they are the big beautiful centerpieces of most armies with huge armor panels gigantic guns and all sorts of flavorful gobbins that's right my friends we are finally turning our attention to the tanks of Warhammer 4000 everything from walking Cathedrals to mobile scrap heaps to elegant hovering hulks 40K has it all and today we are going to start with the poster boys of the franchise the Space Marines The Humble Rhino transport is the very first aardi tank on our list but not because it is the most inferior the Rhino is the tank that built the Imperium and has spawned thousands of variants it is the basis for many other tanks as well including those not used by the Warriors of the adeptus asardes the Rhino is the Bolter of Space Marine tanks built rugged and sturdy the Rhino can be made of almost any locally available material and still be effective it can run on almost anything provided it can combust at least a little bit and can shrug off some outrageous damage while continuing to navigate some of the worst terrain imaginable it has a huge ramp on the back for easy disembarkation two side hatches just in case and a massive hatch on the roof to allow for any soldiers inside to shoot while riding it is also frequently equipped with a pinl mounted stormbolter that the tanks Commander can use to defend the vehicle from infantry related threats it's it's easy to see why the Rhino was used as the basis for almost every asardes tank in their roster in fact over half of the discussion will feature vehicles that use our beloved metal boxes as a base the standard template construct for the Rhino was created sometime in the early days of Humanity's colonization of the Galaxy and has never been lost it was originally named the rh1 and zero track exploration and multi-purpose defense vehicle and its rugged design was intended for use at is a crew transport on new worlds very quickly though as these things tend to happen the militaries of old Tera found that the Rhino was just too reliable to ignore and could be outfitted with a variety of weapon systems without sacrificing its sturdy nature and from then on the rest is history currently the Rhino is used mostly as a transport by the Space Marines and many other Imperial and ex-imperial organizations in this capacity the Rhino has been equipped with extra Weaponry such as a one use hun killer missile rack but the tank has also seen a fair amount of use as a command tank removing some of these offensive options for an increased sensor Suite in terms of importance ease of use and pure versatility the Rhino stands at the very top of this list second tank on our list and we are already cheating just a bit like we said most Vehicles we are discussing today are based on the Rhino chassis but the Razer back is the only other transport the Razer back is is almost identical to the standard Rhino with one notable exception a razor back sacrifices half of its transport capacity in favor of adding a really big gun the weapon is normally fixed to the top of the vehicle and controlled by the same targeting computers that operate the turrets on the venerable land Raider the typical load out is a twinlink heavy Bolter making for a very reliable anti-infantry support platform but the possibilities are almost endless ra RoR backs have been outfitted with heavy framers plasma guns assault Cannon LZ Cannon and the Ferocious multimelta the Razorback came into service not long after the Rhino itself and funnily enough even after the Predator battle tank Martian Tech adepts had seen records of a troop support tank with heavier Armament but hadn't discovered the SDC before putting the Predator into service leaving legionary forces without a middleof the road option between that heavy Firepower and the troop transporting rhino and so when the designs were rediscovered in M36 it took barely 200 years for the Razer back to find its way into the armories of the asardes legions the first true battle tank on this list the Predator has been a deadly force multiplier for Space Marine armies since the legions were founded in many ways the Predator is what the next step in the Razer back evolutionary chain looks like it completely sacrifices what little transport capacity the Razer back had left in order to just up the Firepower the primary feature of any predator is a huge turret which sits on top of the Rhino chassis this turret can be fitted with a fairly wide array of anti-infantry and anti-tank Weaponry but some fairly standard choices are an autoc Cannon or a twinlink LZ Cannon but the Rhino template has never failed to support a weapon system and it certainly hasn't let the Predator down some Wilder weapon choices are the high RPM assault Cannon the terrifying flamestorm Cannon and there are even reports of predators that made use of a graviton cannon although there aren't any surviving examples in the 42nd Millennia and losing the transport capacity allows for even more weapons to be mounted on S side sponson weapons like heavy bolters heavy flamers and plasma quite often chapters will also modify the standard Rhino engines to be more robust allowing the Predator to move faster but the combination of heavy Weaponry plus the support systems and rugged features of the Rhino ch come together to make the Predator an extremely effective battle tank every Army needs a solution to protracted sieges or solid enemy imp placements and The Vindicator is the space Marine's answer like the Predator this tank completely foros any internal space for troops in favor of some offensive options or rather option in this case a massive Siege Cannon this Demolisher Cannon is a short-ranged tool of Destruction capable of leveling just about anything in front of it it is so enormous that not only does it require additional stabilization to be added to the chassis but there isn't even any room for extra weapon systems it's just that one cannon on a rhino body with the usual 10 Marine Transport capacity being taken up by only 16 shells for the main Cannon most vindicators also have a large Dozer style blade on the front for extra armor and to help the squat tank navigate rough terrain leading to a very iconic look these things all come together to make The Vindicator a superb Urban Assault Vehicle able to keep Pace with infantry in order to support their Advance through hostile terrain by completely eradicating hardened enemy positions the history of The Vindicator is a little confused either it was created during the Dark Age of Technology by a general named vindis or it was designed during the Horus heresy to combat the Traer Legions either way when the ultramarine Primark roboute gilan and the Codex asardes he specifically included a place for The Vindicator in Space Marine armies and it's been in regular use ever since built on the Rhino chassis this artillery tank has the speed to be included in a marine Strike Force without being as vulnerable as more traditional artillery like the Basilisk used by the militarum as usual there are several types of Whirlwind but the standard Helios design is marked by a huge missile launcher attached to the the top of the vehicle and enough storage to hold a large quantity of extra ammunition typically loaded by a servator inside the tank the normal missile load out revolves around two types of payload the Vengeance pattern high explosive and the castelline inid in the distant past many more specialty missile types were used but like a lot of things in the Imperium most of those have been lost to time other than that the Whirlwind is equipped with Advanced targeting sensors to offset the inaccuracy caused by changing position so rapidly these arrays also allow for indirect firing meaning that the tank can strike at Target while safely behind cover which gives the short-range Whirlwind a little bit of extra defense this has been the way whirlwinds have been used by Space Marine armies ever since the salamanders first fielded them during the Horus heresy and while some variations were designed to combat Airborne threats that Duty was very quickly taken over by the Hunter and stalker leaving the Whirlwind as the most sole choice for close artillery support in aardi strike forces similarly to the Whirlwind hunters and stalkers fill a very specific role that in a more conventional Army would be filled by batteries of immobile imp placements hunters and stalkers are not artillery however even though you could be forgiven for thinking that since they are variations on the Whirlwind no these two tanks give the space marinees something they desperately need anti-air support the hunter is armed with a Skys spear missile launcher Lacher which fires armor-piercing ordinance at more hardened flying targets the fire rate is a little slow but each missile is Guided by cators made from failed Marine initiates who are too damaged for other servator work but also possessed Keen Minds in life these chapter surfs are hardwired into each Hunter and used to Pilot each missile towards an intended target making the hunter exceptionally good at eliminating high priority aerial threats the stalker takes this same concept and applies it to the faster firing Icarus storm Cannon the interred cators also allow each of the two triple barreled cannons to track different targets saturating the sky with large caliber rounds and both of these vehicles are again built on the Rhino chassis the last in this list to do so in fact which means they are capable of keeping Pace with the aardi strike forces they need to protect this next entry will be a little difficult because these new primaris vehicles were designed at more or less the same time using the same base chassis in this respect the impulsor Repulsor and Gladiator are not much different from the Rhino and all of the vehicles built off its design although those tanks all have the benefit of a much longer service life and so are less strange feeling the base chassis of all three of these tanks is a rhinol likee armored body that sits on top of an array of gravitic impulsion plates that suspend the whole vehicle a small way off the ground this is levitation not flight and Humanity has almost completely lost their ability to make Nimble grab Vehicles so these tanks don't gently float so much as they push against gravity often with enough Force to Simply crush anything underneath it the upshot of this crude method of hovering is that Vehicles like the impulser and repulser can angle their vectored grav plates to push away any swarming infantry in an emergency the core chassis is also able to mount a wide variety of weapon systems again much like the and so these three tanks end up looking a lot like their terrestrial counterparts the impulsor is the basic version it's an open topped troop transport with minimal support weapons sturdy armor and vectored impulsion plates for extra speed and defense typically the impulsor is used by Vanguard forces to quickly maneuver around enemy flanks and so is often equipped with Advanced sensors box boosters and even refractor Shields the repulser on the other hand is more like the Razer back sacrificing some of its transport capacity in favor of fitting a large turret mounted weapon the LZ Talon a close-range laser cannon that can easily punch through armored targets the heavier executioner variant of the Repulsor exchanges this weapon for either a macr plasma incinerator for dealing with heavy infantry or a heavy laser Destroyer for more efficiently removing enemy armor aside from the main Cannon the Repulsor can be armed with several other weapon systems bolters heavy stublers a pinl mounted Onslaught Gatling gun Auto launchers frag and crack storm grenade launchers it's a very versatile tank but so is the Gladiator the Gladiator is the primaris version of the Predator built on the same anti-grab chassis as the impulsor it completely gives its transport space over to larger weapon systems the biggest of these are mounted on a turret which sits at the top of the Tank's body this can be outfitted in similar ways to the repuls turret except that without the need to FY Marines around the Gladiator can upscale these guns a single last Talon becomes a twinlink last Talon for brawling with other armor twin heavy Onslaught Gatling cannons and a tempest Bolter array for scything down infantry or a heavy laser Destroyer for sniping enemy tanks the Gladiator finishes the trifecta of new grav tanks created by bisaria call for his primaris Marines and just like his bolt rifle and the new Marines themselves these tanks represent some of the First new technology to Grace the aardi forces in Millennia the venerable land Raider is the Space Marine tank an Unstoppable armored Juggernaut that bristles with heavy Weaponry while still being able to carry some of the bulkiest Marine squads directly into the heart of a battle the land Raider is a line breaker intended for the most intense Frontline conflict where its positioning can never be Totally Secure to mitigate the danger of being flanked the Raider is heavily armored on all sides with a layered approach to the makeup of its Hull layers of adamantine plasti ceramite and thermoplas fiber mesh form a complete protective barrier and is in fact some of the toughest armor of any vehicle in the Imperium and then there's the Firepower the base fobos model of the land Raider uses a twinlink LZ cannon on both side sponton a twinlink heavy Bolter on a hull mounted turret and a pinl mounted storm Bolter this Loadout is far from the only one the land Raider has been fitted with almost every weapon system the Imperium could think to put on it but with just a handful of Phobos pattern Raiders an aard Force could even pull down Titans but the primary role of most land Raider variants is to safely transport a squad of Space Marines directly into the thickest part of the fighting to achieve this the interior of the Raider is a fully sealed compartment allowing it to operate in any environment once the tank has arrived at the drop off point the front assault ramp opens and on variants like the Crusader pattern a row of mini frag launchers deploy a wave of shrapnel just ahead of the squad to cover their exit the Land Raider has a history stretching back to the Dark Age of Technology but like many other things at that time the SDC for the Raider was lost until the great Crusade and it was quickly put into service for not just the estaris but every Imperial faction possible but in the opening years of the Horus heresy the Forge World responsible for the Raiders production sided with Horus and so the emperor made a decree that only Space Marine forces could operate land Raiders until the Forge World was recaptured or replaced which never happen so the Raider is still an asardes exclusive tank to this day oh and we forgot to mention that it was magos Arkham land who originally rediscovered the STC for the Raider that's right the land Raider isn't named that because it raids the land it is literally lands Raider welcome to 40K folks next we have the only super heavy tank still in active service the estrus built using a combination of the new anti-graft technology developed by the arch magos bellarius call and an stdc recovered by the minotaur's chapter though from where they found this blueprint no one knows the Aus is a super heavy grav tank an enormous floating sled completely over to some truly terrifying Weaponry the principal gun of the Estus is a turret mounted macro accelerator Cannon which is essentially a twinlink rail gun adding to that the tank has side sponson that can mount L rippers or plasma eradicators and a hull Mount that typically Sports heavy bolters but can also house a pair of LZ Cannon for extra anti- armor capability like most other super heavy tanks the Estus is capable of a terrifying level of damage both to land-based targets and aerial threats and the anti-grav plates allow it to Traverse difficult terrain much easier than other vehicles of the same class which lets the estas keep up with the fast moving asardes forces even if it doesn't have quite the punch that a baneblade would have for instance this is by no means an exhaustive list of Space Marine tanks and we could even do entire videos based on just one of these vehicles there is such a wide range of them from almost every faction that this list was just truly scratching the surface so if you have a favorite tank and want to see it discussed here let us know in the comments and as always don't forget to like And subscribe so that you can paint your tanks to the sounds of more lore