Anvil Heavy Tank

**Key Features** | »» Twin 107mm main guns w/ high explosive shells»» 203mm thick sloped armour plating»» Forward opening top hatch»» Exterior firing slits»» Cataloguing plaque (usually removed)

*"...Hey, it works!"*

- Anvil driver upon destroying a Reservist bunker.

## Tactical Analysis

* **Ye Olde Tank:** Due to advances in armour technology and its small calibre guns, the Anvil Tank can no longer go toe-to-toe with modern tanks. However, its armour with the improvements done is world class, and its high explosive shells can make a mess of groups of infantry or light vehicles.

* **Even an old tank can learn new tricks:** Fortunately, it has a secret weapon for protecting itself against such threats. Two men can ride on the sides of the tank and fire on targets of opportunity, giving the Anvil much needed flexibility, and the “Hammer” round which sprays the area in desolator defoliant that melts infantry who tries to go through, and is particularly deadly for garrisoned infantry.

* **WW2? Heck, WW3's already over!:** The Anvil's weaknesses are considerable. Its guns are outdated and lacking in firepower, while its painfully slow turning speed and turret traverse leaves it very vulnerable to being flanked.

* **Now that's a real gun**: In order to give the Anvil more effectiveness on the modern battlefield, the Soviets have been refitting some Anvils with a 180mm "Molot" Cannon.

## Operational History

 File:OldAnvilInvasion.jpg  During the Second World War, known to the Soviets as the Great Patriotic War, the **Anvil Heavy Tank** formed the backbone of the massive Soviet war machine. Rugged, dependable and easily superior to even the best of the Allied vehicles, the T-55 Anvil was feared by Allied forces throughout the war. In the early years that machine was thought of as unstoppable; no weapon the Europeans could turn against it would penetrate the front armour, and its twin 107mm guns could destroy any defensive position in short order, leading to position after position being overrun by Soviet tanks. Even the heaviest French support tanks or deadliest German panzers would falter against their world-class weaponry and thick sloped armour, and the Allies despaired that no weapon could reliably be expected to stop the tank posed to grind over all of Europe.

However, on the Soviet side the Anvil was not seen nearly the same way. It was cheap to produce, being the first main battle tank constructed by automated lines, and in terms of raw statistics seemed to be the most powerful vehicle imaginable, with better range, armour, firepower and even speed than most competitors. However, the decision to go from 100mm cannons to 107mm cannons to improve high explosive delivery had created significant issues. The lack of space made for an uncomfortable fit for the operators and had negatively affected the degree to which the cannons could depress downwards, no climate control left them either freezing or cooking. Poor suspension and hard metal seats meant that driving anywhere was like being in a tumble dryer, meaning that crews would inch the tank along at the lowest possible speed or simply become exhausted from the effort of driving the beast; leading to an urban legend that it was the reason it took so long to overrun Germany despite their flawless win record. Lack of a rotating turret basket made it impractical to point the guns in any direction but forward; the crew had to shimmy around the weapon assembly as it turned. There wasn't enough space for the crew; the 107mm guns were an afterthought so there was barely enough space in the turret. The primitive auto-loaders had the irritating tendency to cause cuts and bruises, or even a broken arm, if improperly handled, which was frighteningly common the crews were barely trained in handling the Anvil, and over half the tanks fielded in 1951 did so without so much as a radio for communication.

Furthermore, the weight of the Anvil required an unprecedented series of bridge construction projects across Europe and Asia, which combined with the Mastiff's own overweight induced issues lead to nearly every single bridge across Eurasia and North Africa being replaced with far heavier duty bridges by the late war, as well as the phenomenon of "Anvil bridges" to handle the weight of so many giant vehicles rolling over them. And the differing rail gauges between the USSR and Europe lead to a heavy dependency on MCV set up production to send them onto the field as opposed to conventional logistics. Though it appeared to Soviet commands and Allied troops alike that the tank was unstoppable, it was plagued by problems its strategic role was covering up, and they soon came to the forefront as the Allies began to strike back.

 File:SU AnvilUpgrade.png  It soon became policy for infantry spotters to ride in the flank entry hatches of the tank and point out potential threats; factories in the field were modified so that the side escape hatches could be used as improvised bunkers of sorts for these spotters and newer marks of the Anvil would solve most of the ergonomic issues and the sheer amount of construction had changed roads and bridges across Eurasia to handle so many heavy tanks. Though this cut down on the losses, the Anvil's time was rapidly passing, and Soviet command rushed the Rhino, designed to be a world beater with its 125mm singular cannon and improved engine, into service as fast as it could manage. When the war ended, some Anvils, retrofitted to fix it’s many issues, were pawned off on other nations, and most of them became the vehicles for the military police and militia to be deployed in case of an invasion of the Soviet bloc itself.

The Asia-Pacific Revolutionary Compact would outright acquire the plans for the Anvil Tank, being quite fond of the vehicle for its ability to dominate the island fighting in the pacific theatre and having extensively modified the tank for the Island Coalition's own usages and produced the even more potent Stormtiger. With their crawling wall doctrine informed by the experience of needing to push through extensively fortified islands, minor continents, and beaches and their extensive usage of MCVs and Amphibious logistics, the size of the Anvil was much less of an issue for them, and the communists of the Dragon Rim were only too happy to take large quantities of Anvils off the hands of the Soviet Union if they were going to replace most of them with Rhinos. Though due to the lack of adjustment to the changes in military production offered by war factories, there were still far more Anvil Hulls than there were potential users.

But while the Stormtiger would serve excellently in the third world war, most considered it to be in essence, a separate vehicle due to how many changes were made to accomodate the design vision of the APRC and to make the vehicle a modern juggernaut able to help hold the APRC's territory in the face of Japanese Invasion and Allied counterattack just as they had swept into significant stretches of territory when on the attack.

This would have been the end of the story of the Soviet Anvil were it not for the massive losses suffered by Soviet tank divisions in WW3. Not only were they losing a great many vehicles in the savage fighting on the Western Front, the ability of the Japanese to rapidly cut off supply lines and escape routes meant that huge numbers of Rhinos and Hammers were abandoned in the field and losses were rarely recovered; the Japanese were quick to salvage these vehicles and dissolve them with nanites to reuse the raw materials, meaning that even as the Soviets took their territory back there were many tanks that were beyond recovery. Though the Soviets never found themselves short of trained crews due to the survivability and compartmentalizing of their vehicles, at the end of the war they found themselves in a position unheard of since the start of automated war machine production; they had more operators than they had vehicles, as the complex and expensive Hammer tank was not rolling off the line and war factories fast enough to replace the losses.

 File:VM-SovietAnvilTank.png
Rather than wait for the rebuilding to be completed the decision was made to press old vehicles into service to temporarily augment Soviet tank divisions to their on-paper strength, and then phase out these vehicles as production caught up. New requisition orders were called and thousands of Anvils flooded back into military service. Mostly placed into reserve units, an interesting concept is currently being trialed by Soviet command. The Anvil is still one of the toughest tanks in the world after getting upgrades to its old RHA armor, and though it definitely is not a tank hunter, it still has great potential as a bunker buster. With that in mind, Anvils being issued to front-line divisions have come with baskets of bursting 107mm high explosive shells, desolator filled “hammer” rounds, and instructions to use them as assault guns against fortified positions. With the new German Wall dividing the territory of the Allies and Soviets, and the threat of the Atomic Kingdom's walls and defensive lines looming, it is generally agreed that such a tank is needed now more than ever.

## Behind the Scenes

* The Anvil's background and design is based on the Heavy Tank from *Red Alert 1*

* The design resembles a mix of the real-life T-34 medium tank, and the Hammer.

## Just the Stats

 **Armour Type** | Heavy Armour

 **Kill Reward** | 5600

 **DPS** | 20

 **DPS** | 25