Considering how much trouble I had with creating a flight model, you might call this my crowning achievement in terms of a flying robot. Along with that; this model also sports a classy design that outmatches the bold and easily visible red on the FSM Elite. You'll notice an almost regal appearance: flaring shoulders, a tasseled breastplate, silver lining along the ankle and torso armor. As I said in the breakdown for the Elite FSM, I have a flair for the dramatic, and if I'm going to create leader units, well, they are going to be marvelous!
That said: how does this unit perform? As you can imagine, this unit performs on par with the Elite FSM in terms of armor quality. The rest must be different for use with the flight model, of course. The body is reenforced even farther than the normal flight model, as this unit is capable of very swift landings and takeoffs. I wanted speed above all, but the light and hard armor doesn't sacrifice defense. It's fast, tough, and with my Hive Mind Program, it is capable to taking a "hive" of flight models and swarming an airship, if need be.
Then, naturally, the armament is similar to the standard flight type. Just as the Flight Model has a cannon mounted on the arm with burst and rapid-fire options, so does the Elite model have and arm cannon with two options to its firing capabilities. You might have noticed that I reworked the design used on my Energy Siphon Prototype for the cannon. The weapon is quite similar, but it uses less power and fires a different type of beam from the Siphon Proto. This gun originally fired a large beam when the Solar Array was full. The gun is still powered by the Solar Array, but it is installed with a limiter, so that it does not overload. Also, as I said, the beams are weaker and smaller and come with the two options: a quick firing short beam for normal attacks, and a higher powered constant beam for focused assaults that don't require as much movement.
The armor, matched with the speed and firepower of this unit make it perfect for the Elite project, and worthy of the name. Though the ground Elite is powerful and tough, I do admit that I have a certain love for the flight model, and that I won't hesitate to mention that it could possibly be the most rounded unit that I have produced.
