Did the Land Raider Crusader Exist Pre Heresy?

[Crystal Geyser]

One of my friends wants to use Razorbacks/Land Raider Crusaders in a Pre-Heresy campaign. Did they exist?

Everyone else is convinced he is wrong, but he wants to justify it with this passage from the Black Templars codex:

 

"Faced with such formidable defenses, it was not until the discovery of ancient techno-arcana in the long-forgotten depths of a captured hive that the tide of the battle was to turn.

Amidst the tattered scrolls and flickering holo-schematics, Marine Artificer Simagus discovered the means to develop one of the most feared battle tanks in the Imperium, the Land Raider Crusader."

BT Codex Page 43

 

Is he right? I ask to just legitimately check who is right, on the offchance we are all incorrect.

[dswanick]

The Razorback was "rediscovered" during M36 (IA vol2, Pg.49). Although it does allude to an earlier incarnation which it replaced, which itself evolved into the Predator. So there was apparently something like it prior to M36.

 

The Land Raider Crusader was invented in 304.M36 (IA vol2, Pg.97) by the Black Templars Chapter.

 

So something like a Razorback, sure. But your friend is out of luck on a Crusader.

Would your friend be content with a "Tartarus" pattern Land Raider? It's alluded to as a precursor of the Prometheus (IA vol2, Pg.111) and so would probably have 2 Twin-linked Heavy Bolters in the sponsons with no hull mounted weapon system.

[Demus Ragnok]

The passage from the BT codex says that the Crusader design had existed prior to the Templars discovering the design. So the design could have been from pre-heresy times. It may have never been put into production however.

[Aegnor]

I think pre-Heresy, there's actually as much scope, if not more, for divergent designs to exist, only for them to have been lost during the Heresy, or in the intervening years. Some will have been rediscovered, but others were lost for ever.

 

I think you could make a perfectly reasonable argument for this to have been the case with the Land Raider Crusader - it was a local variant in use during the Great Crusade - hell, maybe it was even drawn up by one of the crusading fleets at the direction of a Primarch etc, only for that knowledge to be lost during the Heresy... until it was rediscovered in M36 or whenever the current knowledge of it dates back to.

 

Alternatively, if you want to avoid contradicting the existing fluff about it (not that I think you actually would be if you did the above), it's another similar design - not the Crusader itself, but another tank that on the table-top, looks and functions exactly like the Crusader, but is a bit different. Again, the explanation could be that this separate variant was lost during the Heresy.

[PorridgeMeister]

Alternatively, if you want to avoid contradicting the existing fluff about it (not that I think you actually would be if you did the above), it's another similar design - not the Crusader itself, but another tank that on the table-top, looks and functions exactly like the Crusader, but is a bit different. Again, the explanation could be that this separate variant was lost during the Heresy.

 

I would lean towards this, to avoid people telling you that the Crusader was invented, not discovered.

 

The passage quoted from C:BT is not only from the oldest Codex still in use by several years, which slightly contradicts the latest offerings from GW, but actually states that it was technology, not the design itself that was discovered. In reality, the only technological difference between the Crusader and the standard variant is the frag assault launcher on the front hull - the hurricane bolters being essentially bolters welded onto a rack on a sponson frame, which really only takes the same amount technological insight gained from calculating how to open a can of beer with a table edge. ^_^

[dswanick]

The passage from the BT codex says that the Crusader design had existed prior to the Templars discovering the design. So the design could have been from pre-heresy times. It may have never been put into production however.

I would lean towards this, to avoid people telling you that the Crusader was invented, not discovered.

 

The passage quoted from C:BT is not only from the oldest Codex still in use by several years, which slightly contradicts the latest offerings from GW, but actually states that it was technology, not the design itself that was discovered.

This sums it up. The Crusader pattern was invented by the Black Templars in M36 after some critical piece of technology was rediscovered.

[Raven Angel]

I would say no on the pre HH Crusader and Razorback. That said on thing you could do is use naked Predators as Razorback substitutes. According to the fluff for the Predator at the start of the Great Crusade the tank had no side sponsons but could carry a combat squad into battle. as The Crusade progressed Predators scrificed the troop capacity for ammo and power pack storage for the side sponsons that had become standard on these tanks. In that context both the Razorback and the Immolator are DAoT proto Predator designs.

[TennisBall]

Ancient could mean anything but I've always taken it to mean pre-crusade era. Pretty much all the technology they use is based on STC designs created during the Age of Technology.

 

I have to remind myself that technology is not logical to the Imperium nor Mechanicum. It's a bit like buying a new space marine simply because it has a different shaped helmet or some other decoration. It's exciting because we can't add that desired feature even though we could probably easily learn how if we wanted.

 

Vehicles might have bits swapped around on them, but if the technology for allowing a heavy weapon to rotate on top of a rhino doesn't exist, it's not going to be back-engineered from similar technology that is used on a Land Raider or predator. They have to find remains of an STC for the rhino to exist.

 

If razorbacks existed during the Great Crusade or later in the Heresy, they would appear in the Codex Astartes. The razor is regarded as new tech and some chapters don't make much use of them, this suggests that they weren't around during the time of Guilliman or he would have written about how to use them in battle - the marines may not have had access to them until the STC was rediscovered, but they'd have known how to use them.