History Main / DeployableCover

* ''{{Champions}}'' supplement Gadgets! The Force Wall Generator was a device which, when placed on the ground and activated, would create an energy shield to block incoming fire.
* ''{{GURPS}}: Ultra-Tech'' has various portable force screen generators while ''High-Tech'' provides explosives blankets which SWAT officers can use backward to protect themselves from attack.

* This piece of equipment in ''VideoGame/{{Halo 3}}'' is the TropeNamer. You just tossed it out and it would throw up a shield that you could shoot through while blocking your enemies' shots.
** It also had the ''Bubble Shield'', a form of deployable cover that created a [[BeehiveBarrier sphere of protection]] 4m in diameter to wherever it was tossed. It could be walked through, but anything thrown or fired at it was unable to penetrate, even your own shots. Halo Reach included it as an armor ability, also making it smaller.

** In [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarOne 1915-1917]], (Allied) armies experimented with the use of a "creeping barrage" tactic, where the artillery would continually lay down fire just ahead of the advancing troops, using the shell blasts themselves as a form of cover. Creeping barrages soon became obsolete when the Germans realised (as a result of trying to conserve their increasingly scarce ammunition) that short, concentrated, and intense barrages on short sections of the enemy lines followed by lightening-fast assaults and break-throughs[[note]] the rest of the force following through these bridgeheads to encircle and force the surrender of/exterminate the forward sections of the enemy line[[/note]] were much more effective than either creeping barrages or the massive (week-)long barrages (followed up methodically but painfully slowly across a broad front) that had proceeded them both. 'Creeping Barrages' and 'Massive Barrages' were just too slow to result in anything more than tactical advances, as the enemy would always have enough time to bring up reserves to strengthen their lines, something that brief barrages followed by rapid assaults and breakthroughs managed to avoid (In theory, anyway. In practice, Germany's logistics capabilities were always too weak to properly sustain strategic offensives).

* In at least the third ''RatchetAndClank'' game you can buy deployable cover.

* Players carrying riot shields in various shooter games become this for their teammates.

* GlobalAgenda features this in standard and LimitBreak formats for the Robotics class.
* The Block ability in ''S4League''.

** Borderlands2 has the Commando with a similiar turret, which can also create a shield with the right talent.

* The Locusts in ''GearsOfWar'' have bombs that make pillars of earth shoot up from the ground, which they then use as cover.
** Gears of War 2 introduces a [[LuckilyMyShieldWillProtectMe shield]] that can be made into this.

* Engineers in {{Stronghold}} are capable to create cheap and expandable shields that can be deployed in the battlefield to protect other units from enemy fire.

* Engineers in ''VideoGame/Planetside2'' can deploy machinegun turrets with shields that can provide pretty decent cover.

* ''TheHerculoids''.

* ''SpaceGhost'' episode "The Looters". Brak's ray shelter can generate an Impregnashield (a rectangular force field) in front of it.

* Eldar guardians in ''DawnOfWar 2'' may deploy energy shields.

* GI units in ''CommandAndConquer Red Alert 2'' can deploy sandbags which gives them increased resistance and also allows them to use their machine guns, but makes them immobile. The Guardian GI in the expansion can do the same, but using metal plates instead which makes them impervious from getting roadkilled by vehicles. How they get sandbags and metal plates is [[HyperspaceArsenal anybody's guess]], and worse, how they set them up in less than a second. GDI riflemen in C&C 3 can build foxholes, which are basically GarrisonableStructures though this cost some cash and takes a while to build, and if you leave them empty, the enemy can use them too.

** In [[WorldWarOne 1915-1917]], (Allied) armies experimented with the use of a "creeping barrage" tactic, where the artillery would continually lay down fire just ahead of the advancing troops, using the shell blasts themselves as a form of cover. Creeping barrages soon became obsolete when the Germans realised (as a result of trying to conserve their increasingly scarce ammunition) that short, concentrated, and intense barrages on short sections of the enemy lines followed by lightening-fast assaults and break-throughs[[note]] the rest of the force following through these bridgeheads to encircle and force the surrender of/exterminate the forward sections of the enemy line[[/note]] were much more effective than either creeping barrages or the massive (week-)long barrages (followed up methodically but painfully slowly across a broad front) that had proceeded them both. 'Creeping Barrages' and 'Massive Barrages' were just too slow to result in anything more than tactical advances, as the enemy would always have enough time to bring up reserves to strengthen their lines, something that brief barrages followed by rapid assaults and breakthroughs managed to avoid (In theory, anyway. In practice, Germany's logistics capabilities were always too weak to properly sustain strategic offensives).

[[caption-width-right:346:"{{Luckily|MyShieldWillProtectMe}} our {{Force Field|Doors}} BeehiveBarrier will protect us."]]

[[caption-width-right:346:"{{Luckily|MyShieldWillProtectMe}} our {{Ray Enforced|Door}} BeehiveBarrier will protect us."]]

** In [[WorldWarOne 1915-1917]], (Allied) armies experimented with the use of a "creeping barrage" tactic, where the artillery would continually lay down fire just ahead of the advancing troops, using the shell blasts themselves as a form of cover. Creeping barrages soon became obsolete when the Germans realised (as a result of trying to conserve their increasingly scarce ammunition) that short, concentrated, and intense barrages on short sections of the enemy lines followed by lightening-fast assaults and break-throughs[[hottip:*: the rest of the force following through these bridgeheads to encircle and force the surrender of/exterminate the forward sections of the enemy line]] were much more effective than either creeping barrages or the massive (week-)long barrages (followed up methodically but painfully slowly across a broad front) that had proceeded them both. 'Creeping Barrages' and 'Massive Barrages' were just too slow to result in anything more than tactical advances, as the enemy would always have enough time to bring up reserves to strengthen their lines, something that brief barrages followed by rapid assaults and breakthroughs managed to avoid (In theory, anyway. In practice, Germany's logistics capabilities were always too weak to properly sustain strategic offensives).
*** It's worth noting that 10% casualties were expected in a tactical advance covered by a properly-executed creeping barrage; most of those casualties were not due to enemy action[[hottip:*: as one's own troops would be in excellent positions to force the enemy's to surrender by the score or be massacred in their dugouts]] but rather due to defective shells and mis-aimed artillery pieces resulting in some of the barrage hitting one's own troops.

[[quoteright:346: [[VideoGame/MassEffect2 http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/grissom_academy_octavia_7883.png]]]]

* The Geth in ''MassEffect'' seem to be fond of deploying hexagonal energy shields in areas with little cover.

** Cerberus in MassEffect 3 deploys similiar shields, though they can be easily disabled by shooting the generator.

* Every ''{{Homeworld}}'' game has something that's supposed to work this way. The original game's Defence Field Frigates were an out-and-out [[UselessUsefulSpell Useless Useful Ship]][[note]]The defence field effect only really protected the ship itself, which could be worked around except for the fact that the game averts 2DSpace and the AI is bright enough to exploit this fact. Worse yet, two of the four kinds of attack in the whole game flat-out ignore the shield.[[/note]]. ''Cataclysm'' introduced Sentinel fighters that worked a bit like the Planet Defensors referenced in the ''Gundam Wing'' entry on a smaller scale, and were slightly more useful. ''Homeworld 2'' introduced a new Defence Field Frigate that corrected most of the original's deficiencies, but had a short duration and a long cooldown period.

** More commonly, such as in the latter part of World War 1, armies would employ a "creeping barrage" tactic, where the artillery would continually lay down fire just ahead of the advancing troops, using the shell blasts themselves as a form of cover. Creeping barrages soon became obsolete when the Germans realised (as a result of trying to conserve their increasingly scarce ammunition) that short, concentrated, and intense barrages on short sections of the enemy lines followed by lightening-fast assaults and break-throughs[[hottip:*: the rest of the force following through these bridgeheads to encircle and force the surrender of/exterminate the forward sections of the enemy line]] were much more effective than either creeping barrages or the massive (week-)long barrages (followed up methodically but painfully slowly across a broad front) that had proceeded them both. 'Creeping Barrages' and 'Massive Barrages' were just too slow to result in anything more than tactical advances, as the enemy would always have enough time to bring up reserves to strengthen their lines, something that brief barrages followed by rapid assaults and breakthroughs managed to avoid (In theory, anyway. In practice, Germany's logistics capabilities were always too weak to properly sustain strategic offensives).

** More commonly, such as in the latter part of World War 1, armies would employ a "creeping barrage" tactic, where the artillery would continually lay down fire just ahead of the advancing troops, using the shell blasts themselves as a form of cover. Creeping barrages soon became obsolete when the Germans realised (as a result of trying to conserve their increasingly scarce ammunition) that short, concentrated, and intense barrages on short sections of the enemy lines followed by lightening-fast assaults and break-throughs[[hottip:*: the rest of the force following through these bridgeheads to encircle and force the surrender of/exterminate the forward sections of the enemy line]] were much more effective than either creeping barrages or the massive (week-)long barrages (followed up methodically but painfully slowly across a broad front) that had proceeded them both.
*** It's worth noting that 10% casualties were expected in an advance covered by a properly-executed creeping barrage; most of those casualties were not due to enemy action[[hottip:*: as one's own troops would be in excellent positions to force the enemy's to surrender by the score or be massacred in their dugouts]] but rather due to defective shells and mis-aimed artillery pieces resulting in some of the barrage hitting one's own troops.

** More commonly, such as in the latter part of World War 1, armies would employ a "creeping barrage" tactic, where the artillery would continually lay down fire just ahead of the advancing troops, using the shell blasts themselves as a form of cover. Creeping barrages soon became obsolete when the Germans realised (as a result of trying to conserve their increasingly scarce ammunition) that short, concentrated, and intense barrages on short sections of the enemy lines followed by lightening-fast breakthroughs[[hottip:*: the rest of the force following through these bridgeheads to encircle and force the surrender of/exterminate the forward sections of the enemy line]] were much more effective than massive (week-)long barrages followed up methodically but painfully slowly across a broad front.

** More commonly, such as in the latter part of World War 1, armies would employ a "creeping barrage" tactic, where the artillery would continually lay down fire just ahead of the advancing troops, using the shell blasts themselves as a form of cover.

* ''Fracture's'' gameplay was built around the Entrencher, a device which in theory could raise and lower the ground to create cover and foxholes as needed. It didn't work well enough to make up for otherwise bland gameplay and story writing.

* Sandbags! Load them on a truck, take them with you, and in five minutes team of two can construct cover for themselves. If you can't take a truck with you, you're out of luck, though, damn things are heavy.

* The Auger's secondary fire in the ''{{Resistance}}'' series places a short-lived, man-sized wall of energy in front of the user, which is impervious to everything except Auger shots.