Dwarves in Tanks part three

Dwarves in Tanks 3

The third installment proves that not all the best designers agreed with the military use of steam tanks!

DampfPanzerWagon III (The landship Gloria II)
Baron Escta Von Drille was a sailor and loved to mess about in boats. He had already started to look at the possible uses of steam as a means of propulsion for his pleasure craft and purchased a steam boiler and engine from a neighboring principality, however aggressive rumblings and border disputes meant that this one precious, steam engine (originally ‘ear marked’ for his steam launch Gloria) was pressed into service as the power source for his armoured steam landship (Gloria II).

Gloria II was built by the noted marine engineer Heinz Been Vinddie (or Ratty to his friends – sorry friend!) Ratty’s family had been building boats for over 200 years and he used traditional boat building skills and new technology to refine this first ‘landship’ model.

There was only one issue, Ratty was one of those very rare dwarves – a pacifist and designed and built Gloria II or DPW III without any armourment or ordinance (stating that Defence was the best form of Attack).

The torpedo spar was added as a ‘make do’ stand-by, but was never up-dated. Technically the design is ‘sound’ but much better suited to naval tactics rather than the more traditional land battles. At close quarters the torpedo spa can be lethal and will cripple any other PDW design. (At very close range!!!!!)

Special Rules
1 Torpedo must be in contact to do most damage – but halved if not in contact but within 2 inches (any further and the effect is lost on armour – but can still kill dwarves!).
2 The bow armour is the toughest available and the shape makes it ideal for ramming.
3 The crew have a habit of “Full speed ahead and repel all borderers.” +1 for assault and +1 for wounding. Ideal tactics for the “This will be short and sharp type scenarios”.
4 Torpedo can be replaced – it takes three full turns.

Construction
The forward structure and upper superstructure are modelled from cardboard covered in plastic card (use lots of superglue and sellotape to hold the plastic card while the glue sets then sand smooth). The boiler is a slightly modified boiler from a Wild, Wild, West disc throwing toy available from ‘Toys r Us’, but turned up-side-down. The wheels are from a Disney Atlantis toy and the other detail is from the spare box. The Spar is a plastic rod, however other modelers have used cocktail sticks or skewers and these seem to work just as good.

The model is painted in nautical colours and bears the family crest of the Von Drille’s. I had tried to model some rust on this model, however the final finish is ‘well maintained’.