unit-zenith

The Zenith is a heavy hovering missile unit that launches salvos of homing rockets at enemy targets. It functions as a long-range, high-capacity strike craft: fast, durable for its class, and optimized for sweeping area damage rather than point-defense duels. Zeniths are commonly used to snipe static defenses, swarm enemy air defenses when fielded en masse, and deliver items (such as Blast Compound) thanks to their large item capacity and mobility.

Its primary weapon fires paired missile volleys with partial inaccuracy and homing behavior. Each missile shot deals 14 direct damage and has 15 area damage on splash (about 3.1 tiles), with a modest inaccuracy (roughly 5 degrees) and a firing cadence of two banks at 1.5 shots/sec. The missiles’ homing makes them effective against moving targets and clusters, although homing can sometimes cause rockets to pick suboptimal targets in crowded engagements.

Practical notes and strategy:

• Zeniths excel at base raiding and air control below Extreme threat levels; their range and salvo-style fire can disable multiple defenses quickly. In some versions their range was reduced and other stats rebalanced, so assume they are less of a pure outrange platform than older reports suggested.
• Against clustered swarms or units with many small targets, using Metaglass ammo increases splash potential because of its frag effect; pairing this with Shallow Water or Pooled Cryofluid as coolant further boosts fragmenting performance and hit reliability.
• Zeniths are vulnerable to Scatter-class anti-air when those units are fielded in numbers; Scatters were at times able to keep up with or outrange Zeniths after various balance changes, so employ support units (Cyclone, Swarmer) or high-damage combos (Fuse + Parallax) when confronting concentrated anti-air defenses.
• Because of their speed and item capacity, Zeniths are a popular choice for delivery-based tactics like dropping Blast Compound—automating unit pickup with a Micro Processor script can make this tactic very efficient.
• They pair well with artillery suppression or flanking: use other units or long-range fire to draw fire and clear point defenses so Zenith salvos can connect more reliably.

Development history highlights: the unit was renamed from Revenant to Zenith in earlier major updates, received sprite and stat reductions (notably health and range nerfs across versions), and had its command limit removed in a later build. Its description has also been adjusted over time to better reflect targeting behavior. In cultural notes, the name references the astronomical term “zenith,” and the unit appears as a playable character in Animdustry with an unrelated active ability.