What are the Imperium's smallest Warp-capable ships?

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**-Guardsman-**

Warp drives must be a rare and precious technology. You also need a navigator to find your way through the Warp, and those don't grow on trees. So my assumption is that ships below a certain size must enter or latch onto a bigger ship for faster-than-light trips. Is there a known lower limit to the size of ships equipped with a Warp drive?

Unfortunately, 40k lore seems rather thin on any reasonably-sized starships. (A Sword-class escort frigate allegedly has a length of 1.6 km and a crew of 26,000, which is patently absurd, as a ship of such size could hold enough nukes to lay waste to an entire planet. That's some "escorting".)

.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

The smallest warp capable warship we know of is the Cobra Class Destroyer, which is still, as such things go, pretty large. 1.6km long, 0.3km at its widest point.

For relatively civilian ships? They get silly, fast. The Universe Class Mass Conveyor is 12km long, and can carry up to 500,000 passengers.

Yet there are mentions of private ships, such as Amberley Vail’s personal yacht, which is warp capable. I don’t think we’ve any sizing for it though. It is tempting to say “and she has easy access to a Navigator being an Inquisitor”. But that’s a silly thought. Whilst perhaps kind of unusual in the grand scheme of things, such Yachts must be commonly warp capable, otherwise such a ship appearing from nowhere in a system would raised eyebrows, which isn’t what an Inquisitor of Vail’s stripe wants.

If memory serves though, a Navigator is only required for long range Warp Jumps. Trader vessels travelling well established trade routes, only visiting the same two or three systems don’t necessarily require one?

It’s also possible that a smallish fleet need only one Navigator equipped Vessel in its midst to get everyone safely to the intended destination.

**the-gentleman-ranker**

If one assumes BFK to be canon, and yes, i know there is an argument to be made here that since the contract ran out, their lore is now automatically non-canon, but for a few years, the Viper-Class Sloop did exist.

Viper-Class Scout Sloop
Dimensions: 0.95 km long, 0.25 km abeam at fins approx.
Mass: 4.9 megatonnes approx.
Crew: 7,500 crew, approx.
Accel: 6 gravities max sustainable acceleration.

The Viper is the smallest warp-capable vessel used in
Battlefleet Calixis. The Viper is a fast scout ship, with
immensely powerful realspace engines. It is used for shortterm
spy missions aimed at specific hostile regions: unlike,
for example, a Dauntless light cruiser, which will conduct
broad patrols over a wide area, the Viper charges into hostile
territory at high speed. There it uses powerful auspex and
augur scanners to collate as much information as possible,
before retreating to a safe warp jump point while usually
pursued by enemy ships.

Given its specialist role, the Viper is unsurprisingly limited
in many ways. It is a tiny ship, with very restricted space for
additional Components. Furthermore, it is not heavily armed,
as extensive weapon batteries would draw vital power from the
sensor arrays and engines. They are rare vessels in the sector
and are not ideal vessels for Rogue Traders, given their highly
specialised nature. However, more enterprising and wealthy
dynasties will often employ a Viper as part of a larger fleet,
leapfrogging ahead of the main force to rapidly establish the
nature of each planetary system encountered.

Speed: 11
Manoeuvrability: +30
Detection: +25
Hull Integrity: 25
Armour: 14
Turret Rating: 1
Space: 29
SP: 27
Weapon Capacity: Dorsal 1

If we don't accept BFK, then it would either be the Cobra-class destroyer or the Iconoclast Destroyer

**Lord Damocles**

The Warhammer Adventures series features multiple roughly Thunderhawk-sized craft which are warp-capable.

**Flinty**

A navigator is not required. Some kind of vaguely defined computer can pre-calculate warp jumps, they just aren't as reliable and largely restricted to calm and stable warp routes. I imagine if something goes wrong on a calculated jump you are stuffed, while a navigator would be able to guide the ship back to some kind of reasonable re-entry point.

Automatically Appended Next Post:
A quick google turned up the Tarnhelm

https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Tarnhelm

**superkuf**

1) We know that some of the Imperiums most elite factions, such as Custodes and Grey Knights (maybe AdMech, the Inquisition and Officio Assassinorum) have small and very fast voidships to deliver small squads just in time. A squad of Grey Knights can prevent a deamon summoning/manifestation that otherwise would take armies of IG to contain, so it would be worth to have very fast ships available for them. These ships would be highly automatized with a far smaller crew, life support needs, no ship weapons etc. This class of ships would be even smaller than Veils yacht, since they wouldn't have her private army, acrolytes, luxery items and so on.

2) I guess that the Imperium also have a "mailman" class of small and simple voidships, designed only for non-astropath communications between neighbouring star systems. No navigator, since the routes are short, monitored and well travelled. Almost no cargo space, since only paper/data communication are transported. Minimal crew, since the ships only would be used in peace conditions (well, as peaceful WH40k can be) without need for weapon, sensor, damage control etc officers. Small fuel reserves, since they only travel from planet X to planet Y and refuel at Y.

This mailman class could be really small, since it don't need the range, redundancy, weapons, fighting force etc "ordinary" voidships have as standard.

**Flinty**

The Tau are explicitly described as having automated comms drones that jump back and forth. It’s a logical extension that other races do it as well, which would include The Imperium. Probably not all of it, but a million worlds is a big place

**Pariah Press**

Inquisitor Draco’s ship was warp capable, and had only 4-6 people aboard. My impression is that such ships are rare and expensive though.

**Dysartes**

the-gentleman-ranker wrote:
If one assumes BFK to be canon, and yes, i know there is an argument to be made here that since the contract ran out, their lore is now automatically non-canon, but for a few years, the Viper-Class Sloop did exist.

Sorry, but Dakka isn't translating your TLA - BFK?

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

Battle Fleet Koronis.

**Wyldhunt**

Lord Damocles wrote:
The Warhammer Adventures series features multiple roughly Thunderhawk-sized craft which are warp-capable.

These are the smallest that come to mind. There's also that subplot in War of the Fang about the Space Wolf scout(?) ship that's basically getting Last Voyage of the Demeter'd by a Thousand Sons sorcerer/rubric duo hiding in its hull. From what I recall, I got the impression that the crew on that ship was just like, a few dozen. Which is pretty tiny by 40k standards even if it's not Millennium Falcon small. And obviously it's big enough for some bad guys to hide in the lower decks without being detected immediately.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

One thing I will say is I’m not sure we’ve a defined minimum size for a Warp Engine.

We could, and it’s not entirely a stretch, looking to the D-Cannon and Shokk Attak Gun as evidence you don’t need something massive to tear a hole in reality. But as their effects are to-scale (as in, the warp hole can’t be much bigger than the gun from what we see), we can imply the bigger the ship, the bigger its Warp Engine needs to be.

Other complications is as well as your standard VSG, you need a Gellar Field Projector alongside the Warp Engine - and of course a regular power generator with enough oomph to power all the systems at the same time.

So whilst I think I can now safely argue there’s no minimum size for a Warp Engine, there is, somewhere and largely unknown to us, a minimum ratio to ship size. So whilst a one-man fighter craft could be warp capable, the necessary bits and gubbins for space and warp travel will impose a minimum size on the entire craft. And you couldn’t just pinch a fighter scaled warp engine and use it for your Cruiser sized ship.

**Flinty**

The warp engine is there to make the hole, but also to navigate in the immaterium. Dynamite is a compact package that is great at making holes, but internal combustion engines are rather larger

The only thing we have to help us out is the general statement in the lore that warp engines are (in general) massive things that require very large ships. However, as with all other things the general can be trumped by specific cases, often based on low-frequency space magic relics/lost technology and mostly set out where authors need something smaller than a km-long behemoth to keep a plot tight and streamlined.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

Warp Missiles also feature a miniaturised Warp Engine.

But, and this is again a Big But. This is The Imperium we’re talking about. That a tiny Warp Engine can be made doesn’t mean that it’s applied to anything more than a Warp Missile.

**Flinty**

Indeed. A warp missile doesn't navigate the warp as such, it blips in and out so isn't that different to the other warp-based weapons.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

Still stands that teensy wee Warp Engines are possible, which suggests they’re scalable in size.

**mithril2098**

It's like most things with the Imperium.. "it depends"

The smallest warp ships the Imperium seems to be able to manufacture in bulk are a bit under a kilometer long.

We get mentions of smaller ships but they're always described as being either relics of an older time with irreplaceable technology, or extremely rare if not unique creations. which means that it is likely that even if the Imperium does have the plans and resources to make tiny warp ships, their ability to do so is highly limited to only a handful of places and very low production.

though some older books are bit more ambigious about it, probably because the setting was much less defined. for example, at the start of First and Only a pair of Faustus Interceptors are described in a way implying FTL capability, and are seen a long way from any fleet, but aren't explicitly given the ability prior to their destruction (thus ending their only appearance in the setting.) we don't see other small craft with warp ability in use by the Imperial navy again either.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

There’s also the questionable desirability of tiny teeny ships.

The setting shows every race, without exception, favouring Really Honking Big Ships. Even the humble Cobra Destroyer is around the size of an Imperial Star Destroyer.

If you’re a Merchantman, the risks posed by Warp Travel are no different for a small ship than a big one. So there’s no incentive of safety to crew a tiny ship, as that’s only going to limit the amount of cargo you carry. And given many worlds in the Imperium have at least Earth like populations? You want to service as many customers as you can, or carry as varied a cargo of ridiculous luxuries.

Now, that doesn’t mean every merchantman is going to be anywhere near a Universe Class Mass Conveyor. But nor is there any sense in saying, Millennium Falcon tiny ships, except perhaps once you’re in system as a Very Sneaky Stealthy Lander for your Extremely Naughty Goods.

**Flinty**

Not sure I agree with that. Smaller is easier to maintain and crew. Smaller is harder to detect, lower emissions and smaller heat profile Smaller means fewer souls on board in the warp to attract attention.

As set out in this thread there are many reasons for a small fast ship. Messenger, courier, explorer, infiltrator. One of my favourite things in the early game of Elite is the random courier missions requiring you to jump about stringing jobs together.

To paraphrase Mass Effect, the materials for one large warp engine could be used to supply thousands of smaller ships. The only real reason not to routinely build smaller ships is if it can’t be done easily.

The smaller ships would be useless in major void engagements, but not everything needs to be a warship.

**Mad Doc Grotsnik**

But, when your supply run is supplying an entire planet, not just an outpost, village, town or city? Bigger Is Objectively Better.

And for Very Illicit Naughty Things? That’s what sneaky landers are for. Much smaller ships, where the cargo is of such risk and therefor value you don’t need to cart a whole lot about with you. A small ship to surface transport will get that job done. The sort of thing that once in orbit, can easily get lost amongst the rest of the traffic going to and from the surface.

Within The Imperium, the crew of a ship are there for well beyond the long haul. Even on a relatively small ship? The crew is generational. It’s their home. A mobile town/village/city with, one assumes, near 100% employment. You don’t get cash money, you get Scrip, like a Company Town. The ship and its owner, provided you play your part, ensures you’re all fed, watered, bed, security, warmth, power etc etc.

Will there be tiny illicit courier ships? Sure. Could be an inquisitor on board. Could be a cultist looking to spread the bad word.

But for the general Imperium? Big is plenty fine, and kinda required for the sheer scale of the job at hand.