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| Overview
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STARFIGHTER WEAPONS AND CHARACTERISTICS
COUNTERMEASURES Commonly mounted on starfighters when enemy forces are known to possess missile armaments. Used to destroy or confuse incoming enemy warheads. Countermeasures are only effective at extremely close range and are intended as a final defense against imminent missile impact. FLARES Flares are fired individually from a craft to impact and destroy a single incoming warhead. The flare is ejected directly aft and has a range of 0.55 km. Flares are represented as an orange streak on the HUD. If being closely pursued by enemy craft, a pilot may eject a flare. The impact will cause only minor damage to the pursuing craft, but will cause it to spin out of control as in a collision. This may give the fleeing pilot a few seconds to shake pursuit or turn and destroy the attacker. CHAFF Unlike the flare, which actively destroys the incoming warhead, Chaff bursts of energized particles cause premature detonation, saving the craft from damage. The close proximity explosion still causes the craft to temporarily spin out of control, but no damage is sustained. Chaff is visible as multiple streams of sparkling particles trailing from a vessel. Chaff bursts have a duration of several seconds and are effective against multiple warhead impacts within that time. Chaff is a purely defensive countermeasure with no offensive applications.
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