abstract
| - The Dreadclaw is also intended for use in ship-to-ship boarding actions and is outfitted with two sets of grappling claws that allow the Dreadclaw to securely attach itself to the hull of an enemy starship, after attaching it begins cutting through the ship's hull with a ring of powerful melta-cutters located inside the machine's maw. After cutting through the hull, a process that takes only minutes, the Dreadclaw opens its air-tight iris hatch and allows its cargo of Chaos Space Marines passage into the enemy ship. The Dreadclaw is intended as an all-purpose assault boat that can deliver either a squad of up to ten Chaos Space Marines, up to five Chaos Terminators, or a single Chaos Dreadnought to combat for both ground assaults and ship-to-ship fleet actions. The Dreadclaw operates much like its present Imperial counterpart. During a planetary assault, it hurtles through the atmosphere like a man-made meteor until at a certain pre-determined altitude, its retro-rockets kick in and slow its descent to a speed survivable by Astartes (though not necessarily by normal humans). The Dreadclaw does not extend its main claw arms until it has landed and is ready to begin deploying its troops, since the arms' mechanisms are delicate and could be damaged by the impact or the heat of atmospheric entry. Once on the ground, the assault boat's main hatch irises open and the squad or Chaos Dreadnought steps out on the surface. The four claws then extend, driving the Dreadclaw's armoured bulk upwards and revealing its deadly contents, who begin combat operations in their typically savage fashion. Unlike Imperial Drop Pods, the Dreadclaw is an assault boat, which means that it is fully capable of lifting off and leaving a planetary atmosphere or a warship's surface again, so that it can be used to extract Chaotic troops from a planetary surface or boarding operation as well as deliver them.
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