Planetary Warfare Manual

Planetary Warfare Manual

General Introduction

The technological progress of the past centuries has created a great number of weapons of destruction that are now used by numerous armed powers of the Known Galaxy. The list beneath is by no means full, as attempting to count all types of exotech weaponry ever encountered by Mankind would take days.
A number of relatively common exotechs will be written down, however. There'll be marked: [XT] for Xenotechs, [ART] for Archeotechs, [ALT] for Altertechs, [VT] for Voidtechs. Additiona [FBD] signature will be added when the possession and usage of said weaponry (conventional or exo) is considered forbidden by the law of the Confederation of Mankind.

Weaponry

Melee Weapons

Introduction

The deployment of first Heavy Infantry and then Enhanced has led to a limited resurgence of melee weapons on the modern battlefield. A modern exoskeleton (part of even the lightest powered armor) can improve his user's strength by a large margin, allowing something as simple as a sword to slice apart moderately thick armors. It didn't take long for some people to capitalize on this fact - in fact a fair part of the early successes of the genetic warlords during the Genetic Wars was due to mass employment of CQC.
A modern melee combatant is typically a well trained specialist and a tactician, capable of utilizing a great number of methods to close the distance without being killed - including modern forms of nanomachine-based smokescreens, personal AIs disrupting enemy detection equipment, optical camouflage, suppression fire and all gifts of various archeotechs. They are especially often encountered during a boarding operations in space and in urban environment, when the environment itself greatly helps in closing the distance. There were cases of entire squads massacred within seconds by a single successful CQC attack - and of squads of CQC-oriented Enhanced annihilating entire companies of infantry equally fast.
There are also melee weapons that can be used by simple soldiers against heavy infantry or even Enhanced, though typically archeotech in origin. And without improved reflexes and good planning they will typically fail to slay their target.

Weapon List

Magnetic Blade - The standard melee weapon of the average elite soldiers of any star nation. A significant level-up from even the best knives and bayonets. Especially when one needs to kill a person wearing proper battle armor. It’s essentially a tube attached to a hand from the outer side. It contains a blade covered in electromagnets powered from the outside power source (typically the battle armor or powered armor).
When the weapon is fired, the blade is ejected with great force - much greater than a simple swing could produce, even one powered by an exoskeleton. Using it while in battle armor tends to end up in discomfort. There were cases of soldiers intentionally overcharging the system for a great penetration power only to end up losing at least a part of an arm.
When the blade is deployed it can also be used for more classic melee combat - alternatively it can also be pulled back into its tube, and remain there until it is needed once again. The result is a dangerous if simple weapon.
Sidhe’ Power Glaive [XT] - Standard weaponry of Sidhe’ cyberknights, designated as grade 1 xenotech. It looks like a long metallic pole that - when activated - exudes a half-transparent energy blade with shape reminiscing of old Terran glaives. The size makes this weapon a but unwieldy - or at least it would, if not for the fact that it has been subtly modified to allow for devastating thrusts.
This weapon is a truly magnificent example of Sidhe' reality-altering exotechnology. It's capable of easily slicing through every type of armor, though this effect tends to penetrate material only to some depth. Because of that while the resistance of the material used to create armor doesn't matter, only its thickness does.
However, the supply is rather limited - Seelie keep most of their technology for themselves, and the Unseelie are rare. Most of the power glaives that found their way into the human hands are currently in possession of various successful Enhanced serving powerful countries.
Electric Glove is a glove that can produce powerful electric discharges on contact. When used in tandem with a suit capable of producing its own power (any form of powered armour, though many models of battle armour can work just as well) it can do more than just stun unarmored opponents.
Such electic glove is capable of instantly knocking out robots, killing all unarmored opponents (save for some really large creatures) and damaging or temporarily disabling powered armors. When overcharged (which can leave the user's armor disabled for a while) it can also would or kill people in armors. When done with lighter armors it can reach the level of power normally available to heavier ones.
The electric glove is far from being a perfect weapon. Malfunctions happen, sometimes to the point where the user gets electrocuted alongside the target. It's also technologically advanced (so expensive and of limited supply), and it really drains the power supply. As a result, it's much less popular than one would expect.
Monomolecular Blades [ART/ALT] are an entire family of melee weapons that use certain technological gimmick to change their outdated designs into something useful on the modern battlefield. They are all bladed weapons that were sharpened to the point where their cutting edge is merely a single molecule wide, allowing them to slice through armors as if they weren't there. A man in a powered armor to enhance his strength can potentially slice a tank apart with one of these blades.
Monomolecular blades are still classified as exotechs, despite their nature being mostly understood and successfully replicated. That's because manmade monoblades typically go dull after slicing something - even the most advanced ones will stop being monomolecular after a dozen slashes. In the meantime even the least advanced exotech will retain its properties for several hundreds of those - some o them can even sharpen themselves, which means they are going to remain like that forever.
The altertechs are naturally more sought-after due to being better profiled for man-shaped combatants. Monoblades are also counted among the more common of the exotech melee weapons - which, naturally, means also that many enemies will be knowledgeable on dealing with them.
Tavsian Scorchblades [ART] are an assortment of archeotech swords and other bladed weapons attributed to a single fairly prominent precursor species known as Tavsians. Their masters achieved mastery when it comes to control of the temperature. These blades cause a sudden increase in temperature in every inorganic object that they have contact with.
Merely one-second contact with an activated scorchblade increases the surface temperature by at least 500C. Several slashes can cook alive a heavy powered armor' user without breaching the armor itself. They can also quickly disarm enemy carrying a shield. On the other hand they tend to fare poorly against enemies lacking armors. What's more, they are at best so-so against robots - the temperature raise doesn't transfer between layers composed of significantly different materials, and merely surface temperature spike will typically fail to knock out a combat robot unless numerous hits are made.
Scorchblades are probably the second most common melee combat exotechs after the monoblades. Common enough for most cutting-edge armors possessing necessary countermeasures to dampen the scorchblade effects (mostly composite-layered or modular armor plates).
Magnetic Hammers [ART] are something both devastating and hard to use in constricted spaces. They are blunt weapons that essentially weaponize magnetic shields by installing their generators in a casing resembling the hammerhead (though sometimes of rather alien forms). The result is a blunt weapon of potentially incredible power.
The lowest grade exotech magnetic hammers (or the best conventional ones, as hammers were partially replicated) can shatter a shield carried by a soldier in a powered armor. The more powerful on their high power setting can squash a tank like a tin can. There are even some of such an incredible power that it isn't exactly clear how were they used by their creators - after all who needs a melee weapon that can destroy starships?
The maghammers aren't exactly useful in constricted spaces of starships and arcologies, however they excel in engagements against heavier enemies in a slightly more open terrain. They also often possess secondary 'modes of fire' that can use powerful bursts of magnetic fields to startle or even throw around the nearest enemies.
Jahvirian Plagueblades [ART][FBD] are melee combat exotechs forbidden due to being essentially a CQC branch of hostile self-replicating nanotechnology. They aren't a prime target of the Supreme Council' tech-purges due to their scale of operations simply not being large enough to warrant a lot of attention.
Their blades are composed of nanomachine that can 'infect' living flesh on contact, triggering their own self-replication process. Being grazed is lethal in 100% of cases unless someone possesses cutting edge medical nanoware. In which case the result is 'merely' a set of symptoms similar to severe ebola virus, lasting for hours. Debilitating, and it starts influencing the victim within seconds, making it a viable combat weapon.
These weapons are rarely used, and mostly by forces outside of the Confederation of Mankind' control - so primarily by some aliens and the Discord. They aren't very popular, though, due to their makers being far from humanoid, these blades are often rather cumbersome to use.
Hyperspace Blades [ART][FBD] are a wide family of various slashing weapons that employ spatial manipulation technology to create a cutting edge from a spacial distortion connecting Realspace with Hyperspace. The result is a weapon that slices apart the very spacetime instead of matter that happens to occupy bits of it.
Hyperspace blades cannot be stopped by shields, armors or other melee weapons, with the single exception of other hyperblades and extremely rare voidblades. A sufficiently large hyperspace blade will slice a tank apart, the vehicle not offering any noticeable resistance. Of course, there are side effects.
This is, after all, a permanently existing rift connecting the Realspace with the Hyperspace. It's not wide enough to cause instant madness in everyone in the vicinity, but prolonging usage of these weapons will inevitably lead to deterioration of mental health. What's more, it's a weapon that's also psychically dangerous for its users, as accidental cuts (and occasional accidental self-decapitation) happen quite often.
Voidblades [VT] are much more mysterious and rare cousins of the Hyperblades that can only be found in the Void - and even that is extremely rare. For majority of Mankind they exist as myths. Those who know much more than various secrets of the universe are sometimes carrying these portable weapons of mass destruction.
The actual mechanism behind the voidblades is unknown. However they work, they not only are capable of slicing through almost everything at will (they can also not slice everything at will - they somehow understand the users' intent and cut only when they want to) but are also actively intercepting majority of attacks without moving for an inch. All you need is to just stand there with a voidblade in hand and nothing smaller than an artillery round can scratch you. Even the hyperblades fail to put a dent in these weapons.
Naturally - as in case of all voidtechs - these weapons are incredibly rare. Not more than few hundred of those has ever left the Voidspace.

Ranged Weapons

Introduction

Rather than describing any type of weapon on its own, like with melee weapons, a different approach will be taken. A list of weapon technologies will be provided, together with a summary of what sorts of weaponry it is used for. Once that is over, these 'sorts of weaponry' will be listed, including some... a bit more unique.

Weapon Technologies

Firearms, the ancient and venerable family of weapons using a chemical reaction to push solid rounds from the barrel - that to this day failed to become outdated. While their initial velocity is laughable when compared to magnetic weapons, greatly limiting the armor-piercing capabilities (and requiring atmosphere to work), they possess a number of advantages over their younger siblings.
They are easy to produce, require almost no energy to fire, and can achieve much higher rate of fire than even the fastest shooting magnetic rifle. What's more with proper munitions and range they can damage overwhelming majority of enemies that can be encountered on modern battlefield. As a result they remain the backbone of overwhelming majority of planetary armies.
They are typically encountered as handguns, submachine guns, shotguns, and assault rifles, but that's as far as they go. Sniper rifles and dedicated anti-tank weapons are typically delegates to their younger cousin (and rival) described beneath.
Magnetic Weapons, also known as pulse weapons, remain the second part of the duopol of conventional weaponry... and the firearms' main competitor. Either coilguns or railguns, they both use powerful electromagnets to propel solid rounds - with a speed higher than typically achievable by the firearms.
They offer lower recoil, and tend to reliable, accurate and of significant ability to penetrate armors. On the other hand, they require power source to perform to their full ability, fail to shoot fast enough to be considered fully automatic, and are much more expensive than their main competitors. Still within the price range of most countries, though.
Pulse weapons are used for anti-tank weaponry (rifles and cannons), sniper rifles, and battle rifles. No machine guns, as this technology just isn't tailored for this type of weapons. However some of the most advanced countries and organizations have recently began fielding magnetic assault rifles and submachine guns capable of firing short (3-4 rounds) burst of incredible stopping power.
Laser Weapons are the most probable future competitor to the firearms and magnetic weapons. Unfortunately, they remain just a bit beyond the current Humanity's ability to mass-produce. They can be produced (making them a conventional technology rather than exo one), but not in numbers necessary to oufit larger military formations. They can sometimes be encountered in hands of various elite formations.
Lasers offer excellent penetration of conventional armors and perfect precision. They also cause devastatng wounds, with a powerful laser ray capable of explosively sublimating flesh and melting composite armors. They are perfect as anti-tank rifles and anti-tank guns. In recent decades a growing number of laser battle rifles have appeared on various battlefields, taking full advantage of powered armor' ability to supply power.
Smaller laser weapons are almost uniformly exotechs, due to Mankind lacking technology to produce power sources small enough to sustain more than one or two shots. There are no sniper rifles, as the visible laser ray will betray the sniper's position. In the end, dangerous and suprisingly elegant weapons.
Maser Weapons are a dedicated branch of anti-personnel energy weapons that employ concentrated microwaves instead of light (as lasers do). The effect is a weapon that can cook the target alive without having to penetrate armor. They can also cause armors and combat robots to malfunction through overheating. Which would have make it a perfect weapon if not for few rather important facts.
The largest one is the fact that it's not an efficient weapon. It causes grievous burns through the armor, but actually killing someone is troublesome. It's a weapon more oriented towards mutilating enemies and causing pain rather than simply killing enemies. Of course significantly heavier maser does the job good enough, however using anti-tank gun-equivalent to kill enemy soldiers hardly counts as effective use of weaponry.
Masers are most commonly encountered among shotguns, but also battle rifles and anti-tank rifles - in short, anything that can be fueled by external power sources. Unlike lasers, here you can find almost every type of weaponry though, with those mentioned above being merely the most common ones.
Sonic Weapons are a weapon technology even less pleasurable than the masers. They cause vibrations (audible as incredibly loud and deafening noises for those outside of their effective range) that can cause devastating damage to organic enemies. This makes them operate under similar, power source-reliant, way as masers. And like lasers, they only reach their full potential when exotech.
Conventional sonic weapons have serious problems with wave focus, limiting their effective range. As a result, they are mostly limited to close range weaponry, especially shotguns and grenades. This also means that they require usage of full-cover armors with special modifications to be a viable option, as otherwise they'd kill their user together with their enemies. The focus-wave sonic rifles and shotguns are something exclusively exotech. They are also much more powerful, their emissions sometimes reaching 300db - which is enough to cause an effect best summed up as 'instant explosive dismemberment' on its organic victims. Even machines aren't fully resistant to sonic waves of this magnitude.
Majority of Confederation' members possess ability to produce these weapons, however some decides against that. They are powerful, yet due to their gruesomness also rather unpopular. Explorers' Guild is a frequent user of sonic weaponry, due to being often forced to clear derelicts from various biological horrors.
Needle Weapons are a variant on magnetic weapons that are mosty different by virtue of being built to launch radically dfferent ammunition. Needlers are weapons using electromagnetic force to launch monomolecular needles of incredibly ability to pierce armors. In fact, no such armor can even slow down such a round, making needlers a great thing to use on heavily armored opponents.
Of course, roses rarely come without thorns. Needlers fire rounds of a pathetically low caliber, causing minuscule damage to the target - there are cases of people who received a needle shot through the brain and came out unharmed as the needle by virtue of luck. Their stopping power is also abysmal.
What's more Mankind is yet to reproduce the recovered exotech needlers (majority of them altertechs) to their full potential, making conventional needlers brazenly subpar. The real problem is the ammunition, which also means that producing rounds for exotech needlers is impossible - this makes all users of these weapons use their needlers scarcely.
Memetic Weaponry [ART][ALT][FBD] is a branch of exotechs that had been partially replicated by modern science, though in a degree that would make manmade weapons of this family a viable combat choice. Memetic weapons are weapons using special combination of either sounds or lights to force brains of the living beings receiving the stimuli to activate its neurons in patterns causing numerous harmful side-effects.
Memetic weapons are poorly understood. Harmful or beneficial memetic agents can be created by Mankind, however to actually work as intended they need to be specifically tailored to target's brain structure. As a result, they will work only on a singular target, and it will require possessing access to target's detailed brain scans. What's more, they are on the list of technologies forbidden by the Icarus Accord.
As a result, the actually useful memetic weapons are almost exclusively exotechs, created by civilization that understood how to create memes harmful for a significant majority (if not all) organics. The result is a weapon that damages minds of the enemies, causing brain damage and various side-effects (dizziness, bouts of insanity, rage, overwhelming need to sleep or breed etc.), though most of which can be resisted depending on one's willpower. They are also generally useless against non-organic targets.
Hardlight Weaponry [XT] is a relatively recent addon to the rooster. It's a weapon of choice developed by the precursors known as the Vord Chronocracy. Following an undisclosed incident that involved numerous strike forces of the Explorers' Guild, a number of autofabs producing a wide assortment of hardlight weapons were recovered by the Explorers' Guild. As a result, a growing number of its extermination, threat prevention and containment task groups were rearmed.
Hardlight weapons fire bolts made from a bright matter of unknown nature, possessing properties of light, heat and solid matter. On impact they explode, discharging all three of said elements of composition. The result is a weapon capable of piercing all but the toughest conventional armor, firing ammunition that explodes on contact producing a searing heat and a lot of shrapnels.
Hardlight weapons are a varied assortment of pistols, assault rifles, shotguns (with shrapnels that explode on contact like the projectiles themselves) and anti-tank rifles and guns. Their greatest advantage are extremely capacious power cells, allowing a normal trooper carry and use weapon capable of piercing heavy armors.
Plasma Weapons [ART] are, simply speaking, a pure manifestation of the concept of overkill. Plasma weaponry launches bolts of superheated plasma approaching few million degrees Celsius, capable of melting through absolutely everything besides the warship' armor layer. Every hit, even a glancing one, means death. The result is a weapon branch capable of fielding anti-tank sidearms.
Of course, it's not as great as it sounds. Plasma bolts are prone to causing massive collateral damage. Worse, they lose cohesiveness quickly and disperse into clouds of superheated plasma that melts everything in the area before cooling down. This massively lowers plasma' effective range. And if that wasn't enough, the person using plasma guns are notoriously unstable (prone to spontaneous explosion or fatal overheating), and that's without counting in the fact that they standing in arm's range of a weapon firing such bolts is simply dangerous on itself.
As a result, most of the sane users of plasma weapons tend to use it as a dedicated anti-tank weapon, typically grafted onto a combat robot or a drone tank. It's the insane users that are the real problem, however. No manmade versions thus far, due to manmade' plasma bolts dispersing too quickly, rendering the weapon ineffectual.
Vostian Weaponry [ART] are a whole array of weapons attributed to the Vostian precursor civilization. They are counted among the stranger exotechs, with modern science failing to make any sort of theory explaining how exactly they work. Also only a single known precursor species has developed this weaponry - even with that species being rather distinctly numerous, the actual available number of the vostian weapons tends to be extremely scarce.
Vostian weaponry is, in short, a family of disintegrators. They fire an unknown energy ray that causes instant disintegration of organic matter on contact. Unfortunately, they fare badly against armors, with the disintegrating effect quickly dispersing after reaching inorganic matter (it will penetrate few centimeters of armor though). This makes them excel against lightly armored enemies.
These weapons are known for leaving 'reflections' of their victims as transparent and immaterial shades at the place of their death or significant wounds. This is considered unnerving, and is suspected to cause longterm mental problems in those observing them for too long. There are corelations between this and hyperspace weaponry, hinting some deeper connection. This effect disperses after few hours, however.
Hyperspatial weaponry [ART][ALT][FBD] is a family of infantry and vehicle weapons weaponizing Hyperspace in similar way to the hyperblades. They are among the most commonly encountered of the forbidden technologies, as they were developed by a number of precursor and even some alters. As a result, they are often seen in the hands of the forces of Discord and promethean cults, as both of them ignore the Confederation's ban on them.
These weapons fire a spatial distortion shaped to vaguely resemble rounds, existing as a spectral structure in the equilibrium state between Realspace and Hyperspace. These 'rounds' are capable of partially phasing through solid surfaces - the word partially is used because said solid surfaces break into pieces into seconds, the passing of the rounds causing their molecular structure to collapse. As a result, it's one more case of weapon that can go through almost every type of armor, though they shot slowly, their accuracy is so-so and they need to be reloaded very quickly.
They can also cause mental issues with their users, though the effect is notably lesser in comparison to the one caused by the usage of hyperblades. As a result, however, they are still banned in every civilized corner of the world.
Kinetic Weaponry [VT] is a family of voidtech weaponry firing solid rounds propelled through unknown mechanism. They resemble other voidtechs in their otherwordly yet oddly familiar aesthetics, overwhelming power and in how they seem to defy the Mankind's understanding of physics.
Kinetic weapons do not look like conventional weapon. They are an assortment of parts (mostly made of materials resembling crystals or stainless metals) attached to one's forearm, yet capable of independent movement through some sort of (suspected) gravity fields manipulation. There is no barrel, instead these weapons use unknown mechanism to 'levitate' and then launch any object the user wants - even a lighter kinetic weapon is capable of hurling around tank rounds with enough speed to destroy other tanks.
The largest problem of the kinetic weponry is that while its power is overwhelming, their power source is slightly less so. It's still incredible by Mankind's standard and is essentially limitless (most kinetic weapon come with some sort of firepower slider - on the highest setting these weapons change into portable nuke launchers), the more powerful shot the longer the weapon recharges. On the other hand, this means that kinetic rifle can also act as anti-tank rifle and shotgun depending on the setting - the only real variants of this weapon are size ones.

Weapon Types

Handguns - Small, easy to conceal, useful at short range... and, if it's an archeotech weaponry, potentially carrying enough firepower to punch through a tank armor. Manmade handguns are typically firearms, while archeotech handguns can be pretty much every type of weapons mentioned above, maybe save for almost unheard of laser pistols. They are quite common sight throughout the Human Space, though rarely used on a battlefield unless a main weapon is somehow offline.
Machine Pistols/Submachine Guns - Compact, offering high rate of fire and rather short range. Exist in various forms, but all of them playing relatively similar role on the battlefield. It's the type of weapons sometimes issued to vehicle crews for self defense, as they do not take much space and can be used for a suppressing fire. They are rarely encountered outside firearms, which is a basic source of their high rate of fire.
Shotguns - A variety of short distance (relatively speaking, it's still around 20-50 meters) weapons, often tailored towards causing indecent amount of damage to typically badly armored targets. Domain of firearms, sonic weapons, masers, hardlight guns and vostian weaponry. Sometimes used as a support weaponry by a CQC combatants, or by strike teams clearing the hyperspace derelicts of various weird things that could dwell there.
Assault Rifles - Decent rate of fire, decent range, spacious magazines and good accuracy. A well-rounded thing to serve as a basis of army arsenal. Typically firearms, needlers, hardlight and vostian guns. Rarely magnetic guns, though they tend to verge on a semi-automatic mode of fire.Instead they have an increased armor penetration, though beneath the level of more specialized magnetic anti-tank weapons.
Battle Rifles - Oversized assault rifles typically powered from the portable power cells installed in a powered armor. Magnetic, though there are cases of hardlight and vostian weapons. Offer good armor penetration and high rate of fire. Impossible to be comfortably carried by soldiers without a light powered armor, even if there is any stable power source nearby to sustain its hunger.
Anti-tank Rifles - Variant of a battle rifle oriented towards armor penetration. Magnetic or laser. They have low rate of fire (sometimes as bad as 10-15 shots per minute), but are typically very precise, and can puncture powered armors and light vehicles. Pretty much a short-distance sniper rifle to use in the heat of the battle... though they tend to have much higher armor penetration than even sniper rifles, precisely because of the short distance between it and the target.
Sniper Rifles - Long distance. Precise. Decent armor penetration. Almost exclusively magnetic, laser (for use in space, which covers the sniper position), needle and spatial. Often using various powerful visual sensors or even orbital support and cybernetic computing implants to calculate trajectories and environmental factors for an even longer range and accuracy. Dangerous things in skilled hands.
Machine Guns - Various types of guns offering very high rate of fire, used to suppress the infantry or tear unarmored threats into pieces. Firearms, needlers or hardlight. Can be mounted on a vehicle or a powered armor (in this case it's either on an extended mechanical arm above the head, connected to an exoskeleton for stability, or as a simple weapon carried in arms).
Anti-Tank Guns - Typically mounted in fortified positions or tanks. Shoots slowly, penetrates armor with extreme efficiency. Dangerous, destructive, and you can encounter it on pretty much every battlefield in known part of the Galaxy. Magnetic, laser, plasma, hardlight, needle or spatial, other types of are almost unheard of.

Armors

Introduction

There are four main branches of armors, each of them possessing a multitude of internal subcategories designed to play certain roles. Even the lightest of them will possess extensive electronic elements, including communication, visual and auditory sensors and enhancement (including systems that detect and analyze faintest sounds from area directly surrounding the soldier), camouflage nano-paint and so on. Not to mention at least a limited exoskeleton, if only to carry itself around.
Due to armors being tailored to human anatomy, very little of them are archeotech in nature. Altertechs are the only ones that are really possible to be encountered, though many customized conventional armors possess some archeotech components.

Armor List

Combat Vest - 'Combat vests' are the lightest possible type of armor that's actually offering any sort of protection. They are not much different from standard equipment of mid-to-late 21st Century. They are essentially a light exoskeleton with a number of nanocomposite plates protecting the chest from the attacks coming from the front (and to a lesser degree from other directions), all covered in a technologically advanced textile that offers high level defense against knife attacks, fire etc. There is also a helmet, typically with a gasmask that offers some level of protection against chemical weapons.
It's essentially little more than a futuristic version of modern infantry vests from technologically advanced countries, just with added exoskeleton and much more advanced bulletproof elements. It can save its user from firearms and knife attacks, will not catch fire, and will not dissolve when exposed to most 'conventional' acids. If country is advanced enough, it might also possess a surface nanopaint, which makes its camouflage patterns naturally adapt to surrounding environment - while offering some measure of defense against being sprayed by hostile nanomachines. It might even have an exoskeleton that can enhance its user strength or speed a small bit, though typically they'll just carry the entire weight of this thing. But even then, rounds from magnetic weaponry will go through, unless fired from the very edge of the effective range.
Combat vests are typically used by low-cost pirates, planetary militias, regular police forces and countries that really, really lack money to field anything better. They offer certain level of defense against commonly encountered threats and are pretty cheap, though they require atmosphere as they aren't a closed system.
Battle Armor - Battle armors (exact naming varies from country to country) are a level up from the combat vest. To begin with, the battle armors are hermetic suits, which offers much more advanced protection from chemical or nano attacks - and allows them to operate freely in the vacuum, as long as you remembered to at least attach some small maneuver thrusters to them. Within the composite armor lies an exoskeleton that carries the whole thing (pretty important, as they typically go beyond 150kg in weight, even with the relatively lightweight materials used to make them).
They can be easily compared to suits from other sci-fi worlds, for example Mass Effect. However, the battle armor aesthethics are heavily customized, especially in more ideologically radical countries and groups. There the need for aesthethic uniqueness can go so far to make it possible for them to be mistaken with combat vests or any other sort of armors. For example this picture could show an example of how Third Reich battle armor would look like (though they might be a slight bit more bulky, but only so much as to make the it look like the soldier inside was just quite big. All while offering the same level of protection against attacks.
Battle armors are used by regular military units as they offer best possible balance between costs and value. They can stop firearm rounds fired from longer distance (though it will hurt like hell), they can even stop a magnetic rifle round (though it will hurt even more). Many of them also possess a damping layer that greatly reduces the effectiveness of sonic weapons against them. They are also commonly used by forces aboard ships, as if decompression happens, then even without thrusters they will still safeguard the user from the vacuum for at least fifteen minutes, giving a chance to save the unfortunate soldier.
Light Powered Armors - Light Powered Armors are the lesser variant of powered armors, straddling the line between armors that you wear and armors that you pilot. LPA is a rather intimidating suit that can reach 2,2 meters in height (up to 2,5 in case of LPAs made for Enhanced). They are fully hermetic and, in fact, do not possess internal exoskeleton - instead they are the exoskeleton. They offer full protection against chemicals, vacuum, radiation and all but the most extreme temperature variations. They improve their user's strength massively. They offer extensive sets of detection systems and communication devices.
They are practically impervious to firearms, and will yield only against a variety of light-to-heavy anti-armor weapons or magnetic rifles from really, really short distance. What's more, they can a lot of spare weapons and ammo (typically on a number of mechanical arms behind its user back, forming them all into something slightly resembling a backpack. They also include dedicated CQC models that typically include two machine guns on similar mechanical arms that can be extended above the soldier's head (for suppressive fire), and more customized camouflage/electronic warfare systems.
They are even more varied in aesthethics than battle armors. They vary from LPAs stylized after medieval plate armors (including coats of arms, as this type of style is quite often among various militant nobilities) to things that wouldn't look much out of place among the Warhammer 40k space marines. This is especially common among units of more ideologically radical countries, as they are a quite common sight among the elite formations of regional militaries. Though it's a pretty much stable element to still make all LPAs possess humanoid forms.
They are used by heavy infantry and Enhanced formations. They are often used as on-battlefield special strike forces, heavy fire support or heavy units. They are a common sight in elite formations of the national militaries, and during boarding missions in space.
Heavy Powered Armors - Essentially something in-between a powered armor and what once would be considered a mech (and that found no niche on modern battlefield, making the HPAs play its role a bit). A soldier in a HPA is changed into a walking tank, making it a wonderful tool when it comes to elimination of entrenched infantry, especially when it has a bit of problems with anti-tank weaponry. They can reach 3m in height, require dedicated anti-tank weaponry to take down and might possess particle shields. They can also power up a lot of heavy weapons systems due to typically being powered up by a miniature fusion or nuclear power cell.
Just as LPAs, they are pretty varied in aesthethics. They can be humanoid, they can be somewhat humanoid, or they can look just plain like a mech would. The possibilities are numerous, though they are still at least mostly powered armors rather than true mechs (the difference is that they are 'worn' rather than piloted, so the users' control over their body does most of the piloting.
They are used by heavy infantry formations, though typically not by Enhanced, as their improvements in reflexes and speed of decision making would be wasted on what is essentially a walking heavy support platform. They are rather rare, and almost unheard of outside of the relatively close fields upon which they excel (ship boarding actions, urban warfare).

Support Equipment

Introduction

A small fragment mentioning a number of 'support equipment' that is often deployed by infantry or vehicles, but that are neither weapons nor crewed vehicles. This is essentially a joint category for a number of things that do not fit anywhere else, and will be probably expanded upon when need arises.[/justify[

List of Support Equipment

Combat Robots - Training and equipping a soldier is extremely costly, at least when we talk about elite formations of the military. Because of that it is quite common to deploy rudimentary combat robots as fire support and expendable cannonfodder. There is a number of models of robots, ranging from those humanoid to those decidedly non humanoid. With dedicated CQC murderbots (like this one, but with combat equipment). The actual level of combat usefulness depends heavily on how sophisticated their programming is.
Turrets - It really isn't that hard (at least for heavy infantry clad in powered armors) to carry even quite heavy things on their back. And if they cannot carry it, they can use hauler robots to carry things for them. When a group of heavy infantry (or infantry with vehicle or two) expects coming under heavy attack and want to easily multiply their firepower, they can deploy turrets. They range from turrets like that to much more monstrous heavy turrets like this one. Such armaments typically run out of ammunition quite quickly and are vulnerable to hacking attempts (though unless a technological difference is really big, they will at worse shut down, instead of opening fire at their allies).
Combat Dolls - Dolls are artificial humans created by a combination of biotechnology and cybernetics. Their body is typically at least partially organic, though they are cases of fully or almost fully cybernetic Dolls. Their brains are always fully cybernetic. They are typically 'programmed' with complex simulation of human behaviour, based on human brainwaves. Sufficiently advanced Doll if given time without memory resets will begin developing sapience (though their treatment varies from country to country). However, the non-sapient Dolls are sometimes used as expendable cannonfodder. Even before developing sapience they are still much more capable of making decisions than simple robots, making them better in combat.
Drone Tank - Drone Tank is a (typically) light support tank that can ride through the battlefield and engage hostiles on its own. It suffers from the same problems as combat robots and automatic turrets - limited ammo, vulnerable to hacking attempts, combat usefulness heavily depend on how sophisticated the programming is. However they are seen as a cheap cannonfodder for big scale assaults and equally cheap fire support. Most of them look like this, so a chassis with some form of weapon (typically lacking armor) installed atop of it.

Vehicles

Introduction

Vehicles are an obvious element of any combat doctrine. Outside from a mostly infantry-based siege battles, most of the maneuver battles are waged with a variety of combat vehicles. But mostly the tanks, that managed to retake their position as kings of open field battles after the laser AA batteries managed to eliminate aircrafts from the battlefields (while the tank's and their active defenses managed to mostly negate the threat of the anti-tank missiles.

Vehicles List

Tank - A king of the modern open fields battle. Actually defining it has become a bit of a problem, as the classical form of a tank (tank tread, turret with a cannon and some support weaponry) has been somewhat expanded. While such a form still dominates the armies of Mankind, there are also rarer tanks that use wheeled suspension. There are also cases of tread suspension of rather unconventional configuration (similar to this or that). Situation was made even more complicated when forces of the Executive, Successor Codes and a number of lesser alien power began forming their military to a form slightly similar to Mankind, as for example Executive tanks are build on a spider suspension (like those, while Successor Codes went for a mix of tread-based and hover tanks.
There also exist a number of tank subtypes. Some countries go for a WW2-era tank types, deploying infantry-supporting and reconaissance light tanks, medium tanks that engage other tanks in battles of maneuver and heavy tanks that are used to breach fortified positions and decimate lesser tanks when properly supported to avoid encirclement. Sometimes also adding super-heavy tanks to breach super heavy fortifications and decimate entire tank companies, plus tank destroyers to hunt other tanks, especially heavy and superheavy. Others prefer pre-Days of Fire model of Main Battle Tanks used for establishing superiority on open fields but also to support infantry, typically supported by short distance Self-Propelled Artillery. Some go for Solar Commonwealth-style Universal Battle Tanks that are a combination between Main Battle Tanks, and both self-propelled artillery and self-propelled missile launcher. Some countries even ressurected the old Great Britain' system of cruiser tanks for open battles and infantry tanks (heavily armored and tasked with assisting infantry).
Infantry Fighting Vehicle - A type of an vehicle used to carry infantry around the battlefield, while also providing a direct fire support. Fire support that's far below the level of firepower offered by tanks, but still capable of making sure that the unloading infantry will not get immediately slaughtered by heavy infantry. They are typically either wheeled or have tank treads, depending on the model. They also normally possess a single small caliber magnetic cannon (30-50mm), low intensity anti-rocket laser and at least a single machine gun (typically connected to the cannon), all of that operated from the inside. Making them look somewhat like this.
Armored Personal Carrier - APCs evolved from an all-rounded armored transport vehicles with little weaponry to what essentially is a heavy infantry/Enhanced oriented transport vehicle, sacrificing most of the outside weaponry in exchange for expanded passenger compartment. At best it will have an automatic machine gun/magnetic rifle (up to 30mm) used to keep enemy infantry at bay, plus low intensity anti-rocket laser (because some things just have to be there. Making them look somewhat like this.
Tank Destroyer - Either a crucial part of combat doctrine or an improvisation created when one has to face an opponent whose tanks are just much more powerful. Tank destroyers are cousins of tanks, created with a super heavy anti-tank gun mounted not in a rorating turret, but within the chassis. This typically makes them much smaller and easier to conceal, which together with intense front armor makes them a rather dangerous opponents for tanks. It isn't unheard for such a tanks to be armed in laser or even archeotech plasma cannons. A more or less good example would be this.
Super Heavy Tank - Modern heavy tanks generally range from what used to be WW2-era heavy tanks (like Pzkpfw. Tiger) to super-heavy tanks (like Pzkpfw. Maus). The true modern super heavy tank goes beyond that into the level of being grossly oversized engines of destruction, capable of overwhelming entire tank companies and roll through heaviest fortification at ease. They are however slow, vulnerable towards getting encircled and against dedicated super heavy anti-tank guns, like the ones typically mounted upon tank destroyers. Their size ranges from already insanely big tanks similar to this one this one to tanks that are closer to being classified as moving fortresses.
Armored Cars - Small vehicles that can typically carry up to four infantry soldiers. Used for patrolling, as flexible fire support for convoys carrying infantry and heavy infantry, or as simply a car that is used to drive soldiers around. Can typically resist firearms perfectly and magnetic rounds from a bit bigger distance but not from close one. It also tends to have remotely controlled weapon systems, if only to scare infantry away. Good examples would be this and that.
Siege Artillery - Traditional artillery is no longer useful on today's battlefield, as every round going on a parabole trajectory (or simply slow, like a missile) will undoubtedly end up melted midflight by laser defense systems. Many countries have tanks capable of firing on a parabole if an opportunity shows, other keep a number of self-propelled guns ready just in case, but for most it's just the siege artillery. A number of either deployable or self-propelled super heavy cannons that are either magnetic or laser in origin, Their purpose is to slowly close in to enemy fortresses and artillery towers just as the trench warfare continues to get closer, their fire slowly beginning to reach their targets and breaking it apart.
Laser AA - Either stationary battery or a self-propelled one, possessing a precise laser, a powerful power source and sophisticated (and mostly automatic) targetic systems. Such lasers can melt down incoming missiles and even artillery rounds (that do not go on shortest possible - and fastest - trajectory, giving the targeting systems time to analyze them). It was their widespread deployment that essentially kicked aircraft and artillery support from modern battlefields.
Aircraft - Lost most of its power over the battlefield during the Third World War on Earth and never reclaimed. Today aircrafts are used mostly for high attitude reconaissance which sometimes leads to skirmishes between atmospheric fighters. From time to time they can sneak in an opportunistic attack - when, for example, enemy laser defense grid were taken offline by a massive hacking attack.
Naval Ships - On planets with seas - and especially oceanic ones - battles might also occur in water. They are typically waged with a combination of submarines and large surface gunships resembling ancient naval battleships. With aircrafts and missiles out of the picture, most of the naval battles are waged on a distance of up to 10 kilometres, as when it's longer the laser defenses begin successfuly shooting down incoming rounds.

Tactics

Introduction

The military became much more - and almost hopelessly - complicated due to the advancement of technology. The first thing that has to be mentioned in that subject is the fact, that most of the 'ground combat' happens either on the surface of planets or aboard the starships. Both cases are a bit similar, but they also have elements that differentiate them. The scenario we'll focus on is the combat on the surface of the planet.
The biggest technological breakthrough on the field of ground combat happened several centuries ago - but it keeps getting improved further until today and still shapes the way the planetary combat is done. Combat lasers. Not the rare laser handguns (used almost exclusively as anti-tank rifles). Laser AA defense. With the modern degree of technological sophistication, any object that attempts to move through the air above the battlefield (between ten meters to five kilometers above the ground, though this depends on the tech level of both sides) will almost instantly be detected and then melted by air defense lasers.
This doesn’t include only the aircraft. Even solid rounds from both ground-based artillery and ships on the orbit will be (explosively) melted - modern targeting computers (especially on often quite large laser batteries, where there is enough place to install a lot of them - can easily detect an incoming artillery round. Of course, that’s only because of outer factors that limit the rounds’ velocity. Ground artillery cannons’ rounds travel on a parabola, meaning that they take a while to reach the target. Orbital attacks can easily reach the level of firepower enough to avoid interception (by simply increasing the velocity) but shooting fast enough to avoid that means also shooting fast enough for the impact to have the power of a nuclear warhead. Unless one wants to avoid violating the Founding Charter of the Outer Colonies (or just wants to use the planet for something soon), this is considered unwise.
Missiles are yet another victims of it. Sufficiently amassed attacks will score at least some hits before being dispersed - getting melted instantly happens when you alone and get simultaneously hit by several AA laser batteries - but the effect is the same. Spending the equivalent of billions of dollars on missiles to destroy few tanks worth 1/1000th of that is simply stupid.
Of course, using special ablative materials to construct the hull of missiles and aircraft would help… but that already happened. The problem is distance. AA lasers fire from absolutely absurdly short distances when compared to space combat. While air disperses the ray quickly, this just means that the laser would fail to destroy an ablative armor-coated object from a thousand-kilometer distance (while in space it would require the attacker to get into a distance of one hundred to two hundred thousand kilometers). The upper limit of laser AA defenses (four to seven kilometers, typically five) is based not on destructive capabilities of the weapon, but the ground-based detection system accompanying the lasers, how well it fares against all sorts of stealth capabilities (from counter-radar surfaces to literal optical camouflage) and the issue of overheating. Things launched from space are typically melted while still on orbit. Because of the superior firepower of the laser AAs, the combat has moved closer to the ground.

Opening Engagements

To even begin the ground battle the attacker must land its own forces on the ground. That's not an easy feat, and a sufficiently well prepared defense might end the entire invasion at this point, probably causing devastating - and humiliating - casualties to the attacker in the process. Thankfully unless the target world is a worldwide megalopolis like Old Earth, covering entire air space with AA defenses is impossible - one would have to place entire arrays of such lasers every 4-5 km to cover every bit of planetary airspace with sufficient firepower. This means that especially in a case of underdeveloped worlds (or just sparsely populated) there are massive holes that the attacker can exploit to land his forces unmolested.
If attacker expects fierce ground resistance or decides to establish the pecking order right from the start, he can deploy a landing fortress. Enemy has a lot of heavily fortified fortress arcologies? Sure, why not. Let's construct ours in space, attach magnetic inertia dampeners that will prevent anyone inside from getting squashed by impact (plus some thrusters to be used to decelerate right before landing) and simply drop it from orbit. With entire division of combat ready troops inside. Such a massive object can be heavily armored, essentially rendering all defense AA batteries useless. And you can - if you really want - drop ten of them around one area. There are even some floating ones to be used in oceanic worlds.
There is an alternative way of utilizing landing fortresses (also known under many other terms) that is one of the few things that can get you ejected from the Confederation and subsequently terminated. Want to break enemy resistance quickly? Make especially well armored landing fortresses... and drop them on target planets' major population centers with minimal deceleration required to have your troops inside survive without damages. It was a favourite tactic of the Transhuman Alliance during the opening battles of the War of Purity, earning it dozens of easy victories (at the cost of - according to some estimation - even eight digit number of civilian casualties), but it was increasingly phased out after the transhuman march slowed down and remaining human worlds heavily reinforced the anti-air defense of their cities, with entire transhuman armies turned to ash in failed landings.

Two Types of Ground Battles

They are essentially two types of major engagements done on the planet surfaces. Trench battles and open battles.
The planets are big. To fully facilitate the 20th/21st Century-style war on the frontline that might be close in length to an equator (or greater) one would need an insane level of manpower. And while most bigger countries could do that, it’s not easy to supply 20-30 millions of soldiers in food, ammunition, fuel, and spare parts, so the scale is typically smaller and the war less intensive.
Each inhabited (or even militarily contested) planet has many cities. Modern cities (especially in Outer Colonies) are normally arcologies dedicated to a single goal. Each of them is one (massive) building that can house from fifteen to one hundred thousand inhabitants (bigger cities are made by ‘merging’ district-arcologies into one cohesive whole, sometimes hundreds of them). All of them heavily connected via magrails (with trains running on them, trains whose speed can reach few thousands of kilometers per hour, especially if the planet is wealthy and invested in vacuum tubes to avoid them fighting with the air friction at all time).
Of course, even agriculture or teaching-dedicated arcologies are well defended. Their superstructure is built similarly to armors of the starships, so it can survive everything short of a strategic-level nuclear warhead. Each of them can project a particle shield intercepting the orbit-to-ground or air-to-ground attacks that will manage to get through the laser AA defenses. Not to mention artillery positions that are especially deadly on those arcologies that go ‘up’ (essentially ending up with a ‘Spire’ that can be even one kilometre high and hundreds of meters or even few kilometres wide) and have their artillery position fire downwards on the enemy - this allows the MAWs to go wild with velocity, changing the surrounding countryside into deathtrap. With laser interception being extremely hard. There are also dedicated artillery spires (or towers) constructed over dedicated fortress arcologies/cities. Batteries on aone kilometer high tower can relatively easily hit targets 20km away (that's in Earth-like gravity). Answering them is much harder, as the towers are immensely resistant and unless you bombard them thoroughly, they will return fire.
Every arcology is typically garrisoned. Smaller arcologies have regiment or brigade-size local militias - which makes megacities 'naturally' possess entire armies to defend, as a hundred regiments or brigades are a force not to be trifled with, even when they are militias. There are also dedicated fortresses housing regular army units, sometimes entire clusters of arcologies housing an army size garrison (8-12 divisions, each division typically 10-20 thousand soldiers strong), while also providing perfect AA coverage and artillery support from artillery spires.
Assaulting an arcology or a city is no easy thing. It’s a siege battle, not unlike the trench warfare of the First World War. Attackers typically strive to encircle the arcology, cutting off means of resupply. Then there is a grinding war of attrition on the edges of the arcology’ artillery. Defenders wish to expand their defensive lines so they deploy themselves on the fields surrounding the arcology. What follows are often literal trenches (even in 28th Century, obstructing the view to avoid getting shot and to move your infantry around unseen is still a good idea), bunker construction and so on.
Attackers might try to squash the defenders by deploying a variety of siege weapons, typically self-propelled laser cannons and superheavy MAWs with rather intense armors and their own particle shields, to destroy the artillery defending the besieged arcology. Or they might slowly grind enemies to dust, forcing the defenders to expend their remaining artillery rounds on the heavily reinforced and shielded ‘defensive lines’ that are closer and closer to their fortress’ walls with each day. The result (unless relief force arrive) is the same: the attacking forces reach the arcology, blow a hole through its walls (or just storm through the entrances) and, after several days to a month of a close quarters combat, the remaining defenders surrender (or are eaten/killed/enslaved/whatever else the attacker wants).
That was the trench battle variant. Now, time for the open battles.
There is no world-wide frontline, just a variety of arcologies that need to be captured or defended. Aside from infantry (and some typically smaller vehicles) used in the trench combat, there are also entire formations (sometimes army-sized) that have completely different usage. Their mission is to secure the vast swathes of territory between arcologies.
The open battles, also called maneuver battles, happen when such formations clash. They might be platoon-size and be protected from the orbital fire only by a single AA laser battery hidden somewhere nearby. Or they might be army-sized, with dozens of particle shield generators and hundreds of lasers accompanying them and defending them from anything short of the world-ending level of orbital bombardment.
Size doesn’t matter. Always expect masses of tanks and other vehicles, accompanied by typically elite infantry units defending key positions (thickly saturated with anti-tank weaponry). Their clashes are much shorter and much more intense. They end with either one side retreating (and the supply route to your ongoing siege operation remaining secure... or not) or with the dream of every commander. It’s rare to have the AA defenses of one side decimated in a ground battle to the point that the remains of it can be taken out by air or orbital strikes, but when that happens, the entire unit either surrenders or suffers casualties close to 90%.

Note on ‘Armageddon’ scenarios

The possibility of an army (or an arcology) being taken out by extensive orbital bombardment is always there. It doesn’t matter how many lasers you have or how strong is your particle shield. A single battleship can do that. And it will take him a few minutes. Sure, moving close enough to be able to unleash the rapid and precise fire of its MAWs will make it vulnerable against earth-to-orbit weapons. But a number of them (with some escorts - most of the planetary weapons capable of destroying a spaceship on the orbit is missile based). can overwhelm typical planetary defense in that regard.
There are two problems with that. First: it makes the Supreme Council rather angry. Orbital bombardment of planets is written into the Founding Charters as one of the Outer Colonies’ NOPES. Of course, this describes only killing civilians. However, every arcology has at least in part a civilian population. And even a single unfortunate civilian killed will piss off every moderate (and most of the radicals) in the Council, if only by reminding them of terrible atrocities that happened during the Unification Wars. Though, admittedly, such a storm can be suppressed if the side responsible can conclusively prove it was an accident (and it killed a few civilians, not a few million).
Second is that the whole point of planetary invasions is to SECURE the planet. While the wars tend to be strategic stalemates, on a tactical scale the situation always changes rapidly. The conquered planet is supposed to be occupied and used to supply your forces fighting on the new frontline as soon as possible. And when there is a battle on the planet, the arcologies you control (as attacker, in that scenario, but this also counts for those retaken by the defender) are supposed to offer you necessary resources to keep the population well fed (when they can eat and drink enough to live, they tend to not risk their lives attacking the invaders’ forces - though they are still a massive security threat that has to be kept under control). And to supply your forces (so, for example, every arcology dedicated to the military industry will be quickly made into a production facility to supply attackers).
The keywords here are ‘as soon as possible’. Arcology that was captured by extensive use of orbital bombardment will either not be ready to work properly never again… or it might take weeks or months. An example can be employing nuclear weapons to scorch the particle shield over that one particular fortress-arcology - it will leave it surrounded with irradiated wasteland while demolishing any system on their outer hull, forcing the invaders to spend several months fixing both the radiation and damages. And with how the tides of war often change quickly, the country that used to control the planet might be back for revenge in four weeks.
Overusing the brute force, even when you make sure the planet isn’t irreversibly damaged and that no civilians died, is simply idiotic. Even most ‘alien’ of aliens typically avoid that - if only because for them, the habitable planets are much more precious than to humans. And even limited usage of extensive forces might have unexpected consequences. An example can be a MAW round going somehow off-course and hitting a sea, causing devastating tsunami wave. Or ‘limited’ bombardment (merely few hundred 10-15 kilotonnes equivalents, without radiation) can for example cause seismic disturbance that will end up with devastating earthquakes - in one case, during the Unification Wars, such an ‘unexpected seismic disturbances’ ended with the planet in question essentially shattering, and to this day nobody is sure how exactly this chain reaction happened. Hard to figure it out with only shards of the dead planet to work on.
As terrible as it might sound, losing a few hundred thousand soldiers (and few million being wounded - but with all wounds eventually healed by modern healthcare) more but getting the planet intact is always a better business that forcing the issue. The bigger the cost, the more valuable the planet - so it’s rare to see a planet that is simply decided to not be worth the risk. This happens typically when the planet is held by the enemy such as the fallen that is simply next to undefeated in ground battle (for example due to rapid replication and already being spread out everywhere), and is rare.

Military Organization

Introduction

Modern military organization (both of ground forces and navy) mostly dates back to the age of the Solar Commonwealth. Of course, many countries attached or modified some elements of this system. However, since all of them started with the same system (shamelessly stolen from the then-collapsing Commonwealth - which, in turn, has mostly stole it from the former United States), the result is that they are all branches of a single tree. There are many common elements.

Ground Forces

Infantry & Heavy Infantry

The smallest unit in infantry units is a team, typically composed of four soldiers and led by lance corporal (who de fact is a private serving as a temporary non-commisioned officer). A number of such teams exist, such as fireteams, command & support teams, assault/vanguard teams, heavy weapons teams etc. Standard team is the fireteam, typically composed of lance corporal, two riflemen and a gunner, carrying either a light machine gun or an anti-tank rifle. Other teams are typically attached to fireteams on a higher levels and will be described there.
Above it is a squad, composed of three fireteams and a command & support team, typically composed of a corporal in charge of the squad, a communication specialist, combat medic and an Electronic Warfare specialist responsible for jamming enemy communication, hacking open doors (quite important when fighting within an arcology) and deploying mechanical support (for example robots and automatic turrets). After summing it up, a squad is sixteen soldiers.
Above squad is section, commanded by a sergeant. It is typically two squads, with eight soldiers attached. For a mechanized infantry units, these soldiers will be the sergeant and drivers for the Infantry Vehicles or Armored Personel Carriers (soldiers that do not fit into them are loaded into one Armored Car per section). For standard infantry, this will be two heavy weapons team, with an anti-tank guns and heavy machine guns. At this level divergencies begin - there are countries that prefer attaching electronic warfare teams (to swarm the enemies with robots and Dolls). As a general rule, the section is going to end up with around 40 soldiers.
Next step is platoon, typically composed of two sections and commanded by lieutenant. Besides 80 soldiers of the two sections, there will be a number of attachments (depending mostly on the slight divergencies between military doctrines of various countries). For simple infantry this can me more teams focused on heavy weapons, field medicine or electronic warfare, or perhaps an assault team composed of four soldiers with short distance weapons (such as shotguns), placed there to repel enemy that storms the bunker in ALMOST close quarters combat. Mechanized Infantry might have engineers (with a vehicle or two of their own) or heavy infantry assault team. Elite unit might have a team or two of Enhanced or even anomalist. As a whole, platoon size rarely surpassed one hundred soldiers.
Then is the company, typically composed of two platoons (so, around 200 soldiers), and commanded by a captain. Here, actually, not a lot can really diverge from the standard pattern. Above it, 'magic' starts once again, though.
Above the company lies the batallion, under the command of either a major or lieutenant colonel - this depends mostly on whether the country in question bothers with deployment of regiments, instead of just jumping to brigade tier. If regiments are there, the lieutenant colonel will rule the batallion with one or two majors as his executives. If there aren't there, major will typically command the batallion, while the lieutenant colonel won't be there. Batallions are typically the smallest units capable of independent garrison or combat dut. That's because beside the two companies there will be the Combat Support Platoon, composed of batallion headquarters and the logistics units. In the past such units tended to reach company level, but great advancement in computer technology managed to cut down the paperwork (most of it does itself automatically), which limited the manpower requirement.
There lies either the regiment composed of two batallions and around one thousand soldiers (if they exist, the batallion role is typically weakened and the logistics are focused on regimental level) commanded by a colonel, or a brigade. If it's the brigade, then it is composed of anywhere from four batallions and two thousand soldiers (when there are no regiments typically) to two five regiments (each of around 1000 soldiers, so the brigade as a whole has five thousand soldiers). In the latter case, a brigade can also have three or four thousand soldiers. The situation is a bit flexible here. Both regiments and brigades can operate independently, and have their own logistic units, headquarters, well equipped field hospitals and so on. Regiments are typically commanded by colonels, while brigades by either a colonel or brigadier general.
Above it lies the division of anywhere from 10 to 20 thousand soldiers, commanded by major general. There is a number of division types - for example infantry, mechanized infantry, heavy infantry (quite rare in the aftermath of the Solar Commonwealth fall), siege, armored, elite and so on. It all depends on the combination of brigades and/or regiments that are assembled to construct them.
Above division lies the corps, of anywhere between two and four divisions, commanded by lieutenant general or corps general (depending on local nomenclature). Once again, the exact naming of them depends on the divisions that were used to create them, and local language. Then lies the army, of anywhere from two to seven corps, and commanded by army general or colonel general. In away, army (and to a lesser scale corps) have replaced division by being the 'primary' independently operating units.
Final three levels are Grand Armies, Fronts and Army Groups. Here the situation is a bit complicated. Grand Armies tend to be what Army Groups were in the past - a 'simple' combination of several armies and the neccessary support, command and logistics personnel. They are commander by generals. Above them, technically, are Army Groups that can host pretty much any number of Grand Armies (though typically not more than 10), and commanded by high generals or field marshals. However, when you are waging a large scale interstellar campaign, you might be forced to divide the Army Groups between a number of smaller planetary battles. When that happens, it's quite often for the Army Groups to be splited between a number of Fronts (commanded by High Generals, while the Field Marshals remain the Army Group commander in charge of large scale logistics and military coordination).

Armored Units

Armored Units essentially begin at platoon level, which is composed of four tanks and is commanded by a lieutenant (that typically doubles as commander of one of the tanks). Above is tank company composed of three tank platoons and a support platoon. The latter is composed of at least two tanks (including one equipped with additional communication systems that is commanded by the captain serving as a company commander), and a number of support vehicles, including an armored recovery vehicle, armored cargo transporters with some additional ammunitions and fuel, and a self-propelled AA laser battery capable of providing the company with anti-missile, anti-artillery and anti-aircraft defense.
Above it is a batallion that is typically composed of two tank companies (circa 20 tanks, each with a crew of 4 soldiers at average), and two mechanized infantry companies, which gives it 'standard' firepower of around forty tanks and around four hundred soldiers. Tank batallions have their own variants, for example a Heavy Tanks Batallion will have its tank companies spread equally between heavy and medium tanks that are supposed to assist they bigger cousins (so 20 heavy tanks, 20 medium tanks). Tank batallions are commanded by lietenant colonels or majors.
Then lies the armored regiment, composed of two tank batallions, and a support batallion that includes the regimental command, and a large number of support vehicles dealing in repairs, logistics. It is commanded by a colonel. Which means that it's composed of around 100 tanks (with a chance for some of them to be heavy tanks or tanks destroyer) and eight hundred soldiers of mechanized infantry.
Next steps is the armored brigade. Two tank regiments, and a support regiment. This time it will include batallion-sized logistics unit, a tank platoon that serves as moving headquarters for the brigadier general in charge of the unit, and a number of specialized attachments (tank destroyer platoons, heavy tanks platoons, light tanks to be used as reconaissance units, self propelled AA batteries). Comman unit and militant attachments will typically reach the equivalent of a batallion together. Average armored brigade will field up to 220 tanks and 40 support units.
Next is the armored division, with 2 to 3 brigades. It's otherwise unremarkable, save for the fact that it's typically that level where the super heavy tanks are attached. Typically as a core of an entire tank batallion, filled with medium tanks that can assist their juggernaut and prevent it from being flanked. Above this point the armored divisions are fully integrated with the standard military structure (so, for example, one tank division and two mechanized infantry divisions will form a corps, and three such corps will created a tank army).

Division Types

There exist a number of basic divisiontypes, that are created from a combination of brigades and/or regiments to play certain role on the battlefield. There are, however, major differences between modern countries, as many of decide to customized it a bit. Espeically when it comes to the names.

Infantry Division - Typical infantry units are militia formations (not extremely different than the US National Guard) that are tasked mostly with holding the line. They tend to be focused on garrison duty, fortress defense, and general static defenses. They typically lack IFVs, as they aren't expected to maneuver in combat, instead they typically possess additional heavy weapons teams to make up for their lack of firepower. Sometimes they are also named Militia Divisions or Motorized Infantry Division.
Siege Division - Siege divisions are units with internal structure designated for successful CQC. This means assault units (with shorter-ranged weaponry ideal for clearing the bunkers and trenches from enemy presence), siege artillery units, a sizeable number of heavy infantry and so on. They are occasionally also used to defend the fortresses as well. They are also known as Assault Division, though it's pretty rare.
Heavy Infantry Division - Rare sight on the battlefield ever since the fall of the Solar Commonwealth. Heavy Infantry Divisions are typically elite units, composed of many heavy infantry teams, mixing light and heavy powered armors for maximum firepower and agility. Plus, of course, a number of Enhanced and even anomalists... and there are always the ... original aesthethics.
Heavy Assault Division - Heavy Assault Divisions went practically extinct with the fall of the Solar Commonwealth, as they were composed entirely of Enhanced and support personnel. With up to 5-6 thousands of Enhanced per division, it's almost unheard of for such a unit being deployed. Only the most militarized (and wealthy, at that) countries can dare to assemble Heavy Assault Divisions in modern times, and even then the actual ratio of Enhanced to support is tilted a lot in favour of the latter. They are also no longer called HAD, as most of such countries has a bit of ... expansive military culture, and found their own names for such formations.
Mechanized Infantry Division - A maneuverable counterpart of simple infantry division, typically supporting the tank units in battles of maneuver. They can quickly move around, dig in and deploy with some anti-tank weaponry in right places, and generally make enemy's life much worse. Lot of IFVs, some heavy weapons, sometimes even light tank attachments. They can also man the bunkers, though will typically need to be boosted with some additional heavy weaponry.
Armored Division - A standard unit for tanks, used for maneuver warfare. Lots of medium tanks/main battle tanks/universal battle tanks, plus some other, more specialized vehicles (like tank destroyers or super heavy tanks), recon units with light tanks or armored cars, and finally the necessary logistics and engineering units. They form the core of units performing the maneuver battles.