Tank

Although fearsome in capability, tanks are not without several glaring and well-known vulnerabilities. First of all, they are extremely large, heavy and in most cases relatively slow-moving. This means that, barring other factors, hitting a tank with an aimed weapon once you've gotten a good look at it isn't a large problem. Therefore, designers and operators of the things have had to come up with various means to ensure that you don't get that good look, or that even if you do hit it, it doesn't care.

Second of all, because they're large and heavy, tanks are limited in where they can travel. A modern MBT can weigh as much as 75 tons and measure in at 8 meters by 5 meters! Running one of these through a cramped cityscape isn't possible unless you're trying to knock the city down as you go. This sometimes is the case. See Grozny for a recent example. However, in a more frequent problem area, tanks are limited to strong bridges and large transport vehicles, meaning bodies of water such as large rivers or lakes can cause real trouble for them. They are extremely difficult (although not impossible) to move by air.

Third, modern tanks are extremely complex machines, are require an enormous amount of routine (and, unfortunately, sometimes not-so-routine) maintenance in order to remain operational. They cannot typically be used to travel long distances; in between actual engagements (and sometimes during protracted ones) tanks must be carted about on large trucks or railway cars. At any given moment, a significant number of these large expensive and crucial assets may be out of service. They also, therefore, require a huge logistical tail to keep running, with a steady flow of fuels, lubricants, ammunition, spare parts, etc.

Fourth, tanks suffer from their very success. By their nature and due to their deadly capabilities, tanks are regarded as primary targets on any battlefield on which they appear. This results in an amusing dichotomy between tank crew and infantry - tankers profess to not understand why you'd want to be on a battlefield without several inches of high-grade armor around you, and infantry profess to not understand why on earth you'd want to spend all your time inside a high-visibility target, methods of whose destruction have spawned entire industries and technologies.

At the strong suggestion of the Management, this writeup has been split off. For a more (mind-numbingly) complete discussion on the modern tank, see the remainder of this exposition at Tanks: A Brief History and Hunting Guide!

Tank was an old arcade game released by Kee Games (a division of Atari), way back in 1974. This game was also sold by Fun Games Inc. under the name Tankers (same game, different hardware and cabinet).

This is a rather historical title, as it was the first game ever to use solid, contiguous characters, and is the earliest known use of ROM chips for video game graphics. This title was so popular that it allowed Atari to drop the Kee name entirely, and put most future games under the Atari label alone (distributors used to require exclusivity, which was why Atari had about 8 names back in the early 70s).

Tank was followed up by four sequels, Tank II, Tank III, Tank 8, and Ultra Tank. It was also modified for the Atari 2600, where it was called Combat (Combat added airplane sequences, dropped the mines altogether, and had different levels).

This is a rather basic game. Each player uses a set of two levers to control a simple tank inside a maze. Blast mines and your opponent to win. (This is a two player only title, so you will need a friend to play).

There were two different types of Tank cabinets made. The first was an upright with woodgrain sides, and no sideart at all. The main monitor bezel and marquee have all the art (they are done in orange with primitive pictures of tanks). The control panel has four joysticks mounted on it (two for each player). These are of the lever type, and only move up and down.

The cocktail version was a spanking round table, done up in woodgrain, with a black surface. This only had minimal decoration (a simple instruction card by each players joysticks), and the control were mounted directly into the tabletop (most cocktail game had control panels that poked out of the side of the machine).

This title has not been emulated, or properly ported to any other architecture. Atari's Combat is a watered down version, but it isn't the same.

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A tank is a character in any form of RPG (MUD, PnP, MMORPG, etc.) which covers the group behind it. This character must be prepared to take the most damage, if not all of it. The person who tanks, however, does not necessarily take on this job exclusively, and may just be the tank in that specific situation. As such, the tank is no less important than the characters behind simply because it's the one which takes the most hits. In fact, it is quite possible that the highest level character of the group is the one who tanks, since it might be the one which has the highest hit-points or ability to take damage (being the highest level character, in this scenario, it's unlikely that it's in any way less important than the others).

In many situations, those who take on the job of a tank do so reluctantly, foreseeing that they'd be the first one to die if anything goes wrong. A carefully calculated tactic against the target opponent or group of enemies can, instead, prevent this. The following is the possible sequence of events and organization that may take place while using a tank:

1. The tank stands in front of the group, slightly closer to the target.
2. The group stays in either a tight formation or spreads out in a radius around the target.
3. The tank then proceeds to use any ranged attack he may have available, be it magic or a thrown weapon. This attracts the attention of the target to the tank, which is definitely key. A problem arises if there's a group, however: there's no saying that the target might attack this individual (the tank) exclusively.
4. Once the target is moving towards the tank/group, the rest of the available ranged attacks are unleashed. A common strategy to use at this point is to use any spells that may impair or slow down the movement of the target so that more ranged attacks can be fired before it reaches the tank.
5. At this point two things could happen: 1. The target continues towards the tank (good). 2. The target instead heads for another member of the group, possibly the one who last attacked it or who dealt the most damage to it (bad). The tank should at this point regain the attention of the target under these two possibilities by:
   1. Assuming the target is still on its course and still has a considerable distance before reaching the tank, he may proceed to fire more ranged attacks. Once it reaches the tank he will engage in melee combat with the target.
   2. The tank has no choice but to rush ahead and engage the target in melee combat before it reaches any other member of the group. Ideally this works and the tank can fulfil his purpose; if it doesn't work there might be some carnage involved.
6. With the target now exclusively damaging the tank (providing it doesn't affect the area with any form of attacks or magic), the group continues to attack it with ranged weapons or magic.
7. Any healers in the group will be ready to heal the tank in any way they can, and preferably with some form of ranged magic so that they do not get too close to the target (which might very well harm them greatly, seeing as healers do not usually have much HP).
8. To finish the job, some brave melee fighters might want to engage the target as well, taking into consideration that if they regularly use a melee weapon, the ranged weapon (which they are using under this tank scenario) is likely to deal much less damage.

Tank is also used as a verb, meaning 'taking on the job of a tank', e.g.: "You tank, you have much more HP than I."

Tank is a work by Patrick Wright, a professor of cultural studies, on the cultural impact of tanks in the 20th Century. At first this seems like a rather select subject to write a book about, but even with the specialized subject matter, Mr. Wright doesn't manage to cover all the ground of the tank in twentieth century warfare.

This book is not a military history, although it includes plenty of details of military history. The book talks about such famous cultural images as the man standing in front of a tank in Tiananmen Square and the Polish Cavalry charging Nazi tanks in World War II. Other than that, the book also talks about the initial conception of the tank was not just a break through in technology, but involved a reconceptualizing of warfare.

Of the books 19 chapters, at least 4 are primarily concerned with General JFC Fuller, the commander of the United Kingdom's tank brigade in the First World War and an important theoretician of blitzkreig in the interwar period. He was also a member of the Ordo Temporalis Orientalis and the British Union of Facists, a point that Professor Wright explores in some detail.

Apart from the intial development of the tank, the next most indepth discussion is the efforts of Israel Tav to develop the Merkava Main Battle Tank for the Israel Defense Force, and some of the attending cultural issues of this development. Scattered around the book are such interesting discussions as the initial artistic depictions of the tank, of the charge of the Polish Cavalry (which according to Professor Wright, never really happened), the Tiananmen Square incident, the painting of a tank pink in Prague, and the like.

This is a very entertaining book, and well written with some interesting points. On the other hand, while there is some interesting points brought up about the general role of economy, society, and the like, this book doesn't really have a central thesis as far as I could tell, so it is not a "serious academic book" as much as just a book of ideas. About tanks. And their cultural imagery.

Tank (?), n.

A small Indian dry measure, averaging 240 grains in weight; also, a Bombay weight of 72 grains, for pearls. Simmonds.

© Webster 1913

Tank, n. [Pg. tanque, L. stangum a pool; or perhaps of East Indian origin. Cf. Stank, n.]

A large basin or cistern; an artificial receptacle for liquids.

Tank engine, a locomotive which carries the water and fuel it requires, thus dispensing with a tender. --
Tank iron, plate iron thinner than boiler plate, and thicker than sheet iron or stovepipe iron. --
Tank worm (Zoöl.), a small nematoid worm found in the water tanks of India, supposed by some to be the young of the Guinea worm.

© Webster 1913

Tank (?), n.

A pond, pool, or small lake, natural or artificial.

We stood in the afterglow on the bank of the tank and saw the ducks come homa.
F. Remington.

The tanks are full and the grass is high.
Lawson.

© Webster 1913