Combat Engineer Bioroid

## Combat Engineer Bioroid (Nous'Gul)

A specialty derivative of the standard Bioroid design, the **Combat Engineer Bioroid** (**Nous'Gul**, also referred to as the 'Worker Bioroid') was created to support the forces of the Tirolian Empire.

## Background

The militarisation of the Zentraedi did have one drawback for the Robotech Masters, being the loss of the slave labour force that they were originally created to provide. At the same time, the Masters also saw a need for a heavy labour platform that could be employed across their empire, both in terrestrial environments and in space to support their own colonisation efforts as well as to aid their forces in the field. In order to fulfil these requirements, they developed a heavy labour derivative of the Soldier Bioroid.

The so-called Combat Engineer Bioroid was designed from the outset to be easy to mass-produce and deploy across the Empire. Sharing a high degree of parts with the Soldier Bioroid, the Worker rapidly proliferated and soon could be found performing heavy labour everywhere from newly settled colony worlds to on-board the Robotech Master's massive Motherships. While more complex and power-intensive to create then a Zentraedi worker, the Combat Engineer Bioroid had numerous advantages. It was largely self-sufficient, could be adapted to a variety of different roles and due to the use of low-level clones, possessed very little free will or ability for independent action.

While extensively produced, the Combat Bioroid came to be a luxury that the Masters could ill-afford as their Protoculture supplies dwindled. Due to its non-combatant nature, the Combat Engineer Bioroid saw very little action during the Second Robotech War, being relegated to keeping the Masters' ships running as their self-repair systems continued to degrade from Protoculture exhaustion. However, as the Second Robotech War continued, they became the first types to be mass-retired for scrapping and recycling. None are known to have survived.

Note that due to its purple colour scheme, some sources have confused the Combat Engineer Bioroid with the similarly-coloured Advanced Soldier Bioroid.

## Capabilities

The Combat Engineer Bioroid shares the same basic construction as the standard Soldier Bioroid, including the advanced structure and musculature, redundant systems and direct neural interface to the pilot. While this might seem to be overkill for its non-combatant role, the Robotech Masters felt that it was easier to simply modify an existing design rather than build a new one form the ground up. This shared design meant that the Combat Engineer shared a large degree of parts with the Soldier, as well as having similar performance. Furthermore, this meant that it could be used as a combatant if needed, and had the same general capabilities.

Designed for heavy labour, the Combat Engineer Bioroid featured enhanced musculature that gave it greater lifting and carrying capacity than any other Bioroid. The Bioroids were often employed in Tirolian colonies in construction, mining and other heavy labour duties. Likewise, onboard the Tirolian vessels, they were intended for use in shipboard repairs and servicing. Finally, in the field, Combat Engineer Bioroids were employed for creating barricades and fortification as well as salvage and recovery duties.

Usually Combat Engineer Bioroids were operated by the same types of low-level clones as the Soldier Bioroid. These worker clones were often programmed for simple, repetitive tasks, but were also easily directed into more complicated ones. The Combat Engineer Bioroid used the same sensor suite as the Soldier Bioroid, including the same fire control system.

The armor of the Mortar Bioroid is composed of an advanced titanium-steel alloy. The armor stops all small arms and heavy infantry weapons fire, provides excellent resistance to light mecha-mounted weaponry, such as the Zentraedi 22.3mm HE autocannon round, and fair resistance to medium mecha-mounted weaponry, such as the GU-11's 55mm APFSDS round. Note that the Bioroids' redundant systems and advanced design made them exceedingly capable of coping with battle damage, and the total protection afforded by the Bioroid was hence more than the armor data would suggest.

## Weapons and Equipment

* **Dotz-Meghor Drum Gun Pod:** Ion Beam/Pulse Cannon, fires ion discs. Alternatively, the weapon drum can fire this ion salvo as a particle beam. It can fire at a rate of 450 discs per minute for up to 56 seconds in automatic mode, after that limited to one burst/3 seconds, unless sub-maximum rate of fire allows replenishment of the ready ion supply.

* Optionally other gun pods could be used. See the main file for more information.

* **Multi-Function Repair Tool:** Hand-held. A highly-adaptable device that can be reconfigured to a variety of different roles. Used to service Bioroids and other mecha in the field, as well as to perform repair tasks onboard Tirolian space vessels.

* **Minelayer Tool:** Mounted on the rear of the Bioroid, hand-operated. A special tool that can be used to implant mines into most terrestrial surfaces up to and including solid rock. Contains nine 'smart' command detonated mines each with a blast-fragmentation warhead effective against most forms of Mecha armour.

## Notes

* Design Notes
* Bioroid Main File
* Bioroid Hover Sled