Editing Tau Protector Escort

The Escorts from the Tau Protector Fleets are actual warships in contrast to the armed civilian vessels of the [[Tau Merchant Escort|Tau Merchant Escorts.]] The Protector Escorts have frontal hull and co-axial weapons rather than broadside and split arc weapons of the Merchant navy. They also benefit from warfare bonuses.

==Destroyers==
===Lance-boat===
====Kir'la====
[[File:WardenEscort.jpg|300px|right|thumb|The little lance-boat that could.]]
The Kir'la-class Carrier Escort, codenamed Warden-class Gunship, is a small warship of the Tau Empire. 

The Kir'la accompanies the powerful Or'es El'leath-class Carrier into combat. With their Gravitic Drive capability being extremely limited due to their small size, Kir'las are carried between the stars by their Or'es El'leath motherships' Gravitic Hooks and launched when they reach the destination system. Warden-class Gunships are armed with an array of Ion Cannons and Railgun Batteries.

Three Kir'las took part in the Taros Campaign, fighting alongside their mothership, the A'Rho.

The Warden is the lance possessing, all standard weapon light ship for the Tau Protectors' fleet. Since the Tau options are limited, you will probably find yourself using most of the available hulls at some pint or another, as they all have fairly unique and worthwhile load-outs.

Interestingly, of the two escorts, the Warden is the shorter ranged craft along with being the weaker of the two defensively (due to its size), only having half the hull points of the larger Castellan.

It is armed with 2 Ion Cannon Turrets and 2 Railgun Artillery.

*'''Length:''' 900m
*'''Width''' 1.2km

==Frigates==
===Basic===
====Kir'shasvre====
[[File:Castellan.JPG|300px|right|thumb|Your first introduction to the magic of HOMING MISSILES.]]
The Kir'shasvre-class Frigate (or Castellan) is an Escort roughly comparable to the Imperial Navy's Sword and Firestorm-class Frigates. It is armed with a prow Gravitic Launcher and Railgun battery.

Twenty Castellans saw action during the Taros Campaign.

The Castellan is one of the first and earliest Tau warships that allows you to play around with their homing missiles. This gives the Tau a much longer potential range for their Torpedo launches than with other factions, especially if they can provide some form of massed fire or defensive squadron cover to protect the missiles from defence turrets as they travel along their journey. They also have a few light railgun turrets for point-defence purposes and dishing out moderate damage against enclosing enemy vessels.

It is armed with 2 Missile Launchers and 3 Double-Barrel Light Railgun Turrets.

*'''Length:''' 1.6km
*'''Width''' 3.4km

==In Battlefleet Gothic: Armada 1 & 2==
There is nothing too amazing when it comes to the Tau Protector Escorts stat-wise. As both have relatively standard stats for ships of their size. One thing worth pointing out here is that they do not receive the bonus to frontal armor that line ships do on account of their lack of targetable subsystems. However, they do have a handful of basic skills and abilities, the most unique of which is their warfare bonuses they get to pick at the beginning of the battle. Beyond that, most of the uniqueness of the Protector faction lies in their special weapon types, frontal focusing arcs with lack of real broadside weaponry. Great faction for high single-target damage.

{{40k-Tau-Ships}}