ships, usually a mix of large cruisers and smaller corvettes, gather and prepare to strike at the troid as soon as it is within a reasonable range - due to expense and relativistic time dilation problems, the Coalition is usually forced to wait until the troid is dangerously close to the target. Corvettes and cruisers engage the escort of scout ships, which try to provide a screen against the Coalition's troid-buster nuclear torpedoes. All too often, while the Coalition destroys the scouts and the troid, it is not before the troid drops its paragliders full of soldiers and materiel. The gliders, sealed against vacuum, make planetfall beyond the perimeter of the planoformed zone. Because they have almost no energy systems worth speaking of, the gliders are almost invisible to common scanners and must be found and targeted visually. They are usually destroyed only after the soldiers get off with all their materiel. Out beyond the planoformed zone, the rev soldiers gather and prepare themselves before moving in on the perimeter stations. The stations are powerful defensive posts, armed with lasers, anti-personnel rockets, gatling cannons, and anti-personnel "bomblets" hidden out in the landscape. Around the stations, crackers, turners and other planoforming machines work to constantly extend the range of the planoformed zone. A single Coalition officer on duty can run nearly the whole station through his or her implant, needing only one tech on hand who has the expertise to fix what breaks down. Most often, the revs simply march toward a station in waves, and are easily mown down by the station's defenses. As of the time of the book, however, they have gotten much more clever and deadly. Some revs have been transformed into living bombs, which they can set off as an act of will or if struck by high-velocity rounds (as out of a gatling cannon). The revs are also employing near-perfect stealth equipment in their suits, making them nearly invisible to scanning and sight in most EM bands. Lastly, they have been bringing down heavy weaponry in the gliders and caching them all along the perimeter. The Coalition and revs also employ scouts, sending reconnaissance runs into each other's systems, and spies that try to infiltrate each other's societies. Occasionally the Coalition makes raids upon rev positions, but these are few and far between. The Coalition does not have the numbers in both ships and soldiers