Caravan Armored Vehicle

The Caravan Armored Vehicle is a vehicle that the Air Raider can call on in Earth Defense Force 2025 and Earth Defense Force 4.1: The Shadow of New Despair.

In Earth Defense Force 5 it becomes the correctly-translated Caliban Support Vehicle. It is still exclusive to the Air Raider class.

Description
The Caravan is an unarmed, tracked mobile field hospital which can be used to administer treatment to injured soldiers in the field. Since the giant insects and Ravagers clearly do not have any issues with shooting at a hospital, it is also heavily armored.

It is the only such device in either game that can be used an unlimited number of times (subject to supply credit availability), since other healing items like Life Vendors and Reversers cannot be reloaded.

The Caravan has a single driver's position, which can be occupied by an Air Raider or Ranger, and three positions in the rear treatment bay, which any soldier class can occupy. The driver is not healed by being in the vehicle, but all soldiers in the rear bay are. Each Caravan has a set amount of medical supplies inside which is displayed where ammunition normally would be, indicating the total number of hitpoints the vehicle can restore. The displayed "recovery rate" is per frame, meaning it occurs up to sixty times a second.

NPC soldiers will never get in a Caravan no matter how injured they are, even if they have been recruited by the Air Raider driving it. The only way for it to heal anyone in singleplayer is if the Air Raider gets in the back himself.

It is a very large, bulky vehicle but is surprisingly fast and manoeuvrable considering how durable it is; a near-level Caravan is actually tougher than an Epsilon Armored Railgun.

Strategy
The primary weakness of the Caravan is that it takes up the Air Raider's vehicle slot, forcing them to rely entirely on strikes or their comparatively puny weapons to deal damage. As such, it is primarily suited to multiplayer use where other players can use it to stay in the fight, and benefits greatly from being hidden under bridges if there are no Deroys or artillery Hectors around to disturb it. It also benefits from protection by ZE-Guns.

Because the vehicle is so large it is actually a little difficult to get on top of it; the best path is to use the front mudguards, then walk along the side of the vehicle about halfway before jumping to the roof.

Variants
All Caravan variants have a crew of 4 and reload for 5,000 credits.

Description
The Caliban, as well as its new correct translation, boasts a swanky new model. Handling and functionality are similar to the previous iterations, but all Calibans have increased amounts of healing supplies compared to the equivalent Caravan variant, at least twice as much for all variants, with some having even more. However, this is balanced by an increase in their reload credit cost of just under 50%. While driving a Caliban, the driver's item collection radius is increased by 400%. Any health pickups the vehicle collects count as being picked up by the driver, not the passengers. Any soldier class can occupy the driver's seat of a Caliban in this version.

As before, it represents the only method of healing which is not severely limited in supply, only being limited by reload credits rather than having a fixed amount of ammunition. The driver is not healed by being in the vehicle, but all three positions in the rear treatment bay (accessed by a single boarding circle) offer healing at the maximum rate. As with ammo for normal vehicles, there is no way to replenish healing supplies, though even when they are depleted the vehicle is still functional as an unarmed APC.

While in the previous games the Caravan was only really useful with other human players to pick up the slack for the Air Raider's absent vehicle, the vastly improved offensive capabilities of the new Air Raider mean it is not necessarily even a bad idea to take one in singleplayer. It is still possible to get on top of the vehicle by jumping on the front of the track guards and then using the step near the back to get on its roof, allowing deployables to be placed or the Air Raider to target strikes from a higher vantage point and without NPCs jumping around in front of him as NPCs are wont to do.

New for EDF 5 are NPC Calibans which can be found among EDF forces in a few missions. They will typically be placed in a fixed position and their driver's seat is not available, but player characters can get in the back and use their healing supplies until they are depleted. NPCs still cannot heal from these vehicles.

Two variants are DLC. The first is bought as a single item and is a low-level example with impressive-looking stats including more health than the variant above it, but a fixed 10,000 reload credit requirement that cannot be improved. It has a blue paint scheme with the obligatory anime girls for a DLC vehicle, and a pink interior.

The other DLC variant is one of the level 100+ weapons that can only be unlocked as a drop while playing the DLC level packs on Inferno difficulty. It is unlockable only in DLC mission pack 1, and represents an across-the-board improvement over the final normal variant, in particular featuring doubled recovery speed.

Variants
All variant have a crew of 4. Stats reflect the lowest possible request cost.

Trivia

 * The English name in 2025 and 4.1 is mistranslated due to the lack of B / V and L / R distinctions in Japanese; it is supposed to be the Caliban armoured vehicle, after a character in Shakespeare's The Tempest.
 * The EDF 5 Caliban has the hull of an American AAVP7A1 Amtrack, with the treads shifted out from under the body and a large section added to the top.
 * Power Posts and Power Assist Guns actually work on a Caravan/Caliban: they will increase the rate at which it restores life.
 * The interior model used for the rear compartment of the Caravan is identical to that of Armored Vehicle Grape.
 * The Caravan's toughness is a product of the 1.03 balance patch for 2025: prior to this, they had about one-third the amount of health and were basically useless.