The sky grew teeth: SAM rings, ship-killers, and the burner signature
The Early Jets era arrived with the sky wide open. Now it bites back. The Brick Gulf grows four missile batteries that own everything above 350 m, warships that stretch their reach out over the water, a missile boat whose four ship-killers skim the waves at mast height — and a throttle lever that doubles as how bright you burn to a heat-seeker.
The rings, and the one warning you get
A heat-seeking missile arrives in silence — a wingman's shout is your only warning. A guidance radar is different: it screams. Each team's HQ and port now stands a surface-to-air battery, and the moment its beam settles on you the warning speaks in plain words — get below the beam. The launch is a fast rattle and a telephone pole coming up at you at 800 m/s. The counter is the one that defines the era: dive. The radar can't see under 350 m, a missile that loses the beam flies straight and stupid, and putting a bomb on the site itself dumps its whole salvo out of the sky. The batteries are bombable, worth points, and respawn like any emplacement — and the bots hunt them hard, because to a bomber a SAM site is the juiciest target on the field.
The arms tie together over water: park a friendly warship near your target and the ring's reach stretches to nearly double out to sea. The fleet extends the umbrella; knocking those pickets down is air work now.
The Hornet, and smoke that lies to missiles
The era's naval flavor in one hull: the Hornet, a missile boat barely bigger than its own wake, carrying four wave-skimming ship-killers. It can only fire at a hull the fleet has spotted — your eyes are its magazine — and the missile drops to mast height, runs the target down, and starts fires that turn destroyers into torches. Two counters sit in every captain's hands: smoke, now laced with chaff, breaks the lock for good; and islands simply swallow sea-skimmers, so a landmass between you and the launch is armor.
Run cold
The quietest change is the best one: your heat signature is your throttle. A heat-seeker sees warmth, and full burner makes you a bonfire — seen from farther out, brighter than your own flares. Chop the throttle and glide cold and the seeker's eyes shrink; you can slip right past. The new defensive drill is chop, punch flares, break.
The land war aged up fifteen years to match: tanks roll faster, punch through more armor, and come with stabilizers as standard. The whole era fights on land, sea, and air at once.