Dreadnought

A Ultramarines Venerable Dreadnought. Who said Tau are the only Mecha-Fans in the entire galaxy? Also, it looks more badass than aforementioned Tau battlesuits, proving that in the Imperium being as crippled as Stephen Hawking is no excuse to stop being pimp.

Dreadnoughts are the siege Mecha of the Space Marines. They're piloted by a Space Marine who survived but was crippled beyond repair. If the apothecaries managed to save the life of a marine from wounds that would out-right kill a Space Marine (Which is saying a lot), but can't be restored to battle-capable condition anymore, the marine has the option of being interred into a Dreadnought and pilot it from the confines of his armored sarcophagus. The mech itself is synched to the pilot's brain, thus, the marine is capable of piloting the walker as if it was his own body, making these things quite agile despite their large, boxy design.

Dreadnoughts are incredibly tough and their pilots even tougher; they're totally fearless, cannot feel pain and would charge through the thickest gunlines to support his brothers in ripping and tearing the opposition. In fact, the only way to technically kill a Dread is by destroying the Sarcophagus or blowing it up completely, since as long as the Dreadnought has any operational weaponry and the pilot still lives, he will try to kill you with it, even if his machine is already crippled. Some Dreadnoughts contain the oldest warriors in the Imperium; at least one, Bjorn of the Space Wolves, is older than the Horus Heresy. As such, they generally have a ton of combat experience.

Tabletop wise, Dreads are an effective all-rounder and are fairly cheap to boot. They're good at any role they're tooled for, whether its for blowing up tanks with twin-linked lascannons or melta guns or mowing down infantry with an assault cannon or heavy flamer. They can also be formidable close combat units as they can be tooled with power fists, for starters.

You can also deep-strike them in Drop Pods, ensuring hilarity when you get lucky and they end up where they precisely need to be.

Do note, however, that many enemies focus anti-armor weapons on them (especially if there isn't a Land Raider to distract them). A footslogging Dread, without heavy use of cover, will be a burning hulk of points within two turns, relying on the deep striking Drop Pods to get them where they need to go.

Dreadnought Variants

There's a whole bunch of Dreadnought variants that do different things. There's also Wraithlords, Deff Dreds, and Helbrutes, which used to be called Eldar Dreadnoughts, Ork Dreadnoughts, and Chaos Dreadnoughts, respectively.

Castraferrum Pattern

Is the name for the traditional "box" dreadnought that everyone is familiar with, comes in MkIV and MkV flavours (just so you know, MkIV are the ones with the helmet-head). Was designed by the mechanicum during the great crusade, specifically for its smaller size (to assist battle-brothers indoors), its reactor runs on pretty much any fuel, and the chassis is completely customisable; hence there are a terrific number of variations:

• Hellfire Dreadnought: The most common variation of shooty dread, this swaps out its close combat weapon for a missile launcher.
• Ironclad Dreadnought: Even more heavily armored melee dreadnoughts with a Seismic Hammer, Hunter-Killer Missiles, and a built-in Frag Assault Launcher, designed to put giant holes in tanks and bunkers.
• Siege Dreadnought: Specialized bunker-busting Dreadnoughts equipped with Assault Drills and Inferno Cannons. If they manage to come close enough to any building, no matter how fortified, they would wreck it and burn the shit out of anyone inside.
• Venerable Dreadnoughts: Simply put, they're really old Dreadnoughts that have been locked up for a long time and as such are better at fighting and... stuff. Also tend to get sleepy and lose their keys.
• Chaplain Dreadnoughts: Some Chapters have Venerable Dreadnoughts that used to be Chaplains. This basically means they have all those special effects that Chaplains do... in a Dreadnought body.

Chapter Specific Dreads

• Furioso Dreadnought: Heavily armored Blood Angels dreadnoughts, designed to RIP AND TEAR lots of troops in brutal close combat. Sometimes they put a blood crazed maniac from the Death Company inside, which turns Furiouso to unholy uncontrollable and unstoppable rape machine.
  • Furioso Librarian Dreadnoughts: Blood Angels like to lock psykers up in Dreadnoughts, creating unholy amalgamations called Furioso Librarians. In addition to the badassery above, Furioso Librarians were once capable of flying. WAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRDDDDDDDDDD, but no longer while we are between codices.
• Mortis Dreadnought: A variant supposedly exclusive to the Dark Angels that sports two copies of the same ranged weapon, for maximum dakka. This was apparently due to the Dark Angels' talent for writing things down (for entirely practical reasons, like keeping track of grudges, rather than writing down some bible for space marines or the reppressed/begrudging teeming masses) as all Legions had access to this pattern, but only the Angels remembered how to make a leftie dreadnought ranged weapon that wasn't a missile launcher.
• Deathwing Dreadnoughts: the Dark Angels venerable dreads are all members of the inner circle and so reserve special hatred for The Fallen FILTHY CHAOS SCUM
• Doomglaive Dreadnoughts: A specialist dreadnoughts used by the Grey Knights, comes with a nemesis force weapon and a psycannon as standard. Can attempt cleave attacks in close combat and try to hit additional dudes.

Contemptor Pattern

Really old Dreadnoughts before the Horus Heresy that are bigger and stronger than "modern" Dreads. A few Chapters still have them and deploy them to the field. They look more Humanoid like an Anime mech, and people get puzzled on why did they not use these instead of the goofier Dreadknight, but the reasons they don't use them are exactly the same as why they started using the Castraferrum pattern instead, plus Contemptors are becoming rarer and rarer in 40k.

Yes, this is a Contemptor of the Grey Knights. And no, they don't have them. Why the fuck did they not use these instead of the goofy Dreadknight? (Because the Ward, that's why.)

They have a bunch of mysterious cybernetic/AI stuff, which probably means that you should keep these away from the Adeptus Mechanicus, since they like stripping them out for parts to use on their robots. Unlike regular Dreads, they have access to Cyclone Missile Launchers, Heavy Conversion Beamers, Chainfists, Graviton Guns, Plasma Blasters, and the Kheres-Pattern Assault Cannon. They also have a an advanced Atomantic reactor which no-one knows how to make anymore, that is coupled to a field generator that gives them an invulnerable save at the expense of making a Vehicle Explodes result more dangerous.

• Contemptor-Mortis Dreadnoughts: A modified Contemptor Dreadnought most often used by the Dark Angels that puts out a massive amount of dakka... so massive, in fact, that modern autocannon Dreads live in jealousy. Also, they have targeting arrays to fire at flyers.
• Contemptor-Furioso Dreadnoughts: While any contemptor can be kitted out with two close combat weapons only the Blood Angels do this exclusively, since they don't have access to "regular" contemptors in the rules, that means they don't get access to the cool relic weapons.

Other Patterns

So far the Castraferrum & Contemptor are the only patterns of dreadnought that are available as models. (unless you count some of the chaos daemon-engines, but who knows what they started as?)

Other types have been named though, and it is also said that some of these older pre-heresy patterns could have been piloted by non-astartes. So we can cross our fingers that more dreadnoughts may be coming eventually.

• Lucifer: Said to be the prototype for the contemptor, but doesn't have the advanced systems, instead it supposedly has shitloads of frontal armour.
• Furibundus
• Deredeo

Meme

Even in death, the mighty Astartes warrior still serves for the Emperor.

"Even in death, I still serve" was a phrase scattered throughout Warhammer 40k, but it didn't become a meme until the original Dawn of War game, where it's one of the Dreadnought's more common quotes.

The making of a Dreadnought

1: Take 1 outstandingly badass Space Marine

2: Cut him in half (hopefully before he does the same to you)

3: Leave the dying body on the doorstep of some Adeptus Mechanicus guy

4: ???

5: PROFIT!!! DREADNOUGHT!!!

Gallery

• 
  After his internment into a Dreadnought, Brother Koolaidius has specialized in dynamic entry at any location, usually attending to battle brothers with refreshment needs.
• 
  Fear the fucking Breadnought.
• 
  Even in death, I still fuck your army.
• 
  I have come to destroy your anus.
• 
  The Dreadnoughts of the Angry Marines are also known as the Belligerent Engines.
• 
  Suck it.

See Also

• Tankred
• Donovan
• Chaos Dreadnought, the evil (well, more evil) version
• Grandpa Dreadnought
• Bjorn the Fell Handed, of the Space Wolves, and the oldest living Space Marine in the Imperium.
• Davian Thule, of the Blood Ravens, also known as Davian Cool.
• Belligerent Engine, a catch-all term for the Dreadnoughts of the Angry Marines.
• Spared, a short story about a Dreadnought and some Tau.
• Entombed, a not-so-short story about a Dreadnought.