Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars/Scrin buildings

Red text means it is available in Kane's Wrath only. Green text means that the upgrade is available only in Tiberium Wars (the upgrade was moved).

Drone Platform

Cost	3500 (MCV)
Requirements	MCV
Role	Base Construction
Build Time	35 seconds (MCV)
Power	+10

The drone platform is essential to base construction. Players always start with a construction yard, which can be reverted into its aerial form. Often nicknamed "Conyard" (despite it being called a Drone Platform), the Drone Platform is what produces buildings. From Portals to Warp Spheres, defences to superweapons - everything is built here.

Because all buildings are built here, losing a Drone Platform will often result in your losing the game. However, since Foundries can also construct buildings, a Foundry can produce a Gravity Stabilizer, which can in turn produce another Drone Platform. Both the Foundry and the Drone Platform must be eliminated to truly remove the enemy's ability to deploy buildings.

Reactor

Cost	600
Requirements	Drone Platform
Upgrades	Fusion Core
Role	Generates Power
Build Time	6 seconds
Power	+20 (+20 w. fusion core)

The Reactor is the only building aside from the construction yard that produces power, so players will definitely want as many reactors as possible. Several bad things happen when the base is low on power: the minimap shuts down, units and buildings are produced slower, and the turrets do not fire.

Destroying or disabling (via EMP) reactors is a great precursor to an attack, as your forces will be able to penetrate enemy defences while they sit idle and useless.

Reactors can be upgraded with Fusion Reactors once a Tech Assembler (or, in Kane's Wrath, a Nerve Center) is constructed, boosting their power output.

Outpost

Cost	1500
Requirements	Explorer
Role	Base Expansion
Build Time	15 seconds

The outpost is a deployed Explorer. Outposts have no defense or armor on their own, and as such must be defended. The later patches remove the build radius around several buildings, including Portals and Reactors. This makes rebuilding said buildings difficult without an outpost nearby.

Portal

Cost	500
Requirements	Drone Platform/Foundry
Role	Trains Infantry
Build Time	5 seconds
Power	-5

Portals train (or perhaps more accurately, they warp in) all forms of Scrin infantry. Ranging from simple buzzes to Masterminds, Portals work identically to that of a Barracks or Hand of Nod. They have approximately the same health, too, so they can easily be leveled by cannon or high explosive damage types.

Warp Sphere

Cost	2000
Requirements	Extractor
Role	Vehicle Construction/Repair
Build Time	20 seconds
Power	-6

Warp Spheres are the Scrin War Factory. Capable of creating tanks and other armoured menaces, the Warp Sphere, like the War Factory, can repair vehicles parked next to it. This makes them most useful for keeping your tanks in tip-top shape, allowing them to reach higher veterancy levels.

Foundry

Cost	1500
Requirements	Drone Platform
Role	Base Construction
Build Time	15 seconds
Power	-10

A new feature to the Command and Conquer franchise are foundries. Foundries act like a drone platform, and allow you to produce two buildings at once. While in earlier patches they can produce defences as well, later patches removed this feature; they can build, at most, Growth Accelerators.

While building a foundry is often the first thing a player builds, it is often better to build at least one extractor before building a foundry, as foundries take more money than an extractor can provide (a 2:1 ratio). If one wants to build more defences, it is often better to build drone platforms.

Extractor

Cost	2000/3000
Requirements	Drone Platform
Role	Harvester Drop-off
Build Time	20/30 seconds
Power	-6/-15

Extractors (often called Refineries despite their real name) extract the useful materials from raw Tiberium and provide you with money. An essential component to any base, multiple refineries are a must to avoid running out of money. Each field can sustain approximately two refineries. Refineries also store money, but Scrin doesn't need to worry about storing Tiberium because one Refinery is enough to store infinite amount of Tiberium.

Refineries are quite heavily armoured and can take quite a beating, but the fact they store Tiberium can be used against them - the Catalyst Missile and the Tiberium Vibration Scan can destroy or reveal, respectively, open refineries.

Stasis Chamber

Cost	1200
Requirements	Portal
Upgrades	Blink Packs, Disc Launchers
Role	Expands construction options
Build Time	12 seconds
Power	-8

Stasis Chambers act a lot like GDI's Armoury, but it cannot heal infantry units. Instead it allows access to more advanced Scrin infantry, most notably the Shock Trooper. In Kane's Wrath the Shock Trooper upgrades have been moved to this point, but regardless the Stasis Chamber allows you to deploy the Stasis Field support power. It can prove useful when being attacked or to disable an attacking enemy force.

Nerve Center

Cost	1500
Requirements	Extractor
Upgrades	Attenuated Forcefields
Role	Expands construction options
Build Time	15 seconds
Power	-8

A necessity for higher tech levels, the Nerve Center is a versatile and much-needed building. It allows the deployment of several useful abilities, such as the Vibration Scan and the Lightning Spike support powers. Most notably it allows the construction of Gravity Stabilizers, allowing the player's first forays into the powerful Scrin air force. For those sticking to the ground, the Nerve Center also provides powerful Devourer tanks, a considerable step up from the Seeker you'd be using otherwise.

Gravity Stabilizer

Cost	1000
Requirements	Nerve Center
Role	Creates and repairs Scrin aircraft
Build Time	10 seconds
Power	-7

Several of the Scrin's strongest units are its aerial ones, most notably the Devastator and the Planetary Assault Carrier. PACs and Devs, however, are not the only units which rely on the Gravity Stabilizer. Drone Ships, being aerial units, are created here, and not at the War Factory like other MCVs. Stormriders rely on this point for landing and repairs, but are otherwise independent from Gravity Stabilizers.

Technology Assembler

Cost	4000
Upgrades	Conversion Reserves, Shard Launchers, Blue Shards, Forcefield Generators, Blink Packs, Plasma Disc Launchers
Role	Expands construction options
Build Time	40 seconds
Power	-10

Scrin high-end units all rely on the Tech Assembler (often referred to as the Tech Center, regardless of the name) for their construction. Most notably, the Annihilator Tripod (Apod) and Devastators. Shock Troopers gain several useful upgrades at this point, including the ability to attack air units.

In Kane's Wrath, the Shock Trooper upgrades were moved to the Stasis Chamber.

Signal Generator

Cost	3000
Role	Provides Support Powers
Build Time	30 seconds
Power	-15

The Signal Generator deploys the most devastating of Scrin support powers - most notably, the Wormhole support power. Motherships are large, expensive, and uselessly vulnerable, but wormholes in particular allow your units to strike at odd angles and potentially put a large attacking force in the middle of your enemy's base.

Rift Generator

Cost	5000
Role	Superweapon
Build Time	50 seconds
Power	-20

The Scrin superweapon is the Rift Generator, which produces a large, devastating portal to deep space at the target area, sucking everything in. While it takes several minutes to charge and use, the Rift Generator is arguably one of the most useful superweapons. Since it is deployed instantly, the Rift Generator can be deployed to good effect against enemy armies - useful if your enemy is relying on his or her army for defence and attack.

Buzzer Hive

Cost	600
Role	Anti-infantry defense
Build Time	6 seconds
Power	-7

Buzzer Hives produce three non-controllable buzzers to attack enemy units that enter its range. When the hive is destroyed, the buzzers are killed. These buzzers are slightly different from controllable ones; while they cannot be selected by you or the enemy, they can still be attacked and destroyed by the unit AI. While this may slow down the rate at which infantry units are killed by the Buzzer hive, only the largest and most dedicated anti-infantry units can render themselves immune to a Buzzer hive attack, and will find themselves unable to destroy the hive itself without letting the Buzzers in at them.

Like all other anti-infantry base defenses, the Buzzer Hive is deadly to infantry but useless against everything else.

Photon Cannon

Cost	1200
Upgrades	Shard Launchers
Role	Anti-vehicle defense
Build Time	12 seconds
Power	-8

Photon Cannons, not to be confused with the Starcraft defense of the same name, are strictly anti-vehicle. They cause considerably less damage against infantry. Like all base defences, however, they can detect stealth.

Unlike GDI's Guardian Cannon, however, Photons can hit infantry for some minor damage. However, like all basic anti-tank defenses, they are ineffective against larger units unless deployed in numbers. In the future the same money used to build a bank of photons might be better spent on a group of Disintegrators or a Tripod.

Storm Column

Cost	3000
Role	Anti-vehicle/anti-air defense
Build Time	30 seconds
Power	-12

Without a doubt the most versatile advanced base defense in the game, the Storm Column generates an ion storm above it that automatically strikes enemy units and buildings with powerful lightning. In essence, a Storm Column can strike twice for every shot; one from the storm column itself and one from the ion storm above it. It is also the only advanced base defense capable of striking enemy aircraft, and it is extremely good at this.

If Storm Columns have a weakness, it is its slow rate of fire and semi-limited range. Artillery units - Juggernaughts, Beam Cannons, and Devastators - all outrange the Storm Column.

It is very well combined with Scrin aircraft, because the Ion storm improves all properties of air units which makes aircraft very good support for this structure and replenishes it's vulnerability to long range artillery.

Regardless, Storm Columns are extremely deadly and what make the Scrin a powerful turtling faction.

Growth Accelerator

Cost	1500
Role	Accelerates Tiberium Growth
Build Time	15 seconds
Power	-5

Growth Accelerators, as their name implies, accelerate the growth of Tiberium. They can only be deployed on the chasms in the middle of Tiberium fields and require power to function. Every little bit helps, however, and Growth Accelerators allow the Scrin to make more of fewer Tiberium fields.

Growth accelerators can be deployed on any Tib field with which you have line of sight with, so deploying a growth accelerator on an ally's field will really help him later.

Plasma Battery

Cost	800
Requirements	Nerve Center
Role	Anti-air defense
Build Time	8 seconds
Power	-7

The Plasma Battery is the Scrin primary anti-air defense mechanism. While Storm Columns can strike air as well, Plasma batteries are cheaper, cost less power, and are available earlier, and are still extremely effective. They can be used in conjunction with Storm Columns to make an entire Scrin base a giant no-fly zone.

Plasma batteries cause splash damage, making stacked air units very vulnerable to a Plasma Battery's attack.