What's the deal with Ethereals? If they control other Tau

>>47080800
They are indoctrinated since birth.

It's fucking communism, I ain't gotta explain shit

You don't have to be on contact with that shit 24/7 for it to be effective. If evert time an ethereal walked into the room your whole life you had a quasi-religious experience of complete submission to their will, you aren't going to shake your head and yell "GO fuck yourself" the first time one sends you an order over radio just because it didn't feel quite as magical.

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>>47080800
Smell-O-Vision

>>47080800
That ethereal has been skipping leg day.

>>47080852
>>47080869
>>47080917
/thread

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Introducing pheromones was a stupid idea in the first place imho.
It should have been left all vague and uncertain.

>>47080800
I think it is some kind of mix of pheromones and telepathic mind control. That being said, I think the Fire Tau are canonically the most uppity and rebellious of the Tau in general, so you might be on to something.

>>47080800
Traditional forms of propoganda work well when you're out of pheremone range I imagine. As does actually being the lesser evil for most people.

Tau education consist in brain implants.

>>47082724
There is reference in the rpg books to a condition Fire Warriors occasionally suffer called "battlesuit psychosis."

It turns out that when a Fire Warrior spends too long in a hermetically sealed environment, he starts getting all back-talky and questions-orders-y. Therapy involves getting them out of the suit and preferably the attentions of an Ethereal.

>>47080800
The best explanation I've heard is that the mind control/pheromone stuff is there to socially condition the Tau within their society and while they're young and such, but by the time ethereals are leading attack teams and shit, the conditioning is already set in and the other Tau are basically following them out of habit.

Given that they have selectively breed the rest of the Castes for generations, I'm surprised that Farsight is even a thing. I'm sure they had plenty of time to get rid off any insurrectionist ideas.

>>47080800
there are no pheremones. all of that stuff about brainwashing and orwellian stuff is just imperial propaganda to keep imperial citizens from defecting in droves

>>47080800
Ethereals having mind control is just meme magic, like the idiots who quack "If an ork believes he is in space, a fucking kroozer materializes from thin air"

>>47080917
This. You'd just assume it wasn't as overpowering because they weren't physically there.

>>47080917

I tell my superior officers to go fuck themselves over the radio all the time.

The ass chewing I get afterwards is worth it.

>>47080800
Go to bed, Jerry.

Because it doesn't matter if they have magic powers or not, they're still the leadership caste and if you're just some grunt who doesn't even have their own name you just listen to what they tell you to do. It's how armies across all races work.