Relic Entertainment recently added the Tau Commander to their survival-style mode “The Last Stand” in Dawn of War II: Retribution. This development came out of left field, since the original game didn’t include the Tau race in the first place, and while only a single hero unit represents them here, it’s still very nice to have a frequent fan request added, especially this late in the game’s lifecycle.

The Tau Commander plays much like veterans of the Tau’s previous appearance in Dark Crusade expect: amazing at ranged combat, but defenseless up close. The Commander actually deals no damage in melee, so keeping him out of stand-up fights is imperative, and to aid him in that he has a very effective jetpack which allows him to boost around the battlefield. Keep him out of harms way, though, and he’ll light up enemies with gatling lasers or a minor Itano Circus of missiles.

There are two points of contention regarding the fellow, however. First, there’s the perennial “Tau Are Too Anime” debate which always crops up, and while you cannot deny that the Tau were designed with at least some Asian influence, their vehicles and armor are a far cry from anything an anime fan would remark as traditional mecha design. Their humanoid (Tauoid?) mecha look more like a particularly blocky MT from Armored Core than they do even the most Real of Real Robots. Second, the price for this single new character in a single mode of the game costs $9.99, a full third of what the whole of Retribution originally launched for. While this seems like it could be the beginning of a DLC nightmare, Relic has done an exemplary job with keeping patches coming to their games and even adding new content (including the original Last Stand!) for free to their games, and they’re likely just trying to earn back their investment by charging what hardcore fans are willing to pay.