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Boarding Pod

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Ciaphas Cain, The Emperor's Finest






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    Anime and Manga 

    Comic Books 
  • The page picture comes from the Star Wars Legends companion comics to The Force Unleashed II, where an unidentified TIE variant fires several of these to get Terror Troopers aboard the Rebel frigate Salvation.
  • The wolrogs attack a human ship with these in an issue of Strontium Dog. When they're defeated, Johnny tells them to leave the pods where they are or else all the ship's air will leak out through the holes they drilled in the hull.
  • Wonder Woman (1987): Wonder Woman's rebels are seen using small sharp nosed vessels with clamp arms to board a Sangtee Empire ship after their tech crew ensures the Empire ships can't detect the approaching rebel fleet. The Empire only realizes they're under attack once their ships are breached and boarded.

    Film — Live-Action 
  • In Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Rey uses one of the Millennium Falcon's escape pods to board Snoke's ship, Supremacy.

  • Ciaphas Cain:
  • Red Rising: Star Shells are massive armored pods launched at ships and planets.

    Live-Action TV 
  • In the finale of Battlestar Galactica (2003), the entire Galactica was used as one to board a Cylon colony. In the same operation, we see that Raptors can perform as more conventional boarding pods, latching on hull prior to cutting in with torches.
    • In "Fury", a Vidiian cruiser latches onto Voyager with huge grappling cables that cut through the hull. Voyager tears off a section of its hull breaking free.

    Tabletop Games 
  • Warhammer 40,000:
    • Space Marines also have the Caestus Assault Ram. Its magna-melta fires a shot to weaken the enemy's hull, and then the armored prow smashes its way in. Meanwhile, the occupants are held in an inertial dampening restraint system that protects them from the shock of impact; each restraint harness is so big, it can accommodate a Terminator or a regular Space Marine. Once the Assault Ram has penetrated the enemy hull, the assault charges disrupt any defenders with a blast of shrapnel, the clamps release, the hatches drop, and the occupants charge into the fray.
    • Tyranid mycetic spores work as either Drop Pods or boarding pods.
    • Usable in gameplay in the spinoff game Battlefleet Gothic, which features both boarding torpedoes (usually unguided) and reusable Assault Boats (shuttlecraft that attach to the hull to cut through). Most ships are too big and well defended to be captured outright, so most boarding parties in 40K attack to damage a critical system, and then evacuate if possible. In the backstory, a few naval forces have an element dedicated to capturing enemy ships, but this usually amounts to a small army.

    Video Games 
  • X:
  • Star Trek: Armada has Klingon SuQ'Jagh assault ships that can launch boarding pods capable of penetrating any shields.
  • In Warframe, the Grineer make use of "Ramsleds", which are capable of punching through the hulls of both Corpus and Tenno ships to deploy a full squad inside. When siding with the Grineer in Invasion missions, the player may get an opportunity to use one themselves at the level's midpoint. Generally, any ship larger than a fighter will be able to deploy at least one Ramsled. The Corpus and Tenno also make use of boarding parties when in pitched space combat, but handle the delivery of said parties differently (Portals for the Corpus, and either phasing through the hull or entering through the airlock for the Tenno).
  • In FTL: Faster Than Light, you or your enemies can launch boarding drones, which cause a hull breach where they land, then start blasting things. In the Advanced Edition, ion drones also exist, which shut down systems and stun crewmembers. Getting regular crew over is done by transporters.
  • Spacebuild has assault pods that can launch players into enemy spaceships.
  • In stage 2 of MDK2, without functioning teleporters, Doctor Hawkins opts to send Max inside a torpedo aimed at the alien orbiter. What follows is a minigame where you steer the torpedo through an Asteroid Thicket (On an orbit around Earth. Don't ask.) that ends with the torpedo bursting through the orbiter's hull and massacring lots of little green men in the process (even more die when Max pulls out firearms). Later, Max escapes from the orbiter back to Jim Dandy with an alien shuttle which he crashes into the ship's window (again, killing aliens, but only three this time).
  • The Suicide Cannon and Armored Grunt Shuttle in Space Pirates and Zombies allow for boarding actions. While the shuttle is an assault boat, the cannon fires a modified Escape Pod that drills through an enemy hull. However, since escape pods are so fragile in this setting, it's better not to bother with it.
  • Naturally present in Battlefleet Gothic: Armada, a Real-Time Strategy game based on Battlefleet Gothic. The first mission has the player's Imperial cruiser use its boarding torpedoes to send troops aboard a space station that has been taken over by Chaos.
    • The feature returns in Battlefleet Gothic Armada 2 in a variety of forms. Regular boarding assaults deploy swarms of single-use pods to deliver their payload, ships with launch bays can unleash squadrons of assault boats for boarding actions at long rangenote , and Adeptus Astartes ships can use unique boarding torpedoes with slight homing capabilities that're launched from torpedo tubes. Each method varies in its range, the amount of troops it deploys, as well as the type of countermeasures it has to defeat to reach its target.

    Web Comics 
    Schlock: Can we throw a boarding party?
    Breya: Do not let them throw a boarding party.

    Western Animation 

Alternative Title(s): Boarding Torpedo, Breaching Pod


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