Armies of the Terminal.
While Sophont's terminal worlds produce designs made to take advantage of local resources and combat nearby enemies, there are standard baselines from which they tend to diverge. Below are the most common informal names given to some of its more common drone types. It should be noted that these are more classes of drones than models, and there is much variation within them.
Overall, Sophont's forces are primarily composed of diverse groups of heavily specialized units that rely on inhuman coordination to compensate for their lack of generalists. This applies on a strategic level as well, with terminal worlds retooling their forces extensively to counter specific foes, at the cost of becoming less effective against other forces. While this can leave terminal worlds vulnerable to unforeseen developments, the sharing of designs allows anyone of these worlds to retool and produce forces suited to that particular foe.
Swarm drones: a ubiquitous swarm of small aerial drones, each little bigger than a servo skull. they are lightly armed, but are deployed in staggering numbers. Typical use is bringing down poorly armored foes through sheer weight of fire, or supporting more expensive troops, acting as either scouts, targeting aids, or ablative cover. In most cases the swarm is not homogenous, and includes drones that perform various specialized duties.
Skitters: usually a bit larger than a cyber mastiff, and built with at least 4 legs, though frequently 6 or 8. Skitters are the lightest mainline combatant in Sophont's arsenal, and are deployed in vast numbers. Typically they are lightly armored (by Sophont's standards) and highly mobile. Most are well armed for their size, their many legs and sturdy design allowing them to absorb recoil that usually only heavier units possess. Most formations will incorporate a few more expensive variants that mount various heavy weapons. While melee variants do exist, they are rarely used. Instead skitters will self destruct if forced into melee. While most do not have dedicated self destruct charges, the compact plasma cell they are powered by can be induced to explode in a blast on par with a plasma grenade. This makes engaging skitters in melee a dubious prospect, though it often leaves them vulnerable to being swarmed by cannon fodder should they be cornered.
Crawlers: a medium infantry analog, usually bipedal or quadrupedal and notably heavier than skitters. As a main line infantry force there is a higher degree of variance, with a wide array of trade offs being made between speed, armor, and firepower. However, in general they are heavily armored and equipped with a heavy weapon. Typically bipedal models will be designed for city fighting, being slower but more heavily armored and possessing short ranged weapons. Melee variants have become more common, as unlike the skitters these models are not considered fully expandable, however they are still capple of a potent self destruct should they be overwhelmed.
Bastions: a heavy to super heavy infantry analog, they tend not to have a common form factor, being anything from humanoid to hexapodal. Designed to be scattered among crawlers or to be gathered to act as a point of overwhelming force, many have noted they are strategically rough analogs to Astartes and other similar forces. Larger and more heavily armored than Crawlers, bastions at the high end can approach terminator armor in terms of protection. In terms of armament, they will either have a number of heavy weapons, or a single vehicle scale weapon.
Typically they are equipped with more advanced weaponry, though in some cases they are instead deployed in greater number with lesser weapons. It is common for bastions to house data demons and act as field commanders for lesser machines.
Lesser Incarnation engines: bastion sized machines designed using the best technology Sophont can field. While the exact armament and purpose varies wildly, typically they will be built to use warp based technology, or other extremely complex weapons. incarnation engines are custom built to house data demons, and in most cases cannot function without a possessing warp entity. Lesser incarnation engines are the smallest purpose built incarnation engines Sophont fields. Despite this they are still immensely deadly. However, they tend to be extremely specialized and can often be destroyed if forced out of their area of focus. To counter this, Sophont will often deploy them with a bodyguard of bastions if possible.
Beckoning Engines: a recent development, Beckoning Engines are a specialized form of incarnation engine. Deployed en mass, their purpose is to summon the servitors of other gods as reinforcements. While their use has strategic concerns, as Sophont will have to provide payment for anything it calls forth. Tactically they enable it to summon warp born reinforcements with surprising ease. More than one battle has been decided by the arrival of an army of Zaeed's daemonic mercenaires, or one of Zahak's blackened.
Zippies: a ubiquitous light tank analog. Zippies are extremely fast, but possess very little armor. Most variants are skimmers, though tracked versions do exist. Typically they are given extremely specialized weaponry, and form focused fast reaction forces. Swiftly moving to reinforce formations beset by their designated prey. They are typically intended to act more as a stall against determined attacks, buying time to allow a more cohesive response.
Auto armor: probably the broadest category, this term is used to refer to most tanks used by sophonts forces. As there are few roles sophont uses armor for that are truly novel, few bother to differentiate between the various types in an informal context. In general any given tank design will be heavily specialized for a certain role or target. Due to the specialized nature, most auto armors will put at least some emphasize on speed, making it easier to bring them to bear in areas where their specialty is needed. However there are of course many exceptions, especially among auto armors meant for assaulting fixed positions.
Wing cutters: a general term for air superiority fighters. As sophont places a high value on air supremacy, when it goes to war it does so under the wings of countless aircraft. The lack of an organic crew is a great boon for airborne craft, as it eliminates the constraints of the pilot's g torrance. To capitalize on this Sophont's fighters tend to emphasize speed over armor, but this is not universal. Before the Green Awakening sophont showed a marked preference for missiles, however since the awakening the near omnipresence of Orks and their vast swarms has forced the development of more high endurance air to air weapons.
Exploiters: a common type of ground attack craft. Exploiters refer to a multiple types of gunships created to take advantage of gaps in enemy anti air coverage. Through a combination of basic stealth technology and flying low to the ground they can avoid fire from more distant AA emplacements, allowing them to quickly savage formations that have lost local AA coverage. Most designs are fairly low endurance, meant to empty their munitions stores rapidly under the assumption that such gaps will be short lived.
Godfist: most of Sophont's bombers are intensely vulnerable, being unable to deal with even moderate AA or evade enemy interceptors. While many terminal worlds will eventually begin begrudgingly building less helpless variants, godfists will usually remain the core of sophonts bomber wings. While godfits may require the enemy be rendered near helpless against air attack to be effectively employed, their sheer destructive power makes them worth it. Entire armies have been reduced to twisted hulks and blast shadows once their AA has been stripped. There are a handful of godfist designs intended for use in situations where some AA remains; typically these designs are built with the assumption they will not be returning and are strategically closer to deathstrike batteries than true strike craft.
Eliminators: a specialized form of artillery, eliminators focus on pinpoint elimination of specific enemy assets. From removing specific forms of armored vehicles, to dealing specific damage to super heavies, all the way down to anti infantry versions that target specific heavy weapons teams. Eliminators come in a wide range of sizes and forms, though most are some form of missile battery, using sophonts extreme skill with machine spirits to ensure the munitions are clever enough to seek out specific targets. While they deal far less overall damage than typical artillery batteries, their ability to strip specific elements from a foe is of massive strategic use. Eliminators are immensely effective at their niche, and version exist that are able to pick off specific weapon emplacements even through void shields.
Command node: command nodes are massive super heavy tanks that act as dedicated command and control vehicles. Carrying immensely potent cogitators and communication arrays they allow a data demon to exert far finer control and employ more advanced tactics than a more generalized body. While they are very lightly armed for their size, command nodes are extremely durable, caring both thick armor and void shields. They are typically very heavily guarded.
Screamers: a common form of superheavy, Screamers are massive spindly machines that appear to possess an almost mace like shape. With a long thin tube dotted with strange techno arcana, topped with a spinning array of four or more angular prongs. Despite their spindly appearance they are difficult to destroy, as space seems to wrap around them deflecting incoming fire. Their name comes from the distinctive high pitched
scream their main weapon makes when firing. The distinctive firing cycle is the prongs spinning while a visible amount of unknown energy is gathered between them, before stopping instantly and unleashing a screaming beam of brilliant light to sweep across its foes. The beam itself can melt armor and vaporize flesh, but the heat is a mere secondary effect of the strange techno arcana that produces it. The instant the beam ceases firing the glowing line it leaves behind will detonate.The exact effect varies immensely, anything from an eruption of devastating flame, to a line of crushing gravitic distortions, to even a narrow short lived warp rift. When used against single targets the beam will instead play over as much of the target as possible. Screamers are skimmers and appear capable of orbital insertion, rapidly decelerating to come to a hovering stop meters above the ground. Screamers seem to be one of the very few universal designs, as almost every terminal world makes use of these potent super heavies. While relatively little of their inner workings is known, it is highly probable that they are incarnation engine as such an exotic a weapon near certainly needs a guiding intelligence to function.
Greater Incarnation Engine: A catch all term for super heavy sized incarnation engine that do not match an existing designs. Typically these are either unique to to a single terminal world, or the specific data demon they house. A Greater incarnation Engine Is a terror on the battlefield. A Titan wielding the most deadly technology sophont can craft, and commanded by one of its greatest servants. Much like their lesser kin, they are often purpose built for a specific role, and are vulnerable if caught outside it. However their sheer power makes them somewhat less vulnerable to this. A strange occurrence in recent years has been the emergence of champions. Specific data demons with custom designed incarnation Engines who outperform their kin. Their engines will often incorporate imagery or themes from other gods. If this is a deliberate project, or an unexpected result of sophonts servants being exposed to other divinities is unknown.
@Durin I put some thought into what kind of ground forces sophont uses.
