Nix

Nix is the name of a series of bipedal combat vehicles that the Air Raider can call for in Earth Defense Force 5. They are the spiritual successor to the BM03 Vegalta series.

Description
Nixes are large, bipedal humanoid combat vehicles which walk with a fully upright posture and can carry up to four weapons, two on their arms or in their hands, and two on their shoulders.

They are more maneuverable than the Vegalta, in particular having the ability to turn on the spot without walking forwards or backwards, though they are still not able to side-step. As before, they take some time to accelerate to their full walking speed, particularly lower-level and "heavy" variants. They retain the jump and boost functionality, which can be accessed by pressing L3 or X on a PS joypad: this does not change if the default controls are altered. A Nix will jump vertically if it is stationary and forwards or backwards if it has any momentum in the relevant direction: engaging the thrusters will give extra height at a cost of reducing directional momentum the longer they are fired, down to the small amount the thrusters alone provide. Their armament mostly functions in the same way as before, with the main exception being missile launchers. With these, rather than being a vertical-launch type as on the Vegaltas, they fire forwards and handle like those of a Naegling Self-Propelled Missile Launcher, with a fairly long unguided coasting period before starting to seek: in most cases this requires them to turn right around to hit a nearby target. They are fired in a shotgun-like spread which can result in them colliding with the ground even if fired with the torso level: on the flipside, this means the player can lock on to distant targets and then point the launchers directly at a nearby enemy to hit them at short range. Like other vehicle-mounted homing weapons, their targeting box is always "up" whenever they can fire, so it is a little trickier to lock on to a specific target than when using a portable guided weapon. Missile launchers have six locks each, with a lock-on time of 0.55 seconds, launch at a rate of 5 shots per second, and after firing have a 7 second delay before the targeting box appears again and another launch is allowed.

Another change is that there are now two types of automatic weapon on Nixes: some variants use a "Machine Gun" rather than the traditional Revolver Cannon. This weapon fires much faster (sharing the Combat Burner's rate of 30 shots/sec rather the the Revolver Cannon's 12) and has a larger reserve of ammunition, at a cost of slightly decreased per-shot power, inferior range, and more importantly having damage falloff at range like the Ranger's assault rifles and shotguns. Shots from a Machine Gun fly straight rather than with the slight arc of Revolver Cannon shots. While this weapon's stats as written indicate absolutely catastrophic range falloff on later variants, this appears to be an error in writing the stats of variants with Machine Guns: all variants state their minimum damage as the same as that of the Nix A (2.4), thus probably indicating some kind of copy-paste problem. The actual damage at maximum range has been tested to be around 60 on the Nix Assault: most likely the minimum is 50 and the range falloff factor for Machine Guns is a minimum of one-sixth of their total damage. This assumption is used in the stat blocks below.

For whatever reason, Nixes do not destroy minor objects by walking into them: instead, these objects simply do not have collision detection relative to the Nix and it can walk right through them as if they are not there.

It is tricky to get on top of a Nix to plant assist devices, shields or turrets, generally requiring the use of higher terrain or buildings, though with practice it is possible to place a post-type assist device on the machine's left foot fairly consistently. The "origin bone" of the Nix model which is targeted by assist devices is just above the ground between its feet, so it is best to aim low when using an Assist Gun.

The biggest change to the Nix is armor: the high-end variants in particular have vastly superior armor to their Vegalta equivalents, almost to the point of insanity: the best general-purpose variant is bumped up from 20,000 to 104,400 health, only slightly less than the top-level B651 Titan. With the best Guard Post protecting it, this Nix requires almost 280,000 damage to destroy it.

While the Air Raider is the only one who can call in a Nix, any class can drive one once it is summoned: the same goes for Nixes pre-placed in missions.

Standard series
These are jack-of-all-trades variants with middle-of-the-road mobility and boost capabilities, heavy armor, and flexible armament that allows them at least one weapon appropriate to most types of threat. Since later variants can have four weapons all of which have totally different firing characteristics, it is important to have a strong grasp of which button fires what in order to make effective use of them.

Variants with a Rocket Cannon have been nerfed somewhat in that their ammunition has been reduced by one-third compared to their equivalent in the standard Vegalta series, having 20 rounds instead of 30. Missile Pods have had their ammunition count reduced from 64 to 40. Missile Pods no longer have a figure given for their lock-on range, but it appears to be the same 500 meters as the Vegaltas.

Rocket cannon shots will tend to drift upwards from the laser sight's point of aim at long range.

Flame series
The Flame series are red-painted close combat specialists, all armed with at least one flamethrower weapon and with the best mobility and jump characteristics of any basic variant. As with the Vegalta, a DLC "Gold Coat" variant is present: this time rather than having no shoulder weapon it has a unique one, being equipped with a timed grenade launcher on each shoulder that fires in 8-round bursts.

Combat Burners deal low per-shot damage that quickly adds up: their flames always travel out to their maximum range, piercing through enemies and bouncing off solid surfaces, and can damage any enemy they contact. They are best suited to attacking basic insect enemies, particularly Rollers as the weapon will knock them out of their attack animation and the creatures can only deal damage by touching the Nix while in that state. Their rapid fire makes them excellent at stunlocking such enemies.

The shoulder-mounted "Canister Shot" weapon exclusive to this type is an excellent general-purpose shotgun-type weapon that fires a spread of powerful piercing projectiles, lobbing them with a slight ballistic arc. They will tear through enemies on the ground, their spread makes them effective anti-air weapons, and they are even quite suited to attacking tough, large targets such as Teleportation Ships. Their only real shortcoming is a small reserve of ammunition.

Missile-Gun series
These variants are roughly as mobile as the standard series, but focus on engaging multiple targets, packing Revolver Cannons on both arms and Missile Pods on both shoulders. The B variant is the same as a basic Nix, while others have superior upper-body mobility.

The New Revolver Cannon used by the Nix Revolver Custom comes with the benefit of increased muzzle velocity, improving the weapon's performance against fast-moving targets.

Buster series
The Buster series are the heaviest, slowest and most cumbersome variant of the Nix, with minimal jump and thrust capabilities. They make up for this with heavy armament: the first variant has a pair of powerful burst-firing Revolver Cannons with piercing ammunition, backed up with shoulder-mounted Howitzers firing high-explosive rounds, while the latter pair have an even more potent pair of burst-firing Rocket Cannons and their shoulder armament switches to a "Dispersal Howitzer" that fires a spread of explosive submunitions in a similar manner to the Ranger's Stampede launchers and the Fencer's Dispersal Mortars. The laser sight on these weapons indicates the midpoint of the spread of shots, and projectiles will be launched above and below this aim line: it is important not to fire with the torso level to avoid damaging the Nix itself.

It is very important to remember that the Revolver Rocket Cannon's shots deal splash damage: the weapon is extremely powerful (a two-handed shot from a Nix Destroy Cannon throws out 25,200 damage), and firing it at point-blank range will very quickly destroy the Nix itself. The rockets fly perfectly straight after launch but are not particularly speedy, so it can be tricky to lead a moving target and it is often best to mark shots to the ground a target will advance onto rather than aim for an enemy directly.

As with the basic Rocket Cannon, the Revolver Rocket Cannon has been somewhat nerfed in that its ammunition has been reduced by one-third compared to the Vegalta model of the same type.

The Battle Cannon's Heavy Revolver Cannons fire their burst of three shots at a rate of 8.1, with a 1.3 second delay between shots: the rate is thus given as 1.76. Similarly, the Revolver Rocket Cannon's six-round burst is fired at a rate of 4.7 (thus the gun takes over a second to actually finish firing), with a 1.4 second burst delay, so the rate of fire is 2.3. Like all other vehicle-mounted burst fire weapons in EDF 5, getting out of the vehicle will not cause it to stop firing mid-burst.

Grenadier series
A new series for EDF 5 with no equivalent among the Vegaltas, the distinctive weapons of these variants are cannons that lob time-delay explosive grenades in a ballistic arc with good damage and splash radius at a decent rate, and an odd weapon simply called "Explosion." The latter resembles a Dispersal Howitzer, but functions rather differently: it fires a spread of piercing shots on a flat trajectory which explode either 0.5 seconds after launch or if they strike terrain, but not if they hit an enemy. The range is quite short, with the weapon best suited to close-in defence against swarms of weaker foes.

Because the hits from an Explosion are counted separately, they are very effective at dealing with the multi-layer armor of Cosmonauts.

Firing range figures are not given in-game for the grenade launcher or "explosion" weapons: unlike some other weapons, this is not because the range is infinite.

Machine Gun series
This group consists of a pair of DLC variants, one directly paid and one unlockable in a mission pack. The paid version is the Nix Phantasia Shield, a Bullet Girls Phantasia themed variant armed with two of the same "Machine Gun" weapon as the Nix A, and no shoulder weapon. It is arguably better than the A, having more HP and lacking the clunky, slow-firing Rocket Gun.

The Nix Assault is the DLC 2 variant, and has by far the best handling of any Nix, slightly exceeding the Red Guard in both speed and jump capabilities. Like the Saber, it does not precisely fit into any other Nix series, being armed with two very powerful Machine Guns and a single Explosion on the right shoulder with identical stats to the pair on the Grenadier EZ.

Nix Saber
The Nix Saber is the DLC 1 Nix variant, and has handling derived from the Nix Destroy Cannon, though the upper body is more mobile. It has a unique armament considering exclusively of laser weapons: a pair of "Power Saber" arm weapons similar to the armament of the DLC Omega Free Bike that function like a very short-ranged version of a Cosmonaut's Raster Cannon, while the shoulder armament is a pair of ridiculously souped-up Powerdynes. This weapon in particular allows the Nix Saber to take on even foes like Deroys that most other variants struggle to deal with. Both weapons have full-range penetration capabilities.

The Power Saber fires in a 300-round burst: as with all burst-fire vehicle weapons in EDF 5, it is not possible to cut this short and the weapon will continue firing even if the driver exits the Nix after shooting. This means that while the weapon has 6000 ammunition, it actually only has 20 shots.

Pre-placed
As well as the selection of Nixes that can be summoned, there are four drivable variants found in missions, two of which (Nix Green and Nix Yellow) do not match any variant the Air Raider has access to. Their stats scale by difficulty, though their general performance (turn speed, acceleration, top speed, torso movement speed, etc) is generally on par with the lowest-level variant of whatever type they are closest to. As it is difficult to derive damage stats for them since the damage value of their armament also scales by difficulty and by which mission they are encountered in, damage figures are not given. The listed values for their HP are lowest on Easy to highest on Inferno.

As with the Blacker, pre-placed Nixes appear in some missions set underground where the vehicle could not normally be summoned. One result of this is that the Nix does not have an associated headlight effect, making dark areas a little tricky to navigate.

Nix Blue and Nix Green variants are the only NPC types encountered: they have the same armament as the player-controlled versions, though for some reason they use a slightly different gunfire effect for their Revolver Cannons. They will typically either stand still or follow a fixed route and then stand still: like other NPC vehicles, they have unlimited ammunition. They are extremely effective at medium range against insect-type foes, but will quickly be overwhelmed if forced to fight at close range or against large numbers of aerial targets.

Pre-placed Nix Assaults only appear in DLC 2 mission 8, where two sets of two of them are spawned on the map's beaches, intended to be used to defend against the map's ridiculous army of Silver Spiders: they have the same handling as the Air Raider Nix Assault, though they have almost double the health of the player-deployed version on Inferno.

Trivia

 * The vehicle's name is probably supposed to be Nyx, after the Greek goddess who personified the night and was mother to a great many other deities.
 * The game persistently refers to them as "powered exoskeletons," despite that they are vehicles that the operator drives rather than suits that they wear.
 * In addition to the various armed variants, completely unarmed Nixes can be seen as scenery objects at Base 228.
 * The guide laser will visibly arc to indicate the point of aim for howitzers and revolver cannons, suggesting the EDF has somehow invented bendy light.
 * A "revolver cannon" is a real system, used on some guns for fighter jets and warships: the loading mechanism uses a cylinder with multiple chambers to cycle rounds from the magazine. However, the Nix's gun has multiple barrels while a revolver cannon usually only has one, meaning it is probably a mistranslation of "rotary cannon."
 * The Sergeant is apparently licensed to pilot a Nix.