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This article appeared in Quake II  

!Q2-Tank
Tank (Q2)
Health

750

Will gib when health is

-200

Attack Damage
Drops
Found in
[Source]


Get in, take your shot, and get out. Repeat as often as necessary. These metallic beasts can endure massive gunfire.

Quake II manual

In Quake II, the Tank is a large bipedal Strogg battle walker. It is slow and cumbersome, but wields an arsenal of powerful weaponry - its left arm sports a powerful blaster, its right arm sports a machine gun and it has a rapid-firing rocket launcher mounted on its shoulder.

It is first confronted in the Warehouse in Unit 2, and continue to appear throughout the game in many different levels, but generally only one or two individual Tanks on each level in which they appear. However, when the player reaches Unit 9 a stronger version of the Tank is encountered instead, the Tank Commander.

Behaviour and attacks[]

Machine Gun: The Tank's machine gun fires in a wide horizontal arc in the player's general direction and then back again. Each bullet deals 20 damage if it hits. If the player is far away from the tank, then only one or two bullets are likely to hit, but at close range then more bullets can hit and add up to severe damage. The machine gun has less of a delay before firing than the other two weapon systems, giving the player less time to react.

Blaster: The Tank's blaster fires three shots in succession directly towards its target, dealing 30 damage per hit. The blasts can be reliably dodged by strafing. If the player remains in view, Tanks will sometimes fire a more sustained volley.

Rocket Launcher: The Tank's rapid-firing rocket launcher is capable of firing a barrage of rockets at its target, each capable of dealing 50 damage if they hit, and dealing splash damage as well. In the original game, the rockets will be aimed directly towards the player's current position, but in the 2023 remaster the Tank can "lead" its shots somewhat against a strafing player. The Tank will usually launch a volley of three rockets, but if the target remains in its view then it sometimes launches a longer stream of more rockets. The rocket launcher has a longer pre-fire delay than the other two weapon systems, giving the player more time to react.

In the mission pack Ground Zero and the 2023 remaster the Tank will usually follow-up any of its three attacks with a volley from its rocket launcher (or its blaster in the 2023 edition), even if the player is no longer in its view (it'll usually fire at the point where it last saw the player). Furthermore, the animation to fire this follow-up volley is quicker than normal. This can be especially dangerous, because "where it last saw the player" might be right next to the cover where the player is lurking, potentially causing a good deal of splash damage to the hiding player - even worse, if the player was thinking of taking a brief moment in cover to avoid the Tank's fire and then popping out again to take another shot, they might find a barrage of rockets already coming for them without warning. If you take cover out of a Tank's sight, then you should wait in cover a little longer until you're sure its subsequent rocket barrage has finished. Thankfully, Tanks are much less common in Ground Zero than in the vanilla Quake II campaign, but the 2023 remaster applies these changes to all Tanks.

The 2023 remaster also makes Tanks and Tank Commanders exempt from infighting.

Appearance statistics[]

Campaign Easy Medium Hard/Nightmare
Quake II* 31 32 33
The Reckoning 12 13 13
Ground Zero 2 2 2
Quake II 64 5 5 6
Quake II PSX 36 32 43
Call of the Machine 47 50 49

*These statistics refer to the 2023 remaster. The Upper Mines and the Big Gun levels both contain a Tank that was not present in the original release.

Strategies[]

  • The Tank possesses high damage output and durability, but it is let down by its slow speed and the fact that its weapons are slow to commence firing. Cover can be used to your advantage; take a shot with the Grenade Launcher, Rocket Launcher or Railgun (or even the Super Shotgun) then take cover when the Tank begins the animation for one of its weapons. However, this strategy should be used with extreme caution when playing the Ground Zero expansion pack or the 2023 remaster - see above for why.
  • If you must fight one out in the open, the Chain Gun or Hyperblaster are good options due to their excellent damage output. It takes a little under 100 bullets to put the Tank down, or just under 40 shots from the Hyperblaster. In either case, this only takes a few seconds.

Death Messages[]

  • Player was blasted by a tank (Blaster)
  • Player was pumped full of lead by a Tank (Machinegun)
  • Player almost dodged a Tank's rocket (Rocket Launcher)
  • Player ate a Tank's rocket (Rocket Launcher)

Trivia[]

  • Tanks may sometimes perform a victory pose of sorts if they kill the player - it will crouch and slam one arm onto the ground.
  • The Tank's victory pose behaviour can be a disadvantage to it in co-operative gameplay. A Tank might kill one player and then perform its victory pose, ignoring other threats and leaving it wide open to attack from the fallen player's squad-mates.
  • The Blaster and Machine Gun used by the Tank and the Tank Commander are among few instances where a particular weapon is available to both the player and the Strogg, but the Strogg version is more powerful. Other examples are the Phalanx Particle Cannon used by Beta Class Gladiators in The Reckoning, and the Blaster used by Turrets in Ground Zero.
  • In the PSX version, a damage of 300 (instead of 200) is needed to gib the Tank's corpse.

Sounds[]

Sounds
The Tank spotting an opponent
The Tank step
The Tank being injured
The Tank being killed

Gallery[]

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