I asked about gunfire for a good reason. I KNOW how to make gunfire like the NTW2 team did, I even made some particle effects that looked a bit like gunsmoke... but, as an old wargamer who cut his teeth on Napoleonic wargames, I know how muskets were employed. In volleys. Only skirmishers would fire independantly to harass enemy lines. Also, those troops fought in lines and squares....which went out of fashion BIGTIME once people made fire-arms that could hit a target on purpose! Those old India Pattern muskets relied on volume of fire and blind luck to kill.

Also...when it comes to machines, check out what I was doing on the Metal Mayhem mod ( before a road accident shelved any modelling for the immediate future ). Making mech units is easy. As long as it fits an existing skeleton, no problems. FLYING units, however, are another matter altogether.

You can easily modify animations to make a unit appear to hover. Done it. What you CAN'T do, however, is make other units react as though the unit is anywhere but on the ground. They will not shoot 'up' and they will engage in melee with the ground under the flying unit. I made the units hover at a low height so interaction looked more natural. Proper aircraft on a the battle map are impossible.

When it comes to laser trajectory....make sure the velocity is high enough. You also need to play with upper nad lower angles. If you get the velocity too low, the laser will 'curve' downwards. It looks wrong ;) Get the velocity looking good, then tweak the launch angles to make sure they fire at the right place, and the shots don't disappear into the floor.

Be VERY careful about what you want the mod units to be able to do, and choose a scenario and unit set that fits what you CAN do. This will help to keep the mod gather interest. Also, make sure you don't promise anything until you know you can deliver it. Otherwise, all you will get is people knocking hte mod.....and you will never recruit any decent team members, or keep ones you already have. I wish you luck