Warhammer 40K: The ‘Rogal Dorn’ Tank Shouldn’t Exist
Let’s talk about the Guard’s new Rogal Dorn heavy tank shouldn’t be a thing.
The Astra Militarium is getting a new heavy tank. The Rogal Dorn as they’ve shown up is a major upgrade to IG tanks. It’s bigger and badder than the Leman Russ. It’s also a tank that really shouldn’t exist at all. Let’s take a look at why.
The New Tank
If you haven’t been paying attention the new tank we are getting is the Rogal Dorn Battle Tank. It’s a big beefy tank that plods along shooting up stuff. It’s got a verity of turret weapons to chose from, including several versions of the battle cannon. There are sponsions. The tank has a hull mounted weapon that can be brutal. It’s also got a few other guns strapped onto it in modern GW fashion. It’s a cool looking bulky tank, and does fit with the Guard. But when you look at it, it kind of sounds a lot like another tank.
The Tank That Shouldn’t Exist
So… what’s the point of this tank? It fits in between the heavy Leman Russ and the Super-Heavy Baneblade. So it’s a medium-heavy tank? It fact there are a number of Guard tanks, from Forge World, that fill this spot. The Macharius heavy tank and the Malcador are already tanks that sit between the Russ and the Baneblade. So it’s a kind of redundant tank in the lore. Moreover… why add a new tank, that will no doubt be retconned to have always been around. What was needed was really a new updated Leman Russ model. In fact looking at the Rogal Dorn heavy tank you can see how it probably started out as a buffed up Russ. It’s got a very similar weapon layout. So why was it made?
Too Many Guns
The Dorn is a clear result of power creep in the game. I’ve talked a few times before about why Guard struggle in 9th. One of the major issues they’ve faced is that they are simply dated. Modern GW tanks are just covered in guns. Take a look at the Primaris tanks. These guys are studded with guns and shoot dozens or scores of shots a turn. Imperial Guard tanks, which once boasted the best shooting in the game, have fallen behind. Many of their tanks boast a mere two guns. Even a fully equipped Leman Russ maxes out at like 5 guns, and most of them five only a handful of shots. To make them comparable they’ve been forced to make the turrets fire twice.
So in order to bring the Guard up to the power level of the rest a simple Russ re-sculpt wasn’t going to cut it here. Making a bigger model with the same number and type of guns just wouldn’t work. The tank needed to have more and better guns, and because of that it needed to be a new tank.
Why Not Forge World?
So if you need a bigger tank than the Russ, why not one of the Forgeworld ones? Both the Malcador and Macharius have models and heavier weapons than the Russ. The Malcador in particular has a pretty similar weapon load out to the Dorn. I’d guess there are a few reasons for this. I’ve heard based on the way Forge World designs are made its about the same amount of work to make a new tank as to convert a FW tank to the new plastic. Given this, why not make a new tank and then you get to have more tanks.
I also wonder if the Rogal Dorn heavy tank wasn’t originally made to be an upgraded Russ model at first. The real main weapon difference is that the Dorn has the two additional (optional) lower hull weapons. These kind of seem like a tacked on addition. Most of the other hull and turret changes could have just been updated models. So I wonder if at some point they made a new Russ model, and then changed tracks to make it a new tank by adding on some other guns. Either way, its a tank we’re are getting, even if its one that really shouldn’t exist.
Let us know what you think about this new tank, down in the comments!
