A Space Marine of the Great Crusade era armed with a Volkite Caliver
A squad of Space Marines during the Great Crusade armed with Volkite Calivers
A Volkite Weapon is an arcane term used by the Adeptus Mechanicus to refer to a class of powerful thermal ray weapons whose technology is pre-Imperial in origin and dates back to the Age of Strife. These compact weapons possessed considerable killing power, surpassing most other armaments of their size. Volkite Weapons produced a deflagrating attack, in which subsonic combustion caused by a beam of thermal energy propagated through a material by thermodynamic heat transfer so that hot burning material heated the next layer of cold material and ignited it. A Volkite Weapon's heat ray had a devastating effect on organic matter, explosively burning flesh into ash and jetting fire.
Unfortunately, Volkite Weapons of the various types were difficult to manufacture, even for the most able of the Mechanicum's forges, and the demands of the expanding Great Crusade in the late 30th Millennium swiftly overwhelmed the supply of these relic-weapons. Once relatively common within the fledgling Space Marine Legions, Volkite Weapons had fallen largely from favour by the time the Horus Heresy began in the early 31st Millennium and had been superseded by the far more flexible and utilitarian Terran Bolter. Those few examples of a Volkite Weapon that remained in service were the purview of only a few specialised units at the outbreak of the conflict that tore the Imperium apart in a galaxy-spanning civil war. Volkite Weapons in the present time are exceedingly rare, and are scarcely ever seen amongst the Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes in the late 41st Millennium.
Volkite Weapon Variants
- Volkite Serpenta - The pistol variant of a Volkite Weapon.
- Volkite Charger - The assault weapon variant of a Volkite Weapon carried by Space Marine infantry.
- Vokite Caliver - A Volkite heavy weapon variant carried by Space Marine infantry.
- Volkite Culverin - A Volkite heavy weapon variant carried by Space Marine infantry.
- Volkite Carronade - A Volkite heavy weapon variant, mounted on the Glaive Super-Heavy Special Weapons Tank, a variant of the Fellblade.
Notable Users
- Durak Rask - The former Marshall of Ordnance of the Death Guard Legion during the Great Crusade who used a Volkite Serpenta in combination with a Thunder Hammer in battle.
Sources
- The Horus Heresy - Book One: Betrayal (Imperial Armour) by Alan Bligh, pg. 233
- Forge World - Volkite Calivers
- Forge World - Volkite Chargers
- Forge World - Legion Glaive