Name: Laser Tower
Side: Nod
Cost: $600
Power required: 6
Tier: 1
ERA: Tiberian Sun
Base Asset: DonutArnold
Gameplay
The Laser tower replaces the C&C3 Shredder turret. It is a more flexible defence that trades the Shredders spread for precision.
The most noticeable difference is the fact that the Laser tower is not a hub type defence (which now means that all the hub defences have been replaced). I guess you are either a fan of the hub defences or you are not. I started off liking them, but once I started playing the game more, I found that having to place the 3 turrets often ended up hindering fast placement in comparison to other sides base defences.
As with other anti-infantry defences the Laser tower can fire through structures, which means that you do not have to worry about your structures blocking the weapon, and also that you can use structures (such as Power plants) to block your Laser tower, allowing it to get more shots off, while your enemy is forced to get around the obstruction.
A major difference between this and other anti-infantry defences is that it is actually useful against vehicles. Admittedly it is only vs light vehicles, but rather than simply chipping away at vehicles like the GDI Watchtower does, the Laser tower will destroy them quite efficiently. How good is it? If it is only light vehicles that you defending against (for example a Nod mirror match fending off Bike & Buggy harassment) then you should not bother with the Turret, the Laser tower is more efficient due to the fact that you can purchase 2 of them for the price of 1 Turret, and also because the Turrets weapon requires line-of-sight, which means that your buildings will block it.
Seeker is no big deal for the Laser tower!
Against heavy armour (eg MBTs) the turret will perform better provided the circumstances are right. The dilemma is similar to the GDI watchtower vs Guardian Turret selection. In the end many just go with buying 2 Watchtowers instead of a single Turret because of issues such as the turret having a low rate of fire, its weapon needing line of sight, the greater speed you can produce Watchtowers, etc.
For example with the Laser tower because you can buy 2 for every 1 Turret, you could place a Laser tower both in front and behind a tank. This will of course mean that one of the Laser towers will be doing an extra 50% damage because they are hitting the tank in the rear.
And of course, the same as with the Watchtower\Guardian issue, the Laser tower will deal with any infantry in the case of a mixed attack group. Obviously the Turret is useless against infantry.
If your opponent is only building MBTs then of course Turrets would be the way to go, but in all other cases it is sadly too easy to simple make more Laser towers.
So now your thinking, "where are the negatives then?".
Well the first thing is that the Laser tower uses an additional unit of power. No big deal at first, but if you mass Laser towers it will quickly add up.
The other issue is that the Laser towers rate-of-fire whilst faster than the Turret, is still pretty slow for an anti-infantry defence, especially an anti-infantry defence in a squad based game. Remember the precision that was mentioned earlier? the Laser tower targets and hits one infantry unit at a time. What this means is that when it comes to dealing with mass infantry, while the power of each shot means it will often kill an individual unit, it still takes it some time to work through a large squad.
Interestingly this means that the legendary Rocket class squads can be efficiently killed (provided they are not upgraded!) due to the small size of their squad.
Easy!
But the basic Laser tower struggles against the Scrin Razor drones (indeed it can barely cost effectively destroy them, and it is very easy in the early game to create multiple portals to swarm the defence).
So against the basic Laser tower it is actually a good idea to mix in cheap rifle class infantry if you are GDI or Nod. The Scrin has noted do not have this concern.
Because the Laser tower is classed has an anti-infantry defence (it does 'GUN' damage) in cases of mixed infantry and vehicle groups, the Laser tower will automatically go for the infantry first, and only once they are finished off will they target the vehicles. If you are coming up against the Laser tower remember this info and consider bring along some rifle class infantry to take the fire instead of your light vehicles. Also the reverse is true if you are a base commander in control of Laser towers, you might need to occasionally manually target a vehicle (or Rocket squads instead of rifle troops, etc).
Blue Laser upgrade
The talk of a 'basic' Laser tower would suggest an upgrade, but like the GDI Mammoth tank upgrade, it is a tactical upgrade, you gain something, but lose something else. Read on for more information.
The Blue Laser upgrade is a local or object upgrade, which means that you purchase it at a Laser tower and it only effects the tower it was purchased at. The purpose of this upgrade is to greatly increase the anti-infantry capabilities of the Laser tower in sacrifice for the towers anti-light vehicle ability.
Good! little fires means the upgrade is doing its job!
It is unlocked by building an Operation centre (so it is available at Tier 2).
The idea here is that because the infantry in C&C3 can get upgrades, some of which are notoriously spam friendly, a base commander might like an option to sacrifice vehicle stopping power in exchange for more infantry stopping power. I personally am a fan of using an upgraded laser tower in conjunction with an Obelisk of light, the massive vehicle stopping power of the Obelisk, protected against infantry spam by the Laser tower.
The blue laser fires a triple burst, with each burst being basically just as strong against infantry as the regular laser is.
The damage type of this laser is 'SNIPER' which means it does next to nothing vs vehicles.
Not good! the Blue laser is worthless against vehicles!
It is fairly quick to upgrade to the Blue laser, so you can buy the upgrade even in the middle of fending off infantry hordes.
Vs APC+Engineer
You can make it very difficult for a single or double (triple requires additional means) APC+Eng to be successful using the basic Laser tower (of course this requires good scouting and getting a visual on it as early as possible).
The basic idea is that you allow yourself the cost in Laser towers of the combo you are countering (APC+Eng = $1200 = 2 laser towers). How you place the towers (which will be one at a time) determines how successful you will be. If you are too early with your placement then a skilled micromanger will be able to avoid most of the damage by changing course. If you place it right next to the APC, you will guarantee a certain number of shots, but somewhere in between is what you are aiming for.
An APC cannot survive the damage from the 2 laser towers that you will build to counter it, provided your placement is good.
Of course sell the towers once they can no longer do damage to the APC, or it is destroyed, you will need the money in the early game (assuming a $10,000 start). Also if it is a double APC rush, be prepared to temporarily power down your refinery rather than going to low power from having 2 Laser towers up.
This is all feasible because the APC is classed as a light vehicle, and your Laser tower rips through light vehicles.
Vs Bikes & buggy harassment
Build the Laser tower constantly in addition to other measures, the Laser tower is really cost effective vs these vehicles (for pity's sake remember to repair them so they last longer!). Of course sell off any excess Laser towers once you have defeated or warded off the attack. Very useful for protecting your harvesters early game vs Nod.
Vs mass infantry
Obviously if you are at tier 2 or higher, upgrade your Laser towers. But also you should keep them alive as long as possible by building power plants in front of them, blocking enemy fire against the Laser tower and forcing them to destroy the power plant. Once you get good at the tactic, you will be able to sell the power plant just before it is destroyed so you get a rifle squad out to further harass them!
