Crew: 11 (1 commander, 1 Coms Operator, 1 Targeteer, 2 gunners, 4 Loaders, 1 tech adept, 1 driver)
Known Patterns/Subvarrients: I-VII (A-G)
Armament:
Main Armament: 305mm 'Exorcism' Super-Heavy Rocket Artillery pod (15 missiles in the launcher, 30 missiles stored onboard with more supplied by support vehicles)
Secondary Armament: 4 Sponson-Mounted Heavy Bolters (500 rounds each), 2 Hull-Turret Mounted Heavy Bolters (500 rounds each), 2 Sponson Mounted Lascannons (1000 shots each)
Mobility:
Max Speed: 18 km/h
Traverse: 360 degrees (Main turret/array), 180 degrees (Sponson turrets) and 6 degrees (hull turret)
Elevation: -0 to 80 degrees
Powerplant: MR507 V18 Multi-Fuel engine
Dimensions:
Weight: 416 Tonnes
Height: 7 metres
Width: 8.4 metres
Length: 15 metres
Ground clearance: 1.2 metres
Armour:
Superstructure: 200/200/200mm Faramite Alloy Plate
Hull: 200/150/150mm Faramite Alloy Plate
Gun Mantlet: N/A
Turret: N/A
Lore: The Imperial Army, and later Imperial Guard, placed little emphasis on rocket artillery and the potential of long range ballistic weapons. Common wisdom was that anything beyond the horizon could be dealt with by the navy, and anything on the horizon could be flattened more cost effectively with massed artillery barrages. This mentality would prevail until the disastrous Dolon Crusade in M40.957, a Crusade aimed at crushing chaos-fueled rebellions in the Calixis region.
Battlefleet Calixis, being a fleet made up mainly of escort vessels, had great difficulty in maintaining void supremacy while also performing guard duties for the extremely vulnerable Whale assault ships. This meant there was minimal pre-invasion naval bombardment and very little naval support throughout the campaign, as naval assets were stretched to breaking point holding back ex-Imperial Navy and Chaos warships that often completely outclassed Calixis' escort-heavy formations. Only the heroic efforts of Rear Admiral Zoila Kusch kept the crusade's desperate naval situation relatively stable. The Rear Admiral leading her force of 6 light cruisers out of Port Wrath to successfully torpedo and destroy the Chaos Desolator Battleship Tempest's Herald early in the conflict, which was later discovered to be the flagship for the local warmaster; its destruction throwing any organised Chaos counter offensive into total anarchy.
This fragile naval situation, and lack of direct naval support of any kind, meant troops were often deployed directly into the teeth of Macro Cannon-armed fortresses and artillery kill-zones. Bunker complexes, far too extensive to be effectively countered by conventional artillery, could only be defeated by either suicidal massed frontal assaults or (for the fortunate Army Groups) with titian support. The fortified cities and hive cities being an even more desperate situation than the isolated bunker complexes, which could at least on occasion be encircled and starved, but the enemies ability to move freely together with the ability of such settlements to sustain themselves for years or even decades at time made long sieges impractical and rarely successful.
In this environment, the Imperial Guard turned to its Super Heavies to make up for the lacking firepower of frontline units and the lack of naval support against harder targets, and so the Shadowhammer was developed. One of the heaviest tanks developed by the Imperial Guard in its history, the Shadowhammer was effectively a heavily modified Baneblade Hull; as the hull was extended to fit a stockpile of 30 rockets and had its Demolisher Cannon removed. The tank then had a massive rocket pod assembly fitted to where the turret would normally be located, which could traverse and elevate onto any target around the tank within a maximum range of 500km. Each of the massive 1.2 tonne, 12 inch diameter rockets was capped with an Adamantium/Faramite head that could penetrate up to 1km of concrete or traditional steel protection, and then deliver a plasma, Melta or High Explosive Incendiary directly into the target. Each Rocket also came equipped with very simple guidance systems, able to correct for wind currents and ensure the warhead was delivered within 100 metres of the intended target. The tank can launch a barrage of 15 of these huge rockets at a time in a withering barrage that could render whole sectors of an enemy frontline paralyzed as exorcist rockets destroy entrenched positions and heavy equipment en masse ahead of an attack.
The rocket's size and weight, however, meant that reloading the Shadowhammer often took a few minutes under the best conditions, requiring the services of 4 dedicated loaders, a crane, and support vehicles to keep the Super Heavy Rocket artillery supplied and in action.
The Shadowhammer's first large-scale deployment was 4 years after the start of the Crusade on the traitor Stronghold of Stygiene's Fall. There, 3 Brigades of Shadowhamers, totalling 16 vehicles would utterly level the walls of the fortress Hive City, Plasma detonations and seismic HE charges destabilizing the structures of the city while firestorms raged from the thousand-degree heat caused by incindenary and Melta warheads. By the end of the 3 day bombardment and the beginning of the offensive, the fortress city was unrecognizable, as 60% of its structures had been either leveled or burned to the ground. Defenders would fight ferociously, but Imperial casualties would prove significantly below predictions. Many of the heretic's heavy weapons and prepared defences were utterly destroyed by accurate and extremely powerful exorcist rockets.
Since the crusade, the Shadowhammer has seen limited service with several Cadian regiments and at least a dozen are known to serve with the 18th Krieg Sturmartillerie Korps. But the expensive and difficult to manufacture rockets and firing assembly make it extremely unpopular with most lesser or minor regiments; as well as most forgeworlds prefering to build Super Heavies that can be more effectively mass produced on the assembly lines. So the Shadowhammer, despite its awesome power, remains a rarity.