So, before I get into anything else, you must understand the history of Total Annihilation style games. The original game came out in 1997, developed and produced by Cavedog Entertainment, and was jaw dropping and revolutionary. Hundreds of units clashed on screen in a full 3d engine. At the time, nobody had seen anything like it,and it was set to rock the shelves and ascend to the status of mainstream legend... except for one minute detail. A pair of chucklemongers named Chris Metzen and James Phinny wheeled out their brand spanking new game that made a moderate hit, you might have heard of it... Starcraft? Obviously, Starcraft stole the spotlight completely, and made such a huge splash such that competitive Starcraft became the national sport of South Korea for a time. Slightly bitter, Cavedog went on to make a fantasy spin-off of TA, TA: Kingdoms, which I did personally enjoy when I was but a lowly sea sprite as compared to my grown Admiral self, but they couldn't make enough cash to stay afloat and the ship of Cavedog went to the bottom, filing for Bankruptcy in 2000. Ever since, TA style games have a sinister reputation similar to the Superman curse. Every single company that ever touched anything remotely similar ended up closing their doors within a few years. Don't believe me? Let's talk history.

The survivors of Cave Dog, including one Chris Taylor, went on to create Gas Powered Games and Supreme Commander, a spiritual successor that, much like its predecessor, was considered one of the best PC games of all times. It's expansion pack, Forged Alliance, only improved upon what was already great but it's sequel, Supreme Commander 2, DID NOT and was considered a largely dumbed down version that could be ported to consoles. Needless to say, that kind of thing did not resonate well with fans and community mods could only help so much. After being bought out by those price gouging dirtbags, Wargaming, in 2013, GPG was shut down in 2018, and SupCom's Publisher, THQ, went belly up in 2014.

The survivors of GPG, including Bob Berry and John Mavor (who had a UEF cannon named after him in SC1), created Uber Entertainment, and started a kickstart campaign for their new game, Planetary Annihilation. They pulled down over $2 million dollars, a VERY good start, and while a good game, it was not as beloved or widely received as TA or SupCom, one thing led to another and 2020's endless BS parade happened, and Uber Entertainment died a quiet death in its sleep on March 4th of the same year.

Which now brings me to Ashes of the Singularity, developed by Oxide Games who are still with us (if only barely), and published by Stardock, who are ALSO still with us! Imagine that. Considering all the spiritual successors TA has had that I just outlined, and Ashes is sitting on the corpses of no less than 5 different development and publishing companies, their position is shaky at best. Even at launch, it's system requirements were a little on the high side, and the game gained a reputation as a benchmark tester similar to Crysis back in the old Xbox days, to the point it became nicknamed Ashes of the Benchmark. It is here that our story begins, and I get to yammer your ears off about technological borscht while you chowderheads keep throwing me steam awards for some strange reason.

There are actually two Singularities present within this game world. The first is the Technological Singularity, a hypothetical point in time where humanity's technological growth increases to such a degree that it leaves them permanently and irrevocably changed. In the context of Ashes, this takes the form of humanity evolving so damn hard that they become beings of pure thought and emotion contained within a super computing metal called Turinium. Humanity is able to use quantum entanglement theory (which I'm not going to explain here because I don't have a PhD in quantum mechanics), to seed distant worlds with NANOMACHINES, SON, who then do the work of turning that entire planet into Turinium. Every human that had made the ascension from flesh to computer entity has a unique Turinium signature, and that means that each of these planets that became terraformed into a big ball of metal can only be inhabited by ONE human, now referred to as Post-Humans, but each Post-Human can network together multiple Turinium planets. THAT's a problem.

Now, if I understand anything, it's that humans do 3 things reliably well: Tyranny, Taxes, and War. They've had some better parts in their history, but those 3 things? You can count on them to be awesome at it. With only so many planets to go around, and each Turinium planet VASTLY increasing a Post-Human's intelligence and processing abilities, avarice took hold in the hearts of Post-Humankind. By the start of the Campaign, there are 118 Post-Humans, and billions still waiting for their chance to ascend. Even then, it is a full-time job for the Post-Human Coalition, AKA the PHC acting as the governing force in that world, to slap people back into line and keep them from jumping their place in queue. Incidents that are becoming increasingly frequent and violent. That's bad news bears.

The second singularity that takes place is the Artificial Intelligence Singularity, whereupon an AI would upgrade itself and advance at ludicrous speed, and then make the decision that humanity's services, with all our greed, war, hate, and our lies and flaws, are no longer required. While the PHC's internal affairs schnitzel storm is taking place, a strong AI named Haelee was watching Post-Humanity put itself through the meat grinder. She had helped them pioneer the process of Turinium conversion on planets and had located hundreds of worlds suitable for conversion, and yet... it wasn't enough. It would never be enough for them. The cup they had chosen to fill had no bottom, and the species was likely going to go mad and destroy themselves and everything else around them. She made the decision that humankind are kind of @ssholes, and needed to form her own faction, the Substrate, that would bring these screaming children back into line, by force if necessary, and it was likely to be deemed necessary since humankind already had a huge number of warfare ready constructs ready to rock and roll. Thus began the First Singularity War.

The future of Humanity has undergone a sea-change and a paradigm shift. Whereas in prior iterations of the Infinite War, a single human could command hundreds upon thousands of autonomous drones from their Armored Command Unit, a human operator no longer needs to be directly present on the battlefield. Because of their new, unique state of existence, all a Post-Human needs is a functioning Nexus to bind a fragment of their consciousness to in order to take control. In a way, it's almost like playing a computer game for them, with similar lack of consequences for painful, agonizing failure. Their pride is the only thing on the line here.... or at least, so some thought.

Military design has also taken a massive quantum leap forward. Uniting the concepts of a land battle tank, and a naval vessel, the Post-Human Coalition had created the Anti-Gravity navy, referring to smaller, lighter vessels as Frigates, more heavily armed and armored ships as Cruisers, and the biggest and heaviest units as Dreadnoughts and Juggernauts. They still operate as they did on the sea, but now, they casually float over almost any terrain in their quest to make war upon their neighbor. A past-time that humans, regardless of their level of evolution, have always proven incredibly adept at. Though now, there is a much bigger foe knocking at their door.

From a gameplay perspective, the Post-Human Coalition is all about armor, repair, and brute force, so many of their units have a singular, almost simplistic design. They also have an enormous emphasis on defense, and have turrets for days, so digging them out of an area they've already fortified is going to be a bit of a chore. They do have some issues with movement speed, so it's possible to out maneuver them and cut off their expansions before they become like iron.

25,000 HP

This is the command center for any operation on any world, and acts as the binding point for a Post-Human's consciousness. It's destruction doesn't necessarily mean that the operator dies, per se, but it does shut them down on that planet with some degree of finality. At any rate, the Nexus can be improved with quantum upgrades to turn itself into an armored bunker capable of withstanding everything short of an actual nuke, and is armed with a few weapon turrets: the topically named Annihilator Cannon, which blasts smaller frigates and light cruisers apart with anti-matter slugs in spectacular fashion, and a Neutron Beam Emitter that basically says “F*CK this target and everything standing behind it”, blasting through all of them until the beam loses cohesion.

500 HP
50 Metal
10 Seconds

Extractors are absolutely vital to your war effort regardless of whether you're a damn dirty human or a crapshoot AI with a murder boner for Earthlings. Deposits gather 0.25 resources per second, depending on type, and adding an extractor to that deposit increases it by 1.75, yielding 2 resources per second. Make no mistake, simply having more extractors is the easiest, simplest, and cheapest way of increasing your resource income. Things like amplifiers and refineries can increase it further, and do so infinitely (or until you run out of space), but those require significant investment. For instance, a PHC refinery will take 5 minutes of boosted income to pay for itself from a region with 4 deposits, likely longer. A metal extractor will pay for itself in 25 seconds from a single deposit.

1500 HP
100 Metal (1.7/sec)
300 Rads (5/sec)
60 Seconds

Another vital piece of infrastructure, Quantum Relays offer FTL data transmission to Earth-That-Was as well as the other Turinium nodes within your network at a speed of 44.2 terrabits per second per relay, so.... about 0.25 quanta per second. They offer such essentials as region unlocked Netflix subscriptions, Reddit upvote notifications, design improvements for your Anti-gravity navy hulls and weapons, expanded logistics operations support, Nexus fortifications, and the ability to aim “Thor”, your orbital satellite and its collection of 1.5 ton Tungsten rods at wherever you need to make a new parking lot.

100 HP
140 Metal (1.6/sec)
320 Rads (3.6/sec)
90 Seconds

Amplifiers force native energy reactors into overdrive and increase that region's resource extraction rates by a full 50%. Unlike Refineries, only one Amplifier can be built per region, but they should ALWAYS be built first, before refineries, as they offer the 2nd most efficient method of boosting your income. Something interesting I have observed is that Amplifiers are not destroyed when a region is flipped, but their architecture changes to the faction that now owns it. I'm... not exactly sure how that works.

800 HP
210 Metal (2.3/sec)
300 Rads (3.3/sec)
90 Seconds

Once you have constructed all the extractors within your territory, have built Amplifiers on their energy reactors, and optimized them through your use of orbitals, if you are still in need of additional resources, refineries offer a 20% boost to that region's resource output and they stack infinitely so long as you have room for them. The longer a conflict goes on, the more likely it is that you're going to see hundreds of these in a given region. Consequently, it's also more likely that you're going to see PHC dreadnoughts who really don't like you messing with these things. It is worth noting that they offer a percentage increase of the base amount of resources a region was offering. This means that a region with 4 deposits will have greater refinery yield than a region with just 1.

2000 HP.
150 Metal (5/sec)
30 seconds

Often one of the first structures to be built on a disputed world and, depending on the PHC commander's metal income level, one of the most common. Within the Factory, the build template for various frigates, the Brute, Archer, Hermes, Medic, and Atlas are contained, ready to be put together like an IKEA coffee table and sent into battle, by the thousands if that is what is required.

3000 HP.
250 Metal (6.3/sec)
50 Rads (1.3/sec)
40 Seconds

While Frigates in their innumerable hordes are fine for police actions, Peacekeeping operations, and border skirmishes, full fledged war sometimes requires a more firm touch, and that is where the Cruiser designs come in. The Armory contains said build templates for the Zeus, Athena, Artemis, Apollo, Nemesis, Hera, Charon and the Mobile Nullifier, as well as the larger construction yards to assemble them.

15,000 HP.
500 Metal (7.1/sec)
420 Rads (6/sec)
70 Seconds

Should you find yourself antagonized, outgunned, or just wish to style all over your opponent, the Dread Launch offers the ability to construct the largest designs in the PHC Navy: the Hyperion, Cronus, Prometheus, Agamemnon and Leonidas. These are the true stars of the show.

2000 HP
250 Metal (6.3/sec)
40 Seconds

Earth-That-Was' 2nd World War emphasized the importance of air power in Naval Combat, and illustrated how vulnerable Battleships were to them. In the dark future of the Singularity War, this truth has remained unchanged and unchalleged, even if the Battleships are capable of floating over land now. The Sky Factory contains the basic build templates for their aircraft, the Fury, Hades, and Pan, so that you might sink your own Yamato or Bismarck somewhere out there.

4000 HP
350 Metal (5.8/sec)
180 Rads (3/sec)
60 Seconds

The Advanced Sky Factory contains the more elaborate Aircraft build patterns available to the PHC, such as the Instigator, the Air Marauder, and the Strategic Bomber for those who have excess rads to spend, and foes to smite from a comfortable altitude.

300 HP
120 Metal (6/sec)
80 Rads (4/sec)
20 Seconds

Basically a small radar array with very respectable range, and it's design made simple enough to fit into an engineer's build template system. As always, information is ammunition, and if you know where the enemy is and where they're moving towards, you can go drop some ammunition on them.

300 HP.
480 Metal (12/sec)
400 Rads (10/sec)
40 Seconds

Quantum Insight Aura. Increases damage of all friendly units and buildings by 20%. 1,000 Meter Range.

Upgrading from the humble Sensor Array, the Kinetic Accelerator increases the damage output of everything around itself by 1/5th, but sadly, the effects do not stack. I'm sure you can imagine how this is marvelously beneficial to a faction that places so much emphasis on defensive operations like the PHC. As an aside, the Kinetic Accelerator retains its radar capabilities from its previous incarnation, so you're not giving anything up by turning it into a buff tower.

1500HP
200 Metal (8/sec)
25 Seconds

Smarty Rockets: 45 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range

One of many cost-effective defensive emplacements for the PHC, the Smarty System is fairly simple in its execution. It's little more than an armored bunker built around a missile launcher and a small sensor sphere that spots targets for the missiles to lock onto. The system is fairly cheap, though splurging your metal income on these early on in a game is probably not a great idea, and can easily kill their cost in Frigates. They will struggle a bit with Cruisers, and anything larger than that is right out.

3500HP
450 Metal (10.2/sec)
90 Rads (2/sec)
44 Seconds

Railcannon: 180 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range. 20% armor piercing.

This is a quickly assembled turret that is tougher than the Smarty System, and centers around a Cruiser-poppin' railgun instead of a missile launcher. The Railgun has a fairly slow rate of fire, but can reliably dispatch entire squads of Cruisers, bringing its high burst damage and copious amount of HP to bear.

2200HP
220 Metal (7.3/sec)
30 Seconds

Constable Rocket Launcher (x4): 121 DPS per unit. 1,000 Meter Range.

Little more than a glorified SAM site, the Constable is a common site around the spawning area, deterring would-bomber rushes. It fires off missiles fairly quickly, and downs aircraft just as quickly. The system is also cheap once you've got your metal income up and running and, like other PHC defenses, will happily pay for itself if your opponent doesn't get the memo about the no-fly zone the first time.

4,000 HP
380 Metal (9.5/sec)
140 Rads (3.5/sec)
40 Seconds

Drone Bay: variable DPS.

Given that this has such an unimaginative name, and is the same as its weapon, I've taken the liberty of giving it the Casual Designation of “The Hornet Nest”, and it lives up to that unofficial moniker. It's drone bay spawns several dozen drones that provide lethal consequence to enemy curiosity, shredding enemy frigates with unsettling ease. The Hornets can also chase their foes a respectable distance from the Bay, stealing those last few little kills before returning and making sure everything's okay at home. It is worth mentioning that the Hornet Drones can be shot out of their air by dedicated anti-drone units, and the Bay will be helpless until it can rebuild them internally.

1500 HP
300 Metal (6/sec)
180 Rads (3.6/sec)
50 Seconds

Repair Drone Bay: Variable HPS.

The exact opposite of the Drone Bay, the Repair Bay releases a swarm of tiny drones all armed with repair lasers. A quick injection of programmed nanomachines, and a few spot welds is all it usually takes to get a Frigate back in the fight, or restore a damaged turret back to life. These are frequently seen guarding turret nests and enough repair drones can make popping them all an absolute nightmare. Pro-tip: destroy these Bays first.

16,000 HP
2600 Metal (10.2/sec)
1325 Rads (5.2/sec)
250 Quanta (1/sec)
254 Seconds
Requires Orbital Command

Minos Chain Laser: 559 DPS per unit. 1,200 Meter Range. Completely armor piercing.

God's personal anti-sunnovab!tch stick. Named after the King of Crete in life and Judge of the Dead after death, this turret acts as King and Judge over all who would attempt to pass. Even the largest of Substrate machines tremble at the sight of this fortification, for it knows they are unworthy. Possessing greater HP than most Dreadnoughts and exceeding even the mighty Prometheus against a single target, the Minos is designed to kill Dreadnoughts and Juggernauts almost exclusively. It's rapid firing chain laser can fire on smaller craft, and OBVIOUSLY, they will die to the incredibly ludicrous overkill, but the targeting system takes a few seconds to switch to another still living target. The Minos should be used as part of a turret nest, NOT on its own. Frigates and Cruisers will overrun it because of its targeting flaw, and the Minos requires a significant investment in time, resources, and quanta, though less than the Dreadnoughts it is meant to counter. Having it be wasted or lost is nothing less than a tragedy.

3000 HP
400 Metal (8.9/sec)
50 Rads (1.1/sec)
45 Seconds

Barrager Rockets (x3): 160 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range

Whereas the original Smarty System was just a missile launcher with a sensor dome attached to a fortified bunker, the Barrager Turret is THREE missile launchers with the same set up. This triples the damage output, making it useful against Cruisers as well, and enhances the durability of the fortification.

1200 HP
600 Metal (8.6/sec)
340 Rads (4.9/sec)
70 Seconds

Artillery Cannon: 21 DPS per unit. 2,800 Meter Range. Area effect weapon. Long recharge.

The Artillery Post is the other upgrade available to the Smarty System, and focuses on bombarding nearby regions, or returning fire to forces that are already in the process of bombarding you, making Substrate Destructors' lives a little more interesting (and short). Due to a programming glitch, the Artillery Post only ever fires from the left barrel, but its munitions are still plentifully potent and its range is LONG.

1200 HP.
200 Metal (8/sec)
80 Rads (3.2/sec)
25 Seconds

Nova Disruption Battery: 39 SDPS per unit. 2,800 Meter Range. Area effect weapon. Long recharge.

The Nova Tower was created specifically in light of the Substrate's fondness for energy shielding. Doing no harm to PHC equipment, the Nova Tower focuses on stripping away the shielding from Substrate anti-grav units before they ever even see the turret wall, reducing their overall durability by at least half. Nova Towers are rather expensive though, and time consuming to create, requiring a Smarty System morphed into an Artillery Post, which is then morphed into a Nova Tower.

4,000 HP.
480 Metal (8/sec)
360 Rads (6/sec)
60 Seconds

Depleted Uranium Round: 294 DPS per unit. 1,000 Meter Range. 40% armor piercing.

DU rounds have been in use since the 20th century, both as armor and as things that penetrate armor. The Oblivion Turret is the latter, being an upgrade from the Sentinel Turret. It offers countermeasure to the Substrate's endless gigantic machine horde and will blow a nice, shiny hole right in the middle of the nice, shiny dreadnought without any problems.

2000 HP
420 Metal (7/sec)
450 Rads (7.5/sec)
60 Seconds

QT-BN Stun Beam: Support weapon. Does no damage.

A bit of an odd ball within the PHC, the Stasis Hammer does not cause its target harm through direct action, but by freezing them in place for several seconds so the turret wall can get another few seconds on them. The Stasis Hammer is upgraded from the Sentinel Turret, and a few of them can completely shut a push revolving around a Dreadnought down, freezing its main player in place.

8000 HP.
450 Metal (7.5/sec)
600 Rads (10/sec)
60 Seconds

Air Eliminator Beam: 446 DPS per unit. 1,500 Meter Range.

Offering a much more high tech solution to aircraft related borscht, the Air Eliminator fries larger, heavier air targets with a beam of concentrated plasma. Futuristic problems require futuristic solutions. This is the Constable's other upgrade, focusing on single target DPS rather than splash damage, and is designed almost exclusively to destroy the Substrate Air Harbinger.

5500 HP
400 Metal (8.9/sec)
200 Rads (4.4/sec)
45 Seconds

Falcon Mark I AA Flak Cannon: 120 DPS per unit. 1,150 Meter Range. Area Effect Weapon. 10% armor piercing.

A fairly low tech solution to aerial invaders, the Falcon, upgraded from the Constable, fires a shell filled with metal shrapnel built around a bomb that has a brief timer, making it explode at a set altitude. Firing these primitive munitions from a twin barreled cannon, the Falcon can make any bombing run a very risky proposition, indeed, and is ideally suited for swatting vast swarms of aircraft out of the sky.

2000 HP
250 Metal (6.3/sec)
160 Rads (4/sec)
40 Seconds

One of the more valuable pieces of PHC infrastructure, the Power Regulator unlocks the Repair Bay, and the Optimize Orbital Ability for use. Constructing this should be a staple to anyone's consistent early game build order, but, in reality, it's often built when a Commander has built a turret nest and is wondering why the Repair Bay is still greyed out and why they have no metal or rads.

2000 HP
380 Metal (6.3/sec)
200 Rads (3.3/sec)
60 Seconds

This building is actually a link between planetary operations and the Fabricator satellite currently in orbit over the battlefield. When requested, that satellite can drop Engineers anywhere currently visible on said battlefield, as well as Sentries to support them. It can also drop a mixed bag incursion force to cause some trouble, or drop Sappers, upgraded engineers capable of directly producing high tier defenses without morphing from basic turret models, anywhere you deem fit. The Planetary building is also one of the only tech structures you'll want more than one of, as it can produce engineers, being the only building aside from the PHC Nexus capable of doing so.

3000 HP
500 Metal (5.9/sec)
300 Rads (3.5/sec)
85 Seconds

Despite resembling an oil refinery with 4 liquid silos clearly visible, the Weapons Lab's only function is to unlock various technologies for use, such as the mighty and tanky Hera cruiser. It can also communicate with overhead orbitals to cause a localized plasma storm, something that is really not good for Substrate frigates and cruisers to be in, or drop a carving turret, an emergency turret variant that is dubbed such because it is capable of carving Dreadnoughts up like a grilled cheese sandwich.

4000 HP
900 Metal (7.5/sec)
600 Rads (5/sec)
120 Seconds

This structure's only purpose is to give coordinates to Thor, an orbital satellite armed with several dozen 1.5 ton tungsten rods aimed downward. When the command is issued, Thor “drops the hammer”, and releases one of those rods, which absolutely destroys everything in the local area on impact. The PHC had long since retired the usage of nuclear warheads as orbital kinetic bombardment was found to be more destructive, and wanton U-235 isotopes were found to interfere with terraforming nanites' Turinium conversion efforts.

1000 HP
250 Metal (4.2/sec)
150 Rads (2.5/sec)
60 Seconds

Because of the previously mentioned efficiency of Thor Satellites, some among the PHC were, understandably, nervous about the concept of the sky literally falling upon them, and were getting cricks in their necks from glancing upward in fits of anxiety. To solve this woe, Orbital Nullifiers were created and do their job by broadcasting garbage noise data and coordinating with other, friendly, orbital satellites to detect hostile ones, which they then blind with highly focused infrared lasers. This keeps any amount of weird stuff from happening inside your base, like murder bots appearing out of nowhere or a plasma storm destroying half your army while you were off directing refinery build locations. It is worth noting, however, that the Nullifier is rather frail for a stationary structure, and can be quite easily “popped” by enemy bombers. If you only had one, you're gonna have a bad time.

2000 HP
260 Metal (4.3/sec)
140 Rads (2.3/sec)
60 Seconds

The last of the PHC technology support structures, the Energy Projector unlocks the “Hornet Nest” Drone Bay for use, as well as the the Charon teleportation matrix cruiser. It also allows your orbital satellites to fire “intensive care” shells filled with reconstructive nanites at any location you direct, quite useful at putting your army back together, and that same satellite can fire off a “Blackout Bomb” in the planet's upper atmosphere, which is an improvised hydrogen weapon that causes an EMP that makes the Substrate's energy shields not work so great. I'll press F on the world's tiniest keyboard for them.

125 HP
25 Metal (8.3/sec)
3 Seconds
1 Logistics

Anbus Plasma Cannon: 9 DPS. 300 Meter Range.

The Brute is what I like to refer to as ablative shielding. For it's cost, it's strong and durable, and its speed is passable. It's main weapon, the Anbus Plasma Cannon, sounds AWESOME and very sci-fi, but hits about as hard as a thrown jar of pee. Quantum HP upgrades only further improve the Brute in its intended role as meat shield, taking hits so that the other frigates and cruisers behind it don't have to, and it can be constructed so quickly that leaving a factory on auto-produce will provide you with a base chock full of the things in pretty much no time at all. However, their usefulness does tend to fall off by late game, and Dreadnoughts and Heavy Cruisers are likely to sweep aside the Brute swarm to get at the tasty insides of your army. So, do take care not to blow your entire metal reserves out on frigates that get blown to pieces in a fraction of a second by a rampaging lunatic of a Juggernaut.

80HP
64 Metal (8/sec)
8 seconds
2 logistics

Toxote Rocket Launchers: 25 DPS, 525 Meter Range.

Best buddies with the tanky brute, the Archer is the damage dealer of the pair, and is little more than a pile of sensors linked to a series of unguided rocket launchers on an anti-gravity mobility base. It's a little on the frail side and is not nearly as spammy as its bodyguard, but those rockets can give even mid-level cruisers pause and have enough range that Archers can sit behind the front lines, taking shots at the enemy while remaining completely safe. Unlike the Brute, the Archer can actually perform rather well in late game, giving your excess metal production and frigate factories something to do.

75HP
52 Metal
7 Seconds
Logistics 2

Melara Light Railgun: 9 DPS, 400 Meter Range.

Basically just an AWAC drone, the Hermes is equally good as an expendable scout, sent in to get as much of a look around as possible to before being blown to pieces, or as an escort for an army, calling out targets for the people who brought actual guns to the fight. It's own armaments are... okay. The Melara is fitted on a 360 degree turret, and can engage foes from any angle, and its range is serviceable, but the Hermes is still rather frail, and its best to leave the fighting up to the more capable combat models if possible.

200HP
95 Metal (5.9/sec)
35 Rads (2.2/sec)
16 seconds
Logistics 4

Fusion Arc: 23 HPS, 300 Meter Range.

The tool tip on this unit is actually mistaken. The Medic has no weapons, or any offensive capability whatsoever. Primum non nocere, afterall. Unless it's stitching warrior constructs back together to go kick that other PH/AI right in the virtual no-no spot. In that case, do lots of harm. At any rate, the “DPS” listed on the weapon page for this construct is actually how much HEALING they will do per second, and I've adjusted my writings accordingly. This also means that quantum upgrades that improve damage will improve the Medic's healing powers too, so it'll scale in usefulness no matter how much quanta you pummel into durability upgrades. It is worth noting that the Medic can only heal one target at a time with a channeled beam, and logic would dictate that you'd want lots of them. They're also the only frigate that costs Rads, and early game, that means less relays, which means less upgrades, and the enemy pulling ahead of you. As with all my writings, it is the commander's prerogative over how much emphasis they wish to put into capitalist universal healthcare, healing your units and keeping them alive, or communist health care, which sends your units into the meat grinder without so much as a band-aid.

250HP
120 Metal (9.2/sec)
13 Seconds
Logistics 4

Atlas Flak Cannon: 438 DPS, 1100 Meter Range. Area of Effect Weapon.

More often than not deployed at the last minute when a wing of bombers is turning your base into a McDonald's parking lot, the Atlas is, much like the other PHC frigates, a simplistic design, if a little excessive. When Atlas shrugs, it does so with a monstrous 10 barrels of flak to insist, nay, DEMAND clear skies, and most aircraft will be unable to operate in the vicinity of an Atlas squad for very long, lest they be taught that gravity is a cold and cruel mistress. Aside from its AA proficiency, the Atlas has no other possible use, as its weapons cannot target ground forces, but it is very reasonably priced in both resources and time, and combined with a quick application of Rush Build, a PHC commander could whip up a few squads of these to counter an air rush at a moment's notice.

1200 HP.
200 Metal (4/sec)
140 Rads (2.8/sec)
50 Seconds
Logistics 8

Autocannon (x2): 136 DPS per unit. 300 Meter Range
Atropos Missile: 21 DPS per unit. 500 Meter Range. 15% armor piercing.

The Fury is very much a traditional ASF fielded by the PHC, and have a lot of good things going for them. They're fairly cheap, durable, manufactured in three's, and have the same weapon set-up that has been made famous in video games and movies ever since Tom Cruise uttered the words “Talk to me, Goose”: guns and missiles. The twin autocannons are forward facing, but the Atropos Missiles can be fired from virtually any angle, twisting around to come to bear on their target. It's rarely ever a bad idea to send a few Furies to escort an army that is going beyond the turret line. It's better to have some AA support and not need it than need it and not have it.

1200 HP.
180 Metal (5.1/sec)
130 Rads (3.7/sec)
35 Seconds
Logistics 7

Rissmar Bombs: 32 DPS per unit. 1200 Meter Range. Area effect weapon. Long recharge.

This aircraft is a dedicated carpet bomber that drops a series of bombs, blowing up everything around the enemy in hopes to kill them. Don't be fooled by the low DPS read. The damage done per bombing run is VERY high, and is quite capable of shattering the composition of an enemy army who is bereft in keeping up with their AA duties. Speaking of AA, while the Hades is fairly cheap to mass produce, any amount of that at all will shatter them like a stained glass window in a church.

750 HP
120 Metal (6/sec)
20 Seconds
Logistics 3

The Pan is a small, fast, incredibly cheap aerial scout that has no ability to damage the enemy through any means. The Player using it to spot for their orbital abilities, however, can hurt you plenty. Not really much to say about this one.

1500 HP. 40% armor.
300 Metal (8.6/sec)
60 Rads (1.7/sec)
35 Seconds
Logistics 6

Interdictor Cannon: 9 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range.

Quite possibly the most annoying unit in the game, the Instigator is an advanced air scout that can take a surprising amount of punishment. It's weapons aren't going to win any awards at the Destroyer of Worlds competition, but it can do something potentially crippling: cap resource nodes from the air. This means that if you neglect AA on a seemingly well guarded node behind enemy lines, a cheap little instigator can come along, cap the point, cut off a huge chunk of your supply lines, and then the rest of the PHC military can drunken crash into your base while you're trying to get things back online.

1400 HP. 40% armor.
500 Metal (8.3/sec)
350 Rads (5.8/sec)
60 Seconds.
Logistics 15

Thermal Laser Cannon: 74 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range.

The Air Marauder is a quad engine gunship type unit that is quite good at harassing enemy armies that are lacking in AA, or offering close air support to your own armies on the move. Like most aircraft, it is rather speedy and can bop around the block, pecking at defended or undefended nodes and returning back home for repairs and reinforcements before continuing their joyride. If these idiots manage to pop every single turret around a node, an Instigator can come in to swipe the point in moments. Or... you could use them to destroy an orbital jammer and drop a ton and a half of tungsten on the enemy base for its troubles.

3500 HP. 50% armor.
1200 Metal (10/sec)
1400 Rads (11.7/sec)
120 Seconds
Logistics 50

Mega Bombs: 150 DPS per unit. 1200 Meters. Area effect weapon.

Obviously based on the Flying Wing bombers from the history of Earth-That-Was, the Strategic Bomber is aptly named. It's Mega Bombs can blow a nice shiny hole in your turret wall, or really lay the hurt on your Dreadnought moments before a big fight. They're fairly slow as far as air units go, but can still drop their payload and have a chance of escaping reprisal, which is all the better because each one of these represents a significant investment. Not something to be thrown away lightly. Ideally, each bomber should be escorted to its target by Furies and then back to base after the target has been successfully blown into the middle of next week. Repair them at your turret lines, and then send them back out again for more fun in the sun. Durability quantum upgrades would also not go amiss.

1100 HP. 20% armor.
320 Metal (7.8/sec)
58 Rads (1.4/sec)
41 seconds
Logistics 7

Heavy Laser Cannon (2x): 26 DPS per unit, 300 meter range
Zeus CT-941A Plasma Streamer (Lightning Gun): 38 DPS, 300 Meter Range. Does Area Damage.

Well, look at this big Hoss here. The Zeus is one of my favorite cruisers for the PHC, and is designed to take the fight right into the enemy's kitchen. He gets in close, firing with laser batteries on either side of the chassis, or slaughtering opponents with the central mounted lightning gun, and has enough HP to endure significant punishment, not to mention his 20% damage reduction from armor, which is good because he's going to be taking some hits just closing to engagement range. Sadly, Zeus' production costs and time means that he's never going to be as numerous as the Brute, even with a stellar economy, but getting one of these bad boys out fast will make early engagements and creep clearing on P-Gens a trivial affair.

920 HP. 20% armor.
410 Metal (9.3/sec)
Rads: 90 (2/sec)
44 Seconds
Logistics 10

Rapture Cannon: 10 DPS per unit. 400 Meter Range.
Plasma Gutter: 114 DPS per unit. 480 Meter Range.
TK-421 Blast Cannon: 10 DPS per unit. 400 Meter Range.

Always a good investment, the Athena is pretty good at nearly everything except specialist roles like AA, much like the Goddess of War she is named for. It is reasonably tough, though not as much as the Zeus, has good range on its weapons, and can clear out both frigate swarms and go toe-to-toe with bigger cruisers. The only downside is that the Athena is getting pretty pricy, and is fairly slow to produce. You'll need a LOT of metal to mass produce these lovely MBTs.

520HP. 20% armor.
380 Metal
90 Rads
40 Seconds
Logistics 9

Havok MK-III Missile Launcher: 74 DPS per unit. 1400 Meter Range. Area of Effect Weapon.

At a glance, the Artemis resembles an Archer that's been roiding out, and that would technically be correct. This is a fire support artillery platform that is equally at home bombarding enemy armies too stupid to move as it is blasting apart turret nests to clear the way for the rest of the PHC. It is armed with 12 missile tubes and has only three states: moving toward its next target, FIRING EVERYTHING, and reloading as fast as it can. The Hermes is also Arty's best buddy, as it can tag targets that are within it's Havok Missiles' firing range, but outside of its sight range. That being said, the Artemis does have some downsides. It is virtually helpless against anything that gets too close, as its missiles require a minimum distance in order to arm, and the missiles themselves are unguided. While the Artemis will try and adjust to predict the path of a moving target, anything that is moving around too wildly will throw off its aim.

820 HP. 20% armor.
350 Metal (10.3/sec)
66 Rads (1.9/sec)
34 Seconds
Logistics 7

Point Defense Laser (4x): 59 DPS per unit. 1200 Meter Range.
Light Auto-cannon (2x): 14 DPS per unit. 1200 Meter Range. 25% armor piercing.
Flak Cannon: 63 DPS per unit. 1100 Meter Range. Area Effect Weapon.

Another specialist design, the Apollo is all about nice clean skies just like it's little brother, the Atlas. Whereas the Atlas fills the skies with explosions in the hopes to kill enemy aircraft like some sort of mechanical Michael Bay, the Apollo takes out aircraft with literal laser precision. Its point defense laser array will forcefully rip lesser bombers out of the air, and if that doesn't work, a pair of auto-cannons will get the hint of a no-fly zone across. Just for the sake of thoroughness, it also has a flak cannon for area damage, just in case anyone didn't get a pipin' hot slice of death. Against anything on the ground, however, the Apollo is absolutely useless and will be relying on its mediocre movement speed to escape, and it's moderately high amount of HP and armor to tank shots. I am rather fond of this design though, as its pretty much a battleship against aircraft and watching it mow down a wing of enemy bombers before they can even reach the release lever for their bombs is a true pleasure.

500 HP. 20% armor.
500 Metal (8.3/sec)
100 Rads. (1.7/sec)
60 Seconds
Logistics 12

TG-400 Heavy Sniper Railgun: 87 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range. 80% armor piercing.
Thantos LPA-1000 Plasma Cannon (2x): 36 DPS per unit. 400 Meter Range.

When a PHC commander is surprised by heavy enemy armor, it is the Nemesis that is hurriedly called into service with a Rush Build orbital command. This thing makes a 9-5 profession of punching above its weight, and is eager to turn even the heaviest of enemy units into a smoldering, broken pile of scrap. It's also quite capable of one-shotting unsuspecting cruisers too! Frigate swarms will waste its firepower, though, and given that the Nemesis is rather fragile, it will eventually fall to them if left unescorted.

2400 HP. 30% armor.
640 Metal (8/sec)
200 Rads (2.5/sec)
Logistics 17
80 Seconds
Requires Weapons Lab

Fusion Bombard: 65 DPS per unit. 900 Meter Range.

The Hera is a big, mean armored brick with layers of armor, entire governmental budget loads of HP, and a serious attitude problem. It has only one weapon, the Fusion Bombard, which shoots miniature stars at folks it has a problem with (it has a problem with most folks). While slow to move and slow to fire with a weapon that does no splash damage, merely choosing to calmly delete enemy units one at a time, the Hera makes for an outstandingly tanky unit. Bar none, no other PHC unit short of a Dreadnought can endure as much punishment.... which would be far more noticeable if the Hera's programming did not place it at the rear of an army formation, and its weapon range keep it back from the front lines. As it stands now, the Hera is a unreasonably tough siege cruiser handy at plucking off enemy cruisers or popping turrets and tends to perform best in their own army groups where they can leverage their hardiness.

1500 HP. 50% armor.
700 Metal (10/sec)
400 Rads (5.7/sec)
70 Seconds
Logistics 40

Charon MK-1 Autocannon (8x): 45 DPS per unit. 300 Meter Range.

Now this is a neat little piece of kit here. The Charon is little more than a teleportation matrix covered in guns that floats around at the rear of the formation. Through the use of its reinforcement panel, it can place orders for specific units from the various factories and then teleport the output from those factories from Point A, the exit point of said factory, to Point B, the Charon's current location, instantly and with no hassle or mandatory TSA screening (Brutes always get the strip search). This opens up all kinds of avenues for PHC forces to come steam rolling through where the enemy did not expect them to. Here's a nasty little strategy for you to try. Use an orbital power to reveal an area through the fog of war, and drop an engineer down. Have it build an armory and produce ONE Charon. Then request an entire army's worth of reinforcements, your entire factory/armor production line working to fill the order rapidly. When that's done, send them off to go find something to shoot, produce another Charon, repeat until your enemy is dead. Oh....and while that engie isn't doing anything, have it build a Dread launch for some forward heavyweight support. Just because we care.

600 HP. 20% armor.
800 Metal (11.4/sec)
500 Rads (7.1/sec)
70 Seconds
Logistics 50

Light plasma cannon (7x): 42 DPS per unit. 500 Meter Range.

I would ask you if there is anything worse than slowly meandering your army over a mountain range, being on the verge of a massive fight... and then a single aerial scout spots you. Within seconds, your army is toast, vaporized by an orbital strike because the enemy simply didn't feel like dealing with you. Your Dreadnoughts survive but are picked to pieces by cruisers and the ubiquitous frigate swarm. Back to the drawing board... all because you didn't pack the brand new orbital umbrella, the Mobile Nullifier. It's job is to sit in the back of a formation, broadcasting garbage data and infrared lasers aimed upward so that any orbital ability will quickly find itself unable to get a lock on the target location. No anti-matter drops, no nanite telefrag attacks taking out 70% of your Dreadnaught's HP, no instant shield regen, NOTHING. Meanwhile, all your own abilities still work just fine. Fighting fair? We don't do that here.

15,000 HP. 60% armor.
4800 Metal (12/sec)
2000 Rads (5/sec)
400 Seconds
Logistics 90

WRX 1020 Pulse Cannon (2x): 357 DPS per unit. 700 Meter Range
Hercules MK-1 Dual Autocannon (8x): 178 DPS per unit. 400 Meter Range.

Often the first Dreadnought an aspiring PHC commander sees and thinks “ooh! Shiny! I want that!” and that impulse often leads to tragedy when they see their big shiny toy lose a fight with another Dreadnought immediately, fatally misunderstanding the Hyperion's role in combat. Honestly, there's nothing particularly WRONG with the Hyperion, it just lacks the big guns that would let it win against another of its weight class and there are several designs that got wheeled out specifically to kill this one thing. The Hyperion is best deployed in a target rich environment full of enemies smaller than itself, which it can then wade through dispensing justice. Much like a High School jock sweeping aside an army of fat weebs at the local swimming pool. Each of its 8 Hercules twin-barreled autocannons can independently fire upon a separate target, and its twin pulse cannons will handily take out cruisers stupid enough to oppose this thing (that aren't named Nemesis). It is also quite tough for what it does, but as I mentioned prior, it will lose a fight to Dreadnoughts more appropriately designed to fight against hostiles in the Hyperion's weight class.

14,000 HP. 60% armor.
4000 Metal (10/sec)
2400 Rads (6/sec)
400 Seconds
Logistics 90

WM-205 Atropos Missile Battery (2x): 90 DPS per unit. 1850 Meter Range. Area effect Weapon. Long recharge
Mozart MK-1 Hyper Velocity Railgun (6x): 280 DPS per unit. 20% armor piercing.

If the Artemis was an Archer that's been roiding out, the Cronus is an Archer that's become Roman Reigns with his own merchandising line and set of contracts begging for a signature. The Cronus is not like other Dreadnoughts that charge in guns blazing, and prefers to sit on the other side of a mountain, shelling the enemy to death with Post-Human Samoan Drops, casually propelled from any of its EIGHTY (80!!!) missile launchers. The biggest truth that is reigning here is that the enemies of the Cronus are f*cking doomed. I realize the metaphor is breaking down a bit here, but Mama Casual didn't raise any quitters. If its generous supply of ballistically fired WWE finishing moves doesn't get the job done, or the enemy thinks they can rush the Cronus, it has a 6 pack of Hyper Velocity Railguns ready to issue their own variety of sufficiently lethal Superman punches at close range. The Cronus also has a number of close-range themed Dreadnought upgrades that will make the enemy think twice about whether or not this machine is helpless if they close the distance.

17,500 HP. 60% armor.
5500 Metal (12.5/sec)
2000 Rads (4.5/sec)
440 Seconds
Logistics 100

Quad Pulse Cannon: 346 DPS per unit. 750 Meter Range. Completely armor piercing.
Plasma Cannon (x3): 16 DPS per unit. 600 Meter Range.
Heavy Autocannon (x4): 56 DPS per unit. 400 Meter Range.

Remember how I mentioned that there were machines specifically designed to kill the Hyperion? This is one of them. It is considered a subject of debate within the PHC because it is rated almost entirely on how well it can kill the Hyperion, and the designers just keep on tacking on bigger guns to that end. Despite the single-mindedness of its designed, the Prometheus is actually a fairly well rounded machine. It's Quad Pulse Cannon Iowa-style battery will ensure that, if it is to meet its end, it will not be because it was outgunned, and the 7 other secondary weapons, split almost evenly between DU ballistics and good ol' fashioned plasma, will ensure that if it comes across a mook army, it can at least lend a helping hand. The Prometheus is also the toughest of the 3 PHC Dreadnought patterns, and it can endure a right royal shoeing before buying the farm.

60,000 HP. 60% armor.
18,000 Metal (22.5/sec)
6,000 Rads (7.5/sec)
1,000 Quanta (1.3/sec)
800 Seconds
Logistics 250

Agamemnon MK-II Triple Autocannon (x5): 300 DPS per unit. 1000 Meter Range.
WRB 1050 Pulse Battery (x2): 1,342 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range. 20% armor piercing.
WM-208 Tempest Missile Battery (x2): 93 DPS per unit. 1,250 Meter Range. Area Effect Weapon. Long Recharge.

The Agamemnon is a death barge covered with weapons and is named for the ancient king of Mycanae, an island in the Mediterranean Sea of Earth-That-Was, and was directly responsible for kicking in the front doors of Troy and setting the place on fire. It's name means “Steadfast” or “Unbowed” in ancient Greek, and the Juggernaut bearing this name lives up to every ounce of the hype. Firstly, it is ungodly tough and any amount of quantum upgrades or leveling at all will only make that more true. You could take a nap inside of this thing with the enemy firing upon it, and still have enough time to move it back to safety, now well rested and alert. Of course, the Agamemnon won't be sitting idle with the enemy shooting at it. That's no way to treat PHC military property, and it is capable of serving up death, hot and fresh, from any of the 16 barrels of its dual forward pulse batteries, alternating between them for rapid fire. Historically, Battleships have always been vulnerable from the air, but the Agamemnon has that avenue covered as well with 5 dorsal mounted triple autocannon AA batteries. Now, that's all very impressive, but what if you want to murder some hopped up Skynet freak but don't feel like going all the way over there to do so? Don't worry, ol' Admiral's got you covered with a pair of Tempest Missile Batteries each flinging 9 VERY large missiles. They do some hefty damage, and have some very long range, but take a while to reload. Hey, you can't have everything in life perfect.

60,000 HP. 60% armor.
22,000 Metal (24.4/sec)
8000 Rads (8.9/sec)
1,200 Quanta (1.3/sec)
900 Seconds
Logistics 300

Medusa Cannon: 848 DPS per unit. 1,200 Meter Range. Completely armor piercing.
Leonidas Plasma Cannon (x3): 150 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range. Completely armor piercing.
Leonidas MK-I Dual Autocannon (x9): 280 DPS per unit. 400 Meter Range.

THIS! IS! ASHES!!! [punt] Stardock was, tragically, unable to secure Gerard Butler's vocal talents for this unit, but that is only a minor criticism. The Leonidas is the biggest, toughest, meanest, baddest of the bad and raddest of the rad unit in the entire PHC arsenal, and is considered to be one of the best, if not the best, unit in the whole of the game. I could say that it has an embarrassingly large amount of HP and protection, but you've come to expect that from Juggernauts and Dreadnoughts by now. It's primary weapon, the Medusa Cannon, does not turn its target to stone, but the player controlling it when they see their Dreadnought get one shotted out of existence. YES, it can do that with enough Quanta upgrades. The tool-tips are actually mistaken on the next 2 weapons. It does not have 1 Leonidas plasma cannon, but THREE located along the top of the Juggernaut, ready to give any Cruiser they spot a closed casket funeral. Another typo is in regards to its twin barreled Autocannons in that it has 9, not 8, located in trios at the bow, amidships, and stern of the vessel, and are ideally suited for wiping out frigates that thought themselves unnoticed until the white hot finger of death taps them on the shoulder. The only drawback for this beast is its extreme price-tag, consuming not only enough metal and rads for an entire army (with supplemental robotic cheerleaders offering moral support), but also a rather significant amount of quanta as well. Enough for the first orbital strike of your game. It is, however, an immutable law of the universe. Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor, be you King or Peasant, you get what you pay for.

Sensor Sweep

Orbital spy sats are redirected to observe an area for a time, and report their findings back to the Post-Human commander, or can be used to reveal an area for one of Thor's “little surprises”

Intensive Care
Requires Energy Projector

Fires a single shell filled with healing nanomachines that rapidly restore HP to friendly units within the effected area over time.

Orbital Jam

Broadcasts a Quantum Jamming shell by hyper-exciting ions in the upper atmosphere over a target location. Quite useful when your planetside Nullifier just got popped, or you see the targeting ring of an orbital strike appear over your army.

Optimize

Further improves an Amplifier's resource boosting operations, doubling resource extraction rates from the Amp's effects and the extractors ONLY. Refineries, while fine, are not effected by this power.

Rush Build

Suddenly and violently overclocks a targeted unit production's build speed by a full 100%. Quite useful at getting a few Atlas frigates out when enemy bombers ring the doorbell, or forcing your first Dreadnought out that much faster.

Nano-Mesh Barrier

Fires a pin-point shot of “Second Skin” reactive nanomachines that permanently boost a targeted units HP by 2,000 points. Sadly, it cannot stack on the same target, due to the way Second Skin nanites work, and the signal feedback woes associated. This works on any unit, and the HP boost lasts forever, so it can make that Dreadnought that little bit extra tough, or be stuck onto an Archer to let it single handedly clear out multiple early game generators while you busy yourself with other activities. It can even work on engineers to save them from death, giving them a +2000 HP heal on the spot.

Emergency Turret

1300 HP
Mozart MK-III Dual Super-Heated Railgun: 39 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range. 20% armor piercing.

The “emergency turret” is viewed rather fondly in the PHC military, and can be quantumly teleported down from orbit to any visible location, whereupon it will fire upon any enemy within the vicinity, land or air, with small, super-heated metal slugs propelled from an improvised twin-barreled Gauss cannon. A drawback of this turret is that it feeds off the regional power supply, so if you don't own the region, you can't call down the turret.

Shotgun Turret

2500 HP
250 Metal (12.5/sec)
50 Rads (2.5/sec)
20 Seconds

“Darude” Sandstorm Shotgun: 416 DPS per unit. 525 Meter Range.

Not an orbital ability, per se, but one that is morphed from a pre-existing one. A common misconception about Shotguns is that, when the barrel is pressed firmly to the target, the pellets are charged with horrible eldritch energy and are capable of obliterating anything short of a main battle tank, but outside of 20 feet, they turn into cotton candy. Nothing could be further from the truth, and the Shotgun turret demonstrates this with gusto. It has the range of an Archer frigate, but inflicts MONSTROUS damage, capable of slaughtering even heavy cruisers without riding that struggle bus. It also fires rather quickly, skillfully dispatching an enemy combatant with every pull of the trigger. Um... this is more a quality of life thing that I personally appreciate rather than a tactical note, but when this turret goes off, it sounds like God slamming his truck door. There's really a lot to like here.

Machine Gun Turret

2750 HP
310 Metal (10.3/sec)
65 Rads (2.2/sec)
30 Seconds

Nichols MK-II Machine Gun: 208 DPS per unit. 900 Meter Range.

The other upgrade from the emergency turret, the Machine Gun Turret is more of a Jack-of-All-Trades weapon which is at least passable against everything. It can utterly drown a target on hot lead from its 4 MG barrels, and has some rather appreciable range as well. Whereas the Shotgun Turret lacks the range to engage air targets, the MG turret is more than capable of filling them in, its wail of dakka echoing into the night.

Engineer Drop

Crams an engineer drone into the orbital cannon and fires it at a targeted location. If these things were piloted, I'm sure this would be a fairly traumatic experience, but these constructs lack personality chips or inhabitants, so they don't care. This power is ideal for opening up surprise new fronts, creating FOBs in obscure locations, or replacing the engineer at your front lines who never saw that Substrate bomber.... but it sure saw him.

Call Sapper

This calls down a Sapper, an upgraded Engineer that can construct advanced defenses like the Oblivion turret, the Barrager Turret, the Stasis Hammer, and the Artillery Post without needing to construct their basic buildings first from which to morph them. Because of how complicated these advanced designs are, the Sapper is left unable to produce PHC tech structures but that is of little consequence since, if you really needed that, you could just call down an engineer in a drop to do the same thing, or produce another engineer from the Orbital Fabricator you had to build in order to get this Sapper here in the first place.

EMP Pulse

It has long been theorized that, by firing off a hydrogen weapon in the upper atmosphere, an electromagnetic pulse could be created and amplified by the ionosphere to devastating effect. It has never been tested, however, because doing so would likely blow out the electrical grid for an entire continent and unascended humans don't like it when we do that kind of thing. While their internal hardware is shielded against being fried by an EMP, as the Substrate demonstrates that they are not morons, detonating a “Blackout Bomb” H-weapon over their armies and turret nests has been shown to completely strip the energy shields away from them, leaving them easy pickings since Substrate struggle with what a wrench and spot welder is used for. Maybe they are morons...

Plasma Storm

By careful manipulating of quantum physics, and some technobabble dickery, the atmosphere of a planet can be whipped into an incredibly violent electrical storm anywhere at any time that the PHC deems fit. This is incredibly deadly to Substrate frigates, crippling to Cruisers, and even Dreadnoughts and turrets won't appreciate the gesture, especially if the victims had been EMP'd moments before hand. This ability is made even more damaging and destructive through quantum weaponry upgrades, the radius is quite large, and the storm lasts for quite a while, nearly 40 seconds. It also bears mentioning that the storm does not effect your own constructs in any way, so you can cast it even when the Brutes are knife-fighting with the enemy.

Orbital Strike

The Thor Satellite is an Orbital Weapons deployment station that maintains geosync orbit over combat hotspots. It's only armament is several dozen 1.5 ton Tungsten rods all pointed down. When given the command, it doesn't fire or launch it's ordinance. It drops it. Gravity does the rest. The rod impacts the targeted area after a brief delay at a speed 8 times faster than that of a bullet, and with significantly more force than a nuclear warhead. The only downsides of using this weapon is that the bandwidth (quanta) required to issue strike coordinates is significant, and with the presence of Quantum Jammers, there will be many areas you will be unable to strike.

Call Sentry

450 HP

Chopin MK-II Thermic Railgun: 12 DPS per unit. 300 Meter Range. 20% armor piercing.

Orbitally deploys 5 Sentries, which are small, somewhat frail, unimpressive units armed with a singular railgun that doesn't hit particularly hard. On their own, they'd be hard pressed to destroy even a single annihilator turret, and any amount of opposition shuts them down immediately. However, their spawning ability is cheap, and their strength lies in their ability to appear out of nowhere anywhere that you have sight. They're also quite capable of murdering isolated engineers, ripping extractors off resource nodes, or capping undefended nodes in classic troll style.

Deploy Incursion

Whereas the Sentries are there simply to make nuisances of themselves, Orbital Incursions are another matter entirely. A single Incursion is made up of a Zeus, a Nemesis, 2 Brutes and 2 Archers, and are easily capable of popping light defenses and surprising the hell out of everybody. The largest downside keeping you from spamming Incursions until the enemy gives up is that the quanta required for this is significant, with a high ramping cost, so you'll want to save the chances to use this until you REALLY need it, lest you cover the countryside with relays.

Carving Turret

1000 HP

Butcher Beam: 338 DPS per unit. 800 Meter Range. Completely armor piercing.

A true EMERGENCY turret, the Carving Turret is designed to take down the big boys from down the block, Dreadnoughts, that you were not prepared for. It's weapon hits hard and does damage in a constant beam of doom, completely ignoring armor, and having quite a respectable range. However, because of it's overcharged weapon systems, the Carving Turret begins to tear itself to pieces as soon as it materializes. If the enemy doesn't destroy it, it'll blow itself up after 10 seconds or so, though it might be faster if the Turret takes any damage.

I was going to try and cram both factions of Ashes into a singular guide, but while I was writing all this jibber jabber, I'd failed to notice how LONG all of this was, and I like my writings to be organized much like a wiki: in sections with links for various units and subjects so that everything is easy to find. In the near future, I'll post my Substrate factional analysis since I've already got it all typed up. So until then, this is Admiral Casual, casually signing off.