I was flipping through an old Battlefleet Gothic rulebook and noticed a ship called Shark Class Assault Boat, and it occurred to me that it could be drawn at Epic 6mm scale, so I did that. It's perhaps strictly a void ship used for boarding actions, so it's not something one can put on the tabletop, unless it's for some kind of 6mm boarding space hulk crusade thing. So I drew that as well. Then I got to thinking about what kind of troops would be aboard, and who better that Space Sharks? But would a skip only carry space marines? There seems to be a few miniatures specific for boarding actions and Rogue Trader, but I wanted to do my own design here.
I like the idea of IG being given garbage equipment (rather than 'tacticool' special forces stuff), so I started thinking about what an atmospheric suit might look like. Mag boots and a clunky vac/rad helmet. Subconsciously turned out a bit similar to Sontarans from Doctor Who. Some hoses to bulbous tanks on the back.
Who are in the suits? It's shark girls. Maybe the Space Sharks were involved in some business on a world where most IG forces were wiped out (partially by the Space Sharks). Some of the population survived, but were through a series of convoluted events mildly infected by mutated fragments of Space Shark geneseed, making them slightly more resilient to warp effects, and usable canaries on space hulks, and as general thralls.
In my headcanon IG still has beastmen and squats, so there'd be a few of those in the ranks. Also, Chaos trolls and minotaurs are a thing in old Epic. A boarding game might need some investigative specialists so I drew a few of those as well.
The Shark Class Assault Boat is listed as carrying 50 troops which seems a bit low given it's 55m length. If the ship is used purely for boarding, it probably doesn't have fancy living space and might be packed. I suppose its armour could be really thick.
The Thunderbolt dropship (which I renamed to Thunder Cloud because a cloud can drop things) seems to be a design predating 2nd edition 6mm Space Marine, or around that era. Size is unknown and load capacity a bit inconsistent. I've drawn it earlier but here I tidied up the design a bit.
The Thunderhawk design is based on the early model which is more brick-like, with crenelations for when it's landed, sitting kind of like a castle. Very medieval. Unclear how large a 'realistic' model would have to be based on what it can carry. The Knight Paladin above is based on the old mini. The new 40K scale model is much nicer looking than the old 6mm knights I think. I gave my version some fins on the top and a beaky-head, because Space Sharks.