Guard Posts are simple unmanned defense-sentry installations. The offensive element of the Guard Post is any one of the available combat vehicle turrets, with that turret's normal capabilities and limitations. Lacking the vehicle's computers, sensors, and power system, the Guard Post incorporates a power receiver, allowing it to operate from the colony's power plants, a targeting sensor array, and a simple electro-optical targeting and fire tasking (TAFT) computer.

The TAFT is not as sophisticated as the primary computers used in vehicles and arachnids, and in fact, is derived from an emergency-backup computer commonly used in such units. While the electro-optical logic unit handles most of the TAFT's functions, a protein-based pattern recognition unit is used to identity hostile and friendly units, and to select an appropriate threat response. The TAFT's effectiveness can be improved by connecting the Guard Post to the Command Center through the Tube system, which provides a secure data channel to the Savant computers. This allows for pinpoint targeting, increasing the effective damage from most weapons by 50 percent.

While Guard Posts normally operate independently, they can be directed at individual targets in response to commands from the Command Center.

Operational Notes: The Guard Post fires its weapon at enemy units that come within range. It may be equipped with any available weapon system. Weapon damage is increased by 50 percent at Guard Posts that are connected by Tube to a Command Center. Costs listed above are only for the Guard Post structure and do not include those of the weapon. The Status Lights for Guard Posts only appear if the structure is Idled or Disabled. NOTE: This structure explodes when destroyed and may spontaneously explode when damaged.

Tales from New Terra

Emma steered the already damaged Scout around a boulder just as it exploded from the impact of a Rail Gun shell. It had been an uneventful trip back from a mine where she'd been collecting rock samples, until she'd picked up an Eden Lynx somewhere a few kilometers back. A few more kilometers and she would have been safely back to Plymouth. Now she couldn't seem to shake her deadly tormentor.

The Scout was unarmed, nearly defenseless. Speed was all she had, and the damaged Scout provided that only under protest. She expected something critical in the drive to explode at any moment.

She zigged and zagged in what she hoped was an unpredictable pattern. Another shell struck just in front of the Scout, sending her headlong through its cloud of dust, and bouncing through its crater. Too close.

Ahead, two hills rose up on either side of a narrow passage. She had no choice but to go that way, even though it would make her a sitting duck while she passed through the cut. She kept the unit below its top speed until she was in the mouth of the opening, then hit the safety overrides and threw everything the Scout had left into one burst of speed.

As she emerged on the other side of the cut, she heard one of the drive motors scream and die. In her rear-view screen, she could see the Lynx right behind her, its turret swinging into firing position.

Then it exploded, hit by Microwave beams, RPG fire, and EMP grenades, all at once. She'd led it into the gauntlet, a little valley flanked by Guard Posts at the outer rim of Plymouth's defenses.

She slowed the Scout to a crawl to avoid causing further damage. She watched the turrets on either side of her, scanning for other targets. She'd be fine now.

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