Scathe

Scathe is a long-range, slow-firing heavy turret that launches unit-like missiles rather than conventional bullets. All of its ammo types fire ground-only missiles that travel as units (they cannot target air), and many missiles spawn frag missiles or explode into large area-damage blasts. Scathe has an extremely long weapon range and very slow base fire rate and rotation, and it has a long initial windup delay before its first shot. Its missiles include unique behaviors: phase fabric rounds produce a missile with a built-in Force Field and high survivability, surge alloy rounds produce a high-damage primary missile that breaks into lightning-armed frags, and carbide rounds fire reliable, high-area primary missiles with multiple frags. Scathe’s missiles can deal large area damage but apply strong building-damage penalties, so they are far more effective versus units than structures.

Ammo behavior (summary)

• Phase Fabric: 3 ammo per item, reduces fire rate by 20% for that ammo. Primary missile has 500 HP, 30 tiles/s speed, ~6.1s life, and a Force Field ability that provides a 11.25-tile shield radius with a 2000 shield. Primary explosion deals ~400 area damage (15 tiles) with -90% building damage and spawns 7 artillery-style frags (~164 area damage, ~7 tiles, -80% building damage). Missiles cannot hit air.
• Surge Alloy: reduces range by 9 tiles and reduces fire rate by ~10% for that ammo. Primary missile has ~400 HP, ~33 tiles/s speed, ~1.4s life; primary explosion deals ~1800 area damage (5 tiles) with -90% building damage and spawns 5 frags. Frags spawn secondary homing missile units (~36 tiles/s, ~100 HP, ~3.5s life) that each fire lightning (10× ~45 damage) and explode into smaller lightning-bearing explosions (4× ~25 damage, ~180 area damage with -90% building damage). Frag missiles home toward the turret’s target position.
• Carbide: primary missile has 210 HP, ~34.5 tiles/s speed, ~5.5s life; primary explosion deals ~1000 area damage (8.1 tiles) with -90% building damage and spawns 7 frags (~100 area damage, ~5 tiles, -90% building damage). Missiles cannot hit air.

Key mechanical facts

• Scathe cannot target air; all fired missiles and their fragments cannot hit air units.
• Base fire rate is extremely slow (0.1 shots/sec listed), and some ammo modifiers further reduce the effective fire rate for that ammo. Shallow Water boost increases Scathe’s fire rate dramatically (250% fire-rate multiplier under water boost effects).
• Scathe has a long initial firing delay (longest among similar high-windup turrets) and slow turret rotation.
• Fog reveal: Scathe’s fog reveal radius is 67.5 tiles (after changes that reduced reveal percentage).
• Scathe’s projectiles carry heavy building-damage penalties (commonly -70% to -90% building damage depending on update), so they primarily threaten units rather than bases’ internal structures.

Practical notes and tactics

• Scathe excels as a long-range anti-ground artillery/sniper that can melt clustered high-tier ground units or snipe rear-line opponents thanks to its missile units and very long range. It is particularly effective against slow, high-health targets that cannot quickly intercept missiles.
• Phase Fabric rounds create near-guaranteed hits thanks to the missile’s Force Field and high HP; they also absorb incoming projectiles while approaching, making them useful to protect other long-range attackers or to guarantee hits on priority ground targets.
• Surge Alloy rounds produce very high single-shot damage if the primary and frags detonate in close overlap; this ammo is best when the primary connects inside ~46.2 blocks where combined explosions stack.
• Carbide ammo is reliable at range and works well for steady, predictable damage output, but its frags have smaller radii so they can miss against dispersed low-health swarms.
• Scathe is expensive to build and consumes slow-to-produce ammo types; its cost and ammo demand make it a mid/late-game, specialized turret rather than an early spam defense. Protect missile paths or provide projectile-intercepting defenses (regen projectors, shielded walls, or dedicated turret fire) to defend bases from Scathe volley harassment.
• Against Scathe, use fast-fire interceptors (e.g., Tecta) or formations that present few clustered targets so area damage is minimized; placing small walls to absorb blasts or using units that can shoot down missiles before they reach the main force reduces their effectiveness.