Defenses Tech Tree

Defense technologies are some of the most important - they allow you to equip your ships (or soldiers) with state-of-the-art defenses that provide the much needed protection from modern weaponry.

Energy Shield Theory

 * Prerequisites: None
 * Posts: 10
 * Investigations into the theory behind energy shielding have proved fruitful. While energy shielding is not yet possible, further research may enable the creation of a field of pure energy that can surround a ship and block both matter and energy.

Energy Shielding

 * Prerequisites: Energy Shield Theory
 * Posts: 20
 * Scientists have developed a crude form of energy shield which is capable of defending ships from mass-based weaponry as well as energy weapons. Shields require a significant amount of power, however, and will fail after taking enough hits. They take a long time to recharge.

Energy Shield Harmonizing

 * Prerequisites: Energy Shielding
 * Posts: 30
 * Tunes the frequency of energy shields more finely, resulting in less energy going to waste. Shields use less power and as such, are able to last longer.

Large Area Shielding

 * Prerequisites: Energy Shield Harmonizing
 * Posts: 35
 * Advances in shield power efficiency allow the creation of shields which cover a larger area. These area shields are useful for ground defense and are necessary for the construction of larger ships.

Absorptive Shields

 * Prerequisites: Energy Shield Harmonizing
 * Posts: 30
 * Shields can now absorb a small portion of the energy emitted by energy weapons. This slightly weakens the weapons' effect on the shield, as they serve to partially recharge it. It's fairly minor, however.

Forcefields

 * Prerequisites: Energy Shielding
 * Posts: 25
 * Essentially small-scale energy shields. They are useful for creating impassable "doors" or for emergency situations where a ship is damaged and begins to decompress - they are able to block anything, even air.

Subarmor Forcefielding

 * Prerequisites: Energy Shielding, Forcefields
 * Posts: 35
 * This creative use of forcefields allows for their use as a secondary form of defense. Positioned beneath or inside of the ship's armor, they act as a second (though much weaker) shield. They can be used to separate layers of armor from eachother so that energy weapons can only heat up one layer at a time (they will likely fail before the layer above them is completely destroyed, however).

Electromagnetic Repulsion Field

 * Prerequisites: Electromagnetic Manipulation (Electronics technology)
 * Posts: 35
 * An electromagnetic burst is emitted from the ship, repelling plasma as well as ferrous (magnetic) kinetic rounds and missiles. Has no effect on lasers. It takes a long time to recharge, and requires lowering the shields temporarily.

Personal Shield

 * Prerequisites: Energy Shielding, High-Capacity Batteries (Power technology), Miniaturized Batteries (Power technology)
 * Posts: 30
 * Effectively a smaller version of the energy shields already employed on ships, able to be used as a device for personal defense. Generally requires a heavy generator to be carried or attached to power armor.