AT-AT

The All Terrain Armored Transport (AT-AT) are heavily armored, 4-legged juggernauts used by the Galactic Empire to crush their foes under their massive treads in the Star Wars Franchise.

Overview[]

Slow and ponderous, the awe-inspiring All Terrain Armored Transport Walker or AT-AT are the modern day descendants of various armored war machines utilized during the Clone Wars. These gigantic behemoths were created not just to move troops into occupied territories but for "shock warfare" by inspiring fear and dread in the Empire's enemies to see these unstoppable beasts lumbering forward, clearing the path of resistance for lighter vehicles and troops behind them.

Technical Specifications[]

• MODEL: All Terrain Armored Transport

• TYPE: Ground Assault Walker

• OVERALL LENGTH: 22.6 meters (74.15 feet)

• OVERALL HEIGHT: 26 meters (85.3 feet)

• OVERALL WIDTH: 7.9 meters (26 feet)

• MAXIMUM CARGO CAPACITY: 1 ton plus 40 passengers and 5 speeder bikes or 2 AT-ST (All Terrain Scout Transports)

• CREW COMPLEMENT: 1 Commander, 1 Pilot, 1 Gunner/Co-Pilot, 2 Deck Officers

• MAXIMUM SPEED: 60 kph (kilometers per hour)

• PRIMARY MANUFACTURER: Kuat Drive Yards

Design Features[]

The Imperial AT-AT is a heavily armored quadrupedal vehicle that are designed to function on many different terrain types, in a variety of gravitational fields, and diverse climates due to the broad spectrum of planets that the Empire may require them to operate on. With a pair of incredibly powerful FW62 fusion motors that drive the four heavily reinforced tri-jointed legs of the AT-AT onward, these war machines can accelerate to 60 kilometers over flat and even terrain. These articulated legs were heavily supported by durasteel footpads with four separate toe-flaps and impulse terrain sensors that allow the toe-flaps to function as grippers for increased stability on uneven ground when needed.

The power of these drive motors also enable the mammoth vehicles to traverse uneven terrain, marshes, swamps, jungles, forests, rugged hills, and even mountainous regions without seriously slowing them down. In fact, many AT-AT operators rarely push their machines to their full speed as the heavy rhythmic stomping of their marching approach causes the ground to shake and intimidate their enemies, demoralizing them even before the battle begins.

It is also an impressive urban assault vehicle due to its massive height gives its crew excellent line of sight over most urban environments. Low-lying structures and building don't really pose any obstacle to it as it can effectively knock down or crash through even reinforced buildings with comparative ease thanks to it's massively thick durasteel hide/armor that is effectively impervious to all but the most heavy laser cannons. It can shrug off any hand-held blaster fire and most artillery explosive shells as well.

The head of the AT-AT functions as the command center of this war machine and weapon mounts, housing a pair of stations where the pilot and co-pilot/gunner sits before a wide viewport of armored transparisteel that gives them a sweeping field of vision of the battlefield. There are electro-range finders and sensory arrays that gives them assisted combat targeting for its on-board weaponry. Above the pair is the Commander's Station which is equipped with 360-degree holographic visual systems which allows him to properly coordinate the AT-AT on the battlefield, as well as monitor his subordinates and other Imperial forces in the region. In addition, he can also communicate with orbiting Star Destroyers or other Imperial Naval units.

The cockpit head to connected to a trapezoidal main body via a semi-flexible segmented neck/tunnel. This flexible neck allowed for the cockpit to elevate and depress up to 30 degrees and turn as much as 90 degrees, allowing the crew to quickly re-position themselves as needed. The neck also allowed personnel access between the main cargo compartment/main body and the command center. This neck segment however was perhaps one of the main weakness of the AT-AT as the semi-flexibility meant it was less well armored than the rest of this formidable machine.

The main body of the AT-AT also serves as the main troop section/vehicle storage which is run by 2 Deck Officers. It can carry up to 1 ton of consumables and military supplies and weaponry. It also had an reconfigurable cargo hold that would carry up to 40 Stormtroopers or other personnel along with their personal equipment and 5 speeder bikes in a double tiered deck arrangement. Alternatively, the cargo hold could store two All Terrain Scout Transports (AT-ST).

When arriving at their destination, the AT-AT would kneel until the main body was roughly 3 meters off the ground and deploy a rear mounted boarding ramp that would allow the troopers or vehicles to exit the transport. Alternatively, there were several hatches on the flanks of the cargo hold that would allow individuals to rappel in the event that they needed to rapidly deploy without the laborious and time consuming kneeling procedure. There were also large side panels on both flanks that allowed the AT-AT to deploy a sliding disembarkation ramp to allow personnel to board or deploy themselves on a building or structure of comparable height with the standing AT-AT.

The very rear of the main body also contained various engineering machinery such as the fuel slug tanks for the fusion drive motors and atmospheric exchangers and filtration devices for internal environment of the AT-AT. The AT-AT could also be specially modified for certain environmental conditions. For the campaign on Hoth for example; the AT-ATs were augmented with heat circulation systems, de-icing controls, and low-temperature energy efficient controls. AT-AT could also be adapted for desert conditions with heat dissipation grids for extended marches.

Armaments[]

Although primarily designed for transporting troops and machines into enemy territories, the AT-AT is also monstrously well armed. The head module has two chin-mounted Taim & Bak MS-1 heavy laser cannons that serve as the primary assault weapons. These cannons could be fired in tandem or independently and could obliterate even a heavily armored target in a single devastating shot and had an effective range of approximately 3 kilometers.

There were also a pair of FF-4 medium rotating blasters on the temples of each side of the head module that could discharge rapidly repeating blaster bolts.  These medium blasters were intended for lighter and more mobile targets such as airspeeders or enemy troops.

As the AT-AT's head module is located on a pivoting neck which can swing up to 90 degrees left or right and up to 30 degrees up or down; this gives the AT-AT a very wide angled range of fire arcs. 

It was considered a standard Imperial tactic to use the AT-AT itself as a weapon and have the monstrous durasteel footpads literally crush enemies underneath its tread.

History[]

Originally the intimidating All Terrain Armored Transport (AT-AT) Walker were not an integral component of the Imperial Military Forces. In fact, they might not have emerged at all had they not been championed by Commander Maximilian Veers.

Veers was an enthusiast of the successful walker models used in the Clone Wars decades earlier, particularly the All Terrain Tactical Enforcers (AT-TE). The AT-TE's were multi-purpose military walking tanks that functioned as the main ground attack vehicle during the majority of the Clone Wars. However nearing the concluding campaigns of this conflict, the AT-TE's were considered increasingly obsolete, expensive to maintain, and difficult to deploy; not to mention that their manifest weak points were widely known and ruthlessly exploited by the Separatists.

After several disastrous ground campaigns, Emperor Palpatine found the AT-TE's wanting and soon after the end of the Clone Wars; the majority of the AT-TE's were swiftly abandoned and were regulated into antiquity; replaced with more reliable vehicles such as the A5 Juggernauts which used a more conventional wheeled drive.

However, Veers was convinced that the walkers were still a viable technology and saw the desperate need for a heavy ground assault vehicle that could handle a wide variety of environments and terrains. Repulsorlift crafts were too small for bulk transport and too fragile not to mention prone to failure from electromagnetic interference; tracked crawlers were too slow; and steep and uneven terrains made gigantic wheeled transports such as A5 Juggernauts impractical on a wide variety of planets. Instead, Veers resurrected the walker concept by proposing a new model which provided heavier armor, more powerful weapons, as well as being much larger to bestow them with the superiority of higher ground to replace the manifold weaknesses of the earlier AT-TE's. In tribute to the Imperial mindset; the concept of rule via fear, the designers created an incredibly imposing mechanized war beast and thus, the first All Terrain Armored Transports were born.

These awesome war machines were first deployed in limited numbers on campaigns on Carrida, and Culroon III several years before the Battle of Yavin. The intimidating machines were instrumental in soundly crushing the Rebel Alliance in these battles. Veers would become a noted expert in the AT-AT and would spend the next few years refining the design alongside Imperial engineers on the planet Zaloriis.

His improvements were sufficiently noteworthy that the Rebel Alliance sought to sabotage the project by abducting him. This resulted in attracting the attention of the fearsome Darth Vader himself into personally rescuing Veers from captivity. Vader took a great interest in Veers afterwards and pushed for the AT-AT into widespread use where they became regarded as the standard ground assault vehicle of the Galactic Empire. Hundreds of them were built and entire squads of these machines became a standard component of the Star Destroyers' complements of deployed ground-based vehicles.

A number of variants of these mammoth vehicles were created as well such as the All-Terrain Scout Transport (AT-ST); a lighter and smaller bipedal walker design that were created to function as light reconnaissance ground vehicles and often could be seen flanking their larger and bigger brothers, the AT-ATs in the field as covering the larger behemoths' more vulnerable sides from enemy retaliation. Another variant was the All-Terrain Armored Cargo Transport (AT-ACT) which were deployed at construction projects or large Imperial installations or planet bases such as Scarif. The AT-ACT were even larger but much more lightly armored and armed.

Veers himself was ultimately promoted to General and the AT-AT Commander aboard Darth Vader's flagship, the Super Star-Destroyer Executor in time for the Battle of Hoth. Veers distinguished himself in destroying Hoth Base's power generators despite the best efforts of the Alliance's elite Rogue Squadron and Commander Luke Skywalker to stop them. Without power to supply the shield generators, the Empire was able to take the Rebel stronghold.

This decisive battle was considered a major victory for the Empire but it did prove that the AT-AT had a critical flaw in its design. It's high center of gravity was its greatest weakness as Rogue Squadron demonstrated that with critical timing and harpoon cables, it was possible to entangle and force them down, leaving their more vulnerable neck exposed. Nevertheless, the AT-AT continued to serve throughout the Galactic Civil War as an integral part of the Imperial war machines.

Thirty years later, the AT-AT inspired a number of intimidating walkers used by the First Order, continuing their legendary doctrine of rule via fear.

Production Notes[]

The AT-AT was created by George Lucas for Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back as one of the Empire's monstrous war machines for the Battle of Hoth.  They would subsequently return in the sequel, Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi.

Lucas was originally inspired by H.G. Wells' The War of the Worlds alien Tripod war machines for the AT-AT.  Several designs were created before they settled on the four-legged walker design based on an extinct rhino-like species, the Paracerantherium; one of the largest known mammals ever to exist.  An early design featured a two-legged version which Lucas felt looked "neat" but not intimidating enough. Nevertheless, Lucas included this two-legged version as the All Terrain Scout Transport or AT-ST which would serve as a lesser escort for the AT-AT.

Models were created and stop-motion animation was used to create them which created a bizarre, jerky, half-mechanical movement.  The thumping sound of their footsteps was created through a recording of an industrial sheet metal stamper.

The AT-AT was never actually given their name in any of the Star Wars films and were simply referred to as "Imperial Walkers" but were later named in various comics, video games, and Star Wars related media. Their popularity as the tanks of the Star Wars Universe has resulted in a number of "earlier" designs to have emerged in the various prequel films and TV shows.

Although originally thought to be make a reappearance in Rogue One film, it has since been revealed that the imperial walkers were not the infamous All-Terrain Assault Transports but rather an even larger version known as the All-Terrain Armored Cargo Transport (AT-ACT) which were industrial cargo transports that were more lightly armored to save weight and only lightly armed due to the fact that they were not front-line assault vehicles but for used primarily for self-defense.