The counter web

Every weapon in Steel Tide belongs to a weapon class, and each target has an armor class. The armor multiplier matrix gives the damage multiplier for their matchup. Weapon-specific overrides, ranks, research and abilities can change the result. The ground counts as well: a shot fired up a cliff does 25% less. Mountain and City tiles obstruct ground sight; cliffs and elevation do not (Terrain).

The matrix cuts both ways. A weapon made for heavy plate is wasted on soft targets: a Viper's shaped-charge missile does ×1.8 to a Mammoth but only ×0.4 to a Recon Buggy, and a Bison's tank gun does ×0.6 to anything light. Small arms are the mirror image: a machine gun shreds buggies at ×1.5 and only scratches a tank at ×0.4. Bring the wrong class and you pay for it in metal.

Armor classes

Class	Who has it
Light	Engineers, buggies, howitzers, Hornets and landmines
Medium	Light tanks, flak, SAM launchers, tank destroyers, MLRS
Heavy	Battle tanks, heavy tanks and the Salamander
Structure	Most buildings; landmines and water mines use Light and Ship armor respectively
Ship	Surface vessels
Submarine	Submerged vessels (the Barracuda, the Kraken, the Moray), visible only to sonar
Aircraft	Most aircraft; the Hornet uses Light armor

The armor multiplier matrix

A few weapons override single cells (static turrets hit buildings softer than tanks do, the Spectre's cannon trades some anti-light damage for armor penetration); the per-unit table at the bottom of this page shows the result of those overrides.

Who answers what

Threat	Answered by
Light vehicles	Machine guns and autocannons: Recon Buggy, Wolf Light Tank, MG Turret, Gunboat
Medium and heavy armor	Cannons (Bison Battle Tank, Cannon Turret) and guided missiles (Viper Tank Destroyer, Cobra Attack Helicopter)
Fortifications and massed armies	Splash: Thunder Howitzer, Tempest MLRS, Vulture Bomber, Sovereign Battleship
Aircraft	Dedicated anti-air: Flak Track (a light gun against the ground as well), Hawk SAM Launcher, AA Turret and its upgrade the SAM Site, Falcon Fighter, Aegis Frigate; at sea also the secondaries of the Sovereign Battleship and the autocannon of the Gunboat (×0.25)
Helicopters and the Hornet	Everything above, and small arms too, because they fly low: the machine guns and autocannons of the Recon Buggy, the Wolf Light Tank and the Gator Amphibious Combat Vehicle (autocannons at ×0.35), and the roof guns of the Bison Battle Tank and the Mammoth Heavy Tank out to 4.5 tiles, none of which reach jets or bombers
Surface ships	Anti-ship missiles (Missile Boat, Albatross Naval Striker) and torpedoes; an anti-tank missile does only ×0.75 to a hull
Submarines	Sonar platforms only: Aegis Frigate, Cormorant ASW Helicopter and other submarines
Rockets and guided missiles in flight	Point defence: Missile Interrupter at home, Bulwark Mobile Interrupter in the column, never shells
Stealth aircraft	Anti-air standing within 4 tiles of what it protects (Flak Track, Gatling Turret), a Falcon Fighter over it, and the 8-tile bubble of a Radar Station

Two rules matter more than any multiplier:

• Targeting is absolute. A weapon that cannot target a domain does no damage at all. A Bison's cannon cannot shoot a helicopter (only its roof gun can), a Falcon cannot shoot a tank, and a submerged submarine requires sonar to be seen, from a ship or a Cormorant ASW Helicopter.
• Multipliers stack with cost. A Viper's missile does ×1.8 against heavy armor, so a few of them out-trade a Mammoth that costs three times as much, and the same Vipers lose their metal to buggies they can barely scratch.

The full matrix

The best multiplier of each armed unit against each armor class. Green is a hard counter (×1.3 or more), red a poor match (×0.55 or less), and a dash means the weapon cannot target that class at all.

Ranks

A combat unit earns experience for every hit point it takes off an enemy, and is promoted twice on it: Veteran at three times its own hit points of harm, Elite at eight. Each rank is +10 % damage and hit points and +5 % speed; the chevrons beside the health bar say which. Buildings never rank, and the thresholds scale with the unit, so a buggy and a Mammoth climb at the same relative rate.

Killing above your rank pays extra: finishing a unit that outranks you is worth half its hit points again for every rank of the gap, on top of the damage that did it. A green Wolf that lands the last shot on an Elite Bison collects two ranks' worth of gap, about 740 experience, most of its own first promotion in one round. An Elite collects nothing extra, since nothing outranks it. It is the veteran army's own counter: the side that is behind earns its chevrons fastest off the side that is ahead.