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I was looking through my model collection last night when I noticed that I had an old Leman Russ tank where the twin lascannon turret off one of my Predator models would fit the tank hull. I was then somewhat surprised to find in the IG codex there isn't a Leman Russ with a lascannon main armament. After some website searching I found a wiki entry for the Leman Russ Annihilator tank (used primarily by Death Corps of Krieg) that did have a double lascannon turret. However, I don't see that rules for such a tank carried over to 8th, nor apparently, did the actual model.

So, I'd like to scratchbuild one. Before I order some parts though, I wanted to see if anyone has gotten the predator twin lascannon barrel to fit into a recent Leman Russ turret (Not a big concern if not, as I said the Predator turret does fit one of my old Leman Russ models). Furthermore, if I'm going to go ahead with this project and make a custom model anyways, I'm thinking of "lasering" this tank up - twin lascannons in the turret, hull-mounted lascannon and, of course, lascannon sponsons. That'd be what, 199 points?. (Speaking of which, why aren't lascannons available in sponsons anyways?)

Whether its efficient or not, I just want a model of this. But would it be something that other folks would be interested to run? Any other tank variants not covered by the current rules that'd be interesting to model?

I did an Annihilator variant for my magnetized LR out of two HWS Lascannons:


Pretty simple, but it looks good

Oh, nice - I hadn't considered that. May be the way to go for me as I have a couple spare lascannons lying about from an old land raider kit.

The rules are / were in "Imperial Armour – Index: Forces of the Astra Militarum" but that seems to have gone from the FW site, like the turret itself.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I keep meaning to do a Leman Russ Arachnos - "Replaced the tracks with eight robotic legs. Only one working prototype of this variant is known to exist."

I also have a twin missile launcher option:


I thought it made sense beside the twin autocannon and lascannon.
From a lore perspective I think a Multilaseroption would also make kind of sense. Maybe quad multilaser, so 60% of the Punishers shots for +2S and +12'' range

beast_gts wrote:
The rules are / were in "Imperial Armour – Index: Forces of the Astra Militarum" but that seems to have gone from the FW site, like the turret itself.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I keep meaning to do a Leman Russ Arachnos - "Replaced the tracks with eight robotic legs. Only one working prototype of this variant is known to exist."

This.

The annihilator variant is a Forgeworld model. Forgeworld models had rules published by FW, and so are not found in the Astra Millitarum codex.

They DO have current 8e rules and point values found in the imperial armour book mentioned above. However, GW have announced they are replacing these books with new room "soon". Therefore the old book is out of print, may be hard to find, and even if you can find it will likely soon be obsolete.

This is further complicated by the fact that the Annihilator has also been removed from the FW webstore. This may mean it is being retired and wont appear in the new rules. Which may mean it will be moved to Legends, making its legality for games questionable depending on what context you are playing in.

That last bit is a fair bit of speculation though, we really have to wait and see!

Pyroalchi wrote:
I also have a twin missile launcher option

Very cool! It's kind of odd that the Imperium doesn't do missile carriers / tanks - AFAIK there's just the Praetor Armoured Assault Launcher (apart from the Manticore / Deathstrike).

beast_gts wrote:

Pyroalchi wrote:
I also have a twin missile launcher option

Very cool! It's kind of odd that the Imperium doesn't do missile carriers / tanks - AFAIK there's just the Praetor Armoured Assault Launcher (apart from the Manticore / Deathstrike).

Whirlwind too if you're talking general Imperium

 Stux wrote:

beast_gts wrote:

Pyroalchi wrote:
I also have a twin missile launcher option

Very cool! It's kind of odd that the Imperium doesn't do missile carriers / tanks - AFAIK there's just the Praetor Armoured Assault Launcher (apart from the Manticore / Deathstrike).

Whirlwind too if you're talking general Imperium

True - Marines have a few variants (4/5?), and there's the Sicaran Arcus, Land Raider Helios & Hunter.


OK - so the Imperium does have a few missile tanks

beast_gts wrote:

 Stux wrote:

beast_gts wrote:

Pyroalchi wrote:
I also have a twin missile launcher option

Very cool! It's kind of odd that the Imperium doesn't do missile carriers / tanks - AFAIK there's just the Praetor Armoured Assault Launcher (apart from the Manticore / Deathstrike).

Whirlwind too if you're talking general Imperium

True - Marines have a few variants (4/5?), and there's the Sicaran Arcus, Land Raider Helios & Hunter.


OK - so the Imperium does have a few missile tanks

Well, how are are you defining a Missile carrier Manticore/Deathstrike are very different to your Whirlwind or Exorcist.

Man, GW/FW missed an opportunity by not giving us calliope version of a Leman Russ with a rocket battery atop the turret. I'm also fond of that rocket pod Leman, might have to buy a turret to try a shot at making one of those.

That and a Katusha-style chimera (or Taurox?) with a dozen or so mini-missile launchers. Basically a Manticore, but that won't run out of missiles during the game.

 Stormonu wrote:
I was looking through my model collection last night when I noticed that I had an old Leman Russ tank where the twin lascannon turret off one of my Predator models would fit the tank hull. I was then somewhat surprised to find in the IG codex there isn't a Leman Russ with a lascannon main armament. After some website searching I found a wiki entry for the Leman Russ Annihilator tank (used primarily by Death Corps of Krieg) that did have a double lascannon turret. However, I don't see that rules for such a tank carried over to 8th, nor apparently, did the actual model.

So, I'd like to scratchbuild one. Before I order some parts though, I wanted to see if anyone has gotten the predator twin lascannon barrel to fit into a recent Leman Russ turret (Not a big concern if not, as I said the Predator turret does fit one of my old Leman Russ models). Furthermore, if I'm going to go ahead with this project and make a custom model anyways, I'm thinking of "lasering" this tank up - twin lascannons in the turret, hull-mounted lascannon and, of course, lascannon sponsons. That'd be what, 199 points?. (Speaking of which, why aren't lascannons available in sponsons anyways?)

Whether its efficient or not, I just want a model of this. But would it be something that other folks would be interested to run? Any other tank variants not covered by the current rules that'd be interesting to model?

The rules are out there for the Leman Russ Annihilator, it's basically a 40pt turret option for a Russ (but not as a Tank Commander...apparently) except because it is it's own datasheet instead of an addition to the one in the IG codex it's all still costed using the original 8E index point values and rules for everything, the rules are in the FW Index, which means they haven't been updated in years and IIRC may no longer be available from FW.

I loved the original FW concept and turret design...but alas.

@ Stormonu: it would be a cool concept.

One thing I also want to kitbash one day is something similar to the M50 Ontos:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M50_Ontos
So basically a very light, ideally small chassis (centaur light carrier?) with 6 Hunter Killer missiles on top. It would only have 6 shots and be more or less dead weight afterwards, but it would be one really mean round of shooting.



Regarding the Annihilator: while it is still index costed it is noteworthy that it's a better tank killer than the Vanquisher, even outperforming the Vanquisher Tank Commander.
vs. T7 3+:
Vanquisher TC: 2 x 2/3 x 2/3 x5/6 x 9/2 = 3.33 wounds
Annihilator: 4 x 1/2 x 2/3 x 5/6 x 7/2= 3.88 wounds

vs. T8 3+:
Vanquisher TC: 2 x 2/3 x 1/2 x5/6 x 9/2 = 2.5 wounds
Annihilator: 4 x 1/2 x 2/3 x 5/6 x 7/2= 3.88 wounds

But that is mainly because mathematically the Vanquisher really sucks at the moment.

 Stormonu wrote:
That and a Katusha-style chimera (or Taurox?) with a dozen or so mini-missile launchers. Basically a Manticore, but that won't run out of missiles during the game.

There was the Chimerro which had unlimited missiles (but I remember it having more launchers).

beast_gts wrote:

 Stormonu wrote:
That and a Katusha-style chimera (or Taurox?) with a dozen or so mini-missile launchers. Basically a Manticore, but that won't run out of missiles during the game.

There was the Chimerro which had unlimited missiles (but I remember it having more launchers).

You may be thinking of the 40K scale conversion that featured in White Dwarf and Inquisitor magazine.

Those weren't just Inquisitor magazine things - the Chimera variants existed in Epic but did not translate into 40K (hence the conversions you see). So there is fluff/lore behind the variations.

Chimedon, Chimerro, Chimerax if I recall.

PS: Kromlech do a line of varient Russ turrets now for reasonably cheap - including a twin-lascannon version.

https://bitsofwar.com/home/1273-lr-cannon-4.html

oh, nice! Thanks for pointing those all out.

One can never have enough tanks (variants).

 Elbows wrote:
Those weren't just Inquisitor magazine things

No one said they were. Hence why I specifically said "40K scale conversions" after quoting a post with an article containing the original Epic model and addressing the poster's recollection of it looking different.

Funny thing is, as i sit here and look through my 5th edition imperial guard codex(still the best guard codex). it does include 7 variants of the leman russ (not the annihilator ) even including the twin linked autocannon exterminator the space wolves used to be able to include in their marine army (manned by marines of course)

.standard battle cannon
.exterminator-autocannons
.vanquisher
.eradicator nova cannon
.demolisher
.punisher
.executioner plasma cannon


When it comes to missiles the manitcore is the main guard tank platform when they do not feel like fielding one of the many variants of cannon/mortar artillery available to them.