Nuclear Warhead

The warhead is not something you build at a factory or give orders to. A Nuclear Silo or a Kraken Cruise-Missile Submarine fabricates one, you pick the point, and from the moment it leaves the launcher it is an aircraft: a slow launch, a steady cruise at 3 tiles a second, then a faster terminal approach along a straight line to that point, no turning, no dodging, and it detonates on arrival: up to 3,000 damage within six tiles, falling off toward the edge, and 750 in the outer ring out to eight. The blast hits ground units, surface ships and buildings, including allies; aircraft in flight and submerged submarines are immune. The ground to that edge burns for three seconds after the fireball fades.

Two things can bring it down. The first is a veteran: an anti-air unit of rank 2 or better (a Veteran or Elite Flak Track, Hawk SAM Launcher or Falcon Fighter), which takes it ahead of anything else in the sky. The second is the SAM Site, an emplacement built for the job; a building never earns a rank, so an AA Turret under the path watches it pass. A green unit never locks on to it either, and a stray round from one does nothing if it lands on it.

Among those who can shoot, the bar is the same on both sides: one veteran Hawk under the path only scratches it, and two along the line bring it down short of the target; one SAM Site only scratches it, and two along the line bring it down. Coverage is not the same as time: three SAM Sites bunched over the aim point still let it through, because they only see the last stretch of the flight. A shot-down warhead leaves nothing behind but the burst. Point defence, the Missile Interrupter at either tier, never fires at it.

How to use

Read the map before you launch. The flight is a straight line from the launcher, so a silo deep in your base sends the warhead over everything between it and the target; a submarine sends it from a stretch of water nobody fortified. Aim short of the anti-air rather than through it: the blast reaches six tiles and the front eight, and a warhead that comes down at the edge of a base does more than one shot down over its middle. If you are on the receiving end, your vote against the strike is whatever anti-air stands between the enemy's silo and your base: the Hawks that have earned their chevrons, kept alive and under the approach, or a pair of SAM Sites pushed out that way. And the alarm gives you the whole flight to move the army out from under it. Your own warhead in flight wears the radiation trefoil on the minimap, for you and your allies alone.