Further plans in the works. More units for the Rocketeer unit chain. These are primarily defined as foot soldiers with extremely heavy, fairly long range, somewhat slow to recover between weapons uses, often designed to enable the soldier to take down very large targets. There are already a number of these at varying stages, but much of the line, rather than being unusual side-upgrades or alternatives for more core soldier types, could be further built out so that it becomes a more steady upgrade path of its own, with its own niche(s) in strategic play that stabilize the general reasons to train and employ them. I am also considering them capable of surprising variations throughout their upgrade stages that result from the differences in the forms of weaponry they employ. One version may be very good against a certain unit type while its upgrade might find that particular type to be overall terrible for them to face, but there ARE reliable standards you can pretty much rely on. It's just that you might want to pay attention to some of the subtle differences or be taken off guard, overlook a unique weakness, or miss opportunities you might not realize you have with a new upgrade form.
Generally, they are weak to smaller forms of firepower due to their long recovery periods. They do a lot of damage with each blast but take a long time between blasts. This is mostly reflected in what unit types they have benefits and penalties towards. They tend to do well on hills and make a good niche for hill attack units and later for hill defense as well. This is because in such a case the land can often be used against the enemy, causing rockslides and having places to hunker down and find strong concealment can be a big factor for these types.
Here's the line in full, once it has been implemented (
New Units):
Ancient Rocketeer -> Ancient Hand Cannon -> (
Hand Cannon) -> (
Hand Mortar) -> (
Sauterelle) -> (
Mortarman) -> Bazooka -> SAM Infantry -> Anti-Tank -> (
Suppression Infantry) -> (
Laser Infantry) -> (
Sonic Blasters) -> (Space SAM Infantry becomes:
Ion Infantry) -> (
Cyberkineticist) -> (
Disintegration Infantry) -> (
Anti-Matter Rocketeer) -> (
Warp Infantry) -> (
Invoker)
Breaking down the NEW units:
>Hand Cannon
>UNIT_HAND_CANNON
>TECH_GUNPOWDER
We have the Ancient one, but that was based on a later actual gunpowder based design. It was generally considered a somewhat poor and unreliable weapon at the time and the stats will reflect that it wasn't REALLY coming into its own as a highly effective unit type. But it's there in part to provide a stable upgrade path that doesn't force the unit into the awkward requirement to have its role in the army rethought entirely after upgrading. It still has a strong benefit in certain applications, like attacking hill positions where landslides and avalanches can be very useful.
>Hand Mortar
>UNIT_HAND_MORTAR
>TECH_GRAND_WAR
Larger, two-handed launcher of an explosive. Still a little awkward, slow, inaccurate, and capable of mishap, but the ability to lob at long range does help with countering some fortification benefits when used to attack.
>Sauterelle
>UNIT_SAUTERELLE
>TECH_TRENCH_WARFARE
The
Arbalète sauterelle type A, or simply
Sauterelle (French for
grasshopper), was a
bomb-throwing
crossbow used by
French and
British forces on the
Western Front during
World War I. It was designed to throw a
hand grenade in a high trajectory into enemy
trenches. Somewhat weak still but getting better at getting past fortification benefits.
>Mortarman
>UNIT_MORTARMAN
>TECH_ADVANCED_METALLURGY + TECH_TRENCH_WARFARE
Every kid I ever knew growing up had 'army men' sets. And those sets included this guy on his knee with a tube facing downrange. Funny we don't have these Mortar operators as units in CivIV and never have... considering how strongly they factored into things for quite some time in WWII+ warfare eras. These are finally starting to be pretty decent and are very good at penetrating the fortified. Obviously, although they are given to have more small arms rifles and so on, they are a little vulnerable when they come under direct attack from numerous standard soldiers.
>Suppression Infantry
>UNIT_SUPPRESSION_INFANTRY
>TECH_MICROWAVE_WEAPONRY
I will admit that while we have designed effective microwave beam weaponry, heat rays basically, and mounted them on vehicles, we have yet to really give foot soldiers a version of their own to carry and employ. However, I also think it's only a matter of time before we do. Whether at war or in non-lethal crowd control, the abilities these weapons offer, particularly in targeting pilots and onsite machine operators, or large amounts of immediate enemies at close range are quite impressive. When folks get hit by these weapons, they feel nothing but pain. It's almost impossible to continue to operate the vehicle you are in and crashes become hard to avoid, and even the normal functioning of electronics can be disrupted by these beams. It may not seem like a hugely powerful weapon, but I predict they are going to become more and more strategically valid for certain situations to the point that we'll soon have 'bazooka-like' shoulder-mounted soldier deployed versions. And that's what this unit is.
>Laser Infantry
>UNIT_LASER_INFANTRY
>TECH_WEAPONIZED_LASERS
Truly damaging lasers are fairly large devices at first, and aren't likely to be rifle or pistol-sized as you might imagine from Star Wars or Battlestar Galactica. They're very good at taking down targets at long range, slipping through any visible panels to blast out the retinas of pilots, heating up explosives to turn the destructive power of enemy weapons against themselves, and melting down electronic circuits with great accuracy. Just too bad it is such a large weapon system for a foot soldier. Maybe down the road we'll get some smaller laser weapons with this much strength.
>Sonic Blasters
>UNIT_SONIC_BLASTERS
>TECH_ACOUSTIC_WEAPONRY
Once we really figure out just how damaging perfectly gauged sonic discharges can be at tearing apart nearly any material as long as the weapon knows what material it is looking to dismantle, weapons like these will emerge to rip apart large targets at long range, even with wide-angle blasts that can collect quite a few targets of the same type into its field of devastation. Unfortunately, it will be a little slow as the targets will need to be evaluated and the weapon set to destroy them specifically, as different targets require differing frequencies.
>Ion Infantry
>UNIT_SPACE_SAM_INFANTRY
>Move to TECH_ION_BEAMS
Replaces Space Sam Infantry mostly in that it uses a huge shoulder-mounted Ion Cannon. In such a small package (since these things are as miniaturized as possible for a foot soldier and usually can only be mounted on a vehicle due to the size requirements), they blast and then take quite a bit of time to recover. Sure, they generally destroy anything in the path of the blast and are terrific at armor penetration, but the slow recovery and very direct laser-like target focus can be weaknesses that some units can exploit.
>Cyberkineticist
>UNIT_CYBERKINETICIST
>TECH_BINARY_PYSCHOKINESIS
This ability to invoke a fairly true Telekinesis effect to tear apart targets, throw things at targets, push/pull targets to force crashes, rip off doors in hostile space, and so on, is assumed here to require both a biological brain function as well as a technological one, since the biological can connect to the aspect of reality where thought is in control of the physical world, but the technological speed of processing is needed to truly reliably tap into that ability in a useful way. This cyborg is very committed to this function and purpose and he's nearly magical in what he can achieve, but it takes some time to think about what he wishes to do before he can actually do it, so actually works with many of the same benefits and penalties, pros and cons, that so many footsoldier types up to this point using large heavy weapons miniaturized for shoulder mounting have been working with. So yes, the form and method changes dramatically, but the final results aren't all that different, just dramatically improved in this form.
>Disintegration Infantry
>UNIT_DISINTEGRATION_INFANTRY
>TECH_WEAPONIZED_DISINTEGRATION
Sometimes the older ways are superior when the older methods get an upgrade like this. Disintegration tech is so strong as a weapon, that going back to shoulder mounted beam weapons actually makes sense here because no form of armor can maintain integrity when faced with this strike, and the speed of it has improved to the point that it is actually superior to the telekinetics, particularly in taking down very very big targets.
>Anti-Matter Rocketeer
>UNIT_ANTIMATTER_ROCKETEER
>TECH_ANTIMATTER_ROCKET
Going back even further still to rockets (although with major improvements to how they are carried in massive boxes off the shoulders and automated targeting systems) makes sense at this stage because when these rockets hit, they create a stronger disintegration effect in a massive blast zone, completely wiping out any physical matter/energy within the blast zone with an absolute negation effect. Being able to put this ability on a couple of foot soldiers makes for a very easily overlooked mega-threat.
>Warp Infantry
>UNIT_WARP_INFANTRY
>TECH_GALACTIC_WARFARE + TECH_SPACE_CREASING
Perhaps this is best to be envisioned as the next generation of telekinetic. This guy warps and twists space and time itself into knots and creases and folds, capable of tearing apart nearly anything it encounters if it has the time to generate the focus into the effect that can make it happen. Little can resist but if the target isn't all that weak to geometric manipulation of its essence, it might be tough for this unit to defeat.
>Invoker
>UNIT_INVOKER
>TECH_MATERIALIZATION
Another upgrade to the Telekinetic and Warp Infantry concepts, this guy is pretty much a wizard in the way we think of wizards. He's able to manifest nearly any energetic effect, and outright programs things directly into existence, and potentially even OUT of existence. Getting the job done still takes some thought and going through some process (such as 'casting spells' would require) and that can make him a little slow at making nearly anything happen. That can be his undoing. How much of this is tech-based and how much is not is more a matter of the beliefs of the culture that achieves this status on the tech tree, since their collective beliefs are now powerfully influencing reality to reflect those assumptions. Therefore, you can see this as an AI tapping into the thought control over the essence of physics itself and reprogramming reality to shape itself as it wishes, or as a wizard casting spells based on arcane knowledge and means of categorizing and manipulating all the forces in the universe, or as a matter transmutational device mounted on a footsoldier who employs it to create all the same potential range of effects. View him as you wish and perhaps we can create a wide variety of unit arts based on some choices players make down the road, though it'll need something more specifically defined to start with.
