Baneblade
"IT IS THE BEEEEEINNNBLEEEEHHDDDEEEE!" ~ Captain Diomedes of the Blood Ravens.
The Baneblade is a big fucking Imperial tank Warhammer 40,000 universe, known generally for an impressive arsenal (OF GUNS), and disappearing en masse. Besides looking totally kickass, it stomps a lot of ass too. It is supposedly one of the oldest and largest tank designs used by the Imperium, despite that it's actually medium-sized according to the old Epic fluff. Then again, the "big" tanks in Epic were closer to moving, gun-mounting cathedrals. This is an actual tank. A manly tank. The manly tank.
Origins
The Baneblade first appeared in the Space Marine edition of Epic, where it was the Imperial Guard's standard super-heavy tank (it says a lot about the universe that there's such a thing as a "standard" one). This version was armed with a turret-mounted Battle Cannon (with the same stats as the one on the Leman Russ Battle Tank, despite the turret being the size of a Leman Russ), two Lascannons, and a bunch of dice worth of "Bolters" to deal with swarms. Despite obviously having a big gun on the lower hull, there was no representation of it in the tank's rules. Fluff described the hull as the size of a city block.
Being a standard version, there were variants at that point, and only three:
- The Stormhammer was effectively a moving fortress, and the precise armament is hard to say given the odd way the game treated "Bolters;" anything from an officer's Bolt Pistols to both a Leman Russ' Heavy Bolters was one attack dice with the same stats. This means this particular monster might have up to 24 Heavy Bolters in addition to two turrets with two battle cannons each. Basically, you park it a place and then forget about that place, since it is now Defended.
- The Shadowsword was one of two Titan-killing variants, armed with two Lascannons and some "Bolters" like the Baneblade, but with the rear hull built up into a giant casemate mounting a fixed Volcano Cannon, a giant laser weapon normally mounted on Titans.
- The Stormblade was a second variant of the fixed-weapon hull, and proof of how incredibly fucking HUEG the old Epic fluff made the Baneblade chassis; no fruity Lascannons for this one, the sponson weapons were a rack of missiles and a fucking Battle Cannon. Your main gun was a Titan-grade Plasma Blastgun with a Hellion anti-Titan missile slung on the top. Potential drivers had to produce written proof that they were bad enough dudes to save the President before they'd even be considered. Forge World makes a Stormblade, but it just sits there (eating an entire sack of dicks) because it knows it will never be cool enough to have a sponson-mounted Battle Cannon.
The Chaos legions have their own version called the Decimator, which is, in fact, an early pre-production model super-heavy tank that would later lead to the development of the Baneblade. It has replaced its bolters with lots and lots of Reaper Autocannons, resulting in it being far nastier against medium armor, though its main cannon is not turreted, meaning the entire tank has to turn to fire it.
Standard Template Construct
A fun fact about the mighty Baneblade is that when the Adeptus Mechanicus discovered a STC printout with the designs for a Dark Age of Technology tank, the design was classified as a 'light battle tank.' That's right! The Baneblade. The super heavy moving fortress of rape and death was classified as a 'light battle tank.'
When they say that the Human race of 40k is in a dark age and the Imperium is but a pale shadow of Humanities former power and glory; they ain't kiddin'!
The day a Techpriest finds the STC designs for a 'heavy battle tank' every other faction in the setting will shit out their own bones with shock and terror!
Warhammer 40,000
Scratch-built Baneblade models with homebrew (read: unfair) rules have been kicking around since roughly ten minutes after it was introduced in Epic, but it wasn't until Forge World that Games Workshop ever considered releasing an official model. The Baneblade is now available as a plastic kit from GW itself, along with a six-option kit for the casemate fixed-hull variants. The modern Baneblade mounts what's known as a "Baneblade Cannon" (representing belated recognition that the thing in the turret is really huge and so probably not a Battle Cannon) with a coaxial Autocannon, the same two Lascannons it always had, two Twin-linked Heavy Bolters in each sponson and another two on the hull front, and a Demolisher Cannon where the Mysterious Not-A-Weapon was once mounted. This leads to the well-known ELEVEN BARRELS OF HELL, though the vehicle has options for two more sponsons to be mounted (each with another Lascannon and Twin-linked Heavy Bolter) which raises the bar to seventeen. This option can only be taken on the GW plastic kit, as the old Forge World models were shorter, sillier-looking, and had no place for them. These were given their own pattern in the fluff, and thrust upon an unsuspecting Forge World (the other kind) to make and produce for all eternity.
The Baneblade is so awesome Commissar Yarrick uses a customized, "commandeered" Baneblade as his own transport. It's known as THE FORTRESS OF ARROGANCE and it makes Heretics and Xenos wet themselves.
There are currently nine official variants, with the names being a nightmarish jumble of "Bane," "Sword," "Storm," "Shadow," "Blade" and "Hammer" to the point it's difficult remembering which is which. The Storm Hammer has apparently been forgotten somewhere along the line, most likely because GW would either need to make a separate twin-turret hull for a single model, or think of even dumber names for another six variants.
- The most common one, the Baneblade, uses the massive Baneblade Cannon capable of turning entire armies to soup with a single blast of its 10" template.
- The Hellhammer uses the shorter, but no less deadly Hellhammer Cannon which strikes harder but on a smaller area, giving exactly zero fucks about the cover in between.
- The Banehammer fields the Tremor Cannon, a weapon that can turn a huge segment of the battlefield into a patch of flying rubble, slowing down the enemy long enough for the rest of the army to destroy them. It can also carry around up to 10 models.
- The Banesword is a siege tank: its Quake Cannon can be fired as a barrage weapon at a massive range to destroy up to 15' away, use this to troll the WFB players on the next table.
- The Doomhammer is a tank-killer. With a modest 5" blast but stats befitting a tank hunter, the Magma Cannon can reduce all but the largest of titans to scrap. Can also carry 10 men.
- The Shadowsword is a titan-killer. With a D-strength Volcano Cannon, and the ability to upgrade its BS, the Shadowsword has a very good chance of bringing down even the biggest of titans. This guy is your friend.
- The Stormlord is designed with but one purpose: to skullfuck MEQs. With the most dakka seen in Imperial armies (hell, ANYWHERE) in the form of a Vulcan Mega-Bolter, the ability to have up to 20 of its 40 passengers fire from its fighting platform and the option to have four lascannons, this tank WILL FUCK SHIT UP. Point at something that's un-fucked, and the Stormlord will fuck it. With its massive cannon. And NO lube.
- The Stormsword excels at city fighting. Able to turn entire building blocks to dust with a single shot, the tank's main weakness is the short range on its Stormsword Cannon.
- The Forge World Stormblade is armed with
a dumb-looking Plasma Blastgun and can go fuck itselfa plasma-hurling death weapon that eats MEQ's, hordes, hordes of MEQ's, and even light tanks for breakfast. With better range than the Stormlord and a blast radius so big that Plasma Siphons feel even worse about existing, it excels at killing hordes of anything in Apocalypse. Even vehicle hordes.
Dawn of War
In the Dawn of War PC game the Baneblade is the IG super-heavy unit, equivalent to the Chaos Bloodthirster Daemon, or Eldar's Avatar of Khaine. Only it's better because instead of a winged Daemon cow or a big flaming homosexual in a loincloth, it's a fucking giant tank. It is literaly the best of these master units in the game, and it will go toe-to-toe with any other such unit and kill them before they kill it. Every time.
Its a well known fact that the crew members of Baneblades are chosen exclusively on the grounds of how big their balls are. This makes them able to shout "Failure is the weakness of the enemy!" "Releasing ELEVEN barrels of hell!" and "All guardsmen, Follow ME to GLOOREEEEY!" and being the only badass non-Hero unit in the entire Imperial Guard.
It reappears in retribution as one of the superunits, a title it shares with the Swarmlord, the Great Unclean One, the Avatar of Khaine once more (notably, the avatar along with the baneblade are the only returning superunits from the first Dawn of War series), and the Land Raider Redeemer. It makes a centerpiece appearance in the second mission of the campaign where a renegade one chases your characters around while the pilot laughs "AHAHAHAHAHAHA WHO'S FRAGILE NOW BITCH!?!" Well...he did in our imagination anyway.
In multiplayer matches, the tank is a death machine, able to one shot the puny tanks other races can field, and able to gib hoards of nids with its demolisher cannon.
External Links
Gallery
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General Sturn likes it hot and heavy.
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ALL GUARDSMEN!
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FOLLOW ME TO GLORY!
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Make a compensation joke at your own expense.
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The track is broken and the sponson turret has a beef with the driver. This is an official image, by the way.
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Yarrick's fortress of WHERE ARE MY PRUNES
