero, the Space Wolves begin a desperate mission to bring their brothers to heel...."


Episode IV: A NEW HOPE

"It is a period of civil war. Traitor Legions, striking from the shadows, have won their first victory against the Imperium of Man.

During the atrocities of Istvaan III, loyal members of the Traitor Legions managed to smuggle word of Horus's ultimate treachery out of the Istvaan system.

Pursued by Horus's sinister agents, Nathanial Garro races to Terra aboard his starship, the Eisenstein, custodian of the stolen plans that can save his people and restore freedom to the galaxy...."


Episode V: THE WORD BEARERS STRIKE BACK

"It is a dark time for the Imperium. Although the Furious Abyss has been destroyed, Traitor Legions have driven the Loyalist forces from their bases and pursued them across the galaxy.

Evading the snares of the Warmaster, a group of Legionaires led by Roboute Guilliman and Sanguinius has established a new Imperium in the remote system of Ultramar.

The evil Primarch, Lorgar Aurelian, obsessed with destroying the Ultramarines, has dispatched thousands of Word Bearers and World Eaters into the far reaches of space...."


Episode VI: RETURN OF THE PHOENICIAN

"Perturabo has laid waste to the Imperial Fist planet of Hydra Cordatus in an attempt to humble his brother Rogal Dorn and his Legion.

Little does Perturabo know that Fulgrim of the Emperor's Children has secretly begun planning the creation of an ultimate weapon, the Angel Exterminatus.

When completed, this ultimate weapon will spell certain doom for Perturabo and his Iron Warriors...."



Can't think of a good one for Force Awakens, so I'm going to leave it there. Some of these clearly take place at the same time or even out of order, but so is the novel series. I recommend anyone partaking of these fictional movies start with 4-6 and then go back for 1-3, as is tradition.

-Phobos of the Vlka Fenryka

I always enjoy those. Plus, I really loved how much the Doctor was just dicking around with the tournament. =]

Welcome to Round Two

^_^

hS

They're called Norn-Queens, but putting a Jedi team up against one is... less than entirely viable. The reason for that is, well, d'you remember that "Who Would Win" battleship competition you did a while back? The one involving The Mighty Thor? Yeah. That again.

Norn-Queens are the single most important aspect of a Tyranid Biofleet. They're the ones who make everything - literally everything - from the tiniest Ripper to the greatest bioship. They're vast organisms on an unbelievable scale... and that's kind of why bioweapons don't tend to work against them. They're so big, and their consciousness and power so decentralized within their bodies, that by the time it's killed off one part, the rest has adapted to the infection and, well, it might start showing up in the Hive Fleet's spore bombs.

However, that idea of "look for a Queen to kill" is perfectly viable when it comes to the Hive Mind - Hive Tyrants and other beings of similar status effectively become relay nodes for the Hive Mind, and bumping them off severs the connection. There was even a special rule about the Tyranids back in the day called "SHOOT THE BIG ONES!". Spelled like that. =]

The Force acting as a counter to the Hive Mind is definitely an interesting idea, and budding Ethereal force users would definitely work well with that... but that involves putting Ethereals in the field. When Ethereals die, Tau... Tau go a bit nuts. There's also the fact that the Tyranids have a very weird effect on the Warp - while the Warp and the Force are two very different things, the effect of a Hive Fleet overrunning a world is like Alderaan on a grand scale.

On the plus side, we can protect everyone involved. One imagines that the power sources for hyperdrive engines are pretty potent, and if they can be scaled down for use in a starfighter then they can be scaled down for use in a battlesuit. This means that we can nab some of the cool stuff from the Fifth Sphere Expansion a little ahead of schedule - I'm especially thinking XV104 Riptides and XV109 Y'vahras, since anti-infantry and anti-horde weapons are prolly gonna be the order of the day when fighting the gribblies. There's also the fact that XV95 Ghostkeels we around by this point, and super-stealthy Class 9 battlesuits are a pretty good trick to have when it comes to infil/exfil and messing up Hive Tyrants.

It should also go without saying that I love the idea of the Hail of Flames getting turned by the Alpha Legion's human operatives infiltrating the Alliance and planting suggestions in the Hail's command echelons. Perhaps this is where the Tau start cloning their own species, at least in smaller batches, the better to guard against corruption and for spreading the joy and light of the Greater Good. =]

The Alpha Legion has the distinct advantage (in this instance) of not hanging out in the Eye of Terror, and therefore not really looking like Chaos Space Marines. I mean, Space Marines, absolutely, but if they could swing a 'we're a splinter group which has nothing to do with any of that' style of thing, it could still work.

Actually, it doesn't even need to be that complex: the Alphas have human operatives. Find one in a position to help the Rebel side of the Alliance, and they can work their way through until they get onto the Bugzapper. Though it does leave the Alliance in a better position, since they get to keep their fleet.

The difficulty with the Fallen Clone scenario is that the Alliance isn't really pitching itself against Chaos. I mean, granted that there's Chaos all over the place, but mostly they're going to be fighting the Imperium and the Empire. Unless...

... unless a Chaos faction deliberately sets out to turn them. Perhaps the turning point for the Alliance isn't a betrayal by a third party, but by the fall of the Hail of Flames at precisely the moment things seem to be going well (the capture of the Bugzapper). The Bugzapper is whisked away by the clones, and the Alliance fleet is torn apart by Chaos-infected clones running riot. What's left of it limps back to Coruscant, unable to make the journey all the way to the Fourth Sphere.

That separation leaves a ticking time-bomb in the Tau half of the Alliance: the Fourth Sphere doesn't know that the Hail of Flames is vulnerable to mass corruption. So they're fighting the Imperium and the 'Nids, while we watch and go 'but any moment all these soldiers could turn evil...'.

I think you underestimate the Rebels facing the Tyranids, though: they're quite a brave lot by and large, and in the old EU they faced the Vong (extra-galactic organic ships) and the Killiks (slightly less mindless Tyranids) without descending into absolute panic. Their primary strategies, depending on who exactly is on-site, will be 'look for a Queen to shoot' and 'design a bioweapon'. (The latter comes up a lot in the EUs, though not usually condoned by Our Heroes.)

Of course, the Tyranid Hive Mind doesn't have a Queen, so that won't work. The Force team (Luke, Yoda, Leia, and the Ethereals) might be able to pull off some kind of psychic damping effect, disrupting the Hive Mind locally...? It's worth a shot, at least!

hS

I mean, that's a fantastic plot, and I love it to bits, but it hinges on the Tau not having any knowledge of either the Ruinous Powers or their Astartes legions... and that's simply not true. The fact of it is that Tau souls barely even register as souls to the Chaos Gods. They have no psykers. They have no warp navigators. Even for the rapacious and ever-hungering gods of the Warp, they're just not worth the effort. However, the Tau have run into Chaos Space Marines on a number of occasions; while they might not recognise the Alpha Legion specifically, they know what a CSM looks like - specifically, what he looks like splattered over a wide area by railgun rounds. The big weakness is to psykers, actually - the Tau have basically zero defence against Warp powers, and the Rebels have exactly zero defence against it - and may well end up being turned against their cause by the machinations of Chaos. Hell, we could even have the initial clone troops turn to the Ruinous Powers and make the Alliance fight their own for a change, which sounds p cool, especially when you factor in just how many nasty mutations they could get their hands on. Jet Troopers with actual wings, Blurrg Troopers mounted on Beasts Of Nurgle, and maybe even a Clone Trooper Commander who became a Daemon Prince... cool, right?

Also, since this is set prior to the canonical Fifth Sphere Expansion, the problem isn't that you're going to be fighting Hive Fleet Leviathan. Instead, the Tau got to deal with Hive Fleet Gorgon (a splinter of Hive Fleet Behemoth), whose power I think we can upscale considerably considering their new advantages. Gorgon was canonically a Hive Fleet of exceptional adaptability, perhaps because of the Tau's own ability to adapt their technology to face new threats; Gorgon facing off against the Alliance would probably invest heavily in psyker units like Zoanthropes and stuff that could withstand barrages of pulse fire, like Pyrovores and Carnifexes - stuff that the Alliance has never really had to deal with en masse. Meanwhile, the Rebels look upon the Great Devourer with extremely brown pants; perhaps this pushes them closer to the Tau... or perhaps further away. Time will tell. =]

The story of the Tau-augmented Rebellion might be interesting. Their ultimate goal is no longer to bring down the Empire, because that would just let the Imperium take over, but to take control of it through subterfuge and cleverness... I have a feeling this might actually take them into the orbit of the Alpha Legion, who are apparently sneaky Chaos types that don't hang out in the Eye of Terror. Given that neither the Tau nor the Rebels have the knowledge base to immediately recognise a Traitor Legion, they could very well forge an alliance (which is in the interests of Chaos, since the Empire is proving a pain).

Over in the Milky Way, though, we've got 'Tau conquer everything easily' as one plot thread. When your weakness is 'numbers', and that gets negated, things get very boring. On the other hand, it looks like Hive Fleet Kraken arrives on the Tau frontier three years after 'Now', so that could work as a source of conflict.

Meanwhile, the Empire is firing Starkiller+Sun Crusher blasts into the Eye of Terror. What will that do? Options range from 'nothing' to 'destruction of one of more Chaos Gods' (^_~). Whatever happens, it'll provoke a response... but the Bugzapper (or whatever Palpy calls it) is a long way away. Chaos can't get there.

Hmm... except if the Alpha Legion is hanging out with the Rebel-Tau Alliance. The Alliance takes Coruscant with their help, then has to balance fighting off an Imperium assault at Kuat (the Imperial - now Alliance - shipyards) with hunting down Palpatine and the Bugzapper in the Outer Rim. They succeed at both... and then the Alpha Legion betrays them, taking both the Bugzapper and Palpatine directly into the Eye of Terror.

That puts Vader in charge of what's left of the Empire, and he's not one for sitting back when there's vengeance to be had. He's convinced he can resist the corruption of Chaos, so intends to head into their own realm to get his Master out/kill stuff. And he knows that the Eldar Webway can probably be used as back door into the Eye...

... and this is the point at which the Tyranids show up, I guess.

So, running down our list of galactic powers:

-Galactic Empire: dethroned, but still a major force. Fighting against both the Alliance and the Imperium to maintain its holdings, while also attempting to find a way into the Webway.

-Tau-Republic Alliance: expanding rapidly, but in trouble. The Alpha Legion took a chunk of the fleet with them when they betrayed them, so they're strictly weaker than both the Imperium and the Empire in the GFFA. Back in the Milky Way, the Fourth Sphere has just run headlong into the Tyranids, and is seriously numerically overwhelmed. A true merger of the two factions is being mooted.

-Imperium of Man: having a really bad day. They hold a huge slice of the GFFA, but nothing truly critical. Meanwhile, Cadia is still under the guns of the Imperial Navy, and the Fourth Sphere is cutting into their back-lines.

-Powers of Chaos: going well! While they suffered some key losses in the Bugzapper bombardment, they now have the Bugzapper itself, a sizeable hyper-capable fleet (assuming they can persuade the Alphas to hand it over), and a Sith Lord to set about corrupting. Of course, there is the annoying matter of that huge fleet outside the Eye of Terror...

-Tyranids: buzz buzz buzz. Who are these annoying white-armoured people who all look alike?

-Eldar, Dark Eldar: both staying out of things, but now there's a Dark Lord of the Sith and a bunch of Star Destroyers harassing them and asking for the keys. Ugh, the Mon-Keigh never learn, am I right?

Orks: WAAAGH!

hS

(Yeah, I was wrong about it stalling.)

Seriously, this is an amazing plot and it works really well and now I want to write it but there is so much other writing to do and also there is so much cool stuff that I know about the Tau but I know substantially less cool stuff about Star Wars and also I might be flailing a bit because this is SO COOL AAAAAAAA-

Also the dates you mention mean that this takes the place of the Fourth Sphere Expansion, which is now extremely successful instead of being lost in warp storms. Timelines R Fun! =]

... that Ron'nim refers to a clone as a being, while Sha'suam'kha'la refers to it as a soldier in the Hail of Flames.

Anyway, for this, you get more art!



1. The collision of two galaxies. The GFFA's rim materialises through the core of the Milky Way. This puts worlds like Mon Calamari, Yavin, Kashyyyk, and Mandalore directly in the path of...

2. ... the Imperium of Man's invasion force. The first system they encounter is the Sith world of Korriban, which convinces them that the GFFA is a hive of Chaos. They drive out the Rebel Alliance without even noticing them, then engage the Imperial Navy at Concord Dawn. Meanwhile...

3. ... the Rebels flee into the new galaxy, and run into the Tau. Mon Mothma forms an alliance, sharing aid and technology.

4. Emperor Palpatine tries a classic decapitation strike. His Death Star (which had just destroyed Alderaan when the galaxies merged) leaps into the Sol system and prepares to fire on Holy Terra. Unfortunately for Palpatine, the Imperium's fleet is just a bit bigger than the Rebel Alliance. Scratch one Death Star.

5. As part of their deal, the Rebels provide the Tau with information on cloning. A hyperdrive-enabled Tau/Rebel raid on Kamino provides them with samples of the tech, and they quickly get to work reverse-engineering it.

6. With the Imperium at a stalemate somewhere around the Hapes cluster, Palpatine turns his attention to something more serious. Reports have reached him of his Inquisitors being corrupted by a new aspect of the Force... something named Chaos.

7. Dagobah is a long way from the front lines, but Imperium ships are notoriously bad at ending up where they need to be. Ben Kenobi appears to Luke Skywalker, instructing him to head to the swamp planet, train there... and bring Yoda away from peril if he can.

(Not shown are the two Tau Ethereals who travelled with him, whose presence convinced Yoda to leave.)

8. The Imperials engage the forces of Chaos. Chaos wins (obviously). Palpatine begins pursuing other avenues of attack.

9. Ten years on, the Hail of Flames is complete. The first Tau clone army marches to war, split - by their alliance with the Rebellion - between their own expansion and the liberation of Imperium-held worlds in the GFFA such as Mon Calamari, Chandrila, and Bothawui.

10. The Imperial Navy bypasses Cadia and blockades the Eye of Terror. Using hit-and-run tactics honed over a decade of combat with the larger ships of Chaos and the Imperium, they maintain the blockade while Palpatine's new superweapon commences firing. Bolts of red flame emerge from hyperspace and plunge into the swirling Eye, each one with enough energy to destroy a star...

hS

therefore, I do miss some tenses. Yes, I do mean swipe the screen, to switch to other apps. "if I may enter my basket and lift it myself." Yes, it's a Malay expression, something a bit stronger than 'patting yourself on the back'.

I don't think I can commit to developing this Dark Lord character for now. Real life, they are quite a priority. But I will revisit this idea again, if I am not too busy with other stuffs.

It's also a bit of nostalgia seeing you around again, since you were pretty active in 2013 when I joined (this is DawnFire, by the way, in case you didn't catch the name change post. May as well head off potential confusion at the start; it's happened before). I still even have some notes somewhere about Dawn and a handful of other early agents of mine going to this emporium to get fireproof clothing so they could play with their mini-Balrogs...no idea if that'll ever happen now, but the notes still exist.

Anyway. A fun read, like I said, but there are some things I want to point out (briefly, because it seems that's not meant to be the focus). I'll put them in a list, because I rather like lists:

1. You have a few tense problems. You've written this mostly in present tense, but there are a few times where you slip into past tense. These include:

"I found a snoring snaga"->should be "I find"

"I swapped my smartphone's screen"->should be "I swap", though I'm not completely sure that's the right verb. Did you mean "swipe", or that he's switching screens? If it's the latter, then it's fine, just slightly unusual word choice.

"as she extended her arms"->should be "as she extends her arms"

And...that's it for tense problems, actually, unless I've missed something. That's pretty good--based on past experience, that's a fairly normal number of accidental tense changes if you normally write/read in past tense.

2. There are a number of places where the wording is a little odd. Things like "Where had my orcs been" instead of "where are my orcs" (or "where have my orcs gone"). (That's actually the main one--the rest is a count or two of slightly misused punctuation or a missing "a", which...isn't exactly wording, but I'm pre-breakfast here, give me a break with categorization).

I also love the expression "if I may enter my basket and lift it myself." I've never heard it before (though I feel like I know an equivalent); I'm guessing it's translated from Malay? It's fun.

Technical stuff aside...yeah, this was fun to read. This dark lord has a sense of humor to go with his hints of darkness, and Trahan...while she doesn't yet feel like a fully fleshed out character, she also doesn't feel like a cliche or a cardboard cutout. I like the interaction between her and the dark lord.

...of course, I also just like the idea of a dark lord running a couple of businesses. It's interesting. It also makes me want to read more and see everything get really developed. I liked this idea four years ago (no, wait, it's about five now, isn't it? Four and a half? Well, it'll be five at the beginning of 2018, anyway, which, woooow), and it seems my opinion hasn't changed. I'd still like to see more of this (and to know if you've got an overarching plot figured out, because I'm pretty curious), and it's good to see you back.

~Z

"WHERE HAD MY ORCS BEEN?!" Just because I often leave my shop at the hands of Golnash doesn't mean he can skip work as much as he wants.

"I KNOW IT'S DAYTIME! YOU AREN'T AS WEAK TO SUNLIGHT AS YOUR ANCESTORS WERE!" I look under the shirts on display, carefully so I don't have to fold it back. I have fermented durian business to run too, and durian-scented shirts aren't in vogue since... First Age, I guess?

I found a snoring snaga curling peacefully under a mannequin pile. I flick her nose. "Wake up! Job!"

She yawns lazily as she extended her arms. The mannequins slide down, covering her again. She jolts, "Ahh! Avalanche!"

I pinch her nose, moving it side to side a few times. "Avalanche your head! Get up, and send these mannequins to the storeroom!." She quickly starts with her work, tying the same body parts together.

I look around, trying to see if any orcs and snagas are hiding around. "Hey, Trahan, where are the rest?"

She looks up at me. Her eyes are filled with fear. That's odd, usually their eyes are filled with mischief when they look at me.

"My Lord, they are having a holiday..."

"A Holiday? A HOLIDAY???!!!" My roar is befitting Morgoth's at Lammoth, if I may enter my basket and lift it myself. I bring out my mace and swing it around a few times. "Well, where are they holidaying? I intend to give them holidays, lasting forever!"

"My Lord, you don't know?"

"Know what?"

"Today's Friday the Thirteenth!"

My face loses its wrath, and now it is only filled with puzzlement. "Today's Saturday! Friday the Thirteenth's yesterday!"

"Our clock here follows Washington DC. It's 8.00 am Friday!"

I swapped my smartphone's screen. World Time... Oh yes, it's Friday. "Well, why are you not with the others? Don't you want to escape work too?"

"I want overtime. More money, can buy a Samsung android."

I clutch my stomach, laughing at her answer. "I haven't said today's a holiday!" I slam my fist at my chest, trying to stop my laughter. "You get paid your monthly wage. Unless you want to work past 5.00 pm?"

"Oooooh, yes! I get free lunch, right?"

I growl at her. "Don't empty the pantry."

She squeals in happiness and quickly cleans the shop, slapping an "OPEN" sign on the front door. I sit at the cashier's counter, throning with gloom as I wait for the first customers to arrive. This will be a long day, even with no ill luck.

No sooner do I post the above than I come across the Tau word for clone (Ron'nim). Sod. Oh well, I like my one better. =]

By way of recompense, have some (slightly butchered) Tau terms for GFFA-specific terms:

Aun'aku'ni: The Force (lit.: "Ethereal life force sensation/feeling"). This goes off the earlier idea that Ethereals might be latent Force-users, with all that that implies. Perhaps others can be trained to use it... perhaps not. See also Aun'aku'ni'jhi, which refers to the Dark Side; something of which one doubts the Tau would be all that fond, or even tempted by.

Bentu'himoya'la: Jedi (lit.: "Graceful and enlightened protector"). This is a pre-existing term that I feel would definitely be applied to the Jedi, or at least what remains of them. Not for nothing are they called Knights, after all. See also Bentu'himoya'saal and Bentu'himoya'O for padawan and Jedi Master respectively.

Ke'd'havre: Holocron (lit.: "Brilliant (as in luminescent) book of sutras/psalms"). This is another construction - I get the feeling that Jedi teaching holocrons would be viewed in much the same sense as collected sayings and teachings of early Ethereals, of which the D'havre is one of the more famous.

El'er'ex'la: Wookiee (lit.: "Noble person of the fur cloak"). This one, at least, is obvious. =]

Sha'suam'kha'la: Clone trooper (lit.: "Hail of flames warrior"). The lexicon I've been using doesn't have much in the way of grammar, so I rather had to improvise. Besides, there's quite a lot of poesy in the Tau language, so it doesn't not fit. Anyway, the whole "hail of flames" thing is meant to imply a great shower of small flames - emphasizing the sheer scale of a Tau Clone Trooper onslaught as part of a distinct Hunter Cadre, allowing for strategies and engagements on much grander scales than before. The suffix -'la may be replaced with any of the Tau caste ranks to indicate rank ('saal, 'la, 'ui, 'vre, 'el, and 'O in that order).

Ol'nan: Lightsabre (lit.: "Bright sword"). Again, this one's pretty self-explanatory, and personally I like it better than lightsabre. Flows off the tongue a bit more easily, what? =]

Taubacca and Tau Clone Trooper.

I'm assuming that at least the first generation of clones are human, and are in fact using the Fett template. Whether that's because the technology isn't easy to adapt to Tau, or because the Tau aren't too happy about cloning themselves, I couldn't say.

hS

Check out Fight for the Future for more information about what's going on and how you can help. Phone calls are great, but apparently, if you have Twitter, you can tweet, too! Almost makes me wish I had Twitter.

~Neshomeh

[Checks] It looks like it precisely fits what I was talking about, buuuuut I did Of Mice and Men at school and just plain don't like Steinbeck. ^_~

(I saw this one; I also saw this one before it vanished, and have saved it for further snickering.)

hS

I'm reading it for English class. Would that count? It covers multiple generations and is historical fiction (a lot of Biblical references in there, too.)

-Twistey

(Also, there are a couple googly Walfas pics that I made for you and you didn't see, but I'm too sleepy to spend the effort to repost them here.)

I mean, for one thing, Han's gonna love having a supply of photon grenades. Since it's basically a monumentally bad trip in a can, it's good for both Stormtroopers and Sith alike - I'd wager it'd be preeeeetty hard to maintain your concentration on the Force when you've had a Rainbow Psychoactive Rock Concert Flashbang go off in your face. We've also got to remember that Tau pulse pistols are like blaster pistols but, y'know, good, so he's obviously a fan of that. Now, Iunno if you'd get Chewie to part with his bowcaster, but the image of him hauling a cyclic ion blaster or a burst cannon around is kind of awesome. And Leia? Well, we know she's a pretty good shot, so just go all the way with it and give her a rail rifle.

What's also helpful is the fact that rather than durasteel or whatever, Tau armour (and by extension the armour of their Rebel allies) is made of a nanocrystalline substance called fio'tak, out of which pretty much everything is built these days. It's dense, it's durable, and it's incredibly light - and it means that the Rebel forces as well as Tau clone troopers can shrug off blaster fire and even lightsabres as if they were clad head to foot in beskar. In addition to that, we know that the Tau Water Caste are translators and diplomats par excellence, and we also know that the Vespid communication helms are a thing, so I can definitely see Chewbacca and other Wookiee getting something similar to better communicate and co-ordinate with the Fire Caste in the field.

However, one of the most devious and generally nastiest things lurking in the Tau arsenal is drones. They use the whole "combined arms" thing to have a shedload of small orbiting robots - analogous to a starfighter's pilot-assistance astromech droid - to grant bonuses to fire teams in the field. These can be big ol' shield projectors, or they can be rail rifle fire support... or they can have a markerlight. These basically provide massively augmented targeting data for units, and makes them terrifyingly accurate in the field.

In short, Tau clone troopers can shoot straight.

Be afraid. =]

H'okay so. Continuing on from the Imperial/Imperium war, the Rebellion wound up right in the line of the Imperium's invasion fleet, and had to flee the GFFA entirely. They ended up in Tau space, and on the basis of 'you don't want to kill everyone and neither do we', they managed to forge an alliance.

The philosophies of the two sides are very close - the Greater Good is a concept the Rebel leadership can get behind, though they don't go so far as to merge the two. Luke Skywalker, looking for guidance after Kenobi's death, winds up playing disciple to the Ethereals. (Amusingly, the Tau decide that the Duros are a lost Tau caste, probably an Air offshoot.)

The two sides trade technology, and within a year the first Tau hyperdrives roll off the lines. Their first mission is a raid on the GFFA, to pick up some of that fabled cloning technology - the Rebels kind of oppose this, but not strongly enough to break the alliance.

A decade passes. The Imperium is still mired halfway to Coruscant. The Bugzapper of Palpatine (or whatever) has commenced interdiction shots on the Eye of Terror, and is roving the GFFA's Outer Rim eating suns to power itself. And suddenly, all across Ultima Segmentum, ultra-high-tech Tau ships carrying boatloads of first-generation clone troopers drop out of hyperspace. The Fifth Sphere of Expansion is underway at last.

(Meanwhile, a crack Rebel team, armed with Tau tech and including all our favourite characters, returns to the GFFA, aiming to take down the Bugzapper and stop it, y'know, destroying stars...)

hS, havin' fun