What a Tanker! Profiles for E-Series and Löwe
After writing rules for the E-Series and Löwe tanks by Ambush Miniatures for Bolt Action, I thought these would be a nice addition to What a Tanker! as well.
These are unofficial fan-made rules for private use only and are not affiliated with Too Fat Lardies. You will need a copy of the What a Tanker! rules to use them.
All these tanks count as Level 7 in the career ladder, with the exception of the E-10 being Level 5 and E-25 being Level 6. While some of them were planned as early as 1942, their development and production run would not make them available before 1945.
Too Fat Lardies – What a Tanker!
The TooFatLardies have built a solid reputation for producing wargames that prioritise historical feel over rulebook complexity, with games like Chain of Command or Sharp Practice. With What a Tanker!, they returned to the Second World War back in 2018, publishing rules for tank combat with vehicles from various nations of that era. And while I didn’t have the chance to give that game a try at LARDwerp back in 2022, I finally had the chance to do so with Team Würfelkrieg last month, and I’d like to share my experience with the rules in this review.
To give you a brief orientation on the scale of the game: if you want a tabletop game that scratches the same itch as World of Tanks, putting you in the commander’s seat of a WWII tank without drowning you in charts and counters, you should keep reading.
As the release was a few years ago, the printed rules are a bit scarce (~30 GBP / 35 EUR), but no worries — you can still pick up the digital download in their store for 17 GBP.
What Is It About?
What a Tanker! is a tabletop wargame for two or more players set during the Second World War. Each player controls one or more tanks, with the goal of knocking out the opposing side’s vehicles, either through sustained damage or a catastrophic hit. The game covers the full span of the war from 1940 to 1945, with national tank lists for Germany, the USA, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, France, Italy and Japan all included in the rulebook.
Those lists are substantial. On the German side alone, you’ll find everything from the early Panzer II and Panzer III variants of the Blitzkrieg years, through the mid-war workhorses like the Panzer IV F2-G and StuG III, right up to the heavy hitters of the late war: the Panther, the Tiger I, the Jagdpanther and the King Tiger. The Allies are equally well covered. British players can work their way from A13 Cruisers and Matilda IIs up through Cromwells and Sherman Fireflies to the Churchill Mk VII, while Americans progress from M3 Stuarts and Grants into the various Sherman variants and ultimately the M26 Pershing. Soviet players get a compelling path through T-34 variants, KV heavies and the fearsome IS-2. Each nation also has a career ladder that maps tank progression year by year, so there is a genuine sense of historical context to how forces develop over the course of the war.
June 2026 review
Halfway through 2026!
The year is already half over, and we have seen quite a bit so far. CONflict Rheinland may have taken place at the end of May, but the coverage only went online in June, so I’m including it here as well. Once again we had our own table, played a good amount of games, and had a really solid day overall. What more could you want?
It is a bit of a shame, though, that the next tabletop event, as things stand now, will not be until September: Rhein Main Multiversum 2026 in Nidderau. So there will have to be a few private sessions in between.
Speaking of private gaming sessions, there were a few of those in June as well. I met up with Team Würfelkrieg for some gaming and bbq, and we played a few rounds of What a Tanker! That will definitely be continued with more games later on. The highlight, though, was the ride in the Willys Jeep.
Bolt Action – E-Series and Löwe House rules
We just covered the E-10 and E-25 from the Ambush Miniatures Kickstarter Panzerdivision Cerberus, and I saw a lot of people asking how to use them in their games, for example in Bolt Action.
I want to take care of that and wrote some house rules for these units to be used in the third edition of Bolt Action. You will need the core rules for Bolt Action 3rd edition as well as the Armies of Germany supplement book from the same edition to use these unit entries. These are unofficial fan-made rules for private use only and are not affiliated with Osprey Games or Warlord Games.
As it depends on how you want to integrate these models into your game and which narrative you want to pick up, there are certain basic options for these. I used the unit entries from the Armies of Germany book and cross-referenced and calculated how these modifications would affect the point values and such, and this is the result. To keep them as flexible as possible, I provide unit entries from Inexperienced to Veteran for all of them. It is up to you whether you want to play them as the dire Last Stand scenario or as if the war continued into 1946 (and onwards). Therefore I kept the options for Panzer Aces, like Tiger II and other late-war vehicles had. But you are free to use them as unproven prototypes, manned by inexperienced crews, like the Panzer VIII Maus is covered in the book.
If you wish to do so, you can drop the Panzer Ace and add Unreliable or Götterdämmerung (Panzer VIII Maus, p. 63 in Armies of Germany) from the unit profiles provided below. Depending on how hopeless you want to paint the situation, without point reductions to the unit entries. Otherwise reduce the points by 10% if you wish.
All of these vehicles would be added as entries to the Late War Force Selection Guide on p. 125 in the Armies of Germany book. All pictures by Team Würfelkrieg.
Ambush Miniatures – E-10 and E-25 Tank
Today we are covering a topic that has a long tradition here on the Chaosbunker: a tank review!
The occasion is the new Kickstarter campaign by Ambush Miniatures, The War is not over – Panzerdivision Cerberus, which focuses on numerous prototypes and "what-if" concepts from the late years of the war. The campaign covers six different vehicles in total: the E-10, E-25, E-50, E-75, the Panzerkampfwagen Löwe, and an additional Flak variant, all in 28mm scale (approximately 1:56). In today's review, we are taking a closer look at two tank destroyers: the E-10 and the E-25.
But let's start from the beginning and introduce the company behind the campaign. Ambush Miniatures may not be immediately familiar to everyone. Ambush Miniatures is the result of a merger between Heer46 and Air Raid 36/46, two long-time tabletop hobbyists who have combined their passion for World War II miniatures and vehicles under a new name. Heer46 has previously released many historical and "what-if" designs in both 15mm and 28mm scales, while Air Raid 36/46 had established itself in the market with a broad range of 1:200 scale models for aerial combat. Together, they now aim to pool their experience and capacity to bring further ideas to life.
At the heart of the new campaign, Panzerdivision Cerberus, are the armoured vehicles of the E-Series. The E-Series was a German development programme from the Second World War intended to replace the wide variety of existing tank and tank destroyer types with a standardised family of vehicles. Multiple weight classes were planned, ranging from light vehicles up to the heavy E-100, in order to simplify production, maintenance and spare parts supply. The "E" stood for Entwicklung (development), representing the next unified generation of armoured vehicles. None of these vehicles ever reached serial production, however; the project remained at the drawing board stage.
CONflict Rhineland 2026
Last weekend, the latest installment of CONflict Rheinland took place in Langenfeld near Leverkusen. Just like in previous years, we had our own table, this time covering some retro gaming of Warhammer 40,000 2nd edition.
CONflict is a closed, invite-only event that runs from Friday evening until Sunday afternoon, with some people, just like the three of us, only staying for Saturday. We covered things like the location, car park, and so on over the last few years, so I’ll skip that in this year’s coverage. If you’re interested, just check out the coverage since 2022:
As catering was expanded this year, we had more room in the car for miniatures and such, and I brought along two IKEA Samla boxes of sprues and kits for the bring & buy. Once we arrived around 10:30 am, a lot of gaming was already going on, and we did a quick browse before we set up our own table.
Right next to us, Lion Rampant was being played, covering a battle from the Italian Wars with lots of Landsknechts.
Dead Man’s Hand – Mounted US Cavalry
The second part of the US Cavalry range for Dead Man’s Hand by Great Escape Games is a box of mounted soldiers: the Mounted U.S. Cavalry. It continues the line of cowboys (and cowgirls) on horseback and makes perfect sense for the US Cavalry. The mounted US Cavalry was crowdfunded through Kickstarter in March 2026 and delivered in April and May this year.
If you missed it, we already covered the US Cavalry on foot earlier on the blog.
The Mounted US Cavalry (DMHP007) boxed set contains 10 multi-part plastic miniatures for an RRP of 28 GBP. Just like the infantry set, it gives you the parts you need to build US Cavalry on horseback, as well as options for the 9th and 10th Buffalo Soldiers. We received a sample covering half a box, with three different sprues.
Dead Man’s Hand – US Cavalry on Foot
Great Escape Games added the US Cavalry to their range of plastic sets for Dead Man's Hand. These were financed through a Kickstarter campaign in November of last year. If you missed them as part of the Kickstarter campaign, don't worry: you can pick them up now from their online store or through various retailers all over the world.
The DMHP006 boxed set "US Cavalry" contains 10 multi-part plastic miniatures for an RRP of 18 GBP, and gives you the opportunity to build US Cavalry on foot, as well as units from the 9th and 10th Buffalo Soldiers. We received a sample sprue each from both kits — the foot and mounted versions — in Q1 of 2026, and we are catching up with them now in separate reviews.
Furucius – Stone Trove terrain
Last year I had a bunch of rock formations printed, using the Stone Trove files by Dana McDonald.
The project originally came from Kickstarter, and you can now buy the sets on MyMiniFactory in different bundles. There are also a few shops running a merchant license if you don’t have access to your own printer.
All parts were printed on a Bambu Lab A1 Standard, using the High Quality PLA profile with a 0.08 mm layer height. That already gives a very clean result, but on the top surfaces where layer lines were still visible, I went in with a 1:1 mix of filler and white acrylic paint. I just brushed a fairly thick coat onto those areas and let it cure fully before touching anything else.
March 2026 review
The Grim Dark and the Wild West
Posts on the blog have been slow lately, but that is mostly due to internal projects. As I told you, I am working on an Imperial Fists army for the 2nd edition of Warhammer 40k. I made solid progress this month, but still have some work in front of me. One missing piece to prepare is the Whirlwind, which is part of my extension to push them from 1.250 to 1.500 points.
We received another shipment by Great Escape Games for Dead Man's Hand. We will cover the US Cavalry / Buffalo Soliders as well as the Mounted US Cavalry from the Kickstarter. Just give us a bit of time to catch up with the current running projects.
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