Turret

The term "turrets" refers to the guns mounted on the evil invaders. They are the only source of damage, and they can be knocked off with enough focused fire. These turrets harm players by firing a variety of projectiles:

**Pellets**: These are lozenge-shaped projectiles that always maintain the same speed, velocity, and direction. While one of them is easy to dodge, later waves might present walls of these.

**Shurikens**: These are star-shaped projectiles that decelerate over a long time to create "traps" for the player. While earlier ships fire shurikens directly at the player, later ships tend to form ornate designs out of shurikens like stars and triangles in order to trap the player.

**Boomerangs**: These are angular projectiles that accelerate along a curve. Being the fastest projectile in the game and having a curved path, it can catch the player off guard. While earlier ships tend to fire a few boomerangs, later ships will fire whole streams of these projectiles.

**Lasers**: These are linear projectiles with an infinite length. A laser's path is indicated by a thin, white targeting beam and a charge-up sound. The laser harms anything in its path, so it is often used to trap players in a certain region and bombard them with other projectiles. While earlier ships tend to fire single, tracking beams to directly harm the player, later ships tend to fire a spread of static beams meant to trap the player.

**MIRVs:** These are large circular projectiles that release a ring of pellets or a starburst of the laser when in proximity of the player. While slow and easy to dodge, later waves present clusters of these projectiles that can create whole bullet hells by getting close.

**Doomsday Lasers**: These are linear projectiles with infinite length, like lasers. However, they are always fired forwards and are much bigger, covering around a fifth of the screen. Before it fires, a "cloudy" residue and a charging noise indicate its range. Only the final waves on harder missions present these lasers.

## Firing Patterns

### Independent

   Independent firing patterns are not affected of the position of the player and may have a random element to their positioning. These firing patterns are worth naming and categorizing because strategies for negotiating them can be practiced and applied wherever the pattern recurs. While the appropriate dodging strategy may be difficult, independent firing patterns must have a solution because truly impassable firing patterns would be imbalanced. Thus, anticipation and preparation are essential for negotiating difficult untargeted firing patterns.

### Dependent

   Dependent firing patterns are controlled by the position of the player. Different turrets have different speeds at which they track the player, but they are always affected by the position of the player. Unlike independent firing patterns, dependent firing patterns can create impassable barriers, so a general strategy involves drawing fire in one direction to create openings elsewhere.

* basic targeted pellets and shurikens
* targeted spreads
* targeted lasers
* Long lag turrets

Long lag turrets take some time to rotate towards the player's current position, even though they fire at a preset frequency. As a result, fast player motions can cause these turrets to face many directions and thus distribute pellets or shurikens in unpredictable locations. Long lag turrets, especially those that fire many projectiles, must, therefore, be carefully "led" to encourage them to fire in one direction and leave undefended space elsewhere.

* Short lag turrets

Short lag turrets rotate towards the player's current position quickly. These turrets are easily "led" to fire in one direction and thus leave undefended space. However, because they track closely, flying close to these turrets is much more dangerous because they are more likely to put a bullet into the player's flight path. Likewise, boomerang turrets may not obviously be facing the player, causing interactions with them to be unpredictable. Short lag laser turrets must be very carefully anticipated because the player must remain in motion while the laser is firing

* Zero lag turrets

Zero lag turrets always face exactly the location of the player. Laser turrets are never zero lag turrets because they would instantly kill the player. Much like short lag turrets, pellet/shuriken turrets are extremely dangerous to fly close to, because only projectile delay protects the player from the turret.