Board Thread:Custom Lore Development/@comment-26084195-20161219032203

Colonial Legionnaires

A Colonial Legionnaire is the rank-and-file soldier of the Terran Alliance, and is usually composed of Humans, though any member of the Alliance can be a Legionnaire.

Legionnaires are deployed in squads of 10-15 soldiers. Platoons are composed of 50 soldiers. Companies are composed of 300 soldiers. A full Legion is composed of a minimum of 100 companies.

A Legionnaire has an appearance similar to this:

Now, the standard laser rifle of the Alliance looks nothing like that, but this should give you a good idea. The armour plating you see there is composed of an advanced alloy, given a refractive coating to further protect against certain weaponry. The real clincher in terms of equipment is the combination of that visor you see and their gun's systems. The visors have an advanced strategic battlefield imaging system. It highlights unfriendlies, shows exactly where your gun is pointing, calculates grenade arcs including wind speeds and scatter at impact, collects active battlefield information such as radiation levels and temperature, and even intelligently switches between standard, night vision, and thermal vision.

Their pouches contain many things a soldier needs, including enough MREs to last for a month, spare grenades, and plenty of spare energy clips. It also contains canteen which will automatically purify water.

the average Colonial Legionnaire weilds a DER-117, or simply "laser rifle". It can be set for semi-automatic, burst fire, or fully automatic firing patterns. It can also be loaded with Terran grenades, which are very small disks. They are aerodynamic, and the firing mechanism takes up very little space. The explosion is still high-yield despite the compact size. The laser rifle is accurate to very long ranges in today's sense, though they are considered middle range in the 24th century.

Generally, two Legionnaires will wield a "Phoenix" laser, a much larger shoulder-mounted weapon designed to be brought to bear against vehicles or heavier infantry. In some cases, Legionnaire squads will be fielded with no Phoenix lasers, and in some cases, they may be fielded with nothing but Phoenix lasers. They have a low rate of fire.

Sometimes, a Legionnaire may be equipped with a plasma rifle. These are only somewhat larger than a laser rifle, and have a large round barrel. These are considered short ranged weapons in the 24th century, though they're about comparable in range to the standard assault rifles of today. They are not as powerful as a Phoenix laser, but they are easier to wield, and wonderful in close combat. Due to the heat produced by the shot, they require about a second of cooldown between each shot, which is shorter than with the Phoenix laser. They are designed to be used against heavy infantry and light vehicles and walkers. Sometimes, an entire squad of Legionnaires is equipped with plasma rifles. These are called Breacher Teams and are sent as the first wave when assaulting enemy fortifications.

Occasionally, one will find squads of only five Legionnaires in heavy weapons squads. Two of them will be equipped with either a tripod-mounted heavy laser, or a full-auto "Raptor" grenade launcher. The other three will be armed with standard laser rifles. 