Cassowary Bomber

The **Cassowary Bomber** is a vehicle in Ravenfield.

## Characteristics

The Cassowary is a large plane with a grey two-toned color scheme. It carries a total of 2 infantry units - The Pilot and the Turret Gunner.

The Pilot can use the Frontal Auto Cannon and Bombs, while the Turret Gunner controls the dorsal fuselage turret.

The Pilot's main armament is the powerful nose-mounted machine gun. While it has a slow rate of fire, it has a fairly wide blast radius, and can fire 50 rounds before reloading. Each round deals up to 40 splash damage, and an additional 55 on direct hits.

The bombs inflict 1000 damage each at the epicentre and have a 15m splash radius against infantry.

The dorsal gun turret, controlled by a separate operator, serves as the Cassowary's main defense against preying enemy aircraft. It has a low rate of fire and a limited pitch. It's rounds deals 30 splash / 22 direct damage versus infantry and 15 / 22 versus vehicles.

Decelerating close to the ground will automatically deploy the plane's landing gear.

## Advantages

A dedicated ground attacker offering high burst damage, capable of maintaining both high and extremely low airspeeds while strafing, the Bomber Plane excels at finishing targets in single passes. In general, its operational attitude and style grants it invulnerability to the vast majority of threats otherwise present for most other vehicles.

The nose gun can inflict heavy damage to enemies, able to erase both foot soldiers and lightly-armored ground/water vehicles such as Marlins or Razorbacks from well over 400m away with terrifying ease, or even easily down an attack plane in less than seven hits. Overall, it is a powerful general purpose weapon.

The 8 bombs carried by the vehicle can utterly level an area of over 30m in a split second with their high attack rate. While they are more difficult to aim than rockets or guns –– especially versus moving targets–– an accurate hit is extremely rewarding, given that no vehicle can survive more than four hits, with most being destroyed or crippled after 1-2 explosions. Infantry, by the same token, are made all but helpless against accurate bomb deployment.

The dorsal gun turret provides a decent alternative against enemy air vehicles, primarily versus attack planes and other bombers, allowing the pilot to focus on the main assault while areal aggressors are kept at bay .

## Weaknesses

The Cassowary may still struggle to operate under hectic scenarios. Lacking the agility of the Buzzard, it has a hard time turning around to retarget surviving units.

Because of its design's focus towards attacking ground targets, the Bomber's air-to-air combat capability is weak. It is still capable of taking down slow-moving Helicopters with its machine guns, and even dogfighting other Bombers, but against Attack Planes, it will likely fail, especially if the aggressor approaches from the turret gunner's blind spots. A useful defensive tactic in this instance is generally to dive low, allowing the gunner to hit the attacker as they overshoot, but this depends heavily on the bot gunner's skill level.

If a Cassowary Pilot is forced into a dogfight, they will also find that their powerful MG is quite unwieldy versus Buzzards; the gun's slight downwards mounting angle makes it difficult to track moving areal targets, as leading a shot will often hide the target behind the plane's dashboard.

Like all aircraft, it is a prime target for Scalpel users, which can be dangerous to it if countermeasures are unavailable. The AA Gun can easily damage it due to its AOE, though the plane is still likely to survive long enough to outrange or counterattack the gun emplacement. At lower attitudes, it is exceptionally vulnerable to a variety of portable and vehicle mounted weapons, with the SLAM-R being the most dangerous example.

## Gallery

A Cassowary in flightA Cassowary strafing infantry with its powerful nose cannonA Cassowary dropping multiple bombs on a RhinoA Cassowary bombing a MudskipperA Cassowary chasing down another CassowaryA Cassowary scoring a rare hit on a Buzzard flying at a sharp angleA Cassowary's landing gear in actionA PV-2 variant of the Lockheed Ventura.Raven Bomber PlaneInteriorBackside of the cockpitDropping multiple bombsEagle Bomber Plane (Old Model)The oldest version of the Bomber plane, sporting a green paint jobFrom the Developer's Twitter, an image of multiple silly turret configurations. Also showcases green color scheme in detail.
## Trivia

* The Bomber is designed after the Lockheed Ventura.

### Changes in Updates

#### EA24

* Model updated, retractible landing gear added, flight model tweaked, increased agility and responsiveness.