Taurox

High enough that Dreadknights can use it as cover. Also, note Captain Price in the hatch.

The Taurox is a vehicle used by the Imperial Guard serving as a low cost APC. By comparison to the other Dedicated Transport available to the Imperial Guard - the Chimera - the Taurox is less armored (AV 11 on the front instead of 12), and can carry less than a Chimera (capacity 10 instead of 12). However, it has several advantages of its own. The Taurox is less likely to damage itself from moving through Dangerous Terrain and is shootier (arguably).

However, it also looks retarded, a bit like Orks looted an IG vehicle and the Guard looted it right back. This model is one of the ugliest things that Games Workshop has released since the Dreadknight or the Centurions. which at least had some elements of logical design, and can be argued that they look kind of cool. Consider taking a jeep, and ripping the wheels out to replace them with mini treads. And then make the thing as tall as a fucking tank, thanks to treads of ridiculous height. The Taurox takes the METAL BAWKSES to their retarded extreme. It also has exhaust pipes going straight into the crew compartment, so your soldiers can sniff some petrol fumes before doing battle, and then get killed as they disembark by the side-mounted guns which shoot past the doors (Well, there's always the rear hatch).

The Taurox takes its design cues from real life MRAP (Mine Resistant Ambush Protected) vehicles. These APCs are built to withstand IEDs and landmines, and to protect passengers from injury during rollovers, which are more common due to the design- idiotically tall. Think a heavily armored Humvee upgrade that can withstand rocket strikes. The Taurox, on the other hand, seems built to kill its passengers. The aforementioned treads are horribly vulnerable to mines, and its relatively low armor rating means that heavier guns will pop the Taurox like a balloon.

Oh and if you think it would look better with wheels, it does. Oh so much. A good conversion kit can be bought here[1] or here[2]

Both variants should have side armour 11 to help differentiate them more from the Chimera, and would thus give them a better drive by role.

Patterns

There are two variants of the Taurox. The Taurox and the Stormtrooper exclusive Taurox Prime.

Taurox

This is available to the regular guard. A vehicle that looks a lot like an ork truck and is basically a big Metal Box on top of four smaller Metal Boxes. The Taurox and the Chimera are both the same type of unit (a dedicated Transport) and are used by Imperial Guard squads. The Taurox has a twin-linked Autocannon and lets you re-roll dangerous terrain tests as standard (you will have to buy a dozer-blade to do that for the Chimera) while the Chimera is an Amphibious vehicle (not that that really makes much difference), is a tank, and can weather slightly more hits. This means that the Chimera is better for short ranged guard since it's less likely to get destroyed as it rushes towards the enemy. The Taurox is much better for supporting a shooty Imperial Guard army since a twin-linked Autocannon will deal more damage than a Multilaser will and will do so at less of a cost then a Chimera. Hint: Keep it cheep and have it cover hop. With the re-rolls it can keep mobile and the cover will hopefully keep it alive longer (maybe give it camo netting to take full advantage of this).

Taurox Prime

This is only available to the Stormtroopers. It's basically a version of the Taurox with a Hot-shot volley gun in place of the Autocannons (you can swap back to the Autocannon for free, of course) and a Taurox Battle Cannon. The Battle Cannon on the Taurox is a mini version of the Battle Cannon on the Leman Russ; being 48" S7 AP4 Heavy 1, Blast as opposed to the Leman Russ 72" S8 AP3 Ordnance 1, Large Blast. It can be further swapped for a Taurox Gatling Cannon (another mini version of a present weapon, this one having half the shots of a Punisher Gatling Cannon and being Strength 4) or a Taurox Missile Launcher which is basically the Typhoon Missile Launcher Land Speeders get. In addition, it's manned by Stormtroopers instead of the regular Guard so it has BS 4 instead of 3 and is a Fast vehicle.

Hilariously overpriced for what it brings, and equipping it with the missile launchers is sitting you at 20 points less than a Leman Russ eradicator, or exactly 2 Taurox's. All for what equates to an expensive Razorback.

Better Alternatives

Much like every other retarded new model, GW has a habit of coming up with rules that makes you feel like you pretty much have to buy the damn things no matter how shit the models are. Well there is another way - We all want twin linked auto cannons so just convert them on to your chimera. Same for the prime, just find appropriate guns for the turret and that'll do it. No retarded box on boxes, just sweet looking chimeras with some heavy firepower.

That is, if you want your miniature collection to stay GW-pure...

If you want a APC that does not look riddiculous and still looks like what Taurox SHOULD look like, consider buying a bunch of autocannon bits from Ebay and bunch of russian 1:35 BTR-60/80/90 models or 1:35 LAV armored transport sets. They cost aproximately 7-10 moneys each, meaning that you can get easily a full squadron of these better-looking APC's for price of one "hurr durr how does 4x4 tracked vehicle make sense?" taurox.

In Warhammer Fantasy

Because Games Workshop is a bunch of idiots who doesn't like to check they aren't already using a term, Taurox originally appeared in Warhammer Fantasy as a special character for the Beastmen.

Taurox the Brass Bull is a psychopathic Doombull blessed by Khorne for his prodigious talents at killing, having made it a habit of killing and eating anyone and anything that looked him the eye.

Eventually, Khorne took notice and sent one of is Heralds to offer a boon to him - remember, in this edition, beastmen are basically the Chaos Gods' unwanted bastard children and pretty much never get anything nice, in contrast to humans, so that shows how good Taurox was at getting shit done.

Of course, remember what we said about that little habit of his? Yeah; when the daemon addressed him, the dumb brute bit its head off! Then he went into a berserk frenzy, rampaging across the Empire for a year and a day without rest, killing everything he encountered. When the frenzy was finally ended, his whole body had turned into living brass and he was wielding two axes that burned with hellfire.

Except his throat was still living flesh, because you do not bite off a daemon's head and get away with it!

On the tabletop, this manifested as him having a 1+ armour save and 5 wounds, but if you roll 6s for your To Hit and To Wound rolls, then you automatically killed him dead IF he failed that 1+ armour save of his, no matter how many wounds he had left (and unless he's fighting a special character this would nearly never happen).

Taurox was killed during The End Times, when Huntsmarshal Markus Wulfhart put an arrow in his throat from a couple of hundred meters away during the battle for Altdorf.