Editing Leman Russ Battle Tank (section)

==={{anchor|Annihilator}}Leman Russ Annihilator===
[[File:99590105335_Dkkmarsalphapatternannihilator02.jpg|250px|right|thumb|Leman Russ Annihilator.]]

The Leman Russ Annihilator began as a field conversion: An Imperial officer found his armoured units constantly losing to renegade armour, so he decided to replace his company's Leman Russ' battle cannons with the company's [[Lascannon|lascannons.]] This ultimately won them the battle, [[grimdark|but the officer responsible for these conversions was convicted of tech-heresy and executed.]] However, the supply of [[#Vanquisher|Leman Russ Vanquisher]]s is ever-dwindling after the loss of Tigrus, and the [[Imperial Guard]]'s demand for anti-armor tanks is ever-growing, so the Techpriests eventually sanctioned it in order to try to meet demand; Forge Worlds took the twin-linked lascannons off the [[Predator Annihilator]] and put them in the Leman Russ's turret. Because the lascannon is easier to make, maintain, and use, the Annihilator is the preferred armour-hunting tank of armoured regiments expecting to sustain lots of damaged and lost tanks (like the [[Death Korps of Krieg]]).

Forge World rolled this tank with the Death Korps of Krieg army, and was very popular before 5th edition changed the way a Leman Russ works. Since moving and shooting Ordnance weapons was no longer a problem, the Annihilator lost much of its appeal, but after sixth edition changed which weapons can be fired when a vehicle moves, its utility has risen some: because its cannon is not an ordnance weapon, and the Annihilator is a heavy vehicle (unlike the Conqueror), it can fire all of its weapons at full ballistic skill on the move.

It'd be pretty awesome if they gave it the Exterminator treatment where they not only made the weapon twin-linked but doubled its rate-of-fire, which in this case would mean making its lascannons heavy 2 twin-linked. But alas, it's fairly underwhelming at the moment. You're better off just getting a Vanquisher at the moment, seeing as the Vanquisher only costs 5 more points and has a much better gun, it's not twin-linked though, but it could get that from other means.

'''8th ed.''' - Since twin-linked got scrapped, this is the only Russ to have an increase in firepower. Mathhammer-wise, it's on par with the Demolisher for anti-vehicle capabilities (putting out 1.94 wounds against another Leman Russ), but it has double the range, and the turret still costs 40pts. Obviously you're going to put a hull lascannon on it, since you'd have to be lobotomised not to. Also fares slightly better with sponson meltas. The shorter range of the turret means that there's a greater chance of you being in range to use them, unlike the Vanquisher (which scores 0.94 wounds against another Leman Russ by the way).