Energy Shield

The Energy Shield is a specialized material. Its primary function is defense against beam weapons and projectiles.: they consume energy production to stay charged, and deflect non explosive projectiles, mainly lasers. When turned off they behave as BG bracing, allowing projectile to pass through.

## Energy Shield

### Description

Reflects small arms fire and lasers, disabled by explosive weapons.

## Characteristics

### Pros

Can deflect most projectiles and laser beams. Does not block wind access. Can be toggled off in order to conserve energy or to allow projectiles to pass through.

### Cons

Expensive. Consumes energy while active. Destroyed by explosive weapons. Can be disabled by EMP.

### Overview

The Energy Shield consumes energy in order to produce a protective field along its length. The shield deflects most weapons fire, especially including beams from Plasma Laser and the Firebeam. Reflected attacks deal no damage to the shield itself.

In case of lasers, an energy shield can very likely cause friendly fire, as it is not uncommon for the beam to reflect right back to the attacker or another fort.

Once built, the Energy Shield will passively consume 10 energy per second in order to stay active. If the energy reserve reaches 0 at any point, all shields in the fort will deactivate and will come back online as soon as energy is available again.

A shield can also be manually deactivated by double-clicking it, or selecting the "Turn off" option in its context menu. This can be done to conserve energy, or to let incoming projectiles through (for example when anticipating an attack that is very likely to destroy the shield). A shield will afterwards have to be activated manually with the same method. Note that the Energy Shield has a 10-second charging delay after being toggled on before it comes online and starts blocking damage. During the charge-up process, the shield *cannot be repaired* if it's damaged.

As the Energy Shield does not block wind, it offers a way to protect the Wind Turbines from damage, in place of (or together with) Sandbags.

Weapons reflected by the Energy Shield without any damage being dealt:

* All bullet weapons - Machine Gun, Sniper, Minigun, Shotgun, with the exception of the AP Sniper and AP Minigun, which penetrate the shield (unless hitting Moonshine's shield doors).
* Beam weapons - Plasma Laser, Firebeam, Magna Beam, Orbital Laser.
* Light projectile weapons - 20mm Cannon, Buzzsaw.

The Energy Shield is highly vulnerable to explosive weapons. Almost all explosive weapons in the game will destroy the shield in a single hit.

* Swarm Missiles, Warhead, Cannon, Howitzer, Heavy Mortar, Deckgun, Thunderbolt or Nighthawk bombs, will all destroy an energy shield with a single hit.
* Incendiary Mortar can destroy the shield, but due to its low damage it requires two hits to do so.
* EMP will disable the shield and will deal small amount of splash damage (deals no direct damage).
* Rocket will damage the shield on direct hit, but due to its exceptionally low damage modifier - 0.25x - requires two hits to do so. A direct rocket hit will also cause the shield to deactivate and will force it to go through the 10-second warmup delay before it comes back online. Note that this means that a single rocket volley will never destroy an undamaged shield directly, as it will immediately deactivate upon being struck and let the second rocket fly through.

Further to the above, the Energy Shield is also capable of deflecting depleted uranium penetrators from the weapons infused with Buster's active ability. Note that this only applies to the *penetrator itself* - the shield can still be destroyed by a Cannon or a Howitzer, in which case it will not prevent the depleted round from piercing into the fort. For this reason, the blocking of depleted uranium rounds by an energy shield only occurs if the shield itself is protected from destruction (such as with dense wood defense in the front), or if the attack comes from one of the weapons deflected by the shield (such as a 20mm Cannon).

While the Energy Shield offers an impenetrable protection against many weapons, its high build cost and passive energy upkeep, as well as its absolute vulnerability to a range of other weapons, mean that its overuse is ill-advised.