A Space Marine Chapter may only have 3 mighty Battle Barges but Strike Cruisers are far more common, although still quite rare compared to Imperial Navy ships. The arrival of a Strike Cruiser is enough to quell rebelling planets usually, as it is armed to the teeth for assaults, carrying up to a company of Space Marines and their equipment. They are primarily used for rapid deployment and are often the first to arrive in a system, attesting to their ancient designs and engines.
Strike Cruiser Variants
Like Battle Barges, Strike Cruisers represent a vast range of designs and armaments rather than a single class of vessel. Although they are of different designs, they all have the same mission in mind. Strike Cruisers are fast vessels with a large transport capacity and various means of delivering those troops (teleporters, drop pods or launch bays equipped with Thunderhawks). This leads to a wide variety of designs and forms, sometimes to do with where they were manufactured, sometimes to do specifically with Chapter requirements.
Grey Knights Strike Cruisers, due to their proximity to Mars are increadibly sleek vessels, using the most advanced systems available, even by Space Marine standards. Other Chapters, too, possess widely different forms of Strike Cruiser, each shaped by centuries of tradition and varying doctrines.