So, first time posting a thread. I've been GMing a Black Crusade group for a while now, and unfortunately I'm losing a member of the group for the summer. I'm taking the opportunity to switch the rest of the group to Only War for a recreation of the Siege of Vraks, give them some real tank combat against heretics with it evolving into war against the myriad horrors of Chaos (renegade titans, chaos space marines, demon engines, etc).

As part of this, my first scenario is planetfall on Vraks, a little different from the cannon Forgeworld description of the Siege, but something to give them an intro to vehicles and because I have a problem with the first shot of the war starting with already established siege lines. Anyways, I planned to provide the unit (a group of Death Korps of Krieg Grenadiers) with a Centaur Light Assault Vehicle armed with a hunter-killer missile. The idea was to set them an objective (an outpost) that they would need the punch of the hunter-killer missile to break through, and then force them to use the hunter-killer on a surprise renegade Leman Russ Vanquisher (they would be part of a platoon deploying to the battle so they'll have some time to react to the vanquisher as it knocks out other squads before it becomes a real threat to my PCs).

As a result I was looking at what a hunter-killer, and subsequently a hellstrike, would do to a Leman Russ, and I was terribly disappointed. Both pack less punch than a man portable missile launcher armed with a krak round. So my question is, how is it that a large, one shot, vehicle mounted weapon with an availability of Very Rare is less potent than a man-portable, reloadable, Scarce round? As it stands, neither the hunter-killer or the hellstrike have the ability to punch through the forward armor of a Leman Russ, but Black Library fiction is full of examples where these weapons do more.

I'm just curious if this something that anyone else has dealt with, and if maybe there's a more reasonable power level. I don't expect them to one-shot K.O. a battle tank, but more than burnishing the paint would be nice.

Heh, I just read up on vehicles too, and was wondering something similar: Apart from the lascannon or meltas at short range, there really isn't much that can deal big damage through that armour...

Which book has Hellstrikes and H-K Missiles?

As to popping vehicles, yeah, they seem pretty tough. Part of it, to me, has always been the "what kills vehicles KILLS players, being flesh and blood", and otherwise, I'm not entirely sure how well integrated some of the vehicle stuff is, when so much of the game seems to expect infantry. I would think that lascannons, melta weapons and bombs, and krak missiles should be the big vehicle poppers. Luckily, this game doesn't do too much with MCs, so no Carnifexes need stats to beer-can-crash a Russ, and then fail, because I don't think melee rules vs vehicles ever worked in an FFG 40K game line. If they did, Dreadnought CC weapons and chainfists would be good, if not for IG.

I kind of appreciate it, personally. One of those accurate real-world parallels. If you had a group of soldiers, and I had a tank, what would you do? You might run up, and try to board it, but I might kill you with weapons. You might fire a rocket at it, but it'll take a few. You might call in an air strike, but...and that list can go on, hence tanks still work. One of the problems might, again, be that we are comparing this game to the tabletop, where a few hits from a lascannon or krak missile can send a Leman Russ to the heap; that's most of why IG has Heavy weapons Teams. In the RPG, though, even good weapons for tank-hunting, fired by qualified operators, with the Tank Hunting talent, and other such planning, are going to have to ping it a handful of times, and survive doing it. My team of a LR Punisher and LR Demolisher, with their support infantry, are going to scare **** near any Guardsmen.

If you had a group of soldiers, and I had a tank, what would you do? You might run up, and try to board it, but I might kill you with weapons.

Might . That's what tactics and comrades are for. Of course, there's always a risk, but I would consider that working as intended, and not too dissimilar from engaging a bunch of Orks on foot.

I'm sure everyone here knows the movie Saving Private Ryan? That's how you take out a tank with infantry. Such a highly armoured vehicle's biggest disadvantage is limited vision, so there's a good chance your infantry won't be spotted until it's too late, if you act clever and use cover, hiding until it's "safe" to approach. Digging trenches and hunkering down until the tank drives over you, and then slapping magnetic explosives to their underside or rear, works too ... provided you have the willpower to remain calm under the approach of such a roaring metal beast.

Tanks aren't an auto-win against infantry ... which is why tanks are almost always accompanied by infantry, because soldiers on foot have a much better chance at discovering an enemy attempting to sneak up on the armoured vehicles.

pictured: WW2 Japanese Imperial Army anti-tank demolition charges

just two examples out of several eras of infantry fighting and disabling armoured vehicles

The Core has rules for Hunter-Killers and Hellstrikes. Pg. 175 of the Armoury.

And you're right Lynata, they are stated similarly to Krak missiles in the TT, which is why I think at the very least they should have the same strength. Right now, a Krak has +2 Dam, +2 Pen, Proven(2) and Concussive(3) over an H-K. The 5 major rpg systems all agree on the strength of a Krak round, which has worked fine up until now where armour hits an all time high.

I assumed being the first major forray into vehicle combat that Only War would have some issues with balance, my current dilemna is how to adjust for it. Ultimately, I'd like something repeatable and reasonable for the campaign as I'm sure this isn't the only time that my group is going to want to use H-K missiles to add some punch to a vehicle's arsenal.

Rules for Concussive against vehicles would be nice too. Something along the lines of applying the toughness test to all the operators of the vehicle being attacked to represent being tossed about inside the tight confines.

I'm sure everyone here knows the movie Saving Private Ryan? That's how you take out a tank with infantry.

No, that's not how you take out a tank with infantry. A good tank crew who know what they are doing can screw up infantry in so many ways it isn't even funny (the meanest trick involves smoke launchers loaded with white-phosphor shells). If you want to take out tanks with infantry then you use anti-tank missiles. The long-range guided ones.

Well it most certainly depends on the environment and the resources you have at hand.

Some shaped charges that are applied by infantry with direct contact are cheap and efficient. Depending on the battlefield their usage can be "easy" (in urban area) or rather impossible (on a plain steppe at daylight). You can hand them to any soldier and even the most ignorant penal legion cannon fodder can achieve some success with it.

On the other side we do have ranged solution and because WH40k took its tank insperation from WW1 and WW2 we have to use their counterparts too. Guides Missiles etc. is Tau Stuff and the best we have as IG is some TOW HK Missile that always sucked. It is not meant to be good, it is a small thing that you can attach on a vehicle and pray for the best.

Standard Leman Russ MBTs come with their AT Gun already, it is the Lascannon. The WW2 way to counter a Tank were PaKs or Anti-Tank Guns in addition with some dumb-fire rocket-launcher power and auto-cannons for light armored vehicles.

A good tank crew who know what they are doing can screw up infantry in so many ways it isn't even funny

Sure. If they see 'em coming, or are at the very least able to take a guess.

From a 1942 US War Department publication:

INFANTRY TANK HUNTING

German training and operations have both emphasized the importance of aggressive action against tanks by dismounted infantry personnel. All tanks, they teach, have certain vulnerable points which make them easy prey for close-combat weapons specially designed for the purpose and employed by aggressive, trained soldiers. The chief weaknesses of tanks are their relatively poor visibility, their inability to defend themselves within a close radius of the vehicle (dead space), and the time lag in shifting guns from target to target. They also need certain times, usually at night or in rear areas, to carry out maintenance and repairs. This is always a favorable time for the dismounted tank hunter.

Tank hunters, acting alone or in pairs, are also taught to use smoke candles, smoke grenades, and smudges to produce films on the vision slits of the tanks. By using these methods they can get within close enough range to employ hand weapons.

A German training instruction, issued to an infantry unit shortly after it had successfully repelled a British attack, sets forth the basic technique of infantry tank hunting. A translation of the document follows:

Maybe this can even serve as inspiration for Only War GMs when it comes to describing armoured warfare and infantry tactics in their game?

Excellent and very interesting. Once I'd copied it to a .txt file so I could actually read it.

I dunno, but I'm pretty sure that the Leman Russ does have some "extras" the WW2 tanks lacked. Like 360° cupola vision for the tank commander. Or the auspex. Or a permanent 270° killing zone (hull+sponsons weapons).

I think a better comparison would be the Syrian Civil War, as the Leman Russ has more in common with early-mid Cold War hardware as far as internal systems go. And, well, yeah, those guys bust tanks with AT missiles and remote-detonated IEDs because fighting a T-72 up, close and personal is pretty much a death sentence.

Also, it must be noted that Imperial missiles are supposed to be guided (both the normal ML missile and the bigger HK/Hellstrike). So guided missiles are not Tau-only - they simply don't have rules in the RPGs.

Excellent and very interesting. Once I'd copied it to a .txt file so I could actually read it.

Ah, sorry about that - black on grey probably isn't the best contrast... I was still able to read it easily, but that may just be due to my display settings.

I dunno, but I'm pretty sure that the Leman Russ does have some "extras" the WW2 tanks lacked. Like 360° cupola vision for the tank commander. Or the auspex. Or a permanent 270° killing zone (hull+sponsons weapons).

Cupola vision slits were already a thing in WW2 , actually. I guess the problem is that they still don't allow perfect 360° awareness (I had the opportunity to sit in a modern Bundeswehr tank, and it's an issue to this very day) - and that you only have one guy who is supposed to maintain watch to all sides at once. To make it worse, it's the commander, who is supposed to direct the tank in assault, rather than some sort of dedicated lookout. So what are the chances he's going to keep constant watch to the sides or the back, rather than coordinating the cannon gunner's attacks towards the front?

Also, not every tank in 40k is fitted with sponson guns, and even those that are only use weapons with a 90° kill radius - to say nothing of the time they may need to swivel around and acquire targets at close range (a problem pointed out in the aforementioned document).

Now, I can't say anything about a supposed onboard auspex, meaning whether this is actually standard equipment or how reliable it would be in regards to tracking hidden enemies (probably depends on which book you're looking at) - but I do know that infantry assaulting tanks is supposed to be a viable tactic in the TT ... and I'd be surprised if Games Workshop deliberately wrote their fluff in a way that would so obviously contradict a core principle of the game.

So personally, I'd wager that 40k is just as much about infantry charging tanks as it is about soldiers hacking at each other with chainswords. If you have no problem with the latter, why should the former be different?

But I suppose this might just be another question of interpretation. When I look at 40k, I'm seeing way more WW1/WW2 than modern combat (hell, Rough Riders are essentially horse cavalry charging tanks with explosive-tipped lances !), and so I'm also more prone to looking at WW1/WW2 tactics when it comes to how the Imperial Guard operates. I think that's cool, but I can easily see how different preferences could push other players into another direction entirely (up to and including power-armoured Guardsmen in modern tactical gear).

PS: What's an ML missile? The standard man-portable Missile Launcher? If so, then in my interpretation they are not guided, given how this feature is supposed to be a difference between it and the Hunter/Killer (at least according to the Codex).

Yes, it is the normal Missile Launcher missile. The old wargear book outright stated that missile launchers fire guided missiles IIRC. Even the Gaunt books had to go out and create a whole new type of missile launcher so that the Ghosts can have oldschool unguided missile launchers.

On this note, I wonder that nobody gave the obvious advice to the OP: get a man portable lascannon and bust the tank with it, using the Centaur as a mobile weapon emplacement. The Death Korps like lascannons, so the Squad will probably find a few laying around. and as soon as the tank is dead, they can just leave the lascannon in he Centaur so it won't slow them down either.

I just checked the Wargear book and it doesn't say anything about them being guided. I still remembered wrong, however, in that the Codex did not say anything about the tracking mechanisms of the H/K Missile. Indeed it may very well be that even the Hunter/Killer is unguided, too, which might explain its comparatively poor BS score of 3.

I edited that part out of the post, but obviously that was too late.

Where did you read that Imperial missiles were guided? In BFG, even capital ship missile and torpedo weapons are unguided - a distinct difference to Tau weaponry. With the sole exception of the special Seeking Torpedo from WD and the Warp Storm, that is.

[edit] Then again, it could be argued that this is a distance thing. Considering the ranges at which ship engagements are held, this is admittedly a bad comparison to a ground battlefield.

The Centaur as a weapons carrier sounds like an interesting idea, but if we go by the FW model it looks incredibly short. You could probably transport a lascannon in it, but not in a deployed state?

Excellent and very interesting. Once I'd copied it to a .txt file so I could actually read it.

Ah, sorry about that - black on grey probably isn't the best contrast... I was still able to read it easily, but that may just be due to my display settings.

Have I mentioned I really don't like the forum software?

Here is the actual quote for the guided missile launcher:

A missile is a self-propelled projectile, usually incorporating an electronic guidance system, and tipped with a high explosive chemical, kinetic or plasma-based warhead. Missiles generally make use of a chemical rocket, jet engine or even anti-gravity drive to provide motive force, and often contain a guidance package embedded within them.

Maybe it is from the Munitorium Manual?

And the Centaur definitely has place for a heavy weapon because it has a specific special rule for firing squad heavy/special weapons through its front weapon slit thing.

Well, I took another look and there are actually some sort of imperial guided missiles mentioned though that is definitely not the norm and most novels about the IG I can remember utilize the dumb-fire rockets.

On the other side a dumb-fire rocket launcher could utilize some sort of electronic stabilization for its projectiles too, so he could be more accurate on a larger range without the missile being actively guided after launch.

On the other side it is the Tau's theme to have actively guided missiles (Marker-light/Seeker missile etc.) even to a degree where their missiles have drone-like intelligence and are more or less SMART-Weapons. At last that is the extraordinary stuff that gets released about the Tau.

Also the Hunter-Killer-Missile is described as being a larger krak missile with a special part: A logis-engine. If that would be standard issue for any missile it would not have been mentioned that way. At last that is the "Hunter" part in the name. To make this even more clear it is listed as "Suchkopfrakete" in the German Codex, meaning seeker head missile so the emphasis is on that (Though Still BS3).

My conclusion is that regular missiles are still dumb-fired though may utilize stabilizing electronics. But they are far away from being real guided missiles. That is clearly the field of the hunter-killer missiles and the "Armourbane" Missile Launcher from DW RoB is a decent portrayal of that in the RP.

Which book has Hellstrikes and H-K Missiles?

Stats on p. 175, fluff p. 182.

The grand difference between the Krak Missile and the H-K missile appears to be +2 dmg, +2 pen, Proven(2) (which is almost irrelevant) and Concussive (3), which as I understand, doesn't actually affect vehicles or vehicle crews by RAW.

The H-K does get a +20 to hit mind you, and appears to be at least semi-smart.

To be honest, the Autocannon is so close (statwise) you should probably use that one instead anyway.

Yes yes, the H-K has a dedicated cogitator and its tube most commonly also has some sort of array to at last lock-in the target. And hence is a real Smart or guided missile. On the contrary regular IG launcher are imho not. And the concussive part is mostly against some MCs I think.

To be honest, the Autocannon is so close (statwise) you should probably use that one instead anyway.

To be honest, the Autocannon is also more reliable in the TT than the HKM and intended to be so. I know nobody that uses hunter killer missiles and mostly it is, as I think of it, intended to be a modular system that allows vehicles with not real AT like a Multilaser Chimera to at last have some fall back weapon, just like a BGM 71 TOW on a Humvee, only that most common missiles are rather weak in the 40k fluff compared to real life. But hey, you can retro-fit any vehicle with it.

Maybe it is from the Munitorium Manual?

That sounds plausible - and would explain the contradicting impressions as, once again, depending on which book we're looking at. iirc, the Munitorum Manual also suggested a charge slider being standard for las weapons.

And the Centaur definitely has place for a heavy weapon because it has a specific special rule for firing squad heavy/special weapons through its front weapon slit thing.

This thing? Would the thick barrel even fit through this slit ? It also doesn't appear easy to aim, then, either...

Hmm, well, it could also simply be a case of the rules not reflecting the model, or the other way around. The GM could easily just make the call they think is more appropriate, and (for example) make the vehicle a bit longer, and add a 2nd slit for the heavy weapons gunner (above the weapon port, which I would then also add a removable plate to, as such a huge opening is a liability if you don't actually use it for an optional weapon).

I know nobody that uses hunter killer missiles and mostly it is, as I think of it, intended to be a modular system that allows vehicles with not real AT like a Multilaser Chimera to at last have some fall back weapon, just like a BGM 71 TOW on a Humvee

Yeah, that's what the 5E Codex said, too.

And the Centaur definitely has place for a heavy weapon because it has a specific special rule for firing squad heavy/special weapons through its front weapon slit thing.

This thing? Would the thick barrel even fit through this slit ? It also doesn't appear easy to aim, then, either...

Hmm, well, it could also simply be a case of the rules not reflecting the model, or the other way around. The GM could easily just make the call they think is more appropriate, and (for example) make the vehicle a bit longer, and add a 2nd slit for the heavy weapons gunner (above the weapon port, which I would then also add a removable plate to, as such a huge opening is a liability if you don't actually use it for an optional weapon).

Between firing a lascannon through a small slit and charging a Leman Russ with 3 melta bombs (the minimal number required to take it out) I would still choose the lascannon . Maybe even at the cost of the pintle heavy stubber (hmmmm.... 2 lascannons?).

Or maybe a mortar? Is there an EMP round for that thing? That could be pretty darn effective too!

Between firing a lascannon through a small slit and charging a Leman Russ with 3 melta bombs (the minimal number required to take it out) I would still choose the lascannon . Maybe even at the cost of the pintle heavy stubber (hmmmm.... 2 lascannons?).

Provided you do manage to fit the lascannon through that slit ... yes.

Or just prop the lascannon on the ground. I think that if a tank does turn its cannon on you, it makes very little difference between being on foot or sitting in that ... thing.

As for swapping it for the heavy stubber - now that sounds much more doable to me.

Though, didn't Forge World also have some sort of small, fast "scout tank" that came with a single lascannon built-in? That might be a neat alternative. I vaguely recall it having played a role in Faith & Fire.

Or maybe a mortar? Is there an EMP round for that thing? That could be pretty darn effective too!

I don't know about mortar shells, but wasn't there a sort of EMP grenade in this RPG? Haywire or something?

If this is available as a grenade, a GM could easily make it available as a mortar shell, too. The only question would be whether or not the troops ought to have access to something like this (I can't recall how rare it was supposed to be ).

Or just prop the lascannon on the ground. I think that if a tank does turn its cannon on you, it makes very little difference between being on foot or sitting in that ... thing.

The AM doesn't get any Haywire love, but there is a haywire grenade in the BC book and it has 'Rare' availability (the same as the Krak grenade... interesting...).

At first I wondered why you'd mention the Adeptus Mechanicus in this context ...

I swear, I'll never get used to this new abbreviation.

I'm not ready to swap the two heavy stubbers for lascannons. It doesn't fit with the Siege of Vraks outfitting of the Centaurs and wouldn't really be reasonable besides. Autocannons bother me for the same reasons.

I guess I'll just have to MacGyver the encounter. I'm still thinking that it would be best to up jump the damage of the H-K and Hellstrikes to fit the system. Even if an H-K is only supposed to be similar to a TOW, they have a number of confirmed armour kills, and the TT has enough balance problems to make me wary of falling back solely on it as a reference.

My gut reaction is 5d10+8, pen 8, plus the proven and concussive traits with a house rule that concussive inflicts toughness tests on the tank operators or be stunned for 1 round for every 2 DoF (rather than the 1 DoF for those on foot).