Engineer (Tiberium Wars)

"Engineers are not combat units and must be protected!"

- GDI Officer

An engineer is a member of GDI's Corps of Engineers, tasked with capturing and repairing structures in Tiberium Wars and Kane's Wrath. Their Nod equivalent is the Saboteur, and their Scrin equivalent is the Assimilator.

Background
Though excellent at battlefield maintenance, engineers are not well suited to combat. Trained in structural engineering and sabotage, Engineers are non-combatant infantry capable of performing a number of duties. Most notably, these infantry units almost instantly take over enemy structures. Although Engineers possess decent armour, they are normally unarmed, relying on Commanders to clear the battlefield for them, or more likely, to be transported in Armoured Personnel Carriers, or in helicopters.

A typical engineer wears light combat armour (about as protective as a paper sheet) and a gas mask, carries a suitcase with all the necessary tools and control codes for his job as well as GD45 pistols for self defence, though its more of a morale improving item rather than a proper combat weapon.

Battlefield engineers usually first study the "Engineer Combat Primer", a manual that provides basic information on combat engineering and gives the immortal tip to "always wear your hard hat".

Information gleaned from the Tacitus gave GDI some basic information about the Scrin. Although lacking information relating to their tactics and strategies, the information about the Scrin's basic engineering mechanism (including command and control) became accessible. By the later stages of the Third Tiberium War, GDI had trained their engineers in the use of Scrin technology.This decision has proven decisive as GDI engineers have minor difficulties in capturing Scrin structures and walkers.

Game unit
Engineers can prove to be a powerful unit, even though they lack weapons. They have three primary uses in the battlefield: capturing enemy structures, repairing allied structures, and capturing or reclaiming walker husks. They unfortunately cannot repair civilian structures anymore, but they can still garrison inside them for additional safety.

Engineers should be among the first thing a player builds, as capturing neutral structures early on can even the tide for later. Engineers generally should accompany walker divisions so that their husks can be reclaimed as soon as they are downed; players often do anything they can to avoid having their investment on walkers turn against them.

GDI Engineers have a particularly nasty combination of combining with an APC for what is known as the "APC-Engineer rush". Players will try loading engineers into an APC, then charge them at the enemy base. As soon as an APC parks right next to a key structure, the engineer unloads and takes the building. This vastly improves their survivability, but can be countered by selling the building, which produces a squad(or swarm, for the Scrin's case) of basic infantry which kills the engineer or putting up anti-vehicle defences.

As of Kane's Wrath, however, Engineers take several seconds to claim a structure, making the APC-Engineer rush a less viable tactic.

Changelog

 * Tiberium Wars patch 1.01: can no longer capture structures when under the effects of the phase field support power.
 * Tiberium Wars patch 1.05:
 * fixed an exploit which allowed engineer-type units to capture a structure without being adjacent to ita
 * speed increased by 20%
 * can now capture enemy structures and repair allied structures as soon as they reach the edge of the structuresa

a - as Kane's Wrath used a long-obsolete version of Tiberium Wars as its coding base, these changes were effectively reversed in the expansion pack and were never officially fixed.

Variants

 * Combat engineer (Steel Talons)

When created

 * I've got your codes!

When selected

 * Commander?
 * E-engineer, reporting in!
 * I can figure it out!
 * Reporting in!
 * I've got all I need.
 * Everything's ready!
 * Let's get to work!
 * It's all ready!

When moving

 * On my way!
 * Got it.
 * Okay...
 * I'll see ya there!
 * Am I covered?
 * Is this way clear?
 * I'm on it!

When garrisoning a structure

 * Looks safe to me.
 * I'll hide in there for now.
 * Should be safe in there.

When ordered to capture a building

 * I see it, I'm on my way!
 * Grabbing control codes!
 * It won't be long!
 * I'll find a way inside!
 * Just give me a sec to get in there!
 * I'll get this one!

When ordered to repair

 * This one needs some work!
 * I'll fix this one!
 * I'll see what the problem is!
 * I'll fix it, no problem!

When ordered to capture a husk

 * We can use this!
 * I can get that thing working!

When retreating

 * A little help?
 * Time to go!
 * I think it's time to go!

Idle animations
The engineer has the following idle animations:
 * Checks his watch and taps it to make sure it is not broken.
 * Clumsily drops his briefcase and then makes sure nobody saw it.
 * Opens his briefcase and has a drink.