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I wanted to make use of the ork battlesuit commander and gretchin in firewarrior armour I made, so I came up with this list.

Orks:
HQ:
Weirdboy, warphead 70p
Troops:
20x Boys, 2x big shoota, nob, 18x shoota 164p
20x Gretchin, 2x Runtherd 75p
Heavy:
5x Kustom Mega kannon, 10x extra crew 180p
5x Kustom Mega kannon, 10x extra crew 180p

Tau:
HQ:
Commander <no clue> 85p
Troops:
6x fire warriors 54p
Heavy:
2x Broadside Shas'ui 130p

Total: 938p

Not really sure how to equip the commander and broadsides.
Does anyone have any experience with the KMK's? They seem really great on paper, not sure how they'd perform though.

I can't comment on the Tau, but I will comment on your KMK

10 of them can destroy an enemy if you're lucky.

Lets work on being lucky!

First thing first.
Your leadership is sitting at 5. Buy a mini mek and embed him in that unit to give them Ld 7

You're not going to need 20 gretchin manning that thing, they're T7 w/ a 3+

Buy ammo runts! they let you re-roll dice including it gets hot! Dont be shy about using them either! First turn use them all if you have to and fry the enemy

If you usually dont play with a lot of cover, consider an Aegis defense line, you can even pop a gun on there for a grot to shoot!

Interresting points!

The reason I took the extra crew is so that it takes longer before I have to take that leadership test.

Though of course, adding the mek anyways is still a good idea. Would it be worth it to take two big meks instead of the weirdboy, then I get even a ld 8, possibly a bosspole and if I wanted to be really nasty I could take the mega armour! Not only will it have t7 but also a 2+ save. But it would kind of rule out getting tau allies at this point level.

fcademartori wrote:
... 10 of them can destroy an enemy if you're lucky..

I agree with everything you've said, except this. 10 of these should be able to destroy 2 things, depending on what he's targetting.

The issue with an Ork Gun line is that your range of the KMKs are only 36inches, so you're forced to typically bring your gun line quite far forward for it to be effective, which isn't what you'd want to do with a gunline.

A few things:
1. The ADL, which Fcadmartori suggested, is a must IMO. Give it the Quad Gun and your grots will have something to use. 19 grots are better than 20, as you don't need that extra Runtherd, saving you points.
2. Lobbas are 48 inch range, barrange, Strength 5 AP5, and 12 points cheaper than the KMKs. I would suggest taking 5 of these, then 5 KMKs. This will free up a good chunk of points.
3. As Fcadmartori advised, put Ammo runts on all your artillery. Never don't do it.
3. Lootas are awesome. Again 48inch range. A full squad of 15 means means your getting your money's worth, filling out the 3rd heavy support slot. Best source of Strength 7 in most codexes, and really cheap for their points. Behind the ADL, they can go to ground and aim at fliers, snap shooting isn't a major issue for orks as our BS is so poor anyway.
4. Get a Painboy. If you have 20 foot sloggin boys, they won't survive long out in the open. FnP is awesome for them, tho I can understand wanting to use the Weirdboy.
5. Put Rokkits on your Boys. Rokkits are awesome. Shootas are pants.
6. As a distraction unit, either Tankbusters (in a trukk), Meganobz (in a trukk), or a Deffkopta Deffstar unit are really useful, as they are able to destroy stuff which tries to hide out of range or out of sight of your gun line. The later 2 are useful as your army DOES need a combat piviot, incase there are any units which choose to close the cap between too fast for you to shoot down.
7. Ork gun lines might struggle at 1000pts, but i would definately take 15 lootas over 5 KMKs at this level. KMK are really nice, but Lootas just have that range.

Extra point: for true dakkaness, buy the Fortress of Redemption You get some seriously nasty weapons on that thing...

I started running KMK in August. Like you I thought they were awesome. They will not pay for themselves unless you are fighting Footsloggers or Rhinos. In all other situations they won't kill anything.

Eldar will jink and most everything is 13 or 14 so it won't care. Also they can't shoot at flyers.

Deep Strike or Jet Bikes will break them round 2.

I was disappointed and spent way too much money on them.

Save points and run Kannons or Lobbas.

Currently mine are in the box and thinking about going to E-Bay.

It's a huge shame that they have such short range, that's their main downside. I'm going to test running just 3 of them, then 5 Lobbas. It will keep the points cost down and it means that if there isn't something killable, then I'm not at a complete loss.

They fall under the same issue that Traktor Kannons have. Traktors are good, but against elder skimmers they'll be able to jink. Against the odd flier, then Lootas can do the same. Against a dedicated flying army (like Nids) then there's just too many fliers for the one line to take out. As the units don't have split fire (or a varient thereof) it causes issues.

As much as Kannons are nice, I would rather spend my money on Tankbusters. They can get into a better position, have more uses (rokkits, squigs, assulting with meltabombs), kannons just struggle.

It all comes back down to Orks not having enough Heavy Support slots...

i agree with the notion that lobbaz or kannonz are generally better (considering pointcosts)

but

 Sick Bag wrote:

Deep Strike or Jet Bikes will break them round 2.

how can deepstiking units or jetbikes break them in round two? shooting against t7 with a 3+ save isnt that effective...

and the bikes will have to endure 1 round of shooting (which in case of the KMK will be desastrous) while beeing surrounded by an entire ork flank... doesnt seem very scary to me

Rip out the commander from the Tau side and just place in a cadre Fireblade much better for stand and shoot (without moveing 21 shots at rapid fire range)

Brourdsides im not too sure on what your orks are equip with but if you desperatly need AA go rails if you want more Dakka go HYMP