Video Game / Iron Harvest

Iron Harvest is a Real-Time Strategy game set in the alternate reality of 1920+, the same universe that Scythe takes place in. 1920+ is an Alternate History version of Europe two years after the end of World War I; with one of the main differences being that in this world mechs were developed instead of tanks to break the deadlock of the trenches. The game features three factions:

• Polania (Poland): The Polanian Republic is a large agricultural country that is trying to maintain its status and territory while dealing with its aggressive neighbors.
• Saxony (Germany): The Empire of Saxony is one of the most powerful countries in Europe. They boast powerful industries and modern factories in addition to a strong military tradition. They were on the losing side in the Great War and many powerful figures within the Empire secretly oppose the Emperor's appeasement policies.
• Rusviet (Russia): The Rusviet Tsardom is a huge country that has unmatched industrial and population potential. Unfortunately, Rusviet suffered dearly in the Great War and the country is on the brink of civil war.

The game was developed by German studio King Art Games, published by Deep Silver, and fully released on September 1, 2020. It has two DLCs:

• Rusviet Revolution, which adds a campaign that explores Rasputin's rebellion against the Tsar.
• Operation Eagle adds air units and an entirely new faction with their own campaign:
  • Usonia (United States): The Federal Union of Usonia stayed out of the Great War and became an economic and military powerhouse, unnoticed by Europe's old elites. Usonia could become a beacon of hope for the oppressed, bringing freedom and justice to everyone, or it could succumb to the temptations of power and become a new empire, ruling with an iron fist.

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This game contains examples of:

• Ace Custom: Each faction has three hero units, at least one of which is a unique mech.
• Action Bomb: Weapon of choice for the MWF 28 "Stiefmutter", which produces and launches monocycle attack drones with explosive charges mounted on them.
• Airborne Aircraft Carrier: The Usonian "Samson" is an airship that launches tiny helicopter bombers. It's essentially a flying Stiefmutter.
• Allohistorical Allusion: The campaign is littered with these.
  • One supporting character in the Polanian campaign, Michal Sikorski, is a commander of a traditional horse cavalry unit. This might seem odd, but Poland actually had traditional equine cavalry units all the way through World War II, and considered them to be prestige units^note It should be noted that, like most equine cavalry units in World War II, Polish cavalry was actually mounted infantry, meaning they were infantrymen who used horses for transport and dismounted to fight, only fighting on horseback in desperate situations. While they did carry sabres as a backup weapon, their primary weapon was the same rifle used by the rest of the infantry. However, the last battle in history to feature cavalry on both sides using traditional tactics and weaponry such as sabres and lances was the Battle of the Niemen River in 1920(around the time the game is set), where both sides were primarily made up of cavalry forces and Polish cavalry defeated Soviet cavalry, and the last successful cavalry charge in history, during the Battle of Schoenfeld in 1945, was carried out by Polish cavalry fighting Germans, where the Polish managed to win. As well, the Polish didn't stop issuing the lance as a combat weapon until sometime in the mid-to-late 1930's.
  • One such example in the early Saxonian campaign missions that take place during the Great War involves Prince Wilhelm unleashing a chlorine gas attack on a Rusviet fortified position, only for the Rusviets to continue fighting. This is clearly a reference to the Attack of the Dead Men, a similar event from the real-life Great War, only without the mechs.
  • Wojtek, a supporting animal for the Polanian hero, Anna Kos, was a real supporting animal that helped load artillery shells for Polish exiles in World War 2.
• All There in the Manual: Many details of the universe's Alternate Timeline and how the wider world beyond Eastern Europe looks are found in the game materials of Scythe rather than Iron Harvest itself. Additionally, in 2021 the developers commissioned the sci-fi/alternate history YouTube channel The Templin Institute to produce a video promoting the Usonia DLC; the video contains many details about the history of the alternate United States and its neighbors on the American continent which aren't explored in the DLC itself.
• Alternate History: In addition to the development of mechs and Powered Armor instead of tanks, the timeline diverged from our own in other ways earlier. For example, Saxony-Goethburg apparently unified Germany instead of Prussia, and the Tsar was never overthrown during the war.
• Amazon Brigade: The Polanian Powered Armor unit, the Rycerz, is composed of women. With the Operation Eagle DLC, a good number of the Usonian mech and air units are piloted by women.
• Animal Motifs: Saxony is certainly fond of wolf iconography. Their coat-of-arms features a wolf; one of their hero units, Gunter von Duisberg, has two pet wolves and another hero unit, Prince William, has a custom mech with a golden wolf's head; and one of their mechs is named after a wolf character from a Germanic folktale.
• Arbitrary Headcount Limit: The game features a population cap system limiting the number of units you can field at once.
• Arm Cannon: Standard equipment for Polanian PZM-2 "Rycerz" Powered Armor is a large cannon mounted to their forearm which makes short work of most armored targets. Their Smialy walkers carry an even larger version, though theirs is so massive it has to be supported by the other arm like an infantryman holding a rifle.
• Armored But Frail: The Wotan has Heavy armor but low HP. Weaker attacks will deal reduced damage to it, but attacks from Field Cannons and the like will destroy a Wotan very quickly.
• Attack Its Weak Point: Much like real world tanks, mechs have weaker armor on their backside as a concession to fuel efficiency. In the case of light mechs, the difference is noticeable enough for all arms to deal Scratch Damage, rather than nothing at all. In all cases, this makes flanking attacks considerably more effective.
• Author Appeal: 1920+ was designed by Polish artist Jakub Różalski, and Iron Harvest was made by German video game company King Art Games. Fitting for a game focused on central Europe, particularly Poland and Germany.
• Awesome, but Impractical:
  • A few of the mechs fall into this, such as the Ognivo, a flamethrower-toting anti-infantry and anti-building mech that moves slowly and has short range, making it easily kited and taken out by anti-armor weapons.^note The Kolokol standard mech can also outperform the Ognivo at anti-building duties from a much safer range and it's more mobile, with its only disadvantage being its Light armor compared to the Ognivo's Medium. The Serp, a heavy mech with two huge scythes, also falls into this category, as it's quite slow and will likely take a lot of damage before it gets into range to attack.
  • In the Operation Eagle DLC, Usonia's M-22 mech is designed as an anti-mech melee unit. The problem is the lighter armor compared to other comparable late-game mechs, despite that it has reasonably high HP and can self-repair (it needs to immobilize itself to use said self-repair ability).
  • Flamethrower squads are also this. While they can do grievous damage to enemy infantry squads and can deal high damage to buildings, they're slow for infantry, useless against mechs, and their attack can be mostly dodged if your enemy micromanages his units.
  • The Saxonian exosuits, the Eisenhans, are easily the toughest exosuits in the game and are deadly in melee combat, but they're the slowest unit in the game by a large margin. While they have a ranged mortar attack, it's horribly inaccurate, deals minimal splash damage, and doesn't do much damage to heavier armor, making it more of a source of Scratch Damage than anything useful. It takes considerable firepower to bring down a team of Eisenhans, but once faced by something that can take them out, they're basically already dead since they retreat as slowly as they advance (i.e. at a snail's pace). Additionally, their melee power is mostly a non-factor since most players know to not fight them up close.
• Awesome Personnel Carrier:
  • Polania has the Żółw, a walking fortress that carries infantry squads into battle. Firing slits surround it's entire body enabling the infantry to fire out while protected inside and it has a powerful turreted mortar mounted on it.
  • Saxony's heroic mech unit is the Brunhilde, an even larger mobile fort which looks for all the world like a headless AT-AT that can ferry infantry in addition to its formidable onboard batteries of both light and heavy cannons.
• Badass Longcoat: Many Saxony soldiers and officers wear greatcoats.
• The Bad Guy Wins: The Rusviet Revolution DLC ends with Tsar Nicholas dead and Fenris in control of Rusviet.
• Baseless Mission: Lots of them appear in the campaign. The Russviet campaign—which emphasises infiltration and intrigue—favors these in particular, with fewer than half of its missions giving the player a base.
• Beary Friendly: Wojtek totes around a small hospital's worth of medical supplies on his back, allowing him to passively heal allied infantry while out of combat.
• Better to Die than Be Killed: After being captured by Colonel Zubov, Heinrich Steinmetz informs him that part of his release from Tesla's service was the agreement to never be captured alive. He promptly detonates his prosthetic eye, nearly killing Zubov as well.
• BFG: Machine gunner and anti-mech gunner infantry squads carry guns so big and heavy that their movement speed is noticeably slowed compared to other infantry.
• Big Bad: The Fenris organisation, under the leadership of Rasputin, are revealed to be the ones responsible for reigniting the war between the three nations. Using their agents and manipulations, they hope to cause another world war to not only take over Europe but also access Tesla's factory and its highly advanced technologies.
• Big Damn Heroes: The final mission of the campaign has the player controlling two of each faction's three heroes in a bid to stop the Icarus Protocol.
• Bilingual Bonus: Units often have pun-based or meaningful (sometimes both) names - as long as you know a bit of Polish, Russian and German to notice.
• Bilingual Dialogue: There is an option to have each faction speak in their native language; during campaign cutscenes, this results in conversations and exchanges between characters speaking Polish, Russian and German with no apparent need for translation.
• Blade Below the Shoulder:
  • Lech's custom built mech features one of these as a backup melee weapon, while still allowing him to mount an autocannon in the same arm.
  • The Rusviet Serp mech has two enormous mantis arms ending in scythe blades.
• Bling of War: Since units don't change color to reflect which player controls them, unit skins are unlockable cosmetics. Mechs that appear to be gilded with bronze or even gold are unlocked as a player levels up a particular faction and can be equipped in any game mode. Prince Wilhelm's custom mech is also covered in gilt designs by default.
• Cavalry Officer: Michal Sikorski, one of Polania's heroes, is one. In a world of guns and mechs he's rather out of his time but he still gives as good as he gets.
• Chicken Walker:
  • Polania's recon mech, the Śmiały, has these kind of legs and is even nicknamed "Chicken Legs".
  • Rusviet's SHM-86 Kolokol features similarly jointed legs.
• Close-Range Combatant: Rusviet combat doctrine emphasizes getting as close as possible to the enemy to deal maximum damage. They prefer flamethrowers instead of machine guns for anti-infantry duties, equip their infantry with shotguns as standard, have a pair of melee-only units and both their heroes are focused on melee or short range firefights.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Two different variants, simultaneously.
  • On the gameplay side, all units have colored health bars that show who they belong to, using friend/foe coloration. The player is blue, with their allies being dark green and lime green. The first enemy player is red, with the others being orange and yellow. Unusually, all team information is conveyed via these HUD indicators, with individual units not incorporating any of the players' colors.
  • Since units don't change color based on controller, each of the game's factions has canon color coding. Polania favors the greens and browns appropriate to a rural resistance faction. Saxony goes for light blue, frequently accompanied by gold or bronze trim. Rusviet opts for red and black. Usonian units have a red and blue coloration with white highlights.
• Combat Medic: Medic units are outfitted with pistols for self defense, since there doesn't seem to be much of a notion of "protected noncombatants" in the 1920+ universe.
• Cool Helmet: Gunter von Duisberg and many other Saxony soldiers wear Pickelhaube spiked helmets.
• Cyborg: Piotr Kos and Gunter von Duisburg both sport prosthetic arms (though Gunter's might be more of a brace).Anna's brother Janek was turned into a more traditional version by the Rusviets. He is not happy about this development.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance: The characters of the Saxony campaign speak frequently on the importance of preserving the monarchy. There's even a scene where a Saxon soldier can be overheard declaring that giving the vote to women would have ruined the country, to which his comrade replies that a parliament seems unnecessary, given how well having a kaiser has historically gone.
• Diesel Punk: The game takes place in Alternate History Europe during the 1920s where technology developed slightly different.
• Distinguished Gentleman's Pipe: Gunter von Duisberg is often depicted in the artwork smoking one.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: The Usonian campaign focuses on American soldiers getting involved in a Middle Eastern civil war to gain access to Arabian oil. It's even explicitly mentioned that they are doing so without a declaration of war from Congress. The (creators' intended) parallels to the US invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan are hard to miss.

• Enemy Exchange Program: Two versions:
  • The first is a rarely-seen mechanic in the campaign, whereby abandoned mechs can be recaptured by an infantry unit and repurposed by any faction. A somewhat lesser version of this can occur with the weapon teams who will abandon their weapon if enough of the crew are killed allowing other units to capture it.
  • The second and far more common mechanic involves killed infantry units dropping their weapons for other units to pick up. As each faction's infantry essentially uses the same weapons (even their otherwise unique basic infantry drops a "basic weapon" that becomes a rifle when picked up by a Polanian, a shotgun when wielded by a Rusviet and a submachine gun in the hands of a Saxon) armies are able to adapt on the fly to changing battlefield conditions. It's even a surprisingly viable strategy to quickly produce cheap engineers to swoop into battlefields and make off with decent abandoned equipment.
• The Engineer: Every nation fields combat Engineers, who can construct buildings, fortifications and mines. They can also repair damaged mechs.
• Expansion Pack: Operation Eagle adds a new multiplayer faction and a campaign to go with them in the style of a traditional RTS expansion pack.
• Faction Calculus:
  • Polania: Subversive. They excel at long-range engagements and several of their mech units are Fragile Speedster designs with good long range firepower.
  • Saxony: Balanced. Their units on average are tougher then Polania's but not as tough as Rusviet forces. They are also faster and more maneuverable then Rusviet forces but are not as fast as Polania. They excel at medium ranged engagements.
  • Rusviet: Powerhouse. A Mighty Glacier faction with extremely durable but slow moving mechs and the only faction to have access to rocket artillery. They favor close-ranged combat.
  • Usonia: Cannon. Usonian units excel against their foes during initial contact, but the longer the fight the more likely casualties will mount. While having access to advanced airship units that allow them to ignore terrain, these airships alone aren't enough to win a battle.
• Fantasy Counterpart Culture: Despite taking place in what is essentially the real world circa the 1920s, albeit through an Alternate History lens, the game makes a point of giving every nation a different name than in reality.
  • In the game itself, we have the Empire of Saxony (Imperial Germany), the Polanian Republic (2nd Polish Republic), the Rusviet Tsardom (late Imperial Russia), and the Federal Union of Usonia (United States of America).
  • In addition, All There in the Manual material establishes several more: Hispania (Spain), Albion (Great Britain), the United States of Aztlan (Mexico), and the Dominion of Laurentia (Canada).
    • The intro cinematic mentions a "Shogunate" and the "Nordic Kingdoms," which are Japan and possibly the Scandinavian peninsula, respectively. Beyond this mention, neither are ever spoken of again.
• Fire-Breathing Weapon: Both Saxony and Polania field flamethrower infantry. Rusviet has flamethrower mechs in the form of the SHM-78 "Ognivo".
• Foreshadowing:
  • During the tutorial, one of the bullies says Anna is a Rusviet in their snowball fight, and that her brother is one too (despite him not even appearing yet). Guess who comes to her rescue when the bullies gang up on her? And guess whose brother becomes one of the Rusviet heroes, even if he himself is still Polanian?
  • Steinmetz' decision to kill himself rather than grant Zubov access to Tesla's factory foreshadows Tesla's policy on letting outsiders lay hands on his technology, culminating in the Icarus Protocol.
• For Want Of A Nail: The game's version of Germany and Russia never suffered a revolution during the Great War that overthrew their respective monarchs. Averted at the end of Rusviet Revolution DLC - Tsar Nicholas is dead and Rasputin and Zubov take over the country.
• Fragile Speedster: Polania's anti-infantry mech, the Stranznik, and its recon mech, the Śmiały, are both very fast units with good firepower and weak armor and low hitpoints.
• Frameup: Prince Wilhelm murders the Kaiser with Gunter's handcannon and pinning his death on the old commander.
• Friendly Sniper: Anna Kos, when she isn't being a Fiery Redhead, is fairly laid back and informal, commonly reacting to being selected with a breezy "Whatcha need?" She's also a world-class sniper, capable of pulling off a One-Hit Polykill roughly once a minute.
• Gameplay Ally Immortality: Hero units can't be permanently killed. Instead, they drop and can be revived by friendly infantry squads to about 20% health or rebuilt from your headquarters at full health (though you have to pay resources for that).
• Gameplay and Story Segregation:
  • Keeping Prince Wilhelm alive is given a lot of emphasis in the Saxony campaign, despite his status as a Hero Unit making it impossible for him to die on the field.
  • On a less dramatic level, many commenters have pointed out that while the Usonian Revere-class airship is explicitly stated by in-game and official material to be armed only with unguided rockets, the missiles it uses against other air units are very, very obviously self-guided.
• Genre Throwback: Zigzagged. Iron Harvest was pretty explicitly marketed as a classically styled RTS in the mold of games from 1994-2004. Despite this, it plays fairly similarly to 2013's Company of Heroes 2.
• Glass Cannon: A few units can fall into this category.
  • The Mocny, Polania's artillery mech, can do immense damage but cannot take much punishment and is easily destroyed if it starts taking fire. This also goes for the Erlkonig and Nakovalnya artillery mechs, but the Mocny is the most fragile of the three.
  • Janek Kos as a hero unit also counts as this, as he boasts a lot of firepower but has Light armor and relatively low HP, so he can't take much abuse.
  • The Wotan, Saxony's mech-destroyer, is an unusual version - it has the Heavy armor classification but doesn't have the HP to back it up, so any attacks that get through its armor will kill it quickly.
• The Heavy: Though Rasputin is the Big Bad it is the actions of his operative Colonel Zubov that drives most of the plot.
• Hero Unit: Each faction has three. Of them, each faction will have an infantry hero with a Loyal Animal Companion (Anna Kos with Wojtek, Gunter von Duisberg with Nacht and Tag, Olga Morosova with Changa, and Sita al Hadid with Haytham), an Ace Custom mech (Lech Kos, Prince Wilhelm, Colonel Zubov, and William Mason), and a unique hero (Michal Sakorski's cavalry squad, the garrisonable artillery mech Brunhilde, the cybernetic "Victor Popov," and Admiral Mason's Queen Langely flying gunship). In the campaign, the player will control some mix of their faction's heroes in each mission, occasionally fielding all three. In multiplayer, each player chooses one of their faction's Heroes during the Reserve selection screen. Interestingly, the Heroes are classed as being part of the First Reserve (can be called in after the player has built a basic Barracks or Workshop) or Second Reserve (can't be called in until a Barracks or Workshop has been upgraded). The infantry heroes and Sakorski are First Reserve heroes, with the rest being Second Reserve.
• Historical Domain Character:Several, though most are rather ahistorical in their presentation.
  • Grigori Rasputin is the leader of a rebel faction within the Rusviet Union. Notably in real history he was very dead by 1920.
  • Nikola Tesla is the man responsible for the development of mechs and Powered Armor in this timeline. He's also still in Eastern Europe as opposed to the real Tesla who moved to America decades before 1920.
  • Tsar Nicholas and Kaiser Friedrich and his son Wilhelm appear as the rulers of Rusviet and Saxony respectively. As with Rasputin in real history Nicholas and Friedrich were both already dead by 1920, Nicholas to revolution, Friedrich to throat cancer (less than a year after taking the throne) and Wilhelm, while still alive, had lost his throne to a new democracy.
  • The real life tame bear Wojtek is a less well known example (though he's more of a reference; the real life Wojtek was a Syrian Brown Bear found in Iran and was with the Polish army in the 40s, not the 20s).
• Historical In-Joke: A very dark one; During the diplomatic party celebrating the peace treaty early in the Rusviet campaign one of the Saxonian guests references the infamous "Stab in the Back" myth ^note  The conspiracy theory that Germany/Saxony's could have won the First World War but was betrayed from within which is rather surreal given that the player is currently investigating a secret society who is trying to betray the world powers by starting another war.
• Home by Christmas: During the prologue, Polanian troops use this phrase word for word when Anna and Janek ask about the now inevitable war with the Rusviet Union. As one can tragically guess, not only are they wrong, but this version of the Great War lasts for five years instead of the four our world suffered through.
• Hufflepuff House: A throwaway line by Janek Kos at the end of the first level of the Polania Campaign says that the War that would go down would involve all of the major powers of the world including Polania: "Saxony, Rusviet, The Nordic Kingdoms, maybe even the Shogunate." The latter two do not make any appearance either in the gameplay or in the following cinematic, and are never even mentioned again.
• Humongous Mecha: Some mechs are pretty damn big, with special mention going to Polania's PZM-24 "Tur" (an artillery unit that makes houses look puny).
• Interface Spoiler: During campaign missions, the player will be able to guess whether it's a Baseless Mission or if a base will be added later by the presence of iron mines and oil pumps.
• Jump Jet Pack: Rusviet SHM-60 "Groza" Powered Armor suits feature jump jets, allowing them to bypass terrain and rapidly close with the enemy to best employ their powerful cutting blades. Colonel Lev features a scaled up version of the same system on his Ace Custom mech, and the sight of a flying walker the size of a house is quite impressive.
• Kick the Dog: Zubov is very fond of doing this. Examples include ordering his men to burn down a tavern full of civilians and taunting Anna with her father's prosthetic arm.
• Marathon Level:
  • Skirmish maps take around twenty minutes. In comparison, many campaign missions are multi-staged and take over an hour from start to finish. Luckily, Checkpoint Starvation is averted with regular autosaves as the player progresses through each stage.
  • As an example, an early campaign mission sees the player guiding a train through Polania with Anna, Lech, and a small group of soldiers. There are three separate sections to this stage of the level. Once the train reaches the bridge, base buildings are deployed. There is then an optional objection to destroy a Rusviet base in the west to protect the Polanian flank. Then the bridge must be crossed, and another Rusviet base destroyed before the player can finally drive the train through the tunnel to Kolno.
• Medieval Stasis: A short-term Diesel-era example; Polania and Saxony (and presumably Rusviet) deploy the same mechs at the start of the war as they do in the post-war conflicts. While this can probably be explained as game scope limitations, it's still noticeable since warfare of this period was famous for encouraging innovation and rapid development of military technologies.
• Mighty Glacier:
  • Standard Rusviet philosophy when it comes to mech design is that armor trumps all other concerns; if it's not in danger of tipping over or collapsing under its own weight, it needs more plating. While this does mean that even the lightest Rusviet mech has a top speed which could charitably be called sluggish, they can absorb far more punishment than their foreign counterparts.
  • Each faction has a mech that requires both an advanced workshop and an advanced barracks. They all fall into this category once deployed.
• Mini-Mecha: In addition to its high end Humongous Mecha, each faction gets an exosuit unit and at least one light mech designed to scout and/or suppress infantry. All but Saxony get one of each (Saxony's other light mech is a Walking Tank).
• A Minor Kidroduction: The game teaches you how to play with Anna as a little girl having a snowball fight with the boys in her village and hunting a deer, before her brother ships off to fight in The Great War.
• More Dakka:
  • Usonia, the faction added in the expansion, takes this as their entire combat philosophy. While Rusviet will add more armor until a mech can barely move, Usonia does the same with guns. This is best exemplified by their heavy mech, the Knox, which features four main battle cannons, two heavy machine guns, and a cluster of slow-to-reload rocket pods; the thing is basically three stories of weapons mounted on four legs. Most Usonian mechs follow this idea, favoring front-loaded damage on a relatively long cooldown at the expense of armor.
  • Both Saxony and Polania field anti-infantry mechs armed with powerful machine guns, though there are some key differences between the two. The Polania Stranznik has four machine guns, is very fast, and is capable of firing on the move, but has very weak armor. In contrast, the Saxon Grimbart has much heavier armor and about double the health of its Polanian counterpart, but is significantly slower and has to halt to fire its machine gun. In the expansion, Usonia adds its Salem mech to the bullet-spewing, infantry-shredding fray. Like the Stranznik, the Salem has four machine guns, but has them mounted in dual independently swiveling barbettes, allowing it to fire on multiple targets simultaneously. The Salem also has an ability unlocked once it reaches veteran status to fire faster at the cost of its own health.
  • All three factions can field both light and heavy machine gun teams.
  • Saxony can also field squads of Stormtroopers armed with rapid-fire submachine guns.
• Mr. Fixit: Engineers can repair damaged vehicles and buildings.
• No Historical Figures Were Harmed: Switches off with Historical Domain Character. Grigori Rasputin and Tsar Nicholas are referred to by their historical names, but Gunther von Duisberg is quite clearly inspired by Otto von Bismarck. Justified; as Bismarck (who was born in 1815) would be over a century old by the point the game takes place, and is most likely deceased, necessitating someone to fill the role.
• Non-Action Big Bad: All Rasputin does in the game is talk to Tsar Nicholas and give orders to Colonel Zubov to raid Tesla's factory and lab.
• Occupiers Out of Our Country: According to the devs, as well as statements made by Lech, a large part of Polania is still occupied by Rusviet forces at the start of the game. Their campaign tells the story of a struggling rebel army trying to evict these forces from their homeland.
• Old Soldier: Gunter von Duisberg has a gray beard down to his collar and is not a man to play with. Perhaps best exemplified during a cutscene where a Saxon soldier chastises von Duisberg for laying hands on Prince Wilhelm; von Duisberg replies by nonchalantly pulling a revolver and shooting the soldier in the thigh.
• Point Build System: Used in multiplayer and World Map.
  • In multiplayer (and skirmishes against the AI), each player builds a first and second reserve using 5 points, including up to 1 Hero Unit, with all available choices costing 1 to 3 points each. Interestingly, each faction has a mix of 1 and 2 cost heroes, and heroes are hardwired to be in a specific reserve. Generally, second reserve units and heroes cost more points (though this is not the case for Saxony, with Gunter costing 2 points and Prince Wilhem at just 1).
  • In World Map mode, all units in the game have deployment costs from 1 (engineers and medics) up to 12 (superheavy mechs like the Kaiser and Tur). Each map has a deployment budget which can be spent to bring these units into the mission (barring disallowed units, like heavy mechs on a Baseless Mission). After the battle, the player may return an equal budget of units to the army, choosing from among those deployed and produced during the battle. Interestingly, the departure budget is equal to what the player spent on the mission, not what they're entitled to. So you can't send in some cheap units bought with World Map currency and then send expensive superheavy mechs back to the army.
• Possession Implies Mastery: Infantry squads can pick-up abandoned equipment, ranging from grenades and first aid kits to anti-tank guns, lying around and use it without any problems.
• Powered Armor: Each of the factions has a variant.
  • The Saxony Eisenhans is a soldier in power armor lugging around a pair of heavy mortars. As with the mechs, the armor is crude and bulky, and the soldier can only move at a walking pace and has to stand still in order to fire.
  • The Rusviet Groza features jump jets so they can rapidly close with the enemy and engage them with powerful melee attacks.
  • The Polania Rycerz features a hand-held shield and an auto-cannon.
  • The Usonian Ward is primarily designed as a combat repair unit for their mechs, but still packs a melee punch as well as (eventually) being able to build aid stations.
• Power-Up Letdown: To an extent, the top-tier units for each faction don't quite live up to the heavy-armor-destroyer role they're billed as. The "Tur" for example can deal massive damage. but in an area of effect rather than to a single target, making it a lot better at destroying infantry than you would expect but conversely putting it at a significant disadvantage when facing heavy anti-mech destroyers.
• Real Robot Genre: The mechs are meant to invoke the tanks of the First World War; slow and crude with the technology still being in its infancy.
• Religious and Mythological Theme Naming: Saxony is fond of doing this with their units:
  • Wotan is the old High German tongue name for Odin.
  • Erlkönig is German for Elf King, and is the title of a classic poem later adapted by Franz Schubert.
  • Isegrim the wolf is a character from the Germanic folktale Reynard the Fox.
  • Eisenhans Powered Armor is named for the title character in the German fairy tale "Iron Hans".
  • Stiefmutter means "Stepmother", and deploys automated explosives named Hansel and Gretel.
• Ridiculously Fast Construction: As is usual for a Real-Time Strategy game. However, almost all buildings are ad-hoc sheds and tents, so it's not as egregious as usual.
• "Risk"-Style Map: The World Map mode added in an update revolves around one. There are multiple maps and scenarios that can be mixed and matched, along with the option to create custom scenarios. It should be noted that this is much a campaign structure a la Dawn of War - Dark Crusade than a proper four X game a la Total War.
• Roman à Clef: Iron Harvest is essentially set in a steampunk version of our world's 1920s with only the names of the countries and other details of history being changed.
• Sanity Slippage: The Saxony campaign focuses on the damage that the horrors of war have done to Prince Wilhelm culminating in patricide.
• The Scapegoat: Gunter is made to take the blame for Prince Wilhelm's war crimes by Kaiser Friedrich for political reasons.
• Schizo Tech: Even with all the Mechs and Cyborgs running around technology is a bit inconsistent. For example:
  • Saxony is able to equip all its basic infantry with WW2-era submachine guns a good 25 years before real-life Germany was able to begin mass-manufacturing the MP40 (and they never managed to produce enough to make it the standard equipment for their troops).
  • The game's Hero Units include a cavalry officer, a four-legged walking bunker, and a cyborg who shoots lightning.
  • The Smialy is a 15 foot mech carrying a giant bolt-action rifle.
  • The Rusviet campaign is particularly guilty of this, with its focus on "Victor Popov" becoming a cybernetic supersoldier based on Fenris tech. In the 1920s.
  • A cutscene in Usonia's campaign shows a reporter's camera mounted on a tiny, autonomous mech. It then cuts to the camera's feed...which is grainy, sepia-toned black and white.
• Screw the War, We're Partying: A Christmas truce happens between Saxony and Rusviet soldiers that is overseen by Gunter and Prince Wilhelm. While the former is pleased to see the soldiers enjoying the holiday and finally getting a well-earned break from the war, the Prince is disgusted to see his enemies mingling with his men and wishes to have them gunned down right there as they are celebrating.
• Self-Made Orphan: Prince Wilhelm kills his father and blames it on Gunther van Duisberg.
• Sequel Hook: The Saxony campaign ends with von Duisberg, Anna, Olga, Janek and their respective armies uniting under Tesla's banner to wage war against Rasputin and Fenris.
• Shotguns Are Just Better: The Rusviets, in keeping with their army's close quarters combat doctrine, have seen fit to arm their Vanguard infantry with shotguns.
• Shout-Out:
  • Janek Kos, a hunter known for his aim and a teenager eager to take his part in the war.
  • In the final Rusviet mission, Tesla's base is defended by Lightning-Shooting Tesla Coils.
• Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism: Very much on idealistic side. While the 1920+ universe is not all about sunshine and rainbows, its alternate history is visibly less violent and brutal than real life history. For example, Usonia - the fictional expy of USA, banned slavery earlier than their real life counterpart. Technological progress is more rapid. There are decent people on all sides and they are ready to put their differences away and help each other to do what is right. And the message of the story campaigns can be summed up: as long as good people do not stand idle, there is hope for better tomorrow.
• Spider Tank:
  • Saxony is fond of these with two prominent examples being the Sd. KS 78 Isegrim and the SKS 156 Wotan. The MWF 28 Stiefmutter also qualifies, though it looks more like a tick in practice with its six stubby legs obscured under its hull.
  • Polania, not to be outdone, fields the PZM-9 Straznik, an anti-infantry raider, and the PZM-16 Nosidelko, a mobile bunker and mortar carrier. Lech Kos's custom mech also uses all four of its limbs to move, but is instead patterned on a gorilla, to better emphasize its furious close combat power.
  • Rusviet Ognivo and Nagan mechs are a unique variation, as they feature stabilizer wheels in place of rear legs, giving them a movement style akin to a legless man pulling himself forward.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • In the Rusviet Revolution DLC, the Tzar tries to order loyalist soldiers to cease abusing the people they are meant to protect, but since he's King Incognito, and the soldiers in question have likely never even seen the man up close in their life, he's brushed off, and a fight ensues.
  • The Rusviet Revolution DLC opens with Olga reporting to Tsar Nicholas. He is quite cold to her, noting that she's been seen cavorting with Polanian rebels and the man believed to have assassinated his own Kaiser.
• Tactical Rock–Paper–Scissors: Combat largely revolves around Armor Types, both what a unit is equipped with and what they are best at dealing damage to. A general rule is that the larger and slower firing a weapon is, the heavier the armor it can destroy.
• Tesla Tech Timeline: Nikola Tesla is responsible for creating the mechs and other advanced technologies in the world of 1920+. However, Tesla was left disappointed and appalled over his inventions being used in war and has since trying to keep his even more advanced technology away from the public.
• Tripod Terror: The TF-1597 "Icarus", or the Icarus Protocol, is an automated, towering, super-heavy mech designed by Nikola Tesla to destroy The Factory to prevent its technologies from falling to Fenris and anyone who misuse them, and is the final boss. It is a weapon of mass destruction capable of releasing an electrical blast so intense it will melt any metal within a 20-kilometer radius. Tesla unleashed Icarus against Fenris, but the machine was uncontrollable and cannot be shut down, thus forcing the heroes to team up and destroying it.
• Unintentionally Unwinnable: The game released with a lot of bugs, some of which rendered certain objective impossible to complete and therefore certain achievements impossible to get. While some were fixed since then, not all were, especially with the expansion packs. That can make it a complete matter of luck whether you can get, for example, the achievement for not deploying William's exosuit in Mission 4 of the Usonia campaign. Bad luck? Forget about a gold medal in the mission, and with it the achievement for winning gold or higher on the Usonia missions.
• Units Not to Scale: Averted, the mechs are realistically bigger than the infantrymen. That said, artwork tends to depict mechs as being much larger than they appear in game. The worst offender by far is the Tur, which looks to be about 40 feet when deployed, but paintings and cinematics depict it being a titan that easily crests 100 feet.
• Unusual Pets for Unusual People: Each faction has a hero accompanied by a Loyal Animal Companion: a bear, a tiger, a hawk, and a pair of wolves.
• Walking Arsenal: Usonia's M-19 "Knox" heavy mech is the absolute pinnacle of their immediate overwhelming firepower doctrine, being fitted with a heavy battle cannon, four light cannons, dual machine guns, and a pair of rocket batteries. It mounts so much weaponry that the cockpit is a tiny, cramped little nook wedged into the lower torso and looks more like a grudging concession from the designers, who resented not being able to shove another weapon into the space. Accordingly, their burst damage is absolutely catastrophic, though any survivors of their fury may find that "well-armed" does not mean "well-armored".
• Walking Tank: The mechs in general, but the Saxony Isegrim and Wotan look the most like tanks who had their treads removed and spider legs mounted in their place.
• War Is Hell: The first half of the Saxony campaign, set during the Great War, really hammers this point home. The first mission alone sees the player fight through several lines of defenses at great human cost to their troops, only to be hit with a Polanian counter-attack that pushes them right back to their starting position...
• Wrench Wench: Frieda Reute, who repairs and even improves the Brunhilde mech.
• You Require More Vespene Gas: Actually, you require more iron and oil. Iron in-game functions as the gold-like resource used to purchase most units and buildings. Oil is used for vehicles and advanced buildings.
• Your Size May Vary: Polonia's largest mech, the Tur, shows a sizeable discrepancy in size between gameplay and loading screens/videos.

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