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Hey everybody. A lot of you guys know a lot more about military history than me. So, the newer heavy tanks from Forge World (the Macharius and Malcador) are great, evocative vehicles. Are they based on anything from the real world?

Here's some pics...

Malcador


Malcador Defender


Macharius

Not really.

The basic design concept of the tank is a British WW1 heavy tank with added weapons and turrets.

It would not be possible to fit all the weapons and crew into any real world tank without making it a lot larger -- which is what they have done with the model. Look at the size of the crewman.

This is impossible IRL because of problems of moving the tank around without it sinking into the ground, crushing bridges and culverts, and so on. Also it just makes a larger, more valuable target and mechanically complex and liable to breakdown.

The idea of multiple guns and turrets has been used on various real world designs however they were never successful and the basic tank concept reverted to a single turret with a main gun and a couple of machine guns.

Real tanks worth looking at:

British Mark V
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_I_tank#Mark_V_series

British Mark A Whippet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medium_Mark_A_Whippet

Vickers A1E1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vickers_A1E1_Independent

Soviet T35
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-35

M3 Lee/Grant
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M3_Lee
This was the only successful multi gun design and was only a stop gap to get a 75mm gun into action while the Sherman was being designed.

M2 Stuart
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M2_Light_Tank
This had extra MGs in the side sponsons but in later models they were removed and the basic design became a turret and one hull MG. Most WW2 tanks had a hull MG but that feature was being dropped by the end of the war.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

The basic design concept of the tank is a British WW1 heavy tank with added weapons and turrets.

It would not be possible to fit all the weapons and crew into any real world tank without making it a lot larger -- which is what they have done with the model. Look at the size of the crewman.

This is impossible IRL because of problems of moving the tank around without it sinking into the ground, crushing bridges and culverts, and so on. Also it just makes a larger, more valuable target and mechanically complex and liable to breakdown.

The idea of multiple guns and turrets has been used on various real world designs however they were never successful and the basic tank concept reverted to a single turret with a main gun and a couple of machine guns.

Real tanks worth looking at:

British Mark V
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_I_tank#Mark_V_series

British Mark A Whippet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medium_Mark_A_Whippet

Vickers A1E1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vickers_A1E1_Independent

Soviet T35
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T-35

M3 Lee/Grant
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M3_Lee
This was the only successful multi gun design and was only a stop gap to get a 75mm gun into action while the Sherman was being designed.

M2 Stuart
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M2_Light_Tank
This had extra MGs in the side sponsons but in later models they were removed and the basic design became a turret and one hull MG. Most WW2 tanks had a hull MG but that feature was being dropped by the end of the war.

Wasn't the Leman Russ Chassis a French WW1 design that GW used to sell before reusing the mold for IG? Pretty sure I have read this somewhere, maybe on Dak Dak?

They're kind of like an over the top version of the US's Mk VIII tank that came out right after World War I.

I'm pretty sure that the first tank was stolen directly from the set of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom (remember the tank?) and that Steven Spielberg is going to show up in the near future with a lawyer demanding a cut of profits from Forgeworld....

http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat1060053&prodId=prod1101972

The real world 'inspirations' for the basic vehicles are this:

Leman Russ and Land Raider = British Mark V.
Chimera = Soviet BMP/Mark V
Rhino = FV432 or M113./Mark V

The US Mark VIII was basically a development of the British series of WW1.

The British wanted to put a turret on them from the beginning but they could not produce the necessary turret ring so they went with sponsons as a stop gap.

The Sentinel of course is a completely original GW concept.