Manticore Launcher Tank
The Guard has a Manticore. Your numerical superiority is irrelevant.
The Manticore Launcher Tank is one of the least subtle options the Imperial Guard has, being able to deliver as much firepower as an entire Basilisk battery from a single unassuming vehicle. It is built on the versatile Chimera chassis, with a Manticore Missile Launcher attached to its back.
The main reasons that the Manticore isn't more widely used are that it is difficult to load, the missiles are highly explosive even when inactive, and the machine spirits of the tracking, guidance, and launch systems are as temperamental as they are advanced. As such, they are limited in deployment to artillery regiments for the most part, as they are furthest from the front lines and most likely to have the tech-priest expertise required to maintain them.
Tabletop[edit]
The Manticore's Storm Eagle rocket is a thing of delight at 2d6 S10 AP -2 causing d3 wounds each. Like the Wyvern and Basilisk, it benefits not only from indirect fire, but also from the master of ordnance's reroll failed 1 to hit boost. A single manticore is a genuine threat to a huge number of targets, and remarkably doesn't break the bank at 145 points base (as of 9th edition). The only downside is its limited ammunition, and perhaps less than stellar AP.
Unsurprisingly, the Manticore is a strong all purpose attacker causing ladles of grief to anything. If it can fire all four rockets off, the the Manticore will routinely earn its points back.
In previous editions, Storm Eagle rockets had a much, much greater capacity to obliterate a large number of closely packed targets. Back then, it wasn't unheard of for a battery of Manticores to destroy the bulk of an enemy's forces in the first or second turn. While that is no longer really the case, people know that the Manticore is still dangerous, so expect the enemy to focus everything on its destruction, even to the exclusion of all else.
CREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED!!![edit]
A player in a major tournament in New York managed to pull off several bits of undiluted win when using Creed to Scout Manticores against Ork players, enabling them to perfectly get line-of-sight with the enemy army and fire off a barrage. This is widely considered cheese, but remains absolutely hilarious and is something that needs to be witnessed, if only once.
The Rebellion Begins[edit]
Due to the Manticore being an insanely overpriced model - even by the staggering standards of Games Workshop's notorious tendency to charge an arm, leg, and testicle for its miniatures - players have resorted to increasingly-clever methods for representing Manticores on the tabletop, the most common way being to either mod a Chimera APC, which costs about half as much, or to go the full Monty and using decidedly non-Games-Workshop miniatures in order to represent them on the tabletop. Considerable amusement and much rage from certain Neckbeards have ensued.
Note that it costs as much from GW per model as a Leman Russ does, at least in Europe.
Some of the more infamous ones are shown below.
IRL[edit]
“Manticore” is one of the few names proposed for a variant of the Stryker IFV. This variant, appropriately enough, carries the Leonardo DRS, an air defense turret carrying Stinger and Hellfire missiles. It is explicitly said, in the column “Vehicles with Designation”, to be a “Fictional missile-launching tank from the game Warhammer 40,000”. And you can vote for it. So do your part and make the US Army one step closer to the Grim Darkness it deserves to be!
Gallery[edit]
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One of many mods of a Chimera. This one weds a rocket pod from a toy MLRS to a Chimera chassis. It works.
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A fairly clever Manticore made from a Chimera and a Whirlwind.
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How not to convert a Manticore. In case you're wondering, that's the handle end of a fucking tennis racket the rockets are mounted on. A fucking tennis racket.
