Going old school (well sort'a). the All terrain Howitzer platform!

wolverine

Member since: 2007
Location
reynoldsburg, ohio

Ok, as per the thread i had in the general area, this was one of my first vehicles that i had drawn by the nice folk here, iirc by Ben Paddock.  BUT since seemed to pull the image from anywhere it's existed, and i never kept a copy myself, i will need another one of you fine folk to give it a whirl.

 

The AT-HP is a six legged mech, kind of Hexagonal looking for its lower part.  The legs are definitely more spider like in that the knee joints rise to a little above the body of the vehicle.

However that's cause when it 'sits down, it plants itself ready to fire.  On the top of the walker's body, is a large turret, almost reminicent of ww2 Battleships in that it houses 3 large bore barrels that are field howitzers.  THe design was done up way in the past, long before even the clone wars errupted, as a field denial unit..  Shooting large shells far distances, to make crossing terrain hard for enemy units.  BUT it intially was also a tracked unit itself.  Then Grand Admiral Palleon's grand father got a hold of it, just prior to the clone wars, and thought the vehicle would be better served by being a walker..

 

However, the design never got off the board onto a working model that was put into production, as the clone wars started, and the separatists bombed the facility.

Cue 30 years later, and Thrawn is out and about with Commander Palleon on the Chimera, and a copy of the old plans were found in Mount Tanniss on Wayland.  Thrawn felt it was a interesting concept, but never did anything with it himself, so gave the reigns over to Palleon, who kept it on a back burner..  Till the Yussan Vong invaded.  After a # of new republic victories where they noted that using projectiles against the Vong ships seemed to get by their strange sensors and shields, Palleon put an immediate rushjob on these walkers..  They had just under 2 dozen in production by the fall of Coruscant.  And over 50 by the end of the war.

 

The AT-HP walker is roughly 17 meters long, 12 meters tall at the tip of its knees, and maybe 12 meters wide.  The turreted part where the Howitzers are housed in, is 12 meters long, 9 meters wide and 3 meters high, with the 3 barrels side by side.  Outside those are 5 other small turret mounted blasters, for use in dealing with infantry,  The main turret though is NOT fully sealed, and the ammo is kept int he rear of the turret, coming up from a housing area in the body of the walker, which has 2 large holes (ports) that additional ammo is fed through via this walker's companion vehicle, the "Ticker".  So it has been known to be prone to fatricide, if the ammo takes a hit.

 

 

I would like for the vehicle to be drawn "Sitting down" and the howitzer barrels deployed, in some sort of hilly terrain, with maybe some smaller imperial vehicles drawn off to the sides (or just small troops)..

 

 

Thanks.