As you know, tanks saw their first of many actions during WW1. Both Entente and Alliance started to include tanks during battles since 1916. Mark tanks of the Brits, Renault FT 17 of the French, A7V of the Germans and many more not to be forgotten. My question is that were tanks really the craze killers that mowed down thousands of enemies in a blink of an eye depicted in movies and video games (Battlefield 1 baby!) or nothing more than propaganda machines? Also, I would love to know how soldiers or the homefront viewed these bulky beasts. PS: This my first submission on Reddit so sorry for the shit quality if I fuck this post big time!
Tanks during the First World War were new technology that was incredibly unreliable and were (at least initially) poorly used. You were much more likely to loose a tank due to mechanical failure than due to enemy fire and this was a serious problem as you tank forces strength would deplete very quickly the longer operations went on. At the battle of Cambrai 180 of the 476 tanks involved were 'out of action' on the first day of operations or roughly 40% of total strength. This limited there use in battle to the breakthrough stage of operations, compared to tanks in World War 2 which were often used in the exploitation phase of operations. Tanks were slow, bulky and could often be knocked out relatively easily, so with only small numbers, their effectiveness in 1916/early 1917 came entirely from there psychological effect on the enemy (which quickly wore off once they realized how vulnerable the tank was). They were also greatly mistrusted by allied soldiers who would often keep there distance, not maneuvering with or giving the tank supporting fire, further increasing losses. However in late 1917/1918 When the tank was deployed in large numbers and with proper infantry and artillery support, they became much more effective and were one of many key elements to the success of the allied 100 Days Offensive. Germany was late to the tank race and simply did not have the expertise, need or resources to produce effective tanks in large numbers. They only began deploying the A7V in 1918, which was already outclassed by the newer British models and in total only 20 were produced for the entire length of the war.
So ultimately no the tank during World War 1 is not the ultimate killing machine as shown in movies and video games as they were simply too unreliable, slow and bulky to be any threat unless deployed in huge numbers.
P.S. This is my first time answering a question so i hope i did ok, i don't know how to put links in the text so i will just dump my sources down below: