Background
The void-faring vessels of the
Imperium of Man are far more than simple vehicles. With the smallest more than a kilometer in length, a void-ship bears a striking resemblance to an Imperial
hive in miniature, with a population to match. Those who serve aboard a starship see themselves set apart from the rest of the Imperium. Even the lowest press-ganged crew-scum will have the chance to travel to different worlds - a privilege most Imperial citizens do not even know exists - and they make that journey aboard a mighty vessel. When a master gunner fires a single broadside, he is unleashing city-destroying firepower, and the tech-priests of the enginarium control energies of unimaginable potency.
It can be rare to find a "new" starship. Most are hundreds or thousands of years old with some even dating back to the founding of the Imperium, although more and more are launching from
Adeptus Mechanicus Shipyards with every passing cycle to take part in the Indomitus Crusade.
Ship Classes
Transports
Transport are easily the most common starships found in the Imperium. Tasked with the often thankless job of hauling good from one side of the galaxy to the other, transports are large, slow and designed to carry as much cargo as possible. They sacrifice speed, maneuverability and armor in exchange for cargo space and while they often have weapons, they are no match for a true combatant and are the prime target for pirates.
Raiders
Raiders are a broad class of hulls covering everything from privateers to the destroyers used in the Imperial Navy. Typically a “raider” denotes a vessel designed for speed and combat. This makes them popular with the many pirates and buccaneers who raid the space-lanes, preferring to strike lone vessels swiftly, then flee before they should be noticed by a Navy patrol. The Imperial Navy also makes use of raiders (referred to as destroyers), though they prefer to outfit them with heavy ship-crippling munitions such as torpedoes and send them out to hunt larger vessels. Their speed and maneuverability is unmatched by other classes, and their firepower is often as good as other vessels of comparable tonnage. To achieve this, however, raiders sacrifice armor and other defenses, along with cargo and stowage space. In essence, they are glass cannons, able to throw out heavy fire, but unable to take it in return. Instead, they rely on evasive maneuvering and high speed to stay out of the reach of the guns from heavier craft.
Frigate
In many ways, frigates are the pinnacle of the shipbuilder’s art. Lean, fast, and dangerous, frigates can outrun anything they can’t fight, and destroy anything they can catch. While a frigate may not seem as prestigious as a cruiser or battleship, their versatility means they are the Navy’s ship of choice for all manner of actions. Frigates are tasked for convoy escorts, patrols, anti-piracy operations, and even attacks on rebel ships and stations. They routinely skirmish with the frigates and raiders of seditionists, pirates, and even hostile xenos races. Frigates are a balance between all aspects of ship design; speed, maneuverability, firepower, and defences. A skilled Mechanicus shipwright can even increase their cargo capacity and supply stowage without greatly reducing any other aspects. They are also relatively common ships, often with robust, simple designs. Therefore they are easily modified and maintained.
Light Cruisers
Light cruisers are the eyes and ears of the Battlefleet. Smaller and faster than true cruisers, light cruisers have the massive fuel and supply reserves for deep void patrols. These may last for years, even decades, and thus light cruiser commanders must be independent-minded and self-reliant. Light cruisers are also used as the flagships of small squadrons of frigates and destroyers tasked with the escorting convoys or hunting pirates.
A light cruiser’s design is usually balanced between combat and endurance. They have the advantage of being only slightly slower and less maneuverable than a frigate, while mounting a capital ships armament. This is accomplished, however, by giving the light cruiser substantially less armor and reinforced interior bulkheads than a proper cruiser. In short, light cruisers are faster and more maneuverable than standard cruisers, but much more fragile. Light cruisers are built as warships, and converting them to other uses can be difficult.
Cruisers
A cruiser is a warship through and through. These are the ships of the line of the Imperial Navy, the heavy-hitters that fight major naval engagements. These ships are rare – building one takes centuries if not longer, and requires knowledge and technology from mankind’s golden age now only known to the most powerful tech-magos. However, each vessel – often five or more kilometers long – carries the firepower to burn planets. They are designed to win wars, and the Imperial Navy guards them zealously. Cruisers carry large banks of weapons and are heavily armored. They have huge engines, but due to their size, their speed and maneuvering is not spectacular. This is good for a cruiser’s smaller opponents, since their only chance against these behemoths is to flee. Indeed, cruiser designers expect their craft their craft will most often fight other cruisers, and will mount powerful weapons designed specifically to slay these ships.
Battlecruisers
User the simpler technologies of the latter Imperial cruisers, and the power systems of battleships, the master tech-masons of the
Adeptus Mechanicus produced an elegant hybrid, the battlecruiser, during the latter 36th Millennium. Designed to provide the fleet with the long range punch of battleship weaponry in a cruiser-sized hull, battlecruisers are forged purely for heavy engagements between vast capital vessels, and excel in this narrow specialty. They overpower cruisers by virtue of their overcharged weaponry; very few ships can out-shoot a battlecruiser. The battlecruiser concept arose as a result of the perceived failures of the older grand cruiser designs. These had been built around advanced experimental drive systems, which ultimately proved to be unacceptably prone to catastrophic malfunction during warp transit. As a result of these issues, grand cruisers came to be regarded by many as cursed ships.
Grand Cruisers
Grand cruisers are vastly powerful and archaic warships, remnants of a more technologically advanced era of Imperial history. Only battleships carry heavier armor or wield more firepower. These vessels were once the core of battlefleet squadrons, tough warships designed for concerted broadside actions and punishing void-duels.
Now few in number, they are many ways relics of a bygone age. Very few grand cruisers have been constructed in recent millennia, the entire concept having fallen out of favor in many battlefleets. Their revolutionary and highly sophisticated warp and real space engine designs are now poorly understood, leading to many well publicized disasters and warp calamities. Indeed, the fleets of the archenemy contain the reinvigorated hulks of many formerly proud Imperial grand cruisers lost in the warp due to the gradual dilution of the sacred knowledge needed to render these imposing ships safe.
Regarded by many suspicious senior staff officers in the Imperial Navy as dangerous, temperamental, and constructed using dubious and possibly heretical technologies, the surviving grand cruisers of the 41st millennium are largely relegated to the reserve fleets. These are motley collections of outdated and mothballed antique warships, held cold and silent in orbit around munitorium depot worlds, ready for one last call to arms.
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