The beam: red at the first pulse, white-hot at full rampThe tray: Long Barrels sleeve, Heavy Plating brow and skirts, Shrapnel Shell brood rackThe Cutter is the anti-heavy squad: 4 armoured spheres, 200 to deploy, 5,485 hp each, that scuttle up to tanks and giants at 1.6 tiles a second and hold one cutting beam on them. The torch is fixed under the chin, so the whole body turns to aim (120° a second, stepping round on diagonal leg pairs). Every 0.2 s pulse on the same target adds 8,673% to the beam: it opens at 2 damage, runs red to white over 3.0 s and holds at 2,604 a pulse (13,020 a second). One Cutter burns through an Aurochs's 24,041 hp in 3.4 s, the squad of 4 in 1.6 s.Where it wins: in long fights against one big target. In pure-lineup launch balance runs it averages 69% against the field and beats Skitter, Hexguard, Ridgeback, Courser, Heron, Torch, Aurochs, Anvil, Weaver, Salvo and Breaker. Where it loses: to anything in the air (Rotor, Mirage, Seraph and Dreadnought), because it can only hit ground, and to the Landship, which outrange or outlast it. With 4.5 tiles (45 m) of reach it needs a screen in front or a flank to walk in on, and it wants to arrive once the enemy's heavies are committed. Switching targets resets the ramp: a 500 hp Skitter dies in 0.4 s, then the beam starts cold on the next, so a wall of chaff in front of a tank soaks it.Techs change the job. Long Barrels (+4.0 tiles, 8.5 in all, 85 m) lets it start the ramp before the target closes. Heavy Plating (+40% hp, 60 blocked from every hit) and Linked Armor (+120% hp, and each tick's damage on any of the four is pooled and shared across the squad) keep it alive on the walk in. Shrapnel Shell turns each death into 5 Skitters, a screen for the Cutters still burning.