Vehicle of the Week: T-12 Tiger Medium TankThe T-12 Tiger, presented in Historical: Reunification War, was Davion's bid to produce a modern combat vehicle in the wake of the BattleMech, introducing new technology into their tank corps and field a modern main battle tank to preserve traditions and offer a cheaper but still effective option. My suspicion is that the increasing obsolescence of the Estevez probably contributed to their enthusiasm for the project. Operated as Davion's principal MBT during the end of the Age of War and the Reunification War, the Tiger was also extremely widespread. The Lyrans put it into production not long after the Marsden II and the Tiger proliferated across the Inner Sphere by the early 2500s, then just kept spreading. Eventually, everyone with a military industry capable of building the Tiger had built at least a few with the design revived during the Succession Wars as a desperation measure. Despite this, no major variants existed, being subsumed into the same game stats with minor upgrades in components to improve reliability and uprated electronics. Between the expansive user base and the similarities that may have helped inform the Bulldog's design (and quite possibly its lackluster sales), the Tiger was probably one of the most influential tanks in BattleTech's history. The only listed notable operator was the same Colonel John Gordon whose pledge of loyalty alongside the First New Avalon Dragoons gave Alexander Davion the captured men to ransom back his wife and son as well as credibility with the people of the Crucis March. Gordon's own fate was less rosy - after his promotion to General, he was executed in 2533, pushing the violence to a new level of intensity.
At 55 tons, the Tiger is in a bit of an odd spot, but it's one that makes more sense when you look at it in the tank's historical context. Today, that obliges you to use a heavy vehicle bay. The contemporaneous DroST transports in the same book reveal that the vehicle bay was apparently not considered
de rigueur at the time the tank was designed, so you're looking at a different environment where the question is cargo space, not bay space, and under that regime, the Tiger makes more sense. A Veridian 220 ICE provides the power to go 64 kph in clear terrain, a very familiar speed for older medium tanks. The "Quantum Heavy Plate" isn't especially heavy at 6 tons but the 20/20/16/20 armor spread does stop a certain amount of fire. At the time, with primitive 'Mechs still fairly common, armed support vehicles only slowly leaving the MBT role, and the Star League a dream of a man who wouldn't be born for decades, it was still thin but not as unreasonable. All the same, this is definitely the tank's weak point. The Federated AC/10 in the turret is the centerpiece of the armament, giving you a nice, solid, concentrated blast out to 15 hexes, not to mention a punch-through against support vehicles without BAR 10 armor. Two tons of ammunition leave you with more ammo than the tank's armor will let it use. An Archer SRM 4 rack is mounted alongside the main gun, providing a reasonable short-range crit-seeker; with only one ton of ammo, I recommend you stick with standard rounds for most situations. Two different brands of machine guns were used, a Grizzly-3 Minigun in the turret and a pair of Borman-A5C Heavy Machineguns, one each fore and aft. Despite the name, the Bormans are standard machine guns, not heavies. While they're described as drawing on separate ammunition feeds, that's not reflected in the stats and the Grizzly was later replaced by a third Borman using a common ammo supply.
If you're using the Tiger, my advice is to look at the Bulldog and take some inspiration there. This isn't a tank you use alone. They're cheap, disposable, and individually not that tough. In other words, Tigers are perfect for throwing at the enemy in groups. Those of you looking to use them today may want to consider the value of armor-piercing or precision ammo - there's enough ammo to carry 10 rounds of a single type and precision will give fast-moving units a nasty surprise. Back in the day, you may want to put flak in the second bin to keep VTOLs and fighters honest. While unlikely in most games, some tear gas or knock-out gas SRMs may be useful if you see a need to disperse hostile crowds (like the insurgent troops and mobs
also found in Historical: Reunification War) without creating lists of martyrs in the convenient major outrage size. Alternate rules for both are found in the Biological and Chemical Weapons section of the same book.
Killing them isn't terribly difficult one on one. Move in, focus on a side, and pound it, disabling first if it's convenient. The problem is that Tigers aren't tanks people deploy singly and a lance of them can put out a respectable amount of fire. Compounding this is the lack of a lot of our modern long-range options in some time periods when Tigers were extremely common, so just slapping them around with a
Falconer isn't on the table.
Griffins still are, though, and will give a lance of Tigers fits. Other reasonably fast mediums with PPCs or LRMs are equally good options. Many of their opposing tanks are using longer-ranged weapons, which doesn't help anything.
References: That's the bad thing about working out on the edge. The MUL, CamoSpecs, and even Sarna haven't caught up yet. That being the case, here's the Tiger in all its glory:
