Imperial Navy

Cathedrals IN SPEHSS!

The Imperial Navy is one of the main branches of the Imperial military in Warhammer 40,000 (although very little of the Navy actually appears in the tabletop game). They are also one of the main factions in the beloved spin-off game Battlefleet Gothic.

Unlike the Imperial Guard, who get killed in the thousands millions billions every day battlefield per day, the Imperial Navy rarely suffers that many casualties. This is because, unlike the flashlight used by Guardsmen, the main weapon of the Navy is a giant, heavily-armed, heavily-armored battleship that puts other races' spaceships to shame (well, except Necrons). These ships are also massive, flying, Gothic cathedrals.

Depending on how you look at it (and who you're looking at), the officers of the Navy are either wealthy cowards or badass gentlemen. In either case, their ships have crews numbering the hundreds of thousands or even millions (we're not kidding when we say that each ship has its own language(s) and culture(s)), since the Imperial Navy doesn't understand how auto-loaders work, so loading a gun requires thousands of slaves running on treadmills. Of course, this might be the fault of a certain other branch of the Imperium, who, coincidentally, do have working auto-loaders on their ships. In any case, the Imperium has found it cheaper and more effective to use manpower because they have that many people to throw at even the tiniest of problems. Of course, for a major officer, most days simply require him to press a button and blow something up, then go back to drinking his tea. Oh, and maybe scramble the ground-support flyers, if he's feeling charitable that day.

Note that, back in the Great Crusade, the Imperial Guard and Imperial Navy were one and the same, operating under the far-less-badass name of "Imperial Army." However, thanks to the Horus Heresy, the two got split up, so that a single military commander couldn't control too many forces; a Guard commander isn't able to get off any given planet without the Navy, and the Navy isn't able to conduct wars (and, you know, occupy territory) without the Guard. Despite how much they need each other, the two bicker constantly, which, in fact, may be the reason for all the Grimdark the 40k universe is saddled with.

/tg/ has a hard-on for female Admirals, but come on, wouldn't you?

Types of Ships

The Imperial Navy has four types of ships they hide their cowardly asses in. The main ships are battleships, cruisers, escorts, and fighters

Battleship

Supposedly rare, but every Grand Marshal and High Admiral has one to hide in. Bonus points if that coward is also Chaos. The biggest heaviest hitters available, these things are like actual medieval cathedrals in that the grandchildren of the workers who start building them get to live to see their completion.

• Emperor: The "standard" battleship of the 40k 'verse, the ship has multiple fighter decks and weapons batteries. Unfortunately, most commanders like to use this ship as a hideout, causing the lack of sufficient air support in the ground wars. Tabletop-wise, its status as the official battleship of Battlefleet Gothic doesn't stop it from losing carrier duels against the Chaos equivalent.

• Retribution: Packing all gun batteries, the ship can devastate an entire continent in one broadside, but for some reason cannot destroy a hive city or fort with void shields - or in some cases, ones without any shields at all...; either that or GW is just pulling another Michael Bay out of their asses again since, they have no idea on how consistency works, let alone a simple knowledge of physics.

• Apocalypse: This ship packs a lot of lances and a Nova Cannon. Shares all the disadvantages of a Gothic-class cruiser.

• Oberon: The mixed-breed bastard of the Imperial Navy. It has lances, fighter bays, and weapon batteries. Its a powerful ship... when fighting foes half its size "Newer" fluff says the Oberon is rare, but a complete success in making a ship capable of killing anything it comes across, alone. Unfortunately, fluff also says a ridiculously low number of these (apparently) powerful ships were made (like, 3 or so).

• Nemesis: The super-carrier of the Imperial Navy. It has SIX flight decks (the size of towns or small cities, each), more than any other ship in the galaxy. But because of Rule of Cool, it is incredibly rare since the Navy captains prefer to get up close broadside their enemies, or actually rather because all of the ships in this class were just ships modified from Emperor class ships in one particular war, because they were damaged or otherwise.

• Gloriana: Massive, terrifying and capable of decimating entire fleets on their own, these were the personal flagships of the Primarchs during the Great Crusade. Very few, if any, are still around in the Imperium in M41, though a few such as the Terminus Est or Vengeful Spirit are still tooling around inside the Eye of Terror. Because they were dickheads, the Alpha Legion had two, creatively named the Alpha and the Beta.

Grand Cruiser

Only slightly weaker and less powerful than Battleships, Grand Cruisers were the Battlecruisers of the Ancient Imperium (Modern Battlecruisers are simply outclassed by these Venerable Vessels). Nowadays most of them run on Archeotech that is barely understood and hard to repair with current Imperial knowledge. These grand ships are often used as Flagships in Lieu of extremely rare Battleships. Basically, they are the quintessential battlecruisers; Tougher and Deadlier than cruisers and yet more mobile than Battleships.

• Avenger; A Vengeance with only macrobatteries (kilometres of Macrobattery broadsides). Intended to break the line of battle like Nelson's ships at Trafalgar, while suffering from the lack of an armored prow. Unfortunately line-breaking is quite a dangerous role for any ship, even a Grand Cruiser that excels at doing it, and so not many exist in the 41st Millenium. Those that have survived are known for being exceedingly reliable and faithful; it takes a lot of damage or mistreatment to cause these noble vessels to give trouble. If you spoke with members of the Imperium (both members of the public and the navy), this is the vessel they would think of if you asked them about Grand Cruisers.

• Exorcist; A Vengeance that has carrier bays in place of lances. Useful in providing carrier support to any Imperial fleet. Originally designed for extended operations alone on the Frontiers of Imperial Space, either on Patrol or by exploring into the unknown, the Exorcist developed quite a reputation for 'boldly going where no man has gone before'. Whilst not many remain in Imperial Service due to maintenance difficulties, they still find use in the hands of Rogue Traders who need vessels capable of long cruises and of defending themselves against anything they might encounter.

• Repulsive; Whilst the Repulsive Grand Cruisers are exceedingly manoeuvrable heavy warships (and therefore exceedingly useful because they can fill a hole in the Imperial tactical lineup), they are considered a cursed class due to the majority of them falling to chaos, which unfortunately was the result of experimental warp drives which occasionally interfered with the Gellar Field (OMGWTFBBQTIME). The ones that remain in Imperial control are kept mothballed in reserve fleets and segmentum fortresses (imagine giant glass boxes with 'In Case of Emergency, Break Glass' signs).

• Vengeance; The granddaddy of "modern" Imperial warships. The Vengeance was the winner of a GW-sponsored ship design contest, and was originally known as the Furious. Highlights include a half-armored prow that resembles those on standard Imperial ships but provides no additional protection, no forward-firing armament, and the firepower of two Lunar-class cruisers.

Battlecruiser

What do you do when you forget how to maintain an entire category of heavy warships? You build a new bunch of heavy warships, with simpler technology.

Battlecruisers are basically upgunned cruisers, with more weapons (usually adding dorsal weapons and some armor), and are intended to fill the gap between true battleships, which are rare, and normal cruisers, which tend to die really easily to the ancient Chaos cruisers and grand cruisers.

• Armageddon; An upgraded variant of the Lunar Class Cruiser (YAY! ANOTHER ONE!). A rather new innovation, the Armageddon class is basically made up from recovered Lunar Class Hulks that have been extensively repaired and then retrofitted with more armour and more weapons. The base hull was never designed to cope with all this extra equipment (and the extra crew to man said equipment) and so it has problems operating independently for long periods of time. Battlefleets won't say no to them because more guns = better!

• Chalice; A fast heavy cruiser. Unique to the Calixis sector and an exceedingly new design, the Chalice was conceived as a Battlecruiser that could either out-run or out-manoeuvre anything it can't kill. Whilst good in theory, unfortunately, speed came at the cost of armour and durability and so whilst these vessels punch hard, they can't take many hits. Imperial Propaganda is currently trying to cover up their failings and is lauding them as the Poster-ships of the Calixis Sector and therefore a lot of people think they're the 'Best Battlecruisers Eva!'.

• Mars; In a word - Mediocre. Some Imperials say it's versatile due to its diverse weapons loadout but in reality it makes it an awkward duckling to use. The Nova Cannon and Launch bays would be good on a ship holding back and harassing enemies at range and yet it has Macrobatteries and Lances which are great for brawling. So if you sit back and harass or go in and brawl, you're wasting half your ship. The Imperial Navy never really got on with it either and so it has gone out of production on most Forge-Worlds.

• Overlord; The Classic Imperial Battlecruiser. Using the standard Imperial doctrine of - Macrobatteries, Lances and Torpedoes, the Overlord has become the most effective Battlecruiser simply because it really complements standard Imperial Navy Tactics. As an added bonus, its simplicity of design makes it easier to produce and one can be built within a decade. The only negative (if you can call it a negative), is that it's not really useful for anything except war.

Cruiser

Cruisers are the bread and butter of the Imperial Navy. Much larger than escorts and light cruisers, but less rare than battleships, cruisers are what the Imperial Navy (and Chaos and Xenos) use to fight their campaigns across the stars. Thus far, all Imperial Cruisers have been shown to utilize the same hull-type: a squat armored prow in front, capable of mounting a prow-mounted weapon system, and a big bunch of engines in the back, with baroque and Gothic architecture in-between.

• Ambition; Custom-made Cruisers for the exceedingly affluent - it's the Rolls Royce of the Cruiser World. Most Rogue Trader ships are second-hand, battle-scarred, tired and worn ex-navy vessels but the Ambition is not. It's the only cruiser class that can be bought brand spanking new by Private parties in the Imperium and each one is unique and built to the customer's specifications. These exclusive ships, whilst still cruisers and deadly in their own right, are stately homes and status symbols. Some durability sacrifices have been made in order to make them the most opulent and luxurious ships on the market but for eccentric people like Rogue Traders, it's generally worth it.

• Conquest-Class Star Galleon; Built for the very first Rogue Traders on the orders of the Emperor himself, the Star Galleon is an ancient and noble design. Whilst not considered heavily armed by modern standards, they're still formidable opponents and yet as specialist exploration vessels they are able to operate independently for many years and can transport greater quantities than other Cruisers. In effect, it's a cruiser fused with a transport and looks fucking amazing.

• Dictator; A Carrier retrofit of extremely damaged Lunar Class Cruisers. If a Lunar class has its lance weaponry destroyed, it's quicker, easier and cheaper to replace those with heavy launch bays for strike craft. This makes it quite versatile and able to deal with virtually all situations and interestingly enough, makes it more effective than the original Lunar Class at everything except fighting as a ship of the line.

• Dominator; A variant of the Lunar Class, the Dominator is designed primarily for planetary bombardment and assault. Not generally used in fleet actions even though it can provide support with its Nova Cannon when necessary.

• Gothic; Another variant of the Lunar Class, the Gothic is designed as a heavy Lance gunship. Due to the amount of Lance Weaponry it carries, it can easily deal with ships of its own size or larger but often does require an escort or a partner to strip enemy void shields first in order to use its own weaponry to the maximum effect. When supported and used correctly, Gothic Cruisers are the most efficient way to deal with enemy capital ships.

• Jupiter; A kitbashed design, converted from other classes of cruiser that have been heavily damaged in battle. By stripping out all the damaged components and replacing them with launch bays, you get a pretty sturdy carrier. Just don't let the enemy get anywhere near it. Apparently the Imperium doesn't build these normally at all.

• Lunar; The Lunar. You've heard so much about it and now you want to know what it makes it the standard Imperial Cruiser. First of all, it's one of the oldest designs still in use by the Imperium and is so easy to build that even less advanced worlds can produce them. They're quite versatile due to their weapons loadout (a balanced build of Macrobatteries, Lances and Torpedoes) and make up the backbone of Battlefleets throughout the entire Imperium. This is the cruiser against which all other cruisers are measured.

• Tyrant; The Tyrant was originally intended as a stand-off vessel; it would stay at long range and bombard enemies from afar with superfired plasma weaponry. Unfortunately, due to design compromises where it mixed both short range and long range weaponry to save on power, it wasn't really deadly enough at long range to do its job. Therefore the Imperial Navy is trying to replace the short range weapons with ancient Long-range weaponry (that doesn't use a lot of power) recovered from Space Hulks or Renegade Ships. The Hull itself is a rather effective design and so the Tyrant has become very popular with Rogue Traders who generally replace all of the Plasma Weaponry in order to have more power available compared with other cruisers.

Light Cruiser

Smaller than true cruisers, light cruisers are used in two ways. Either you use a fast, maneuverable light cruiser like the Dauntless to add some extra firepower to a scouting squadron or long-range patrol, or you use a pocket cruiser like the Voss light cruisers to add some heavy firepower and armor to a convoy, fleet, or base. The advantage of the light cruisers are that they're cheaper to build and operate than real cruisers.

• Defiant; A carrier variant of the Endeavour. It's quite versatile (by virtue of being a carrier) and so has found a home in many Rogue Trader houses but unfortunately the Imperial Navy doesn't consider it as useful because they can't stand by themselves and require an escort. Due to being based off of the Endeavour, it's relatively well armoured for a Light Cruiser and that does help with its survivability.

• Dauntless; The standard Light Cruiser of the Imperium; it's a Jack-of-all-Trades. You can't go wrong with the Dauntless even though other Light Cruisers may be better for certain tasks. Considered 'scouting' cruisers, these make up the bulk of Imperial Patrol Squadron leaders.

• Endurance; Light Cruiser with just enough guns to claim it has them, lance batteries and a couple of torpedoes. It's an all in one with not much of any particular thing.

• Endeavour; A 'heavy', Light Cruiser, designed as a stop-gap between the 'lighter' light cruisers and true cruisers. Whilst they can slug it out in a fleet fight, they can easily be overwhelmed because they simply aren't cruisers and don't have the equivalent fire-power or hull integrity. As an added titbit, most of Battlefleet Koronus' patrols consist of an Endeavour and a pair of frigates.

• Lathe-class Monitor-Cruiser; An Adeptus Mechanicus Light Cruiser designed around deep space exploration and extreme self-reliance. These ships, when properly outfitted, can operate for decades without returning to imperial space for resupply. These would make up the bulk of Explorator fleets.

• Secutor-class Monitor-Cruiser; An Adeptus Mechanicus Light Cruiser designed to excel at the art of war. Tougher than all of the other Light Cruisers and yet still more mobile than true Cruisers. Due to being designed from the ground up to be a Warship, this Light Cruiser is fitted with Cruiser sized Void Shield Generators.

• Siluria; Three-quarters the cost of the Endeavor, and about three-quarters the ship. Standard weapon batteries only, no fancy frills to speak of. Cheap and effective, at short range, to catch enemy torpedoes.

Ironclad

8 kilometer long battering rams. No, really. Tyranids and Orks are busy taking notes.

Frigates

Ranging from about 1.4-2km long. They are used for all sorts of duties from convoy escorts to attack or patrol squadrons.

• Claymore Corvette; Designed entirely around escorting vulnerable transports and protecting them against light raiders in order to allow true Frigates to accompany more valuable ships such as Battleships, Battlecruisers and Cruisers. The Claymore Corvettes are easy to mass produce and maintain and are exceedingly common in the private sector.

• Falchion Frigate: A new (245 years old) class of escort ship built by Voss Prime. Slow as balls but still capable of firing torpedoes. While Cobras are used offensively in fleet actions, Falchion's are designed to be convoy escorts and stick close to larger warships to defend them from enemy escorts.

• Firestorm Frigate: A Sword-class frigate with a prow-mounted Lance. Gives the Sword some extra anti-ship punch that it dearly needs. For some reason it's two hundred metres longer than the sword and yet it's apparently only a refit (shrug).

• Sword: The most common warship in the Imperial Navy, and one of the simplest. No torpedoes or lances to distract you here; a Sword puts two massive laser batteries behind a pointed armored prow and cuts into enemy formations like a multi-laser through canon.

• Tempest Strike Frigate; Specialized Brawling frigate designed for devastating enemies at close range. It has a triple armoured prow and heavy short-range broadsides. They're often equipped with Assault Boats and Barracks for boarding actions.

• Turbulent; Heavy Naval Escorts; these things have comparable armour to cruisers. They're built to sally forth ahead of the main fleet and win skirmishes against enemy scouting forces and vanguard elements. They've garnered a reputation for being lucky; they've contributed to many glorious victories and survived catastrophes that other ship classes have not. Their only downside is that they have rather antiquated communication equipment, probably equipped for durability, not ease of use.

Destroyers/Raiders

The most common warship class. Their tasks range from scouting to shuttling VIPs or fighting in fleet engagements in large squadrons. Most pirates use these speedy, nimble vessels to prey upon transport ships.

• Cobra Destroyer: The PT-Boats of the Imperial Navy. Small, fast, and lightly armed, their one purpose in life is to fire shoals of torpedoes from 3-8 ship squadrons. A great part of the Imperium's military advantage (in fluff and on the tabletop) comes from all the torpedoes they can fire at the enemy, and the Cobras are a big part of that.

• Havoc Destroyer; Small, yet fast raider sized vessels almost rivaling frigates in firepower. In large squadrons these can easily overwhelm larger vessels by weight of fire.

• Viper Scout Sloop; Smallest warp-capable ship in mass production. It is an exceedingly fast scout ship with ridiculously powerful realspace engines and high-tech auspex scanners. In support of Naval Operations these vessels would burn into enemy territory at high speed, collect as much information as possible and then warp back to friendly territory. Unfortunately they are so specialized that they can't do much else apart from that.

Fighter

Reusable torpedoes

Armed Freighter (in the Battlefleet)

Ships bought, borrowed or stolen and then armed in the misguided attempt to boost the strength of a fleet in desperate need of ships (instead of simply using the legio cybernetica to make robots to do the monotonous manual labor so 90% of the hundred thousand crew members can be spread out amongst a hundred more warships)

Logistic Vessels

Ships used for the transportation of cargo or individuals. The majority of Imperial ships would fall into this category.

• Carrack-Class Transport Ship; A newer version of the Conquest Star Galleon. It's a hardy vessel that can defend itself quite well against raiders. The profile even looks like a Military Vessel so opponents who can't distinguish between Imperial Ships could be scared off.

• Goliath-Class Factory Ship; An Adeptus Mechanicus vessel designed to harvest plasma from Stars. These ships supply the fuel for the entirety of the Imperium. Other ships can be fitted with Plasma Scoops to top up their own tanks but this is the true fuel-harvesting-workhorse of the Imperium.

• Jericho-Class Pilgrim Vessel: Refinery ships that have been converted into personnel carriers, the majority of which will be transporting poor-er passengers. Can't really defend itself but usually not even worth the bother for pirates.

• Loki-Class Q Ship; Converted Cargo ships designed to sacrifice some space for added weaponry. They can serve as Convoy defence in a pinch and can surprise the odd pirate who may underestimate them.

• Orion-Class Star Clipper; Blockade runners through and through. They're designed to transport low-volume but high-quality goods, even through hostile space. Speed is the name of their game. Hell, these things can put some Eldar ships to shame.

• Universe-Class Mass Conveyor; Think Super-Tanker in space. It's the largest standardized Cargo hauler in the Imperium and is 12km long. It looks freaking awesome too.

• Vagabond-Class Merchant Trader; Rather small cargo vessel but extremely common. As if to assist with its 'commoner' theme, it makes you yawn just looking at it.

Important Details

Crews

Navy crews are made up of officers, techpriests, slave drivers, and slaves.

A bit of an over-simplification, but broadly true. Due to the Imperium's aversion to AI and Automation each ship needs at least thousands of people to man it. Whenever the crew count gets low, the Imperial Navy sets up fake strip clubs on a planet claiming "Free Hookers" to lure in unsuspecting men (and the occasional woman). Once a future crewman steps in, he's knocked out, bound, gagged, and taken to the ship, where they'll slave away the rest of their soon-to-be-short existence doing everything needed to make flying through space and fighting in the void possible.

This includes dragging shells the size of houses into cannons while being whipped. Still, at least for the crew sex is allowed, in fact encouraged, if for no other reason than maintaining the crew complement. Seriously, whole fucking cities and civilizations arise from the more massive ships, every bit as intricate as a long lived Hive City. Here is an idea of how it works, right up to the Roman armor, whips and beatings. Oh and apparently besides whole civilizations, there are whole civilizations of mutants around too. They can more or less settle new worlds for da Emprah by simply disgorging their excess population, which the crew is probably all too happy to do.

One area where fluff hasn't been consistent is in the uniform worn by Imperial Navy crewmen. Some sources suggest that uniforms are divided by segmentum of the Imperium, while others suggest that it is a sector-by-sector fashion choice. Given the scale the of the Imperium and the fact that Navy fleets are already identified by hull color, it's probably on a segmentum basis, but Games Workshop doesn't care enough to make a decision about it.

Travel

The ships of the Imperium travel through the Warp using what's called a warp drive to get to where they're going. However, this isn't your happy, fancy tunnel-of-light like in Star Wars, or everything-moves-fast Star Trek, it is an alternate dimension full of Chaos. In order to avoid being turned inside-out (think event horizon) and getting hentai-raped by every daemon in the warp, the ships rely on what is called the Gellar Field to keep the furries, undesirables, and various other evil beings out of their ship when traveling through. The Baroque decorations are also implied in helping to ward off said daemons. They rely on a Navigator that uses the Empra as a beacon to safely navigate the Warp, hence the title "Navigator".

Ranks in the Navy

While the Imperial Navy uses a lot of the ranks in similar fashion to modern militaries, they invariably hold to a more archaic form and are not equivalent to modern day ranking systems. Particularly since it's quite clear that commissions in 40k can often be purchased rather than earned, and that a "Warrant" would most likely hold to the original term and be an "officer by appointment" rather than an enlisted grade. Though considering the immense variety of units within the Imperium, this may not necessarily be the case galaxy-wide, so all options are equally valid.

Officer Ranks

• Lord-High Admiral of the Imperial Navy - This guy is a High Lord and is the single dude responsible for the ENTIRE Imperial Navy, though likely he doesn't do much other than delegate to his subordinates and attend tedious High Lord meetings.
• Lord-High Admiral - There are five of these guys, one for each Segmentum. While they're probably never anywhere near the front lines they probably have more to do, since its their job to oversee the deployment of fleets and materials from sector to sector.
• Lord Admiral - The guy in charge of a sector fleet who gets direct command of vessels and formations. You see these guys in the fluff quite regularly when "key" worlds (like Armageddon) need defended or attacked.
• Solar Admiral - Often a terminal rank... no really. Occasionally regular Admirals who do good jobs can put themselves forward for promotion to this position, which needs to be approved by the Lord-High Admiral, then the officer needs to travel to Terra be reviewed by the Lord-High Admiral of the Imperial Navy. Obviously this can take a very, VERY long time to approve. So they might often be dead before the promotion gets approved. If they get approved they are likely to get promoted straight up to sector commander (see Lord Admiral) as a position will have probably opened up while he was waiting. More rarely, Solar Admirals can get sent on "detached duties" which is basically a license to do as they please with their independent fleets.
• High Admiral - Commands several group of naval fleets (e.g. Battlegroups), often the most senior Navy officer in a Crusade but the things these fucks usually do is just having snacks with their Imperial Guard counterparts and leaving the combat duties to their subordinate Admirals
• Admiral - Gets put in charge of a fleet and told to oversee some subsectors. He's usually the highest of the "front line" ranks and much of his time will be on active duty patrolling his assigned region.
• Vice Admiral - Fleets traditionally get split into three parts, with the highest Admiral taking up the portion containing the larger ships, while the "Vice" Admiral takes the "Vanguard" portion of faster moving ships.
• Rear Admiral - the third portion of a fleet would be the "Rearguard" and usually gets assigned to the youngest/least experienced Admiral in the fleet. His job is usually the quietest one as he gets the mop-up and repair duties.
• Commodore - an experienced Captain in command of a squadron of capital ships. It's traditionally only a temporary rank, as capital ships don't always get assigned to each other the same way that escorts do. But the realities of war often mean that ships stay together for extended periods, often well beyond the lifespans of generations of captains.
• Lord Captain - not actually a rank, but an honourific applied to Captains of detached vessels operating independently. The "Lord-" part implies that they operate with the full authority of the the Imperial Navy when they act so they can deal with outside organisations (like planetary governors, Space Marines or Imperial Guard) on relatively even footing.
• Captain The commander of a single capital ship or the lead starship in an escort squadron.
• Commander - Usually the commander of an escort vessel. Is also the ranking officer on board orbital space stations. It also gets used as the terminal rank amongst Pilots, since small attack craft all fall under the remit of the Navy; so a Wing Commander would get command over all pilots based on a single carrier.
• Lord Lieutenant - The second-in-command to captains of capital ships, bizarrely Commanders don't hold that role and hold their own positions. Thankfully because a chain of command exists in any military, despite a Wing Commander holding higher "actual" rank over a Lieutenant on a carrier vessel he would not hold any higher authority on that ship than his duties allow for.
• Lieutenant - a "working" rank. Either holds command over small system vessels or acts as second in command to Commanders of escorts, or as department heads on Capital ships. They are also Squadron leaders amongst pilots.
• Sub-Lieutenant / Ensign - Team leaders or attack craft pilots
• Midshipman - Apprentice officers who haven't passed any exams or earned any responsibility, they would exist below the Warrant Officers in terms of authority, despite holding a commission. Midshipmen are commissioned from Imperial Nobility as part of the Imperial Tithe (which can mean virtually anyone gets the job if they send their useless heirs just to keep the best ones at home) but they are also assigned from the Schola Progenium. In addition, Midshipmen also may be taken on as a personal favour from the Captain of a vessel if he knows the family. This echoes the ancient real-world practice of young noblemen showing up while the vessel was in dock with a letter from their family and being granted a commission on the Captain's say-so.

NCO Ranks

• Ship Master - the most senior Warrant officer on board a starship, also quite possibly the busiest man on the starship. It's his job to maintain the logs, update stellar navigation charts, oversee ships stores and order supplies, and command a hanger deck if there is one. Basically he's the guy who knows the ship better than anyone. In real-world historical usage, this guy would have an authority equivalent to a Lieutenant on board a starship, and would "mess" (ie: occupy the same space) as the other officers do.
• Bosun - (Shorthand for Boatswain) The NCO directly responsible for all of the common crew members, including maintaining discipline. Despite his position, his actual rank may vary depending upon the size of vessel or operational requirements, in practice it never really matters since he's unlikely to ever meet another Boatswain. (real-world Boatswains could be proper Warrant Officers or not and held responsibility over all areas of the ship other than Engineering, which was left to the Chief Engineer, as if they disciplined/executed/imprisoned an skilled crewman from that department the ship could be crippled).
  • Note that most Capital Ships, but not all Escort ships, may have an actual Naval Commissar on board in this role, tasked with maintaining discipline up to and including the Officer compliment.
• Chief Warrant Officer - Also called "Chief Petty Officer" on some vessels. Will often be given command of important ship sections (like Chief Engineers, helmsmen, or auspex control, as these are are critical to ongoing operation of a starship)
• Warrant Officer - You'll find lots of guys of equivalent rank on a ship, in command of various operational sections keeping the ship running at all times:
  • Masters of Ordnance - make certain that Torpedoes and Attack craft (if any) are fueled and maintained.
  • Master Gunner - have responsibility over all of the weapons batteries and make ensure they are loaded and fired when required.
  • Master-at-Arms - responsible for all "small" arms on board a starship, overseeing all Sergeants-at-Arms, as well as maintaining order over any barracked Guard regiments currently in transit.
  • Master of the Vox - making sense out of the bazillions of messages that run through the bridge at any given moment both internally and externally (crews can get pretty massive, and a lot of traffic can come through at once).
  • Steward - the guy who keeps everyone else well fed.
• Gun Captain - Funnily enough, the man in charge of a single gun crew. Makes sure that the weapon is taken care of, is reloaded quickly enough, and is accurate when asked to fire. All of that comes back to this guy.
• Sergeant-at-Arms - Man in charge of the weapons lockers and leader of boarding parties, as well as maintaining ship-board security. Usually they are transferred from Imperial Guard regiments so that they don't have any prior association with the crew.
• Armsmen - Crewmen trusted to carry weapons. They are not true soldiers as offensive boarding actions tend to be rare. So these guys still have their own regular responsibilities on board ship. Since they are trusted more, they have slightly more freedom to move around the vessel as well, though most Imperial employees really don't want the job, since it means they get scrutinised more, or they could end up beating up their buddies.
• Voidsmen - the lowest rank of crewman on board a Naval Starship above the Servitors unless the Captain is cool with slavery. If they have a skill or a trade they may be referred to as Able Voidsmen which is an official rank that might require examinations. Additionally, if they show leadership qualities they might be promoted to Leading Voidsman and put in charge of work gangs and be considered for promotion to Warrant Officer if a position opens up.

Notable Problems

These are problems some have with the Imperial Navy and their fluff....

General Logistical Problems

The big problem that the Imperial Navy has is that it's the only organised navy in the galaxy that's trying to defend its massive amounts of space. To do this takes vast numbers of ships but rather thinly spread out. Given the problems of warp travel it's also extremely hard to reinforce friendly fleets under attack. The foes of the navy come essentially in two flavours; raiders who might just manage to scrape together a few converted transports (building even escort-sized ships is a huge undertaking, akin to building damn near the entire American Navy combined from iron ore and making it fly) which take an escort squadron to murder, and huge organized invasion fleets that take a whole fleet to fight. These combine together to mean that outside of fleet bases and important strategic worlds there is nowhere in the Imperium that is actually well-defended. At best a fleet has to be formed and sent out and they could arrive months later. Travel takes a lot of time, and out in the void it can be extremely hard to know what you are actually fighting against, especially since the enemy tend to kill anyone who tries to look at them. So when there's a large enemy force that you absolutely must fight (not fighting is much preferable) you don't just band together whoever was within shouting distance of the flagship and go murdering, you pull together every single vessel in the sector and hope to the Emperor it's enough to do the job.

Warships genuinely are vast things and obscenely expensive and risking them at all in major actions is not something anyone does lightly. Each cruiser is larger and more complex than a fully-kitted titan legion. These things are MASSIVE. In the BFG book there's a fluff story of a cruiser being built at a shipyard that orbits a primitive world. The entire population of the planet were given over to mining the resources needed to build one single cruiser. It took them eleven years to mine the ore. Sure, that's a primitive world, but if you think about it that makes carving out the rocks for it the largest single project ever engaged upon without mechanization. If you add together all seven wonders of the world you aren't even close to the pile of rock we're talking about. So these things are a big fucking investment and the high lords really don't like risking them without a really good reason (makes you questioning why they wouldn't build 20 smaller ships instead).

So if you ever wondered why the Navy doesn't get more action, now you know. By the time the big, awesome ships get on the scene the invasion already probably finished and the bad guys moved on. Then you nuke the shit out of them from orbit or drop millions of poor bastards into the meat grinder. Far better idea all round. It's the reason that the enemy, even nutters like Chaos, don't fight in the void without reason. On the ground it's just a scrap, and maybe you win or maybe you don't. If you lose in the void then your campaign on the surface is dead. No reinforcements, no support and a massive constant orbital bombardment to kill everyone left. That tends to mean fleets hover around and not fighting, one ensuring the other can't directly interfere with the surface war.

Thus the rumor that the Navy has no balls. But who needs balls when you have a nova cannon sized dick and eighteen dice worth of fire power.

Ship Size

No one is quite sure how big the ships really are. One story claims the Retribution-Class is a mere 3 kilometers long, while another says it is 9 kilometers and up to 20 kilometers.

Your best bet is Rogue Trader. Although going by those figures, anything bigger than a cruiser has an average density around that of hydrogen... From a helpful poster on Heresy-Online we have this:

For the most accurate scale, look towards the Battlefleet Koronus Expansion, as it is more a stat/rulebook rather than a story. That and previous consensuses, as well as cross referencing with the Horus Heresy rulebooks by Forge World (which places Battleships at 8-12km) place cruisers just above 5 kms, and Battleships in the mid 8's. Please note that most ships above the size of 8ish kilometers are either a unique modified/purpose built flagship or a ship of a small class that is not in widespread calculations.

Transport.

<1 kilometer-ish. That's the small ones, there are super transports in 40k as well though (a thunderhawk would go here).

Escort.

1-2 kilometer. "Small" ships, like the cobra. Designed to flank foes and operate in squads.

Light cruiser.

3-5 Kilometer. A smaller cruiser, not super common.

Cruiser.

5 Kilometers. The standard fighting vessel, every imperial fleet has them. And they are the most numerous. (Perhaps some escorts are more common, i might be wrong though)

Heavy cruiser.

5 kilometers. A beefed up cruiser.

Battle Cruiser. 5-6 kilometer. Beefed up Cruiser, generally more 'modern' than a Heavy Cruiser

Grand Cruiser. 6-8 kilometer. Pocket Battleship. Very old.

Battleship.

8-12 Kilometer. The biggest of the lot. Simply put.

The Horus Heresy novel "Know No Fear" had this to say about ship sizes, taken from /tg/ who quoted it from the book and written here is just the lengths and names of the ships, for simplicity and space:

Macragge’s Honour. Twenty-six kilometers - Flagship

Spirit of Konor. Seventeen kilometers - Battleship

Antrodamicus. Twelve kilometers - Grand Cruiser

Antipathy. Nine kilometers - Cruiser (note that the book said it had "six thousand lives" on board, small crew for it's size)

Aegis of Occluda. Seven kilometers - Class unknown

Gladius. Four kilometers - Escort

Then there is the Abyss-class created by Lorgar that is said to match the Phalanx in size. He made three of them.

Weapon Effects

If the weapons can annihilate a continent, why can't it destroy a mere hive? Because different writers don't talk to each other that's why. Also shields maybe.

Lack of Balls

It is well-known that most Imperial Navy Officers don't have em.

An Imperial Navy fleet is most effective when Inquisitors take it over. See Here.

External Links

• A Comprehensive List of Ships
• Battlefleet Gothic Additional Ships Compendium

Gallery

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  The Lord Admiral's Love Shack

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  The Grand Marshal's Summer Palace of PWNAGE

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  Imagine how quick land battles would be if these things actually helped They do help, but they can't do it too much or they risk fucking up the planet they came to save, also you try aiming a lance cannon at a spot a meter wide from orbit without hitting your mates on the ground

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  The Bullet-Catchers of the Navy

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  Another demonstration of too much spare time

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  One of the revered ships of Battlefleet /tg/: Flankitus

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