Krhażssa-class Shock Lander

The Krhażssa-class Shock Lander is a superheavy orbital landing ship, or mobile base, used by the Integratoriate Direct Force of the Hierarchy.

Intended for large-scale, opposed planetary assaults, the Krhażssa is a massive needle-shaped craft designed to survive atmospheric reentry and direct impact with the planetary surface. Decceleration during descent is achieved through the firing of 8 fusion rockets. At around 800 m in height and weighing more than a battleship, even with decceleration the Krhażssa are as much as they are landing craft, and serve to effectively wipe out any resistance in a radius of 350 km around the landing site, providing a safe temporary opening for the mass deployment of troops.

Once landed, the top of the landing craft unfolds to reveal several batteries of air-defence and artillery weaponry, including railguns, nuclear guided missiles and a long-range x-ray composite laser array, as well as four combat hangers stocked with fighters, bombers and drones, as well as several battalions of ground troops and their equipment. The peak of the central spire houses a warship-grade composite field emitter.

Krhażssa are designed to be self-sufficient and self-contained beachheads - once having landed on a planet it is impossible for them to be launched into orbit in one piece, and they serve as a long-term forward operating base for Direct Force troops as they secure control over a planet. Sufficient supplies are provided for almost a year of independent operation, after which it is expected regular supplies from orbit will be available. Much of the landing craft is effectively disposable, and after the conclusion of a campaign any remaining equipment, sensor blocks, armaments and ammunition in usable condition are stripped down, dissassembled and returned to space to be fitted in newly built hulls.

Transport of Krhażssa-class vessels from system to system is carried out by subspace-equipped Khrahatur-class motherships, each of which is docked with up to 6 landers. In a single planetary assault, as many as 20 Krhażssa-class ships may be used, chiefly to secure population centers.

18 of the landers took part in the Empire-Hierarchy War of 277, and came to be known by the Empire as the Kuchikuhana or 'Destroyer Flowers'.