Hero units, or the lack thereof.

A few people have asked me about hero units, and whether they would be in my mod at all. After all, most RTS games have heroes of various sorts. They range from the slightly better units (Act of War, campaign only), to fairly fleshed out beings complete with experience, gear, and special abilities akin to an RPG (like Warcraft 3), and most of them falling somewhere in between.

There are no units in this mod that you can only have one of (barring Stealth MCVs, although they're hardly 'heroes'). Probably the most similar to heroes are Stealth Advanced infantry, although you can have many of them in a game. What is meant by advanced?

Well, I use the term "Basic Infantry" to refer to any infantry that you can build right after building a barracks or other infantry recruitment centre, money depending. So Advanced infantry are infantry that have pre-requisites other than a barracks and money.

Both Turtle and Stealth have Advanced Infantry in the normal sense. Turtle's Advanced Infantry require a particular building to build, and Stealth Advanced Infantry require an unlock to build each. Rush's advanced infantry are upgrades of their basic infantry, and also require unlocks to get.

Advanced infantry are not necessarily better than basic infantry. They simply fill different roles. All teams have basic infantry that fulfil basic combat roles (obviously). All three teams have anti-infantry, anti-tank, and anti-air infantry. Anti-tank infantry also double as early game anti-fortification, although they do not outrange defence structures.

Advanced Infantry sometimes fill the same roles, but in different ways (not 'just better'), but also tend to fill less standard ones. So... Here's a run down of advanced infantry.
Turtle Advanced Infantry:
Advanced Anti-Fortification Infantry:
Requires: Turtle Vehicle Procurement Facility
Description: Turtle Anti-Fortification Infantry are artillery infantry. While they do less damage to buildings and tanks, they frontload a lot more, and have increased range. This allows them to target defencive structures and fortifications without risk. The increased frontload also means that first strike capability is more important than normal.
Turtle AF infantry can also be upgraded to be more versatile also. The additional ammunition upgrade gives them EMP rounds and Incendiary rounds in addition to their standard rounds. The EMP round does have a wide area effect, but doesn't disable for very long, so it's mostly a stop-gap, and isn't as effective as dedicated EMP weapons. However, being hit by an EMP might make the enemy stand still long enough for them to be hit by more artillery.
The incendiary round is a good weapon to use to protect your tanks from hordes of anti-tank infantry, and has a wide area of effect, so is probably the more useful of the two extra ammunition types.

Turtle Advanced Armour Neutralising Infantry:
Requires: Turtle Stealth Detection Tower
Description: Turtle Armour Neutralising Infantry can't actually kill enemies. However, it can effectively neutralise enemy vehicles to be picked off by support. Really, this ability is quite useful. It allows slower turtle vehicles catch up to enemies, and also mitigates the efficiency of hit and run attacks.
One of the more hilarious uses I have found for it is mounting them in super-heavy IFVs, and then having them lock down enemy vehicles and then crushing the enemy vehicles with the super-heavies.
Its upgrade increases its range to match that of anti-tank infantry. While the AF infantry increase their versatility, AN infantry just get a straight upgrade. The range increase means that the armour neutralising infantry can start shooting at opposing HATs at the same time they are being shot at, rather than significantly after (probably never, since they die).
This infantry, while non-lethal, has quite a lot of uses. Be creative.

Rush Advanced Infantry:
Rush advanced infantry are simply upgraded versions of their basic brethren. So for this list, I have forgone typing "Advanced" in front of everything.
Anti-Infantry Infantry:
Requires: Rush Anti-Infantry Flamethrower Unlock
Description: Taking this upgrade for a Rush Anti-Infantry Infantry replaces their gun with a flamethrower. The flamer has shorter range than the assault rifle, but puts out damage much faster. Essentially, it takes the Rush basic anti-infantry weapon, and makes it more of what it is.
It can also clear garrisons from buildings. This unlock is highly useful when used with an IFV, as it closes the distance, and also provides protection when attempting to take out a building garrison.

Anti-Tank Infantry:
Requires: Rush Anti-Tank Artillery Unlock
Description: Taking this upgrade for a Rush Anti-Tank Infantry replaces their missile launcher with an artillery weapon similar to the Turtle AF infantry, although shorter ranged and less powerful.
The difference between the two is that the Rush one is much cheaper and easier to crank out, and once the unlock has been acquired, there is nothing stopping the user from upgrading any anti-tank infantry. However, it is slightly worse, so you need more for the same task.
Once again, this is very useful with an IFV.

Anti-Air Infantry:
Requires: Rush Anti-Air Flak Unlock
Description: This upgrade maintains the same DPS and range as the unupgraded version, but does less frontload. The projectile travels faster too, so it's better for responding to an air raid, but the lowered front-load is worse for a planned attack (for instance, attacking a turtle ROB). This is probably the slightest change in role for the Rush upgrades.

Stealth Advanced Infantry:
Stealth advanced infantry, as I stated before, are the most similar to heroes. They are quite a departure from other infantry in that they are expensive, and actually inefficient. They tend to be a little softer in their counters. Also, they can all climb cliffs. Pretty cool, eh?
Advanced Anti-Infantry Infantry:
Requires: Advanced Anti-Infantry Unlock
Description: The Stealth Advanced Anti-Infantry is a sniper. It doesn't exactly infringe on the basic anti-infantry infantry's role. While it kills infantry in one shot, it does so at a much slower rate than Stealth Basic Anti-Infantry (about half as quickly). However, it does it from a longer range.
Secondly, it can snipe people out of garrisons. This means that it is very useful in a Stealth vs Rush game, as it can eliminate Rush's money sources.
Thirdly, it can observe an area indefinitely. This allows it to spot greater distances than normal, and also stealth detect in that area. This makes it the most mobile and versatile stealth detection available in the mod. This makes it very important for Stealth Mirror matches.

Advanced Anti-Tank Infantry:
Requires: Advanced Anti-Tank Infantry Unlock
Description: The Stealth Advanced Anti-Tank Infantry is a special ops soldier carrying a heavy AT rocket launcher, and a submachine gun. While it is a soft-counter to infantry, the equivalent cost of basic anti-infantry infantry can do it faster and at longer range.
It is, however, quite good against vehicles. Maintaining the same DPS as basic anti-tank infantry, they frontload more, so are much better for ambushes. Their ability to climb cliffs also makes them more able to escape from tanks that survive an ambush.

Advanced Anti-Fortification Infantry:
Requires: Yeah... You know.
Description: Unlike the other two anti-fortification infantry, this one plants bombs in the fashion of C&C commandos. Like them, however, they are not just good against fortifications, but things staying still. Once again, it has the same SMG as the Advanced Anti-Tank, making it another decent all-round infantry, although very expensive for what it does. It is generally good for giving a wake-up call to enemy players who have forgotten which army you are playing, especially since they can have up to nine bombs placed at any one time.

Bombs can also be placed on vehicles, although you have to be careful if you don't want your infantry crushed by heavier vehicles. This may have some obvious applications, like sticking it to a construction vehicle while it's building an expansion, and then letting it drive back into a base before causing damage.

The additional mobility gained through using advanced infantry may well be worth it, especially if the bad guys have stepped up patrols at choke points.

Indeed, all the advanced infantry are very useful, and generally are good as supporting units, although are generally not the units to spam or build lots of, which is my intention.