TME-08 Pincer Tank Destroyer

STATISTICS

OVERVIEW

    The TME-08 Pincer Tank Destroyer is a conversion of the "Debbie" (Th'kret) tank destroyer used by the Thaurian Concordat.   An scaly (and overly flashy) design, like most Thaurian equipment, was characterized by its ability to speed into battle and use its main gun to full effect before becoming a statistic on a government chart thanks to its paper-thin armor.

CAPABILITIES

    Lightly armored but fast and heavily armed, the Pincer packs a Gauss rifle with eight rounds.  Only two tons of standard armor protects its thirty-ton frame, yet it speeds across gunsights at 119 kilometers per hour.  Its dependence on ammunition limits its tactical usefulness but forces its pilot to use the hit-and-run tactics it was intended for.  The spikes on the front are decorative and absolutely worthless except for scaring infantry.  It runs a meter off of the ground, forcing it to use thrust vectoring and the control flaps on the side for maneuverability.   It has been said that driving a Pincer is like flying an airplane.

    That is not an exaggeration.  Unlike most armored combat vehicles, it has a single crewman lying on his stomach on a platform slanted 30° who is responsible for driving the tank using his left hand and aiming the Gauss rifle with his right hand.  Pushing the left-hand joystick foreward accelerates, pulling it back decelerates or accelerates in reverse, and manipulating it left or right turns the tank in that direction.  Pushing the right-hand joystick depresses the Gauss rifle barrel (down to -10°), pulling it back raises the barrel (up to 30°), manipulating it from side to side rotates the Gauss rifle in its limited 30° arc.  A special helmet worn by the pilot tracks his eye movements and uses them to align the aim of the weapon in order to improve accuracy.  The pilot looks through a large plexiglass canopy that gives him unsurpassed vision arcs; compasses, maps, waypoints and targeting reticles are projected onto the canopy, removing the need for an instrument panel.  Pincer pilots (and they often demand to be called 'pilots') are usually either men and women who washed out of fighter pilot training, experienced vehicle drivers who got bored with "normal" driving, or young recruits; all of which love the speed and thrill of piloting a Pincer, which is comparable to hugging the ground in an aircraft or speeding around in a sports car.

DEPLOYMENT

    The Pincer is popular both with fast recon units, mercenaries, and armor training centers trying to coax young volunteers into the unimpressive duty of vehicle driver.  Reportedly, there is also a black market forming among minor-college students on backwater worlds using dearmed Pincers (or Pincers equipped with a laser targeter instead of a Gauss rifle) as racers and chick magnets, but TME has nothing to do with this.

VARIANTS

    The usual 3060 modification of a Pincer replaces the Gauss Rifle with a heavy rotary autocannon with copious amounts of ammunition, usually on the order of three tons.  As there's no point in designing a vehicle with greater endurance if it isn't going to survive, the remaining three tons are allocated towards additional armor.  Pilots mount this armor so that it does not affect the Pincer's handling; fortunately for them, aerodynamic armor has a very good ballistic slope to it.

    DESIGNER'S NOTE:    Micro Machine.

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