The Badger is the Marran Tier 2 tank, bought three to a squad from the Bulwark and folded into whichever main faction army has contracted The Marran. Mercenary groups are hired partway through a match rather than played on their own, so a Badger squad is always fighting beside Protectorate, Grell, Legion or Xol units.
It is the clearest expression of the group's design, because a single Badger is unremarkable and three of them are not. Every Badger attack adds a stack of the same debuff to the target, so several attacking the same thing reach the sixth stack far faster than one can. The sixth stack is where the payoff sits: area damage and a slow.
Figures below describe the September 2026 Early Access build carrying the identifier ZS.c36778, and they move with a patch cadence that has been close to weekly since launch. Roughly half the versus roster had a stat touched in the fortnight before that build was captured, so read every number here as dated rather than permanent.
Stat Block
Stat | Value |
|---|---|
Cost | 200 hexite and 150 flux for a squad of 3, which is 66.67 hexite and 50 flux each |
Health | 150 |
Shields | 150 |
Armor | Not published in the entity data for this unit |
Armor type | Heavy |
Status resist | Not published in the entity data for this unit |
Move speed | 450 |
Vision | 16 |
Supply | 3 |
Build time | None. Mercenary units are hired, not built. |
Tier | 2 |
Domain | Ground unit |
Infuse cost | 6.459 |
Reanimate cost | 6.459 |
Replicate cost | 6.459 |
Bought from | Marran Bulwark |
Weapons
Weapon | Damage | DPS | Range | Cooldown | Targets | Bonuses |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Pulse Charge | 16 | 9 | 15 | 1.7s | Air and ground | +50% against Medium armour |
Charged shot | 30 | Not published | Not published | Fires on the sixth stack | Ground only | +50% against Medium armour |
The two lines are one weapon rather than two. Pulse Charge is the ordinary attack and it applies a stack; the charged shot is what the sixth stack releases, dealing area damage and slowing what it hits. The entity data publishes a full row only for the ordinary attack, so the charged shot figures here come from the dated studio balance note of August 28, 2026 rather than from the stat block.
Abilities
The entity data lists no activated ability for the Badger. The stacking debuff is part of the weapon rather than a separate ability entry, which is why it does not appear as one.
Upgrades
Nothing upgrades the Badger directly. The Marran talent line, taken at faction levels 2, 4 and 6, is the only thing that changes it.
Level | Talent | Effect | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
2 | Life Path | Experience gain increased by 30 percent. | ||
4 | Pulse Capacitors | Passive power gain increased by 200 percent and range increased by 20 percent, taking the Pulse Charge from 15 to 18. | ||
6 | Bulwark Amplification | Bulwark move speed increased by 50 percent, Pulse Barrage loses its power cost, the Bulwark generates shields on nearby damaged units, and three | unlock and spawn. |
Conversion Costs
Three factions can act on a unit that already exists instead of building a new one, and each pays out of the same top bar power pool. Infuse is the Grell mechanic, permanently raising a friendly unit's health, damage and regeneration for the rest of its life at a bonus of 45 percent since the balance pass of August 11, 2026. Reanimate is the Legion of Truth version, which speeds the unit up by 30 percent while it lives and stands it back up when it dies. Replicate is the Xol version, which copies an eligible allied unit outright.
The Badger is eligible for all three, and in this build the three prices are identical at 6.459 power each. See Resources and Economy for how the top bar pool fills.
Role
The Badger holds the middle of a Marran line at 15 range, which is further out than most Tier 2 tanks in the game and the same reach as the Marran Heavy Trooper. Nine DPS from one Badger is poor; twenty seven from a squad focusing one target, arriving at the sixth stack in roughly two volleys, is the intended reading.
The Medium bonus points it at the same targets as the Marran Pulse Skimmer, which since August 11, 2026 means every harvester and extractor in the game plus the broad middle of each roster. Against Medium the Pulse Charge does 24 rather than 16.
Two limits matter. The squad has to commit, because spreading fire across three targets never reaches the sixth stack on any of them. And since August 28, 2026 the charged shot no longer affects flying units, so against air the Badger contributes only its ordinary 16 a shot.
Faction Context
All five Marran units come out of a single mobile structure, the Bulwark, which travels while producing. Within that roster the Badger sits between the cheap Tier 1 pair and the heavy Tier 3 Marran Halo Tank, and it is the unit that makes the others land harder: the slow on the sixth stack keeps targets inside Marran Sharpshooter fire and inside the Halo Tank's beam line.
Tier and Armour Interactions
Heavy armour type on 150 health and 150 shields means the Badger is durable against the general case and vulnerable to anything carrying a Heavy bonus, which in the Marran roster includes their own Heavy Trooper at +100 percent. The entity data publishes no flat armour value for it, so repeated weak hits are not blunted.
Its own bonus keys off Medium armour rather than a domain, so it applies on the ground and in the air identically, and the base Pulse Charge does hit both. Units covers the six armour types in the current build and the flat armour maths behind them.
Counters
Strong Against
Target | Why |
|---|---|
Medium armoured ground clusters | The 50 percent bonus plus a sixth stack that deals area damage and slows, from three units attacking one point. |
Harvesters and extractors | Medium armour since August 11, 2026, so the bonus applies to the whole economic layer. |
Slow approaching lines | 15 range and a slow on the charged shot make closing on a Badger squad expensive. |
Weak To
Threat | Why |
|---|---|
Air units | The charged shot stopped affecting fliers on August 28, 2026, so against air the squad does flat damage with no payoff. |
Heavy armour bonuses | The Badger carries Heavy armour itself, and any weapon built to punish Heavy hits it at full effect. |
Spread out armies | The stack mechanic rewards focus fire and gives nothing back when targets are scattered. |
Balance History
July 25, 2026: unit volume lowered, a sound change with no combat effect.
July 30, 2026: damage held at 16 and a 50 percent bonus against Medium armour was added.
August 11, 2026: a bug that stopped the area damage applying was fixed.
August 14, 2026: a further fix for Badgers not always dealing damage.
August 28, 2026: charged shot damage reduced from 40 to 30, and the charged shot no longer affects flying units.
Notes
The roster record for this unit is COMPLETE on every field the source publishes. Two values are absent from the entity data and are left blank rather than guessed: the flat armour value and the status resist value.
A third gap is worth naming precisely. The entity data publishes no separate row for the charged shot, so its range, cooldown and area radius are unknown; only its damage and its bonus are on record, from the dated studio note.
Mercenary units carry no build time, and that is a property of the game rather than a gap in the record: they are hired rather than constructed, so the entity data publishes a price and a squad size but no production timer.
There is a live conflict between the two sources here. The entity data lists the ordinary Pulse Charge as hitting air and ground, while the August 28, 2026 studio note says the charged shot no longer affects flying units. These are consistent if the note applies only to the sixth stack release, which is how this page reads them, and the studio note is treated as authoritative on its own subject.
Per unit numbers are drawn from a community maintained entity catalogue that the studio links from each of its own faction pages. It is the only place a full stat block is published, so read the figures as careful community documentation of one build rather than as an official specification. Dated balance notes come straight from the studio patch posts and are stated as such.