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I know and love the Razorback Rikarius and the Rhino Advancer, but what are some other obscure or little known vehicles of the Space Marines or Imperium?

I'd like to see more on the APDS-6a Defender, a stopgap Chimera modification from Armageddon equipped with a laser destroyer.

 Haighus wrote:
I'd like to see more on the APDS-6a Defender, a stopgap Chimera modification from Armageddon equipped with a laser destroyer.

Hadn't heard of that one before... now I want one

Chimera variants?

Chimero, Chimedon and Chimerax. I can’t remember which is which, or if they sacrificed transport capacity, but one had a quad Autocannon turret, one a Battlecannon Turret, the other an array of Hunter Killer Missiles.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Chimero, Chimedon and Chimerax.

Seconded - Chimero had extra HKs, Chimedon the mini battlecannon and Chimerax had the autocannon (SOL link).

beast_gts wrote:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Chimero, Chimedon and Chimerax.

Seconded - Chimero had extra HKs, Chimedon the mini battlecannon and Chimerax had the autocannon (SOL link).

I have a distinct feeling those three live on in the Taurox Prime weapon options.

That’s a bloody good point, hadn’t thought of that!

Up until a few years ago I would have said the Sabre, which only existed as a Rogue Trader-era white dwarf conversion article before Forgeworld resurrected it.

The Hermetika command variant of the Spartan assault tank. Mentioned once in Horus Heresy Book V: Tempest (Page 237, sidebar for the Damocles Rhino)

The Shedu-class Overlander, a six-wheeled transport used by the Steel legion

the Squat Overlord Armoured Airship, Iron Eagle Gyrocopter and Goliath mega-cannon. everyone remembers the land train but not the other stuff

The Capitol Imperialis. Lots of people remember this tank, but almost nobody remembers that it's a variant of the Squat Leviathan, they gave the plans to the Imperium.

The Adeptus Arbites Castigator riot control vehicle. Has since had its name stolen by the Sisters of Battle. Repressor is better known but still fairly obscure

The Hercules Heavy Tank used by space marines.

Jump Sentinels. Exactly what they sound like, used during the Heresy

the Pegasus AAV - Amphibious transport based on the Rhino chassis

All the weird little tanks they made for Krieg in Epic, like the Ragnarok, Siegfried and Bruennhilde

Van Cleef's Wader, a type of primitive transport vehicle that showed up in Dark Heresy 2nd edition

not imperial, but the Eldar Bright Stallion, Fire Gale and Towering Destroyer Knights

There's a ton of obscure imperial vehicles that were mentioned in passing or as one-offs

Brain is telling me the Olympus battle tank? That might be a tempestus fugitives thing though so...

Edit: it was 'Olympia Storm Tank' and it was in the tempestus fugitives 'Age of the Emperor' book so scratch that.

The "Chaos Infernal Relic Achillies" has got to be a rare bird though.
For every hull point it has lost its quad mortar gains +1S -1AP and an extra -1Ld for pinning tests.
So losing 3hp makes the quad-mortar S8 AP2 Heavy4, small blast, barrage, pinning, shellshock

Jump sentinels also got used by that steampunk regiment in Fire Caste, iirc. That book also notably has steampunk power armor suits and an aquatic fortress (battleship?).

Gods of Mars features the Iron Fist - an open-topped command Rhino variant with a quad heavy bolter; and the Leman Russ Destroyer - the only detail of which is that it has sponson lascannons (The Warhammer World Cadian Muster display features a Russ with lascannon sponsons, but the turret is a Vanquisher).

The King Russ was featured in an old White Dwarf - having long-barrel battlecanon, predating the Vanquisher.

In the Gaunts Ghost's novel "His last command" (around page 425 in the Omnibus "The Lost") an Artillery unit from Dev Hetra is mentioned, sporting several Hydras and quote "multi laser carriages".

It is not really specified what kind of vehicle it is but when I asked around for ideas on that the forum consensus was that it might be similar to the WW2 universal carrier. From the description it was intended to be used to supress enemy infantry

Would that not be a Rapier?


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 Lord Damocles wrote:
Gods of Mars features the Iron Fist - an open-topped command Rhino variant with a quad heavy bolter; and the Leman Russ Destroyer - the only detail of which is that it has sponson lascannons (The Warhammer World Cadian Muster display features a Russ with lascannon sponsons, but the turret is a Vanquisher).

The King Russ was featured in an old White Dwarf - having long-barrel battlecanon, predating the Vanquisher.

There was (is?) a Leman Russ Destroyer, with a whacking great hull mounted laser.

It's not as obscure as most things mentioned already as we have a current model for it, but the Kharon Pattern Acquisitor has one of the most outlandish designs in the imperial armoury.

 Pyroalchi wrote:
In the Gaunts Ghost's novel "His last command" (around page 425 in the Omnibus "The Lost") an Artillery unit from Dev Hetra is mentioned, sporting several Hydras and quote "multi laser carriages".

It is not really specified what kind of vehicle it is but when I asked around for ideas on that the forum consensus was that it might be similar to the WW2 universal carrier. From the description it was intended to be used to supress enemy infantry

I suspect those are more likely to be Rapier carriers. Whilst their most famous incarnation carries a laser destroyer array, a variant carries multilasers and had a model in... 2nd edition I think. It is probably a reference to that.

It varied! Originally it was a Laser Destroyer, then Multi-Laser, then deleted, then brought back and so on and so forth.

In terms of available Heresy models, Astartes get the Laser Destroyer, Solar Auxilia the Quad Multi-Laser.

The latter of which in 2nd Ed terms is a frankly sickening rate of fire!

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
It's not as obscure as most things mentioned already as we have a current model for it, but the Kharon Pattern Acquisitor has one of the most outlandish designs in the imperial armoury.

It's very Lynch Dune-like.

 Iron_Hands_Fan wrote:
I know and love the Razorback Rikarius and the Rhino Advancer, but what are some other obscure or little known vehicles of the Space Marines or Imperium?

Everything in every imperial armor FW book from 3rd-7th edition is quite literally this-rare variants of standard designs. just in land raiders alone aside from the big 3-

(phobos/crusader/redeemer) you have the ares, achillies, terminus ultra, prometheus, hyperios and spartan. and the little tiny one from rouge trader.


P.S. jump/drop sentinels were still around in use by the elysians

I still have a soft spot for the short lived Warlord sub-classes of the original Adeptus Titanicus.

Not just varying arms, but void shield count, movement, manoeuvrability. Introduced at a time before Warhounds and Reavers were released to provide variety, they remain an interesting glimpse at what might still lurk in the reserves of Titan Legions.

does the Genestealer limo count as obscure? certainly wish they would bring that back

Limos are a bit of a tricky one, because it was never actually a particular vehicle, it was a generic class of vehicle lumped together into a single statblock and called a limo.
Having said that the example artwork they gave for it was pretty badass, and that was fairly obscure

My braincells are already too overloaded with fictional tanks names and I have nearly forgotten all when arrived at the bottom of the page lol. However, do I read correctly that the limousine was litteraly "pick a toy car" ?

On the forgotten designs part. I would have loved to see more models or wider spread use to the AT-70 of the sabbath worlds crusade.

Unless I simply unaware of them?

 Maréchal des Logis Walter wrote:
My braincells are already too overloaded with fictional tanks names and I have nearly forgotten all when arrived at the bottom of the page lol. However, do I read correctly that the limousine was litteraly "pick a toy car" ?

at the time i believe there were only a couple vehicle kits despite there being a number of vehicles with stats.. the leman russ kit and the Rhino/Whirlwind/Predator kits primarily, plus a small ork buggy thing. scratch building, conversion, and proxying played a much bigger part of the game than they've become today.

Small ork buggy indeed. The OG. Battlewagon was available! You could precariously stack 20+ boyz in that bad boy, and if they fell off the. Those models took damage and had to run to catch up!

Have you got the rule snippet for that? 'd love to read it as this sounds insanely hilarious

 aphyon wrote:
just in land raiders alone aside from the big 3-

(phobos/crusader/redeemer) you have the ares, achillies, terminus ultra, prometheus, hyperios and spartan. and the little tiny one from rouge trader.

Don't forget the Excelsior and Deimos.

 Maréchal des Logis Walter wrote:
Have you got the rule snippet for that? 'd love to read it as this sounds insanely hilarious

It’s pretty short. 2nd edition rules could do that

https://www.sprubitz.co.uk/space-ork-battlewagon-vehicle-data-card-from-warhammer-40000-2nd-edition-3141-p.asp

The banner pole was useful for this as you could hook 3 boyz over it.

Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:It varied! Originally it was a Laser Destroyer, then Multi-Laser, then deleted, then brought back and so on and so forth.

In terms of available Heresy models, Astartes get the Laser Destroyer, Solar Auxilia the Quad Multi-Laser.

The latter of which in 2nd Ed terms is a frankly sickening rate of fire!

There are also HH (resin) models for Rapiers with quad heavy bolters and a graviton cannon. Essentially it is a platform that can mount multiple weapons.

Based on this, I see no reason to assume twin multilasers are not still a loadout in the lore, even if there are no current models or rules for them. Edit: FW also made a quad multilaser for their updated version of the Graia pattern Rapier, so definitely exists.

Here is the two early models, one showing a weapon that is clearly the inspiration for the current laser destroyer array, and one which looks more like twin multilasers:

Citadel Journal 43 says these are the Graia and Voss patterns respectively. So I think it is reasonable for Voss-pattern Rapiers to be equipped with multilasers as standard (the Citadel Journal article just counts them all as laser destroyers for simplicity, the earlier rules in Citadel Journal 32 gave them all multilasers).

aphyon wrote:

 Iron_Hands_Fan wrote:
I know and love the Razorback Rikarius and the Rhino Advancer, but what are some other obscure or little known vehicles of the Space Marines or Imperium?

Everything in every imperial armor FW book from 3rd-7th edition is quite literally this-rare variants of standard designs. just in land raiders alone aside from the big 3-

(phobos/crusader/redeemer) you have the ares, achillies, terminus ultra, prometheus, hyperios and spartan. and the little tiny one from rouge trader.


P.S. jump/drop sentinels were still around in use by the elysians

Technically jump sentinels are distinct from drop sentinels. The latter can be equipped with grav chutes and fit in a Valkyrie, the former actually have jump packs and can move around like assault Marines.

Not all of the FW designs are particularly rare IMO. I'd expect Armageddon-pattern Basilisks, for example, to be very common in much of Segmentum Solar as the planet is the principle source of Chimera-based vehicles for the region. Others, like the Trojan, are hugely-common workhorses also used by civilians- Imperial Armour states there are over a thousand known marks of Trojan! I don't think any other vehicle gets into triple figures for variants, let alone four. There are also simple field conversions like the Thunderer, which are probably very common in attritional wars.

 Maréchal des Logis Walter wrote:
Have you got the rule snippet for that? 'd love to read it as this sounds insanely hilarious

Here you go.

Same in second edition.