Legions Imperialis – Spartan Assault Tanks

On Tuesday, we discussed the Land Raider Proteus Explorator, and today, we will introduce its larger counterpart: the Spartan Assault Tank for Legions Imperialis.

We saw the plastic kit of this model in 2022, and last year the Spartan Assault Tanks were added to Legions Imperialis as a squadron of four vehicles, with an RRP of 31.50 GBP / €41 EUR.

In terms of lore, Spartan Assault Tanks are sometimes called Land Raider Spartans, as they are a prolonged version of the Mk II Land Raider designed to transport more Terminators. While the Spartan itself is now part of the official lore, it began life as a conversion based on the Rogue Trader-era Land Raider kit, combined with plastic card and parts from the old Space Marine Rhino. It was introduced in the Modelling Workshop section of White Dwarf 119 in November 1989 by none other than Tony Cottrell (former head of Forge World and designer of an incredible number of kits)!

The tank was updated in 2012 with the initial release of Horus Heresy as a massive resin kit (Forge World even covered it in a video teaser). For comparison, here are the old Imperial Armour instructions for the kit from Forge World's Warhammer 40,000 product range. However, it is now a 'regular' plastic kit, first released with the second edition of Horus Heresy in 2022 as part of the Age of Darkness boxed set, and also released last year for Legiones Astartes.

Like any other Legiones Imperialis set, it comes with two identical mid-sized sprues, a greyscale instruction leaflet, and - in this case - a matching decal sheet for the Legiones Astartes.

Due to its increased size and additional features, this kit only covers two models per sprue, as opposed to the three included in the Land Raider kit. Nevertheless, almost no space is left unused, and the casting quality is superb with only minor mould lines and no flash or mould slip.

As you can see from the sprue, there is a choice of either sponson-mounted quad lascannons or laser destroyers and either hull-mounted heavy bolters or lascannons. The crew wears Mk 6 armour.

We will build two Spartan Assault Tanks from one of the sprues, beginning with the inner hull. As an example of a possible conversion, you could modify one of the tanks to have an open ramp.

As with the Land Raider, the side panels are sturdy, single-cast pieces. However, there are smaller details, such as the drive sprocket cover on the inside and the two pieces for the exhaust system.

As mentioned earlier, the Spartan Assault Tank can be equipped with either sponson-mounted quad lascannons or laser destroyers. The sponsons on Legions Imperialis vehicles are usually delicate, so I recommend using tweezers for assembly. To avoid flooding the small pieces with glue, I suggest applying the glue to a tile and briefly dipping the small pieces into it, rather than applying the glue to the component itself.

In addition to the sponsons, you can choose a hull-mounted weapon system: either synchronised heavy bolters or lascannons.

Last but not least, add the crew to the tank. You can build the commander's hatch either closed or open, and you have the option of equipping all of the tanks with either a multi-melta or a heavy bolter. The crew wears Mk 6 armour.

Here is a quick size comparison with the "smaller" Land Raider.

Finally, here are the assembled Spartan Assault Tanks. Please note that I replaced the Mk 6 crew with Mk 3 armoured miniatures from other Astartes kits.

Conclusion

While I enjoyed building these, I have some issues with Legions Imperialis kits that only include four miniatures. At an RRP of 41 EUR / 31.50 GBP, that feels quite steep. However, as the Spartan Assault Tank has a transport capacity of five, you don't need that many of them; you can actually go a long way with just a single box to transport your Terminators into battle.

The level of detail that Games Workshop has managed to capture in these kits is incredible, and they are a delight to look at. With the upcoming addition of Cerberus and Typhon, we will see further variants and derivatives of the Spartan chassis at this scale. I can't wait to paint them for the 7th Legion to accompany my Huscarls.

The Horus Heresy and Legions Imperialis are brands by Games Workshop.