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For the tank destroyer here is the old post from Thrasybulus Strategos I found that sparked a few diverting hours reading.
I've been playing about with a tank-heavy force, but the feel I was going for was more a light armour/screening force one - lots of Conquerors and Salamanders, some mech. infantry, limited artillery, only Warhounds in the way of titans (sometimes). Most of my force selections would work with your proposed list, which made me happy (although part of me would love to see two or three variant armoured regiment lists...). Although we were costing 10-strong Conqueror companies at 500 points, and that seemed to be about right.
Love where the tank riders are going; I will have a go with them as soon as I get a chance. Likewise 6-strong Griffon batteries.
I have a couple of pleas, though I suspect they'll be unpopular... I would like to see both Valkyries and Vultures in the list. They are basically like helicopters, which in many ways are just flying tanks - great shock weapons, highly manoeuvrable with lots of firepower. The best place for them, and their natural home, in my view, is supporting an armoured regiment (or drop troopers).
Fine, some units have to go to stop this list becoming just a harder version of the Steel Legion. But for my money, the first candidates for the drop should be genuine infantry support weapons - Demolishers (in the sidebar fluff in the old IG codex they actually seemed to be organic to some infantry companies...), Thunderers, and possibly Hellhounds. But also I'd exclude, or severely limit, dedicated tank destroyers (Destroyers, but also the Shadowswords that seem so popular in SL armies...). These should be basically defence-oriented and for helping the infantry to deal with enemy armour while your own proper tanks are off doing the things that tanks do best. I don't know about the rest of you but I'd rather have a tank list that reflected offensive, blitzkrieg style armoured warfare, than one which looked like a late WWII Panzer division on the defensive (which the SL list already does pretty neatly).
To give all this some spurious 'real-world' justification, I would cite the Soviet army of the 70s and 80s. Motor Rifle divisions (mechanized infantry heavy, with plenty of tanks and SP artillery - rather like the SL) had anti-tank battalions; Tank divisions didn't.
The difference is clearer in the assets available at the next level up (Corps to us in the West, but Army to the Soviets): Combined Arms Armies (3/4 MR divisions, 1 Tank division) on paper had an anti-tank battalion (with tank destroyers) and an anti-tank regiment (with towed guns). A Tank Army though, (4 Tank divisions) had neither of these. What it did have was an Airborne Assault Brigade, and an Attack Helicopter Regiment, neither of which in turn appeared in the Combined Arms Army. I could go on, but you get the point.
I sympathize with the desire to get all the lovely FW models into proper lists, but I think that where I'm going with this may be that the solution is not to try to cram them into a single list, but to have variants just like the infantry, so for example: a 'line' or 'spearhead' list, reflecting most IG armoured regiments most of the time, used for their primary shock purpose; a 'light'/'cavalry'/'armoured reconnaissance'/whatever list (which could also indulge the 'Lawrence of Arabia'/LRDG yearnings of some of us...); and a 'siege'/'urban assault' list to include all the specialized kit like Medusas and the less common superheavies (the IG's answer to the 79th Armoured Division?)
Sorry, didn't mean to go on quite so long...
I can if people want stick the whole of the 2004 tank list stuff up?
(Evil and Chaos @ Jul. 05 2007,16:23)
QUOTE No 25cm move though for any of the non-sponson tanks, because it fudges the difference between all normal Leman Russ & the Conqueror.
There is still a big difference for the tanks for 5cm move and 30cm move. A conqueror formation is an excellent assault formation (or would be if the FF was 4+) as it have the attacking speed and toughness but just as importantly a 10cm counter charge. You can space out more and still get units into positions to defend when attacked.
Tank Regiments are not simply used to fight other tank analogues in the 41st millenium... they're also used to assist attacks on, or directly engage, enemy infantry.
Well historically Tanks fought infantry as well, they just expected to meet other tanks with so many around. Indeed the states (who integrated tank destroyers into formations in the late war) spent most of WWII trying to avoid enemy tanks.
After all, your flavour text is a retcon; Originally StormHammers were no rarer than any other type of SHT.
Its real I tell, you, all real!
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