Horus Heresy – Mechanicum Krios Battle Tank / Venator

An entirely new kit from the Mechanicum Heavy Support Force is the Krios Battle Tank including the Venator variant.

This vehicle was moved from a former Forge World resin kit into a multi-part plastic kit, covering both variants and three different weapon load outs. You can build from this set the regular Krios Battle Tank (either with Lightning Cannon or Irradiation Blaster) or Krios Venator with a Pulsar Fusil. We do not have a official RRP yet, as the kit is currently only available as part of the Mechanicum Heavy Support Force, but pricing is very likely between 55 to 62,50 EUR.

The Krios fulfilled the rule of the Mechanicum's main battle tank, similar to a Predator in the Legiones Astartes, during the Horus Heresy and before in the Great Crusade. As the Krios is quite difficult to build and maintain, it was outside of the capabilities of the most STCs, and therefore never seen in service outside of the Taghmata or Skitarius. This vehicle uses a different approach in warfare, for example it lacks a regular tank turret or thick layers of armour, it uses a series of interlocking energy fields and is quite maneuverable and fast due to its large tracks.

While the lore states, that there were multiple derivations and variants, the only one really known is the Krios Venator, that replaces the Lightning Cannon with a Pulsar-fusil and moves the main battle tank into the role of a tank destroyer, including a large shield and further generators.

The Krios is build from three large sprues, with one covering the side tracks, one the middle sections and a third one including all the parts for the three different weapon load outs. The way these are split, it would be easily possible to repurpose the tracks or add further weapon variants by swapping one of the sprues. The Mechanicum does not have a vehicle accessory sprue and this kit does not cover the hunter-killer missiles.

As usual with most tank kits, we start with the track sections. These are quite stable and massive pieces. Removing the mould lines from the sides of the tracks takes a bit of time, and we build the other half the same way, basically mirroring it. Quick build, no hassle here what so ever.

Next up is the mid section and a lot of the rivets on the underside of that part were damaged or rubbed off. As this is the underside, you won't see that, but still, a production design that causes this is not as thorough as it should be. We add one of the energy fields to the front of that section.

And then we move to the Servitor gunner. This is an updated design, as the old Forge World model had a member of the Mechanicum on the command throne and not just a "simple" servitor. This entire section is cut into countless pieces and to be honest, I am not quite sure if you should assemble these as far as I did, if you intend to properly paint them. It has a crab-shell like design, and mimics the pose of the Space Jockey from Alien.

There are huge wheels to the sides of the gunner and they do have a very present mould line, that takes a bit of time to clean as well. I recommend a mould-line remover tool, but you can use a sharp blade as well.

The gunner has a mid-section connector for the two weapon system of the battle tank. This piece is unfortunately included only one time, if we had a second copy, we could magnetise the weapon variants of the Krios.

At first we build the Lightning Cannon, quite the long weapon system and lean design. I would recommend leaving the outer armour pieces off until you painted the entire kit.

The second weapon system is the Irradiation Blaster. Very layered design, with a lot of depth. Just like with hte Lightning Cannon, I'd recommend leaving the armour panels off until you are done painting it.

I glued the mid section to one side, to keep the carriage open for the further build.

The Krios has side sponsons, which are optional and cover centreline mounted volkite calivers. These are quite fiddly to build and the building instructions lack a certain detail, the orientation of the connector pieces for the volkite calivers. These have to point towards the middle to properly mount the weapons. This could have been designed sturdier as well.

With these glued to the sides, we can assembly the regular Krios Battle Tank.

In case you would like to build the Krios as a the Venator tank destroyer, we build the third weapon option from this kit, the Pulsar-fusil. And as this does not use the mid-sector extension, you could keep the weapon systems swapable / magnetised. This is something!

The last piece we need for the Krios Venator is the huge shield for the front, and if you magnetise the pieces marked in red (along with one of the sides), you could swap between the battle tank and venator variant quite easily.

This is the break down, how I divided the kit into sub-builds for painting and later magnetisation. The second picture shows you the two different weapon variants for the regular Main Battle Tank. I think they could have put that piece in there twice, to make it properly swapable.

As the Krios is a main battle tank, it is small than the Triaros / Karacnos, but I can't help and think of some kind of Ordinatus build from these track sections. To give you an idea of the size compared to other Mechanicum units, you can see him here as well side-by-side.

Both models are quite detailled and cover a lot of depths for model builders / painters as well.

Conclusion

An impressive kit with its small weaknesses. Some sections are quite fiddly to build, split into a lot of small pieces that are far from beginner friendly to assemble. Along with some of the mechanic pieces having an incredibly long outline, causing a more time consuming removal of mould lines.

But beyond that, a stunning detailed kit. I like that you can - with minor modifications - swap between regular Krios and the Krios Venator, it would have been very neat if they went that bit further and added the second mid section connector or split it differently, that we could actually magnetise between Lightning Cannon and Irradiation Blaster.

With the release of the Heavy Support Force, I can't wait for the next wave of Mechanicum for Legions Imperialis, as we've seen teasers of the Karacnos and Krios, but got no further info when these will drop. But very likely along another supplement, as they weren't included in the Rise of the Dark Mechanicum.

Warhammer 40,000 and The Horus Heresy are brands by Games Workshop.

The reviewed product item was provided by the manufacturer.