THE WEAPONS
Alliance: L5-H Riesig Assault Walker
By 2170, the Riesig Assault Walker had been in service with human militaries for fifty years. Designed for the harsh conditions of the northern hemisphere of Earth, they are almost supernaturally reliable machines, requiring little maintenance and boasting excellent fuel efficiency. With an impressive array of weapons options, they can be outfitted for almost any job, from specialist anti-personnel roles to cracking bunkers and fixed defences.
The H variant was the most common in 2170. It possessed two 20mm gatling mass accelerator weapons capable of firing tungsten, disruptor, fragmentation or incendiary rounds at up to 6,000 rounds per minute. Mounted on the sides of the main cabin, these were referred to by troops as the "fangs" of the vehicle, not only because of their placement but also the effect they would have on targets. Vehicles hit by the weapon were sprayed with ragged holes as if bitten repeatedly by some giant beast, whereas infantry would be chewed to pieces entirely. In addition to this, the Riesig H had two multi-purpose missile pods on either side of the driver position. An 155mm mass accelerator was mounted on a remote turret on top with a coaxial machinegun, aimed by the commander seated behind the driver and firing HE-fragmentation or tungsten rounds. Some models replaced the mass accelerator for an anti-aircraft missile system. For defensive purposes, the walker had modern kinetic barrier technology, ablative and hyper-dense plate armour, an active defence system and a highly advanced sensor array.
With its formidable offensive and defensive capabilities, the Riesig is assigned primarily to infantry units to bolster them against armoured attack, and to provide them with support in rough terrain where tanks or anti-grav vehicles would be at a disadvantage. In the streets of New Omaha and other towns on Mindoir, this would prove a very necessary thing, as the batarians turned every junction into a killing zone. The one hundred and twenty Riesig walkers on Mindoir can be credited with saving the urban pockets of the 737th Infantry from being slaughtered, providing weight to the human concept that every military problem has an engineering solution. The batarians would be taught to fear the weapon in many campaigns to come.
Alliance: M-40 Orca Main Battle Tank
The Orca MBT is named for the killer whale of Earth, and was co-developed alongside the Mako APC. Designed for extreme survivability against all forms of ground-based weapons, the Orca incorporated new technologies into a tracked heavy armour hull and a turret system. Slower than the Mako but faster than the Riesig, it was based on the old A-8 Tiger, which had performed well during both the Cold War and the First Contact War. It had a low profile compared to either the Mako or Riesig, giving it a considerable advantage in armoured warfare over either. It required more maintenance than either as well however, mainly due to its numerous redundant systems and large engine.
Its complement of armament was considerable. As its first role is to destroy enemy armour, its primary weapons are an 155mm long-barrel mass-accelerator which is also deployed on the Mako, and an extreme-range guided missile system, which would later become the primary armament of the M-44 Hammerhead series. The ammunition of these weapons can be varied according to the target being fired upon, with HE fragmentation, disruptor and tungsten rounds available for both. It also possesses three machineguns, one coaxial, one hull-mounted and another on the top of the turret with a grenade launcher. For defence, it had kinetic barriers, active defence systems, smoke/decoy launchers, hyper-dense sloped armoured plating coated with non-explosive reactive armour sections, and sensory equipment in small pods facing all directions.
The armoured brigade of the 737th Infantry contained 240 Orca tanks. These were deployed near the river flood plains and rolling farmlands where they would be most effective, and where it was assumed an enemy invasion would strike first. Although a single Orca could destroy any number of batarian vehicles in the open, the invaders were careful to avoid landing zones where they could be attacked in such a manner. Despite this, the tanks would play a crucial role in bringing the battle to a close.
Batarian Hegemony: Personal Kinetic Barriers
Kinetic barriers, or "shields", were a piece of military equipment on the rise by the time of the Battle of Mindoir. First encountered by humans during the Battle of Xi'an Valley, they had a high per-unit cost until the mid-2170s. As such, only elite military forces were issued with them both in the private and public sectors. The soldiers of the Batarian External Forces, and in particular those loyal to Vice-Hegemon Ar'dra, had received them en masse. Every batarian soldier on Mindoir was protected by a kinetic barrier system, giving their infantry a considerable one-to-one advantage in defences over the Alliance Army regulars they faced.
Coupled with the iron discipline and cunning tactics of the External Forces, the barriers became a weapon in themselves. Troops could be used for bait with far less risk to lives and materiel, and massed charges made against Alliance defensive positions that would have been certain suicide to unshielded troops. Kinetic barriers would have a huge impact on both the outcome and tactics of both sides in the battle.
Batarian Hegemony: Biotics
One of the most devastating weapons in the arsenal of the Batarian Hegemony were not built, but were born. The biotic assault trooper is a formidable living weapon, placed into a unit of similar soldiers, given the best in equipment for tech attacks, and high motivated. The ability to manipulate mass over a distance with nothing but an amplifier and their own bodies was one the External Forces valued extremely highly, and biotic individuals were conscripted into service as soon as they could walk. The high instances of biotic potential in batarians before the Reaper War has created some debate as to whether or not the Hegemony was deliberately exposing pregnant women or children to element zero in the hopes of increasing their number. While the only solid evidence for this is the large number of biotics in the batarian military between 2170 and 2184, the theory is compelling due to the motivations of the batarian state at the time.
The biotic squads would cause some of the most grievous casualties to Alliance forces in the course of the battle, acting alongside the krogan platoons in the assaults on the human strongpoints. The impression left on the commanders of the garrison would spread to the High Command once combat telemetry was analysed. The Alliance would found the Army Biotic Assault Corps under the auspices of the First Legion, once enough biotics had come of age two years later. The memory of men being tossed like rag dolls by the batarian attackers on Mindoir would later come to haunt the perpetrators, as the favour was repaid on Anhur and Torfan. In 2170 however, such things were to seem almost inconceivable as the biotics of the External Forces aided the great defeat.