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The Obsidian Chariot

The design of the Land Raider predates the Imperium itself; this is well known. However, the Primarch of the Salamanders, Vulkan, rode with his Salamanders into war aboard one particular Land Raider, the Obsidian Chariot. The Fury of it's Machine Spirit was matched only by the heat of its cannons, and it was never lost on the field of battle. It is said that the Chariot's Machine Spirit was, in fact, sentient, an Artificial Intelligence, in defiance of all Mechanicus tradition, and quite fond of Vulkan as a side note, such that when first revived, upon hearing of his disappearance, the Machine Spirit was too melancholic to speak for a day or so. It, however, is one of the few souls to remember Vulkan in life, and it's memories alone would make it magnificent in matters of faith. It's prowess of the battlefield is only known by half-heard rumors. The lack of legends around it of course being because it left so few survivors in its wake.

BS: 5 Armor: 14/14/14

Special Rules: Fury Of The Machine, Assault Vehicle, Magma's Child

Fury Of The Machine: The Obsidian Chariot is not to be used lightly, for it's mind is temperamental and it's reliability best not spoken of, as it has been long denied of it's proper user. This rule is much like Power Of The Machine Spirit, and provides all the benefits, but to control such a powerful Machine Spirit, the operator must be strong of mind as well. To represent this, at the beginning of the controller's movement phase, the vehicle takes a Leadership Test at Leadership 9. If successful, the vehicle continues as normal. If double 1s are rolled, the Machine Spirit has performed wonderfully; the vehicle may fire a second extra weapon, and at a third target. However, if the test is failed, the vehicle becomes moody, and refuses to shoot. If double sixes are rolled, the Vehicle refuses to move or shoot entirely, nor can troops disembark this turn.

Magma's Child: The Obsidian Chariot is immune to the Melta rule, and Meltabombs only roll 8+D6 for penetration. In addition, the Obsidian Chariot rolls +1 on the Vehicle Damage table when Ramming, and leadership tests against it when Tank Shocking are at -2.

325 Points

Wargear

2 Sponson Mounted Dragonbreath Cannons

Pintle Mounted Flamestorm Cannon

Front mounted Multi-Melta

Dragonbreath Cannons: Far beyond the Technological prowess of the Imperium today, Dragonbreath Cannons are the greatest of Melta technology ever produced, holy artifacts of ages passed glowing with the Dark Age of Technology,

S: 10 AP: 1 Range: 36” Type: Heavy 1, Melta.

Transport Capacity: 12

Not to bad. Just a few points to consider.

1. An emotional and moody vehicle? Something doesn't quite seem right here. I can see the machine spirit being more intelligent than normal...but emotional as well? Hard to imagine.

2. What's the transport capacity?

3. It would seem strange if it were to have an assault ramp in the front as well as a front-mounted Flamestorm cannon. From a design perspective, that isn't very smart of the engineers to do. Just imagine:

Gunner: Burn, tyranid scum, burn!

Driver: Wait, our guys are disembarking!!

Gunner fires a full tank of burning promethium.

Gunner: What's that you said? It's too loud in here.....

I like the points/fluff and i think the plus's/drawbacks work nicely but why do weapons that are more then str 9 do 1 more damage to the vehicle?

Because the thing is coated in lava, which would weaken the armor against really powerful hits.

if anything I would give it immunity to Melta due to its design. and having magma pouring down its sides is a little odd. this is supposed to be a lost technological wonder, not some divine construct.

I would have it be immune to Melta weapons(weapons with the Melta special rule do not gain the benifit from it) and auto-pass terrain tests.

the moodyness needs to go, I would change it to be that it can PotMS 2 weapons instead of 1, or be able to move and fire 1 gun.

make it 350 points and a 0-1 choice(duh)

Transport capacity would be 10. it was supposed to carry the Primarch into battle, I am sure it can fit a min sized termy squad.

I'm slightly rewriting this...

Rewrote Magma's Child, and swapped the placement of the Flamestorm Cannon and Multi-Melta.

Still no transport capacity?

Also, with what is essentially ceramite sheilding on an AV14 vehicle, all those guns as well as the ramming/tank shocking buffs, I would say 300pts is a tad cheap. I agree with Grey Templar that the points need to be upped.

The idea of an overpowered land raider getting pissy and refusing to fight (a la "@#%@^ you guys, I'm goin' home!) is hilarious

Derped, I always meant for the thing to have transport capacity 12. And I'm thinking, maybe 325 points would be good?

Your Friend Doctor Robert wrote:Derped, I always meant for the thing to have transport capacity 12. And I'm thinking, maybe 325 points would be good?

Sounds reasonable.

brutal, i've borrowed your idea for the great crusade rule set i've been writing

it sounds pretty cool, and its pretty well thought out. I just have one problem.

a Land Raider is not a puppy dog. its a war machine.

no argument on its rules, just the verbage. maybe instead of "moody" it no longer has its known commander and without him refuses to accept orders it deems as in poor tactical choice or without the spirit of battle in its issuance.

not to piss in anyones cheerio's, just my $.02

This seems a little overpowered, I'd advise cutting the Hellfury cannons back to S8. And I might think up a different name for them, Hellfury missiles are anti-infantry rockets mounted on a Vendetta gunship and giving two completely different pieces of wargear the same name is asking for confusion sooner or later.

AnomanderRake wrote:This seems a little overpowered, I'd advise cutting the Hellfury cannons back to S8. And I might think up a different name for them, Hellfury missiles are anti-infantry rockets mounted on a Vendetta gunship and giving two completely different pieces of wargear the same name is asking for confusion sooner or later.

Everything with "Hell" or "Fire" in it is taken, gorramit.

I'll think something up in a bit.

Updated and renamed

Looks really good and balanced to me, only its points seem a little too much, but then the other tank that has that melta rule melta (monolith) cost more or less the same.

Personally I think it works nicely - from my recollections of the Titan books, Titan AI (and I assume by extension most imperial AI) is highly erratic, and a little eccentric and that's with its Princeps in good healthy working order, when their Princeps dies it's a fair bit of work to give it a new one, and there's been cases of Titans going down or losing their princeps and going insane.

So if this Land Raider did have AI that had bonded to this guy, and no one knew it was actually AI / was capable of linking a new commander it's entirely possible it would go a little crazy or develop major eccentries and I like that idea.

Can't really comment on the stats as I don't play marines but fluff wise it seems good tbh

I'd imagine Imperial Battleships are even worse about that, but this thing here has an exceptionally strong Machine Spirit for a vehicle its size.