Castigator Tank

Watch and rejoice as the Bolter Bitches finally have their first actual tank in nearly three decades.

Not to be confused with the Castigator Bolt Cannon nor the Castigator Titan.

Have you ever Looked at a predator tank and thought to yourself "The only way this could be more awesome is if it had Tits and was on fire.", well now the Ecclesiarchy has you covered!

After plenty of Sisters of Battle players bitched and moaned on /tg/ over the walking circus that is, the Paragon Warsuit, GeeDubs decided to do a saving throw by giving them a new armored vehicle to play with. Ladies and gentlemen, meet the Castigator Tank, the first actual tank in the Sisters of Battle army list.

Overview

Resembling a hand-me-down version of a Space Marine Predator Tank that has been Ecclesiarchy'ed all over to make it just different enough to warrant its own model at full price. The Castigator Tank functions as the Leman Russ Battle Tank of the Sister's army list, which is a godsend to SoB players, since their actual armored vehicle column range from unsuitable against enemy tanks to not having enough wounds.

Crunch

By default the Castigator is armed with a twin-linked Autocannon, two Heavy Bolter sponsons and a hull-mounted Heavy Bolter. For 5points it can switch out its Autocannon with a Battle Cannon and for additional 5 points you can arm it with a a pintle-mounted Storm Bolter and /or a Hunter-Killer Missile

A vanilla Castigator is a good scource of anti MEQ. It´s Autocannon is S 7 AP-1 D2 with means a 50% chance of getting through MEQ armour and with potentially 12 attacks there is a good chance some MEQ will definitely die by the guns of your Castigator. The Heavy Bolter´s on your Castigator will aid further in turning those MEQ into meat giving you minimum 13 shoots per shooting phase. The Storm Bolter doesn´t really add that much killing power because of its AP0, but against GEQ and hordes it does add some additional Dakka. As a self defence against tanks you can add a ONE Hunter-Killer Missile, but be sure to max out your damage with some miracle dice. (Or trust your girlfriends with their melta and multi-melta to do the job, use the miracle dice on their attack for more damage and invest those 5 points in something more efficient. Because team work makes the dream work.)

Looking at the Castigator´s Battle Cannon we have a weapon with 72“ for long range support to soften up the targets. You have two shells for that: sanctified shells and pyro shells.

Sanctified shells are S9 AP-3 D3 killers who are a nightmare for MEQ because of their AP and the blast rule. This means against squads of 6-10 dudes you are ALWAYS do a minimum of 3 attacks and against hordes of 11+ you ALWAYS do your full complement of 6 attacks. Against medium sized squads of 6- 10 this is awesome since nearly everything without a invulnerable save or FNP will most certainly take casualties. Against smaller squads of custodes or terminators however your number of attacks are less certain but still deadly.

Now what about vehicles? The blast rule doesn´t apply here because tanks won´t come up in squads of 6-10 which means no certain 3 attacks. Which mean by average you do around 9 damage and this is enough to severely cripple the shoot vehicle. Meaning if you get the first strike and make sure you hit and wound your target (Miracle dice says „Hello“), it is either finished with the next shoot or you at least reduced it´s effectiveness.

This makes it an effective vehicle/monster killer and bane of MEQ.

The second shell is more of a GEQ and horde killer with its S6 AP-1 D1. Although it really only shines at large hordes were it´s full 9 attacks can be used. Against medium squads of 6-10 it has a minimum of 3 attacks and is outclassed by the Autocannon in S and attacks (minimum of 4) The pyro has the advantage of ignoring cover however, with might come in handy against Fire Warrior and their counterparts hiding in their trenches. So it really depends on which foe you are up against.

Little funny thing about the kit

Strangely the castigator kit includes two side doors with the "fleur de lys" which are in no way mentioned in the assembly manual. Not even as a variant to the side hatches! You could think "Hey! Maybe they were meant to be installed, if you don´t take the two Heavy Bolter sponsons". But according to the codex you MUST take the sponsons. They are not optional! So either the sponsons were optional but this was later cut or GW fucked up because they forgot to show them as variant in the manual.

Similar to this, the manual shows only the unlit four braziers for the sides and forgot to mention, that there are lit braziers as a variant. Although this can be seen as a minor error compared to the doors who are just plain missing.

But the most likely reasoning for both is that since the Castigator shares the main hull sprue with both the Immolator and the Exorcist, they're a leftover from them. This is the same with vehicles that use the Rhino and Chimera chassis: as sprue molds, specially the big ones used for vehicles; are expensive as frak, you can save costs using the same sprues on several vehicles. Business as usual, then.

On the plus side: A talented kit basher can probebly create something awesome with it. Like cutting it´s size down a little bit and form a aspis (Hoplites shield) for your customized Saint Celestine. Add a Guardian Spear and you have a kick ass pallas athena look alike!

Or reshape it into a power buckler and add it to the side of your Paragon Warsuit´s range weapon, so it can shield it´s pilot from incoming fire. With a little Green Stuff you could even sculpture a storm shield for your Paragon Warsuit, giving it more protection and improving it´s design!

Also, If you save the doors and bits you can use them on the plastic Deimos Rhino to have a pimped-out one for your high-ranking girls for "cheap".