Hello, I'm new here!

I've noticed that some people are bashing the Leman Russ tank design.

I think that Leman Russ makes perfect sense looking from the perspective of development of technology. Military technology in Wh40k wasn't developing in conditions of humanity warring against itself. It was developed in response to a human empire expanding and encountering alien threats.
For example Predator was developed from Rhino as a fast assault tank in response to Ork threat. Predator was already largely invulnerable to Orkish weaponry.

I think that Leman Russ was also developed specifically to fight Orks which were probably the most common type of enemy encountered during exploration of the galaxy. It just needed a thick armour and lots of guns and be easy to manufacture and maintain.

Bro do you even tank? The Leman Russ is a singularity of utter stupidity in armor design. It lacks suspension. It has sponsons build into the armor. Its clearance is a joke. Its engine block appears to be barely armored. The tank is utterly cramped and severely limits the amount of ammunition that can be stored inside. Its profile is utterly ridiculous and makes it stick out like a sore thumb. Its barely slope armor is just going to take the fearsome A-T weapons of 40K head on rather than deflecting them away.


There is NEVER a reason to make a tank with a high profile and little sloped armor, ESPECIALLY in 40k. With how dangerous plasma, rockets, railguns, etc all are, you want thick sloped armor to give the maximum amount of armor between you and that shot as possible.

Oh, and then there's how the Leman Russ is just a DAOT tractor. It isn't even a tank.

It lacks suspension.

It doesnt. It just doesnt have alot of travel.
It's a slightly advanced WW1 design. most of IG inspiration comes from WW1 and WW2. So it makes sense that it doesnt look like a modern day MBT.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
Hello, I'm new here!

I've noticed that some people are bashing the Leman Russ tank design.

I think that Leman Russ makes perfect sense looking from the perspective of development of technology. Military technology in Wh40k wasn't developing in conditions of humanity warring against itself. It was developed in response to a human empire expanding and encountering alien threats.
For example Predator was developed from Rhino as a fast assault tank in response to Ork threat. Predator was already largely invulnerable to Orkish weaponry.

I think that Leman Russ was also developed specifically to fight Orks which were probably the most common type of enemy encountered during exploration of the galaxy. It just needed a thick armour and lots of guns and be easy to manufacture and maintain.

Welcome to dakka!

As stated, the LRBT is actually an armored tractor, it was not intended to be a MBT when it was conceived. It also draws a lot of inspiration from WWI era tanks, with the sponson guns and being very tall with little sloping. Its design is very impratical, even if orks were their main threat during the expansion. Although afaik, leman russ tanks date to the GC time, so they were actually used after human kind had expanded its borders and during the time the Emperor was reuniting all of humanity. Not to mention the tank design looks fairly awkward if you add on the sponson guns, it reminds me of a russian t-28 tank. Not to mention the cannon is supposed to be what a 105 or 120mm? yet its larger than a similar scale 152mm KV-2 cannon, by a great margin. Its just such an impratical design.Its extremely tall, comically oversized weapons, and it has a hard time convincing anyone it can do its job.

comically oversized weapons, and it has a hard time convincing anyone it can do its job.

I think thats more to do with 40k miniature hero scale. The figure for the caliber is very old (it's supposedly 120mm btw).

If we scale it down to 120mm, it actually looks like a real tank turret from WW2.

 Keep wrote:

It lacks suspension.

It doesnt. It just doesnt have alot of travel.
It's a slightly advanced WW1 design. most of IG inspiration comes from WW1 and WW2. So it makes sense that it doesnt look like a modern day MBT.

No, it definitely lacks suspension, or at least what we'd consider suspension in a modern tank. The track is drawn like the tank is straight out of WWI, same with the Land Raider.

Forgeworld cutaway shows that it has a suspension.
There are better tank models and suspension, clearly, but its still an improvement over WW1. And it only goes 35kph topspeed on roads.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
Hello, I'm new here!

I've noticed that some people are bashing the Leman Russ tank design.

I think that Leman Russ makes perfect sense looking from the perspective of development of technology. Military technology in Wh40k wasn't developing in conditions of humanity warring against itself. It was developed in response to a human empire expanding and encountering alien threats.
For example Predator was developed from Rhino as a fast assault tank in response to Ork threat. Predator was already largely invulnerable to Orkish weaponry.

I think that Leman Russ was also developed specifically to fight Orks which were probably the most common type of enemy encountered during exploration of the galaxy. It just needed a thick armour and lots of guns and be easy to manufacture and maintain.

You're right. So long as you don't compare it to tanks fielded by Necrons, Tau, or Eldar, sure, it's an ok design.

Gets a bit better once the orks get to looting it

 Wyzilla wrote:
Bro do you even tank? The Leman Russ is a singularity of utter stupidity in armor design. It lacks suspension. It has sponsons build into the armor. Its clearance is a joke. Its engine block appears to be barely armored. The tank is utterly cramped and severely limits the amount of ammunition that can be stored inside. Its profile is utterly ridiculous and makes it stick out like a sore thumb. Its barely slope armor is just going to take the fearsome A-T weapons of 40K head on rather than deflecting them away.

There is NEVER a reason to make a tank with a high profile and little sloped armor, ESPECIALLY in 40k. With how dangerous plasma, rockets, railguns, etc all are, you want thick sloped armor to give the maximum amount of armor between you and that shot as possible.

Except that like most of vehicles, Leman Russ is a relic. Predator's light armour was already good enough against most Ork weapons. Leman Russ didn't need sloped armour when it was invented because it was designed for fighting hordes of aggressive subhumans and their ramshackle vehicles. It just needed to be big and mean and exist in large numbers.

When it comes to being cramped, I suspect that when they designed it for Space Marine, the Lascannon sponsons and possibly the turret were automated just like in Predator. Also, it's a very big tank. It's possible that it isn't that cramped.

 Wyzilla wrote:
Oh, and then there's how the Leman Russ is just a DAOT tractor. It isn't even a tank.

AFAIK the tractor thing is an internet myth. Never seen anyone give a source for it. I think a better explanation would be that Leman Russ was for manufacturing in greater numbers than Predators and Land Raiders for beating large Ork incursions.

Thatguyhsagun wrote:
As stated, the LRBT is actually an armored tractor, it was not intended to be a MBT when it was conceived. It also draws a lot of inspiration from WWI era tanks, with the sponson guns and being very tall with little sloping. Its design is very impratical, even if orks were their main threat during the expansion.

Fighting orks would be much more similar to WWI than WWII and later conflicts.

Thatguyhsagun wrote:
Although afaik, leman russ tanks date to the GC time, so they were actually used after human kind had expanded its borders and during the time the Emperor was reuniting all of humanity.

From what I understand, weirdo heavy tanks like Malcador and Leman Russ were brought back when Imperial Army lost access to Land Raiders and Predators.

Thatguyhsagun wrote:
Not to mention the tank design looks fairly awkward if you add on the sponson guns, it reminds me of a russian t-28 tank. Not to mention the cannon is supposed to be what a 105 or 120mm? yet its larger than a similar scale 152mm KV-2 cannon, by a great margin. Its just such an impratical design.Its extremely tall, comically oversized weapons, and it has a hard time convincing anyone it can do its job.

120mm. For some reason the battle cannon is water-cooled.

Interwar designs like T-28 were created for a repeat of WWI where the main enemy of tanks would be masses of infantry, automatic weapons and occasional artillery, not lots of AT guns and tanks.

 Keep wrote:

comically oversized weapons, and it has a hard time convincing anyone it can do its job.

I think thats more to do with 40k miniature hero scale. The figure for the caliber is very old (it's supposedly 120mm btw).

If we scale it down to 120mm, it actually looks like a real tank turret from WW2.

Except for the centred hatch.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
When it comes to being cramped, I suspect that when they designed it for Space Marine, the Lascannon sponsons and possibly the turret were automated just like in Predator. Also, it's a very big tank. It's possible that it isn't that cramped.

Mockup for real human scale, with FW (main)armor thickness and 150mm rounds (to fit the miniature model better), Ammo load like described in IA:1

Not too much space, not too cramped (remember, personal gear, other equipment and secondary ammo+ ammo for sponsons still needs to go in there)

Except for the centred hatch.

That's correct... on the realistic scale model there is more space, so it could go back (on the real model there is barely any space so it's centered for optical reasons basically)

Well, there are few points about it:

1. The origin of the STC template. LR was originally just a tractor, but it was later turned into a tank due to it's high engine output and ease of manufacture.

2. It's main intended role is infantry support, not tank battle. That's why it looks like a child of Mark V and M4 Sherman.

3. The model was made to resemble the WW1/2 echo the Guard has. Also, remember that GW sculptors aren't engineers.

 Finlandiaperkele wrote:
Well, there are few points about it:

1. The origin of the STC template. LR was originally just a tractor, but it was later turned into a tank due to it's high engine output and ease of manufacture.

Source, please?

 Keep wrote:

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
When it comes to being cramped, I suspect that when they designed it for Space Marine, the Lascannon sponsons and possibly the turret were automated just like in Predator. Also, it's a very big tank. It's possible that it isn't that cramped.

Mockup for real human scale, with FW (main)armor thickness and 150mm rounds (to fit the miniature model better), Ammo load like described in IA:1

Not too much space, not too cramped (remember, personal gear, other equipment and secondary ammo+ ammo for sponsons still needs to go in there)

Chapter Approved 2004 claims that it's a 120mm smootbore gun. Hull has width of 4,86m. I think the interior width would be about 3m and height about 2m?

This cut-out shows sponson crew but no loaders:

It also lists an autoloader.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:


When it comes to being cramped, I suspect that when they designed it for Space Marine, the Lascannon sponsons and possibly the turret were automated just like in Predator. Also, it's a very big tank. It's possible that it isn't that cramped.

In the Black Library novel Hammer of the Emperor, there is a story called Gunheads about an IG tank company, and supposedly they have gunners inside the sponsons/the sponsons have room for gunners to sit outside the tanks main body. This is noted numerous times in the book, most notably the sponson gunmen actually enter/exit the tank through hatches in the sponsons. It always seemed silly to me the writer chose to portray the sponsons manned as if the tank were a superheavy (all guns are manned individually by separate crewmen) but also to the point he made them into what amounts to armored pillboxes on the side of the tank. Its the only fluffpiece about guard Leman Russ tanks in any true detail. In the same book theres a short stint about a tank commander in a Russ, but its sponsonless. Most of the IG pieces ive read are the Gaunts Ghosts series and they dont use LRBT's. So not too sure how cannon it is, but apparently there are literally guys who hang outside the main body of the tank to fire the sponsons. They seem to die an awful lot in the book, and to minor things like landmines or flamers.

That's a Demolisher if you haven't noticed. FW:IA lists Leman Russ and Demolisher to have loaders. But thanks for the picture, haven't seen that one before. Definitely interesting.

Chapter Approved 2004 claims that it's a 120mm smootbore gun

I know, but since the diameter is so extremely different to the visual model it's a better fit. And remember - this artwork is a) extremely old and b) someone just drew it on a paper. That doesnt mean it's going to work in 3D (look at the shells and then at the cannon... that just doesnt fit.) I oriented mine on the FW leman russ cutout sideview. If you look at the chimera cutout from the same author, that's also horribly outdated and doesnt match up with the FW interior cutout, which looks far more believable. I wanted to work out how an actual Leman Russ could be realistically, because those sizes and figures are all basically made up from thin air. Particulary the dimensions of the thing.

About sources: In Double Eagle there are also some sections about the Leman Russ, but not in too much detail. Ghaunts Ghosts i remember mentioning of Conqueror tanks fighting against inferior local tanks. It was in the book where they want to save the shrine (completely forgot the name...)

 Keep wrote:


About sources: In Double Eagle there are also some sections about the Leman Russ, but not in too much detail. Ghaunts Ghosts i remember mentioning of Conqueror tanks fighting against inferior local tanks. It was in the book where they want to save the shrine (completely forgot the name...)

The Pardus Armored, on the shrineworld of Hagia, in the book The Saint (think thats the omnibus name, its the first story). They go into absolutely zero detail about the tanks which is disappointing, and apparently conqueror battle cannons (S7) have an easy time tearing through most heavy armor in the book, as at one point the pardus kill 55 ish tanks in a head-to-head fight, losing about a quarter of that in return, and overall account for more than a hundred tank kills to the 20ish conquerors, 2 Destroyers and an Executioner. I found that amusing since it can hardly scratch medium armor on TT,

Being an Officer in the Armor Branch of the Army sort of forces me to have a very negative view of the Leman Russ. It's quite clear to me that it was designed by someone who has no idea how a tank works or is intended to work. Neither do any of the writers of the fiction.

In the end though, it really doesn't matter and I hesitate to rail too hard against the thing. I don't expect someone to know the ins and outs of a very complicated piece of military hardware, and the Leman Russ is is very clearly designed to emulate the first British tanks from World War I- which was a terrible terrible battle tank, and used instead as a mobile-cover-line-breaker.

However, that doesn't excuse the fact that the thing would not work anywhere except a flat field. And even then it better be dry, or else that thing is sinking right in the mud and becoming mostly immobile.

Cramped? You must have never seen a T-34. LR is like a ballroom on tracks
For being a WW1, WW2 style tank, the LR is actually pretty good. Better than Sherman, T-34 or Pz.Kpfw. IV. (okay, we might need to cover the tracks a bit more though)
Also, isn't the LR made out of magic space metal? Maybe that material is so strong sloped armour is not necessary.

Thatguyhsagun wrote:
In the Black Library novel Hammer of the Emperor, there is a story called Gunheads about an IG tank company, and supposedly they have gunners inside the sponsons/the sponsons have room for gunners to sit outside the tanks main body. This is noted numerous times in the book, most notably the sponson gunmen actually enter/exit the tank through hatches in the sponsons. It always seemed silly to me the writer chose to portray the sponsons manned as if the tank were a superheavy (all guns are manned individually by separate crewmen) but also to the point he made them into what amounts to armored pillboxes on the side of the tank. Its the only fluffpiece about guard Leman Russ tanks in any true detail. In the same book theres a short stint about a tank commander in a Russ, but its sponsonless. Most of the IG pieces ive read are the Gaunts Ghosts series and they dont use LRBT's. So not too sure how cannon it is, but apparently there are literally guys who hang outside the main body of the tank to fire the sponsons. They seem to die an awful lot in the book, and to minor things like landmines or flamers.

Sponsonless tanks have a hatch in place of sponsons, so it's possible that gunners are actually in sponsons. Ouch.

 Keep wrote:
That's a Demolisher if you haven't noticed. FW:IA lists Leman Russ and Demolisher to have loaders.

Looks like stuff keeps getting downgraded technologically.

 Keep wrote:
I know, but since the diameter is so extremely different to the visual model it's a better fit. And remember - this artwork is a) extremely old and b) someone just drew it on a paper. That doesnt mean it's going to work in 3D (look at the shells and then at the cannon... that just doesnt fit.) I oriented mine on the FW leman russ cutout sideview. If you look at the chimera cutout from the same author, that's also horribly outdated and doesnt match up with the FW interior cutout, which looks far more believable. I wanted to work out how an actual Leman Russ could be realistically, because those sizes and figures are all basically made up from thin air. Particulary the dimensions of the thing.

Gun diameter on the model is more like 240mm. The original Space Marine Leman Russ model had a smaller barrel sticking out of the coolant shroud.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Cramped? You must have never seen a T-34. LR is like a ballroom on tracks
For being a WW1, WW2 style tank, the LR is actually pretty good. Better than Sherman, T-34 or Pz.Kpfw. IV. (okay, we might need to cover the tracks a bit more though)
Also, isn't the LR made out of magic space metal? Maybe that material is so strong sloped armour is not necessary.

I'm curious about your thoughts regarding the Russ being better than the tanks you listed? From my understanding of them the Leman Russ design seems very much inferior too those you listed, and I'm not entirely sure I have read everything written about the Russ so it's very possible I've missed something. The only thing I can see that would equate the Russ to World War II tanks is the simple fact it has a turret- other than that the thing seems entirely designed off British Mark "X" tanks.

Then again I'm perfectly willing to just chalk it up to magic space metal as it seems to be the only way it makes sense

 Ignatius wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Cramped? You must have never seen a T-34. LR is like a ballroom on tracks
For being a WW1, WW2 style tank, the LR is actually pretty good. Better than Sherman, T-34 or Pz.Kpfw. IV. (okay, we might need to cover the tracks a bit more though)
Also, isn't the LR made out of magic space metal? Maybe that material is so strong sloped armour is not necessary.

I'm curious about your thoughts regarding the Russ being better than the tanks you listed? From my understanding of them the Leman Russ design seems very much inferior too those you listed, and I'm not entirely sure I have read everything written about the Russ so it's very possible I've missed something. The only thing I can see that would equate the Russ to World War II tanks is the simple fact it has a turret- other than that the thing seems entirely designed off British Mark "X" tanks.

Then again I'm perfectly willing to just chalk it up to magic space metal as it seems to be the only way it makes sense

Well, it is much larger than WW2 tanks, it can have a lascannon which would instantly blow up any WW2 tank, it has a huge gun that puts every WW2 tank to shame, it has advanced rangefinding and targetfinding equipment, it can run on any kind of fuel (extremely important) and its shape is not all that different from a Sherman tank either:

The only thing the Sherman has over the LR is better track design.

 Iron_Captain wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Cramped? You must have never seen a T-34. LR is like a ballroom on tracks
For being a WW1, WW2 style tank, the LR is actually pretty good. Better than Sherman, T-34 or Pz.Kpfw. IV. (okay, we might need to cover the tracks a bit more though)
Also, isn't the LR made out of magic space metal? Maybe that material is so strong sloped armour is not necessary.

I'm curious about your thoughts regarding the Russ being better than the tanks you listed? From my understanding of them the Leman Russ design seems very much inferior too those you listed, and I'm not entirely sure I have read everything written about the Russ so it's very possible I've missed something. The only thing I can see that would equate the Russ to World War II tanks is the simple fact it has a turret- other than that the thing seems entirely designed off British Mark "X" tanks.

Then again I'm perfectly willing to just chalk it up to magic space metal as it seems to be the only way it makes sense

Well, it is much larger than WW2 tanks, it can have a lascannon which would instantly blow up any WW2 tank, it has a huge gun that puts every WW2 tank to shame, it has advanced rangefinding and targetfinding equipment, it can run on any kind of fuel (extremely important) and its shape is not all that different from a Sherman tank either:

Spoiler:

The only thing the Sherman has over the LR is better track design.

Ah I see. Yes I agree with everything you say regarding the weaponry and such. For what it's worth I feel the same about the matchup as you, the Leman Russ would annihilate the Sherman simply because the Sherman could never hope to penetrate its armor with that tiny main cannon.

I misunderstood what you meant by better. I thought you meant the overall design was better, not combat capabilities. My apologies.

 Ignatius wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Cramped? You must have never seen a T-34. LR is like a ballroom on tracks
For being a WW1, WW2 style tank, the LR is actually pretty good. Better than Sherman, T-34 or Pz.Kpfw. IV. (okay, we might need to cover the tracks a bit more though)
Also, isn't the LR made out of magic space metal? Maybe that material is so strong sloped armour is not necessary.

I'm curious about your thoughts regarding the Russ being better than the tanks you listed? From my understanding of them the Leman Russ design seems very much inferior too those you listed, and I'm not entirely sure I have read everything written about the Russ so it's very possible I've missed something. The only thing I can see that would equate the Russ to World War II tanks is the simple fact it has a turret- other than that the thing seems entirely designed off British Mark "X" tanks.

200mm turret armour, 200mm superstructure armour, 150mm hull armour, 120mm gun, lascannon, heavy bolters, multifuel power plant, auspex, targeters, life support?

Also, the original LR had very wide tracks.

 Ignatius wrote:
I'm curious about your thoughts regarding the Russ being better than the tanks you listed? From my understanding of them the Leman Russ design seems very much inferior too those you listed, and I'm not entirely sure I have read everything written about the Russ so it's very possible I've missed something. The only thing I can see that would equate the Russ to World War II tanks is the simple fact it has a turret- other than that the thing seems entirely designed off British Mark "X" tanks.

Then again I'm perfectly willing to just chalk it up to magic space metal as it seems to be the only way it makes sense

The Armor is very thick, even if we assume it's just steel it would be even superior to the Tiger II for the most part.
The cannon - well that could be argued. It's pretty short, so not alot of kinetic energy. It's kinda like the standard sherman or early T-34 and KV guns. Not really designed for Tank fights. Not the extremely long guns from mid/late German tanks for example. But for tank fights we have the long vanquisher cannons.
Speed and engine power are kinda on par with a Tiger Tank. According to FW the standard Hull Engine is called "HL230 V12 Multi-Fuel" sounds familiar? ... The Tiger I's engine was named "Maybach HL230 P45" (V12-petrol)".

However, i doubt that the weight would be accurate if you build that tank out of regular steel. It would be much heavier, because it is so large, has very thick armor etc. That's, i think, the only real magical thing about it

 Keep wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:
I'm curious about your thoughts regarding the Russ being better than the tanks you listed? From my understanding of them the Leman Russ design seems very much inferior too those you listed, and I'm not entirely sure I have read everything written about the Russ so it's very possible I've missed something. The only thing I can see that would equate the Russ to World War II tanks is the simple fact it has a turret- other than that the thing seems entirely designed off British Mark "X" tanks.

Then again I'm perfectly willing to just chalk it up to magic space metal as it seems to be the only way it makes sense

The Armor is very thick, even if we assume it's just steel it would be even superior to the Tiger II for the most part.
The cannon - well that could be argued. It's pretty short, so not alot of kinetic energy. It's kinda like the standard sherman or early T-34 and KV guns. Not really designed for Tank fights. Not the extremely long guns from mid/late German tanks for example. But for tank fights we have the long vanquisher cannons.
Speed and engine power are kinda on par with a Tiger Tank. According to FW the standard Hull Engine is called "HL230 V12 Multi-Fuel" sounds familiar? ... The Tiger I's engine was named "Maybach HL230 P45" (V12-petrol)".

However, i doubt that the weight would be accurate if you build that tank out of regular steel. It would be much heavier, because it is so large, has very thick armor etc. That's, i think, the only real magical thing about it

Magic space metal that is lighter and stronger than steel. Unobtanium at its finest.

Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Cramped? You must have never seen a T-34. LR is like a ballroom on tracks
For being a WW1, WW2 style tank, the LR is actually pretty good. Better than Sherman, T-34 or Pz.Kpfw. IV. (okay, we might need to cover the tracks a bit more though)
Also, isn't the LR made out of magic space metal? Maybe that material is so strong sloped armour is not necessary.

I'm curious about your thoughts regarding the Russ being better than the tanks you listed? From my understanding of them the Leman Russ design seems very much inferior too those you listed, and I'm not entirely sure I have read everything written about the Russ so it's very possible I've missed something. The only thing I can see that would equate the Russ to World War II tanks is the simple fact it has a turret- other than that the thing seems entirely designed off British Mark "X" tanks.

200mm turret armour, 200mm superstructure armour, 150mm hull armour, 120mm gun, lascannon, heavy bolters, multifuel power plant, auspex, targeters, life support?

Also, the original LR had very wide tracks.

Keep wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:
I'm curious about your thoughts regarding the Russ being better than the tanks you listed? From my understanding of them the Leman Russ design seems very much inferior too those you listed, and I'm not entirely sure I have read everything written about the Russ so it's very possible I've missed something. The only thing I can see that would equate the Russ to World War II tanks is the simple fact it has a turret- other than that the thing seems entirely designed off British Mark "X" tanks.

Then again I'm perfectly willing to just chalk it up to magic space metal as it seems to be the only way it makes sense

The Armor is very thick, even if we assume it's just steel it would be even superior to the Tiger II for the most part.
The cannon - well that could be argued. It's pretty short, so not alot of kinetic energy. It's kinda like the standard sherman or early T-34 and KV guns. Not really designed for Tank fights. Not the extremely long guns from mid/late German tanks for example. But for tank fights we have the long vanquisher cannons.
Speed and engine power are kinda on par with a Tiger Tank. According to FW the standard Hull Engine is called "HL230 V12 Multi-Fuel" sounds familiar? ... The Tiger I's engine was named "Maybach HL230 P45" (V12-petrol)".

However, i doubt that the weight would be accurate if you build that tank out of regular steel. It would be much heavier, because it is so large, has very thick armor etc. That's, i think, the only real magical thing about it

Again... simply misunderstood what he meant, as I clarified in the post above these.

I still completely disagree that the tank passes as any sort of advanced or even capable piece of equipment.

 Ignatius wrote:


I still completely disagree that the tank passes as any sort of advanced or even capable piece of equipment.

I dont see any lascannons lying around our military warehouses.. I dont deny that the tank itself is poorly designed and comically shaped, but the gear it mounts and what it has in it is a different story. Multi-meltas, lascannons, even heavy bolters would be amazingly powerful by modern standards and well above what we have now, and some of the equiptment must be comparable or better than what we have now. Auspex for example. It may be unreliable most times but its an amazingly advanced and complex piece of equipment

The heavy bolter is meh, at best. The energy weapons are where its at.

 Keep wrote:
The Armor is very thick, even if we assume it's just steel it would be even superior to the Tiger II for the most part.
The cannon - well that could be argued. It's pretty short, so not alot of kinetic energy. It's kinda like the standard sherman or early T-34 and KV guns. Not the extremely long guns from mid/late German tanks for example.

It depends on what kind of ammunition it fires, though. I suspect that a 120mm krak shell would be pretty brutal. Also, HE shells used by the Imperium are ridiculously powerful with power of a 30x heavier modern shell.

 Keep wrote:
Speed and engine power are kinda on par with a Tiger Tank. According to FW the standard Hull Engine is called "HL230 V12 Multi-Fuel" ... The Tiger I's engine was named "Maybach HL230 P45" (V12-petrol)"

I had an impression that Leman Russ is supposed to be something like a Tiger (especially with the non-sloped armour). Looks like the authors had a similar impression . It has one advantage over Tiger - it can run on coal.

Yeah, it can run on any fuel it can burn. Promethium, diesel, kerosene, coal... if it burns, the Russ can roll.

Thatguyhsagun wrote:
The Pardus Armored, on the shrineworld of Hagia, in the book The Saint (think thats the omnibus name, its the first story). They go into absolutely zero detail about the tanks which is disappointing, and apparently conqueror battle cannons (S7) have an easy time tearing through most heavy armor in the book, as at one point the pardus kill 55 ish tanks in a head-to-head fight, losing about a quarter of that in return, and overall account for more than a hundred tank kills to the 20ish conquerors, 2 Destroyers and an Executioner. I found that amusing since it can hardly scratch medium armor on TT,

In TT we don't have so much differentiation, and no lokal PVS Tank stats. And in TT we don't have ammunition types (HE and AP).

 Ignatius wrote:
It's quite clear to me that it was designed by someone who has no idea how a tank works or is intended to work. Neither do any of the writers of the fiction.

Why do you assume that in 40k they have the same knowledge level about Tank warfare as we do now? You only know it's not a good tank design because you where taught so and have seen better ones. Realworld Tanks, at some point, looked quite similar to this. If you where stuck back in that time in history you would propably think different.

Trenchwarfare and mass charges are still in favor in 40k IG doctrine, don't forget that

 Keep wrote:


Trenchwarfare and mass charges are still in favor in 40k IG doctrine, don't forget that

Yes. The vast majority of both AdMech scientists/engineers and Imperial generals are complete idiots.

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Keep wrote:


Trenchwarfare and mass charges are still in favor in 40k IG doctrine, don't forget that

Yes. The vast majority of both AdMech scientists/engineers and Imperial generals are complete idiots.

No, they are actually quite competent considering the situation they are in.

Thatguyhsagun wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:


I still completely disagree that the tank passes as any sort of advanced or even capable piece of equipment.

I dont see any lascannons lying around our military warehouses.. I dont deny that the tank itself is poorly designed and comically shaped, but the gear it mounts and what it has in it is a different story. Multi-meltas, lascannons, even heavy bolters would be amazingly powerful by modern standards and well above what we have now, and some of the equiptment must be comparable or better than what we have now. Auspex for example. It may be unreliable most times but its an amazingly advanced and complex piece of equipment

Again, I'm speaking on the design of the tank itself. Obviously an energy weapon that travels as fast as light (because it is light) in such a manner is superior. Again, simply commenting on tank design and theory.

 Keep wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:
It's quite clear to me that it was designed by someone who has no idea how a tank works or is intended to work. Neither do any of the writers of the fiction.

Why do you assume that in 40k they have the same knowledge level about Tank warfare as we do now? You only know it's not a good tank design because you where taught so and have seen better ones. Realworld Tanks, at some point, looked quite similar to this. If you where stuck back in that time in history you would propably think different.

Trenchwarfare and mass charges are still in favor in 40k IG doctrine, don't forget that

I agree that it fits the gritty trench warfare style the Imperial Guard are remembered for. However, there seems to be just as many stories about Imperial Guardsmen storming across fields and using modern war tactics as there is about the Trench warfare style. The Leman Russ is terriblly designed for anything but this trench system, which even then it isn't very well adapted for.

And sure, I've got pretty extensive knowledge about this sort of thing, but it's something that has been acquired through a few short years spending time dealing with these things. Our knowledge has come about collectively from just about exactly 100 years of using tanks. I struggle to believe that the Imperium would stick to their first design even after thousands of years of using the Leman Russ, but then again, maybe that's the point. We are always looking for ways to improve tanks and their design, regardless of our thoughts of superiority.

 Keep wrote:
Forgeworld cutaway shows that it has a suspension.
There are better tank models and suspension, clearly, but its still an improvement over WW1. And it only goes 35kph topspeed on roads.

It's pulled much higher speeds in recent fluff and some of the otehr novels. Like they recycled 2nd edition fluff from Codex Chaos in one of the Noise Marine supplements and it was pulling around 35 kph off road (rather rocky terrain at that.)

Like most things it's entirely interpretive. And this include the diagrams and artwork. For example, do we say the Russ is equipped with a 120mm smoothbore and carries 36-40 rounds of ammo, or is it actually equipped with a small sawed off battleship cannon loaded by MicroOgryn and the ammo is stored in hammerspace?

You could even argue there are two 'kinds' of Russes, the visual one (which might be built by worlds/cultures more towards a WW1 aesthetic) and what others build (and is generally more sane even if it probably doesn't approach WW2 standards.)

The joys of variable fluff mean you don't have to worry about ABSOLUTE TRUTHS in your fiction and you can adapt it to whatever you best find sensible (or however gakky you want it, especially if you happen to hate the Guard/Imperium/etc.)

 EmpNortonII wrote:
Yes. The vast majority of both AdMech scientists/engineers and Imperial generals are complete idiots.

Everyone in 40K are technically 'idiots' if we use a real life metric. For all sorts of reasons (vehicle design, doctrine, use of equipment, etc.)

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Yes. The vast majority of both AdMech scientists/engineers and Imperial generals are complete idiots.

No, they are actually quite competent considering the situation they are in.

Connor MacLeod wrote:

 Keep wrote:
Forgeworld cutaway shows that it has a suspension.
There are better tank models and suspension, clearly, but its still an improvement over WW1. And it only goes 35kph topspeed on roads.

It's pulled much higher speeds in recent fluff and some of the otehr novels. Like they recycled 2nd edition fluff from Codex Chaos in one of the Noise Marine supplements and it was pulling around 35 kph off road (rather rocky terrain at that.)

You can also drive other tanks with their on road speed across difficult terrain. Except not for long. The reason why they don't go full speed offroad is because of damage and passenger comfort. You will automatically slow down if it gets too rough. Just because there is no paved road doesnt mean you are "off road".
It has to have suspension to achieve higher speeds then walking speed otherwise every bump is like driving with a bike against a brick wall.

We are always looking for ways to improve tanks and their design, regardless of our thoughts of superiority.

That's the difference to 40k. In 40k innovation is looked down upon.

 Keep wrote:
You can also drive other tanks with their on road speed across difficult terrain. Except not for long. The reason why they don't go full speed offroad is because of damage and passenger comfort. You will automatically slow down if it gets too rough. Just because there is no paved road doesnt mean you are "off road".
It has to have suspension to achieve higher speeds then walking speed otherwise every bump is like driving with a bike against a brick wall.

Suspension is variable like everything else. THere is the Honour Guard quote for example:

Honour Guard wrote:The Conqueror's time-honoured torsion-bar suspension systems and high power to weight ratio meant they were more nimble than most of the adversaries they encountered, whether super-heavy monsters or lacklustre mediums like the ones the Infardi were fielding.

Or that old WD article that covered the Armoured company rules and the good old '120mm smoothbore' a small child could hide inside. There's also the old Inferno! Demolisher you can see glimpses of the suspension, and also the 'not-quite sponsons'. I especially loved the fact it used Russian composite armor and also has secondary plasma cannons in the triple digit GJ range (thats how many joules the therms work out to lmao) Oh and the autoloader.

So yeah, like most 40K 'evidence' its entirely variable due to the agglomeration of years.

That's the difference to 40k. In 40k innovation is looked down upon.

When you have factions who want to innovate opposed by factions who hate to innovate and then people generally not sharing their goodies because they don't trust each other (even amongst the AdMech) you're not likely to get any sort of standardized progress. But it still does happen (it happened even more in earlier fluff, like with the Chimera and its variants, and its origins around 2nd edition) else where did Hellfire rounds come from?

 Keep wrote:

We are always looking for ways to improve tanks and their design, regardless of our thoughts of superiority.

That's the difference to 40k. In 40k innovation is looked down upon.

I'm right there with you on that one. I understand that in-universe it's seen as the pinnacle on Battle Tank design, and used to great effect.

Out of universe however, I understand that it's actually not, and a very poor example of a battle tank. That's the separation I'm trying to highlight. That in our world, the thing is terrible.

I feel like my position has been muddled a little bit, so here's the jist of what I'm saying:

40K Leman Russ = workhorse of the Imperium and great battle tank

Reality Leman Russ = Horrible tank design

The OP came off to me as trying to claim that it was both in universe a great tank (again, I agree with), AND in our world a great tank (where I disagree).

Plus, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to use the expertise I have in the field. Dakka is full of people who are economists, managers, philosophers, etc. It's not often I get to sound smart

People's definition of 'great' tends to be highyl variable and subjective to what they think is 'true'. If you ever venture into any of the hard scifi communities try asking them what they think 'hard' scifi is (which varies from 'only a few decades/centuries from now' to 'hard as long as it doesn't have FTL and forehead aliens. Especially if it has RKVs')

40K itself is the greatest example of how subjective opinion can be with the way the different factions (and their fans) regard themselves and others.

 Ignatius wrote:



40K Leman Russ = workhorse of the Imperium and great battle tank

Reality Leman Russ = Horrible tank design


Plus, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to use the expertise I have in the field. Dakka is full of people who are economists, managers, philosophers, etc. It's not often I get to sound smart

It's mediocre, at best. It's the Sherman of 40k. Its only virtues are that it is cheap to make and an idiot can operate it.

No one in their right mind would choose to crew it over the Hammerhead or Fire Prism.

It compares pretty well to the Predator, though...

Eldar and Tau vehicles are pretty stupid as well. Lightly armored, and the antigrav means they will have an even higher line of sight elevation than a ground vehicle. And the Tau one doesn't even have the Eldar's excuse of high speed.

Let's not forget the Tau forgetting they have railguns and drones and netowrking and the indirect-fire capability they have (heck, they have NO tube artillery of any kind, which is a pretty big drawback from modern forces. There's a reason why we haven't gone with everything missiles, after all.)

The Eldar really aren't much better, given some of their artillery is silly like that monofilament nonsense.

If realism is your metric, anything modern will pretty much stomp anything 40K, and the tech difference really isn't significant enough to make a difference against the differences in doctrine and competence.

I think that a lot of people are taking the Leman Russ the wrong way.

The Imperium is a vast place, full of different cultures and people. Including people of different technological advancement.

Say you are Tank Commander Tankus Commanderus of the 678th Otathan Regiment of tank. Under your command you have the Leman Russ Battle Tank 'Fluffy'. You and fluffy have been together since she left the factories in Otathan Prime, but now it is time for the 678th Otathan Regiment to head out into battle, against some Chaos scum in the far east of the Galaxy.

You and Fluffy arrive safely arrive on the contested world of Scrabthrax, and are soon sent into battle south of Scrabthrax beta. During this battle, there is no dedicated anti-tank support, so the Tech Priests attach a pair of lascannons onto Fluffy so that she can provide anti-tank against the Chaos forces.

You succeed in the battle and Fluffy heads back into the depot for repairs, part of her transmission system has been destroyed by a lucky Chaos missile launcher. However, the mechanics back at the shop are not from Otathan, instead they are from the world Garvil VI, it's a more backwards planet, barely achieving a level of technology equal to that of inter-war Earth. However, Fluffy is so simply designed, that they are able to repair the tranmission and send her back into battle.

Next battle takes place in an urban enviroment, and Emperor be praised, there is a squadron of Vanquisher tanks giving anti-tank cover. So they replace Fluffy's lascannons with heavy flamers.

During the battle , your driver is struck by a piece of shrapnel and is declared unfit for battle. Due to a mix up in command there are no replacement Otathanian drivers available, the replacement driver comes from another planet, called Martius. Despite the fact that Martius is in Segmentum Solar, and Otathan is in Segmentum Obsurous, he knows exactly how to drive Fluffy, because the Leman Russ is built exactly the same.

I think that is why the Leman Russ is as simple as it is, an Otathanian tank crew with a Martius driver with parts from Nax XIII assembled with Garvil VI mechanic is still going to work.

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:



40K Leman Russ = workhorse of the Imperium and great battle tank

Reality Leman Russ = Horrible tank design


Plus, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to use the expertise I have in the field. Dakka is full of people who are economists, managers, philosophers, etc. It's not often I get to sound smart

It's mediocre, at best. It's the Sherman of 40k. Its only virtues are that it is cheap to make and an idiot can operate it.

No one in their right mind would pick to operate it over the Hammerhead or Fire Prism.

It compares pretty well to the Predator, though...

Imperial Guard was my first army and still near and dear to me so I may have over estimated its place in the universe a bit

But I am not at all qualified to comment on the filthy xenos tanks however.

See, this thread is going to follow a single predictable pattern, because there is this assumption there is a binary either or dynamic. Either its all good, or all bad. Even though reality doesn't really work that way even at the best of times (people try to pretend it isn't.)

I mean go into any military history forum and ask whether Soviet or NATO tanks are better in the cold war era. Or whose doctrine was superior. I've seen enough debates like that to know they'll go pretty much the same way any 'Imperium vs Alien' argument on here would go. 40K isn't about absolutes, and if you try to force it into that paradigm the debate will go nowhere. And I'm willing to bet this topic has been discussed heaps of times before over many, many years with no satisfactory conclusion.

 welshhoppo wrote:
I think that a lot of people are taking the Leman Russ the wrong way.

The Imperium is a vast place, full of different cultures and people. Including people of different technological advancement.

Say you are Tank Commander Tankus Commanderus of the 678th Otathan Regiment of tank. Under your command you have the Leman Russ Battle Tank 'Fluffy'. You and fluffy have been together since she left the factories in Otathan Prime, but now it is time for the 678th Otathan Regiment to head out into battle, against some Chaos scum in the far east of the Galaxy.

You and Fluffy arrive safely arrive on the contested world of Scrabthrax, and are soon sent into battle south of Scrabthrax beta. During this battle, there is no dedicated anti-tank support, so the Tech Priests attach a pair of lascannons onto Fluffy so that she can provide anti-tank against the Chaos forces.

You succeed in the battle and Fluffy heads back into the depot for repairs, part of her transmission system has been destroyed by a lucky Chaos missile launcher. However, the mechanics back at the shop are not from Otathan, instead they are from the world Garvil VI, it's a more backwards planet, barely achieving a level of technology equal to that of inter-war Earth. However, Fluffy is so simply designed, that they are able to repair the tranmission and send her back into battle.

Next battle takes place in an urban enviroment, and Emperor be praised, there is a squadron of Vanquisher tanks giving anti-tank cover. So they replace Fluffy's lascannons with heavy flamers.

During the battle , your driver is struck by a piece of shrapnel and is declared unfit for battle. Due to a mix up in command there are no replacement Otathanian drivers available, the replacement driver comes from another planet, called Martius. Despite the fact that Martius is in Segmentum Solar, and Otathan is in Segmentum Obsurous, he knows exactly how to drive Fluffy, because the Leman Russ is built exactly the same.

I think that is why the Leman Russ is as simple as it is, an Otathanian tank crew with a Martius driver with parts from Nax XIII assembled with Garvil VI mechanic is still going to work.

Sure, all that.

But what does it have to do with the actual design of the tank? I get the standardization of the equipment and everything, but why does it have flat, tall sides? Why does it lack suspension in any meaningful form? Why does it lack sloped armor that deflects a round to a place where it won't cause even more damage? Why does it lack rear armor? For what purpose does it have sponsons (terrible idea really)? Why is it so darn big? There are tons of problems with it design wise that makes zero sense.

Why can't there be a standard tank design that is actually a GOOD one?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Connor MacLeod wrote:
See, this thread is going to follow a single predictable pattern, because there is this assumption there is a binary either or dynamic. Either its all good, or all bad. Even though reality doesn't really work that way even at the best of times (people try to pretend it isn't.)

I mean go into any military history forum and ask whether Soviet or NATO tanks are better in the cold war era. Or whose doctrine was superior. I've seen enough debates like that to know they'll go pretty much the same way any 'Imperium vs Alien' argument on here would go. 40K isn't about absolutes, and if you try to force it into that paradigm the debate will go nowhere. And I'm willing to bet this topic has been discussed heaps of times before over many, many years with no satisfactory conclusion.

Why bother with anything? Just because it's been debated before doesn't mean we can't. That sounds terribly nihilistic.

Connor MacLeod wrote:


I mean go into any military history forum and ask whether Soviet or NATO tanks are better in the cold war era. Or whose doctrine was superior.

Unlike the Imperium, NATO and the Soviets created new tank designs on a regular basis. They advanced in technology.

... it's also part of the setting that they're losing territory overall and that the AdMech is so tradition-bound that innovation takes thousands of years, if it happens at all.

 Ignatius wrote:

 welshhoppo wrote:
I think that a lot of people are taking the Leman Russ the wrong way.

The Imperium is a vast place, full of different cultures and people. Including people of different technological advancement.

Say you are Tank Commander Tankus Commanderus of the 678th Otathan Regiment of tank. Under your command you have the Leman Russ Battle Tank 'Fluffy'. You and fluffy have been together since she left the factories in Otathan Prime, but now it is time for the 678th Otathan Regiment to head out into battle, against some Chaos scum in the far east of the Galaxy.

You and Fluffy arrive safely arrive on the contested world of Scrabthrax, and are soon sent into battle south of Scrabthrax beta. During this battle, there is no dedicated anti-tank support, so the Tech Priests attach a pair of lascannons onto Fluffy so that she can provide anti-tank against the Chaos forces.

You succeed in the battle and Fluffy heads back into the depot for repairs, part of her transmission system has been destroyed by a lucky Chaos missile launcher. However, the mechanics back at the shop are not from Otathan, instead they are from the world Garvil VI, it's a more backwards planet, barely achieving a level of technology equal to that of inter-war Earth. However, Fluffy is so simply designed, that they are able to repair the tranmission and send her back into battle.

Next battle takes place in an urban enviroment, and Emperor be praised, there is a squadron of Vanquisher tanks giving anti-tank cover. So they replace Fluffy's lascannons with heavy flamers.

During the battle , your driver is struck by a piece of shrapnel and is declared unfit for battle. Due to a mix up in command there are no replacement Otathanian drivers available, the replacement driver comes from another planet, called Martius. Despite the fact that Martius is in Segmentum Solar, and Otathan is in Segmentum Obsurous, he knows exactly how to drive Fluffy, because the Leman Russ is built exactly the same.

I think that is why the Leman Russ is as simple as it is, an Otathanian tank crew with a Martius driver with parts from Nax XIII assembled with Garvil VI mechanic is still going to work.

Sure, all that.

But what does it have to do with the actual design of the tank? I get the standardization of the equipment and everything, but why does it have flat, tall sides? Why does it lack suspension in any meaningful form? Why does it lack sloped armor that deflects a round to a place where it won't cause even more damage? Why does it lack rear armor? For what purpose does it have sponsons (terrible idea really)? Why is it so darn big? There are tons of problems with it design wise that makes zero sense.

Why can't there be a standard tank design that is actually a GOOD one?

I imagine that it has more to do with the type of opponents that the Imperium tends to face en masse, the followers of Chaos, who use similar equipment, or Orks, who use crude technology. It is a terribly designed tank, but I think the problem with designing a new one is down to the size of the Imperium. A new-variant of a Leman Russ might break down on a planet where they use the old one, so they new one can'y be repaired. Plus, even modern day tanks love to break down an awful lot.

 EmpNortonII wrote:
Unlike the Imperium, NATO and the Soviets created new tank designs on a regular basis. They advanced in technology.

And how long have the Tau been using the hammerhead? Or the Eldar their tanks? How does this change my point about 'from a realism standpoint everyone in 40K is a complete moron?'

... it's also part of the setting that they're losing territory overall and that the AdMech is so tradition-bound that innovation takes thousands of years, if it happens at all.

Alot of things are 'part of the setting' depending on which fluff you're referring to. Its sort of all about interpretation. Trying to insist that there is one truth is pretty silly in a setting that has tried to do the exact opposite for literally years now.

 Ignatius wrote:
Why bother with anything? Just because it's been debated before doesn't mean we can't. That sounds terribly nihilistic.

For amusement. Because you want to be right. Because you have a 'point' to prove. Lots of reasons I can imagine depending on the kind of person you are. I enjoy an interesting technical discussion and learning new stuff about science and technology and all that techno-fetishist stuff. I have sort of lost my taste for dogmatic MY TRUTH AND NO OTHER type stuff that characterizes alot of factional-oriented debates, especially since its largely interpretation anyhow. And lot's of threads like this tend to become factionalized because it involves people's likes or dislikes and then you get people badmouthing one faction or another (if its not going to be the Imperium or some facet of it, it will be the Tau. Or the Eldar, or some other faction.)

I mean you can debate stuff without it becoming about one side winning, or being better than the other, or having it otherwise binary. 40K isn't terribly binary anyhow (it would be rather boring if it was.)

Connor MacLeod wrote:

 Keep wrote:
You can also drive other tanks with their on road speed across difficult terrain. Except not for long. The reason why they don't go full speed offroad is because of damage and passenger comfort. You will automatically slow down if it gets too rough. Just because there is no paved road doesnt mean you are "off road".
It has to have suspension to achieve higher speeds then walking speed otherwise every bump is like driving with a bike against a brick wall.

Suspension is variable like everything else. THere is the Honour Guard quote for example:

I know that the conqueror supposedly has torsion bars. I haven't seen a Leman Russ description that says it has no suspension which mr wyzilla here was claiming.

Connor MacLeod wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:
Unlike the Imperium, NATO and the Soviets created new tank designs on a regular basis. They advanced in technology.

And how long have the Tau been using the hammerhead? Or the Eldar their tanks? How does this change my point about 'from a realism standpoint everyone in 40K is a complete moron?'

A complete lack of innovation is fine when nothing is better than what you have.

Connor MacLeod wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:
Why bother with anything? Just because it's been debated before doesn't mean we can't. That sounds terribly nihilistic.

For amusement. Because you want to be right. Because you have a 'point' to prove. Lots of reasons I can imagine depending on the kind of person you are. I enjoy an interesting technical discussion and learning new stuff about science and technology and all that techno-fetishist stuff. I have sort of lost my taste for dogmatic MY TRUTH AND NO OTHER type stuff that characterizes alot of factional-oriented debates, especially since its largely interpretation anyhow. And lot's of threads like this tend to become factionalized because it involves people's likes or dislikes and then you get people badmouthing one faction or another (if its not going to be the Imperium or some facet of it, it will be the Tau. Or the Eldar, or some other faction.)

I mean you can debate stuff without it becoming about one side winning, or being better than the other, or having it otherwise binary. 40K isn't terribly binary anyhow (it would be rather boring if it was.)

Wait so you do want to have a discussion? I'm confused now. Your last comment just seemed like you didn't want to have this discussion.

I'm just following the typical debate format, where one side makes a statement, and waits for the other to refute it.

But I'm with you on the whole "everyone in 40k is a moron thing when it comes to this kind of thing".

Hm. I regret not changing my LR tracks to be like a shermans

Connor MacLeod wrote:

 Keep wrote:
Forgeworld cutaway shows that it has a suspension.
There are better tank models and suspension, clearly, but its still an improvement over WW1. And it only goes 35kph topspeed on roads.

It's pulled much higher speeds in recent fluff and some of the otehr novels. Like they recycled 2nd edition fluff from Codex Chaos in one of the Noise Marine supplements and it was pulling around 35 kph off road (rather rocky terrain at that.)

It probably has speed limiters just like M1 Abrams.

 Ignatius wrote:
I agree that it fits the gritty trench warfare style the Imperial Guard are remembered for. However, there seems to be just as many stories about Imperial Guardsmen storming across fields and using modern war tactics as there is about the Trench warfare style. The Leman Russ is terriblly designed for anything but this trench system, which even then it isn't very well adapted for.

And sure, I've got pretty extensive knowledge about this sort of thing, but it's something that has been acquired through a few short years spending time dealing with these things. Our knowledge has come about collectively from just about exactly 100 years of using tanks. I struggle to believe that the Imperium would stick to their first design even after thousands of years of using the Leman Russ, but then again, maybe that's the point. We are always looking for ways to improve tanks and their design, regardless of our thoughts of superiority.

The Imperium doesn't design tanks it digs out ancient STCs plans. Leman Russ and Malcador are heavy infantry tanks. Imperial Guard is stuck with Leman Russ as "battle tank" because it lost access to Predator which is a tank for doing manoeuvre warfare and to Land Raider heavy IFV.

In the dark age of technology you'd have Predator and Land Raider for manoeuvre warfare and Leman Russ for when you get bogged down in a war with millions of greenskins. All of them used by ordinary humans, not Marines.
During Horus Heresy, large part of advanced facilities manufacturing Predators and Land Raiders was lost and Space Marines got exclusive right to them. Imperial Army had to regress to using Malcador and later Leman Russ as their only tanks.

 Ignatius wrote:
I'm right there with you on that one. I understand that in-universe it's seen as the pinnacle on Battle Tank design, and used to great effect.

Out of universe however, I understand that it's actually not, and a very poor example of a battle tank. That's the separation I'm trying to highlight. That in our world, the thing is terrible.

I feel like my position has been muddled a little bit, so here's the jist of what I'm saying:

40K Leman Russ = workhorse of the Imperium and great battle tank

Reality Leman Russ = Horrible tank design

The OP came off to me as trying to claim that it was both in universe a great tank (again, I agree with), AND in our world a great tank (where I disagree).

I mean that it's a decent tank design for what it was designed to do.

 Ignatius wrote:
Sure, all that.

But what does it have to do with the actual design of the tank? I get the standardization of the equipment and everything, but why does it have flat, tall sides? Why does it lack suspension in any meaningful form? Why does it lack sloped armor that deflects a round to a place where it won't cause even more damage? Why does it lack rear armor? For what purpose does it have sponsons (terrible idea really)? Why is it so darn big? There are tons of problems with it design wise that makes zero sense.

Why can't there be a standard tank design that is actually a GOOD one?

Because it was designed for fighting the most common enemy in the Wh40k setting - a horde of hyper-aggressive giant subhumans armed with inferior weapons, driving ramshackle vehicles. Sponsons are for providing multiple sources of fire from a single tank. A reasonable thing when one is massively outnumbered by a hyper-aggressive enemy.
If Predator's thin but fancy armour was enough to allow massive victories against orks, Leman Russ'es thick but flat armour was also enough. I suspect that being very big may somehow help fighting an opponent that likes melee fighting.

The springs in that image are a part of suspension:


"This armour is thickest on the tank's front, with decreasing thickness along the sides and rear, to prevent the engine from overheating or over-straining of the transmission."
I don't know how much the thickness of the rear armour decreases. Possibly no more than in real life tanks. I doubt it doesn't have rear armour.

I think it's quite reasonable to use this:


When living in a galaxy where most common life form is this:

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:



40K Leman Russ = workhorse of the Imperium and great battle tank

Reality Leman Russ = Horrible tank design


Plus, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to use the expertise I have in the field. Dakka is full of people who are economists, managers, philosophers, etc. It's not often I get to sound smart

It's mediocre, at best. It's the Sherman of 40k. Its only virtues are that it is cheap to make and an idiot can operate it.

No one in their right mind would choose to crew it over the Hammerhead or Fire Prism.

It compares pretty well to the Predator, though...

Contrary to the bs hype the History Channel gives to German tanks, Shermans were actually pretty damn good and at least to my knowledge, extremely hard to penn the front armor until you get to the crazy later tanks. But it was exceptionally good for its time.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:

Connor MacLeod wrote:

 Keep wrote:
Forgeworld cutaway shows that it has a suspension.
There are better tank models and suspension, clearly, but its still an improvement over WW1. And it only goes 35kph topspeed on roads.

It's pulled much higher speeds in recent fluff and some of the otehr novels. Like they recycled 2nd edition fluff from Codex Chaos in one of the Noise Marine supplements and it was pulling around 35 kph off road (rather rocky terrain at that.)

It probably has speed limiters just like M1 Abrams.

 Ignatius wrote:
I agree that it fits the gritty trench warfare style the Imperial Guard are remembered for. However, there seems to be just as many stories about Imperial Guardsmen storming across fields and using modern war tactics as there is about the Trench warfare style. The Leman Russ is terriblly designed for anything but this trench system, which even then it isn't very well adapted for.

And sure, I've got pretty extensive knowledge about this sort of thing, but it's something that has been acquired through a few short years spending time dealing with these things. Our knowledge has come about collectively from just about exactly 100 years of using tanks. I struggle to believe that the Imperium would stick to their first design even after thousands of years of using the Leman Russ, but then again, maybe that's the point. We are always looking for ways to improve tanks and their design, regardless of our thoughts of superiority.

The Imperium doesn't design tanks it digs out ancient STCs plans. Leman Russ and Malcador are heavy infantry tanks. Imperial Guard is stuck with Leman Russ as "battle tank" because it lost access to Predator which is a tank for doing manoeuvre warfare and to Land Raider heavy IFV.

In the dark age of technology you'd have Predator and Land Raider for manoeuvre warfare and Leman Russ for when you get bogged down in a war with millions of greenskins. All of them used by ordinary humans, not Marines.
During Horus Heresy, large part of advanced facilities manufacturing Predators and Land Raiders was lost and Space Marines got exclusive right to them. Imperial Army had to regress to using Malcador and later Leman Russ as their only tanks.

 Ignatius wrote:
I'm right there with you on that one. I understand that in-universe it's seen as the pinnacle on Battle Tank design, and used to great effect.

Out of universe however, I understand that it's actually not, and a very poor example of a battle tank. That's the separation I'm trying to highlight. That in our world, the thing is terrible.

I feel like my position has been muddled a little bit, so here's the jist of what I'm saying:

40K Leman Russ = workhorse of the Imperium and great battle tank

Reality Leman Russ = Horrible tank design

The OP came off to me as trying to claim that it was both in universe a great tank (again, I agree with), AND in our world a great tank (where I disagree).

I mean that it's a decent tank design for what it was designed to do.

 Ignatius wrote:
Sure, all that.

But what does it have to do with the actual design of the tank? I get the standardization of the equipment and everything, but why does it have flat, tall sides? Why does it lack suspension in any meaningful form? Why does it lack sloped armor that deflects a round to a place where it won't cause even more damage? Why does it lack rear armor? For what purpose does it have sponsons (terrible idea really)? Why is it so darn big? There are tons of problems with it design wise that makes zero sense.

Why can't there be a standard tank design that is actually a GOOD one?

Because it was designed for fighting the most common enemy in the Wh40k setting - a horde of hyper-aggressive giant subhumans armed with inferior weapons, driving ramshackle vehicles. Sponsons are for providing multiple sources of fire from a single tank. A reasonable thing when one is massively outnumbered by a hyper-aggressive enemy.
If Predator's thin but fancy armour was enough to allow massive victories against orks, Leman Russ'es thick but flat armour was also enough. I suspect that being very big may somehow help fighting an opponent that likes melee fighting.

The springs in that image are a part of suspension:

Spoiler:

"This armour is thickest on the tank's front, with decreasing thickness along the sides and rear, to prevent the engine from overheating or over-straining of the transmission."
I don't know how much the thickness of the rear armour decreases. Possibly no more than in real life tanks. I doubt it doesn't have rear armour.

I think it's quite reasonable to use this:

Spoiler:

When living in a galaxy where most common life form is this:

Spoiler:

Sponsons are moronic because they weaken the flank armor and make it extremely easy for enemy armor or AT weapons to penn the sides. The only time when sponsons make "sense" is when they aren't sponsons, they're just remote controlled turrets stuck on the side of the tank, like a pintle mounted browning with the ammunition stored outside. Thus it's just bolted onto the flank armor rather than you gutting the flank armor to fit the sponson, which is an armored hole leading to the belly of the tank. You don't mount sponons to deal with massed infantry threats like Orks, that's what the infantry escort is there to do. You don't stick heavy bolters or lascannons on the flanks of the Leman Russ, you hand those to the Guardsmen squads serving as the infantry escort. If infantry is still a problem, then you just load cannister shells and turn the charging Orks into a giant pulpy mass of green goo.

Also, you have a terrible understanding of Orks if you think they're mindless brutes who zergrush the enemy with zero tactics in an all-or-nothing charge. Orks practice combined arms, just like the Imperium, and assault with massive armor columns, infantry, scouts, mechanized infantry, and fly air support constantly. There is zero reason for the Leman Russ to exist besides rule of cool and GW not having a damned clue as to what a good tank would look like. Even the Eldar and Tau, who have fantastic vehicles in terms of mobility and armament, stiff suffer from idiodic design at times. Like putting a cockpit on your tank that's exposed to enemy fire.

Tau are bit better, but their armor is certainly built like a glass cannon looking at those engines.

The Sherman was a solid tank up to the point it met a Panther or Tiger. But considering the workhorse tank of the Nazis was the Pz. IV series, meeting Panthers and Tigers weren't as nearly as common as films like to make it seem.

And the Sherman did pretty well again the Pz. IV series with them being fairly on par with one another.

That aside, it is still a pretty crummy design and any no reasonable amount of RH steel you slap (i.e. To the max amount its frame and engine and treads can take) onto it, the likes of HEAT and SABOT are still going to give it a bad day with that lack of slope.

And about "super metals/composites" the M1 Abram's composite armor ranges between ~20-50 mm (I haven't looked at the stats all too recently so I could be off by a bit) but is equivalent to 600mm RHA.

If i ever get my hands on a leman Russ, I'll probably convert it into something similar to the ARL 44. For me, that's a much more tolerable design.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
I mean that it's a decent tank design for what it was designed to do.

No it isn't. It's an utterly terrible tank that only "works" because of the sheer quantity of them the IG can throw at an enemy. It has major design flaws that even a WWI-era tank designer would recognize as unbelievably stupid, and only continues to exist in its current state because the Imperium is limited to cargo-cult "engineering" and blindly following what their religious texts tell them to do.

And no, the most common enemy being orks doesn't change this problem. Even if the LRBT is slightly less awful than some ork tank design the LRBT still sucks. It just gets away with sucking because the enemy is even worse. A properly-designed tank would still work much better in that situation.

The springs in that image are a part of suspension:

And the point is that they don't work. The tracks are narrower than the side armor plates, and if the "suspension" springs compress more than an inch or so the metal plates adjacent to the tracks will touch the ground. On hard surfaces the constant scraping will slow the tank down, on anything less than a high-quality paved road it will dig in and immobilize itself almost immediately. The LRBT's "suspension" is actually worse than having no suspension at all because it adds weight and complexity without providing any benefit.


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 Wyzilla wrote:
Tau are bit better, but their armor is certainly built like a glass cannon looking at those engines.

To be fair, a Hammerhead is more like a helicopter gunship than a modern tank, and aircraft almost inevitably have exposed engine bits to shoot at. In a "real" battle, unlike on the tabletop, it should use helicopter-style tactics like hiding behind a hill and only popping up for a few seconds to railgun a target. And in that kind of fight tank-level armor on most of its hull should more than offset having slightly larger engine intakes than a real-world helicopter.

 Wyzilla wrote:
Sponsons are moronic because they weaken the flank armor and make it extremely easy for enemy armor or AT weapons to penn the sides. The only time when sponsons make "sense" is when they aren't sponsons, they're just remote controlled turrets stuck on the side of the tank, like a pintle mounted browning with the ammunition stored outside. Thus it's just bolted onto the flank armor rather than you gutting the flank armor to fit the sponson, which is an armored hole leading to the belly of the tank.

Original Leman Russ from space Marine looked more like a remotely controlled external turret. The old Demolisher cutout that I posted seems to have them as remotely operated weapon stations with the operators sitting inside. Currently the sponson is mounted over second access hatch. I don't think they actually cut it out.

 Wyzilla wrote:
You don't mount sponons to deal with massed infantry threats like Orks, that's what the infantry escort is there to do. You don't stick heavy bolters or lascannons on the flanks of the Leman Russ, you hand those to the Guardsmen squads serving as the infantry escort. If infantry is still a problem, then you just load cannister shells and turn the charging Orks into a giant pulpy mass of green goo.

Infantry would probably get suppressed due to the amount of dakka Orks pack.

 Ignatius wrote:
Also, you have a terrible understanding of Orks if you think they're mindless brutes who zergrush the enemy with zero tactics in an all-or-nothing charge. Orks practice combined arms, just like the Imperium, and assault with massive armor columns, infantry, scouts, mechanized infantry, and fly air support constantly.

That's 40k. I'm talking about the times when STC were designed - the Dark Age of Technology. According to Predator fluff, back then Orks were much weaker technologically and more mindlessly aggressive.

 Ignatius wrote:
Even the Eldar and Tau, who have fantastic vehicles in terms of mobility and armament, stiff suffer from idiodic design at times. Like putting a cockpit on your tank that's exposed to enemy fire.

Tau are bit better, but their armor is certainly built like a glass cannon looking at those engines.

I think the basic problem with Eldar and Tau vehicles is that in tabletop game they can't really use their mobility. They are built more like helicopters or planes than tanks. It suggests that they should do pop-up or high speed hit and run attacks.

People seem to think of WW1 designs as terrible... They serve their purpose better than a Russ would (Russ however has Space magic on his side).

The WW1 tanks legitimately had nearly nothing that could appose it. Infantry had to resort to using ditches and flame throwers to halt Tanks. Tanks eventually carried mini bridges on their backs to counter this. The first turret tanks also came in WW1.



What makes the Leman Russ design silly (beyond the fact that its space magic, from the materials to the engine, and to the weaponry) is the shape. With such a large silhouette it presents a large target, with little for it to hide behind.

Its gun looks very low velocity and likely would be used to lob shells. It carries too much weaponry to be useful (assuming at full loadout) means the commander will have a hard time directing and commanding his tank.

The commander is further impeded by the fact he appears to be the one firing and loading the gun, as the turret clearly only has him in it. This means he is trying to do many many jobs, resulting in poor combat showings.

The exposed tracks is also not ideal.

7 Crew at max would make this vehicle very, very cramped. Many crew would die as a result, since bailing from the vehicle is not possible for most crew (but its the imperium...) and replacing a lost crew member (as rare as that will be) would result even less combat efficiency than we already have.

The shape of the tank, is also not ideal.

I guess we have no real comment on the weapons, the materials and engine since its all space magic, but what we can say for sure is that they are most definitely not put to good use.

Its a pity though, I dont know about any one else, but to me the Imperial Tanks look more like a cartoon than anything worth being a tank. (same for all the tanks in 40k... except being alien gives them a pass).

On the plus side, the space magic gives them a huge edge. How many times have armored thrusts had to lose momentum because of a lack of fuel? Many I can recall. Logistics through the use of Space magic gives the Imperial Guard a lot of edge, but like the leman russ, its not used very efficiently, which makes the space magic end up being very negligible to its overall design.

Overall, I think the mighty Bob Semple tank of New Zealand is one of the few tanks that appears to be worse than the Leman Russ. Which doesnt say a lot for the russ.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
I mean that it's a decent tank design for what it was designed to do.

No it isn't. It's an utterly terrible tank that only "works" because of the sheer quantity of them the IG can throw at an enemy. It has major design flaws that even a WWI-era tank designer would recognize as unbelievably stupid, and only continues to exist in its current state because the Imperium is limited to cargo-cult "engineering" and blindly following what their religious texts tell them to do.

And no, the most common enemy being orks doesn't change this problem. Even if the LRBT is slightly less awful than some ork tank design the LRBT still sucks. It just gets away with sucking because the enemy is even worse. A properly-designed tank would still work much better in that situation.

The thing is that Leman Russ is a high tech version of an Interwar heavy infantry tank design. The difference is that instead of being challenged by WWII Germans, the correctness of the design was confirmed by Orks which were on lower tech level.
Also, I think that a WWI-era tank designer would be amazed by its reliability, ability to accept various fuel types, life-support, electronic devices, weapons, etc.

That said, in 41st millennium it's an outdated design. The Imperium lost ability to anything about it, though. They can't design a new tank and they can't bring Predators and Land Raiders back to the Guard. Personally, I think it's more of a PDF-level tank that due to unfortunate circumstances ended up in Guard than a proper Guard tank.

 Swastakowey wrote:
People seem to think of WW1 designs as terrible... They serve their purpose better than a Russ would (Russ however has Space magic on his side).

The WW1 tanks legitimately had nearly nothing that could appose it. Infantry had to resort to using ditches and flame throwers to halt Tanks. Tanks eventually carried mini bridges on their backs to counter this. The first turret tanks also came in WW1.

My point is that Leman Russ is like it is because it was designed and initially operated in conditions similar to WW1. Predator has weaker armour and it was greatly successful against early Orks due to its near-invulnerability to Ork weapons. Masses of Leman Russ tanks would enjoy similar supremacy against the Orks when their STC design was created (and didn't need adamantium and ceramite and was easier to use for untrained personnel).

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
The thing is that Leman Russ is a high tech version of an Interwar heavy infantry tank design. The difference is that instead of being challenged by WWII Germans, the correctness of the design was confirmed by Orks which were on lower tech level.

And the other difference is that it has a suspension that doesn't function (and will inevitably result in it immobilizing itself if it goes anywhere but a high-quality paved road), a turret that can't fit its gun, etc. It's an inexcusably bad design that is clearly worse than its real-life inspiration.

Also, I think that a WWI-era tank designer would be amazed by it's reliability, ability to accept various fuel types, life-support, electronic devices, weapons, etc.

Sure, it has some nice toys attached to it, but the overall design is shamefully bad. The WWI-era designer's reaction would probably be something like "WTF, you have magic laser guns and this is the best you can do?".

That said, in 41st millennium it's an outdated design.

No, it's a non-functional design. It isn't just old and replaced by better tanks, it's hopelessly stupid and very clearly designed by people who didn't understand how tanks work. There is no point in time when the LRBT would have been a good idea.


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 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
My point is that Leman Russ is like it is because it was designed and initially operated in conditions similar to WW1.

No it isn't. The LRBT is like it is because the designer had no clue how tanks work and made a roughly tank-shaped lump of plastic. It would be a hilarious failure in WWI conditions, where it would immobilize itself in soft ground long before it got anywhere near the battle. The only way it could be even remotely useful in WWI is if you dig a hole, drop the LRBT into it with only the turret above ground, and cover it in dirt to create a fixed bunker. And even then it would probably suck compared to proper fortifications.

Masses of Leman Russ tanks would enjoy similar supremacy against the Orks when their STC design was created (and didn't need adamantium and ceramite and was easier to use for untrained personnel).

Who cares if orks sucked that much back then? Making a tank that would be laughably bad in 1915 when you have the ability to make lasers/FTL spaceships/etc is just insane. If you're capable of designing and building a lascannon then making at least a 1950s-era tank should be trivially easy. And that 1950s-era tank would have vastly better performance than the LRBT for a negligible increase (if any) in complexity and cost.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
The thing is that Leman Russ is a high tech version of an Interwar heavy infantry tank design. The difference is that instead of being challenged by WWII Germans, the correctness of the design was confirmed by Orks which were on lower tech level.

And the other difference is that it has a suspension that doesn't function (and will inevitably result in it immobilizing itself if it goes anywhere but a high-quality paved road), a turret that can't fit its gun, etc. It's an inexcusably bad design that is clearly worse than its real-life inspiration.

What would make it immobilize itself?

By the way, here is how the original Space Marine Leman Russ looked:
https://epicaddiction.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/traitor-russ/

 Swastakowey wrote:
It carries too much weaponry to be useful (assuming at full loadout) means the commander will have a hard time directing and commanding his tank.

The commander is further impeded by the fact he appears to be the one firing and loading the gun, as the turret clearly only has him in it. This means he is trying to do many many jobs, resulting in poor combat showings.
7 Crew at max would make this vehicle very, very cramped. Many crew would die as a result, since bailing from the vehicle is not possible for most crew (but its the imperium...) and replacing a lost crew member (as rare as that will be) would result even less combat efficiency than we already have.

That's what you are ssuming, but that's not true. Access hatches are on both sides and the top. A Panther Tank had 5 crew and only 2 hatches.
And as you can see, it is not super cramped - apart from inside the turret, but still manageable. And that is with using just 90% of the dimensions that somebody at GW made up from thin air.

 Keep wrote:

Mockup for real human scale, with FW (main)armor thickness and 150mm rounds (to fit the miniature model better), Ammo load like described in IA:1

Not too much space, not too cramped (remember, personal gear, other equipment and secondary ammo+ ammo for sponsons still needs to go in there)

By the way, here is how the original Space Marine Leman Russ looked:
https://epicaddiction.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/traitor-russ/

Wow, it looks better then the 40k plastic kit

 Keep wrote:

By the way, here is how the original Space Marine Leman Russ looked:
https://epicaddiction.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/traitor-russ/

Wow, it looks better then the 40k plastic kit

True. It looks both more odd and sci-fi and seems to have wide tracks. Also, the barrel is clarified to be inside the thick tube. I don't know what they were thinking when they created the plastic kit.

 EmpNortonII wrote:
A complete lack of innovation is fine when nothing is better than what you have.

So despite their phenomenal AI, technology and industry, and all that hype, they still can't do any better than field Tau and their auxiliaries in the field as line troops (even the way they fight) and can't even be bothered to make automated vehicles or weapons? A drone tank, more competently designed robot infantry, etc. would be more sensible (and put their own peoples lives at risk)

Oh and even if they DO have to risk their supposedly 'high value' Tau soldiers, there's tons of ways they could do this without directly exposing themselves to direct fire (apparently the Tau can't figure out how to use their railguns for indirect bombardment even thoguh we figured this out thousands of years ago?) Oh and we can get on the brilliance of using mecha in combat (not the most optimal designed for practical warfare no matter who uses them, but the Tau don't even have the Imperium's excuse of religious veneration. They're supposed to be dynamic and forward-thinking, remember?)

None of this actually changes my original point, anyhow. Tau are as moronic as everyone else in 40K, if we're going to play the mocking game. You can't pick on one faction without picking on the rest.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:

It probably has speed limiters just like M1 Abrams.

Possibly. I remember a reaallly old short story in like a pre-Forgeworld (as we know it) Imperial armour where the Russes had modded engines for greater speed. Probably the souped up engine modification like Salamander Scouts have. I even think the old vehicle design rules technically (barely?) allowed such for a Russ. It could just be as simple as removing speed limiters

 Keep wrote:
I know that the conqueror supposedly has torsion bars. I haven't seen a Leman Russ description that says it has no suspension which mr wyzilla here was claiming.

I don't remember it either, although he's made this claim multiple times before IIRC. It wouldn't surprise me if there WAS a Russ like that, since tech industrial levels and materials science varying mean you're going to produce a wide variety and quality of Russes even if the basic 'design' was vaguely similar (cosmetic differences.. HAH) Just like you can have steam powered Russes.

I also find the idea of feudal era societies producing steam tanks (The same way feral orks could make steam gargants a thing) perversely amusing, honestly. If I had any gripe about them it would be the seemingly limited arcs (they fan fire ahead and to the sides, but its not 180 degree arcs, which leaves a pretty big blind spot for a supposedly useful weapon.)

The 'design' or 'look' of the Russ whilst maintaining a broadly similar looking appearance almost certainly changes according to who builds it, how they build it, and what they build it for. Just like real life tanks. That's going to produce variable quality but its also a simple fact of the way things are set up. It's not like the visuals clash with the fluff as far as 'correct' goes, anyhow (Ironically the Russ is actually shorter by diagrams.. unless Imperial guardsmen as a rule are 2+m tall routinely!)

Again thats part of the problem. The assumption is that the Leman Russ must either be 'all good' or 'all bad'... because somehow being capable of being both (or having a combination of good and bad qualities, which is more likely and more 'realistic' if anything) is not possible/desirable. This is rather puzzling.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:

Original Leman Russ from space Marine looked more like a remotely controlled external turret. The old Demolisher cutout that I posted seems to have them as remotely operated weapon stations with the operators sitting inside. Currently the sponson is mounted over second access hatch. I don't think they actually cut it out.

If you look at the Inferno cutaway for the Demolisher I posted, the guns don't look anything like sponsons, they also look like remotely controlled weapons stations inside the hull. Not quite the same thing as sponsons. That doesn't mean they DON'T use sponsons on some designs of course (because they do, including on Superheavy tanks) but its more of that technicial/industrial/doctrinal inconsisteny that makes the IG so dysfunctionally varied. If they have the tech they go with remote stations (which have been a thing since 1st edition anyhow). If they don't, they use the lower tech option of sponsons (at least on some tanks. Even then not all tanks always use sponsons, its an optional thing like most attahcments/'upgrades')

How old is that Inferno cutaway?
If we compare the situation to SM Bolters who where initially said to be exclusively rocket propelled and look at it now....

But i'm definitely with you in that there are certainly tech level differences. A PDF will propably be equipped with lesser stuff then actual IG tank units.

If I had any gripe about them it would be the seemingly limited arcs (they fan fire ahead and to the sides, but its not 180 degree arcs, which leaves a pretty big blind spot for a supposedly useful weapon.

The arc is 180° to the front (90° per sponson). With sponsons you have a pretty big arc of coverage. Compare that to WW2 hull machinegunners... Leman Russ with 3x HB is definitely less prone to close infantry attack. And maximum gun depression is much higher for the sponsons then it would be for a hull mg on strongly sloped armor. So it's easier to shoot at infantry in holes or trenches

The assumption is that the Leman Russ must either be 'all good' or 'all bad'

? I think the strengths and weaknesses are pretty obvious for the Leman Russ (measured in the 40k universe, not compared to modern tanks)

It could just be as simple as removing speed limiters

Nah, it won't suddenly go 60+kph. Not with that puny engine or horsepower to weight ratio. Add to that the big track section, which will likely have alot more power losses due to increased friction.

 Keep wrote:
How old is that Inferno cutaway?
If we compare the situation to SM Bolters who where initially said to be exclusively rocket propelled and look at it now....

Late 90s I think. Not that time seems to have any difference on fluff, otherwise Necromunda, the Inquisitor RPG, Epic, or much BFG would be invalid I suspect. Not to mention a whole slew of 40K novels and other source material.

But i'm definitely with you in that there are certainly tech level differences. A PDF will propably be equipped with lesser stuff then actual IG tank units.

I suspect there's differences even in line units, the same way you get IG regiments that field rough riders (or some equivalent.) There may be tech disparities (because such extreme contrasts are also about 40K - the mind impulse unit steam tanks from IA1 for example) but it still happens. I expect there is some hilarious game of perpetual catchup in the Imperium trying to 'standardize' and only meeting with imperfect results because stuff keeps changing.

The arc is 180° to the front (90° per sponson). With sponsons you have a pretty big arc of coverage. Compare that to WW2 hull machinegunners... Leman Russ with 3x HB is definitely less prone to close infantry attack. And maximum gun depression is much higher for the sponsons then it would be for a hull mg on strongly sloped armor. So it's easier to shoot at infantry in holes or trenches.

Each 'sponson' could cover 180 or so of the sides (and rear, if they work together.) which would be more useful in its 'anti-infantry' role. Then again some may actually be like that. We're going by the visuals for what they are, and I already commented on that :d

? I think the strengths and weaknesses are pretty obvious for the Leman Russ (measured in the 40k universe, not compared to modern tanks)

I'm commenting once again on the polarization of the debate. If things were 'well there's good and bad stuff about it' it wouldn't be shaping up as an argument.

Nevermind that strength or weakness can be context dependent as well. Tanks aren't just used for shooting at other tanks (that's kinda western philosophy) they have some significant support roles too, and a tank optimized for one role may not be as good at the other (tradeoffs are just apart of any sort of systemic design. You can't have everything.)

Alternately if you design something to be a little bit good at everything (which could qualify for a Russ) its not likely to be exceptional at anything (even with advanced tech.)

Of course this assumes we're applying some measure of logic to things (at least a logic that resembles real life.) I mean if you have dropships/shuttles, missiles, computers, and all sorts of high tech stuff, it becomes much harder to have a literal WW1 STYLE WARFARE IN EVERY WAY, because the way wars are fought (including WW1) is shaped as much by the technology as the doctrine. Some bits of tech may not shape it much (EG lasguns or high tech body armor) but others WILL have a huge difference (Sensors/computers/missiles. Heck superheavy tanks and artillery that can shoot down titans shape it, because how do you defend against that short of theatre shielding which you almost certainly won't always have. Or aircraft, how do you protect yourself in trenches against those?). One could argue that such 'logic' does not apply in such debates (or apply a wholly different standard), but then alot of the comparisons made (including real world ones) would cease to matter and this thread I suspect becomes rather pointless.

Nah, it won't suddenly go 60+kph. Not with that puny engine or horsepower to weight ratio. Add to that the big track section, which will likely have alot more power losses due to increased friction.

Acceleration isn't going to be high that its going from 0-60 in 1 second no, but it culd achieve 60 kph on or even off road depending on the design. There were 2nd edition Russes that did exactly that:

Codex Chaos: page 80 wrote:The Leman Russ batlte tank rumbled along the pass, its tracks squealing in protest as the vehicle was driven at speed over the rocky terrain. The steep sides of the gorge rose up menacingly on either side, the black volcanic wlals leaving the pass in permamant shadow. Behind the battle tank came a short column of Imperial Chimeras, the armoured troop carriers multi-lasers swivelling to cover the sides of the pass in case of enemy attack.

...

"How far now?" he continued, trying to put the thought of dameons out of his head.

"Thirteen klicks, sir." the Guardsman replied, checking the instruments in front of him.

"Estimated time till arrival?"

"Eleven minutes, sir."

The battle tank was suddenly shaken by a deep, rumbling blast as a weapon was fired into the pass. Looking through the sights Rosman saw a section of the gulley wall to the right erupt. Much of that part of the gorge wall proceeded to give way, chunks of rock as big as the Leman Russ tumbling down into the pass, partially blocking the reinforcements' route.

A second blast, like a thrumming boom, rocked the tank and over the comm-link Rosman heard a cry of anguish from one of the other vehicles. The tank commander scanned the sides of the pass through the tank's sights but could see nothing. Simultaneously the cliff face behind the tank crumbled, separating the Leman Russ from the rest of the cavalcade.

Obviously not a standard by any means, but I think it does show just how variable it is (since the other end is literally slower than the forgeworld standard, at 19 km/hr and some variants even slower.) Must be some good suspension, too

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
What would make it immobilize itself?

The fact that it has an inch of ground clearance at most, and it has all of its weight concentrated on narrow tracks. If the tracks sink an inch into soft ground the side armor next to them touches the ground and starts to dig in. And then, instead of rolling across the ground on tracks, the LRBT is trying to drag itself through the mud like a boat in water.

Connor MacLeod wrote:
So despite their phenomenal AI, technology and industry, and all that hype, they still can't do any better than field Tau and their auxiliaries in the field as line troops (even the way they fight) and can't even be bothered to make automated vehicles or weapons?

This is probably one of those "the fluff only looks at the interesting stuff" cases. Nobody wants to read a story about a Tau cargo ship dumping a few million gun drones onto a planet and coming back a month later after they've killed everything. So those battles happen in the background, while the stories we get are the ones where Tau characters are involved and the gun drones are supporting them.

I don't remember it either, although he's made this claim multiple times before IIRC.

It's never explicitly stated that the LRBT has no suspension, it's just clear from every visual example of the tank that it either doesn't have one or has one that is so ridiculously ineffective that it's worse than having no suspension at all (because it adds weight and complexity with no benefit). The issue is that the tracks have nowhere to go without taking them inside the adjacent armor plates and allowing the tank's hull to touch the ground. And this is a very consistent "feature" of the tank: the model has it, the codex art has it, the FW cutaway drawing has it, etc. In fact, I can't remember ever seeing a picture of a LRBT that doesn't have this flaw.

Each 'sponson' could cover 180 or so of the sides (and rear, if they work together.) which would be more useful in its 'anti-infantry' role. Then again some may actually be like that. We're going by the visuals for what they are, and I already commented on that :d

Not if it's manned by a human gunner. You need to armor it, and if it was able to turn 180° you would need 360° of armor. That means you could only climb in from the top. And there is not a whole lot of space in that little sponson to begin with.

If you have it swivel mounted, like on a predator, then certainly. But the weapon itself isn't armored and quite vulnerable actually.

There were 2nd edition Russes that did exactly that:

That assumes that the guardsmans estimation is correct, he can calculate correctly, that local minutes are realworld minutes and that 13 klicks are still 13 kilometer. OR that the author knows what any of these are.

would be invalid I suspect

Not so much as invalid. But things in the fluff changed over the time.

I don't see how missiles, computers and jet aircraft change the fact that infantry in trenches is extremely difficult to clean out. WW1 was like it was because forces where equal, resulting in a deadlock and war of attrition. Add AA screen on both sides, add antitank weapons on both sides. And it's still a deadlock. And if there is one thing IoM is good at, its bringing in fresh meat.

 Keep wrote:
Not if it's manned by a human gunner. You need to armor it, and if it was able to turn 180° you would need 360° of armor. That means you could only climb in from the top. And there is not a whole lot of space in that little sponson to begin with.

Huh? Why would you need 360* of armor? You only need to armor the parts that are outside the hull, the 180* arc the gunner pivots through is behind the tank's hull armor and doesn't need additional protection.

I don't see how missiles, computers and jet aircraft change the fact that infantry in trenches is extremely difficult to clean out.

Because aircraft can drop napalm bombs from above and turn the trenches into an oven, carpet bomb everything so thoroughly that the trenches don't matter, etc. Or they can simply bypass the trenches entirely and land troops behind the fixed defenses. Missiles and computer-aimed artillery vastly improve the accuracy of weapons and make it a lot easier to destroy fixed fortifications and airburst shells above the trenches. And of course the ultimate change of the modern era is tactical nuclear weapons capable of wiping out vast sections of trenches along with everything inside them.

WW1 was like it was because forces where equal, resulting in a deadlock and war of attrition. Add AA screen on both sides, add antitank weapons on both sides. And it's still a deadlock. And if there is one thing IoM is good at, its bringing in fresh meat.

And then someone in orbit drops a bombardment on the whole region, ending the stalemate.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
What would make it immobilize itself?

The fact that it has an inch of ground clearance at most, and it has all of its weight concentrated on narrow tracks. If the tracks sink an inch into soft ground the side armor next to them touches the ground and starts to dig in. And then, instead of rolling across the ground on tracks, the LRBT is trying to drag itself through the mud like a boat in water.

It's annoying that they introduced these flaws when creating the 28mm version of the tank while they weren't present in the initial design.

Connor MacLeod wrote:
If you look at the Inferno cutaway for the Demolisher I posted, the guns don't look anything like sponsons, they also look like remotely controlled weapons stations inside the hull. Not quite the same thing as sponsons. That doesn't mean they DON'T use sponsons on some designs of course (because they do, including on Superheavy tanks) but its more of that technicial/industrial/doctrinal inconsisteny that makes the IG so dysfunctionally varied. If they have the tech they go with remote stations (which have been a thing since 1st edition anyhow). If they don't, they use the lower tech option of sponsons (at least on some tanks. Even then not all tanks always use sponsons, its an optional thing like most attahcments/'upgrades')

I think it's more of a question of progressing degradation of Imperial Guard by GW.
Starting out in Rogue Trader with Predators, Rhinos and Land Raiders, all of which had auto-aim and power fields, then degrading to Leman Russes with remote weapon stations and auto-loaders and finally suffering the final degradation of Gunners actually being in sponsons and manually loaded battle-cannon.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
It's annoying that they introduced these flaws when creating the 28mm version of the tank while they weren't present in the initial design.

Sure, but the original LRBT was a vaguely tank-shaped lump of metal (like all the other Epic stuff) with even worse design flaws. And it still doesn't have a functioning suspension. The only difference is that its tracks are at least wider than the side sections and able to support it properly. And really, we can't even be sure of that much because the lack of precision in the old Epic models makes it unclear whether the track width was deliberate or merely just sloppy sculpting work.

 Keep wrote:
Not if it's manned by a human gunner. You need to armor it, and if it was able to turn 180° you would need 360° of armor. That means you could only climb in from the top. And there is not a whole lot of space in that little sponson to begin with.

The stuff in the Inferno diagram isn't lierally a sponson. Its a stuck on gun mount that happens to overlay the hull, operated remotely by the gunner. And making it 180 degrees (swivelling to cover the rear half of the tank) simply means readjusting the mounting so that it doesn't have a big mass of matter sticking in the back and restricting it to a 90 degree angle. You could make a better case for the hull mounted lasguns in the Chimera being 'sponsons' because they at least have to fire out of a hole made in the hull.

That assumes that the guardsmans estimation is correct, he can calculate correctly, that local minutes are realworld minutes and that 13 klicks are still 13 kilometer. OR that the author knows what any of these are.

You can say that about literally any fluff put out by 40K, including the codexes. If we go that route, then we don't really know anything do we? Unless you have a foolproof, objective and GW approved method for sorting fact from fallacy in 40K fluff.

I don't see how missiles, computers and jet aircraft change the fact that infantry in trenches is extremely difficult to clean out. WW1 was like it was because forces where equal, resulting in a deadlock and war of attrition. Add AA screen on both sides, add antitank weapons on both sides. And it's still a deadlock. And if there is one thing IoM is good at, its bringing in fresh meat.

As noted, aircraft can drop bombs. They can use it to take out your own artillery or your forces that are hiding in a trench (That has literally no overhead protection.) They can also provide targeting data for more precise artillery bombardments. Missiles are guided munitions (EG more precision, and they don't have to be in line of sight to fire.. they can hit anything in range.) Computers help you do all that - they've massively improved the way warfare has changed by providing more information (targeting and otherwise) that enables us to do so many things and do it better.

Or even better, you now have starfighters AND STARSHIPS that can bomb stuff. From orbit. What good are trenches when your enemy has countless ways to make a colossal hole in your trench lines that the other side can use his own forces to exploit (especially if they have dropships, mechanized units, etc.)

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
I think it's more of a question of progressing degradation of Imperial Guard by GW.
Starting out in Rogue Trader with Predators, Rhinos and Land Raiders, all of which had auto-aim and power fields, then degrading to Leman Russes with remote weapon stations and auto-loaders and finally suffering the final degradation of Gunners actually being in sponsons and manually loaded battle-cannon.

I don't think the IG are 'degrading' being GW's fault. Its that we keep getting more and more data about the IG dumped on it, and this tends to cloud the issue because so many different 'views' of what it is arise. I mean they've actually regaind DEathstrikes for the last few editions, which makes them something of a quasi-pentomic army (not something that works with a ww1 doctrine. At all.) And we got the Taurox in 6th (whaver people say about how it looks its still a vehicle that MOVES.) And there were tons of other little details, like the auger arrays:

These ‘spyboxes’ feed intelligence back to command elements behind the lines. Strategic servitors compile and redistribute this data in order to refine the coordinates issued to support elements in the field.

That is DEFINITELY not WW1. Any bit of it. But its not exactly anything SPECIFIC either, because the IG by design is not meant to be any one, standardized thing, but a huge, dysfunctional mess incorporating everything that sometimes works, and sometimes doesn't, but somehow still manages to forge on.

 Peregrine wrote:
Sure, but the original LRBT was a vaguely tank-shaped lump of metal (like all the other Epic stuff) with even worse design flaws. And it still doesn't have a functioning suspension. The only difference is that its tracks are at least wider than the side sections and able to support it properly. And really, we can't even be sure of that much because the lack of precision in the old Epic models makes it unclear whether the track width was deliberate or merely just sloppy sculpting work.

Are we talking about This Epic LRBT? Not sure about the rest of that or not (I see springs at least, I think) but it does have the virtue of not having a moronically oversized (and unrealisticly proportioned) battle cannon. That seems more plausible than midget Ogryn loaders anyhow

Connor MacLeod wrote:
Are we talking about This Epic LRBT?

About the model that was linked a few posts ago, but it seems to match that picture at least as well as any of the early-era (and non-FW) Epic blobs of metal match their respective fluff.

(I see springs at least, I think)

It has springs, but they can't possibly do anything. Just look at the picture and tell me what happens if the track moves upward more than a couple inches. And then compare it to the original 40k-scale Baneblade model:



Not only does the model have suspension elements included (though not visible from the side because they're blocked by the wheels) the tracks have room to move upward without letting the tank drag along the ground.

but it does have the virtue of not having a moronically oversized (and unrealisticly proportioned) battle cannon.

I don't know, it's still pretty bad. It's a bit smaller than the battlecannon on the standard plastic kit but it looks like it scales to about the same size as the gun on the FW alternate turrets.

Huh? Why would you need 360* of armor? You only need to armor the parts that are outside the hull, the 180* arc the gunner pivots through is behind the tank's hull armor and doesn't need additional protection.

You need a hole to stick the gun through. And that hole has to move in some way. If you point it forward the backside of the thing that holds the gun shows to the rear and vice versa. Take a guess why WW1 tank sponsons looked like they did.

Because aircraft can drop napalm bombs from above and turn the trenches into an oven, carpet bomb everything so thoroughly that the trenches don't matter, etc. Or they can simply bypass the trenches entirely and land troops behind the fixed defenses.

Carpetbombing differs in the effect exactly how from an artillery barrage? Artillery can also take out enemy artillery. And if aircraft can fly over the trenches undisputed, it's not a deadlock. In an AA heavy environment they will do that little trick once or twice and that's it. Airbursting was already done in WW1...
And space ships are out of the equation, because if they send troops down somewhere they either want it intact, or they can't use them due to orbital defenses.
And ballistic missiles are not the pinpoint accurate solution you try to make them out to be. we are talking about 50m up to 3km (early scud) of mean deviation.

And of course the ultimate change of the modern era is tactical nuclear weapons capable of wiping out vast sections of trenches along with everything inside them.

IG isn't modern era. Nuking isn't an option, unless we are talking about an exterminatus. If IG would have cheap use of nuclear warheads, many landbased threats wouldnt exist anymore. That means they either don't use it, or it's not available in significant enough numbers to make a big impact.

That Baneblade picture looks like it has quite exposed wheels and tracks. Would that not make them vulnerable to enemy fire?

 Ashiraya wrote:
That Baneblade picture looks like it has quite exposed wheels and tracks. Would that not make them vulnerable to enemy fire?

It would, but virtually every real-world tank has the same problem. There's just no practical way to have both mobility and significant armor for the sides of the tracks.

 Peregrine wrote:
It has springs, but they can't possibly do anything. Just look at the picture and tell me what happens if the track moves upward more than a couple inches. And then compare it to the original 40k-scale Baneblade model:



Not only does the model have suspension elements included (though not visible from the side because they're blocked by the wheels) the tracks have room to move upward without letting the tank drag along the ground.

I'm not versed enough in the intricies of suspension enough to dispute on this or judge so.. eh. I consider it academic anyhow, since if nothing else there is the Honour Guard quote, and its already been established there's plenty of reason for ludicrous variation in the Leman Russ (like the IG as a whole.)

PS: Not trying to dimsis what you're saying as being totally irrelevant or accuse you of anything. It still applies, I just don't think it's the sole consideration/relevant evidence.

I don't know, it's still pretty bad. It's a bit smaller than the battlecannon on the standard plastic kit but it looks like it scales to about the same size as the gun on the FW alternate turrets.

Short barreled is not neccesarily itself a problem, depending on the design of the weapon and its ammunition. the M551 Sheridan had a stubby, wide calibre barrel (Same used on the M60 Patton STarship, and a slightly longer version was proposed for the MBT-70 experiment. If you want even crazier ideas, there have been rocket-assisted KE rounds, at least by some of the US tank design history books I've read, and the MBT-70 was designed to fire anti-tank ammo as well.) That said, there's no way in heck you can justify something bigger than my freaking head calibre wise (140-150mm would be bad enough because IRL they require autoloaders to work. You might be able to get around that with 40K magic, but a shell caliber rivalling naval battleship artillery for size? That's like hundreds of kilos at a minimum, envermind the volume of said shells.) If I had to take 'short barrel' vs 'unrealistically huge barrel' I'm definitely taking the former, because there's no way in hell to make the latter realistically work (if we're going to obsess about realism, of course.)

 Keep wrote:
And space ships are out of the equation, because if they send troops down somewhere they either want it intact, or they can't use them due to orbital defenses.

First, that's not true. Plenty of novels have done it (Heck, 13th Legion novel had the Last Chancers infiltrating a city shortly AFTER an orbital bombardment cremated the army in their path!) Heck it's a part of the 5th edition codex:

They [Officers of the Fleet] coordinate with the Imperial Navy bomber wings and even the lance batteries onboard warships. Whilst the full might of the Imperial Fleet cannot be called upon, the avaialble firepower is enough to disrupt the enemy's supply lines, forcing their reserves to take shelter or face destruction from above. Such actions delay enemy reinforcements from entering the fray...

And they were an aerospace option in Epic Armageddon (There were units that provided orbital bombardment like the Emperor-class Battleship)

This category includes all of the interstellar spacecraft used by armies to move from one star system to another. These craft can vary in size from small escorts to huge battleships armed with enough firepower to level a hive city! In Epic they are assumed to be operating from low orbit where they can land drop pods and provide long-range support for ground troops.

This still doesn't address drop ships and shuttles, because the IG explicitly deploy from orbit at some point once they get to their destination, and that includes directly into the fight (how many pictures have we seen of the IG doing that? Cover of the 5th edition rules? the Tyrok Fields artwork?)

And ballistic missiles are not the pinpoint accurate solution you try to make them out to be. we are talking about 50m up to 3km (early scud) of mean deviation.

you mean like Hunter-Killer missiles, right? If we're talking something like Deathstrikes, well, they're basically nukes (or worse). IF we're talking manticores accuracy becomes less of an issue because they rely on submunitions (like fairly recent missiles.) and you don't need extreme precision with that (you're deliberately going for area of effect.) You don't even have to be modern to be 'not-WW1', since 50s or 60s would suffice quite well.

IG isn't modern era. Nuking isn't an option, unless we are talking about an exterminatus. If IG would have cheap use of nuclear warheads, many landbased threats wouldnt exist anymore. That means they either don't use it, or it's not available in significant enough numbers to make a big impact.

Of course they aren't modern era. 'modern' forces operate under a culture and doctrine/rules/political system vastly different from 40K, against a more diverse and vatly different sieres of opponents. It's not going to be remotely comparable. but it doens't HAVE to be modern to be 'Not just WW1' or demonstrate highly variable warfare. Most if not all modern forces also don't have anything like a Deathstrike in their inventory do they?

 Ashiraya wrote:
That Baneblade picture looks like it has quite exposed wheels and tracks. Would that not make them vulnerable to enemy fire?

Not just that, but I know there's some Baneblade cutaways that actually DO show them with Sponsons, and that can be a real disadvantage potentially because its a thinning/weakening of the overall armor integrity (you have to makea hole to fit the gun, as has been noted.) That can be 'vulenrable' to enemy fire too. Better hope the baneblade has good compartmentalization (maybe it does!)

On the other hand there was the Baneblade from Courage and Honour that stood up pretty well to repeated Tau railgun hits as well. *cue random potential outrage at mention*

This still doesn't address drop ships and shuttles, because the IG explicitly deploy from orbit at some point once they get to their destination, and that includes directly into the fight (how many pictures have we seen of the IG doing that? Cover of the 5th edition rules? the Tyrok Fields artwork?)

Shuttles and Dropships are subject to AA just like any fighter would if deployed in the combat zone. And it's quite frankly a stupid idea...

Plenty of novels have done it (Heck, 13th Legion novel had the Last Chancers infiltrating a city shortly AFTER an orbital bombardment cremated the army in their path!) Heck it's a part of the 5th edition codex:

These are not situations where trench lines develop however. If they have any form of superiority it's obvious that deadlocks can't form up.

IF we're talking manticores accuracy becomes less of an issue because they rely on submunitions

again - not any better then an artillery barrage against a trench/fortification network. Yes you will hit something but it's not causing the entire network to fall down. Apart from that, every missed explosion creates an additional crater. It's not going to give you any decisive edge. It's just grinding more meat.

 Keep wrote:
You need a hole to stick the gun through. And that hole has to move in some way. If you point it forward the backside of the thing that holds the gun shows to the rear and vice versa. Take a guess why WW1 tank sponsons looked like they did.

Ok, I think I see what you're saying, but you're making some very specific assumptions about how the sponsons are designed. It's possible to make sponson guns with a much larger firing arc than the LRBT has without having giant plates of armor inside the tank. For example, look at how the Malcador sponsons are designed. They're not quite 180* but they cover a much wider area with very little difference in armor required.

Carpetbombing differs in the effect exactly how from an artillery barrage?

Because of the vast difference in firepower. A 155mm artillery shell is about 100lbs. A single B-52 carries 70,000lbs of bombs. That's the rough equivalent of 700 artillery shells delivered simultaneously to a concentrated area from one bomber.

Artillery can also take out enemy artillery.

Yes, which is why computers and aircraft make such a difference. If you have radar tracking the incoming shells and computer-aimed return fire static artillery positions are suicide. The best you can do is fire a few shells and then immediately start running before the return fire can arrive. So that puts a severe limit on how much firepower artillery can deliver, and makes WWI/Vraks-style "spend a day shelling the trenches before you attack" use of artillery impossible. Aircraft, on the other hand, can deliver a massive "artillery" strike with a single bombing run and completely annihilate a target.

And if aircraft can fly over the trenches undisputed, it's not a deadlock. In an AA heavy environment they will do that little trick once or twice and that's it.

And that's exactly the point! You can't have a WWI-style stalemate because one side will quickly gain air superiority (especially when pretty much everyone in the setting is eager to be martyred and has no objection to taking 90% losses if it wins the war), obliterate static AA defenses, and start bombing everything on the ground.

Airbursting was already done in WW1...

Not the same kind. Proximity fuses weren't invented until WWII, so airbursting required timer fuses that aren't as effective against trenches.

And space ships are out of the equation, because if they send troops down somewhere they either want it intact, or they can't use them due to orbital defenses.

Why are we just magically assuming that an important element of the setting is completely absent, despite its frequent use in the fluff? And orbital strikes are just one example of why trench warfare doesn't work, even if they don't exist at all because of plot you still have the other reasons.

And ballistic missiles are not the pinpoint accurate solution you try to make them out to be. we are talking about 50m up to 3km (early scud) of mean deviation.

And? Ballistic missiles are armed with nukes. 50m inaccuracy with a tactical nuke is so trivial it might as well be zero. Also, I don't know why you're focusing on ballistic missiles when guided weapons (including guided weapons with nukes) exist and have much better precision.

Nuking isn't an option, unless we are talking about an exterminatus.

Why not? Tactical nukes are not a significant long-term threat to the planet itself, so the only reason not to use them is for moral reasons. And we know very clearly that the Imperium has no such moral reasons.

If IG would have cheap use of nuclear warheads, many landbased threats wouldnt exist anymore. That means they either don't use it, or it's not available in significant enough numbers to make a big impact.

Yes, and that's kind of the point: IG act stupidly. Nobody is denying that trench warfare happens in 40k, the point is that it shouldn't happen and all examples of it are the result of stupidity by everyone responsible.

Because of the vast difference in firepower. A 155mm artillery shell is about 100lbs. A single B-52 carries 70,000lbs of bombs. That's the rough equivalent of 700 artillery shells delivered simultaneously to a concentrated area from one bomber.[...]And that's exactly the point! You can't have a WWI-style stalemate because one side will quickly gain air superiority (especially when pretty much everyone in the setting is eager to be martyred and has no objection to taking 90% losses if it wins the war), obliterate static AA defenses, and start bombing everything on the ground.

A marauder only carries 12k lbs of bombs. And while he can drop them at once, he has to then fly back (safely), land, repair and rearm, start, fly again. That takes a long time.
By that time an artillery piece has propably shot the same amount, and is cheaper, requires less training, less maintenance and less sophisticated equipment.

IN doesn't throw it's equipment away like IG. Going against Air defenses with air you're going to suffer heavily. Manticore AA missiles sure as hell are easier to optain then a thunderbolt, lightning or marauder including their pilots.

You're arguing with the perspective of present day equipment and present day numbers (US vs whoever the hell it is they're invading this time). This is 40k however.

Connor MacLeod wrote:
I'm not versed enough in the intricies of suspension enough to dispute on this or judge so..

It's not really an intricate detail thing, it's a pretty fundamental flaw. The basic concept of a suspension is that the wheel/track/ski/whatever moves up and down on a spring. Let's say the obstacle in question is an average speed bump in the tank's path. When a vehicle with proper suspension hits the speed bump the first wheel moves upward in response, the spring absorbs most of the energy of the impact, and the main hull of the vehicle doesn't move very much. Then as it passes over the bump the spring forces the wheel back down (again, without moving the rest of the vehicle very much) and the next wheel reaches the obstruction and repeats the process. The end result is that the wheels and springs do most of the moving, while the rest of the vehicle remains stationary (in the vertical axis at least). But this requires that it be possible for the wheels to move.

In the case of the LRBT this simply can't happen. Even if the tracks have wheels and springs the moment any part of the wheels/tracks moves upward it rises above the bottom edge of the tank and the main hull of the tank hits the speed bump. You've essentially created the tank equivalent of those idiots who modify their cars to put the body an inch above the road and can't go over speed bumps without scraping the bottom of the car. And if the tank sinks even slightly into soft ground the bottom edge of the tank will immediately touch the ground and start to dig in as well.

Now compare this to the Baneblade, where if a wheel moves upward it has a long way to go (about 1.5-2") before it rises above the bottom edge of the tank. and any part of the tank besides the tracks touches the ground. Alternatively, the Baneblade could sink 1" into mud and still only have the tracks touching the ground.

eh. I consider it academic anyhow, since if nothing else there is the Honour Guard quote, and its already been established there's plenty of reason for ludicrous variation in the Leman Russ (like the IG as a whole.)

The problem is that it's actually a very consistent problem. Virtually every visual example of the LRBT (and possibly every example, I have yet to see one that breaks the trend) suffers from the same problem. The only counter-examples are all written descriptions, and they all require the visual ones to be wrong to a much greater degree than can be plausibly explained by artist error. The inevitable conclusion is that the standard LRBT does not have a functioning suspension. Maybe there's some incredibly rare high-end variant that changes the design significantly but is still called a LRBT, but it has to be so rare that we've never seen any pictures of it.

Short barreled is not neccesarily itself a problem, depending on the design of the weapon and its ammunition.

But the short barrel isn't the issue, it's the diameter. I agree that the LRBT's barrel diameter is ridiculously huge, but my point is that the Epic variant suffers from the exact same problem. It looks like it's slightly smaller than the plastic kit and roughly the same size as the FW variant turret. That's still way beyond any real-world tank by a huge margin.


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 Keep wrote:
A marauder only carries 12k lbs of bombs.

The Marauder is also explicitly stated to be a medium bomber at most. We just don't see bigger ones because strategic bombing is beyond the scale of any 40k-universe game GW has published.

By that time an artillery piece has propably shot the same amount, and is cheaper, requires less training, less maintenance and less sophisticated equipment.

Except it probably hasn't, because the artillery piece has spent most of its day running and desperately trying to dodge incoming fire. Even the Marauder carries the equivalent of 120 155mm artillery shells. Let's assume that the Marauder is flying one mission per day (a very conservative estimate, especially if you're willing to have multiple crews for a single bomber). To match the Marauder's daily delivery of explosives the Basilisk* would have to maintain a rate of fire of five shells per hour, or about ~10 minutes per shot. That sounds reasonable, but remember that the Basilisk is probably going to be shooting ~5 shells at most and then running away before the return fire lands, and will also have to spend time refueling and reloading (and probably swapping crews if you don't want fatigue to be an issue). So in theory the Basilisk can match the low-end estimate from a medium bomber, but not by a very impressive margin.

And then there's one very important difference: the rate of delivery. The most effective shot in an artillery barrage is the first one, and the value of each shot after that decreases significantly as the targets take cover. The Basilisk in this situation is going to pay a heavy penalty in marginally-effective shells because its firepower is spread out across an entire day. The Marauder, on the other hand, delivers its entire payload simultaneously. There's no warning or opportunity to take cover, the entire 120-shell equivalent has the full effectiveness of the first shell in the Basilisk's barrage.

*We're going to assume it's a Basilisk since a towed earthshaker gun would be instantly destroyed by return fire against a modern-level enemy.

Going against Air defenses with air you're going to suffer heavily.

So? What's the alternative, sit back and do nothing while you take heavy losses in trench warfare?

Manticore AA missiles sure as hell are easier to optain then a thunderbolt, lightning or marauder including their pilots.

But that's not the comparison. It's not one AA missile (which isn't a guaranteed kill, so make that several AA missiles) against one plane, it's the AA missiles, their launcher/radar site/etc that was destroyed after the missiles were fired, and the value of everything that was destroyed by air strikes once the AA was removed, and the value of winning the battle after making the required sacrifice against one plane.

You're arguing with the perspective of present day equipment and present day numbers (US vs whoever the hell it is they're invading this time). This is 40k however.

Yes, and that was the point: the IG is stuck in WWI-era tactics because of plot reasons, and pretty much everyone in charge of deciding how they fight (in-universe) is a complete idiot.

 Peregrine wrote:
For example, look at how the Malcador sponsons are designed. They're not quite 180* but they cover a much wider area with very little difference in armor required.

The side sponsons can't shoot directly to the front, and don't even talk abobut overlapping field of fire. Besides, this variant takes more room internally.

In the case of the LRBT this simply can't happen. Even if the tracks have wheels and springs the moment any part of the wheels/tracks moves upward it rises above the bottom edge of the tank and the main hull of the tank hits the speed bump.

You are assuming that the tracks sit flush with the sideskirts all the time. And that the springs are soft as if they where made for a tank that has a lot of travel. If they travel down they can be damped. And the ride heigth could be adjustable (so it looks a bit like the malcador, at least on the bottom section).
The suspension is pretty bad, but to claim that it could not happen at all is a stretch.

the IG is stuck in WWI-era tactics because of plot reasons

Not sure about you, but to me that's actually what makes it fun. If i want modern day everything i concern myself with coldwar what-might-have-been scenarios. If you refuse to emerse yourself into the setting and claim that everyone is stupid, just because they dont have access to everything we've got now... well maybe try something else then, if it's so bad.

So? What's the alternative, sit back and do nothing while you take heavy losses in trench warfare?

Eitherway losses will be high. And ground assetts are easier to replace for the IoM

 Keep wrote:
You are assuming that the tracks sit flush with the sideskirts all the time.

And it's an entirely justified assumption. That's how it is on the model, and that's how it is in every piece of codex art/cutaway drawing/video game/etc.

And that the springs are soft as if they where made for a tank that has a lot of travel.

They have to be, because if they are too stiff there's no difference between having a suspension and just bolting the wheels directly to the hull. A suspension has to move to function correctly.

And the ride heigth could be adjustable (so it looks a bit like the malcador, at least on the bottom section).

And there's no evidence for that at all. The only reason to even speculate that it might work that way is if you're stubbornly opposed to admitting that the LRBT is a bad design.

Not sure about you, but to me that's actually what makes it fun. If i want modern day everything i concern myself with coldwar what-might-have-been scenarios. If you refuse to emerse yourself into the setting and claim that everyone is stupid, just because they dont have access to everything we've got now... well maybe try something else then, if it's so bad.

Who said that I don't enjoy it? Pointing out in-universe stupidity is not the same thing as saying that 40k sucks and we hate it. And yes, the lack of access to modern weapons/tactics/etc is a sign of stupidity. These things should be trivial for an empire that has laser rifles/FTL spaceships/etc, there's absolutely no reason for a competent military to be stuck in 1915 (or earlier!).

Eitherway losses will be high. And ground assetts are easier to replace for the IoM

Then what's the point of having aircraft at all if you're never going to use them? If you're willing to sacrifice a whole regiment of guardsmen to save a single Thunderbolt and pilot then your aircraft are going to spend the entire war in their hangars, and you might as well scrap them and use the metal to build knives for your guardsmen.

I think someone here is overstating the effect of aircraft in a contested airspace on the field and then giving artillery waaay to much downplay on their importance...

Artillery have very complex set ups, requiring counter artillery sections, diversionary sections and then the main guns. The rate at which artillery fire is very fast, and when employed in barrages has devastating effect.

Added to this is the fact that artillery is mobile (unlike video games where they are portrayed as stationary etc) having their limbers or transports nearby. Today we even have a lot of mechanized artillery. The battle of guns are always moving and so on. Its all very complex stuff.

Aircraft however, are drastically impeded in contested airspace. Its all well and good having aircraft blow up poor people in poor countries, but in a conventional war aircraft, like in previous wars, will drop like flies until one side wins the attrition war and claims the airspace and even then, losses are still an issue. So if your mauruder bomber somehow makes it through enemy defense, they then have target, they only have a few tries at this (as apposed to artillery which can correct rounds through the use of spotters etc) before it has to spend hundreds of thousands + flying home to try again. If it survives this is.

Its all complex stuff, no matter thew time period. The problem with 40k, is nothing about it is realistic. It should be a huge combined arms effort with detailed plans and clear logistics etc, instead they magically havew things then drive everything forward. Special things poof forward instead, negating some of the walking forward.

But one thing is clear, in a real war, artillery will be far more practical. Of course, on sea the opposite is true (aircraft reign king of the seas).

As for the tank, it sucks. Ever driven a car (not a 4 wheel drive etc) but a family car off road? It wrecks it pretty fast. Imagine how much worse that would be for a tank... Suspension is very important for its function.

Then what's the point of having aircraft at all if you're never going to use them? If you're willing to sacrifice a whole regiment of guardsmen to save a single Thunderbolt and pilot then your aircraft are going to spend the entire war in their hangars,

They get shipped to another location if they can't conduct any effective work. Yes IoM is like that. Human lives dont matter.

And there's no evidence for that at all. The only reason to even speculate that it might work that way is if you're stubbornly opposed to admitting that the LRBT is a bad design.

No, i'm not stubbornly opposed to admitting the LRBT is a bad design. It is bad. I'm stubbornly opposed to surrendering to a technical challenge and thinking how to actually make work what it is supposed to do/be instead of claiming it doesnt work without even trying.

They have to be, because if they are too stiff there's no difference between having a suspension and just bolting the wheels directly to the hull. A suspension has to move to function correctly.

No suspension is as stiff has having none at all. Even slight suspension reduces parts from breaking quickly.

 Swastakowey wrote:
Added to this is the fact that artillery is mobile (unlike video games where they are portrayed as stationary etc) having their limbers or transports nearby. Today we even have a lot of mechanized artillery. The battle of guns are always moving and so on. Its all very complex stuff.

Define "mobile". And then remember that radar-aimed counter-battery fire will potentially be on its way before the first shells have reached their targets. IA1 states that a Basilisk shell takes about 18-19 seconds to reach its maximum range, so that's maybe 30-40 seconds at most from the moment the first shells are fired to complete the barrage, dismantle the guns, attach them to their transports, and get out of the threat radius of the incoming shells. An artillery tank like a Basilisk can do that, a towed earthshaker gun is almost certainly dead. And even the Basilisk is probably going to have to be very careful about preparing its escape route, not getting spotted moving into its next firing position, etc. Sustained rate of fire is going to be much lower than the theoretical maximum rate that you can load shells into the gun.

Its all well and good having aircraft blow up poor people in poor countries, but in a conventional war aircraft, like in previous wars, will drop like flies until one side wins the attrition war and claims the airspace and even then, losses are still an issue.

So what if losses are an issue? It's not like trench warfare is free of losses either. Remember, this whole discussion came up as an explanation for why WWI/Vraks-style trench warfare makes no sense outside of a WWI-era setting. If you're suggesting years of attrition warfare in the trenches as an alternative to sacrificing aircraft in a brief battle for air superiority then I really don't see how that's supposed to be a better alternative.

So if your mauruder bomber somehow makes it through enemy defense, they then have target, they only have a few tries at this (as apposed to artillery which can correct rounds through the use of spotters etc) before it has to spend hundreds of thousands + flying home to try again. If it survives this is.

Why do you need multiple tries at a target when you have guided bombs, computer bomb sights for your "dumb" bombs, and enough payload to massively overkill anything near the target? Remember how a single B-52 carries the equivalent of ~700 155mm artillery shells?

Also, no, you aren't correcting your aim with a spotter unless you're willing to sacrifice your artillery guns to do it. If you aren't moving away from your initial firing position by the time your first shots hit and give the spotter anything to spot then you've just lost all of your guns to counter-battery fire. The only way you can spot artillery is if the other side is fighting with WWI-era technology and don't have radar-aimed counter-batter fire, but then they probably also don't have anything that can stop the air strikes.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Keep wrote:
They get shipped to another location if they can't conduct any effective work. Yes IoM is like that. Human lives dont matter.

If lives don't matter then why are you so concerned about losing pilots? What you're suggesting is the exact opposite of the Imperium's "win at all costs" approach to war.

I'm stubbornly opposed to surrendering to a technical challenge and thinking how to actually make work what it is supposed to do/be instead of claiming it doesnt work without even trying.

But why should we assume that it works? Why not just state the obvious, that it's a completely broken design that only functions by ork-like faith in the machine god and/or act of plot and leave it at that?

No suspension is as stiff has having none at all. Even slight suspension reduces parts from breaking quickly.

But we're literally talking about an inch of movement at most before the hull of the tank hits the ground. I really don't see how that's supposed to be useful, especially since the weight and complexity wasted on a barely-functioning suspension could have been spent on making more durable components.

But why should we assume that it works?

Duh? Because it somehow does in 40k?

especially since the weight and complexity wasted on a barely-functioning suspension could have been spent on making more durable components.

Make something thicker and it will be stiffer, therefore even more prone to fatigue through shocks. Gains weight, achieves basically nothing. You NEED elasticity, even if it's not much.

lives don't matter then why are you so concerned about losing pilots? What you're suggesting is the exact opposite of the Imperium's "win at all costs" approach to war.

It's not about the pilots. Its about the machines. Besides, training pilots to fly and combat in a jet aircraft takes alot more ressources/time then grunt training. Navy aircraft can have ejector seats, so obviously they are valuable as well.

Remember how a single B-52

Which does not exist, and would be shot down on approach if it did in the situation we talk about.

years of attrition warfare in the trenches as an alternative to sacrificing aircraft in a brief battle for air superiority then I really don't see how that's supposed to be a better alternative.

As if you can achieve a brief battle of air supremancy against a foe of similar strength.

If magic missiles can blow up artillery in less than 30 seconds... then why can't magic AAA blow up aircraft hours before they get near the target?

I think someone just loves aircraft a bit too much.

Also you dont need to dismantle guns to move them, merely limber them up and move... have you seen artillery being transported by trucks? Or artillery that has been built into trucks?

Even with computers firing artillery/bombs they still miss. There are many factors involved, meaning eyes on the ground are needed for it all. I mean, why do aircraft in your odd world have magic bombs that hit everything without dying... but not artillery?

Makes no sense why you pick and choose.

One more point... in the fluff the Leman Russ is a great battle tank which you refute... but then use the fluff to defend your artillery sucks idea as well. Again picking and choosing.

 Swastakowey wrote:
If magic missiles can blow up artillery in less than 30 seconds... then why can't magic AAA blow up aircraft hours before they get near the target?

Because hitting a 700mph target flying at treetop level that can make high-g turns to evade an incoming missile or a bomber at 50,000' is much more difficult than tracking a high-arc ballistic projectile back to its source and firing a similar shot back to that location. Flight time for a Basilisk shot is ~20 seconds at maximum range, and as soon as the shell comes over the horizon the exact location of the Basilisk is known. So the delay before counter-battery fire hits, assuming the guns/rockets/whatever are committed to the counter-battery role and ready to fire, is the time it takes to aim plus ~20 seconds flight time. And because a Basilisk can't run away at 500mph it's much easier to catch it in the area of, for example, a Manticore salvo.

As for why they can't do it hours before reaching the target, because range matters? A Basilisk has ~15km range. A plane flying at just under mach 1 will cross that distance in ~2 minutes, and will cover over a hundred times the Basilisk's maximum range in two hours. I think it should be obvious why counter-battery fire at 15km range is much easier than hitting a target from 1500km away.

Also you dont need to dismantle guns to move them, merely limber them up and move... have you seen artillery being transported by trucks? Or artillery that has been built into trucks?

Dismantling, packing, whatever you want to call it the concept is the same. You have to take the gun out of its firing position, pack it up for towing, get it attached to the towing vehicle, and start moving. And you have to do it very quickly or you're dead.

Even with computers firing artillery/bombs they still miss. There are many factors involved, meaning eyes on the ground are needed for it all. I mean, why do aircraft in your odd world have magic bombs that hit everything without dying... but not artillery?

Again, the difference is quantity. A bomber formation is delivering the equivalent of thousands of artillery shells within a few seconds, up to tens of thousands if you want to use WWII-style swarms of bombers. It doesn't matter if one B-52 misses the target with some of its bombs, the formation as a whole just covered the entire area. And remember, we're talking about area targets like a trench network, not dropping a 500lb bomb on a specific enemy commander's head from 50,000'.

And sure, once you start talking about guided weapons artillery can match the precision of aircraft. A modern artillery tank armed with GPS-guided shells would be able to fire a salvo of shells perfectly aimed at, say, an enemy gun emplacement without a spotter as long as the target location is known. But IG artillery doesn't have those, especially when we're talking about Vraks-style trench warfare. If they somehow did the end result would be effectively the same: static defenses (as you have to have in trench warfare) become obsolete.

One more point... in the fluff the Leman Russ is a great battle tank

Except it isn't. The fluff is that the Imperium believes that the LRBT is a great tank. From an outside observer's position the fluff presents a truly awful design that only "works" because most of the Imperium's wars are against equally incompetent enemies.

I agree with Peregrine. The LRBT spits in the face of modern tank design. It has little armor sloping, it is way too tall, it has a comically tiny turret, it has an unarmored engine, little practical suspension, almost no ground clearance, huge slab sides just begging to be punched through, bad track design, outdated concepts like sponsons, unguarded tracks, no reactive armor at all, horrible accuracy, speeds laughable by modern standards and a comically oversized gun.

My fan-theory as to why the LRBT does so well is because the other tanks of 40k are just as badly designed or even worse. Except for the Eldar Fire Prism. Disregarding it's cartoonishly big gun it is not a bad design all things considered. It has nice rounded features, as long as it hugs the ground it isn't too tall, active camo will ensure that it stays hidden and it is fast.

The LRBT spits in the face of modern tank design

Well no sh!t, The Mark IV also spits in the face of modern tank design, so does the Tiger tank. If half the basic theme for IG is inspired by WW1 and partially WW2, what do you expect?

 Peregrine wrote:

 Swastakowey wrote:
If magic missiles can blow up artillery in less than 30 seconds... then why can't magic AAA blow up aircraft hours before they get near the target?

Because hitting a 700mph target flying at treetop level that can make high-g turns to evade an incoming missile or a bomber at 50,000' is much more difficult than tracking a high-arc ballistic projectile back to its source and firing a similar shot back to that location.

If it's so easy, why don't you calculate it for us as an example? If it's indeed so easy, how comes SAM where introduced in 1950's and yet Mortar hunting radars (that )only could find mortars and eventuall howitzers) where available 1960, with tracking radars for missiles flat firing long range guns only beeing available no sooner then 1970 ? U-2 was shot down 1960 at 70k feets. Heigth doesnt protect you or makes it so much harder to reach. You just need a bigger missile the higher it gets. The tech stays the same.
We definitely know IoM has SAM's, i've never heard of counter artillery radar however.

The Mark IV was designed to cross some trenches and withstand machine gun fire. It was not designed for the combat conditions the LRBT has to go through. And the Tiger isnt too bad of a design. It has a reasonable profile, good armor, a good gun and for its time it was surprisingly quick. Most importantly, the Tiger has a functional suspension system. A Tiger shaped LR would be a vast upgrade over the current design.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
The Mark IV was designed to cross some trenches and withstand machine gun fire. It was not designed for the combat conditions the LRBT has to go through.

When LRBT was designed, the most likely opponents were hordes of backwards and stupid Orks. In current times the main opponents are somewhat smarter Orks. Ork tanks are still worse than Leman Russ.

The suspension seems to be a sculptor's/artist's fault, not something planned as a part of the fluff. By the way how do you recognize lack of suspension visually?

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
When LRBT was designed, the most likely opponents were hordes of backwards and stupid Orks. In current times the main opponents are somewhat smarter Orks. Ork tanks are still worse than Leman Russ.

Fighting against even weaker enemies doesn't mean the LRBT isn't a stupid design. It's just a stupid design that doesn't cost the Imperium as many wars as it might if their enemies were more competent.

The suspension seems to be a sculptor's/artist's fault, not something planned as a part of the fluff.

Who cares why the creators made that decision? It's still the fluff.

By the way how do you recognize lack of suspension visually?

By applying your understanding of how suspensions work, noticing that the LRBT has maybe an inch of ground clearance at most, and realizing what this means for a suspension's ability to work properly.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Keep wrote:
Well no sh!t, The Mark IV also spits in the face of modern tank design, so does the Tiger tank. If half the basic theme for IG is inspired by WW1 and partially WW2, what do you expect?

A tank that is at least as well designed as real tanks from WWII, instead of one that every WWII tank designer would laugh at?

Also, nobody is disputing GW's inspiration for the LRBT. The point is that it's a bad design from a functional point of view. A terrible design can still be just fine from an aesthetic point of view, if it's appropriate for the setting.

If it's so easy, why don't you calculate it for us as an example?

Ok, give us some position data for an artillery shell.

If it's indeed so easy, how comes SAM where introduced in 1950's and yet Mortar hunting radars (that )only could find mortars and eventuall howitzers) where available 1960, with tracking radars for missiles flat firing long range guns only beeing available no sooner then 1970 ?

Because they're two separate technologies with different limiting factors? Early SAMs used command guidance and large (preferably nuclear) warheads to overcome the limits of computer technology, and even Vietnam-era air to air missiles were incredibly unreliable. The main limiting factor is the guidance system, with radar and heat-seeking systems each having their own weaknesses (having to "paint" the target until impact and seeker cooling, respectively) to deal with. Counter-batter radar, on the other hand, is mostly limited by CPU power and the ability to process radar data very quickly then automatically aim the counter-attack. And then on top of that you have to consider historical factors like which system the military considered a higher priority and dedicated more funding to, etc.

U-2 was shot down 1960 at 70k feets. Heigth doesnt protect you or makes it so much harder to reach. You just need a bigger missile the higher it gets. The tech stays the same.

Sure, but making a bigger missile is not a trivial problem to overcome (as demonstrated by the fact that no SAM was ever capable of doing more than making SR-71 pilots laugh at the waste of ammunition). Size goes up, cost goes up, etc. Which just goes back to the original point: shooting down a 500mph bomber at 50,000' is much more difficult than counter-battery fire against WWI-era fixed guns. Now instead of artillery batteries trading fire for days/weeks/months at a time you have a battle for air superiority (almost certainly too short for trench warfare to develop) followed by the winning side gaining the ability to bomb unopposed.

We definitely know IoM has SAM's, i've never heard of counter artillery radar however.

Sure, which just goes back to the original point that the LRBT succeeds because everything around it is incompetent. The IG should have radar-aimed counter-battery fire, because the required technology should be trivially easy if you're able to build plasma guns/FTL starships/etc.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
The Mark IV was designed to cross some trenches and withstand machine gun fire. It was not designed for the combat conditions the LRBT has to go through.

When LRBT was designed, the most likely opponents were hordes of backwards and stupid Orks. In current times the main opponents are somewhat smarter Orks. Ork tanks are still worse than Leman Russ.

The suspension seems to be a sculptor's/artist's fault, not something planned as a part of the fluff. By the way how do you recognize lack of suspension visually?

Do you actually know anything at all about 40K, or is your only source of information that godawful wikia that should be mailed a cease and desist for how much it misinforms its readers? Orks were STRONGER back during the Great Crusade, when one WHAAAAGH in particular was led by the biggest and baddest Ork Warboss in history, commanding a horde of super Ork Meganobs that put their current counterparts to utter shame.

FFS, Orks are neither stupid nor primitive. They simply choose to look like such, but otherwise are just as modernized as the Imperial Guard- even better than some regiments.

To be fair to the Leman Russ, GW in general is terrible at designing AFVs. The only really good ones I can think of are the Rhino, Falcon Chassis Variants and arguably the Baneblade and some of its variants. The rest suffer from a varying combination of being too tall, comically oversized guns, a derpy track design, oddly undergunned for vehicles of their type and serving no real practical use to any competent military.

 Wyzilla wrote:
Do you actually know anything at all about 40K, or is your only source of information that godawful wikia that should be mailed a cease and desist for how much it misinforms its readers? Orks were STRONGER back during the Great Crusade, when one WHAAAAGH in particular was led by the biggest and baddest Ork Warboss in history, commanding a horde of super Ork Meganobs that put their current counterparts to utter shame.

FFS, Orks are neither stupid nor primitive. They simply choose to look like such, but otherwise are just as modernized as the Imperial Guard- even better than some regiments.

Leman Russ is a STC vehicle which means it was designed during the Dark Age of Technology, not during Great Crusade. Fluff for Predator says that Predators with their heavier armour and greater firepower (greater than Rhino) allowed colonists to easily slaughter Orks and destroy their vehicles because Orks were close-quarters-combat oriented and had few weapons that could harm it.

The number of non-tankers here talking like they know about tanks makes my head hurt. If another person takes the line of thinking that "sloped armor automatically = better" I am going to slap them.

weaponsofwwii wrote:
Slope Effect
One of the most mis-understood aspects of armour design is sloped armour. The common argument is that sloped armour offers better protection than vertical armour, simply because the sloped armour offers a thicker horizontal protection for the same plate thickness. If this argument was true, sloped armour would not only fail to offer a better protection for an armour plate of a given weight, but would in fact in some cases decrease the protection of the armour plate.
Net Weight Reduction (Trigonomic Approach)
Consider two armour plates: one is vertical, and one has an inclination of 30 degrees from vertical. The armour plates must both offer a protection equivilant to 100 mm thickness. Obviously, the vertical plate must be 100 mm thick. If using pure trigonometry to calculate the required thickness of the other plate, we would get 100 mm × cos (30) ≈ 87 mm. While this result would seem to indicate a weight saving of 13 percent, it does not take into account that the armour plate would have to be longer to cover the same area.
If the armour plate would have to be 1000 mm tall, the height of the vertical armour plate would naturally be 1000 mm. The length of the sloped armour plate, however, would have to be longer, since sloping the armour would reduce the height covered by a plate 1000 mm long. The exact length is easily calculated as 1000 mm ÷ cos(30) ≈ 1155 mm. Since 100 mm × 1000 mm ≈ 87 mm × 1155 mm, it is demonstrated that the weight will be identical of two plates that has the same horizontal thickness and covers the same area, regardless of slope. Formally, this can be presented as cos(x) ÷ cos(x) = 1.
Potential Protection Reduction
Since it would appear that the calculation above does not favour neither vertical nor sloped armour (aside from a slightly more cumbersome interior layout for the sloped armour), if the purely trigonomic advantage in horizontal thickness was the only advantage, the thinner, sloped armour plate would in fact be at a disadvantage. Although thinner armour plates will usually have a higher Brinell hardness, the thinner plate is more likely to be overmatched.
If a plug is formed when a shot hits a sloped armour plate, the plug will offer less resistance than the surrounding armour plate. As a result, the shot will turn towards the armour plate, decreasing the effective angle and negating much of the increased horizontal thickness. (WAL 710/492)

Sloped armor is generally used when you can't cast a thick enough vertical plate for the amount of effective thickness that you want. There is the benefit of increased chances of deflection, but modern shells strike at such high velocities that if they fail to penetrate the armor; they just outright shatter rather than deflect so that hasn't been a realistic consideration since the T-64 first rolled out with a smoothbore APDS gun.

The Leman Russ is very much an interwar design of the same breed as the ToG II, and the stats given to it by Forgeworld are patently ridiculous in many places, but please stop pretending to be experts on tanks when you aren't. If flat armor were so terrible; then every modern main battle tank would be at fault for having more or less completely flat sides.

High profile is also not a universal disadvantage like many think it is. High profile offers greater visibility, increased crew comfort and ammunition storage, and also generally means that your tank can have more gun depression than a lower profile counterpart would. Building a tank really low means you need to find short people to pilot it and also tends to kill your tank's gun depression which is not the greatest thing in the world when you have to fight over ridges and hills or in urban terrain.

Also, nobody is disputing GW's inspiration for the LRBT. The point is that it's a bad design from a functional point of view.

When it is inspired by WW1 for the entire exterior, how do you expect it to be better then WW2 or even later designs?
It is essentially an indiana jones tank, compressed in length and scaled to "heroic proportions" like everything in 40k is.

 Peregrine wrote:

We definitely know IoM has SAM's, i've never heard of counter artillery radar however.

Sure, which just goes back to the original point that the LRBT succeeds because everything around it is incompetent. The IG should have radar-aimed counter-battery fire, because the required technology should be trivially easy if you're able to build plasma guns/FTL starships/etc.

No, it's not trivially easy, if they don't have the specific technology. They just assemble things according to their STC instructions / the machines do it for them. It's like claiming that if you can read the instructions to build an Ikea drawer that you are able to come up with a production and assembly plan for a pocket calculator. Reading instructions != understanding the technology, and technology != other technology.

Sure, but making a bigger missile is not a trivial problem to overcome (as demonstrated by the fact that no SAM was ever capable of doing more than making SR-71 pilots laugh at the waste of ammunition). Size goes up, cost goes up, etc. Which just goes back to the original point: shooting down a 500mph bomber at 50,000' is much more difficult than counter-battery fire against WWI-era fixed guns. Now instead of artillery batteries trading fire for days/weeks/months at a time you have a battle for air superiority (almost certainly too short for trench warfare to develop) followed by the winning side gaining the ability to bomb unopposed.

That's because the SAM's in the period where built to defend against bombers and regular fighter jets, not jets with mach 3 at extreme altitude. They simply ran out of fuel before they could reach up to the distance/altitude. The Missile will nontheless be less cheaper then the aircraft.

nd even Vietnam-era air to air missiles were incredibly unreliable

No they where not. They where very effective, to the point where US aviation was forced below the altitude envelope of the SA-2 where they are not effective, but instead AAA is more effective. And that despite all the jamming and suppression effords.

Let me quote for you with your B-52 fetish:

The highest per type loss rate during Linebacker II was incurred by the B-52 fleet, exclusively to S-75/SA-2 SAM shots, despite the heavy use of onboard EW, support jamming aircraft, defence suppression aircraft, chaff bombers and fighter escorts. Had SAMs been absent from the theatre, it is unlikely any B-52s would have been lost.
The statistical loss rate of 15 x B-52D/G across 729 flown sorties is around 2 percent, the limit for sustainable losses in an attrition strategy campaign, despite the concerted defence suppression effort directed against the PAVN SAM force. Importantly, once the PAVN expended most of its warstock of S-75/SA-2 SAM rounds, no further B-52s were lost.

And that is against an inferior bush army against a world military power.

Ok, give us some position data for an artillery shell.

ill be back shortly

 Keep wrote:

Let me quote for you with your B-52 fetish:

The highest per type loss rate during Linebacker II was incurred by the B-52 fleet, exclusively to S-75/SA-2 SAM shots, despite the heavy use of onboard EW, support jamming aircraft, defence suppression aircraft, chaff bombers and fighter escorts. Had SAMs been absent from the theatre, it is unlikely any B-52s would have been lost.
The statistical loss rate of 15 x B-52D/G across 729 flown sorties is around 2 percent, the limit for sustainable losses in an attrition strategy campaign, despite the concerted defence suppression effort directed against the PAVN SAM force. Importantly, once the PAVN expended most of its warstock of S-75/SA-2 SAM rounds, no further B-52s were lost.

And that is against an inferior bush army against a world military power.

It should be kept in mind that the North Vietnamese army of that time was equiped with,at that time modern, soviet weaponry. To characterize them as bush army is therefore misleading.
Regardless, the Leman Russ is a bad design but it ultimately works on the same kind of "rule of cool" logic that makes stupid things like knights, titans and cathedral shaped spaceships viable.

at that time modern, soviet weaponry

Yes they where equipped with modern weapons, but they had to carry everything across the jungle basically. And they never had equal numbers as far as airforce is concerned / enough AA capabilities to deal with the overwhelming number of airvehicles sent against them. The point is - they just where not more successfull because of numbers and extreme efford to jam/counter SAM's (they had nothing else to fear after all).

 Kain wrote:
The number of non-tankers here talking like they know about tanks makes my head hurt. If another person takes the line of thinking that "sloped armor automatically = better" I am going to slap them.

weaponsofwwii wrote:
Slope Effect
One of the most mis-understood aspects of armour design is sloped armour. The common argument is that sloped armour offers better protection than vertical armour, simply because the sloped armour offers a thicker horizontal protection for the same plate thickness. If this argument was true, sloped armour would not only fail to offer a better protection for an armour plate of a given weight, but would in fact in some cases decrease the protection of the armour plate.
Net Weight Reduction (Trigonomic Approach)
Consider two armour plates: one is vertical, and one has an inclination of 30 degrees from vertical. The armour plates must both offer a protection equivilant to 100 mm thickness. Obviously, the vertical plate must be 100 mm thick. If using pure trigonometry to calculate the required thickness of the other plate, we would get 100 mm × cos (30) ≈ 87 mm. While this result would seem to indicate a weight saving of 13 percent, it does not take into account that the armour plate would have to be longer to cover the same area.
If the armour plate would have to be 1000 mm tall, the height of the vertical armour plate would naturally be 1000 mm. The length of the sloped armour plate, however, would have to be longer, since sloping the armour would reduce the height covered by a plate 1000 mm long. The exact length is easily calculated as 1000 mm ÷ cos(30) ≈ 1155 mm. Since 100 mm × 1000 mm ≈ 87 mm × 1155 mm, it is demonstrated that the weight will be identical of two plates that has the same horizontal thickness and covers the same area, regardless of slope. Formally, this can be presented as cos(x) ÷ cos(x) = 1.
Potential Protection Reduction
Since it would appear that the calculation above does not favour neither vertical nor sloped armour (aside from a slightly more cumbersome interior layout for the sloped armour), if the purely trigonomic advantage in horizontal thickness was the only advantage, the thinner, sloped armour plate would in fact be at a disadvantage. Although thinner armour plates will usually have a higher Brinell hardness, the thinner plate is more likely to be overmatched.
If a plug is formed when a shot hits a sloped armour plate, the plug will offer less resistance than the surrounding armour plate. As a result, the shot will turn towards the armour plate, decreasing the effective angle and negating much of the increased horizontal thickness. (WAL 710/492)

Sloped armor is generally used when you can't cast a thick enough vertical plate for the amount of effective thickness that you want. There is the benefit of increased chances of deflection, but modern shells strike at such high velocities that if they fail to penetrate the armor; they just outright shatter rather than deflect so that hasn't been a realistic consideration since the T-64 first rolled out with a smoothbore APDS gun.

The Leman Russ is very much an interwar design of the same breed as the ToG II, and the stats given to it by Forgeworld are patently ridiculous in many places, but please stop pretending to be experts on tanks when you aren't. If flat armor were so terrible; then every modern main battle tank would be at fault for having more or less completely flat sides.

High profile is also not a universal disadvantage like many think it is. High profile offers greater visibility, increased crew comfort and ammunition storage, and also generally means that your tank can have more gun depression than a lower profile counterpart would. Building a tank really low means you need to find short people to pilot it and also tends to kill your tank's gun depression which is not the greatest thing in the world when you have to fight over ridges and hills or in urban terrain.

Fair enough about the flat armor argument. Sloped armor wouldn't offer much protection against energy weapons either. However, I disagree with you about the high profile argument in relation to the Leman Russ. The Leman Russ tank's gun cannot depress beyond pointing straight ahead. This is primarily an issue with the turret design as the gun is stopped from going lower by the bottom plate. On the Stygies and Ryza patterns this problem seems to be corrected but I am unsure as how common those patterns are.

In addition, while having a tall profile in of itself isn't a bad thing but the Leman Russ is excessively tall. Taller than any modern tank in service. It is going to stick out like a sore thumb as others have noted. (It is 14.5 ft tall or 4.4m. In comparison, the M1 Abrams is 8 feet tall. The WW1 British heavy tanks, the ones they are based off of is also 8 feet tall. The Monstrous Jagdtiger is 9 feet tall as was the Sherman).

KingDeath wrote:

 Keep wrote:

Let me quote for you with your B-52 fetish:

The highest per type loss rate during Linebacker II was incurred by the B-52 fleet, exclusively to S-75/SA-2 SAM shots, despite the heavy use of onboard EW, support jamming aircraft, defence suppression aircraft, chaff bombers and fighter escorts. Had SAMs been absent from the theatre, it is unlikely any B-52s would have been lost.
The statistical loss rate of 15 x B-52D/G across 729 flown sorties is around 2 percent, the limit for sustainable losses in an attrition strategy campaign, despite the concerted defence suppression effort directed against the PAVN SAM force. Importantly, once the PAVN expended most of its warstock of S-75/SA-2 SAM rounds, no further B-52s were lost.

And that is against an inferior bush army against a world military power.

It should be kept in mind that the North Vietnamese army of that time was equiped with,at that time modern, soviet weaponry. To characterize them as bush army is therefore misleading.
Regardless, the Leman Russ is a bad design but it ultimately works on the same kind of "rule of cool" logic that makes stupid things like knights, titans and cathedral shaped spaceships viable.

Having a modern missile does not make one a modern army. The NVA was numerically and technologically greatly inferior to the US. Not to mention they did not have any infrastructure to speak of. And by waging a guerilla war in the jungle, they definitely were a 'bush army'.
That the Leman Russ is not a great design is undeniable, but it still is superior to WW2 and even modern tanks by virtue of having far superior technology.

The WW1 British heavy tanks, the ones they are based off of is also 8 feet tall.

Because it didn't have a turret, add a turret and it will be quite a bit taller... Besides, those measurements where stated out of thin air, without actually checking what would be actually required/enough in terms of size to do the things it is supposed to do. My experiment shows that you only need to scale up the plastic model by a factor of 50.7, which is about 90% smaller then what is stated. Besides, the dimensions that are repeated over and over again dont even really match the model, in the sense that the proportions are off

I like this thread.

I am devouring both sides arguments, and learning lots about tanks.

Thanks guys!

 Peregrine wrote:

Also, nobody is disputing GW's inspiration for the LRBT. The point is that it's a bad design from a functional point of view. A terrible design can still be just fine from an aesthetic point of view, if it's appropriate for the setting.

If it's so easy, why don't you calculate it for us as an example?

Ok, give us some position data for an artillery shell.

There you go Artillery Radar Data. Have fun.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Having a modern missile does not make one a modern army. The NVA was numerically and technologically greatly inferior to the US. Not to mention they did not have any infrastructure to speak of. And by waging a guerilla war in the jungle, they definitely were a 'bush army'.

The example is from the bombing missions over Hanoi, not guerrilla war in the jungle.

That the Leman Russ is not a great design is undeniable, but it still is superior to WW2 and even modern tanks by virtue of having far superior technology.

Except it really isn't. Superior technology doesn't matter if your tanks are all immobilized 50 miles from the battlefield because they have no ability to drive over any terrain more difficult than a high-quality paved road. I mean, we're talking about a tank that could potentially be stopped by the average parking lot speed bump. At least the WWII tank is going to reach the battle and contribute.


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 Keep wrote:
There you go Artillery Radar Data. Have fun.

Before I screw around with processing this* could you tell me where you got it from, and what assumptions were made in generating it (especially the assumptions made to calculate drag on the shell)? Is this taken from a game? Third-party calculator? Your own math?

*The trivially easy part is the computer calculating the target location once you have counter-battery software. Unfortunately I don't right now.


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 Keep wrote:
No, it's not trivially easy, if they don't have the specific technology. They just assemble things according to their STC instructions / the machines do it for them. It's like claiming that if you can read the instructions to build an Ikea drawer that you are able to come up with a production and assembly plan for a pocket calculator. Reading instructions != understanding the technology, and technology != other technology.

Ok, so you're conceding that the only reason they don't have it is incompetence, exactly like I said.

That's because the SAM's in the period where built to defend against bombers and regular fighter jets, not jets with mach 3 at extreme altitude. They simply ran out of fuel before they could reach up to the distance/altitude. The Missile will nontheless be less cheaper then the aircraft.

Well yes, that was exactly my point. Designing air defenses is not as simple as just saying "make the SAMs bigger" and auto-killing anything that dares to come into your airspace. And keep in mind that the Marauder and Thunderbolt are capable of operating from orbiting starships, which implies much higher top speeds and altitudes than the SR-71.

They where very effective, to the point where US aviation was forced below the altitude envelope of the SA-2 where they are not effective, but instead AAA is more effective. And that despite all the jamming and suppression effords.

I said air to air missiles, not SAMs. The F-4 was originally designed without a gun because, like you, everyone assumed that missiles were an auto-kill weapon. Unfortunately it turned out that Vietnam-era air to air missiles sucked and they had to start bolting external gun pods to the planes to give them a chance.

The statistical loss rate of 15 x B-52D/G across 729 flown sorties is around 2 percent

Oh no, a 2% loss rate. You do realize that this is the Imperium we're talking about, where sacrificing whole regiments of guardsmen to defend an irrelevant patch of territory is standard practice, right? The Imperium doesn't have mourning families back home or political concerns to deal with. If it takes 100% losses to win the war then they aren't going to hesitate for a moment to do it. Life is cheap, and the only calculation that matters is the value of aircraft vs. the value of targets they destroy added to the value of the objectives they accomplish.

my own simulation model with drag dependence on cd-mach-relation ship curves like this http://zak-smith.org/~zak/DigiCam/McCoy/small/156_5700_img.jpg

*The trivially easy part is the computer calculating the target location once you have counter-battery software.

Well no gak. You said hitting a moving aircraft (that means, if target is left, steer left) is harder then tracking a projectile...

Ok, so you're conceding that the only reason they don't have it is incompetence, exactly like I said.

Then let us know how competent you are in developing a projectile path reverse engineering algorithm

 Keep wrote:
my own simulation model with drag dependence on cd-mach-relation ship curves like this ]http://zak-smith.org/~zak/DigiCam/McCoy/small/156_5700_img.jpg

Ok, so that's the exact curve you used?

Well no gak. You said hitting a moving aircraft (that means, if target is left, steer left) is harder then tracking a projectile...

Yes, and it should be pretty obvious why. Counter-battery fire requires accurate tracking of a target, and then a return shot on a fixed point. Hitting aircraft requires accurate tracking of a much faster and more maneuverable target for a much longer time, filtering out the target's countermeasures (flares, etc), and having enough energy to pursue the target despite its evasion attempts.

Then let us know how competent you are in developing a projectile path reverse engineering algorithm

Which is an interesting question, but not one that's very relevant here. Whether or not I personally feel like investing enough time to do it doesn't change the fact that it's not a very difficult task for the computer once you have the software. The flight path of a ballistic projectile can be completely derived from just a few data points because the equations governing its movement are very well understood. Once you have enough CPU power to do the required calculations fast enough (and radar capable of tracking the shell accurately) all that's left is testing your software to make sure it works correctly.

 TheCustomLime wrote:

 Kain wrote:
The number of non-tankers here talking like they know about tanks makes my head hurt. If another person takes the line of thinking that "sloped armor automatically = better" I am going to slap them.

weaponsofwwii wrote:
Slope Effect
One of the most mis-understood aspects of armour design is sloped armour. The common argument is that sloped armour offers better protection than vertical armour, simply because the sloped armour offers a thicker horizontal protection for the same plate thickness. If this argument was true, sloped armour would not only fail to offer a better protection for an armour plate of a given weight, but would in fact in some cases decrease the protection of the armour plate.
Net Weight Reduction (Trigonomic Approach)
Consider two armour plates: one is vertical, and one has an inclination of 30 degrees from vertical. The armour plates must both offer a protection equivilant to 100 mm thickness. Obviously, the vertical plate must be 100 mm thick. If using pure trigonometry to calculate the required thickness of the other plate, we would get 100 mm × cos (30) ≈ 87 mm. While this result would seem to indicate a weight saving of 13 percent, it does not take into account that the armour plate would have to be longer to cover the same area.
If the armour plate would have to be 1000 mm tall, the height of the vertical armour plate would naturally be 1000 mm. The length of the sloped armour plate, however, would have to be longer, since sloping the armour would reduce the height covered by a plate 1000 mm long. The exact length is easily calculated as 1000 mm ÷ cos(30) ≈ 1155 mm. Since 100 mm × 1000 mm ≈ 87 mm × 1155 mm, it is demonstrated that the weight will be identical of two plates that has the same horizontal thickness and covers the same area, regardless of slope. Formally, this can be presented as cos(x) ÷ cos(x) = 1.
Potential Protection Reduction
Since it would appear that the calculation above does not favour neither vertical nor sloped armour (aside from a slightly more cumbersome interior layout for the sloped armour), if the purely trigonomic advantage in horizontal thickness was the only advantage, the thinner, sloped armour plate would in fact be at a disadvantage. Although thinner armour plates will usually have a higher Brinell hardness, the thinner plate is more likely to be overmatched.
If a plug is formed when a shot hits a sloped armour plate, the plug will offer less resistance than the surrounding armour plate. As a result, the shot will turn towards the armour plate, decreasing the effective angle and negating much of the increased horizontal thickness. (WAL 710/492)

Sloped armor is generally used when you can't cast a thick enough vertical plate for the amount of effective thickness that you want. There is the benefit of increased chances of deflection, but modern shells strike at such high velocities that if they fail to penetrate the armor; they just outright shatter rather than deflect so that hasn't been a realistic consideration since the T-64 first rolled out with a smoothbore APDS gun.

The Leman Russ is very much an interwar design of the same breed as the ToG II, and the stats given to it by Forgeworld are patently ridiculous in many places, but please stop pretending to be experts on tanks when you aren't. If flat armor were so terrible; then every modern main battle tank would be at fault for having more or less completely flat sides.

High profile is also not a universal disadvantage like many think it is. High profile offers greater visibility, increased crew comfort and ammunition storage, and also generally means that your tank can have more gun depression than a lower profile counterpart would. Building a tank really low means you need to find short people to pilot it and also tends to kill your tank's gun depression which is not the greatest thing in the world when you have to fight over ridges and hills or in urban terrain.

Fair enough about the flat armor argument. Sloped armor wouldn't offer much protection against energy weapons either. However, I disagree with you about the high profile argument in relation to the Leman Russ. The Leman Russ tank's gun cannot depress beyond pointing straight ahead. This is primarily an issue with the turret design as the gun is stopped from going lower by the bottom plate. On the Stygies and Ryza patterns this problem seems to be corrected but I am unsure as how common those patterns are.

In addition, while having a tall profile in of itself isn't a bad thing but the Leman Russ is excessively tall. Taller than any modern tank in service. It is going to stick out like a sore thumb as others have noted. (It is 14.5 ft tall or 4.4m. In comparison, the M1 Abrams is 8 feet tall. The WW1 British heavy tanks, the ones they are based off of is also 8 feet tall. The Monstrous Jagdtiger is 9 feet tall as was the Sherman).

The Leman Russ is a stupid tank design, I'm not disputing that.

But anybody who pretends it's uniquely bad needs to take a look at non-40k things.

There are after all; things that make the Leman Russ look like a stroke of engineering genius.



Or the relentlessly mockable UNSC scorpion with it's pansy ass WW2 era 90mm, piss weak armor, and ridiculous hugeness (the dimensions are roughly equal to the Imperial Macharius Superheavy tank hilariously enough)

(teledyne expeditionary tank)

Or this...thing...

Oh my god the Scorpion... I swear that thing was designed from the ground up to kill it's crew. It's thin armor, the stupidly exposed crew (Seriously, why is the crew only protected by a hatch that can be knocked off by small arms fire?), the stupid way the hull gun is operated, the lack of a coaxial machine gun... I think the reason the Scorpion did as well as it did is because it's Covenant counterpart was somehow even worse.

 Keep wrote:
And what do A2A missiles have to do with aircrafts beeing able to penetrate a AA heavy environment?

The guidance systems are the same, so the air to air missile results demonstrate that missile guidance was far from perfect even in Vietnam. It's a response to your claim that SAMs are a simple problem that we solved back in the 1950s.

Anyway, remember that source you posted for B-52 loss rates? It also points out that hitting those B-52s required spamming "dozens" of SAMs per kill. That's hardly an impressive hit rate.

Hitting aircraft requires accurate tracking of a much faster and more maneuverable target for a much longer time, filtering out the target's countermeasures (flares, etc), and having enough energy to pursue the target despite its evasion attempts

faster? Artillery shells travel in the mach 1-3 range (depending on shot angle) and are significantly smaller then an aircraft. Not sure what movies you watched where Bombers evaded a mach 4 missile...
Proximity Missiles dont require a full hits, so evasions are difficult and even partial hits can be enough to put the aircraft out of action for several days

Ok, so that's the exact curve you used?

No, obviously not. You don't get that data from a projectile when you're tracking it with a radar. Could as well be a round cannonball...

The guidance systems are the same, so the air to air missile results demonstrate that missile guidance was far from perfect even in Vietnam. It's a response to your claim that SAMs are a simple problem that we solved back in the 1950s.
Anyway, remember that source you posted for B-52 loss rates? It also points out that hitting those B-52s required spamming "dozens" of SAMs per kill. That's hardly an impressive hit rate.

I guess you haven't read the article. It's quite obvious that if you can dedicate dozens of escorts just for ECM jamming and other obfuscation, AND fly below the effective envelope of the SAM that it simply cant be as successfull.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
Having a modern missile does not make one a modern army. The NVA was numerically and technologically greatly inferior to the US. Not to mention they did not have any infrastructure to speak of. And by waging a guerilla war in the jungle, they definitely were a 'bush army'.

The example is from the bombing missions over Hanoi, not guerrilla war in the jungle.

That the Leman Russ is not a great design is undeniable, but it still is superior to WW2 and even modern tanks by virtue of having far superior technology.

Except it really isn't. Superior technology doesn't matter if your tanks are all immobilized 50 miles from the battlefield because they have no ability to drive over any terrain more difficult than a high-quality paved road. I mean, we're talking about a tank that could potentially be stopped by the average parking lot speed bump. At least the WWII tank is going to reach the battle and contribute.

No it is not. The only contribution a WW2 tank will give to battles in the year 40000 is wasted resources.
The Leman Russ on the other hand is perfectly capable of getting to the battlefield and crossing trenches. It is not going to be stopped by a speed bump.

 Keep wrote:
Proximity Missiles dont require a full hits, so evasions are difficult and even partial hits can be enough to put the aircraft out of action for several days

I'm not talking about making a last-second evasion and dodging a direct hit, I'm talking about making a high-g turn that the missile can't follow. Once the missile's rocket burns out it's gliding and has a limited amount of energy to pursue and hit the target. High-g maneuvering burns energy very quickly, and only the plane is able to replace it. So the missile slows down, falls behind, and doesn't get anywhere near the target.

No, obviously not. You don't get that data from a projectile when you're tracking it with a radar. Could as well be a round cannonball...

You get it because as an engineer designing a counter-battery system you're familiar with artillery shells and know their aerodynamic properties.

I guess you haven't read the article. It's quite obvious that if you can dedicate dozens of escorts just for ECM jamming and other obfuscation, AND fly below the effective envelope of the SAM that it simply cant be as successfull.

I read it, you just don't like the conclusion that it offers. SAMs aren't a magic "no planes allowed" weapon, and certainly weren't back then. In a hypothetical 40k battle you can expect the same kind of ECM/anti-radar missiles/etc to be used to protect the bombers. The only difference would be that the Imperium has a much higher tolerance for losses and will happily sacrifice a million pilots to take down an AA network if it is the key to winning the war.

And yes, it's possible that the Imperium lost the STCs for ECM and anti-radar missiles, but that just goes back to the original point: if the Imperium can't avoid getting stuck in trench warfare it's because of their own incompetence, not because trench warfare is a reasonable thing to expect.


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 Iron_Captain wrote:
The Leman Russ on the other hand is perfectly capable of getting to the battlefield and crossing trenches. It is not going to be stopped by a speed bump.

Apparently you haven't looked at the design, because there is no way it can handle anything tougher than a high-quality paved road without immobilizing itself. There's no (meaningful) suspension, and an inch or two of ground clearance at most. The only possible explanation for its success is an ork-style psychic effect where the faith of the LRBT's crew allows it to do things that it shouldn't be capable of.

 Peregrine wrote:

Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
The Leman Russ on the other hand is perfectly capable of getting to the battlefield and crossing trenches. It is not going to be stopped by a speed bump.

Apparently you haven't looked at the design, because there is no way it can handle anything tougher than a high-quality paved road without immobilizing itself. There's no (meaningful) suspension, and an inch or two of ground clearance at most. The only possible explanation for its success is an ork-style psychic effect where the faith of the LRBT's crew allows it to do things that it shouldn't be capable of.

I don't know if you have ever looked at the time 40k takes place in, but it is quite far (like really incredibly far) into the future. One can reasonably assume the Leman Russ is made of fancy magical space metals and has fancy magical space technologies that allow it to operate as effectively as described in the fluff, despite the design being horrible from an early 2nd milennium point of view.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
I don't know if you have ever looked at the time 40k takes place in, but it is quite far (like really incredibly far) into the future. One can reasonably assume the Leman Russ is made of fancy magical space metals and has fancy magical space technologies that allow it to operate as effectively as described in the fluff, despite the design being horrible from an early 2nd milennium point of view.

"Magical space metals" is not a solution to a geometry problem.

 Peregrine wrote:
Oh no, a 2% loss rate. You do realize that this is the Imperium we're talking about, where sacrificing whole regiments of guardsmen to defend an irrelevant patch of territory is standard practice, right? The Imperium doesn't have mourning families back home or political concerns to deal with. If it takes 100% losses to win the war then they aren't going to hesitate for a moment to do it. Life is cheap, and the only calculation that matters is the value of aircraft vs. the value of targets they destroy added to the value of the objectives they accomplish.

Aircraft are much more expensive than tanks and space-capable ones probably reach crazy price territory. We're talking about 10+x the price of Leman Russ per aircraft and 100+x per space aircraft.
So, I suspect that pulling their aircraft out may make sense, especially space-capable.

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
Aircraft are much more expensive than tanks and space-capable ones probably reach crazy price territory. We're talking about 10+x the price of Leman Russ per aircraft and 100+x per space aircraft.
So, I suspect that pulling their aircraft out may make sense, especially space-capable.

Citation for this? When you answer please remember that the Imperium does not pay money for its troops and equipment, it holds a gun to a planet's metaphorical head and says "give us what we need or die".

 Peregrine wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:
I don't know if you have ever looked at the time 40k takes place in, but it is quite far (like really incredibly far) into the future. One can reasonably assume the Leman Russ is made of fancy magical space metals and has fancy magical space technologies that allow it to operate as effectively as described in the fluff, despite the design being horrible from an early 2nd milennium point of view.

"Magical space metals" is not a solution to a geometry problem.

Yes it is. You forget we are dealing with fiction. Magical space metal is the solution to anything:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AppliedPhlebotinum?from=Main.Handwavium

You get it because as an engineer designing a counter-battery system you're familiar with artillery shells and know their aerodynamic properties.

Yes you could propably extract it from the data you measure, but you are not presented the data of that particular projectile the enemy fired at you in a nice table.

The only difference would be that the Imperium has a much higher tolerance for losses and will happily sacrifice a million pilots to take down an AA network if it is the key to winning the war.

They send groundforces, because that is cheap and easy to replace. Aircraft are not, unless you have seen evidence that the imperial navy likes to sacrifice fighters?

I'm not talking about making a last-second evasion and dodging a direct hit, I'm talking about making a high-g turn that the missile can't follow.

Thats why maneuverable fighters are engaged with slower missiles and sustainer motor / ramjet

 Peregrine wrote:

 Aszubaruzah Surn wrote:
Aircraft are much more expensive than tanks and space-capable ones probably reach crazy price territory. We're talking about 10+x the price of Leman Russ per aircraft and 100+x per space aircraft.
So, I suspect that pulling their aircraft out may make sense, especially space-capable.

Citation for this? When you answer please remember that the Imperium does not pay money for its troops and equipment, it holds a gun to a planet's metaphorical head and says "give us what we need or die".

There's no in-world citation for this. That's how things look in real world, which is where the fluff writers probably got the idea from.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
Oh my god the Scorpion... I swear that thing was designed from the ground up to kill it's crew. It's thin armor, the stupidly exposed crew (Seriously, why is the crew only protected by a hatch that can be knocked off by small arms fire?), the stupid way the hull gun is operated, the lack of a coaxial machine gun... I think the reason the Scorpion did as well as it did is because it's Covenant counterpart was somehow even worse.

The Wraith is a lightly armored mortar carriage forced into front-line duty, so yeah, the covenant fields something even worse than a tank that would lose to a WW2 era King Tiger.

As an IG player, and a soon to be mechanical engineer, all of the tracked vehicles, minus the rhino chassis, and sicaran really bug me.

It added that extra motivation for me to go scratchbuild/conversions, but also made me buy the forgeworld LR bits.

The thing that bugs me the most about all of them, are the sponsons. If you were to put sponsons on a vehicle in the future, definitely do not shove them through the suspension. Have em off of the turret, or a side skirt affair.

The suspension on Imperial vehicles is just archaic, no travel, WAY TOO HIGH of a profile, for anything.

A turret and turret ring that tiny, would never happen past early WW2.

straight/flat surfaces have been the new fad for the past 20 or so odd years thanks to composite armor, so the front of the LR is meh to me.

Also, barrel length, especially with smooth bore designs, has shown to be less of an issue. Also ammunition technologies have made even low pressure, low velocity guns to still be effective, and allow use of ATGMs or other specialized ordnance.

LR is way too front heavy, and too squat of a design for me to even consider it as plausible. But the fluff behind it is why I still like it.

If I were to make 40k tank, it would definitely borrow from the majority of modern tanks, but also bring back some old ideas.

With the awesome new tech just out of material sciences, I would definitely consider a tank that utilizes a mix of bell crank, christie, and torsion bar designs.

I think the best protection for the LR against both enemy fire and criticism is its unbreakable plot armor.

Debates on its design and comparisons with modern tanks are always fun to make but mostly irrelevant. They are irrelevant not only because we apply our XXI° century mindsets to frame the "LR problem", but merely because GW said this tank is awesome and then, this tank is. Period.