Owl Radar Car

The Owl is the Radar Station's circle on tracks. It sees 16 tiles — more than any drone, less than the station's 24 — and it sees by radio, so neither the night nor the rain shrinks the circle, and a stealth aircraft inside 6 tiles of it is shown. Every gun standing in that circle fires at its full reach at what it could never see for itself: a Tempest sees 8 tiles and throws 13, and beside an Owl the other five are a siege that sees.

It pays for that with everything else. It has no gun, thin plating, and it is slow — slower than a Mammoth — so it belongs in the column, not out ahead of it. It needs a Radar Station to build and an Advanced War Factory to build it from, and like the station it loses its sight to 7 tiles while the grid is short of power.

How to use

Drive it with the artillery, inside the anti-air umbrella, and stop it a few tiles behind the guns: the circle reaches past their range, and a stopped Owl is one that is not wandering into the fight. At night or under rain it is the only ground unit whose eyes still work, which is when a Tempest line with an Owl beside it decides a siege on its own.

Killing the Owl is the answer to the column. It dies to anything, so a buggy raid or a pair of helicopters that reach it blind every gun it was spotting for, and an army that brings one has to keep something between it and the raider.

Anecdotes

The owl hunts by ear as much as by eye, which is why it is the one bird abroad after dark.