Missile Launch & Flight
Missiles chase the target, not a coordinate.
LIVE HOMING
A fired missile doesn't aim at a fixed point — it re-reads its target's actual position every second for the whole flight and homes on wherever the target currently is, not a stale coordinate from launch.
THE TWO THAT DON'T TRACK
Ground strikes and bombing runs fly to a fixed map coordinate and detonate wherever that point is on arrival, regardless of who's standing there. Everything else — unit strikes, air-to-air, SAM shots, torpedoes, naval gunfire, interceptors — tracks a live unit or incoming missile.
ARRIVAL IS CHECKED, NOT SCHEDULED
Flight time is estimated at launch (3D distance ÷ missile speed) and used as a timeout ceiling — actual arrival is decided tick-by-tick by whether the missile has closed within ~200 m of the target's current position, with a 5-second grace period past the estimate before it's ruled a miss for taking too long.
BALLISTIC ARCS & DROPPED BOMBS
Ballistic missiles fly a parabolic arc — climbing to a peak roughly 25% of the launch-to-target distance (capped at 400 km), then descending. That peak is locked in at launch based on where the target was at that moment, so a target that relocates mid-flight can make the arc look slightly off — a cosmetic quirk of the flight model, not a targeting bug. Dropped bombs just fall at a constant rate, no arc, no live homing.
AIRCRAFT SELF-DEFENSE
Self-defense is a separate, purely reactive layer: any airborne aircraft being chased by an incoming missile auto-fires its own interceptor the instant that missile enters its personal defensive range — no player input, no coordinator involvement, purely local and instant. It only triggers for aircraft actually in the air; grounded aircraft rely on ground defense. Stacked aircraft each get an independent chance against the same inbound missile.
| ENGAGEMENT DOCTRINE | BEHAVIOR |
|---|---|
| AGGRESSIVE | Fires everything loaded at the first incoming missile — nothing left if a second arrives right after |
| DEFAULT (CONSERVATIVE) | Holds back, fires one round per incoming missile |