Hachiman (Combat Vehicle)

The Hachiman Fire Support Tank gets little respect, but its effectiveness ensures that the Clans continue to use it. Both stem from the fact that it uses a compartmentalized crew area. While this increases the survival rate of its crew, they also suffer from decreased communication. The Hachiman, like all combat vehicles, is a second-line piece of technology. That does not stop many Clans from employing it offensively, however, as it has a decent top speed for a missile carrier at 65 km/h. Clans that are more vehicle-heavy, such as Clan Hell's Horses and Clan Blood Spirit, sometimes have Hachimans in front-line units. While it does not often come under heavy fire, the Hachiman does have a respectable seven tons of Ferro-Fibrous armor.

In the aftermath of the Jihad the Hachiman had become spread across the Inner Sphere and was employed by several of the major factions as well as mercenaries.

Weapons and Equipment
The fire support vehicle's main armament is its twin, turret-mounted Type XX "Great Bow" LRM-20s that are used to devastate opponents from long range. Each of these is slaved to an Artemis IV Fire Control System, making the missiles more accurate. Four tons of ammunition is usually sufficient for Trials, but a Hachiman crew could quickly find itself without ammo in a more protracted engagement. Should an enemy manage to close with a Hachiman, its crew can unleash its pair of Series 2d ER Medium Lasers and the front-mounted Pattern J6 Streak SRM-4.

Variants

 * AAA - This Jihad era variant, was designed for Anti-Aircraft operations. The variant exchanges all its weapons save the ER Medium Lasers for pair of Class 20 Hyper Assault Gauss Rifles. Twenty four rounds of ammunition split between the two guns. BV (2.0) = 1,418